which white smoke-clouds rose after explosive noises.

"With a little careful strategy we might get through," said the
captain. "There's a general waiting for us, and I have noticed that
generals are impatient fellows. Let's try our luck."

We walked across the wild flowers, past the sheep, who only raised
their heads in meek surprise when shells came with a shrill,
intensifying snarl and burrowed up the earth about them. I noticed how
loudly and sweetly the larks were singing up in the blue. Several
horses lay dead, newly killed, with blood oozing about them, and their
entrails smoking. We made a half-loop around them and then struck
straight for the chateau which was the brigade headquarters. Neither
of us spoke now. We were thoughtful, calculating the chance of getting
to that red-brick house between the shells. It was just dependent on
the coincidence of time and place.

Three men jumped up from a ditch below a brown wall round the chateau
garden and ran hard for the gateway. A shell had pitched quite close
to them. One man laughed as though at a grotesque joke, and fell as he
reached the courtyard. Smoke was rising from the outhouses, and there
was a clatter of tiles and timbers, after an explosive crash.

"It rather looks," said my companion, "as though the Germans knew
there is a party on in that charming house."

It was as good to go on as to go back, and it was never good to go
back before reaching one's objective. That was bad for the discipline
of the courage that is just beyond fear.