He turned the corner and entered the farm, all following him. Duchêne had just thrown a fagot on the fire. All these people, with faces blackened by powder, still animated by the combat, their clothes torn by bayonet-thrusts, some blood-stained, advancing from the darkness into the light, presented a strange spectacle. Kasper, whose forehead was bandaged with his handkerchief, had received a sabre-cut; his bayonet, buff facings, and high blue gaiters, were stained with blood. Old Materne, thanks to his imperturbable presence of mind, returned safe and sound from the fray. The remains of Jérome's and Hullin's troops were thus once more united. They wore the same wild physiognomies, animated by the same energy and desire for vengeance. But Hullin's men, harassed by fatigue, sat down right and left, on the fagots, on the stone sink, on the low pavement of the hearth--their heads in their hands and elbows on their knees; while Jérome's, who could not be convinced of the disappearance of Hans, Joson, and Daniel, looked about everywhere, exchanging questions, broken by long pauses. Materne's two sons held each other by the arm, as though afraid of losing one another, and their father, behind them, leaning against the wall, with his elbow on his gun, watched them with an expression of satisfaction. "There they are, I see them," he seemed to say: "two famous fellows! They have saved their skins, both of them." If any one came to ask him about Pierre, Jacques, or Nicolas, his son or his brother, he would reply hap-hazard--"Yes, yes, there are several lying down there on their backs. What can you expect? It is war! Your Nicolas has done his duty. You must console yourself." Meanwhile he thought--"Mine are out of the scrimmage; that is the chief thing." Catherine and Louise were busy preparing supper. Duchêne came up from the cellar with a barrel of wine on his shoulder. He set it down, and knocked out the bung; and each partisan presented his flask or cup to be filled with the purple liquid which glittered in the firelight. "Eat and drink," said the old dame to them: "all is not lost yet; you will have need of your strength again. Here, Frantz, unhook those hams for me. Here is bread and knives. Sit down, my children." Frantz reached down the hams in the chimney with his bayonet. The benches were brought forward; they sat down, and notwithstanding their sorrows, they ate with that vigorous appetite which neither present griefs nor thoughts for the future can make a mountaineer forget. But it did not prevent a bitter sadness from filling the hearts of these brave men; and first one and then another would stop suddenly, letting fall his fork, and leave the table, saying--"I have had enough!"