. vault was a feat which even a college oI TE Coa by (Concluded from last week.) Ba — for a place to rest. I had decided to travel in the daytime as well as night, because I understood that it was only a few miles from the frontier, and I was naturally anxious to get there at the earliest possible moment, although I realized that there I would encounter the most hazardous paft of my whole adventure. To get through the heavily guarded barbed wire and electrically charged barrier was a problem that I hated to think of even, although the | hours I spent endeavoring to devise | some way of outwitting the Huns were many. It had occurred to me, for instance, that it would not be such a difficult matter to vault over the electric fence, which was only nine feet high. In col- lege, I knew a ten-foot vault is consid- ered a high-school boy's accomplish- ment, but there were two great dif- ficulties in the way of this solution. In the first place it would be no easy When night came I looked around \ matter to get a pole of the right length, weight and strength to serve the purpose. More particularly, how: ever, the pole-vault idea seemed to me to be out of the question because of the fact that on either side of the elec- tric fence, six feet from it, was a six- foot barbed wire barrier. To vault safely over a nine-foot electrically charged fence was one thing, but to combine with it a twelve-foot broad athlete in the pink of condition would be apt to flunk. Indeed, I don’t be- lieve it is possible. Another plan that seemed half-way reasonable was to build a pair of stilts about twelve or fourteen feet high and walk over the barriers one by one. As a youngster I had acquired consider- able skill in stilt-walking and I have no doubt that with the proper equip- ment it would have been quite feas- ible to have walked out of Belgium as easily as possible in that way, but whether or not I was going to have a chance to construct the necessary stilts remained to be seen. There were a good many bicycles in use by the German soldiers in Belgium and it had often occurred to me that if I could have stolen one, the tires would have made excellent gloves and insulated coverings for my feet in case it was necessary for me to at- tempt to climb over the electric fence bodily. But as I had never been able to steal a bicycle this avenue of es- cape was closed to me. I decided to wait until I arrived at ” the barrier and then make up my mind how to proceed. To find a decent place to sleep that night, I erawled under a barbed wire fence, thinking it led into some field. As I passed under, one of the barbs caught in my coat and in trying to pull myself from it I shook the fence : for several yards. y Instantly there came out of the night the nerve-racking command: “Halt!” Again I feared I was done for. I crouched close down on the ground in the darkness, not knowing whether to take to my legs and trust to the Huns missing me in the darkness if he fired, | or stay where I was. It was foggy | as well as dark, and although I knew the sentry was only a few feet away | from me I decided to stand, or rather | lie, pat. I think my heart made almost as much noise as the rattling of the | wire in the first pPace, and it was a | tense few moments to me. | I heard the German say a few words | to himself, but didn’t understand them, | of course, and then he made a sound . as if to call a dog,-and I realized that ! his theory of the noise he had heard was that a dog had made its way through the fence. For perhaps five minutes I didn’t stir, and then figuring that the German had probably continued on his beat I crept quietly under the wire again, this time being mighty careful to hug the ground so close that I wouldn't touch the wire, and made off in a dif- ferent direction. Evidently the barbed wire fence had been thrown around an ammunition depot or something of the kind, and it was not a field at all that I had tried to get into. 1 figured that other sentries were probably in the neighborhood and I proceeded very gingerly. After I had got about a mile away from this spot I came to an humble Belgian house and I knocked at the door and applied for food in my usual way, pointing to my mouth to indi- cate I was hungry and to my ears and mouth to imply that I was deaf and dumb. The Belgian woman who lived in the house brought me a piece of bread and two cold potatoes and as I sat there eating them she eyed me very keenly. si I haven't the slightest doubt that she realized I was a fugitive. She lived so near the border that it was more for that reason, I appreciated more OLITWITTING LIELTENANT PAT OBRIEN- ©, 548, by FAT ALIA OBRIEIY + was good and I enjoyed it. fuily the extent of the risk she ran, for £R ALN W AN Baer Hw win no doubt the Germans were constantly watching the conduct of these Bel- | gians who lived near the line. My theory that she realized that I was not a Belgian at all, but prob- | aby some English fugitive, was con- | firmed a moment later, when, as I. made ready to go, she