minister of justice. And after all, I reflect, the Belgians once had
wives and children too. Many of them have neither wife nor child any
longer. And so perish all Germans!

The plumber, who had been studying his "hand," looked up from the cards.
"We have killed a great number of the Bosches," he said dispassionately.
"Yes, a great number. It was in a beetroot field, and there were as many
dead Germans as beetroots. Near by was a corn-field; the flames were
leaping up the shocks of yellow corn and the bodies caught fire--such a
stench! And the faces of the dead! Especially after they have been
killed with the bayonet--they are quite black. I suppose it's the
grease."

"The grease?"

"Yes, we always grease our bayonets, you know. To prevent them getting
rusty."

He was a man of few words, but in three sentences he had given me a
battle-picture as clearly visualised as a canvas of Verestchagin. The
reminiscences of the plumber provoked the paperhanger to further
recollections, more particularly the stunning effects of the French
shell-fire. He had found four dead Germans--they had been surprised by a
shell while playing cards in a billet. "They still had the cards in
their hands, monsieur, just as you see us--and they hadn't got a
scratch. They were like the statues in the Louvre."

"Yes," said the _sous-officier_, "I have seen them like that. I remember
I found a big Bosche--six feet four he must have been--sitting dead in a
house which we had shelled. His face was just like wax, and he sat there
like a wooden doll with his long arms hanging down stiff--yes! _comme
une poupee_. And I couldn't find a scratch on him--not one! And do you
know what he had on--a woman's chemise! _Ecoutez!_" he added suddenly,
and he held up a monitory hand.

Echoing down the corridor outside there came nearer and nearer the beat
of a drum and with it the liquid notes of a fife. I recognised the
measure--who can ever forget it! It stirs the blood like a trumpet. The
door was kicked open and two convalescent soldiers entered, one wearing
a festive cap of coloured paper such as is secreted in Christmas
"crackers." He was playing a fife, and the drummer was close upon his
heels.

Every one rose in his bed and lifted up his voice:

Allons! enfants de la Patrie!

A strange electricity ran through us all. The card-players had thrown
down their cards just as the plumber was about to trump an ace. The
others had tossed aside thei