It was at that moment that Jean and Maurice recognized in the tall, thin, spectral form that passed swiftly by, their colonel, de Vineuil. He was accompanied by the regimental surgeon, Major Bouroche, a large man with a leonine face They were conversing in broken, unfinished sentences, whisperingly, such a conversation as we sometimes hear in dreams. “It came by the way of Basle. Our 1st division all cut to pieces. The battle lasted twelve hours; the whole army is retreating—” The colonel’s specter halted and called by name another specter, which came lightly forward; it was an elegant ghost, faultless in uniform and equipment. “Is that you, Beaudoin?” “Yes, Colonel.” “Ah! bad news, my friend, terrible news! MacMahon beaten at Froeschwiller, Frossard beaten at Spickeren, and between them de Failly, held in check where he could give no assistance. At Froeschwiller it was a single corps against an entire army; they fought like heroes. It was a complete rout, a panic, and now France lies open to their advance—” His tears choked further utterance, the words came from his lips unintelligible, and the three shadows vanished, swallowed up in the obscurity. Maurice rose to his feet; a shudder ran through his frame. “Good God!” he stammeringly exclaimed. And he could think of nothing else to say, while Jean, in whose bones the very marrow seemed to be congealing, murmured in his resigned manner: “Ah, worse luck! The gentleman, that relative of yours, was right all the same in saying that they are stronger than we.” Maurice was beside himself, could have strangled him. The Prussians stronger than the French! The thought made his blood boil. The peasant calmly and stubbornly added: “That don’t matter, mind you. A man don’t give up whipped at the first knock-down he gets. We shall have to keep hammering away at them all the same.” But a tall figure arose before them. They recognized Rochas, still wrapped in his long mantle, whom the fugitive sounds about him, or it may have been the intuition of disaster, had awakened from his uneasy slumber. He questioned them, insisted on knowing all. When he was finally brought, with much difficulty, to see how matters stood, stupor, immense and profound, filled his boyish, inexpressive eyes. More than ten times in succession he repeated: “Beaten! How beaten? Why beaten?” And that was the calamity that had lain hidden in the blackness of that night of agony. And now the pale dawn was appearing at the portals of the east, heralding a day heavy with bitterest sorrow and striking white upon the silent tents, in one of which began to be visible the ashy faces of Loubet and Lapoulle, of Chouteau and of Pache, who were snoring still with wide-open mouths. Forth from the thin mists that were slowly creeping upward from the river off yonder in the distance came the new day, bringing with it mourning and affliction. II.