touched me on | the arm and indicated that I was to wait a moment. She went to a bureau and brought out two pieces of fancy Belgian lace which she insisted upon my taking away, although at that par- ticular moment I had as much use for Belgian lace as an elephant for a safety razor, but I was touched with her thoughtfulness and pressed her hapd to show my gratitude. She would | not accept the money I offered her. I carried the lace through my sub- | sequent experiences, feeling that it : would be a fine souvenir for my ! mother, although as a matter of fact if | I had known that it was going to de- | lay my final escape for even a single | moment, as it did, I am quite sure she would rather I had not seen it. On one piece of lace was the Flem- ish word “Charite” and on the other the word “Esperage.” At the time I took these words to mean “Charity” and “Experience” and all I hoped was that T would get as much of the one as I was getting of the other before I finally got through. I learned subse- quently that what the words really stood for were “Charity” and “Hope,” and then I was sure that my kind Bel- gian friend had indeed realized my plight and that her thoughtful sou- venir was intended to encourage me in the trials she must have known were before me. I didn’t let the old Belgian lady know, because 1 did not want to alarm her unnecessarily, but that night IT slept in her backyard, leaving early in the morning before it became light Later in the day I applied at an- other house for food. It was occupied by a father and mother and ten chil re T hesitated to ask tzem for food without offering to pay for it, as I re- alized what a task it must have been for them to support themselves with- | out having to feed a hungry man. Ac- cordingly I gave the man a mark and then indicated that I wanted some- thing to eat. They were just about to | eat, themselves, apparently, and they ! let me partake of their meal, which consisted of a huge bowl of some kind of soup which I was unable to iden- tify and which they served in ordinary | wash basins. I don't know that they | not worry me very much. The soup All the time I was there I could see the father and the eldest son, a boy Again | Feared | Was Done For. about seventeen, were extremely n/rv- ous. I had indicated to them that I was deaf and dumb, but if they be- lieved me it didn’t seem to make them any more comfortable. I lingered at the house for about an hour after the meal and during that time a young man came to call on the eldest daughter, a young woman of perhaps eighteen. The caller eyed me very suspiciously, although I must have resembled anything but a British officer. They spoke Flemish and I did not understand a word they said, but I think they were discussing my prob- able identity. During their conversa- tion, I had a chance to look around dhe room. There were three alto- gether, two fairly large and one somewhat smaller, about fourteen feet long and six deep. In this smaller room there were two double-decked i account of a lack of leather. beds, which were apparently intended to house the whole family, although how the whole twelve of them could sleep in that one room will ever re- main a ‘mystery to me. From the kitchen you could walk | their conditions are not the most directly into the cow-barn, where two cows were kept, and this, as I have pointed out before, is the usual con- struction of the poorer Belgian houses. I could not make out why the caller | seemed to be so antagonistic to me, : and yet I am sure he was arguing with the family against me. i facet that I wasn’t wearing wooden Perhaps the shoes—1 doubt whether I could have obtained a pair big enough for me— had convinced him that I was not really a Belgian, because there was nothing about me otherwise which could have given him that idea. At that time, and I suppose it is true today, about 94 per cent of the | peuple in Belgium were wearing wooden shoes. don’t believe I ever saw any other kind of footwear and they are more common there than they are in Hol- land. The Dutch wear them more on I was told that during the coming year prac- tically all the peasants and poorer people in Germany, too, will adopt wooden shoes for farm work, as that is one direction in which wocd can be substituted for leather without much loss. When the young man left, I left shortly afterwards, as I was not at all comfortable about what his inten- tions were regarding me. For all I knew he might have gone to notify | the German authorities that there was a strange man in the vicinity—more perhaps to protect his friends from suspicion of having aided me than to injure me. At any rate, I was not going to take any chances and I got out of that neighborhood as rapidly as I could. That night found me right on the ¢rontier of Holland. CHAPTER XVIlL Getting Through the Lites. Waiting until it was quite dark, I made my way carefully through a field and eventually came to the much dreaded barrier. It was all that I had heard about it. Every foot of the border