Dawn found us all up and moving about, each one hunting, among the groups, those who, through mutual sympathy, would become more particularly “comrades,” or, to use a word more expressive, more characteristically French, “companions,” those with whom one breaks bread.[B] The crowd was composed of the most diverse types, but the greater number were from Normandy. Most of these Normans were farmers, many of them well-to-do; a few were dairymen and others horse-dealers. The rest of the company was Parisian. It is the custom in recruiting the French army to mix with all the contingents a certain percentage of Parisians, thus scattering over all of France, and particularly along the eastern frontier, the influence of the country’s capital. In the French army the Parisian has the reputation of being an excellent soldier; very alert, of great endurance, light-hearted, and agreeable, with a keen sense of humor which sweeps away gloom and dispels melancholy. He is also a bit hot-headed and does not yield readily to discipline. The leaders know the admirable results they can obtain by appealing to the vanity or the sentiment of the Parisian, and that he is capable of almost any effort is freely admitted. They fear, however, his caustic humor, his facile raillery and his eternal joking, which sometimes endanger their prestige. At least, these ideas existed before the war. Under the fiery tests of these three years, all differences of thought have melted as in a terrible crucible; and there has been brought about a national unity so intimate and so absolute, that one would not know how to make it more perfect.