y sort of game.
Everybody seemed to be going about as if they had been at this sort of
thing all their lives; as if, in fact, they couldn't do anything else.

Every vehicle and every person that went into the salient had to
travel on that broad highway, flanked with tall trees, and paved with
cobble stone. Wire entanglements and trenches traversed the roads at
intervals, and shell holes filled with water in the adjacent fields
showed the road to be within range of the German guns.

As we approached Ypres we could see that, like all the towns of
northern France and Belgium, it was sharply separated from the
adjacent fields; there were no extensive suburbs such as are found
around the modern British or American city causing them to merge
gradually into the surrounding country. When we passed the first
houses we were practically in a solid compact town.

According to the custom in Flanders, the houses and stores of Ypres
were built close together, right on the sidewalk, without gardens or
spaces between them. Many were white, and the effect of the white
stucco and red brick gave the city a clean and sanitary appearance. It
was a town with a population of less than 20,000, a mere reminiscence
of that ancient city of Ypres of the 12th century which had had a
population of 200,000 inhabitants and which had been the most powerful
city in Flanders and one of the richest in the world,--a city larger
and more powerful than London. Ypres was famous for its cloth in the
13th century, when it had 4,000 looms in use. Through wars and
religious persecutions the population of Ypres had dwindled at one
time to 5,000 people. Her fortifications had long ago been dismantled,
and with the exception of a few magnificent buildings, her ancient
glory had departed.

As our car slowly passed through the town evidences of shell fire were
abundantly apparent. Here was a house with its roof blown off; another
with the windows blown out, the woodwork splintered and the walls
pitted with shrapnel; while another had been completely gutted. We
turned to the right and came upon the famous church of St. Martin's.
Great piles of stone and debris lay in front of it, the roof was gone
and the windows had disappeared, but the tower was still intact; the
houses in the neighborhood had been blown to atoms.

Our hearts beat faster when we came upon the building adjacent to it,
facing the Grande Place,--the glorious cloth hall of Ypres, beautiful
even in i