Two of our men are asleep,—one on the floor, another in a bunk. The rest of us wrap our coats around us and smoke pensively. We think of home, and wonder what our friends there are doing just now. It is August and slightly after midnight. The time difference makes it a few minutes past six in the States. At the seashore they are coming in from canoeing and swimming, sitting around before dinner, discussing the plans for the evening and the happenings of the day. At the mountains they are finishing rounds of golf or sets of tennis, and the pink and gold of the sunset is crowning the peaks with a fading burst of glory. Soon the fights of the hotel will shine brightly forth into the gathering gloom, and the dance music will strike up. Each tells the others just what he would be doing at the moment were he in the States, and comments. It is all done in an absolutely detached manner, just as one describes incidents and chapters in books. We think we would like to be home now, but we know that we would rather not. We are perfectly contented to be doing what we are doing, and do not envy those at home. Nor do we begrudge any of them the pleasant times they may be having. In fact, if we thought they were giving them up we would be miserable. One cannot think about this war for long at a time, and when one meditates it is to speculate on what is happening at home. One gloats over imaginary dances, theatres, and all varieties of good times. I have often enjoyed monologue discussions with my friends, or imagined myself doing any one of the many things I might have been doing. It is the lonesome man’s chief standby to five by proxy. Outside there is continually the dull thunder of the guns. They are evidently firing _tir de barrage_, for there is a certain regularity in the wave of sound that rumbles in on us. Perhaps the barrage is falling on the roads behind the enemy lines, cutting off and destroying his supply trains. Perhaps it is trying to sweep some of his batteries out of existence, or perhaps it is falling on his trenches, taking its toll of nerve and life. Again we can only conjecture. There is the continual whine of his shells rushing overhead, and the _crump-crump_ of their breaking in the near distance. Then the enemy starts a little sweeping of his own, and the _arrivées_ begin to fall in an arc which draws steadily nearer, until a thunder clap just outside and the rattling of _éclats_, dirt, and tree fragments on the roof, make you rejoice in your cover, and you chuckle as a _brancardier_ sleepily remarks, “_Entrez!_” You wonder curiously, and listen expectantly to see if the next will fall on you; then you doze again or say something to the man beside you.