Yes, it was getting hot! The surging flood of Germans beat upon the French fortress like sea-breakers upon a rocky coast. The uproar increased. It seemed that the utmost limits of the possible must be reached, but each day those limits receded. Each day more cannon crashed; each day the explosions were faster and more furious; each day the storm augmented. One made his escape as from a horrible nightmare. Our ears hummed. Our nerves, strained to the breaking-point, vibrated and quivered like the strings of a violin. We could have dropped in our tracks from suffering and weakness. However, an immense pride sustained our waning physical force. Mud-bespattered, thin, repulsive, we resummoned our stamina when we heard a command, at the edge of a ruined village; a general was looking at us. Instantly, backs straightened, heads lifted; bayonets were fixed on gun-barrels. Our troop, panting with exhaustion, but proud, impeccable, filed past that man, our chief, whose clear eyes were fixed upon us. We understood each other. Without words, without speech, our faces told him, “We have given our lives; ‘They’ have not passed!” and, without a word, his look responded: “I know it.” We had our reward. Somehow our physical pains disappeared. Our effort, our sacrifices, our fears, our wounds, had been of service; the baffled enemy was stumbling without progressing, was crumbling away. Verdun held, and behind her protecting arm France still lived. Just the same, the time had come to seek the automobiles. We could not hold control of ourselves except when on our feet. The instant we stopped moving about, the instant we were seated, or reclining, no matter in what position we relaxed for a single second, we were asleep. Neither jolts, nor knocks, nor sudden stops interrupted our giant sleep. We slept without a remnant of physical sensation. We slept violently, as heavy and inert as dead men. We slept with all our body, all our heart and soul; fists clinched, mouths open; shaken about, wholly unconscious, carried away less like men than like parcels of cloth, earth, flesh, and accoutrement. We no longer had names or personality. We were nothing but clods, utterly at the end of our vitality. Thus we crossed the country, passing bivouacs where troops were encamped, roads where convoys were mounting toward the battle-line, forests where cavalry were awaiting their call. The noise of the cannon diminished to a distant rumble, became faint, and was lost. We slept on. Occasionally, a man stretched himself, changed position, and plunged again into oblivion like the rest. Some, in their dreams, cried out disconnected words, mumbled, or wept. A madman in my carriage suddenly leaped out and plunged into the blackness of the night. He was not missed until the next day. Three camions had passed over him, leaving him nothing but a mangled rag on the road.