The Glory of the Coming by Irvin S. Cobb

THERE was mingled comedy and woe in the scenes at Paris on the memorable day when the great long-distance gun -- which the Parisians promptly christened "Big Bertha" in tribute to the titular mistress the Krupp works where it was produced -- first opened upon the city from seventy-odd miles away and thereby established, among other records, a precedent for distance and scope in artillery bombardments. Paris was in a fit mood for emotion. The people were on edge; their nerves tensed, for there had been an alarm the evening before. The raiding planes had been turned back at the suburbs and driven off by the barrage fire, but the populace mainly had flocked into the _abris_ and the underground stations of the Metropolitain.

At ten o'clock that night, after the danger was over, a funny thing occurred: The crew of a motor-drawn fire engine had fuddled themselves with wine, and for upward of half an hour the driver drove his red wagon at top speed up and down the Rue de Rivoli, past the Tuileries Gardens. With him he had four of his _confreres_ in blue uniforms and brass helmets. These rode two on a side behind him, their helmets shining in the bright moonlight like pots of gold turned upside down; and as they rode the two on one side sounded the _alerte_ signal on sirens, and the two on the other side sounded the "all clear" on bugles; and between blasts all four rocked in their places with joy over their little joke.