ter overshadowing
them.

Maurice's eyes were bent on the horizon, where it was reddened with the
flames of burning Falaise. They had one consolation, however: the train
that had been believed to be lost came crawling along out of the Chene
road. Without delay the 2d division put itself in motion and struck out
across the forest for Boult-aux-Bois; the 3d took post on the heights
of Belleville to the left in order to keep an eye to the communications,
while the 1st remained at Quatre-Champs to wait for the coming up of the
train and guard its countless wagons. Just then the rain began to come
down again with increased violence, and as the 106th moved off the
plateau, resuming the march that should have never been, toward the
Meuse, toward the unknown, Maurice thought he beheld again his vision
of the night: the shadow of the Emperor, incessantly appearing and
vanishing, so sad, so pitiful a sight, on the white curtain of good old
Madame Desvallieres. Ah! that doomed army, that army of despair, that
was being driven forward to inevitable destruction for the salvation of
a dynasty! March, march, onward ever, with no look behind, through mud,
through rain, to the bitter end!

VI.

"Thunder!" Chouteau ejaculated the following morning when he awoke,
chilled and with aching bones, under the tent, "I wouldn't mind having a
bouillon with plenty of meat in it."

At Boult-aux-Bois, where they were now encamped, the only ration
issued to the men the night before had been an extremely slender one
of potatoes; the commissariat was daily more and more distracted and
disorganized by the everlasting marches and countermarches, never
reaching the designated points of rendezvous in time to meet the troops.
As for the herds, no one had the faintest idea where they might be upon
the crowded roads, and famine was staring the army in the face.

Loubet stretched himself and plaintively replied:

"Ah, _fichtre_, yes!--No more roast goose for us now."

The squad was out of sorts and sulky. Men couldn't be expected to be
lively on an empty stomach. And then there was the rain that poured down
incessantly, and the mud in which they had to make their beds.

Observing Pache make the sign of the cross after mumbling his morning
prayer, Chouteau captiously growled:

"Ask that good God of yours, if he is good for anything, to send us down
a couple of sausages and a mug of beer apiece."

"Ah, if we only had a good big loaf of bread!" s