"That doesn't matter. That doesn't matter. Take it all the same. You
are soldiers, like the others.... _Vive la France!_" And all the
thirty Territorials, in deep and solemn tones, repeated "_Vive la
France!_"

What a change had come over these men who, people feared, were ripe
for revolt, undisciplined, and reckless! What kindness and grace in
the women who stay at home and suffer! An old railwayman said to me:
"It has been like that, Sir, from the first day of the mobilisation.
These girls pass their days and nights at the station. It is really
very good of them, for they won't make anything by it." The old
working man was right: "They won't make anything by it." And yet I am
sure that many soldiers who have passed that station on their way to
the Front will keep the same grateful remembrance that I still have.
I shall never forget the group of girls in white on the sunny platform
of the little station; I shall never forget the simple grace with
which they prevailed upon the men to accept the good things they
offered and even forced upon them. I thanked them as best I could, but
awkwardly enough, trying to interpret the thoughts of all those
soldiers. And when the train had started again on its panting course,
I felt sorry I had not been more eloquent in my speech; that I had
already forgotten the name of the little station, and never thought of
asking the names of our benefactresses.

We were now getting near the fighting zone, and I already felt that
there was a change in the state of mind of the people. They still
called out to us: "Good luck!... Good luck!" But earlier in the day
this greeting had been given with smiles and merry gestures; now it
was uttered in a serious and solemn tone. At the station gates and the