He entered the cottage, but fell over the threshold. The vodka was now beginning to go to his head. He started singing, and looked round the cottage for Franek, even saying 'Morgen, Kerl,' although Franek was not there. After that he laughed loudly, staggered, shouted 'Hurrah!' and fell full length on the bed. In the evening he awoke sober and rested, and welcomed Franek, then, having got some pence out of Magda, he took his triumphant way to the inn. The glory of his deeds had already preceded him to Pognębin, since more than one of the soldiers from other divisions of the same regiment, having returned earlier, had related how he had distinguished himself at Gravelotte and Sedan. So now when the rumour spread that the conqueror was at the inn, all his old comrades hastened there to welcome him. No one would have recognized our friend Bartek, as he now sat at the table. He, formerly so meek, was to be seen striking his fist on the table, puffing himself out and gobbling like a turkey-cock. 'Do you remember, you fellows, that time I did for the French, what Steinmetz said?' 'How could we forget?' 'People used to talk about the French, and be frightened of them, but they are a poor lot--_was_? They run like hares into the lettuce, and run away like hares too. They don't drink beer either, nothing but strong wine.' 'That's it!' 'When we burnt a town they would wring their hands immediately and cry "Pitié, pitié,"[7] as if they meant they would give us a drink if we would only leave them alone. But we paid no attention to them.' 'Then can one understand their gibberish?' enquired a young farmer's lad. 'You wouldn't understand, because you are stupid, but I understand. "Doné di pę!"[8] Do you understand?' 'But what did you do?' 'Do you know about Paris? We had one battle after another there, but we won them all. They have no good commanders. People say so too. "The ground enclosed by the hedge is good," they say, "but it has been badly managed." Their officers are bad managers, and their generals are bad managers, but on our side they are good.' Maciej Kierz, the wise old innkeeper of Pognębin, began to shake his head. 'Well, the Germans have been victorious in a terrible war; they have been victorious--but I always thought they would be. But the Lord alone knows what will come out of it for us.' Bartek stared at him. 'What do you say?' 'The Germans have never cared to consider us much, anyhow, but, now they will be as stuck up as if there were no God above them. And they will illtreat us still more than they do already.' 'But that's not true!' Bartek said. Old Kierz was a person of such authority in Pognębin that all the village always thought as he did, and it was sheer audacity to contradict him. But Bartek was a conqueror now, and an authority himself. All the same they gazed at him in astonishment, and even in some indignation. 'Who are you, to quarrel with Maciej? Who are you--?'