There on that famous sector of the French line, where Castelnau and Langle de Cary in the autumn of the same year had all but broken through, he remained through the whole of 1916.

That was the year of Verdun and the Somme.

Neither the Allies nor the enemy had men or energy to spare for important action in Champagne that year; but Gouraud's watch was never surprised, and again he was able to acquaint himself with every military feature, and every local peculiarity of the desolate chalk-hills where France has buried so many thousands of her sons.

At the end of 1916, his old chief, General Lyautey, now French Minister for War, insisted on his going back to Morocco as Governor; but happily for the Army of Champagne, the interlude was short, and by the month of May, Lyautey was once more in Morocco and Gouraud in Champagne--to remain there in command of his beloved Fourth Army till the end of the war.
* * * * * Such then, in brief outline, was the story of the great man whose guests we were proud to be on that January evening.

Dinner was very animated and gay.