The Tergnier Hotel could only give us one room between us. I let Soubise go to bed, and I slept in an armchair, dressed as I was. The following morning I asked about a train for Cateau, but was told that there was no train. We had to work marvels to get a vehicle, but finally, Dr. Meunier, or Mesnier, agreed to lend us a two-wheeled conveyance. That was something, but there was no horse. The poor doctor’s horse had been requisitioned by the enemy. A wheelwright, for an exorbitant price, let me hire a colt that had never been in the shafts, and which went wild when the harness was put on. The poor little beast calmed down after being well lashed, but his wildness then changed into stubbornness. He stood still on his four legs, which were trembling with fury, and refused to move. With his neck stretched forward toward the ground, his eye fixed, and his nostrils dilating, he would not budge any more than a stake in the earth. Two men then held the light carriage back, the halter was taken off the colt’s neck, he shook his head for an instant and, thinking himself free and without any impediments, he began to step out. The men were scarcely holding the vehicle. He gave two little kicks and then began to trot. It was only a very short trot. A boy then stopped him, some carrots were given to him, his mane was stroked, and the halter was put on again. He stopped suddenly, but the boy, jumping into the gig and holding the reins lightly, spoke to him and encouraged him to move on. The colt tried timidly and, not feeling any resistance, began to trot along for about a quarter of an hour, and then came back to us at the door of the hotel. I had to leave a deposit of four hundred francs with the notary of the place, in case the colt should die. Ah, what a journey that was with the boy! Soubise and I sitting close together in that little gig, the wheels of which creaked at every jolt! The unhappy colt was steaming like a _pot-au-feu_ when the lid is raised. We started at eleven in the morning, and when we had to stop, because of the poor beast who could not go any farther, it was five in the afternoon and we had not gone five miles. Oh, that poor colt, he was certainly to be pitied! We were not very heavy, all three of us together, but we were too much for him. We were just a few yards away from a sordid-looking house. I knocked and an enormous old woman opened the door. “What do you want?” she asked. “Hospitality for an hour and shelter for our horse.” She looked out on the road and saw our turnout. “Hey, father,” she called out in a husky voice, “come and look here!” A fat man, quite as fat, but older than she was, came hobbling heavily along. She pointed to the gig, so oddly equipped, and he burst out laughing and said to me in an insolent way: “Well, what do you want?” I repeated my phrase, “Hospitality for an hour, etc., etc.” “P’raps we can do it, but it’ll want paying for.” I showed him twenty francs. The old woman gave him a nudge.