Then the little one, gesticulating with a hunk of bread in his hand, began his story: 'I was washing my shirt while the _soupe_ was being got ready--we were in a beastly hole, a regular funnel with big woods all round it which enabled those swinish Prussians to creep up on all fours without our knowing it--then, just at seven o'clock, their shells began falling in our pots. We rushed to arms in a jiffy, curse it! and up to eleven o'clock we fancied we were giving them a downright licking--but there weren't more than five thousand of us, you must know, and fresh detachments of those pigs kept constantly coming up. I was on a little hill, lying down behind a bush, and in front of me and right and left of me I could see them marching up, swarming like ants, like lines of black ants that never came to an end. Well, you know, we couldn't help thinking that the commanders were regular duffers to have shoved us into such a wasp's nest, far away from our comrades, and to leave us there too, to be crushed without any help coming. Then, in the midst of it all, our general, that poor devil General Douay,[16] who was neither a fool nor a capon, was hit by a ball and toppled over with his legs in the air. His account was settled! All the same, we still held out, but there were too many of them, and we had to slope. Next we fought in an inclosure, and defended the station with such a thundering row going on that one was quite deafened. Then, I hardly know, but the town must have been captured, and we found ourselves on a mountain--the Geissberg they call it, I think--and there, having entrenched ourselves in a kind of château, we kept on potting those pigs. They jumped into the air as we hit them, and it was a sight to see how they came down again on their snouts. But it was all no good; they kept on coming up till they were quite ten to one, and with as many guns as they wanted.[17] It is all very well to be brave, but bravery in an affair like that simply means leaving one's carcase on the field. Well, we were quite in a jelly at last, and we had to take ourselves off. All the same, our officers showed themselves regular duffers--didn't they, Picot?'