harassed to yield provision for the army and large towns; already their
best horses had been taken for the siege-trains and the forage-wagons;
already their ploughshares were perforce idle, and their children cried
because of the scarcity of nourishment; already the iron of war had
entered into their souls.

The little street at evening was mournful and very silent: the few who
talked spoke in whispers, lest a spy should hear them, and the young
ones had no strength to play: they wanted food.

Bernadou, now that all means of defence was gone from him, and the only
thing left to him to deal with was his own life, had become quiet and
silent and passionless, as was his habit. He would have fought like a
mastiff for his home, but this they had forbidden him to do, and he was
passive and without hope. He closed his door, and sat down with his hand
in that of Reine Allix and his arm around his wife. "There is nothing to
do but wait" he said sadly. The day seemed very long in coming.

The firing (which had come nearer each day) ceased for a while; then its
roll commenced afresh, and grew still nearer to the village. Then again
all was still.

At noon a shepherd staggered into the place, pale, bleeding, bruised,
covered with mire. The Prussians, he told them, had forced him to be
their guide, had knotted him tight to a trooper's saddle, and had
dragged him with them until he was half dead with fatigue and pain. At
night he had broken from them and had fled: they were close at hand, he
said, and had burned the town from end to end because a man had fired at
them from a house-top. That was all he knew. Bernadou, who had gone out
to hear his news, returned into the house and sat down and hid his face