I was up early in the morning, and with my elbows on the work-bench I watched the people pass by; young men in blouses, poor old men in cotton caps and short vests; old women in jackets and woolen skirts, bent almost double, with staff or umbrella under their arms. They arrived by families. Monsieur the Sous-Préfet of Larrebourg, with his silver collar, and his secretary, had stopped the day before at the "Red Ox," and they were also looking out of the window. Toward eight o'clock, Monsieur Goulden began work, after breakfasting. I ate nothing, but stared and stared until Monsieur the Mayor, Parmentier and his coadjutor, came for Monsieur the Sous-Préfet.
The drawing began at nine, and soon we heard the clarionet of Pfifer-Karl and the violin of great Andrès resounding through the streets. They were playing the "March of the Swedes," an air to which thousands of poor wretches had left old Alsace for ever. The conscripts danced, linked arms, shouted until their voices seemed to pierce the clouds, stamped on the ground, waved their hats, trying to seem joyful while death was at their hearts. Well, it was the fashion; and big Andrès, withered, stiff, and yellow as boxwood, and his short chubby comrade, with cheeks extended to their utmost tension, seemed like people who would lead you to the churchyard all the while chatting indifferently.
That music, those cries, sent a shudder through my heart.
I had just put on my swallow-tailed coat and my beaver hat to go out, when Aunt Grédel and Catharine entered, saying:
"Good morning, Monsieur Goulden. We have come for the conscription."
Then I saw how Catharine had been crying. Her eyes were red, and she threw her arms around my neck, while her mother turned to me.
Monsieur Goulden said:
"It will soon be the turn of the young men of the city."
"Yes, Monsieur Goulden," answered Catharine, in a choking voice; "they have finished Harberg."
"Then it is time for you to go, Joseph," said he; "but do not grieve; do not be frightened. These drawings, you know, are only a matter of form. For a long while past none can escape; or if they escape one drawing, they are caught a year or two after. All the numbers are bad. When the council of exemption meets, we will see what is best to be done. To-day it is merely a sort of satisfaction they give people to draw in the lottery; but every one loses."
"No matter," said Aunt Grédel; "Joseph will win."
"Yes, yes," replied Monsieur Goulden, smiling, "he cannot fail."
Then I sallied forth with Catharine and Aunt Grédel, and we went to the town place, where the crowd was. In all the shops, dozens of conscripts, purchasing ribbons, thronged around the counters, weeping and singing as if possessed. Others in the inns embraced, sobbing; but still they sang. Two or three musicians of the neighborhood—the Gipsy Walteufel, Rosselkasten, and George Adam—had arrived, and their pieces thundered in terrible and heart-rending strains.
Catharine squeezed my arm. Aunt Grédel followed.
Opposite the guard-house I saw the peddler Pinacle affar off, his pack opened on a little table, and beside it a long pole decked with ribbons which he was selling to the conscripts.
I hastened to pass by him, when he cried:
"Ha! Cripple! Halt! Come here; I have a fine ribbon for you; you must have a magnificent one—one to draw a prize by."
He waved a long black ribbon above his head, and I grew pale despite myself. But as we ascended the steps of the mairie, a conscript was just descending; it was Klipfel, the smith of the French gate; he had drawn number eight, and shouted:
"The black for me, Pinacle! Bring it here, whatever may happen."
His face was gloomy, but he laughed. His little brother Jean was crying behind him, and said:
"No, no, Jacob! not the black!"
But Pinacle fastened the ribbon to the smith's hat, while the latter said:
"That is what we want now. We are all dead, and should wear our own mourning."
And he cried savagely:
"Vive l'Empereur!"
I was better satisfied to see the black ribbon on his hat than on mine, and I slipped quickly through the crowd to avoid Pinacle.
We had great difficulty in getting into the mairie and in climbing the old oak stairs, where people where going up and down in swarms. In the great hall above, the gendarme Kelz walked about, maintaining order as well as he could, and in the council-chamber at the side, where there is a painting of Justice with her eyes blindfolded, we heard them calling off the numbers. From time to time a conscript came put with flushed face, fastening his number on his cap and passing with bowed head through the crowd, like a furious bull who cannot see clearly and who would seem to wish to break his horns against the walls. Others, on the contrary, passed pale as death. The windows of the mairie were open, and without were heard six or seven pieces playing together. It was horrible.
