moment I found myself, with Amelie, in a compartment where there were
already eight women, a young man, two children, and heaps of
hand-luggage--bundles in sheets, twine bags just bulging, paper parcels,
and valises. Almost as soon as we were in, the train pulled slowly out
of the station.

I learned from the women that Meaux was being evacuated. No one was
remaining but the soldiers in the barracks and the archbishop. They had
been ordered out by the army the night before, and the railroad was
taking them free. They were escaping with what they could carry in
bundles, as they could take no baggage. Their calm was remarkable-not a
complaint from any one. They were of all classes, but the barriers were
down.

The young man had come from farther up the line-a newspaper chap, who
had given me his seat, and was sitting on a bundle. I asked him if he
knew where the Germans were, and he replied that on this wing they were
at Compiegne, that the center was advancing on Coulommier, but he did
not know where the Crown Prince's division was.

I was glad I had made the effort to get to town, for this began to look
as if they might succeed in arriving before the circle of steel that
surrounds Paris, and God knows what good that seventy-five miles of
fortifications will be against the long-range cannon that battered down
Liege. I had only one wish--to get back to my hut on the hill; I did
not seem to want anything else.

Just before the train ran into Lagny--our first stop--I was surprised to
see British soldiers washing their horses in the river, so I was not
surprised to find the station full of men in khaki. They were sleeping