“The struggle is not yet at an end, for the Germans need a victory. You will be able to rob them of that victory. “We have munitions in plenty and numerous reserves. “But above all you have your indomitable courage and your faith in the destiny of the Republic. “The eyes of the country are upon you. You will be among those of whom it will be said: ‘They stopped the Germans from getting to Verdun!’” The Sergeant-Major, himself deeply moved by what he reads, leaves a pause between the last sentence and the official “Dismiss!” which sets his hearers free. And the company breaks up slowly, as if with regret. The men understand better what they have done, and the hardships they have undergone take on a new lustre in their eyes. That sense of loneliness which in long conflicts leads each man, little by little, to complain of his individual trials, and to imagine that his leaders and the community as a whole are indifferent, suddenly vanishes: down there, when they were in the jaws of hell, their Commander and their countrymen saw everything. And in the silence which for a moment seals their lips, makes their features grave and motionless, and combines all those stray thoughts into one supreme idea, a historic thrill passes through them. Individual destinies grow wider; nothing counts any longer but the collective task. Then they disperse into groups, and tongues are loosened. For the first time since the relief they consent to speak of the ten days spent in the Vaux sector. Their scattered impressions may be summed up in the proud boast: “At any rate, _they_ have decamped for to-night.” The fierce, uninterrupted bombardment, so hard to endure for those who are out of action, gives rise to protests. The veterans of the Artois campaign compare notes and agree that they have never seen such an orgy of firing. “It ought not to be allowed,” declares a new hand. Modestly, as if it were an everyday incident, a Corporal of the 158th tells some light infantrymen of his share in the last engagement, that of the evening of March 16 in Vaux village, which is half French, half German, and is intersected by barricades and trenches: “I was in the village, near the barricade. After the Jack Johnsons, the look-out men told us that _they_ were coming in masses. The parapets are manned. The Lieutenant says: ‘Don’t hurry, my lads, let them come up.’ When _they_ are within easy range, our men open fire. The Boches were seen to fall like ninepins. Still they came on again, and yet again. They have plenty of self-confidence.”