nt and ingenuity; they assisted those who
could walk, and carried others, either in their arms, like little
children, or pickaback when the nature of the hurt allowed it; at other
times they united in groups of two, three, or four, according to the
requirements of the case, and made a chair by joining their hands,
or carried the patient off by his legs and shoulders in a recumbent
posture. In addition to the stretchers provided by the medical
department there were all sorts of temporary makeshifts, such as the
stretchers improvised from knapsack straps and a couple of muskets. And
in every direction on the unsheltered, shell-swept plain they could
be seen, singly or in groups, hastening with their dismal loads to the
rear, their heads bowed and picking their steps, an admirable spectacle
of prudent heroism.

Maurice saw a pair on his right, a thin, puny little fellow lugging
a burly sergeant, with both legs broken, suspended from his neck; the
sight reminded the young man of an ant, toiling under a burden many
times larger than itself; and even as he watched them a shell burst
directly in their path and they were lost to view. When the smoke
cleared away the sergeant was seen lying on his back, having received
no further injury, while the bearer lay beside him, disemboweled. And
another came up, another toiling ant, who, when he had turned his dead
comrade on his back and examined him, took the sergeant up and made off
with his load.

It gave Maurice a chance to read Lapoulle a lesson.

"I say, if you like the business, why don't you go and give that man a
lift!"

For some little time the batteries at Saint-Menges had been thundering
as if determined to surpass all previous efforts, and Captain Beaudoin,
who was still tramping nervously up and down before his company line,
at last stepped up to the colonel. It was a pity, he said, to waste the
men's morale in that way and keep their minds on the stretch for hours
and hours.

"I can't help it; I have no orders," the colonel stoically replied.

They had another glimpse of General Douay as he flew by at a gallop,
followed by his staff. He had just had an interview with General de
Wimpffen, who had ridden up to entreat him to hold his ground, which he
thought he could promise to do, but only so long as the Calvary of Illy,
on his right, held out; Illy once taken, he would be responsible for
nothing; their defeat would be inevitable. General de Wimpffen averred
that