s eyes.

The impetuous band halted suddenly. Some of their men were rolling on
the ground. Some were bending themselves double, trying to get across
the road without being seen. Others remained stretched out on their
backs or face downward with their arms in front. The riderless horses
were racing wildly across the fields with reins dragging, urged on by
the loose stirrups.

And after this rude shock which had brought them surprise and death, the
band disappeared, instantly swallowed up by the trees.

CHAPTER IV

NEAR THE SACRED GROTTO

Argensola had found a new occupation even more exciting than marking out
on the map the manoeuvres of the armies.

"I am now devoting myself to the taube," he announced. "It appears from
four to five with the precision a punctilious guest coming to take tea."

Every afternoon at the appointed hour, a German aeroplane was flying
over Paris dropping bombs. This would-be intimidation was producing
no terror, the people accepting the visit as an interesting and
extraordinary spectacle. In vain the aviators were flinging in the city
streets German flags bearing ironic messages, giving accounts of the
defeat of the retreating army and the failures of the Russian offensive.
Lies, all lies! In vain they were dropping bombs, destroying garrets,
killing or wounding old men, women and babes. "Ah, the bandits!" The
crowds would threaten with their fists the malign mosquito, scarcely
visible 6,000 feet above them, and after this outburst, they would
follow it with straining eyes from street to street, or stand motionless
in the square in order to study its evolutions.

The most punctual of all the spectators was Argensola. At four o'clock
he was in the place de la Concorde with upturned face and wide-open
eyes, in most cordial good-fellowship with all the bystanders. It was
as though they were holding season tickets at the same theatre, becoming
acquainted through seeing each other so often. "Will it come? . . . Will
it not come to-day?" The women appeared to be the most vehement, some
of them rushing up, flushed and breathless, fearing that they might have
arrived too late for the show. . . . A great cry--"There it comes! . . .
There it is!" And thousands of hands were pointing to a vague spot on
the horizon. With field glasses and telescopes they were aiding their
vision, the popular venders offering every kind of optical instruments
and for an hour the thrilling spectacle of an aeri