'Yes, you dirty pigs!' repeated Jean, quite beside himself, 'it serves you right! You are not deserving of the trouble I'm going to take to try and find something for you; because, after all, it's my duty not to let you kick the bucket on the road.' Thereupon he started on a journey of discovery, like every good corporal should do under the circumstances, taking with him Pache, whom he liked on account of his gentleness, though he considered him far too fond of priests.
Meantime, Loubet had noticed a little farmhouse standing two or three hundred yards away, one of the last houses of Contreuve, where, it seemed to him, a good deal of business was being done. Calling Chouteau and Lapoulle, he said to them: 'Let us have a try. I fancy we can get some grub over there.'
Maurice was left to mount guard over the pot of boiling water, with orders to keep the fire alight. He had seated himself on his blanket, with his shoe off so that the sore on his heel might dry. He was interested at the sight which the camp presented with all the squads at sixes and sevens since they had learnt that there would be no distribution of provisions. He became conscious that some of the troops were always short of everything, whilst others lived in abundance; in fact, it all depended on the foresight and skill of the corporals and the men. Amid the stir and bustle around him, he noticed, on glancing between the tents and the piles of arms, that some fellows had not even been able to light a fire, and that others, resigning themselves to circumstances, had already retired for the night; whilst others again, on the contrary, were eating, he could not tell what, but doubtless something nice, with keen appetite and relish. He was also struck by the beautiful order that prevailed among the reserve artillery encamped on a hill above him. As the sun set, it shone forth between two clouds, casting a glow over the guns, which the artillerymen had already carefully cleansed of all the mud that they had been splashed with during the march.
Meantime the commander of the brigade, General Bourgain-Desfeuilles, had installed himself comfortably at the little farmhouse whither Loubet and his comrades had betaken themselves. The general had found a fairly good bed there, and was seated before an omelet and a roast fowl, which had put him in an excellent humour; and Colonel de Vineuil having come to speak to him respecting some matter of detail, he had invited him to stay and dine with him. So they both sat there eating, waited upon by a big, fair fellow, who had only been three days in the farmer's employ, and who declared himself to be an Alsatian refugee, carried away in the rout of Frœschweiler. The general talked openly in presence of this man, commented on the march of the troops, and then, forgetting that the fellow did not belong to the Ardennes, began questioning him respecting the roads and the distances. Painfully affected by the thorough ignorance which the general's questions revealed, the colonel, who, for his part, had formerly resided at Mézières, supplied some precise particulars, whereupon the general vented his feelings in the exclamation: 'How idiotic it all is! How can one fight in a country one knows nothing whatever about?'