En permission--State of France--The France of 1905 and the France of
1915--The class of 1917--Bar-le-Duc--The air raid--Called to Verdun.


X. THE GREAT DAYS OF VERDUN

Verdun in 1912--Verdun on the night of the first great attack--The
hospital--The shelled cross road--The air shell--The pastry cook's
story--The cultivateur of the Valois and the crater at Douaumont--The
pompiers of Verdun--"Do you want to see an odd sight?"--Verdun in storm
and desolation.






A Volunteer Poilu

Chapter I

The Rochambeau S'en Va-t-en Guerre

Moored alongside a great two-storied pier, with her bow to the land, the
cargo and passenger boat, Rochambeau, of the Compagnie Générale was
being loaded with American supplies for the France of the Great War. A
hot August sun struck spots and ripples of glancing radiance from the
viscous, oily surface of the foul basin in which she lay inert; the air
was full of sounds, the wheezing of engines, the rattling of cog-checks,