beside the French and under French command, laughing and singing, and covered themselves with glory. This was the first occasion in which units of the Pennsylvania Division had been in action, but as it was not under their own commanders it cannot properly be regarded as a part of the divisional activity.

Word of this action seeped back to the regiments and created a profound impression. The doughboys talked about and envied their companions and pledged themselves, each in his own heart, to maintain that high standard of soldierly character when the moment arrived.

Meantime, the regiments had gone plugging ahead with their training work—rifle shooting, bayonet work, hikes and practice attacks succeeding each other in bewildering variety.

The work was interrupted July 5th by the arrival of messengers from brigade headquarters. The regiments were to move up in closer support of the French lines. Marshal Foch had shepherded the Germans into a position where their only possibility for further attack lay almost straight south from the tip of the Soissons-Rheims salient. The French forces there were expected to make the crossing of the Marne so hazardous and costly an enterprise that the Germans either would give it up almost at the outset, or would be so harassed that the push could gain little headway. In any event, the American support troops—including our own Pennsylvanians—were depended on to reinforce the line at any critical moment. And for that reason it was imperative that they be within easier striking distance.

So, very early on the morning of July 6th, the bugles roused the men from their slumbers and word was passed by the sergeants to hurry the usual morning duties, as there was "something doing." No larger hint was needed. Dressing, washing, "police duty" and breakfast never were dispensed with more rapidly, and in less than an hour after first call the regiments were ready to move.

The 110th, the 111th and the engineers moved off without incident, other than the keen interest aroused by the increasing clamor of the guns as they marched northward, to the new positions assigned them. Parts of their routes lay over some of the famous roads of France that had not suffered yet from the barbarous invaders, and made fairly easy going. At times they had to strike across country to gain a new and more available road.

A doughboy, pressing close to where a fine old tree leaned protectingly across the sun-baked road, reached up and pulled a leafy twig. He thrust it into the air hole in his hat, and laughingly remarked that "now he was camouflaged." His comrades paid no attention until he remarked later that it was a good thing to have, as it helped keep the flies away. Thereafter there were many grasping hands when trees or bushes were within reach, and before noon the men bore some semblance to the Italian Bersaglieri, who wear plumed hats.

The going was not so smooth for the 109th, however. The farther the regiment moved along its northward road the louder and more emphatic became the cannonading. Both the officers and men realized they were getting very much closer to artillery fire than they had been. A spirit of tense, nervous eagerness pervaded the ranks. The goal of the long months of hard training, the achievement of all their dreams and desires, seemed just ahead.

They had passed the little village of Artonges, where the tiny Dhuys River, no more than a bush and tree-bordered run, swung over and joined their road to keep it company on the northward route. Pargny-la-Dhuys was almost in sight, when a shell—their first sight of one in action—exploded in a field a few hundred yards to one side.

At almost the same time an officer came dashing down the road. He brought orders from brigade headquarters for the regiment to turn off the road and take cover in a woods. Pargny and the whole countryside about were being shelled vigorously by the Germans with a searching fire in an effort to locate French batteries.

The shelling continued with little cessation, while the 109th in vexation hid in the woods south of Pargny. The doughboys became convinced firmly that the Germans knew they were on the way to the front and deliberately were trying to prevent them, through sheer fear of their well-known prowess. For many a Pennsylvania soldier had been telling his comrades and everybody else for so long that "there won't be anything to it when this division gets into action," that he had the idea fixed in his mind that the Germans must be convinced of the same thing.

Three times the cannonade slackened and the heckled Pargny was left out of the zone of fire. Each time the 109th sallied forth from its green shelter and started ahead. Each time, just as it got well away and its spirits had begun to "perk up" again, the big guns began to roar at the town and they turned back.

This continued until July 10th. When orders came that morning for the regiment to proceed northward, there was much gibing at Fritz and his spite against the regiment and little hope that the procedure would be anything more than another march up the road and back again.

Surprise was in store, however. This time the guns were pointed in other directions, and the regiment went over the hill, through what was left of Pargny after its several days of German "hate," and on up the road.

Just when spirits were soaring again at the prospect of marching right up to the fighting front, came another disappointment for the men. A short distance north of Pargny, the column turned into a field on the right of the road and made its way into a deep ravine bordering the northern side of the field. Ensued another period of grumbling and fault-finding among the men, who could not understand why they still saw nothing of the war at first hand.

The discussion was at its height as the men made camp, when it was interrupted by a screeching roar overhead, followed almost instantaneously by a terrific crash in the field above their heads and to the south.

"Whang" came another shell of smaller caliber on the other side of the road, and then the frightful orchestra was again in full swing. Suddenly that little ravine seemed a rather desirable place to be, after all. Most of the men would have preferred to be in position to do some retaliatory work, rather than sit still and have those shells shrieking through the air in search of them, but the shelter of the hollow was much more to be desired than marching up the open road in the teeth of shell fire.

An air of pride sat on many of the men. "Old Fritz must know the 109th is somewhere around," they reasoned.

Three days passed thus, with the regiment "holed up" against the almost continuous bombardment. Little lulls would come in the fire and the men would snatch some sleep, only to be roused by a renewal of the racket, for they had not yet reached that stage of old hands at the front, where they sleep undisturbed through the most vigorous shelling, only to be roused by the unaccustomed silence when the big guns quit baying.

Runners maintaining liaison with brigade headquarters and the other regiments were both better off and worse off, according to the point of view. Theirs was an exceedingly hazardous duty, with none of the relatively safe shelter of the regiment, but, too, it had that highly desirable spice of real danger and adventure that had been a potent influence in luring these men to France.

Liaison, in a military sense, is the maintaining of communications. It is essential at all times that organizations operating together should be in close touch. To do this men frequently do the