_in three months._

We leave the hill, half sliding down the frozen watercourse that leads
to it, and are in the motor again, bound for an Army Headquarters.

No. 4

_April 14th_, 1917.

DEAR MR. ROOSEVELT,--As the news comes flashing in, these April days,
and all the world holds its breath to hear the latest messages from
Arras and the Vimy ridge, it is natural that in the memory of a woman
who, six weeks ago, was a spectator--before the curtain rose--of the
actual scene of such events, every incident and figure of that past
experience, as she looks back upon it, should gain a peculiar and
shining intensity.

The battle of the Vimy Ridge [_April 8th_] is clearly going to be the
second (the first was the German retreat on the Somme) of those
"decisive events" determining this year the upshot of the war, to which
the Commander-in-Chief, with so strong and just a confidence, directed
the eyes of this country some three months ago. When I was in the
neighbourhood of the great battlefield--one may say it now!--the whole
countryside was one vast preparation. The signs of the coming attack
were everywhere--troops, guns, ammunition, food dumps, hospitals, air
stations--every actor and every property in the vast and tragic play
were on the spot, ready for the moment and the word.

Yet, except in the Headquarters and Staff Councils of the Army nobody
knew when the moment and the word would come, and nobody spoke of them.
The most careful and exact organisation for the great movement was going
on. No visitor would hear anything of it. Only the nameless stir in the
air, the faces of officers at Headquarters, the general alacrity, the
endless _work_ everywhere, prophesied the great things ahead. Perpetual,
highly organised, scientific drudgery is three parts of war, it seems,
as men now wage it. The Army, as I saw it, was at work--desperately at
work!--but "dreaming on things to come."

One delightful hour of that March day stands out for me in particular.
The strong, attractive presence of an Army Commander, whose name will be
for ever linked with that of the battle of the Vimy ridge, surrounded by
a group of distinguished officers; a long table, and a too brief stay;
conversation that carries for me the thrill of the _actual thing_, close
by, though it may not differ very much from wartalk at home: these are
the chief impressions that remain. The General beside me, with that look
in his kind eyes which seems to tell o