sm of the foreigners who were
offering their blood for France. Many were lamenting that the government
should delay twenty days, until after they had finished the operations
of mobilization, in admitting the volunteers. And he, a Frenchman born,
a few hours before, had been mistrusting his country! . . .

In the daytime the popular current was running toward the Gare de l'Est.
Crowded against the gratings was a surging mass of humanity stretching
its tentacles through the nearby streets. The station that was acquiring
the importance of a historic spot appeared like a narrow tunnel
through which a great human river was trying to flow with many rippling
encounters and much heavy pressure against its banks. A large part of
France in arms was coursing through this exit from Paris toward the
battlefields at the frontier.

Desnoyers had been in the station only twice, when going and coming from
Germany. Others were now taking the same road. The crowds were swarming
in from the environs of the city in order to see the masses of human
beings in geometric bodies, uniformly clad, disappearing within the
entrance with flash of steel and the rhythm of clanking metal. The
crystal archways that were glistening in the sun like fiery mouths were
swallowing and swallowing people. When night fell the processions were
still coming on, by light of the electric lamps. Through the iron grills
were passing thousands and thousands of draught horses; men with their
breasts crossed with metal and bunches of horsehair hanging from their
helmets, like paladins of bygone centuries; enormous cases that were
serving as cages for the aeronautic condors; strings of cannon, long
and narrow, painted grey and protected, by metal screens, more like
astronomical instruments than mouths of death; masses and masses of
red kepis (military caps) moving in marching rhythm, rows and rows of
muskets, some black and stark like reed plantations, others ending in
bayonets like shining spikes. And over all these restless fields of
seething throngs, the flags of the regiments were fluttering in the air
like colored birds; a white body, a blue wing, or a red one, a cravat of
gold on the neck, and above, the metal tip pointing toward the clouds.

Don Marcelo would return home from these send-offs vibrating with
nervous fatigue, as one who had just participated in a scene of racking
emotion. In spite of his tenacious character which always stood out
against admitting a