indeed, and many houses, all in movement with the early morning; and the
chalked numbers on the doors, and here and there an empty tin of
polishing-paste or an order scrawled on paper and tacked to a wall
betrayed the passage of soldiers. But of the army there was nothing at
all. Scouting on foot (for that was what it was) is a desperate
business, and that especially if you have nothing to tell you whether
you will get in touch in five, or ten, or twenty miles.

It was nine o'clock before a clatter of horse-hoofs came up the road
behind us. At first my companion and I wondered whether it were the
first riders of the Dragoons or Cuirassiers. In that case the advance
was from behind us. But very soon, as the sound grew clearer, we heard
how few they were, and then there came into view, trotting rapidly, a
small escort and two officers with the umpires' badges, so there was
nothing doing; but when, half a mile ahead of us on the road, they
turned off to the left over plough, we knew that that was the way we
must follow too. Before we came to the turning-place, before we left the
road to take the fields on the left, there came from far off and on our
right the sound of a gun.

It was my companion who heard it first. We strained to hear it again;
twice we thought we had caught it, and then again twice we doubted. It
is not so easily recognizable a sound as you might think in those great
plains cut by islands of high trees and steading walls. The little "75"
gun lying low makes a different sound altogether at a distance from the
old piece of "90." At any rate there was here no doubt that there were
guns to the right and in front of us, and the umpire had gone to the
left. We were getting towards the thick, and we had only to go straight
on to find out where the front was.