In the early part of the war--September, 1914--when the French occupied Péronne, there was hard fighting about Noyon; at that time the Germans were too strong and the French had to fall back, but they both recovered and relost it later on. In 1917 they took Noyon once more during the great German retirement, but again it passed into German hands during the March advance in 1918, to be abandoned finally by the enemy on the 29th of August. After changing hands so often it is not to be wondered at that the town is a good deal damaged. It is not, however, totally destroyed. The cathedral (Plate 76) is a building dating from the eleventh and twelfth centuries, with very interesting architectural features. It has been greatly injured by shell-fire, roof and vaulting having mostly gone and the towers being much damaged. Toward the end of their great advance in 1918 the Germans succeeded (on the 28th of March) in crossing the little River Doms (a southern tributary of the Avre), on which Montdidier (Plate 77) stands, and this little town, which was entirely ruined (but by this time is largely rebuilt), formed the south-western apex of their advance. Farther north, on the Avre itself, they took Moreuil and Morisel on the 29th of March, and within the next few days crossed the river and reached--from there southwards to Montdidier--the higher ground on the west of the valley, which forms the background in Plate 78. They were here, for the time, about ten miles south-east of Amiens, just as beyond Villers Bretonneux they were the same distance west. The photograph shows how exceedingly thin the coating of soil over the chalk in this district is, all the shell-holes (they are quite small) showing up like patches of snow. The little Avre River runs under the line of trees in the distance at the foot of the higher ground which the Germans had reached. The main road southwards in the Avre valley lies here for a long distance between banks which are still riddled with German dugouts and French defences dating from the fighting of 1918. Five days after Foch had started the great counter-offensive in July the German lines here were attacked by French troops, with some British tanks in aid, and were driven back to the Avre. The attack was in many ways a notable one, perhaps especially for the tanks, but was only a preliminary before the great advance of the 8th of August (p. 44), when at one bound the Avre was passed and the Germans pushed six miles westward. Montdidier was surrounded by the French three days later, its garrison surrendered, and the great advance continued its inexorable progress. [Illustration: _PLATE LXXIII._ BEAUMONT-HAMEL. _An official photograph taken from near the cross-roads at Beaumont-Hamel looking across the Ancre Valley to the northern part of the Thiepval Ridge, towards Miraumont._] [Illustration: _PLATE LXXIV._ THE "BIG BERTHA" EMPLACEMENT.