awn. The great day had arrived!

Amiens was in darkness, with the lightnings of the guns which had never
ceased their labors through the night flashing in the heavens their
magnetic summons to battle. When a dip into a valley shut out their roar
a divine hush lay over the world. On either side of the main road was
the peace of the hour before the dawn which would send the peasants from
their beds to the fields. There were no lights yet in the villages. It
had not occurred to the inhabitants to try to see the battle. They knew
that they would be in the way; sentries or gunners would halt them.

The traffic was light and all vehicles, except a flying staff officer's
car, were going their methodical way. Vaguely, as an aviation station
was passed, planes were visible being pushed out of their sheds; the hum
of propellers being tried out was faintly heard. The birds of battle
were testing their wings before flight and every one out of the hundreds
which would take part that day had his task set, no less than had a
corps, a regiment of artillery, or the bombers in a charge.

"This is the place," was the word to the chauffeur as we swept up a
grade in the misty darkness.

Stretched from trunk to trunk of the trees beside the road were canvas
screens to hide the transport from enemy observation. Passing between
them had the effect of going through the curtains into a parterre box.
Light was just breaking and we were in a field of young beets on the
crest of a rise, with no higher ground beyond us all the way to
Thiepval, which was in the day's objective, and to Pozieres, which was
beyond it. Ordinarily, on a clear day we should have had from here a
view over five or six miles of front and through our glasses the action
should have been visible in detail.

This morning the sun was not showing his head and the early mist lay
opaque over all the positions, holding in place the mighty volume of
smoke from bursting shells. As it was not seven o'clock the sun might
yet realize its duty in July and dissipate this shroud, which was so
thick that it partially obscured the flashes of the guns and the
shell-bursts.

Seven-ten came and seven-twenty and still no more light. It was too late
now to seek another hill and, if we had sought one, we should have had
no better view. At least, we were seeing as much as the Commander of the
Fourth Army in his dugout near by. The artillery fire increased. Every
gun was now firing, all stretchin