pale and weary boy. The food was bad, but the crisp French bread was
delicious. Perhaps nowhere in the world is the bread average higher
than in France--just as in America, where fancy breads are at their
best, the ordinary wheat loaf is, taking the average, exceedingly
poor.

Calais was entirely dark. The Zeppelin attack, which took place four
or five weeks later, was anticipated, and on the night of my arrival
there was a general feeling that the birthday of the German Emperor
the next day would produce something spectacular in the way of an air
raid. That explained, possibly, the presence so far from the
front--fifty miles from the nearest point--of so many flying men.

As my French conversational powers are limited, I had some difficulty
in securing a vehicle. This was explained later by the discovery the
next day that no one is allowed on the streets of Calais after ten
o'clock. Nevertheless I secured a hack, and rode blithely and
unconsciously to the house where I was to spend the night. I have lost
the address of that house. I wish I could remember it, for I left
there a perfectly good and moderately expensive pair of field glasses.
I have been in Calais since, and have had the wild idea of driving
about the streets until I find it and my glasses. But a close scrutiny
of the map of Calais has deterred me. Age would overtake me, and I
should still be threading the maze of those streets, seeking an old
house in an old garden, both growing older all the time.

A very large house it was, large and cold. I found that I was
expected; but an air of unreality hung over everything. I met three or
four most kindly Belgian people of whom I knew nothing and who knew
nothing of me. I did not know exactly why I was there, and I am sure