le brown _carmagnole_ of those days, was plodding his way
toward Carentan. When the first levies were made, there was little or
no discipline kept up. The exigencies of the moment scarcely admitted
of soldiers being equipped at once, and it was no uncommon thing to see
the roads thronged with conscripts in their ordinary clothes. The young
fellows went ahead of their company to the next halting place, or
lagged behind it; it depended upon their fitness to bear the fatigues
of a long march. This particular wayfarer was some considerable way in
advance of a company of conscripts on the way to Cherbourg, whom the
mayor was expecting to arrive every hour, for it was his duty to
distribute their billets. The young man's footsteps were still firm as
he trudged along, and his bearing seemed to indicate that he was no
stranger to the rough life of a soldier. The moon shone on the pasture
land about Carentan, but he had noticed great masses of white cloud
that were about to scatter showers of snow over the country, and
doubtless the fear of being overtaken by a storm had quickened his pace
in spite of his weariness.

The wallet on his back was almost empty, and he carried a stick in his
hand, cut from one of the high, thick box hedges that surround most of
the farms in Lower Normandy. As the solitary wayfarer came into
Carentan, the gleaming moonlit outlines of its towers stood out for a
moment with ghostly effect against the sky. He met no one in the silent
streets that rang with the echoes of his own footsteps, and was obliged
to ask the way to the mayor's house of a weaver who was working late.
The magistrate was not far to seek, and in a few minutes the conscript
was sitting on a stone bench in the mayor's porch waiting for his
billet. He was sent for, however, and confronted with that functionary,
who scrutinized him closely. The foot soldier was a good-looking young
man, who appeared to be of gentle birth. There was something
aristocratic in his bearing, and signs in his face of intelligence
developed by a good education.

"What is your name?" asked the mayor, eying him shrewdly.

"Julien Jussieu," answered the conscript.

"From--?" queried the official, and an incredulous smile stole over his
features.

"From Paris."

"Your comrades must be a good way behind?" remarked the Norman in
sarcastic tones.

"I am three leagues ahead of the battalion."

"Some sentiment attracts you to Carentan, of course,
citizen-consc