line between Belgium and Holland is protected in precisely the same manner. It is there to serve three purposes: first, to pre- vent the Belgians from escaping into Holland ; second to keep enemies, like myself, from making their way to free- dom; and third, to prevent desertions on the part of Germans themselves. One look was enough to convince any one that it probably accomplished all three objects about as well as any con- trivance could, and one look was all I got of it that night, for while I lay on my stomach gazing at the forbid- ding structure I heard the measured stride of a German sentry advancing { towards me and I crawled away as fast as I possibly could, determined to spend the night somewhere in the fields and make another and more ! careful survey the following night. The view I had obtained, however, was sufficient to convince me that the pole-vault idea was out of the ques- tion even if I had a pole and was a proficient pole-vaulter. The three fences covered a span of at least twelve | feet and to clear the last barbed wire | fence it would be necessary to vault not only at least ten feet high, but at | ever used the basins to wash in as | least fourteen feet wide, with the cer- i | well, but whether they did or not did tain knowledge that to touch the elec- trically charged fence meant instant death. There would be no second chance if you came a cropper the first time. The stilt idea was also impractica- | ble because of the lack of suitable timber and tools with which to con- struct the stilts. It seemed to me thatthe best thing to do was travel up and down the line a bit in the hope that some spot might be discovered where conditions were more favorable, although I don’t know just what 1 expected along those lines. It was mighty disheartening to real- ize that only a few feet away lay cer- tain liberty and that the only things preventing me from reaching it were three confounded fences. I thought of my machine and wished that some kind fairy would set it in front of me for just one minute. I spent the night in a clump of bushes and kept in hiding most of the next day, only going abroad for an hour or two in the middle of the day to intercept some Belgian peasant and beg for food. The Belgians in this section were naturally very much afraid of the Germans and I fared badly. In nearly every house German soldiers were quartered and it was out of the question for me to apply for food in that direction. The prox- imity of the border made everyone eye each other with more or less sus- picion and I soon came to the conclu- sion that the safest thing I could do was to live on raw vegetables which I could steal from the fields at night as I had previously done. That night I made another survey of the barrier in that vicinity, but it looked just as hopeless as it had the night before and I concluded that I only wasted my time there. I spent the night wandering north, guided by the North Star which had served me so faithfully in all my trav- eling. Every mile or two I would make my way carefully to the barrier to see if conditions were any better, but it seemed to be the same all along. I felt like a wild animal in a cage, with about as much chance of getting out. . Continued next week) . — Plans for the organization of a national federation of manufactur- ers’ councils, to meet war-time and after-the-war emergencies, have been announced. Among the peasants I | | cisms are in no way personal but are i study over it and improve yourself. | NEWS IN THE TRENCHES. The boys in the front line trenches are not fighting all the time, even if pleasant. But the soldiers of Uncle { Sam always make the best of their | surroundings and if there is any hu- { mor in the situation they will endeav- or to extract it. Take the 311th ma- chine gun battalion, members of that organization publish a little paper right in the trenches called “The | Bust Em Browning.” Russell C. | Hughes is given as the editor and | their motto is “Enroute to Berlin.” | The issue of August 16th, has reach- ied the “Watchman” editor's desk i through the kindness of a friend and | contains the following pert para- | graphs: DISCIPLINE (By Major C. M. DuPuy) Your discipline has a deal to do i with your success from now on. i Your discipline is the printed page on which officers and men as well ! read of what you are made inside. So { what’s the use of holding high ambi- i tions if the whole story is twisted, botched, and lied about by your way of expressing yourself as a soldier. | { Some men resent it when they are | | told to salute differently, to walk dif- | ferently, or to stand at attention more | smartly. Remember that these criti- i made for the best interest of the serv- ice. In civil life men are apt to say: { Tuesday and Friday. | “I am what I am. If people don’t | like me, I can’t help it. I am as God i made me!” But soldiers are not. They are made by training and an anxiety on the part of the man to make good. If somebody criticizes | you don’t repel it with anger but