I pressed Catharine's hand, and we passed slowly through the crowd to the hall where Monsieur the Sous-Préfet, the Mayors, and the Secretaries were seated on their tribune, calling the numbers aloud as if pronouncing sentence of death in a court of justice; for all those numbers were really sentences of death.
We waited a long while.
It seemed as if there was no longer a drop of blood in my veins, when at last my name was called.
I advanced, seeing and hearing nothing; I put my hand in the box and drew a number.
Monsieur the Sous-Préfet cried out:
"Number seventeen."
Then I departed without speaking, Catharine and her mother behind me. We went out into theplace, and, the air reviving me, I remembered that I had drawn number seventeen.
Aunt Grédel seemed confounded.
"And I put something into your pocket, too," said she; "but that rascal of a Pinacle gave you ill luck."
At the same time she drew from my coat-pocket the end of a cord. Great drops of sweat rolled down my forehead; Catharine was white as marble, and so we returned to Monsieur Goulden's.
"What number did you draw, Joseph?" he asked, as soon as he saw us.
"Seventeen," replied Aunt Grédel, sitting down, with her hands upon her knees.
Monsieur Goulden seemed troubled for a moment, but he said instantly:
"One is as good as another. All will go; the skeletons must be filled. But it don't matter for Joseph. I will go and see Monsieur the Mayor and Monsieur the Commandant. It will be telling no lie to say that Joseph is lame; all the town knows that; but among so many they may overlook him. That is why I go, so rest easy; do not be anxious."
These words of good Monsieur Goulden reassured Aunt Grédel and Catharine, who returned to Quatre-Vents full of hope; but they did not affect me, for from that moment I had not a moment of rest day or night.
The emperor had a good custom: he did not allow the conscripts to languish at home. Soon as the drawing was complete, the council of revision met, and a few days after came the orders to march. He did not do like those tooth-pullers who first show you their pincers and hooks and gaze for an hour into your mouth, so that you feel half dead before they make up their minds to begin work: he proceeded without loss of time.
A week after the drawing, the council of revision sat at the town hall, with all the mayors and a few notables of the country to give advice in case of need.
The day before Monsieur Goulden had put on his brown great-coat and his best wig to go to wind up Monsieur the Mayor's clock and that of the Commandant. He returned laughing and said:
"All goes well, Joseph. Monsieur the Mayor and Monsieur the Commandant know that you are lame; that is easy enough to be seen. They replied at once, Eh, Monsieur Goulden, the young man is lame; why speak of him? Do not be uneasy; we do not want the infirm; we want soldiers."
These words poured balm on my wounds, and that night I slept like one of the blessed. But the next day fear again assailed me; I remembered suddenly how many men full of defects had gone all the same, and how many others invented defects to deceive the council; for instance, swallowing injurious substances to make them pale; tying up their legs to give themselves swollen veins; or playing deaf, blind, or foolish. I had heard that vinegar would make one sick, and, without telling Monsieur Goulden, in my fear I swallowed all the vinegar in his bottle. Then I dressed myself, thinking that I looked like a dead man, for the vinegar was very strong; but when I entered Monsieur Goulden's room, he cried out:
"Joseph, what is the matter with you? You are as red as a cock's comb."
And, looking at myself in the mirror, I saw that my face was red to my ears and to the very tip of my nose. I was frightened, but instead of growing pale I became redder yet, and I cried out in my distress:
"Now I am lost indeed! I will seem like a man without a single defect, and full of health. The vinegar is rushing to my head."
"What vinegar?" asked Monsieur Goulden.
"That in your bottle. I drank it to make myself pale, as they say Mademoiselle Selapp, the organist, does. O Heavens! what a fool I was."
"That does not prevent your being lame," said Monsieur Goulden; "but you tried to deceive the council, which was dishonest. But it is half-past nine, and Werner is come to tell me you must be there at ten o'clock. So, hurry."
I had to go in that state; the heat of the vinegar seemed bursting from my cheeks, and when I met Catharine and her mother, who were waiting for me at the mairie, they scarcely knew me.
"How happy and satisfied you look!" said Aunt Grédel.
I would have fainted on hearing this if the vinegar had not sustained me in spite of myself. I went upstairs in terrible agony, without being able to move my tongue to reply, so great was the horror I felt at my folly.
Above, more than twenty-five conscripts who pretended to be infirm, had been examined and received, while twenty-five others, on a bench along the wall, sat with drooping heads awaiting their turn.
