REGENT WAR AREA AN EERIE COUNTRY.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14844, 22 February 1919, Page 3

REGENT WAR AREA AN EERIE COUNTRY.

STRANOE QUIET RFHTS OWIR , LAND OF REGENT BATTLES. TRAVELLING STRANGER O!NCE I MORE. WELCOME, - Behind Lines m France, Nov. 27. — This land of recent battles is a queer land now. Over the shell-torn villages and blasted woods, the pitted fields and the 'mill of ail that once was, is a strange qiu'et. The winter sky. is lacking m airplanes, and great flocks of crows have taken their place. '■ A few villagers have crept back .to see what of their homes and holdings, but probaljly the winter will; have passed before reclamation and reconstruction ax© undertaken on a ]arge scale, i • Along the roads repaired and rebridged for the Allies' advance, into German territory, long camion trains move slowly and always southward. They 1 travel leisurely now, for the need of hurry is gone. They bring back the salvage of battlefields, all the things that go to make .war, abandoned or captured. Truck load after truck load of rines ami shells, of water bottles and haversacks, cartridges, machine guns, bayonets a.nd trench knives and pistols, mess kits, overcoats, caps, an endless catalogue of paraphernalia are brought m. The battle zone is still full of it all, m heaps and racks, waiting salvage. '- .-■■' , Now and then conn© trains of airplane camions burdened with dismantled flying machines of every type and every nation,' engine and fuselage* and running gear on I the truck and the great wings on its j specially designed trailer. Some of them i are unharmed, but many sliow 'bullet holes through the frail fabric or the ruins of a crash. A fair proportion of them bear the Maltese Cross that marks I them Boche. r There are trains of captured enemy artillery, particularly of motor batteries, driven and manned by Frenchmen, and , these are happy outfits. Often the guns are decorated with . evergreens, and always the French soldiers laugh, and wave cv greeting. As they creep through the villages the popula-ce flock® out to view the cannon that for four years sent death and devastation to their land, and the children, clamber on tha carriages 1 and out of the grim. barrels. , But it is the tvoops on the way bi.?k that are most interesting, returning to rest areas or -to their ports of, embarkation for home. 1 French or American, their behavior is tl:© same. Always they are laughing or singing, always they greet everyone cheerily or boisterously, and. always , the French officers salute with a smile when they meet an American car, while the. men wave and shout : "La, 'guerre est finis !'' or a similar greet-. nyq. Even the children cry "Finis! :Fin ; s!"'.to the passing «ar. . Strangest of alt are the lights at night m the hamlets and villages, or shinuig friendly from tlie isolated faarmhouse, m regioiivs further back. For so long France seemed a deserted land to the traveller by night. Hour after hour the Associated Press correspondent has travelled at night without a glimmer to be seen m the countryside, and now from every hill and viale the oheery windows shine a,nd the villages are ablaze. The papers devote columns i^o the illumination of Paris, but it ia jhera m, -ths remote part of France where war has-been that lghts at night seem most wonderful, even if they are but candle or little lamp. Where once camions or staff cars loomed lightless m the roads 'to the imminent threat of collision, and often its accomplishment, the brilliant headlights st*vb the night. There m every village now the towelling stranger can obtain food, not m variety perhaps, but enough, and; veryhospitably. The deprecatory polite a;nd necessary refusal to requests* for refreshments that usually were received m litt-e«ha,mlet£p or single farms has given way to a cheerful offering of what there is, for the farmers know now that the spectre of a winter of short rations has disappeared. The rationing of certain foodstuffs is still m effect. Bread tiokate are necessary m public eating placed, no matter how unpretentious/ Butter and milk are seldom to be had 4 and oKeese is scarce, but of plain vegetables and certain meats there is plenty, and the carefully hqayded* stoves o{ the light red and white wines* of the country are forthcoming when demanded. ,' At this season there is game m the small town markets, hares and rabbits, venison, red-legged partridges, and the large French quail and vjttcl boar. It is high, but not so tugh. as it always is at home. ■■ " .