Don’t defend. Reform. Do you walk lumberingly? Do you stand awk- wardly? Do you give indistinct com- mands and then call down the men for not executing a movement the or- , der for which they did not hear? | One way to success is to get the manner of success. One way to be a | machine gunner is to get the manner {of a machine gunner—then you'll: want to be what you have simulated and the transformation will take place. A WEEK IN FRANCE. (A Typical Buck Private’s Unexpurgated Diary) i MONDAY | I am here in France. I have a date | with Willie, the Hun, that son-of-a-' gun from out Berlin way. I knew | that Black Jack Pershing couldn’t do the big job with the proper polish | without the 311th. Always during | our long trip, we were given a fine | welcome. Just to show the Kaiser that it could be done, they packed us| in the boat until, for me, there was | lots of room to wiggle my ears and | toes, but to crook my arm or turn around meant assault and battery on | my neighbors. I was plenty comfort- able just the same. When we sailed out the band played everything from : “Good Bye Broadway, Hello France” to “Yankee Doodle.” There was a re- | port arcund that Major DuPuy burst several buttons off his new blouse so ' proud was he of us. For the first couple of days out! Uncle Sam played a mean trick on me. He gave me something to eat that didn't agree. I felt turbulent amidships. I thought there was a! plot there. I know I wasn’t seasick. | They said our boat shot down a, half dozen U-boats on the last trip. Each night, the story said, they got 2 or 8. If the trip had lasted a week | more, we would have put the whole German navy out of business. Then, after the sea trip, came the personally conducted tour of France. I think we circled it 4 or 5 times from the number of hours we rode in the luxurious Pullmans. They only put 40 “Hommes” in a car and they put 45 or 50 in them in the U. S., so that proves we had plenty of room. Now I am learning to bing the Boche. TUESDAY Made my grand summer offensive on the French language today, I lost. Took the first 2 objectives of Wee Wee and Bon Jour easily but it wasn’t long before the pesky lingo flanked me and got me down and had a strangle hold. Made a rapid but very strategic retreat to my billet. A billet, gentle sir, is the home of the soldier in France. It is built of stone, made to last till Gabrial bu- gles assembly. It has hardwood floors, we all know this. It has a tile roof. It is large and commodious and it has plenty of room for all. It has every modern convenience known to the elite of this city. It general- ly has horses right at hand for quick travel and cows also so that the morn- ing milk may be available. Is it any wonder every soldier is tickled to death to be here? WEDNESDAY I'm getting sore at the damned bombastic, bumptious Boche. First He drags me across the ocean away from the girl and the U. S. life. Then he keeps me here. And now he puts me in a tin hat and a gas mask. Some one will get all cut up yet in this war if he isn’t careful. ) I'm going to learn these instru- ments of torture that prevent other torture just to spite the Limburger cheese. 1 modestly proclaim, how- ever, that there is some class to me in the outfit. Even the French las- sies look and smile. THURSDAY A quiet day. Got up at 5 a. m. Did setting-up exercises, cleaned up the streets like a’ White Wing; drill- ed at least 8 hours when I lost count; learned the Browning gun so that I can get up in my sleep and take it down, put it together and tell just how it is done; fired on the range and took the whiskers off an imaginary “germ;” ate 3 squares that would put a pig to shame; walked 15 ar 20 miles; squinted at the variety of French femininity here after supper; stood reveille and retreat and half a dozen other formations; wrote 6 let- ters to the U. S. and then went to bed because I got tired loafing around. FRIDAY 1°11 hand it to the women here. To- day I noted that although they don’t know what a brassiere is, they can run a farm house, a stable, a vine- ! yard, a dairy, and, in the spare min- : utes raise a family. : SATURDAY i Got my new little “Go to Hell” hat ! today. Some class to it. Here are my directions for wearing it: Grip it firmly by both meat-hooks. Open it like a pocketbook. Duck low like ! a bull exasperated. Let right flank get a toe hold on the right ear. Point front towards right optic; spread rest over hirsute scenery; give self a! glancing pile driver blow and trust to God that it will stay on and charm La Petite. SUNDAY Too lazy to write today. Went to | church. Heard a French Priest cuss or praise the Americans, I don’t know | which. He worked hard. Spent part | of the day trying to coax the dirt out of my clothes with a scrubbing | brush, a bar of soap, some beads of ! sweat and a determined disposition. | Vive La France. SEARCHING FIRE Bon Jour! Wee, Wee! We have changed our name. new one is more aesthetic. | We were delayed in publishing, ow- ! ing to the fact that our Sextuple Hoe : presses were