the neighbourhood of Metz. The case of two American strangers was a
precarious one involved in such a mass, with food even very uncertain
and the likelihood of being side-tracked at any station, but we
were both strong and light-hearted and I felt at my waist-band the
comfortable contact of my bright yellow Napoleons which would pull
us through. Constantly we beheld scenes of the greatest interest. The
August landscape smiled its best about us, we passed Dijon and many
another old storied city famous in former wars, and now again
humming with the military life with which they had been so many times
familiar. The _Mobiles_ came thronging to every depot from
the vineyards and fields and the remoter villages. As yet they were
usually in picturesque peasant attire, young farmers in blouses or
with _bretelles_ crossing in odd fashion the queer shirts they
wore. Careless happy-go-lucky boys chattering in the excitement of
the new life which they were entering, only half-informed as to the
catastrophes which were taking place, but the mothers and sisters,
plain country women in short skirts, quaint bodices and caps, looked
upon their departure with anxious faces. I was familiar enough with
such scenes in our own Civil War; thousands of those boys were never
to return.

Reaching Paris we found an atmosphere of depression. A week or two
before the streets had resounded with the _Marseillaise_ and
echoed with the fierce cry, "A Berlin! A Berlin!" That confidence had
all passed, I heard the _Marseillaise_ sung only once, and
that in disheartened perfunctory fashion, perhaps by order of the
authorities in a futile attempt to stimulate courage that was waning.
Rage and mortification over the fast-accumulating German successes
possessed the hearts of men. In the squares companies of civilians
were industriously drilling, often in the public places men wearing