upon him.

"He is alive," one of them said, stooping over him, "he is gasping for
breath. I think he is dying, but, anyhow, we may as well carry him in."

They lifted the man, and as they did so several shots rang out from the
French outposts. As soon as they had gone on Cuthbert sat up to listen.
He could hear now the heavy tread of men who were, it seemed to him,
crossing from the right towards the German village. He listened for a
minute or two to assure himself that he was not mistaken, and then
crawled back towards his own outposts.

"Don't fire," he said, when he knew that he must be near to them, "I am
one of those who went out just now."

"Don't fire," he heard a voice he knew to be the lieutenant's repeat,
"It is Hartington. I was afraid he was done for." A minute later he
joined him.

At this moment a sharp fire broke out from the German lines, showing
that their party had also returned to their outposts.

"You will find Des Valles farther along, Hartington; if you have
anything to report you had better go to him at once, you can tell me
afterwards how you escaped. I had quite given you up."

"I suppose I had better go to him," Cuthbert said, "but I have not much
to report except that there is no doubt the noise we heard was caused by
a heavy column of men marching into the village over there."

Cuthbert found the captain and made his report.

"Thank you, Hartington. We were pretty well convinced it was so, for
even before the firing between your party and the Germans began, the
sound was loud enough to be clearly distinguished. I suppose you can
give no guess at their numbers?"

"They were a strong body, but how strong I could not tell. A hundred
Prussians marching will make as much noise as five hundred Frenchmen,
but even allowing for that I should think there will be at least one
strong battalion, perhaps more."

"If that is the case we must be on the lookout. Of course they may fancy
we mean to attack them, but on the other hand they may intend to push
forward. I will go with you to the colonel; he ought to know what you
think about it. He was along here a few minutes ago, but the noise was
not so plain then, and we did not estimate the force to be anything like
as strong as it is in your opinion."

Cuthbert made his report to the colonel, and the latter at once went
forward with Des Valles to the outposts, after giving orders for the men
in the houses to fall in at once and be ready either