The region between the Arras-Péronne and the Cambrai-St. Quentin roads has been fought over both by French and British. Going eastwards from the crossing of the Somme at Brie the country already showed signs of renewed cultivation, but some villages, like Mons and Bernes, were totally destroyed, and others, like Estrées, Vraignes, and Hancourt, and the little town of Vermand, had been very badly strafed. Near Cambrai, villages such as Bony and Vendhuille, Gouzeaucourt and Ribécourt (Plate 87), and of course Bourlon, were quite in ruins. At Gouzeaucourt very active reconstruction was, however, going on, and rows of neat brick cottages had already appeared. To mention all the ruined villages would be to give almost a complete list of them, but over the whole region active and obviously successful attempts were being made to carry on cultivation, the surface having been by no means so badly damaged as farther north. Southwards from St. Quentin, also, much cultivation is being actively carried on, although many of the villages, such as Liez and Essigny, are badly injured; but after La Fère is reached, and beyond the Oise, cultivation is complete, and the conditions are more or less normal as far as the Ailette and the Aisne. North of Cambrai also, on the east of the Cambrai-Douai road, where the country was always in German occupation, and behind the Hindenburg defence lines, its condition is also normal. [Illustration: _PLATE LXXXI._ BOURLON WOOD. _The remains of Bourlon village, in the north-west corner of the wood, which was fought for, and taken, and lost again in the Cambrai battle of November, 1917._] [Illustration: _PLATE LXXXII._ BELLICOURT. _The south end of the 6,000-yard tunnel on the St. Quentin Canal, seen from the western bank of the canal cutting. The village of Bellicourt lies over the tunnel mouth, and the higher ground beyond is that covered by the Americans in the advance of the 29th of September, 1918._] [Illustration: _PLATE LXXXIII._ THE ST. QUENTIN CANAL. _The canal cutting looking down from above the tunnel mouth--an "absolutely impregnable" portion of the Hindenburg Line defences._] [Illustration: _PLATE LXXXIV._ THE RIQUEVAL BRIDGE. _The only bridge over the St. Quentin Canal which was not destroyed by the Germans before our attack on their "impregnable" position in September, 1918. A small party of the Midland Territorials, under Captain Charlton, reached it in the fog just in time to deal with the sentries, throw the charges into the water, and so save the bridge._] [Illustration: _PLATE LXXXV._ BELLENGLISE. _One of the entrances to the immense underground workings constructed by the Germans as a part of the Hindenburg defences at the St. Quentin Canal. The elaborate workings were finally only a trap for the thousand Germans who were secured there as prisoners._] [Illustration: _PLATE LXXXVI._ ST. QUENTIN CATHEDRAL.