The ambulance was as busy as a beehive this A. M. Except for one or two, the patients are all feeling better. AndrÉ, the third on the left, whose sonorous "Merci, chÈre Soeur" nearly frightened me to pieces one day, seems to be the wit and authority on all subjects—a real leader, I should say, and drÔle! Augustin, four beds from him, is our difficult child, the only one of the twenty-nine who is spoiled and fights his dressings, but we must be patient with him for he has been very sick and that drawn look about the nose and a certain, startled expression of the eyes, worry me. But the little Soeur Victoire says comfortingly that he will soon be well, though he does not wish to eat and his jaws are a little stiff. O, chÈre Soeur, in your sweet faith, are stiffened jaws such a trivial circumstance?

Next Augustin is Sylvestre, le beau. He was the splendid pointeur of Fort Chaudefontaine and was the least burned of the men; that is why I know he is beautiful; also I catch many glimpses of him in the little mirror in which he is constantly regarding himself, but he is bon garÇon, nevertheless—his honest blue eyes attest it.

At the end of the row is the big Flamand, who was always two feet too long for his bed. He is sitting up now and that great, black head, with features swollen three times their normal size, is a sight to frighten the boldest. If he should roar at me I would drop everything and flee. But he doesn't; nobody roars; for they are all the finest gentlemen in the world, even in their trying moments.

At ten o'clock this evening, right out of the silence, issued sounds of heavy, rolling carts, and horses' hoofs. Madame de H. and I stole out into the court to see what it might be and, almost as if by magic, whole regiments came pouring along in the greatest haste and disorder. A wing of the servants' quarters hid the approach of the soldiers from us and the strange, non-resonant quality of the atmosphere tonight deceived us as to their nearness. In a moment they were upon us—not three feet away, for some of the troops had taken, not the usual highroad two hundred feet distant, but a short cut by the narrow path which directly passes the court yard. Happily we had hidden ourselves behind the grille, in the foliage, or we might have been shot without ceremony, as by order of the military governor of the city "every civilian shall be indoors and lights out at eight P. M."

We enjoyed the danger a little at first because we did not realize it; all the same we obliterated ourselves as much as possible, though hardly daring to move or breathe. Not an arm's length away, their nearness oppressed us and the waves of heat which reeked from their toiling bodies sickened us. But there we crouched in our light dresses, easily seen if one had chanced to look, and separated only by an iron fence with sparse, fluttering vines from a mass of tired, quarrelsome, desperate men. Why! any of them might have run us through in a flash as one would lunge at a white rag for the amusement of his companions. Indoors the family were frantic, not daring to open a crack of the door for fear of violent consequences to us.

The night was full of dull noises; even the clanking chains of the gun carriages seemed muffled and the thud of horses' hoofs in the mud added to the air of secrecy which pervaded the scene, while the moonlight threw out shadows and drew crazy perspectives and showed up silhouettes of men positively falling from their seats with fatigue. Some one was twirling a French soldier's cap on a bayonet, we heard smothered yawns, the words "Russland," "Vaterland," and finally the infantry whistling in unison as they limped along.