in order to maintain it, yet in
spite of that, the crew for ages and ages, had never known an instant
of agreement, of team work, of clear reason. Periodically half of them
would clash with the other half. They killed each other that they might
enslave the vanquished on the rolling deck floating over the abyss; they
fought that they might cast their victims from the vessel, filling
its wake with cadavers. And from the demented throng there were still
springing up gloomy sophistries to prove that a state of war was the
perfect state, that it ought to go on forever, that it was a bad dream
on the part of the crew to wish to regard each other as brothers with a
common destiny, enveloped in the same unsteady environment of mystery.
. . . Ah, human misery!

Julio was drawn out of these pessimistic reflections by the childish
glee which many of the convalescents were evincing. Some were
Mussulmans, sharpshooters from Algeria and Morocco. In Lourdes, as they
might be anywhere, they were interested only in the gifts which the
people were showering upon them with patriotic affection. They all
surveyed with indifference the basilica inhabited by "the white lady,"
their only preoccupation being to beg for cigars and sweets.

Finding themselves regaled by the dominant race, they became greatly
puffed up, daring everything like mischievous children. What pleased
them most was the fact that the ladies would take them by the hand.
Blessed war that permitted them to approach and touch these white women,
perfumed and smiling as they appeared in their dreams of the paradise
of the blest! "Lady . . . Lady," they would sigh, looking at them with
dark, sparkling eyes. And not content with the hand, their dark paws
would venture the length of the entire arm while the ladies laughed at
this tremulous adoration. Others would go through the crowds, offering
their right hand to all the women. "We touch hands." . . . And then they
would go away satisfied after receiving the hand clasp.

Desnoyers wandered a long time around the basilica where, in the shadow
of the trees, were long rows of wheeled chairs occupied by the wounded.
Officers and soldiers rested many hours in the blue shade, watching
their comrades who were able to use their legs. The sacred grotto was
resplendent with the lights from hundreds of candles. Devout crowds
were kneeling in the open air, fixing their eyes in supplication on the
sacred stones whilst their thoughts were fly