Glances from my Hotel Bristol window overlooking Warsaw's main street, day after day, furnished me with thousands of words of descriptive material for the Associated Press dispatches. It seemed that the head office in New York was bloodthirsty, insatiable for more and more picture stuff of the horrors of the newest war.

One drizzling afternoon with this endless procession passing, my eyes fell on a staggering animal, once a horse, a skinny, meagerly dressed boy of six or seven was leading. The harnessed four hoofs were tugging at four rickety wheels. A length of flat boards served as the wagon bed.

The framework structure containing the wagon load consisted of rough planks of seven feet or so and two feet up and two feet across. The boxlike affair apparently had been tacked together overnight.

Trudging behind was a small, thin woman with faltering steps. Strands of hair dangled beneath a rain-soaked scarf. At times she clung to the edge of the vehicle for support and assistance along the way.

Her right hand held the image of the tiny hand of what appeared to be a rag doll, rather than the little, three-year-old girl that it really was. Crying and near exhaustion, the child was taken into the mother's arms, with difficulty at intervals of relief. Over the woman's narrow shoulders were draped a long, well-worn winter overcoat. It was heavy and she attempted at times with her left hand to gather the folds of the garment as she would a long skirt to prevent tripping.

I watched this passing of living drama five or six minutes. And then it was gone.

Where were the other mourners, the relatives, friends, neighbors?

For some 48 years this picture of life in the real and rough has been with me; that frail, little figure of a woman, clinging so carousingly to that enormous, old, thread-bare overcoat to the very last---that remnant of the husband and father in the box.