From the crowds which had been waiting all day for a chance to get to the guichets in the rear of other and greater crowds, there rose a murmur which seemed to me like a great sigh from stricken hearts.

On this October day, for example, there was no sign of surprise on the part of the buxom lady behind the guichet of the booking-office when I asked for a ticket to Béthune, although there had been heavy fighting in that district only a few hours before, at the end of a great battle extending over several days.