morning, but none
was demanded. Gallagher apparently knew what he was doing.

His pair of lead horses were walking in much too orderly a fashion for
the occasion. Apparently the occasion demanded a little greater show of
dash and spirit. Gallagher sunk his spurs into the flanks of his mount
and punched its mate in the ribs with the heavy handle of his riding
crop.

The leads lunged forward against their collars. The sudden plunge was
accompanied by a jangle of chains as the traces tightened. The gun
carriage jolted and the cannoneers swore at the unnecessary bouncing.

"Easy, Zigg-Zigg, whoa, Fini." Gallagher pulled on the lines as he
shouted in a calculated pitch the French names of his horses. And then
the reason for Gallagher's conduct developed.

A pair of wooden shutters on a first floor window of the gate-tender's
cottage opened outward. In the window was a lamp. The yellow rays from
it shone upward and revealed a tumbled mass of long black hair, black
eyes that gleamed, red cheeks and red lips. Then a sweet voice said:

"Gude-bye, Meeky."

"Orry wore, Jeen," replied Gallagher.

"_Apres la guerre_, Meeky," said Jeanne.

"Orry wore, Jeen," repeated Gallagher.

"Oh, Jeanie, dear, please call me 'Meeky,'" sang out one of the men,
astride one of the wheel pair of the same gun.

The window had closed, but before the light disappeared, black eyes
flashed hate at the jester, and Gallagher, himself, two horses ahead,
turned in the saddle and told the taunter to shut his mouth, observing
at the same time that "some guys didn't know a decent girl when they saw
one."

We rode on. Soon, on the left, the sun came up cold out of
Switzerland's white topped ridges miles away, and smiling frigidly
across the snow-clad neutral Alps, dispelled the night mist in our part
of the world.

The battery warmed under its glow. Village after village we passed
through, returning the polite salutes of early rising grand-sires who
uncovered their grey heads, or wrinkled, pink-faced grandmothers, who
waved kerchiefs from gabled windows beneath the thatch and smiled the
straight and dry-lipped smile of toothless age as they wished us good
fortune in the war.

We messed at midday by the roadside, green fields and hills of France,
our table decorations, cold beef and dry bread, our fare, with canteens
full to wash it down. When the horses had tossed their nose-bags
futilely for the last grains of oats, and the captain's watch had t