house--that the Germans have eaten up all her store of food, and that
her old mother is already beginning to starve. Yet certain appetizing
smells, which come down the staircase from upstairs when the door is
opened, lead me to believe she is deceiving us. I do not blame her for
treasuring what she has for her own flesh and blood; but I certainly
could enjoy a couple of fried eggs.

Nine a. m. Mittendorfer has been in, with vague remarks concerning our
automobile. Something warns me this young man is trifling with us. He
appears to be a practitioner of the Japanese school of diplomacy--that
is, he believes it is better to pile one gentle, transparent fiction on
another until the pyramid of romance falls of its own weight, rather
than to break the cruel news at a single blow.

Eleven-twenty. One of the soldiers has brought us half a dozen bottles
of good wine--three bottles of red and three of white--but the larder
remains empty. I do not know exactly what a larder is; but if it is as
empty as I am at the present moment it must remind itself of a haunted
house.

Eleven-forty. A big van full of wounded Germans has arrived. From the
windows we can see it distinctly. The more seriously hurt lie on the
bed of the wagon, under the hood. The man who drives has one leg in
splints; and of the two who sit at the tail gate, holding rifles
upright, one has a bandaged head, and the other has an arm in a sling.

Unless a German is so seriously crippled as to be entirely unfitted for
service he manages to do something useful. There are no loose ends and
no waste to the German military system; I can see that. The soldiers in
the street cheer the wounded as they pass and the wounded answer by