“What! whip France? We, whipped by those Prussian pigs, we!” He came up to Weiss and grasped him violently by the lapel of his coat. His entire long frame, lean as that of the immortal Knight Errant, seemed to breathe defiance and unmitigated contempt for the foe, whoever he might be, regardless of time, place, or any other circumstance. “Listen to what I tell you, sir. If the Prussians dare to show their faces here, we will kick them home again. You hear me? we will kick them from here to Berlin.” His bearing and manner were superb; the serene tranquillity of the child, the candid conviction of the innocent who knows nothing and fears nothing. “_Parbleu_! it is so, because it is so, and that’s all there is about it!” Weiss, stunned and almost convinced, made haste to declare that he wished for nothing better. As for Maurice, who had prudently held his tongue, not venturing to express an opinion in presence of his superior officer, he concluded by joining in the other’s merriment; he warmed the cockles of his heart, that devil of a man, whom he nevertheless considered rather stupid. Jean, too, had nodded his approval at every one of the lieutenant’s assertions. He had also been at Solferino, where it rained so hard. And that showed what it was to have a tongue in one’s head and know how to use it. If all the leaders had talked like that they would not be in such a mess, and there would be camp-kettles and flannel belts in abundance. It was quite dark by this time, and Rochas continued to gesticulate and brandish his long arms in the obscurity. His historical studies had been confined to a stray volume of Napoleonic memoirs that had found its way to his knapsack from a peddler’s wagon. His excitement refused to be pacified and all his book-learning burst from his lips in a torrent of eloquence: “We flogged the Austrians at Castiglione, at Marengo, at Austerlitz, at Wagram; we flogged the Prussians at Eylau, at Jena, at Lutzen; we flogged the Russians at Friedland, at Smolensk and at the Moskowa; we flogged Spain and England everywhere; all creation flogged, flogged, flogged, up and down, far and near, at home and abroad, and now you tell me that it is we who are to take the flogging! Why, pray tell me? How? Is the world coming to an end?” He drew his tall form up higher still and raised his arm aloft, like the staff of a battle-flag. “Look you, there has been a fight to-day, down yonder, and we are waiting for the news. Well! I will tell you what the news is—I will tell you, I! We have flogged the Prussians, flogged them until they didn’t know whether they were a-foot or a-horseback, flogged them to powder, so that they had to be swept up in small pieces!”