Everyone else must be ready for work here."

Outside, in front of the old grey church, engines were soon started. The sun had set. Venus and Jupiter shone close together in the twilight. It seemed that those bright spheres could never be theatres of war. Yet what if this earth should after all be the first world to throw off this primeval strife?

From the east came a roar of guns, continuous, like the noise of a waterfall. At that distance the cannonade sounded not savage, but methodical, deliberate. It seemed not the cry of nations madly fighting, but the roar of machinery, the final expression of Western civilisation. Was this the great battle at last, or only another little experiment, resulting in pain, death and the conquest of a few ditches?

A group of drivers stood before the cars awaiting orders. "It's come at last," said one of them, "what we have been waiting for." "No, too soon," said another. A staunch pacifist cried, "Go it our guns," and checked himself in shame with the apology, "It's nicer to hear ours than theirs, somehow"; but another broke in, "It's awful, it's ghastly, no matter whose guns. It's just a huge hideous dog fight." After a pause he said, "Think of the pluck, though! And a fellow can't go into that fire without some ideal."

All stood impatiently quiet, awaiting further orders. Some perhaps had need to screw up their courage in preparation for expected shell-haunted runs, and all were humbled by the thought of the incomparable devotion of the fighting men. Helpless anger at the war fought against a longing to share fully the great burden of danger.

The old grey church stood quiet as ever. Its spire dimly soared into grey sky. Its clock tolled the hour deliberately, ringing through the noise of war. The aloofness of the church seemed a symbol of that consciousness of all humanity which sometimes flashes on the mind to make war ridiculous. The quiet church declared peace ultimate, war merely a stage.

Another order came, and cars dispersed to evacuate the sick and wounded from the hospitals. Men and baggage were safely stowed, stretchers strapped into place; rugs and hot bottles comforted the lying. One driver, who was without a car, helped his friends to load, and chatted with the patients in his best French. So sudden an evacuation must needs perturb weak men recovering from wounds. To chat with them is to cheer.

The moon rose red from the enemies' lines, and climbed among tall trees. She seemed indeed a hostile moon, lighting the attack. She might end the lull that had come with the darkness. Someone seeing her murmured with quaint urgency, "Couchez-toi, la lune." He added, "Our people at W. will be busy to- night. Helmets and respirators are no farce there. Some of those roads will be hot enough if this is really the battle. And one is always short of sleep at W."

Gradually the hospitals were emptied. The last man, with a bad foot, had to go sitting, for lack of space. There were still cars in reserve and others expected from headquarters.