courage and endurance, women, after all, can only guess--through whatever
rending of their own hearts.

But I was to come somewhat nearer to it than I thought then. The morrow
brought surprise.




V


Dear H.

Our journey farther north through the deep February snow was scarcely less
striking as an illustration of Great Britain's constantly growing share in
the war than the sight of the great supply bases themselves. The first
part of it, indeed, led over solitary uplands, where the chained wheels of
the motor rocked in the snow, and our military chauffeur dared make no
stop, for fear he should never be able to start again. All that seemed
alive in the white landscape were the partridges--sometimes in great
flocks--which scudded at our approach, or occasional groups of hares in
the middle distance holding winter parley. The road seemed interminably
long and straight, and ours were almost the first tracks in it. The snow
came down incessantly, and once or twice it looked as though we should be
left stranded in the white wilderness.

But after a third of the journey was over, the snow began to lessen and
the roads to clear. We dropped first into a seaport town which offered
much the same mingled scene of French and English, of English nurses, and