The old gendarme, Kelz, with his huge cocked hat, was walking about, and as soon as he saw me exclaimed: "At last! At last! Here is one, at all events, who will not be sorry to go; the love of glory is shining in his eyes. Very good, Joseph; I predict that at the end of the campaign you will be corporal."
"But I am lame," I cried angrily.
"Lame!" repeated Kelz, winking and smiling; "lame! No matter. With such health as yours you can always hold your own."
He had scarcely ceased speaking when the door of the hall of the Council of Revision opened, and the other gendarme, Werner, putting out his head, called, "Joseph Bertha."
I entered, limping as much as I could, and Werner shut the door. The mayors of the canton were seated in a semi-circle, Monsieur the Sous-Préfet and the Mayor of Phalsbourg in the middle, in arm-chairs, and the Secretary Frélig at his table. A Harberg conscript was dressing himself, the gendarme Descarmes helping him. This conscript, with a mass of brown hair falling over his eyes, his neck bare, and his mouth open as he caught his breath, seemed like a man going to be hanged. Two surgeons—the Surgeon-in-Chief of the Hospital, with another in uniform—were conversing in the middle of the hall. They turned to me, saying, "Take off your coat."
I did so. The others looked on.
Monsieur the Sous-Préfet observed:
"There is a young man full of health."
These words angered me, but I nevertheless replied respectfully:
"I am lame, Monsieur the Sous-Préfet."
The surgeons examined me, and the one from the hospital, to whom Monsieur the Commandant had doubtless spoken of me, said: "The left leg is a little short." "Bah!" said the other; "it is sound."
Then placing his hand upon my chest he said, "The conformation is good. Cough."
I coughed as freely as I could; but he found me all right, and said again:
"Look at his color. How good his blood must be!"
Then I, seeing that they would pass me if I remained silent, replied: "I have drank vinegar." "Ah!" said he; "that proves you have a good stomach; you like vinegar."
"But I am lame!" I cried in my distress.
"Bah! don't grieve at that," he answered; "your leg is sound. I'll answer for it."
"But that," said Monsieur the Mayor, "does not prevent his being lame from birth; all Phalsbourg knows that."
"The leg is too short," said the surgeon from the hospital; "it is doubtless a case for exemption."
"Yes," said the Mayor; "I am sure that this young man could not endure a long march; he would drop on the road the second mile."
The first surgeon said nothing more.
I thought myself saved, when Monsieur the Sous-Préfet asked: "You are really Joseph Bertha?"
"Yes, Monsieur the Sous-Préfet," I answered.
"Well, gentlemen," said he, taking a letter out of his portfolio, "listen."
He began to read the letter, which stated that, six months before, I had bet that I could go to Laverne and back quicker than Pinacle; that we had run the race, and I had won.
It was unhappily too true. The villain Pinacle had always taunted me with being a cripple, and in my anger I laid the wager. Every one knew of it. I could not deny it.
While I stood utterly confounded, the first surgeon said:
"That settles the question. Dress yourself." And, turning to the Secretary, he cried, "Good for service."
I took up my coat in despair.
Werner called another. I no longer saw anything. Some one helped me to get my arms in my coat-sleeves. Then I found myself upon the stairs, and while Catharine asked me what had passed, I sobbed aloud and would have fallen from top to bottom if Aunt Grédel had not supported me.
We went out by the rear-way and crossed the little court. I wept like a child, and Catharine did too.
Monsieur Goulden knowing that Aunt Grédel and Catharine would come to dine with us the day of the revision, had had a stuffed goose and two bottles of good Alsace wine sent from the "Golden Sheep." He was sure that I would be exempted at once. What was his surprise, then, to see us enter together in such distress.
"What is the matter?" said he, raising his silk cap over his bald forehead, and staring at us with eyes wide open.
I had not strength enough to answer. I threw myself into the armchair and burst into tears. Catharine sat down beside me, and our sobs redoubled.
Aunt Grédel said:
"The robbers have taken him."
"It is not possible!" exclaimed Monsieur Goulden, letting fall his arms by his side.
"It shows their villainy," replied my aunt, and, growing more and more excited, she cried, "Will a revolution never come again? Shall those wretches always be our masters?"
"Calm yourself, Mother Grédel," said Monsieur Goulden. "In the name of Heaven don't cry so loud. Joseph, tell me how it happened. They are surely mistaken; it cannot be possible otherwise. Did Monsieur the Mayor and the hospital surgeon say nothing?"
I told the history of the letter, and Aunt Grédel, who until then knew nothing of it, again shrieked with her hands clenched.