slightly held up. We | will be on the job regularly every | The Serg’t. Quinn has left the staff to | engage in more arduous training to trim the Tartar at the Front. The sky smiles, the birds sing, the | girlies look beautiful, every soldier | walks on air, all wine is nectar, | France is wonderful. Pay day has ar- | rived and the pockets have enough francs to paper the walls of a billet. | “To make the world a decent place | to live in,” sighed the husky private | as he applied the fagot broom to the | barnyard. ! Official Communique from seat No. 3: “The Germans took Peruna and Castoria, just before starting their | big retreat. There is nothing else of ! importance to report.” i With the little “Go to Hell” hat, | the gas mask and the new Parisian | model of tin Kelly, we tell the world | fair that we are not responsible for | what we do to the Fritzies. Yep, we claim that the 311th has! ab-so-lute-ly the jazziest jazz band in France. There is an unconfirmed ru- mor that it will be on the Keith cir- cuit just after Christmas, if Europ- ean engagements permit. Even the French cows do that latest jazz step down the streets daily. Concerning Women. Three jails for the exclusive use of women and to be run entirely by wom- en are to be established in Chicago. Even the patrol wagons will be op- erated by women. The increase in the number of wom- en who have replaced men in Eng- land’s industries now number nearly a million and a half. More than 120,000 women in Italy are doing the hardest kind of work in occupations formerly held exclu- sively by men. Women employees in government plants are to have their health and welfare carefully supervised. Over 15,000 women can be used as hospital assistants or student nurses in the United States. on The woman’s committee of the Council of National Defense has pass- ed a resolution that all women of the | United States express their loyalty and respect to the colors and the Na- tional anthem by standing at atten- tion when the flag is passing or the National anthem is rendered. On an average the ultimate limit of a woman’s capacity appears to be about 75 to 80 per cent. of a man’s capacity as a worker. Young girls in England are taking strenuous exercises under the super- vision of experts so as to prepare them for hard and heavy work in the government plants later on. Female millinery workers in Mas- sachusetts have minimum wage rate. The Labor party, of Black County, England, have nominated Miss Eliz- abeth MacArthur as their candidate for a seat in the British Parliament. ‘Waste Paper. : The point raised by Representative Walsh, of Massachusetts, who com- | plains at the reckless waste of paper by the government, when newspapers are compelled to reduce the size of their publications in the interest of conservation of print paper, is well taken. As he so emphatically states, this profligate use of paper entails a tremendous expense to the taxpayers and offsets the economies in stocks effected by private concerns. “The War Industries Board,” he said, “has ordered the daily and week- ly newspapers to curtail in the use of print paper and to comply with other restrictions. This edict will be obey- ed by the press. Yet while calling for conservation and economy by stern decree on the part of the news- papers of the country, the Federal government has been and is practic- ing most wasteful methods in the use and consumption of print paper by its various activities and agencies.” Mr. Walsh has not far to look for evidence in support of his statements. It abounds in every branch of the gov- ernment in the form of bulletins and publications, pamphlets and reports, each small in itself but in the aggre- gate requiring an immense amount of paper and an equal amount of labor. Congress itself sins in the manner in which it pads out the pages of the Congressional Record with useless matter. The government certainly should practice the economy which it preaches.—Washington Post. Delayed "Ref erences. Old Goldrock’s chaffeur had join- ed the army and he had decided that now he would enlist the services of a woman driver for his car. When a young woman appeared in answer to his advertisement she was asked for a reference. “Well, sir, I haven’t one now, but I coy get one in a month or two,” she said. “Yes, but why the delay?” asked Goldrocks. “It’s like this, sir. My last employ- er is in the hospital at present.”— Chicago News. ———Subseribe for the “Watchman.” FOR AND ABOUT WOMEN. DAILY THOUGHT The soul is a fire which darts its ray through all the senses.—Madame de Stael. Look to the Kiddies.