through the fields, driving before them
in disordered flight the black goblins of winter, and leaving in their
wake green growing things and tender, subtle perfumes. The wayside
greenery, robing itself in tiny buds, was already heralding their
arrival. The birds were venturing forth from their retreats in order
to wing their way among the crows croaking wrathfully above the closed
tombs. The landscape was beginning to smile in the sunlight with the
artless, deceptive smile of a child who looks candidly around while his
pockets are stuffed with stolen goodies.

The husbandmen had ploughed the fields and filled the furrows with seed.
Men might go on killing each other as much as they liked; the soil had
no concern with their hatreds, and on that account, did not propose to
alter its course. As every year, the metal cutter had opened its
usual lines, obliterating with its ridges the traces of man and beast,
undismayed and with stubborn diligence filling up the tunnels which the
bombs had made.

Sometimes the ploughshare had struck against an obstacle underground
. . . an unknown, unburied man; but the cultivator had continued on its
way without pity. Every now and then, it was stopped by less yielding
obstructions, projectiles which had sunk into the ground intact. The
rustic had dug up these instruments of death which occasionally had
exploded their delayed charge in his hands.

But the man of the soil knows no fear when in search of sustenance, and
so was doggedly continuing his rectilinear advance, swerving only before
the visible tombs; there the furrows had curved mercifully, making
little islands of the mounds surmounted by crosses and flags. The seeds
of future bread were preparing to extend their tentacles like devil
fish among those who, but a short time before, were animated by such
monstrous ambition. Life was about to renew itself once more.

The automobile came to a standstill. The guide was running about among
the crosses, stooping over in order to examine their weather-stained
inscriptions.

"Here we are!"

He had found above one grave the number of the regiment.

Chichi and her husband promptly dismounted again. Then Dona Luisa, with
sad resolution, biting her lips to keep the tears back. Then the three
devoted themselves to assisting the father who had thrown off his fur
lap-robe. Poor Desnoyers! On touching the ground, he swayed back and
forth, moving forward with the greatest effort, lifting his