inst the wall of my dug-out. His good,
honest face is hollow, his eyes, with their blue rims, seem
starting out of his head. '_Mon Capitaine_, I'm used up. There
are only three stretcher-bearers left. The others are dead or
wounded. I haven't eaten for three days, or drunk a drop of
water.' His frail body is only held together by a miracle of
energy. Talk of heroes--here is a true one!

"Eight o'clock. We are relieved.

"Eleven o'clock. Message from the Colonel. 'Owing to
circumstances the 101st cannot be relieved.'

"_Merci!_

"What a disappointment for my poor fellows! Lieutenant X---- is
lost in admiration of them. I daresay--but I have only
thirty-nine of them left."

Eighteen hours later.

"The order for relief has come. We shall leave our dead behind us
in the trench. Then-comrades have carefully placed them out of
the passage-way.... There they are--poor sentinels, whom we leave
behind us, in a line on the parados, in their blood-stained
uniforms--solemn and terrible guardians of this fragment of
French soil, which still in death they seem to be holding against
the enemy."

But the enemy advances inexorably, and within the fort the dead and
dying multiply.

"Captain Tabourot fought like a lion," says another witness. "He
was taller than any of us. He gave his orders briefly, encouraged
us, and placed us. Then he plunged his hand into the bag of bombs,
and, leaning back, threw one with a full swing of the arm, aiming
each time. That excited us, and we did our best."

But meanwhile the enemy is stealing up behind, between the trench and
the fort. Captain Tabourot is mortally hit, and is carried into the
dressing-station within the fort. Commandant Raynal, himself wounded,
comes to see him. "No word of consolation, no false hope. The one
knows that all is over; the other respects him too deeply to attempt a
falsehood." A grasp of the hand--a word from the Commandant: "Well
done, _mon ami_!" But the Captain is thinking of his men. "_Mon
Commandant_--if the Boches get through, it is not the fault of my
company. They did all they could." Then a last message to his wife.
And presently his name is carried through the dark by a carrier-pigeon
down to the Headquarters below: "The enemy surrounds us. I report to
you the bravery of Captain Tabourot, seriously wounded. We are holding
out." And a few hours later: "C