The rampart of the Vosges falls away sharply to the plain on its eastern side, and from the convent crowning the heights of the Odilienberg a wonderful bird’s-eye view exists of the mountains and the plain: Strasbourg and the silver streak of the Rhine dimly visible in the distance, far, far away beyond, the still dimmer line of the Black Forest mountains. The convent itself, a favourite “viewpoint” for trippers to the Vosges, has, thanks to its restaurant and café, a curiously secular appearance. The good nuns apparently drive a brisk trade in souvenirs and picture-postcards, the restaurant catering as much for the needs of the body as the prayers of the faithful for the soul. The wooded heights of the Vosges, sometimes beech, sometimes pine, varied by splendid scarlet patches of mountain-ash berries at their best, are threaded by excellent roads. In the neighbourhood of Saales we braced ourselves, thanks to the exhortations of the driver, to resume our acquaintance with the horrors of the line. But a few damaged houses, and here and there a shattered tree, proved how lightly by comparison this district had escaped. Woods and fields were in a normal condition, and vigorous efforts had clearly been made to deal with the shattered houses. The scenery of the Col de Schlücht is very fine. A country to be really appreciated must be seen on foot, and motoring is at best but an unsatisfactory makeshift for the busy. To the true vagabond, as Borrow and Robert Louis Stevenson understood the term, the friendly hills of the Vosges must offer many attractions as a wandering ground. Our time being limited, we were grateful to the motor for the cinematograph impression we were able to carry away. Fighting of a more serious character had taken place on the Col de Schlücht than at Saales. It was along this road the French made their original thrust into Alsace at the beginning of the war, when for a brief period they occupied Colmar in the plain below. Driven back by the Germans with heavy losses, the line was stabilised for some years at a point near the head of the pass. Even so the unfailing test of the trees showed that the destruction had not been complete. Münster at the foot of the pass was a heap of ruins. Here for a time artillery fire must have been heavy. But we passed rapidly out of the zone of battle; a great contrast in this respect to the plain of the Woevre where, mile after mile before Verdun is reached, the aspect of the landscape along the road from Metz is desolate and desolating in the extreme.