The bell still tolls mournfully; the bowed, black figures grow fainter in the mist. In from the Atlantic sweeps the storm, raging above the piteous mourners. Shrieking! Whistling! Howling! Where now the sunny France sung by the poets? Where the gaiety and life, so typical of the charming French? Gray clouds, wind-swept roads, black skeleton branches, straining away from the sea. Rain in gusts. Cold, sorrow, desolation in all the land! Since the war began, seventy-five thousand Frenchmen have fallen on the field of honor. Some on the battlefields, some in the trenches, others destroyed beyond human recognition. Nameless graves cover the northern plains. In innumerable hospitals lie the broken remnants of French manhood. Five hundred thousand they are today, suffering untold agonies, helpless, uncomplaining. What can Americans, in the happy safety of their homes know of the tragedy, the death, that overwhelms us here? It is so far-reaching, so stupendous, so heart-breaking, all energy and activity become paralyzed. Where begin? What can one do? If one helps only a few hundreds, how about the thousands one cannot reach? England, in fine generosity, has sent supplies of all kinds: medicines, garments, hospital stores, surgical instruments; five hundred tons have crossed the channel. Beyond praise, the pitying help of England! She has poured her wealth, her supplies, her splendid armies, into France, giving ungrudgingly and constantly. But for her timely assistance, we should be in unimaginable straits. But now England needs for her own. With her great losses in men, fifty-seven thousand; her own wounded the end of this October; her thousands upon thousands of refugees—one cannot expect her to do for all. How are her cousins across the Atlantic coming to our aid? Can we count on the Americans? Will their warm hearts send out to us these necessities for the wounded not only now, but during the long weary months that stretch in such dreary perspective before us? The melancholy little funeral is a daily occurrence; so used to it are we, one scarcely notices it. The wounded living claim all our pity and work. Darkness closes down early these bleak November days, and the few straggling lights illumine streets deserted. At 8 o'clock all cafes close, the lamps are put out, and only the military patrol with their feeble lanterns traverse the gloom. Nothing more until the cold November dawn wakes us to another day of hard work. Where fashionable women in luxurious motor-cars sped through the avenues, now soldiers hobbling on sticks and crutches, or wheeled in chairs, appear. Women and children swathed in crepe wander in dumb groups on the Esplanade. The shops are full of soldiers' necessities, and everywhere high and low, young and old, the seamstress, the shop-keeper behind her counter, the young girls taking their morning walks, even little schoolgirls, grandmammas and nurses, all are knitting.