made as promptly as
possible, and the right treatment must follow without delay. Then all
went well, as in this case--unless, indeed, something went wrong. Yes,
indeed, this patient was a triumph which should finally reduce to
silence those civilian colleagues of his who considered a military
surgeon competent at most to deal with venereal diseases and broken
bones.

Reimers listened in an absent-minded way to his long-winded
deliverances on the subject of acclimatisation, taking furtive glances
the while at the other officers in the mess-room.

They also seemed in no way changed. Major Lischke and Captain von
Wegstetten were still at loggerheads, Lischke blustering away in his
loud voice, and Wegstetten assuming his most ironical expression.
Captain Stuckardt was listening in a half-hearted way; he had quite
recently been put on the list for promotion to the staff, and
consequently wore a rather preoccupied look. Hitherto he had found the
charge of one battery difficult enough, and now he would have to
command three. Undisturbed by the dispute, the captain of the fifth
battery, Mohr, had sat down to the table by himself; he was always
thirsty, and had already disposed of half a bottle of champagne.
Madelung, fresh from the Far East, paced up and down with short nervous
steps between him and the disputing officers. In passing, he glanced at
the two fighting-cocks with a kind of scornful pity, and at the silent
toper with contempt. Major Schrader and Captain von Gropphusen were
whispering and chuckling together in a window nook. They had one
inexhaustible theme--women; while forage was the favourite topic of the
two men standing beneath the chandelier--Traeger and Heuschkel, the
officers commanding the first and second batteries. The third battery
had the fattest horses in the regiment--"and the laziest," said the
colonel; nevertheless, it must be allowed, that when the inspector from
the Ministry of War paid his visit, it was an uncommonly pleasant sight
to see the hind-quarters of those horses shining so round and sleek in
their stalls.

"Carrots! carrots!" cried Heuschkel. "They're the thing!" And Andreae,
who, as a healer of men must also have some knowledge of the inside of
beasts, was called on to endorse this view as to the excellence of
carrots as fodder.

Thus Reimers felt himself rather out of it all, and was just about to
leave the mess-room and join his younger comrades, when Madelung came
towards him.