More and more shells, and then a lull. After this exhibition of afternoon hate, we took tea with some officers of the 15th Hussars in a tent in the chateau grounds. It was a delicious meal, and was not interrupted, though enemy shells from time to time shot over our heads and exploded some distance away in the woods behind. The ineffectiveness of the enemy shelling was greeted every time there was an explosion by cat-calls, shouts and whistling on the part of our imperturbable soldiers. Then the enemy diverted his guns to a village through which our return road ran. On our approaching this place we found our way barred by military policemen, who informed us the traffic was temporarily held up, and that we would have to seek our destination by another and a more devious route. Looking back, one is amused at the nonchalance of this tea in the open with the Hussar officers, while German missiles were shooting over our heads and crashing to earth a couple of hundred yards away. Had the enemy shortened the range we should all have gone up among the little birds. Did you see that splendid joke in _Punch_--an old man talking to a very badly wounded Irish soldier swathed in bandages from head to foot? The former says, "This is a terrible war, isn't it, my man?" Pat replies, "Yes, sorr, it is that; a rale tirrible war. But faith! 'tis better than no war at all." Capital, and so deliciously Irish! _August 23rd, 1915._ Excessively busy days these--out sometimes from nine in the morning till about ten at night, often missing meals perforce. A few days back I was in the city whose name practically sums up the character of British fighting--Ypres. Never have I seen such a picture of desolation. Not a house standing; only skeletons of buildings, shattered walls, and gaping window openings, from which all vestige of glass has long since disappeared. The Church and the Cloth Hall are simply piles of debris. To walk along the streets is like a kind of nightmare, even when the Boches are not indulging in a spell of hate against the place. Talk of Pompeii--why, this puts it quite among the "also-rans." What a pathetic spectacle to see a whole city in ruins! Stupefaction and sadness at the wholesale destruction is my impression of this melancholy ruin of an historic town.