made my knees tremble. Zebede took my musket,
telling me to read it, for he, too, was glad to hear from home.

I put it in my pocket, and all our Phalsbourg men followed me to hear
it, but I only commenced when I was quietly seated on my bed in the
barracks, while they crowded around. Tears rolled down my cheeks as
she told me how she remembered and prayed for the far-off conscript.

My comrades, as I read, exclaimed:

"And we are sure that there are some at home to pray for us, too."

One spoke of his mother, another of his sisters, and another of his
sweetheart.

At the end of the letter, Monsieur Goulden added a few words, telling
me that all our friends were well, and that I should take courage, for
our troubles could not last forever. He charged me to be sure to tell
my comrades that their friends thought of them and complained of not
having received a word from them.

This letter was a consolation to us all. We knew that before many days
passed we must be on the field of battle, and it seemed a last farewell
from home for at least half of us. Many were never to hear again from
their parents, friends, or those who loved them in this world.

XII

But, as Sergeant Pinto said, all we had yet seen was but the prelude to
the ball; the dance was now about to commence.

Meanwhile we did duty at the citadel with a battalion of the
Twenty-seventh, and from the top of the ramparts we saw all the
environs covered with troops, some bivouacking, others quartered in the
villages.

The sergeant had formed a particular friendship for me, and on the
eighteenth, on relieving guard at Warthau gate, he said:

"Fusilier Bertha, the Emperor has arrived."

I had yet heard nothing of this, and replied, respectfully:

"I have just had a little glass with the sapper Merlin, sergeant, who
was on duty last night at the general's quarters, and he said nothing
of it."

Then he, closing his eye, said, with a peculiar expression:

"Everything is moving; I feel his presence in the air. You do not yet
understand this, conscript, but he is here; everything says so. Before
he came, we were lame, crippled; only a wing of the army seemed able to
move at once. But now, look there, see those couriers galloping over
the road; all is life. The dance is beginning: the dance is beginning!
Kaiserliks and the Cossacks do not need spectacles to see that he is
with us; they will feel him presently."

And the sergeant's laugh r