death and silence. I was destined to have the wish gratified in
abundance. Fifteen minutes brought me to the outskirts of Vise,
and there, coming over the hills and wending their way down to the
river, were two long lines of German soldiers escorting wagons of
the artillery and the commissariat. They came slowly and
noiselessly trudging on and I was upon them as they crossed the
main road before I realized it. The men were covered with dust; so
were the horses. The wagons were in their somber paint of gray.
There was something ominous and threatening in the long sullen
line which wound down over the hill. The soldiers were evidently
tired with the tedious uneventful march, and the drivers were
goaded to irritability by the difficulty of the descent. Could I have
retreated I would have done so with joy and would never have
stopped until my feet were set on Holland soil.

But I dared not do it. As the train came to a stop, I started bravely
across the road. A soldier, dropping his gun from his shoulder,
cried:

"Halt!"

"Is this the way to Vise?" I asked.

"Perhaps it is," he replied, "but what do you want in Vise?"

As he spoke, he kept edging up, pointing his bayonet directly at
me. A bayonet will never look quite the same to me again. Total
retreat, as I remarked, was out of the question. My inward
anatomy, however, did the next best thing. As the bayonet point
came pressing forward, my stomach retired backward. I could feel