Above the graves the grasses nod,
Below the fort the poppies bow.
Mother of all, to thee and God
The war-taught nations make their vow—
By stars that shone and hopes that led
We shall be worthy of our dead!
THE DAY OF GLORY
... if the armistice is signed, a salvo of cannon from the Invalides at eleven o'clock will announce the end of the war.
The clock hands crept slowly past ten and lagged intolerably thereafter. The rapid beating of your heart, telling off the minutes, brought eleven finally very near. Then the clock, your heart, all the world, seemed to stand still. The great moment was there. Would the announcing cannon speak? Such a terrible silence as the world kept during that supreme moment of suspense! It was the quintessence of all the moral torture of four nightmare years.
And then ... like a shock within your own body it came, the first solemn proclamation of the cannon, shaking the windows, the houses, the very sky, with its news. The war was over. The
