When asked where they were going, most of the people replied, “Straight ahead of us, a’ la grace de Dieu.”

By the morning the heat had grown intolerable and a splendid looking man got down from a cart and came towards me.  Might he turn his party into the drive and rest a bit in the shade?

I was only too willing, and gladly offered hot soup and stewed fruit to any who would accept.

Two long heavy drays each drawn by a pair of the handsomest big bay horses with creamy manes that I have ever seen, pulled up in the courtyard.  Impromptu seats had been arranged in the wagons and from these climbed down some twenty or thirty old women, children and men, worn out by the fatigue, anxiety, and want of sleep.  My heart went out to them, and in a generous moment I was about to offer them my beds so they could get a good rest before starting off again, but on second thought it dawned on me that I must keep them for the army!  What a pretty thing it would be if another auto full of wounded suddenly appeared and found all my wards occupied!

I explained my position.  They grasped it at once.  It was too good of me.  They were all well and needed no beds—­would I let them sleep in the bay for a few hours?

But better still, I suggested, if the boys would carry a dozen or so extra mattresses I possessed into the harness room, the women might lie there, and the men could take to the hay.

They had food, plenty of it, bought on the way from village dealers who had not yet been seized with panic and shut up shop.  So I told them that instead of building individual fires they might cook their noonday meal on my huge range.  They might also use my kitchen utensils and china if they would wash up, and thus save unpacking their own.  Apparently this was unheard of generosity and I cannot tell you how many times that morning my soul was recommended to the tender protection of the Blessed Virgin.

While the women prepared the meal, George had taken the men to the wash-house, where soap and water worked miracles on their dusty faces; one by one all the members of the group disappeared in that direction and when they gathered around the long table in the refectory, it was altogether a different company to that of an hour before.

As they sat down it came over me that none of us had eaten since the night before, and dropping onto a chair, I suddenly realized that I was tired.  Berthe and Nini, however, wanted to know where I would lunch, and were rather startled when I informed them to lay a cloth on the kitchen table and to bring out all the cold meat, cheese, bread, butter and jam in the larder.  It would be a stand-up picnic lunch for everyone to-day, and what was more, it was very likely to be picnic dinner; so Julie was ordered to put two chickens to roast and some potatoes to boil—­both needed but little attention and would always be ready when we might need them.