The Downfall (La Débâcle). Emile Zola

ankles. The solitude now seemed to have become more vast, and the only living creatures they encountered were some emaciated sheep, guarded by a big black dog.

      At last, at about four o'clock, the 106th halted at Dontrien, a village on the banks of the Suippe. The little river meanders between tufts of foliage, and the old church stands in a graveyard, which a gigantic horse-chestnut tree fairly covers with its spreading shade. The regiment pitched its tents in a sloping meadow on the left bank of the stream. According to the officers, the four army corps would bivouac that night along the line of the Suippe from Auberive to Heutrégiville, by way of Dontrien, Béthiniville and Pont-Faverger, with a front extending along a distance of nearly five leagues.

      Gaude immediately sounded the call to rations, and Jean, the great purveyor in ordinary, ever on the alert, had to hurry off, taking Lapoulle with him. They returned in half an hour's time with a rib of beef and a faggot of wood. Three oxen of the drove that followed in the rear of the army had already been slaughtered and cut up. Lapoulle then had to go off again to fetch the bread which had been baking since noon in the village ovens. Excepting wine and tobacco, which were never once distributed during the whole period, there was on this occasion an abundance of everything.

      Jean, on his return, had found Chouteau engaged in pitching the tent with Pache's assistance. He looked at them for a moment like an experienced old soldier who considered they were making a mess of the job, and finally remarked: 'Well, that'll do since it's going to be fine to-night. But if it were windy we should all be blown into the river. I shall have to teach you how to pitch the tent properly.'

      Then he thought of sending Maurice to fetch some water in the large can, but he saw that the young fellow had seated himself on the grass, and had taken off his shoe to examine his right foot. 'Hallo! what's up?' asked Jean.

      'The counter has rubbed the skin off my heel. My other shoes were going to pieces, and at Rheims, stupidly enough, I chose these because they were just my size. I ought to have taken a larger pair.'

      Kneeling down, Jean took hold of Maurice's foot and turned it round as gently as though he were dealing with a child. 'It isn't a laughing matter,' he said, shaking his head; 'you must be careful. A soldier who can't depend on his feet may just as well be chucked on a rubbish heap. My captain was always saying, out in Italy, that battles are won with men's legs.'

      Thereupon, Jean sent Pache to fetch the water, which, after all, was an easy task, since the river was only some fifty yards away. Meantime, Loubet, having lighted the wood in a hole which he had dug in the ground, was able to set the large pot upon it, dropping the meat, which he had skilfully secured together with string, into the warm water. Then came the blissful enjoyment of watching the soupe boil. Fatigue duties being over, all the men of the squad, full of tender solicitude for the cooking meat, had stretched themselves on, the grass around the fire. Like children and savages, brutified by this march towards the Unknown with its uncertain morrow, they now seemed to care for nothing but eating and sleeping.

      Maurice, however, had found in his knapsack one of the newspapers he had bought at Rheims, and Chouteau on seeing it exclaimed: 'Is there any news of the Prussians? You must read it to us.'

      Under Jean's steadily increasing authority the men were now getting on fairly well together; and Maurice obligingly began to read all the interesting news, whilst Pache, the squad's needlewoman, mended a tear in his overcoat for him, and Lapoulle cleaned his gun. First of all there was an account of a great victory gained by Bazaine, who was said to have thrown an entire Prussian army corps headlong into the stone quarries of Jaumont; and this imaginary narrative[20] was a dramatically circumstantial one; the enemy's men and horses were said to have been crushed to death among the rocks, annihilated in fact, to such a degree, that not one whole body was left for burial! Then came copious particulars respecting the pitiful condition of the German armies since they had entered France. Badly fed and badly equipped, the men had fallen into a state of complete destitution, and, stricken with fearful maladies, were dying en masse by the wayside. Another article related that the King of Prussia had the diarrhœa, and that Bismarck had broken his leg in jumping out of the window of an inn where some Zouaves had almost caught him. That was capital! Lapoulle laughed from ear to ear, whilst Chouteau and the others, who did not for one moment entertain the shadow of a doubt, felt wondrous bold at the idea that they would soon be picking up Prussians like sparrows in a field after a hailstorm. But it was especially Bismarck's fall that amused them. The Zouaves and the Turcos were plucky devils, and no mistake. All sorts of legends were current concerning these fellows, who not merely made Germany tremble but angered her as well. It was disgraceful, so the German papers declared, that a civilised nation should employ such savages in her defence. And although these so-called savages had already been decimated at Frœschweiler, it seemed to the French as if they were still intact and invincible.