"O the scoundrel! God grant that he may cross my threshold again. I will cleave his head with my hatchet."
Monsieur Goulden was astounded.
"And you did not say that it was false. Then the story was true?"
And as I bowed my head without replying, he clasped his hands, saying:
"O youth! youth! it thinks of nothing. What folly! what folly!"
He walked around the room; then sat down to wipe his spectacles, and Aunt Grédel exclaimed:
"Yes, but they shall not have him yet! Their wickedness shall yet go for nothing. This very evening Joseph shall be in the mountains on the way to Switzerland."
Monsieur Goulden hearing this, looked grave; he bent his brows, and replied in a few moments:
"It is a misfortune, a great misfortune, for Joseph is really lame. They will yet find it out, for he cannot march two days without falling behind and becoming sick. But you are wrong, Mother Grédel, to speak as you do and give him bad advice."
"Bad advice!" she cried. "Then you are for having people massacred too!"
"No," he answered; "I do not love wars, especially where a hundred thousand men lose their lives for the glory of one. But wars of that kind are ended. It is not now for glory and to win new kingdoms that soldiers are levied, but to defend our country, which had been put in danger by tyranny and ambition. We would gladly have peace now. Unhappily, the Russians are advancing; the Prussians are joining them; and our friends, the Austrians, only await a good opportunity to fall upon our rear. If we do not go to meet them, they will come to our homes; for we are about to have Europe on our hands as we had in '93. It is now a different matter from our wars in Spain, in Russia, and in Germany; and I, old as I am, Mother Grédel, if the danger continues to increase and the veterans of the republic are needed, I would be ashamed to go and make clocks in Switzerland while others were pouring out their blood to defend my country. Besides, remember this well, that deserters are despised everywhere; after having committed such an act, they have no kindred or home anywhere. They have neither father, mother, church, nor country. They are incapable of fulfilling the first duty of man—to love and sustain their country, even though she be in the wrong."
He said no more at the moment, but sat gravely down.
"Let us eat," he exclaimed, after some minutes of silence. "Midday is striking. Mother Grédel and Catharine, seat yourselves there."
They sat down, and we began dinner. I meditated upon the words of Monsieur Goulden, which seemed right to me. Aunt Grédel compressed her lips, and from time to time gazed at me as if to read my thoughts. At length she said:
"I despise a country where they take fathers of families after carrying off the sons. If I were in Joseph's place, I would fly at once."
"Listen, Aunt Grédel," I replied; "you know that I love nothing so much as peace and quiet; but I would not, nevertheless, run away like a coward to another country. But, notwithstanding, I will do as Catharine says; if she wishes me to go to Switzerland, I will go."
Then Catharine, lowering her head to hide her tears, said in a low voice:
"I would not have them call you a deserter."
"Well, then, I will do like the others," I cried; "and as those of Phalsbourg and Dagsberg are going to the wars, I will go."
Monsieur Goulden made no remark.
"Every one is free to do as he pleases," said he, after a while; "but I am glad that Joseph thinks as I do."
Then there was silence, and toward two o'clock Aunt Grédel arose and took her basket. She seemed utterly cast down, and said:
"Joseph, you will not listen to me, but no matter. With God's grace, all will yet be well. You will return if he wills it, and Catharine will wait for you."
Catharine wept again, and I more than she; so that Monsieur Goulden himself could not help shedding tears.
At length Catharine and her mother descended the stairs, and Aunt Grédel called out from the bottom:
"Try to come and see us once or twice again, Joseph."
"Yes, yes," I answered, shutting the door.
I could no longer stand. Never had I been so miserable, and even now, when I think of it, my heart chills.
From that day I could think of nothing but my misfortune. I tried to work, but my thoughts were far away, and Monsieur Goulden said:
"Joseph, lay labor aside. Profit by the little time you can remain among us; go to see Catharine and Mother Grédel. I still think they will exempt you, but who can tell? They need men so much that it may be a long time coming."
I went then every morning to Quatre-Vents, and passed my days with Catharine. We were very sorrowful, but very glad to see each other. We loved one another even more than before, if that were possible. Catharine sometimes tried to sing as in the good old times; but suddenly she would burst into tears. Then we wept together, and Aunt Grédel would rail at the wars which brought misery to every one. She said that the Council of Revision deserved to be hung; that they were all robbers, banded together to poison our lives. It solaced us a little to hear her talk thus, and we thought she was right.
