ld send them on
their way.

What has been capable of causing this metamorphosis in me? A story, a
legend, perhaps, told, at any rate by one on whom rests the direst of
suspicions.

Cegheir-ben-Cheikh has finished his cigarette. I hear him returning
with slow steps to his mat, in barrack B, to the left of the guard
post.

Our departure being scheduled for the tenth of November, the
manuscript attached to this letter was begun on Sunday, the first, and
finished on Thursday, the fifth of November, 1903.

OLIVIER FERRIERES, Lt. 3rd Spahis.

I

A SOUTHERN ASSIGNMENT

Sunday, the sixth of June, 1903, broke the monotony of the life that
we were leading at the Post of Hassi-Inifel by two events of unequal
importance, the arrival of a letter from Mlle. de C----, and the
latest numbers of the Official Journal of the French Republic.

"I have the Lieutenant's permission?" said Sergeant Chatelain,
beginning to glance through the magazines he had just removed from
their wrappings.

I acquiesced with a nod, already completely absorbed in reading Mlle.
de C----'s letter.

"When this reaches you," was the gist of this charming being's letter,
"mama and I will doubtless have left Paris for the country. If, in
your distant parts, it might be a consolation to imagine me as bored
here as you possibly can be, make the most of it. The Grand Prix is
over. I played the horse you pointed out to me, and naturally, I lost.
Last night we dined with the Martials de la Touche. Elias Chatrian was
there, always amazingly young. I am sending you his last book, which
has made quite a sensation. It seems that the Martials de la Touche
are depicted there without disguise. I will add to it Bourget's last,
and Loti's, and France's, and two or three of the latest music hall
hits. In the political word, they say the law about congregations will
meet with strenuous opposition. Nothing much in the theatres. I have
taken out a summer subscription for _l'Illustration_. Would you care
for it? In the country no one knows what to do. Always the same lot of
idiots ready for tennis. I shall deserve no credit for writing to you
often. Spare me your reflections concerning young Combemale. I am less
than nothing of a feminist, having too much faith in those who tell me
that I am pretty, in yourself in particular. But indeed, I grow wild
at the idea that if I permitted myself half the familiarities with one
of our lads that you have surely with your