All night we had marched without repose, without food. In our exhaustion we had become the spectres of our former selves, and our hearts were breaking from discouragement. We did not know that right alongside of us the most victorious offensive in the history of the world was commencing. We did not suspect that, under pressure from General Maunoury, the German 4th Reserve Corps was giving way, and that this must assure the rout and the final defeat of Von Kluck’s army. From the 8th we began to play an active part in the great battle. The 5th Cavalry Division was ordered to surprise a German convoy and to seize it. The officers told us of this mission. At last we were going to do something; our time of waiting was at an end, and there was to be no more wandering about the burnt-up country, devoured by thirst and discouraged at feeling ourselves lost and forgotten in the great struggle we had set our hand to. The convoy would be four kilomètres long, and we could already imagine the attack, the taking of the booty. It was going to be a romantic and amusing episode, and the dragoons sat up in their saddles, forgetting their fatigue and their hunger, and full of joy at the thought of the promised combat. In my inner self I could not share the general enthusiasm; I felt that we had been exactly marked down by the enemy’s aircraft which flew over us each moment, insolently bidding defiance to our rifle and machine-gun fire. The expedition, however, started off well. A young dragoon, sent forward as scout, penetrated into a farm and there found fifteen Prussian Staff Officers engaged in stuffing themselves with food. He calmly pointed his revolver at them and advised them to surrender. “My regiment will be here directly; any resistance is useless.” In reality he had to keep them under the muzzle of his revolver for a long quarter of an hour, for the regiment was still far off. A major having shown signs of moving, the dragoon blew out his brains at point-blank range, and he succeeded in keeping them all terrorised until our arrival. This capture stimulated still further the general good humour. I can still see six of the fourteen prisoners file past the flank of the column, each between two dragoons, a forage cord tied to the reins of their horses, and I can see again the cunning and furious look of a “hauptmann” still bloated with the feast which we had prevented him from completing. I remember the gay, frank laugh of the whole regiment, its light-heartedness at having laid hands on these fat eaters of _choucroute_, who were too astonished even to be insolent.