I returned to the city about eight or nine o'clock in the evening. When they closed the gates, and as I passed, I saw the small inns full of conscripts and old returned soldiers drinking together. The conscripts always paid; the others, with dirty police-caps cocked over their ears, red noses, and horse-hair stocks in place of shirt-collars, twisted their mustaches and related with majestic air their battles, their marches, and their duels. One can imagine nothing viler than those holes, full of smoke, cobwebs hanging on the black beams, those old sworders and young men drinking, shouting, and beating the tables like crazy people; and behind in the shadow old Annette Schnaps or Marie Héring—her old wig stuck back on her head, her comb with only three teeth remaining, crosswise, in it—gazing on the scene, or emptying a mug to the health of the braves.
It was sad to see the sons of peasants, honest and laborious fellows, leading such an existence; but no one thought of working, and any one of them would have given his life for two farthings. Worn out with shouting, drinking, and internal grief, they ended by falling asleep over the table, while the old fellows emptied their cups, singing:
"'Tis glory calls us on!"
I saw these things, and I blessed heaven for having given me, in my wretchedness, kind hearts to keep up my courage and prevent my falling into such hands.
This state of affairs lasted until the twenty-fifth of January. For some days a great number of Italian conscripts—Piedmontese and Genoese—had been arriving in the city; some stout and fat as Savoyards fed upon chestnuts—their great cocked hats on their curly heads; their linsey-woolsey pantaloons dyed a dark green, and their short vests also of wool, but brick-red, fastened around their waists by a leather belt. They wore enormous shoes, and ate their cheese seated along the old marketplace. Others were dried up, lean, brown, shivering in their long cassocks, seeing nothing but snow upon the roofs and gazing with their large, black, mournful eyes upon the women who passed. They were exercised every day in marching, and were going to fill up the skeleton of the sixth regiment of the line at Mayence, and were then resting for a while in the infantry barracks.
The captain of the recruits, who was named Vidal, lodged over our room. He was a square-built, solid, very strong-looking man, and was, too, very kind and civil. He came to us to have his watch repaired, and when he learned that I was a conscript and was afraid I should never return, he encouraged me, saying that it was all habit; that at the end of five or six months one fights and marches as he eats his dinner; and that many so accustom themselves to shooting at people that they consider themselves unhappy when they are deprived of that amusement.
But his mode of reasoning was not to my taste; the more so as I saw five or six large grains of powder on one of his cheeks, which had entered deeply, and as he explained to me that they came from a shot which a Russian fired almost under his nose. Such a life disgusted me more and more, and as several days had already passed without news, I began to think they had forgotten me, as they did Jacob, of Chèvre-Hof, of whose extraordinary luck every one yet talks. Aunt Grédel herself said to me every time I went there, "Well, well! they will let us alone after all!" When on the morning of the twenty-fifth of January, as I was about starting for Quatre-Vents, Monsieur Goulden, who was working at his bench with a thoughtful air, turned to me with tears in his eyes and said:
"Listen, Joseph! I wanted to let you have one night more of quiet sleep; but you must know now, my child, that yesterday evening the brigadier of gendarmerie brought me your marching orders. You go with the Piedmontese and Genoese and five or six young men of the city—young Klipfel, young Loerig, Jean Léger, and Gaspard Zébédé. You go to Mayence."
I felt my knees give way as he spoke, and I sat down unable to speak. Monsieur Goulden took my marching orders, beautifully written, out of a drawer, and began to read them slowly. All that I remember is that Joseph Bertha, native of Dabo, Canton of Phalsbourg, Arrondissement of Sarrebourg, was incorporated in the sixth regiment of the line, and that he should join his corps the twenty-ninth of January at Mayence.
This letter produced as evil an effect on me as if I had known nothing of it before. It seemed something new, and I grew angry. Monsieur Goulden, after a moment's silence, added:
"The Italians start to-day at eleven."
Then, as if awakening from a horrible dream, I cried:
"But shall I not see Catharine again?"
"Yes, Joseph, yes," said he, in a trembling voice. "I notified Mother Grédel and Catharine, and thus, my boy, they will come, and you can embrace them before leaving."
I saw his grief, and it made me sadder yet, so that I had a hard struggle to keep myself from bursting into tears.
He continued, after a pause:
"You need not be anxious about anything, Joseph. I have prepared all beforehand; and when you return, if it please God to keep me so long in this world, you will find me always the same. I am beginning to grow old, and my greatest happiness would be to keep you for a son, for I found you good-hearted and honest. I would have given you what I possess, and we would have been happy together. Catharine and you would have been my children.But since it is otherwise, let us resign ourselves. It is only for a little while. You will be sent back, I am sure. They will soon see that you cannot make long marches."
