If one could think away the "'eclopes" in the streets and the
wounded in their hospitals, Chalons would be an invigorating
spectacle. When we drove up to the hotel even the grey motors and
the sober uniforms seemed to sparkle under the cold sky. The
continual coming and going of alert and busy messengers, the riding
up of officers (for some still ride!), the arrival of much-decorated
military personages in luxurious motors, the hurrying to and fro of
orderlies, the perpetual depleting and refilling of the long rows of
grey vans across the square, the movements of Red Cross ambulances
and the passing of detachments for the front, all these are sights
that the pacific stranger could forever gape at. And in the hotel,
what a clatter of swords, what a piling up of fur coats and
haversacks, what a grouping of bronzed energetic heads about the
packed tables in the restaurant! It is not easy for civilians to get
to Chalons, and almost every table is occupied by officers and
soldiers--for, once off duty, there seems to be no rank distinction
in this happy democratic army, and the simple private, if he chooses
to treat himself to the excellent fare of the Haute Mere-Dieu, has
as good a right to it as his colonel.
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