The great gloomy courtyard was one mass of soldiers. From a gallery a non-commissioned officer read off a string of names from a pay-roll, and in squads the soldiers went up the stairs to receive their travelling allowance. We recruits stood in a corner, not knowing what to do or whom to report ourselves to. Finally a corporal exhorted us to go to the devil. We were in the way. It would not be our turn for a long time. We could wait, we should wait, being nasty recruits, blues, nom de Dieu. Mumbling further things descriptive of how he despised blues he went off. Then came soldiers, carrying on boards long rows of little tin bowls. The Spahis and Zouaves crowded at once round the steaming pots, but Herr von Rader hurled himself in the fray, and captured portions for all of us. It was thus that I made the acquaintance of "la gamelle," the venerable tin eating bowl of the French army, baptized "la gamelle" centuries ago. I was tasting for the first time the soup of the French army, a mixture of bread and greenstuffs and small pieces of meat. The cooking of this soup was an ancient, time-honoured custom. The musketeers of Louis XIV., of Cardinal Richelieu and Cardinal Mazarin prepared their soup in the very same fashion. Lounging about the place we came to the canteen of this curious army hotel, and made our way through a labyrinth of wine-casks, which were massed in front of the little door. There was an awful din inside. We sat down at one of the long tables and were served with the French army wine at fifteen centimes a bottle. Good wine, too, but it was impossible to enjoy it quietly, the Lord of the Canteen, a fat little man with greedy eyes, being eager for business--second-hand clothes business. He pestered us unceasingly with his offers and demands. Herr von Rader sold his boots for half a franc, after a great deal of haggling, since he wanted the half-franc badly, but objected to going barefooted. The owner of the canteen, however (who evidently thought the buying of good boots at half a franc a good thing), solved the difficulty. Out of some corner he conjured a pair of shoes such as the French Zouaves wear. Although they were in a bad state of dilapidation, Herr von Rader figured out that four bottles of wine could be exchanged for fifty centimes, and the boots changed owners....