While he spoke, I sat silently sobbing, my face buried in my hands.
At last he arose and took from a closet a soldier's knapsack of cowskin, which he placed upon the table. I looked at him, thinking of nothing but the pain of parting.
"Here is your knapsack," he added; "and I have put in it all that you require; two linen shirts, two flannel waistcoats, and all the rest. Well, well, that is all."
He placed the knapsack upon the table and sat down.
Without, we heard the Italians making ready to depart. Above us Captain Vidal was giving his orders. He had his horse at the barracks of the gendarmerie, and was telling his orderly to see that he was well rubbed and had received his hay.
All this bustle and movement produced a strange effect upon me, and I could not yet realize that I must quit the city. As I was thus in the greatest distress, the door opened and Catharine entered weeping, while Mother Grédel cried:
"I told you you should have fled to Switzerland; that these rogues would finish by carrying you off. I told you so, and you would not believe me."
"Mother Grédel," replied Monsieur Goulden, "to go to do his duty is not so great an evil as to be despised by honest people. Instead of all these cries and reproaches, which serve no good purpose, you would do better to comfort and encourage Joseph."
"Ah!" said she; "I do not reproach him, although this is terrible."
Catharine did not leave me; she sat by me and said, pressing my arm:
"You will return?"
"Yes, yes," said I, in a low voice. "And you—you will always think of me; you will not love another?"
She answered, sobbing:
"No, no! I will never love any but you."
This lasted a quarter of an hour, when the door opened and Captain Vidal entered, his cloak rolled like a hunting-horn over his shoulder.
"Well," said he, "well; how goes our young man?"
"Here he is," answered Monsieur Goulden.
"Ah!" remarked the captain; "you are making yourself miserable. It is natural. I remember when I departed for the army. We have all a home."
Then, raising his voice, he said:
"Come, come, young man, courage! We are no longer children."
He looked at Catharine.
"I see all," said he to Monsieur Goulden. "I can understand why he does not want to go."
The drums beat in the street and he added.
"We have yet twenty minutes before starting," and, throwing a glance at me, "Do not fail to be at the first call, young man," said he, pressing Monsieur Goulden's hand.
He went out, and we heard his horse at the door.
The morning was overcast, and grief overwhelmed me. I could not leave Catharine.
Suddenly the roll beat. The drums were all collected in the Place. Monsieur Goulden, taking the knapsack by its straps, said in a grave voice:
"Joseph, now the last embrace; it is time to go."
I stood up, pale as ashes. He fastened the knapsack to my shoulders. Catharine sat sobbing, her face covered with her apron. Mother Grédel looked on with lips compressed.
The roll continued for a time, then suddenly ceased.
"The call is about commencing," said Monsieur Goulden, embracing me. Then the fountains of his heart burst forth; tears sprang to his eyes; and, calling me his child, his son, he whispered, "Courage!"
Mother Grédel seated herself again, and as I bent toward her, taking my head between her hands, she sobbed:
"I always loved you, Joseph; ever since you were a baby. You never gave me cause of grief—and now you must go. O God! O God!"
I wept no longer.
When Aunt Grédel released me, I looked a moment at Catharine, who stood motionless. Then I turned quickly to go, when she cried, in heart-breaking tones:
"O Joseph! Joseph!"
I looked back. Her strength seemed to leave her, and I placed her in the arm-chair, and fled.
I was already on the Place, in the midst of the Italians and of a crowd of people crying for their sons or brothers. I saw nothing; I heard nothing.
When the roll of the drums recommenced, I looked around, and saw that I was between Klipfel and Furst, all three with our knapsacks on our backs. Their parents stood before us, weeping as if at their funeral. To the right, near the town-hall, Captain Vidal, on his little gray mare, was conversing with two infantry officers. The sergeants called the roll, and we answered. They called Furst, Klipfel, Bertha; we answered like the others. Then the captain gave the word, "March!" and we went, two abreast, toward the French gate.
At the corner of the baker Spitz, an old woman cried, in a choking voice, from a window:
"Kasper! Kasper!"
It was Zébédé's grandmother. His lips trembled. He waved his hand, without replying, and passed on with downcast face.
I shuddered at the thought of passing my home. As we neared it, my knees trembled, and I heard some one call at the window; but I turned my head toward the "Red Ox," and the rattle of the drums drowned the voices.
