The "tin hat" gives a certain sameness to the highest points of the
beings that are there, but even then the divers ways of wearing
it--on the regulation cap like Biquet, over a Balaklava like
Cadilhac, or on a cotton cap like Barque--produce a complicated
diversity of appearance.

And our legs! I went down just now, bent double, into our dug-out,
the little low cave that smells musty and damp, where one stumbles
over empty jam-pots and dirty rags, where two long lumps lay asleep,
while in the corner a kneeling shape rummaged a pouch by
candle-light. As I climbed out, the rectangle of entry afforded me a
revelation of our legs. Flat on the ground, vertically in the air,
or aslant; spread about, doubled up, or mixed together; blocking the
fairway and cursed by passers-by, they present a collection of many
colors and many shapes--gaiters, leggings black or yellow, long or
short, in leather, in tawny cloth, in any sort of waterproof stuff;
puttees in dark blue, light blue, black, sage green, khaki, and
beige. Alone of all his kind, Volpatte has retained the modest
gaiters of mobilization. Mesnil Andre has displayed for a
fortnight a pair of thick woolen stockings, ribbed and green; and
Tirette has always been known by his gray cloth puttees with white
stripes, commandeered from a pair of civilian trousers that was
hanging goodness knows where at the beginning of the war. As for
Marthereau's puttees, they are not both of the same hue, for he
failed to find two fag-ends of greatcoat equally worn and equally
dirty, to be cut up into strips.

There are legs wrapped up in rags, too, and even in newspapers,
which are kept in place with spirals of thread or--much more
practical--telephone wire. Pepin fascinated his friends and