ntinued to turn when, with an ugly
little whistle, a small piece of something struck my view-finder and
another my tripod. Luckily nothing touched the lens. I awaited the next.
It was longer this time, but it came, and nearer to me than the previous
one. I was satisfied. I thought if they elevated another fifty yards I
might get a much too close view of a shell-burst, so scrambled aboard
the car, and made a detour round the mine on to the road beyond.

"Those scenes ought to be very fine," I said. "It's one of those lucky
chances where one has to take the risk of obtaining a thrilling scene."

By the balls of white smoke I could see that shrapnel was bursting in
the near distance.

"That's near Pouilly," I said. "We are turning up on the left, let's
hope the Huns don't plaster us there."

Reaching the village of Bovincourt, the villagers were there eagerly
awaiting our arrival. They again crowded around the car, and it was with
difficulty that I persuaded them to let us pass into the village.
Cheering, shouting, and laughing they followed close behind. I stopped
the car and asked an old man who, by his ribbons, had been through the
1870 war:

"Where is the Mayor?"

"There is no Mayor, monsieur, but a mayoress, and she is there,"
pointing to a buxom French peasant woman about fifty years of age.

I went up to her and explained in my best French that I had brought
bread and sausages for the people, would she share them out?

"Oui, oui, monsieur."

"I would like you to do it here, I will then take a kinematograph film
of the proceeding, so that the people in England can see it."

"Ah, monsieur, it is the first white bread and good French sausage we
have seen since the Bosches came. They took everything from us,
everything, and if it had not been for the American relief we should
have starved. They are brutes, pig-brutes, monsieur, they kill
everything." And, with tears in her eyes, she told me how the Huns shot
her beautiful dog because, in its joyfulness, it used to play with and
bark at the children. "They did not like being disturbed, monsieur, so
they shot him--poor Jacques! They have not left one single animal;
everything has gone. Mon Dieu, but they shall suffer!"

I changed the painful subject by saying that now the British had driven
back the Bosche everything would be quite all right. With a wan smile
she agreed.

I set up my camera, and telling my man to hand over the food, the
Mayoress shared it o