nplace. Poor child, she looks as if she
had been working at the vintage."

"That is right, madame; stand up for your own," and her husband,
who was accustomed to his wife's speeches, laughed. "But for all
that, commonplace or not commonplace, I should like to see some of
Milly's bright, healthy color in my girls' cheeks; and I should
like to see them walk as if they had forgotten, for a moment, their
tight boots and high heels."

His wife was about to make an angry reply, when the arrival of the
four boys--bearing in triumph the last basket of plums--changed the
conversation; and shortly afterwards, Madame Duburg remarking that
the evening was damp, and that she did not like Julie and Justine
to be out in it any later, the Du burgs took their leave.

Chapter 2: Terrible News.

The ten days succeeding the declaration of war were days of
excitement, and anticipation. The troops quartered at Dijon moved
forward at once; and scarcely an hour passed but long trains,
filled with soldiers from Lyons and the South, were on their way up
towards Metz. The people of Dijon spent half their time in and
around the station. The platform was kept clear; but bands of
ladies relieved each other every few hours, and handed soup, bread,
fruit, and wine to the soldiers as they passed through. Each
crowded train was greeted, as it approached the station, with
cheers and waving of handkerchiefs; to which the troops as heartily
responded. Most of the trains were decorated with boughs, and
presented a gay appearance as, filled with the little line men, the
sunburned Zouaves, swarthy Turcos, gay hussars, or sober
artillerymen, they wound slowly into the town.

Some of the trains were less gay, but were not less significant of
war. Long lines of wagons, filled with cannon; open trucks with the
deadly shell--arranged side by side, point upwards, and looking
more like eggs in a basket than deadly missiles--came and went.
There, too, were long trains of pontoons for forming bridges while,
every half hour, long lines of wagons filled with biscuits, barrels
of wine, sacks of coffee, and cases of stores of all sorts and
kinds passed through.

The enthusiasm of Dijon, at the sight of this moving panorama of
war, rose to fever heat. The sound of the Marseillaise resounded
from morning to night. Victory was looked upon as certain, and the
only subject of debate was as to the terms which victorious France
would impose upon conquered Prussia.