The children ran after us, shouting:
"There goes Joseph! there goes Klipfel!"
Under the French gate, the men on guard, drawn up in line on each side, gazed on us as we passed at shoulder arms. We passed the outposts, and the drums ceased playing as we turned to the right. Nothing was heard but the plash of footsteps in the mud, for the snow was melting.
We had passed the farm-house of Gerberhoff, and were going to the great bridge, when I heard some one call me. It was the captain, who cried from his horse:
"Very well done, young man; I am satisfied with you."
Hearing this, I could not help again bursting into tears, and the great Furst, too, wept, as we marched along; the others, pale as marble, said nothing. At the bridge, Zébédé took out his pipe to smoke. In front of us, the Italians talked and laughed among themselves; their three weeks of service had accustomed them to this life.
Once on the way to Metting, more than a league from the city, as we began to descend, Klipfel touched me on the shoulder, and whispered:
"Look yonder."
I looked, and saw Phalsbourg far beneath us; the barracks, the magazines, the steeple whence I had seen Catharine's home, six weeks before, with old Brainstein—all were in the gray distance, with the woods all around. I would have stopped a few moments, but the troop marched on, and I had to keep pace with them. We entered Metting.
That same day we went as far as Bitche; the next, to Hornbach; then to Kaiserslantern. It began to snow again.
How often during that long march did I sigh for the thick cloak of Monsieur Goulden, and his double-soled shoes.
We passed through innumerable villages, sometimes on the mountains, sometimes in the plains. As we entered each little town, the drums began to beat, and we marched with heads erect, marking the step, trying to assume the mien of old soldiers. The people looked out of their little windows, or came to the doors, saying, "There go the conscripts!"
At night we halted, glad to rest our weary feet—I, especially. I cannot say that my leg hurt me, but my feet! I had never undergone such fatigue. With our billet for lodging we had the right to a corner of the fire, but our hosts also gave us a place at the table. We had nearly always buttermilk and potatoes, and often fresh lard on a dish of sauerkraut. The children came to look at us, and the old women asked us from what place we came, and what our business was before we left home. The young girls looked sorrowfully at us, thinking of their sweethearts, who had gone five, six, or seven months before. Then they would take us to the son's bed. With what pleasure I stretched out my tired limbs! How I wished to sleep all our twelve hours' halt! But early in the morning, at day-break, the rattling of the drums awoke me. I gazed at the brown rafters of the ceiling, the window-panes covered with frost, and asked myself where I was. Then my heart would grow cold, as I thought that I was at Bitche—at Kaiserslantern—that I was a conscript; and I had to dress fast as I could, catch up my knapsack, and answer the roll-call.
"A good journey to you!" said the hostess, awakened so early in the morning.
"Thank you," replied the conscript.
And we marched on.
Yes! a good journey to you! They will not see you again, poor wretch! How many others have followed the same road!
I will never forget how at Kaiserslantern, the second day of our march, having unstrapped my knapsack to take out a white shirt, I discovered, beneath, a little pocket, and opening it I found fifty-four francs in six-livre pieces. On the paper wrapped around them were these words, written by Monsieur Goulden:
"While you are at the wars, be always good and honest. Think of your friends and of those for whom you would be willing to sacrifice your life, and treat the enemy with humanity that they may so treat our soldiers. May heaven guide you, and protect you in your dangers! You will find some money inclosed; for it is a good thing, when far from home and all who love you, to have a little of it. Write to us as often as you can. I embrace you, my child, and press you to my heart."
As I read this, the tears forced themselves to my eyes, and I thought, "Thou art not wholly abandoned, Joseph; fond hearts are yearning toward you. Never forget their kind counsels."
At last, on the fifth day, about five o'clock in the evening, we entered Mayence. As long as I live I will remember it. It was terribly cold. We had begun our march at early dawn, and, long before reaching the city, had passed through villages filled with soldiers—calvary, infantry, dragoons in their short jackets—some digging holes in the ice to get water for their horses, others dragging bundles of forage to the doors of the stables; powder-wagons, carts full of cannon-balls, all white with frost, stood on every side; couriers, detachments of artillery, pontoon-trains were coming and going over the white ground; and no more attention was paid to us than if we were not in existence.
Captain Vidal, to warm himself, had dismounted and marched with us on foot. The officers and sergeants hastened us on. Five or six Italians had fallen behind and remained in the villages, no longer able to advance. My feet were sore and burning, and at the last halt I could scarcely rise to resume the march. The others from Phalsbourg, however, kept bravely on.
