es of fugitives, and finally we should be
surrounded, either cut to pieces or forced to surrender. Of two things,
I am not sure that it would not be best for us to be handsomely thrashed
on the first day of our sortie."

"You take a very gloomy view of things," she said, almost angrily.

"Why, I should have thought you would be pleased. I am prophesying
success for your friends, the Germans."

"I don't know why you should always insist that they are my friends. I
was of opinion that they were right at first, and am so still, but I
think they now are behaving hardly and cruelly; at least I think
Bismarck is. It was heartless for him to insist, as a condition of the
armistice, that Paris should not be re-victualled while it lasted. Of
course they could not agree to that, though they would have agreed to
anything like fair conditions. Everyone really wanted peace, and if the
Germans hadn't insisted on those terms, peace would have been made. So
things have changed altogether, and it is clear that not the Germans,
but their leaders, want to injure and humiliate France to the utmost.
They were not content with their pound of flesh, but they want to
destroy France altogether. I despised these people at first, but I don't
despise them now. At least they are wonderfully patient, and though they
know what they will have to suffer when everything is eaten up, no one
has said a word in favor of surrender, since Bismarck showed how
determined he was to humiliate them."

"I think I shall win my bet after all, Mary."

"I am not so sure as I was that you won't. I didn't think I could ever
have eaten horse-flesh, but it is really not so bad. Monsieur Michaud
told us, yesterday, that he dined out with some friends and had had both
cat and rat. Of course they were disguised with sauces, but the people
made no secret of what they were, and he said they were really very
nice. I don't think I could try them, but I don't feel as certain as I
did; anyhow, we haven't begun to touch our stores, and there is no talk
of confiscating everything yet."

CHAPTER XI.

Two men were sitting in a cabaret near the Halles. One was dressed in
the uniform of a sergeant of the National Guard. He was a
powerfully-built man, with a black beard and a mustache, and a rough
crop of hair that stuck out aggressively beneath his kepi. The other was
some fifteen years younger; beyond the cap he wore no military uniform.
He had a mustache only, and was