I cannot possibly give an adequate idea of the horrible stench which caught me by the throat when I opened the door of "my" room. Imagine the odour of 80 human beings, 79 of which had not had a bath within the last three months, add to that the emanations from 160 pairs of boots which had been in use for an average of three years, sheets that had not been changed for a month, and crown the mixture with a smell of stables rising through the floor (our room stood over a stable containing 100 horses), and you will perhaps be able to gather a faint idea of what the place smelt like. Five minutes after the trumpeters had returned to barracks the evening "call" took place. In the cavalry, troopers are not called by their individual names in the evening; but every trooper has either to stand at the foot of his bed in uniform if he has been out, or in stable dress if he has not left barracks, or else he can be in bed if he chooses. The Sergeant of the Week walks through the room, each Corporal having to report with reference to absent men, whether they are on guard, or stable duty, on leave, or missing. When the Sergeant has been the round of a room, the men can do what they like throughout the barracks until 10 P.M., when they must all be in bed at the bugle call of "Lights out." In my time the night call was at 8 P.M., but since General Boulanger was Minister of War soldiers have been allowed to stop out until 9 P.M. After the evening call we changed our clothes and the _Volontaires_ collected in the canteen. This consisted of a large room, 30 feet by 20; a long table stood in the middle of it, with smaller tables on each side, forms running alongside of each. A kitchen opened on to this room, and the place was crowded. If the smell of our living-rooms was bad, the smell of the canteen was equally so: burnt fat, onions, garlic, wine, and bad tobacco furnished its chief components. A large number of men, and almost every Corporal of the various squadrons in which the _Volontaires_ were serving, were collected in the canteen in the hope--which was not deceived--of getting drinks from us. They chiefly appreciated red wine, which was sold at fivepence and sixpence a quart, superior wine fetching eightpence a quart. Brandy could be had at a halfpenny a glass, or 1_s._ 2_d._ the quart. These prices left a very good margin of profit to the canteen-keeper, as all wines and spirits sold in French barracks are exempt from excise duty. A table had been reserved for us, and there the fourteen _Volontaires_ who were serving that year met in the evening. That night our chief topic of discussion related to the _Bienvenue_ (welcome), a canteen banquet offered by the _Volontaires_ to the men and Corporals of their respective _pelotons_. It was at length settled that this should take place on the following Friday.