Night had fallen; the sky sparkled with stars. Every one gazed forward, and said to his comrade, "We are nearing it! we are nearing it!" for along the horizon a dark line of seeming cloud, glittering here and there with flashing points, announced that a great city lay before us.
At last we entered the advanced works, and passed through the zig-zag earthen bastions. Then we dressed our ranks and marked the step, as we usually did when approaching a town. At the corner of a sort of demilune we saw the frozen fosse of the city, and the brick ramparts towering above, and opposite us an old, dark gate, with the draw-bridge raised. Above stood a sentinel, who, with his musket raised, cried out:
"Who goes there?"
The captain, going forward alone, replied:
"France!"
"What regiment?"
"Recruits for the Sixth of the Line."
A silence ensued. Then the draw-bridge was lowered, and the guard turned out and examined us, one of them carrying a great torch. Captain Vidal, a few paces in advance of us, spoke to the commandant of the post, who called out at length:
"Whenever you please."
Our drums began to beat, but the captain ordered them to cease, and we crossed a long bridge and passed through a second gate like the first. Then we were in the streets of the city, which were paved with smooth round stones. Every one tried his best to march steadily; for, although it was night, all the inns and shops along the way were open and their large windows were shining, and hundreds of people were passing to and fro as if it were broad day.
We turned five or six corners and soon arrived in a little open place before a high barrack, where we were ordered to halt.
There was a shed at the corner of the barrack, and in it acantinièreseated behind a small table, under a great tri-colored umbrella from which hung two lanterns.
Several officers arrived as soon as we halted; they were the Commandant Gémeau and some others whom I have since known. They pressed our captain's hand laughing, then looked at us and ordered the roll to be called.After that, we each received a ration of bread and a billet for lodging. We were told that roll-call would take place the next morning at eight o'clock for the distribution of arms, and then we were ordered to break ranks, while the officers turned up a street to the left and went into a great coffee-house, the entrance to which was approached by a flight of fifteen steps.
But we, with our billets for lodging—what were we to do with them in the middle of such a city, and, above all, the Italians, who did not know a word either of German or French?
My first idea was to see thecantinièreunder her umbrella. She was an old Alsatian, round and chubby, and, when I asked for theCapougner-Strasse, she replied:
"What will you pay for?"
I was obliged to take a glass ofeau-de-viewith her; then she said:
"Look just opposite there; if you turn the first corner to the right, you will find theCapougner-Strasse. Good evening, conscript."
She laughed.
Furst and Zébédé' were also billeted in theCapougner-Strasseand we set out, glad enough to be able to limp together through the strange city.
Furst first found his house, but it was shut; and while he was knocking at the door, I found mine, which had a light in two windows. I pushed at the door, it opened, and I entered a dark alley, whence came a smell of fresh bread, which was very welcome. Zébédé had to go further on.
I called out in the alley:
"Is any one here?"
Then an old woman appeared with a candle at the top of a wooden staircase.
"What do you want?" she asked.
I told her that I was billeted at her house. She came down-stairs, and, looking at my billet, told me in German to follow her.
I ascended the stairs. Passing an open door, I saw two men at work before an oven. I was, then, at a baker's, and this accounted for the old woman being up so late. She wore a cap with black ribbons; her arms were bare to the elbows; she, too, had been working, and seemed very sorrowful.
"You come late," she said.
"We were marching all day," I replied, "and I am fainting with hunger and weariness."
She looked at me and murmured:
"Poor child! poor child!"
"Your feet are sore," said she; "take off your shoes and put on these sabots."
She put the candle upon the table and went out. I took off my shoes. My feet were blistered and bleeding, and pained me horribly, and I felt for the moment as if it would almost be better to die at once than to continue in such suffering.
This thought had more than once arisen to my mind in the march, but now, before that good fire, I felt so worn, so miserable, that I would gladly have laid myself down to sleep for ever, notwithstanding Catharine, Aunt Grédel, and all who loved me. Truly, I needed God's assistance.
While these thoughts were running through my head, the door opened, and a tall, stout man, gray-haired, but yet strong and healthy, entered. He was one of those I had seen at work below, and held in his hands a bottle of wine and two glasses.
"Good evening!" said he gravely and kindly.
I looked up. The old woman was behind him. She was carrying a little wooden tub, which, she placed on the floor near my chair.