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Twenty-seventh day of the war. Sultry weather, with light northerly breezes. Temperature at five P.M. 26 degrees centigrade. "Hold tight!" Such is the watchword given by the French Government, and French and British soldiers are holding tight for all they are worth against the slowly advancing German armies. Heavy fighting all along the lines from the Somme to the Vosges continues without a break.
This is the line Belfort, Épinal, Toul, Verdun. A German attack launched upon this line without violating neutral territory would have to be frontal, for on the north the line is covered by the neutral states of Belgium and Luxemburg, while on the south, although the gap between the Vosges and the Swiss frontier apparently gives a chance of out-flanking the French defences, the fortress of Belfort, which was never reduced even in the war of 1870-1, was considered too formidable an obstacle against which to launch an invading army.
At Épinal in the Vosges, on the first Sunday in Lent, bonfires used to be kindled at various places both in the town and on the banks of the Moselle. They consisted of pyramids of sticks and faggots, which had been collected some days earlier by young folks going from door to door.
"Is it possible?" the Sous Prefect said, coming forward again, "that these gentlemen are the Captains Barclay, of whom the Paris papers which we received three days since were full, as having passed through the German lines, and having swam the Seine at night, under fire? They had previously been decorated for great acts of bravery, in the Vosges; and were now made commanders of the Legion.
Thus, in the Vosges, meadows are literally flooded for weeks together, and while in the department of Vancluse a meadow may receive, in five waterings of six and a half hours each, twenty-one inches of wnter, in the Vosges it might be deluged for twenty-four hundred hours in six applications, the enormous quantity of thirteen hundred feet of water flowing over it.
For if none of the bearers of the names I have mentioned lived in the Place des Vosges, it is certain that others bearing equally noble names lived there.
If I look down the stream, I see the narrow town, and the Neckar flowing out of it into the vast level plain, rich with grain and trees and grass, with many spires and villages; Mannheim to the northward, shining when the sun is low; the Rhine gleaming here and there near the horizon; and the Vosges Mountains, purple in the last distance: on my right, and so near that I could throw a stone into them, the ruined tower and battlements of the northwest corner of the castle, half hidden in foliage, with statues framed in ivy, and the garden terrace, built for Elizabeth Stuart when she came here the bride of the Elector Frederick, where giant trees grow.
A dog of the Vosges, as large as a wolf, with bloodshot eyes and bristling hair, flew at Cyprien's throat, who fell on the floor. "Help! Help!" cried the scoundrel. The Marquis, livid with terror, had succeeded in opening the door. "Here, Cliepé! Here!" shouted Pierre. The dog gave Cyprien another furious shake, and dropped him. He rolled himself out of the door. Pierre flung it to and bolted it.
She said with a pensive and indifferent air: "It is possible that there is a will." When they entered the house, the footman handed Madeleine a letter. She opened it and offered it to her husband. "OFFICE OF M. LAMANEUR, Notary. 17 Rue des Vosges," "Madame: Kindly call at my office at a quarter past two o'clock Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday, on business which concerns you."
I saw beyond it the infinite plain of Alsace and the distant Vosges. The cliff of limestone that bounded that height fell sheer upon the tree-tops; its sublimity arrested me, and compelled me to record it.
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