ti, the commander of the Eclaireurs
of the Seine, is lying--a portion of his hip has been blown away by a
shell, and the doctor has just told me that he fears that he will not
recover, as the wound is too high up for an operation. In the room
beyond him is a young lieutenant of Mobiles, who has had his leg
amputated, and his right arm cut open to extract a portion of the bone,
and who still has a ball in his shoulder. Most of the soldiers in here
are wounded either in the leg or in the arm. There is a great dearth of
doctors, and many wounded who were brought here last night had to wait
until this morning before their turn came to be examined. The American
Ambulance and several others are also, I hear, full. I go in
occasionally to see the Germans, as I can talk their language, and it
cheers them to hear it. I see in the newspapers that wounded Bavarians
and Saxons are perpetually crying "Vive la France!" I can only say that
those here do nothing of the kind. They do not seem to be particularly
downcast at finding themselves in the hands of their enemies. They are
treated precisely as the French are, and they are grateful for this.

It is said this evening that the troops will be withdrawn and return to
the Bois de Vincennes. Some say that we have left 20,000 men at Villiers
and Champigny; but I take it that our loss does not exceed 6,000 men.
The general idea seems to be, that to-morrow we are to try to get out in
another direction, either by Chatillon or Malmaison. A pigeon came in
this morning from Bourbaki, with a despatch dated Nov. 30, stating that
he is advancing, and among the soldiers this despatch has already become
an official notice that he is at Meaux. All I know for certain is that
the ambulances are ordered out for eight o'clock to-morrow morning, and
that I am now going to bed, so as to be ready to start with them. I hear
that there has been fighting both yesterday and to-day near Bondy; but
not being able to be in two places at once, I cannot tell what really
occurred. To my civilian judgment it appears that as our object was to
force the line of heights on the south-east of Paris, which constitute
the Prussian lines of investment in that direction, and as we have not
done so, we can hardly be said to be in a better position than we were
last Monday. At a heavy cost of life we have purchased the knowledge
that our new artillery is better than was expected, and that Line and
Mobiles will stand under fire