fend, le Nord, le Pas-de-Calais, and la Somme, and Jean's plan, not a
difficult one to carry into execution, was simply to make for Bouillon
and thence complete his journey across Belgian territory. He knew that
the 23d corps was being recruited, mainly from such old soldiers of
Sedan and Metz as could be gathered to the standards. He had heard it
reported that General Faidherbe was about to take the field, and
had definitely appointed the next ensuing Sunday as the day of his
departure, when news reached him of the battle of Pont-Noyelle, that
drawn battle which came so near being a victory for the French.

It was Dr. Dalichamp again in this instance who offered the services of
his gig and himself as driver to Bouillon. The good man's courage
and kindness were boundless. At Raucourt, where typhus was raging,
communicated by the Bavarians, there was not a house where he had not
one or more patients, and this labor was additional to his regular
attendance at the two hospitals at Raucourt and Remilly. His ardent
patriotism, the impulse that prompted him to protest against unnecessary
barbarity, had twice led to his being arrested by the Prussians, only
to be released on each occasion. He gave a little laugh of satisfaction,
therefore, the morning he came with his vehicle to take up Jean, pleased
to be the instrument of assisting the escape of another of the victims
of Sedan, those poor, brave fellows, as he called them, to whom he gave
his professional services and whom he aided with his purse. Jean, who
knew of Henriette's straitened circumstances and had been suffering from
lack of funds since his relapse, accepted gratefully the fifty francs
that the doctor offered him for traveling expenses.

Father Fouchard did things handsomely at the leave-taking, sending
Silvine to the cellar for two bottles of wine and insisting that
everyone should drink a glass to the extermination of the Germans.
He was a man of importance in the country nowadays and had his "plum"
hidden away somewhere or other; he could sleep in peace now that the
francs-tireurs had disappeared, driven like wild beasts from their lair,
and his sole wish was for a speedy conclusion of the war. He had even
gone so far in one of his generous fits as to pay Prosper his wages in
order to retain his services on the farm, which the young man had no
thought of leaving. He touched glasses with Prosper, and also with
Silvine, whom he at times was half inclined to marr