—The children : of the nation must be fed, they ought to have the right food, and the Unit- ced States Food Administration wants i you to give it to them. America’s purpose is to safeguard the coming generation. It would be foolish, indeed, to de- | fend the physical condition of the | present generation of children by short rations or the wrong kind of food. The children of today must be given those things that build strong bodies and good brains. _ This can be done without disregard- ing the country’s food program, for the war-time emergency foods are in many cases the most palatable and at the same time the most wholesome for the feeding of children. Milk is the prime requisite of all children’s diet. Every child should get a quart of milk 2 day in some form or other. Besides plenty of milk, he should have at least one cup- ful of some good cereal (and this can well be some other than wheat) much | fruit, only a little meat (for which an egg can readily be substituted) and fresh green vegetables. Fats have an important place in a child’s diet. But if a child is given a quart of whole milk every day, that along with the butter on his bread— to say nothing of the little meat or | egg in his daily diet—will furnish him with enough fat and will give it to him in the most wholesome form. Some sweet is also good in the di- et if given with meals or directly afterward. Conservation sweets, such as dates, raisins, stewed fruits, ete, are the best possible form of | sweets for the growing child. Des- serts should be of the simplest such as junket, rice, cornstarch or plain custards. Worth Knowing.—The covers of stamp books which are sold at any postoffice are firm enough to make a foundation for little slip coverings of i linen or silk. These covered stamp books will sell at any fair. Use for refrigerator dishes the wooden or pasteboard .plates; they are inexpensive, don’t break and can be bent a little to make more room. In cleaning wall paper use bread crumbs two _ days old; rub with a downward light stroke; never work horizontally; cut away the soiled parts of the bread as it is used. Use a little soda with baking pow- der; it improves the taste of cake or pudding. Cold hard-boiled eggs chopped fine and generously moistened with cream salad dressing spread thickly between dainty slices of bread are very nice. Make cup cakes; children like them better than loaf cake. Hard-boiled eggs with yolks re- moved, mashed and moistened with cream salad dressing, put back in whites and eggs wrapped in wax pa- per; bread and butter sandwiches to go with them. | Try making the new hairpin lace : and using it in place of hemstitching. | Make a loop with thread or crochet { cotton in middle of hairpin. Place | crochet needle on under side of hair- pin, and turn hairpin. Catch thread with crochet hook and draw through i loop. With crochet needle in loop in | middle of thread of hairpin catch { loop around the hairpin. You will i then have two loops of thread on cro- | chet needle, then catch thread with | needle and pull it through the two. i You will have the one loop in middle . of hairpin to start again. | If you wish to make a centerpiece | of leaves, try this stitch. First work | an ordinary stitch from side to side, following the outline on the leaf. A | cat stitch is a series of stitches tak- | en from side to side between two { lines. After leaf is filled with cat | stitches, take a new thread, and . starting up the top of the leaf take | two tight buttonhole stitches where | the threads cross, then carry the , thread across to the next crossed : stitches on opposite side and again take two buttonhole stitches. Work | back and forth in this way until the ! leaf is filled. Cover the marked line { of the leaf with Kensington outline "and it is complete. Activities of Women.—There are 1,000,000 more women than men in England today. The Japanese Red Cross has over 200,000 women members. _ The number of married women in industry has greatly increased since the war began. Secretary of War Baker claims that the war couldn’t go on without the aid of women. Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, the ar- dent Suffragist, is being boomed for a seat in Congress from the Nine- teenth district of New York. Women canteen workers in the French army are making use of the German prisoners by having them make tin cups from old tin cans. Miss Elizabeth L. DuVal, of Balti- more, who recently sailed on her first trip as junior operator, has the dis- tinction of being the first woman wireless operator to assume duty on the seas. Thoroughbred Code.—I believe in work. For discontent and labor are not often companions. I believe in leisure and in play. For neither mental nor physical develop- ment is possible without them. I believe in thrift. For to store up a little regularly, is to store up char- acter as well. I believe in simple living. For sim- plicity means health and health means happiness. I believe in loyalty. For if I am not true to others I cannot be true fo myself. I believe in a cheerful countenance. For a sour face is the sign of a grouch. : I believe in holding up my chin. For self-respect commands respect from others. I believe in keeping up my courage. For troubles flee before a brave front. I believe in bracing up my brother. For an encouraging word may save the day for him. I believe in living up to the best that is in me. For to lower the stan- dard is to give up the fight. - ) *