Running through a wood at low speed, he came out on a small open stretch of garden. In one corner, near a shattered pile of brick, was a half-overturned but still recognizable grand piano, and crouched half behind and half on it, the sun throwing his iron-gray uniform in strong contrast to the red wood and the light glinting on his rifle-barrel, was a German soldier, a sniper. It was too late to turn. The boy jumped the cycle to high-speed, thinking thus to dodge the aim. As he skimmed by, he cast a backward look at the soldier. He had not moved. The gray uniform still lay crouched behind and across the piano, and the hands still rigidly held the rifle, but there were no eyes in the sockets of the dead man. They had been pecked out by the crows. Many fields in France will be haunted by ghosts when the war is over. The road was greasy and covered with débris, requiring slow riding. It was not wise to look too closely at the piles along the way. Overhead the September sun shone brightly, here and there a clump of wild-flowers which had escaped destruction waved in the wind, the arching trees were green, for, over this battlefield mainly shrapnel and rifle-fire had been used and no high-explosive shell with looping trajectory had stripped the branches. On through the beech-forest to the desolation beyond and Horace, looking down, saw the road a mere tangle of beams, stones and scrap-iron. He got off, to lead his wheel, and saw, under his foot--a paving stone. This, then, was a street! Yes, bit by bit, he could see the outlines of a tiny village. It could not have held more than a dozen houses, but not a wall, not a fence was standing. Here the Germans must have made a stand and the ground was leveled flat for their pains. Over a horrid pile, a trellis-work of roses had fallen. It made the boy think of the gardener's reply to a recruiting sergeant, when he joined the colors: "The only plants that France is interested in growing now are--laurels." Few villages were as wholly devastated as this, though in many of them the houses were piles of brick and plaster, with walls standing here and there. Everywhere were graves, bearing thin wooden crosses, with the soldier's kepi or a few faded flowers hanging on them. A village of formerly a hundred houses had but one left habitable. Like most of the places in the march of the retreating army, it had been deliberately set on fire for revenge. A sudden whistle made the boy duck his head. A bullet? No, a blackbird singing. "In spite of all, he knows it is French soil again!" said Horace, half aloud, and laughed at his own thought.