It was dark already, and the dense masses of smoke made it impossible to see fifty paces ahead. Everything was moving toward the windmills, the clatter of the cavalry, the shouts, the orders of the officers and the file-firing in the distance, all were confounded. Several of the squares were broken. From time to time a flash would reveal a lancer bent to his horse's neck, or a cuirassier, with his broad white back and his helmet with its floating plume, shooting off like a bullet, two or three foot soldiers running about in the midst of the fray,--all would come and go like lightning. The trampled grain, the rain streaking the heavens, the wounded under the feet of the horses, all came out of the black night--through the storm which had just broken out--for a quarter of a second. Every flash of musket or pistol showed us inexplicable things by thousands. But everything moved up the hill and away from Ligny; we were masters. We had pierced the enemy's centre, the Prussians no longer made any defence, except at the top of the hill near the mills and in the direction of Sombref, at our right. St. Amand and Ligny were both in our hands. As for us, a dozen or so of our company there alone among the ruins of the cottages, with our cartridge-boxes almost empty;--we did not know which way to turn. Zebede, Lieutenant Bretonville, and Captain Florentin had disappeared, and Sergeant Rabot was in command. He was a little old fellow, thin and deformed, but as tough as steel; he squinted and seemed to have had red hair when young. Now, as I speak of him, I seem to hear him say quietly to us, "The battle is won! by file right! forward, march!" Several wanted to stop and make some soup, for we had eaten nothing since noon and began to be hungry. The sergeant marched down the lane with his musket on his shoulder, laughing quietly, and saying in an ironical tone: "Oh! soup, soup! wait a little, the commissary is coming!" We followed him down the dark lane; about midway we saw a cuirassier on horseback with his back toward us. He had a sabre cut in the abdomen and had retired into this lane, the horse leaned against the wall to prevent him from falling off. As we filed past he called out, "Comrades!" But nobody even turned his head. Twenty paces farther on we found the ruins of a cottage completely riddled with balls, but half the thatched roof was still there, and this was why Sergeant Rabot had selected it; and we filed into it for shelter. We could see no more than if we had been in an oven; the sergeant exploded the priming of his musket, and we saw that it was the kitchen, that the fireplace was at the right, and the stairway on the left. Five or six Prussians and Frenchmen were stretched on the floor, white as wax, and with their eyes wide open. "Here is the mess-room," said the sergeant, "let every one make himself comfortable. Our bedfellows will not kick us."