Roumania wants Transylvania just north in Hungary, occupied by 2,500,000 people, the majority Roumanians—­this will make her 10,000,000 people—­and Italy wants territory from Austria and naval ports on the Adriatic sea.

Neither Italy nor Roumania has its full war supplies and equipments.  Servia, however, has been terribly pounded by Austria and but for her good fortune in pushing Austria back out of Servia in December, the Roumanians with their 450,000 well-organized troops might have had to come to her assistance earlier than was prepared for.  Indeed, it is now expected that Italy and Roumania will move against Austria within a few weeks.  Russia and the Allies are making their agreements for this intervention.

And what does America know about these movements on the European chessboard, and upon what basis should she aspire to be arbiter or peace adviser?

CHAPTER V

FRANCE AND THE FRENCH

Signs of War not Conspicuous—­Paris reopened—­A Rejuvenation—­English and American Help—­French Casualties—­French Heroes.

One enters France nowadays by the Folkestone and Dieppe route, which is a four-hour Channel trip or longer, or by Folkestone and Boulogne, a Channel trip of ninety minutes more or less.  All the routes to Calais are used by the government for its troops, supplies, and munitions.  England’s hospital base is at Boulogne.  Here is the center of her Red Cross work, with a dozen big hospital ships commandeered from the P. & O. line and bearing distinctive stripes around their hulls.  One hospital ship is set apart for the wounded Indians, and the apartments within are fitted up according to the various religious castes prevalent among the troops of India now fighting in France and Flanders.  Here at times puts in Lord Zetland’s yacht, fitted out by Queen Alexandra for wounded English officers.

When you travel by rail, if you did not know that war was in the country you would never suspect it, unless you wondered why a red-hatted, blue-coated guard, with a rifle carelessly swung over his shoulder, is noticeable now and then by a cross-road or near the buttress of an important railroad bridge.  You pass trains of troops, but the uniforms are quiet, the men jovial and unwarlike.  The wounded are not conspicuously moved by day.

Although you are not many miles away from the firing line, where an average of more than ten thousand are daily falling, the country is as peaceful and quiet as can be imagined.  The big black and white horses are winter ploughing.  The red and black cattle and the sheep and hogs are grazing in fields and pastures.  The reddening willows speak of an early spring, and the full blue streams tell the brown grasses, and the tall poplars that their colors will soon be gayer.