we almost expected to see the city sink into the earth.

Terrible in the desolation of the night, on fire, haunted by specters of
wounded men who crept along the narrow lanes by the city walls, Verdun
was once more undergoing the destinies of war. The shells were falling
along rue Mazel and on the citadel. A group of old houses by the Meuse
had burnt to rafters of flickering flame, and as I passed them, one
collapsed into the flooded river in a cloud of hissing steam.

In order to escape shells, the wounded were taking the obscure by-ways
of the town. Our wounded had started to walk to the ambulance station
with the others, but, being weak and exhausted, had collapsed on the
way. They were waiting for us at a little house just beyond the walls.
Said one to the other, "As-tu-vu Maurice?" and the other answered
without any emotion, "II est mort."

The 24th was the most dreadful day. The wind and snow swept the heights
of the desolate moor, seriously interfering with the running of the
automobiles. Here and there, on a slope, a lorry was stuck in the slush,
though the soldier passengers were out of it and doing their best to
push it along. The cannonade was still so intense that, in intervals
between the heavier snow-flurries, I could see the stabs of fire in the
brownish sky. Wrapped in sheepskins and muffled to the ears in knitted
scarves that might have come from New England, the territorials who had
charge of the road were filling the ruts with crushed rock. Exhaustion
had begun to tell on the horses; many lay dead and snowy in the frozen
fields. A detachment of khaki-clad, red-fezzed colonial troops passed
by, bent to the storm. The news was of the most depressing sort. The
wounded could give you only the story of their part of the line, and you
heard over and over again, "Nous avons reculés." A detachment of cavalry