as a
general rule, is of no mean stature. Even in days when rations may be
reduced owing to the British blockade, which holds up supplies destined
for the German Empire, German recruits are still plump and fat, and
Brandenburgers not less so than their fellows. Thus the task of
turning dead men over and filching their garments, hard enough in any
case, was made more difficult in the darkness, particularly so for
young fellows such as Jules and Henri, who were not stoutly built like
the Germans.

"Slip on any sort of an old coat and helmet at first," Henri advised,
"then if that Max comes back we can push our way in amongst the bodies
of the fallen, and he'll be none the wiser. Later, when we have the
opportunity, we can make a more leisurely search, and perhaps we shall
be lucky in finding garments that fit us."

It was a fortunate thing, indeed, that they decided on such a plan.
For as they went about the hall, stooping over the bodies of the
fallen, endeavouring to select and discover clothes likely to suit
their own stature, a loud order was heard from behind the battered end
of the hall, and presently some twenty men inarched in, the short and
snappy officer leading them.

"Pull out the fellows who are still alive, or not too seriously
injured," he commanded. "Leave the dead till later on. Now hurry!"

Parties of stretcher-bearers followed the soldiers, and, starting at
once, began to bend over the fallen forms lying about the hall, turning
men over, dragging the dead aside, and lifting those who were wounded
out of the mass. Coming to a distant corner, not so far indeed from
the exit leading to the stairway which Jules and Henri had defended, a
party of bearers discovered a pack of Germans lying in all directions,
their limbs stretched in the most fantastic postures, some on their
sides, their heads resting on an arm as if they were sleeping; others
on their faces, their arms doubled up beneath them; and others, again,
on their backs, stiff and stark already.

"Dead!" said the commander of the party, a junior non-commissioned
officer. "On one side with him!"

"Dead!" repeated one of the bearers, leaning over another figure.
"Here, he's not a big man, I can manage him single-handed."

"As dead as any," cried a third, and seemed quite jovial about it.
"Here we are! He's no weight at all--quite a puny fellow for a
Brandenburger."

They dragged perhaps half a dozen bodies away from the corner to the