regimented up to their very death, up to the grave, into which they--
unfortunate cobblers, tinkers, peasants, and clerks--were shoved to the
accompaniment of salvos from big-mouthed cannon.

The sound of taps had just died away, and the watchmen were making their
rounds, when they discovered three men in the deep shadow of the broad
avenue, and drove them into the house.

"Are you officers, eh?" the head-watchman, a stocky corporal of the
landsturm, with grey on his temples, growled and blustered good-
naturedly. "Privates must be in bed by nine o'clock." To preserve a show
of authority he added with poorly simulated bearishness: "Well, are you
going or not?"

He was about to give his usual order, "Quick, take to your legs!" but
caught himself just in time, and made a face as though he had swallowed
something.

The three men now hobbling toward the entrance for inmates, would have
been only too glad to carry out such an order. However, they had only
two legs and six clattering crutches between them. It was like a living
picture posed by a stage manager who has an eye for symmetry. On the
right went the one whose right leg had been saved, on the left went his
counterpart, hopping on his left leg, and in the middle the miserable
left-over of a human body swung between two high crutches, his empty
trousers raised and pinned across his chest, so that the whole man could
have gone comfortably into a cradle.

The corporal followed the group with his eyes, his head bent and his
fists clenched, as if bowed down beneath the burden of the sight. He