For, after all, one must live. First of all, one must live. Now, here it is clear that there is not enough food to go round. What then? Then the field is open for the craftiest and the boldest. Let us suppose that there are twenty bold men among the thousand prisoners. From the lean corpse of our cow they have cut their large share, the lion’s share; now it is the turn of the little jackals to divide up what remains. Let us suppose that one of these “lions” has a conscience. Let us suppose that his mind is influenced by the morality of the gospels or by socialist ideas. Is he to sacrifice his average share, the share requisite to keep him in good health, because the others, nine hundred and eighty in the thousand, have nothing but a famine ration, and can have nothing else, whatever he may do? Ought he to make up his mind, as an act of goodwill, and knowing that the general regimen will be no whit bettered, to accept malnutrition for himself, to accept the permanent ruin of his health? Christ, where are your beatitudes? Will the determinism of the body ever be overcome? Will your reign, your city of justice, ever be established upon this dreary planet? But if the world continues, and if the general supply of goods should happen to become as greatly restricted as it is within the limits of our fortress, I shall be sorry for the city of the just. Let the twenty “lions,” from virtuous motives, tie up their jaws, let us suppose that there are one thousand ascetics in place of nine hundred and eighty, the stew will be little thicker. The electric bell, its jarring note issuing from all the doorways, breaks in upon these grey reflections, as much the outcome, perhaps, of personal discouragement as of the realities of the situation. It is five o’clock. In a twinkling the ants disappear into the under ways. * * * * * In kitchen No. 22, Dutrex, Durupt, and the three cooks are standing round the vice. Half a gruyère cheese is fixed in it. This is the entire dinner; each one of our four hundred and eighty men, those fed from the first of the three kitchens, will have to be satisfied this evening with the four hundred and eightieth part of this half cheese. Devèse is usually responsible for the serious task of cutting up the cheese. He is an expert, being accustomed every day in Paris to serve out large quantities of ham, saveloy, and galantine. Unfortunately our cook-butcher is confined to bed in the hospital casemate with a sore throat. Dutrex has therefore asked little Lambert, Maître Lambert, Lambert the Good, to do the cutting up.