and adding intolerably to the weight of knapsacks and great-coats.
Just as the rain began to hold up, however, the 106th saw a chance to
go forward, while some zouaves in an adjoining field, who were forced
to wait yet for a while, amused themselves by pelting one another with
balls of moist earth, and the consequent condition of their uniforms
afforded them much merriment.

The sun suddenly came shining out again in the clear sky, the warm,
bright sun of an August morning, and with it came returning gayety;
the men were steaming like a wash of linen hung out to dry in the open
air: the moisture evaporated from their clothing in little more time
than it takes to tell it, and when they were warm and dry again, like
dogs who shake the water from them when they emerge from a pond, they
chaffed one another good-naturedly on their bedraggled appearance and
the splashes of mud on their red trousers. Wherever two roads
intersected another halt was necessitated; the last one was in a
little village just beyond the walls of the city, in front of a small
saloon that seemed to be doing a thriving business. Thereon it
occurred to Maurice to treat the squad to a drink, by way of wishing
them all good luck.

"Corporal, will you allow me--"

Jean, after hesitating a moment, accepted a "pony" of brandy for
himself. Loubet and Chouteau were of the party (the latter had been
watchful and submissive since that day when the corporal had evinced a
disposition to use his heavy fists), and also Pache and Lapoulle, a
couple of very decent fellows when there was no one to set them a bad
example.