Page:War's dark frame (IA warsdarkframe00camp).pdf/93

Rh “You name on that cross. Lieutenant or Captain von So and So."

"In view of those ruined villages," the elderly Quaker said, such charity is admirable. It is very French."

"We are not Boches," the officer laughed.

"In spite of the crimes of the Germans in Lorraine we have no quarrel with the sorrowful families of the dead."

"Both sides fell very fast here? I asked.

"It was a hard battle," he answered. might say the Boches were turned back as they were at the Ourck. It is, as you can see, nearly at the other end of the line. Because these men fell the Kaiser was forbidden to trot into Nancy, and something was repaid of the debt we owe the Boches for Gerbéviller. We are getting very close now. Before long we will see it."

The name had acquired in my mind, and, I think, in the Quaker's, a symbolism of inexpressible wrong. We shrank a little from the fact. The automobile approached the edge of the plateau too quickly for us. There was, however, in our first glimpse of the dead city an unexpected relief.

It snuggled, badly defined because of the pleasant shrubbery, in the centre of a shallow bowl. The charming little river Mortagne wound