I came to a small village, and decided to stop and get some food for
ourselves and for my horses, as they showed signs of distress. There,
too, the streets were full of infantry, but, to my astonishment, none
of them belonged to any of the regiments of my Corps. So I supposed I
had passed its left wing without knowing it. Bad luck! I rode up the
steep alleys, looking for some inn where I could put up, but all the
inns were filled with hot, footsore soldiers, who seemed thankful for
a moment's rest. They were sitting about wherever there was any shade
to be found. With their coats unbuttoned, their neckties undone and
shirts open, they were trying to recover their vigour by greedily
devouring hunks of bread they had in their wallets, spread with the
contents of their preserved meat tins.

At the door of the vicarage, near the pretty little church which could
be seen from the surrounding country, I saw an old priest who was
distributing bottles of white wine to an eager crowd of troopers. I
heard him say in a gentle voice:

"Here, my lads, take what there is. If the Prussians come, I don't
want them to find a drop left."

"_Merci, ... merci, Monsieur le Curé_."

All at once there was a frightful explosion quite close to us, which
made the whole church-square quiver. A German "coal-box" had fallen on
to the roof of the church, making an enormous hole in it, out of which
came a thick cloud of horrible yellow smoke. A shower of wreckage
fell all around us and made a curious noise. The windows of all the
houses came clattering down in shivers. In a twinkling the little
square in front of the vicarage was empty. A few men who were wounded