All along the street, people were coming out, gazing, listening; boys ran into the woods, mothers screamed. A few men more fearful than the rest went off too, each with a loaf under his arm; women, raised their hands to Heaven, calling them back and declaring they would go with them. And whilst I was gazing upon this sad spectacle, suddenly two carts came up, full gallop, from the valley of Graufthal. It was the noise of these two vehicles that I had mistaken for drums approaching. A week later I should not have made this mistake, for the Germans steal along like wolves: there is no drumming or bugling, as with us; and you have twenty thousand men on your hands before you know it. The people riding in the carts were crying, "The Prussians are at the back of the saw-mills!" They could be heard afar off; especially the women, who were raising themselves in the cart, throwing up their hands. At a hundred yards from the mill the cart stopped, and recognizing Father Diemer, municipal councillor, who was driving, I cried to him, "Hallo, Diemer! pull up a moment. What is going on down there?" "The Prussians are coming, Monsieur le Maire," he said. "Oh, well, well, if they must come sooner or later, what does it signify? Do come down." He came down, and told me that he had been that morning to the forest-house of Domenthal in his conveyance, to fetch away his wife and daughter who had been staying there with relations for a few days; and that on his way back he had seen in a little valley, the Fischbachel, Prussian infantry, their arms stacked, resting on the edge of the wood, making themselves at home; which had made him gallop away in a hurry. That was what he had seen. Then other men came up, woodmen, who said that they were some of our own light infantry, and that Diemer had made a mistake; then more arrived, declaring that they _were_ Prussians; and so it went on till night. About seven o'clock I saw an old French soldier, the last who came through our village; his leg was bandaged with a handkerchief, and he sat upon the bench before my house asking me for a piece of bread and a glass of water, for the love of God! I went directly and told Gredel to fetch him bread and wine. She poured out the wine herself for this poor fellow, who was suffering great pain. He had a ball in his leg; and, in truth, the wound smelt badly, for he had not been able to dress it, and he had dragged himself through the woods from Woerth. He had eaten nothing for twenty-four hours, and told us that the colonel of his regiment had fallen, crying, "Friends, you are badly commanded! Cease to obey your generals!" He only rested for a few minutes, not to let his leg grow stiff, and went on his weary way to Phalsbourg. He was the last French soldier that I saw after the battle of Reichshoffen.