      Six o'clock was striking from the little steeple of Dontrien when Loubet called: 'The soupe is ready!' The squad seated itself devoutly round the pot. At the last moment Loubet had been able to procure some vegetables from a peasant living close by, so that the broth had a fine scent of carrots and leeks, and was as soft to the palate as velvet. Then Jean, the distributor, had to divide the meat into strictly equal portions, for the men's eyes were aglow, and there would certainly have been much growling had any one portion appeared to be in the smallest degree larger than the others. Everything was devoured, the men gorging themselves to their very eyes.

      Even Maurice felt replete and happy, no longer thinking of his foot, the smarting of which was passing away. He now accepted this brutish comradeship, principles of equality being forced upon him, by the physical needs of their common life. That night, too, he enjoyed the same sound slumber as his five companions, the whole lot of them being heaped together in the tent, well pleased at feeling themselves warm whilst the dew was falling so abundantly outside. It should be added that Lapoulle, egged on by Loubet, had removed some large armfuls of straw from a neighbouring rick, and on this the six men snored as comfortably as though they had been provided with feather beds. And in the clear night, along the pleasant banks of the Suippe, flowing slowly between the willows, the camp fires of those hundred thousand men illumined the five leagues of plain from Auberive to Heutrégiville, like trailing stars.

      Coffee was made at sunrise, the grains being pounded in a platter with the butt of a gun, and thrown into boiling water, to which a drop of cold water was added in order to precipitate the grounds. The sun rose that morning with regal magnificence, amid great clouds of gold and purple. Maurice, however, no longer looked at the horizon or the sky, and only Jean, like the thoughtful peasant he was, gazed with an expression of uneasiness at this ruddy dawn which betokened rain. Indeed, before they started, when the bread baked the day before had been given out, and Loubet and Pache had fastened the three long loaves which the squad received to their knapsacks, he blamed them for having done so. The tents were already folded, however, and everything had been strapped to the knapsacks, so that he was not listened to. Six o'clock was striking from all the village steeples when the army set out again, gallantly resuming its forward march in the early hopefulness of this new day.

      To reach the road from Rheims to Vouziers the 106th almost immediately began cutting along by-ways and ascending slopes of stubble. This lasted during more than an hour. Lower down, towards the north, Béthiniville, where the Emperor was said to have slept, could be seen embowered in trees. Then, on reaching the Vouziers road, they again found themselves among plains similar to those of the day before. The last sorry fields of 'la Champagne pouilleuse' were here spread out in all their dispiriting monotony. A meagre stream, the Arne, now flowed on the left, whilst the vast expanse of barren land stretched away on the right, so flat that the distance of the horizon was considerably increased. The soldiers passed through some villages, St. Clément, with its only street winding along the road, and St. Pierre, a large place inhabited by well-to-do folks, who had barricaded their doors and windows. The men halted at about ten o'clock near another village, St. Etienne, where, to their great delight, they were able to procure some tobacco. The Seventh Corps had now become divided into several columns, and the 106th marched on with merely a battalion of foot Chasseurs and the reserve artillery behind it. Vainly did Maurice turn round at the bends of the road, in the hope of seeing the immense convoy which had so greatly interested him the day before; the