is weak. Good or evil purpose, Humanity has to pay the price.
Why! In that very fight for that little village of which I have been
telling you we were fighting for the shelter of those old houses as much
as victory. And with the French it was the same.

"It wasn't for the sake of glory, or for the sake of strategy. The
French knew that they would have to retreat before morning and we knew
perfectly well that they would go. As far as the war was concerned there
was nothing to fight about. Yet our infantry and theirs fought like wild
cats, or like heroes if you like that better, amongst the houses--hot
work enough---while the supports out in the open stood freezing in
a tempestuous north wind which drove the snow on earth and the great
masses of clouds in the sky at a terrific pace. The very air was
inexpressibly sombre by contrast with the white earth. I have never seen
God's creation look more sinister than on that day.

"We, the cavalry (we were only a handful), had not much to do except
turn our backs to the wind and receive some stray French round shot.
This, I may tell you, was the last of the French guns and it was the
last time they had their artillery in position. Those guns never went
away from there either. We found them abandoned next morning. But that
afternoon they were keeping up an infernal fire on our attacking column;
the furious wind carried away the smoke and even the noise but we could
see the constant flicker of the tongues of fire along the French front.
Then a driving flurry of snow would hide everything except the dark red
flashes in the white swirl.

"At intervals when the line cleared we could see away across the plain
to the right a sombre column moving endlessly; the great rout of the
Grand Army creeping on and on all the time while the fight on our left
went on with a great din and fury. The cruel whirlwind of snow swept
over that scene of death and desolation. And then the wind fell as
suddenly as it had arisen in the morning.

"Presently we got orders to charge the retreating column; I don't know
why unless they wanted to prevent us from getting frozen in our saddles
by giving us something to do. We changed front half right and got into
motion at a walk to take that distant dark line in flank. It might have
been half-past two in the afternoon.

"You must know that so far in this campaign my regiment had never been
on the main line of Napoleon's advance. All these months since the
invas