Then as the clear, fine voice of this noble lad filled
those halls of pain and death with a rippling melody of cheer,
we looked again and a vision came.
In fancy we saw once more the French peasants toiling in their
fields of grain; over the once desolate region the skylarks were
soaring and singing above emerald meadows, covered with the blue
of the corn-flower and crimson of poppies; the pines were
peacefully murmuring their age-old songs of freedom and content,
unmindful of the conquer-lust of the Hohenzollerns; the evening
sky was no longer profaned by the lurid illumination of star
shells as they looped across the ghastly field; in what were
once shell holes filled with poisonous water the frogs were
piping; in the lovely gardens overlooking the Meuse the mavis
and merle were singing; and in the violet dusk no hissing shells
screamed their songs of death and destruction, and no crashing
of forests were heard from far-thrown shells, but the heavy box-
scented breeze bore the heavenly psalm of the nightingale.
Across the road from the ward moving silently about the avenues
of that vast "city of the dead," French mothers were scattering
flowers on graves of their loved ones; and then it was
understood why Chester Howland sang while the thundering cannon
shook the wards. Soon for him there would be no weary marches,
no days of terror and nights of pain.
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