Another frequent visitor was Rosa, a young woman whose husband was on the other side and who now made a livelihood serving as cook for some Hungarian officers. She listened to all their conversations and every now and then tried to fathom some secret which she referred at once to us. The table at which she served belonged to a group of field artillery officers and she told me that they had a long discussion in which some of them held that a supply of 5000 shots for every gun would be enough in the first battle, whereas others held that, given the enormous waste of munition in modern methods of warfare, this number would not guarantee a sufficient reserve. On the whole, from the reports received I inferred that the Austrians were short of ammunition and had placed their hope in a quick success of the offensive, for otherwise they would find themselves in a very bad position because there were very few projectiles in the internal depots in Austria to replace those spent at the front. Rosa also told me of the abundant fare the enemy officers allot themselves, for they were not ashamed to give free rein to their gluttonous desires even though their soldiers were kept on truly pitiful rations. Poor Rosa also brought us whatever she could take away from the table and one day she came with a large package of cigarettes which she held out to us saying, “I hope you will not smoke them all in one day; I hope you will appreciate them because I had to pay for these cigarettes with kisses.” I tried to show I appreciated them so as not to displease her, but in truth I preferred never to smoke again in my life rather than force such bargaining on her, but alas, she had often to resort to such methods if she wished to feed her youngsters who otherwise would die of hunger. Sometimes Rosa, weeping, told us of the compromises she had had to make to appease the hunger of her youngsters. “Necessity makes me do it,” she would say, “but you should see the disdain with which the gay Viennese women, who have followed the officers thus far, treat me. Many of them go about dressed in clothes stolen from our houses and the other day, in the house of one of these street-walkers I recognized a whole silver coffee set which belonged to a count who ran away during the first days of the retreat.”