It then occurred to Maurice to stand treat to the squad by way of wishing them all good luck—'if you'll allow it, corporal,' said he.
After hesitating for a moment, Jean accepted a drop of something short. Loubet and Chouteau were there, the latter slyly respectful since he had seen Jean's fists so near his face; and Pache and Lapoulle were there also, good fellows both of them, when others did not set them agog. 'To your health, corporal!' said Chouteau, in an unctuous voice.
'To yours, and may we all bring our heads and feet back,' politely replied Jean, amid an approving titter.
The others were starting, however, and Captain Beaudoin had already drawn near, apparently greatly shocked, and bent on reprimanding the tipplers, whereas Lieutenant Rochas, indulgent when his men were thirsty, affected to look in another direction. And now they sped along the road to Châlons, an endless ribbon, edged with trees and stretching in a straight line right across the vast plain, with stubble extending far away on either side, and dotted here and there with lofty ricks and wooden mills, whose sails were turning. More to the north were rows of telegraph posts, indicating other roads on which the dark lines of other troops on the march could be discerned. Several regiments also cut across the fields in dense masses. In the van, on the left, a brigade of cavalry trotted along, quite dazzling in the sunlight. And the entire horizon, at other times so blank, so mournfully empty and limitless, became animated and populous with these streams of men gushing forth from all directions, these apparently inexhaustible myriads that poured, as it were, out of some gigantic ant-hill.
At about nine o'clock the 106th wheeled to the left, quitting the road to Châlons for another straight, endless, ribbon-like highway, conducting to Suippe. The men were marching in two open files, leaving the centre of the road clear. The officers walked along there at their ease, and Maurice noticed how strongly their thoughtful air contrasted with the good humour and satisfied sprightliness of the men, who were as pleased as children to find themselves on the march again. The squad being almost at the head of the regiment, he also obtained a distant view of M. de Vineuil, and was greatly struck by the gloomy carriage of the colonel's tall, stiff frame, which swayed with the motion of his horse. The band had been packed off to the rear among the sutlers' carts. And accompanying the division came the ambulance vans and equipage train, followed by the convoy of the entire army corps, the forage waggons, the provision vans, the baggage waggons, a stream of vehicles of every description, more than three miles in length, and looking like an interminable tail when, at the few bends of the road, it was possible to obtain any view of it. A herd of cattle brought up the extreme rear in the far distance—a straggling drove of big oxen stamping alone in a cloud of dust; the live, whip-driven meat, as it were, of some warlike migratory people.
Meanwhile, Lapoulle from time to time hoisted up his knapsack by dint of shrugging his shoulders. Under pretence that he was stronger than his comrades, he was often laden with the utensils of the squad, such as the large stew-pot and the water-can. On this occasion he had also been entrusted with the company's spade, which he had been told it was an honour to carry. He did not complain, however; in fact, he was laughing at a song with which Loubet, the tenor of the squad, was enlivening the long tramp. Loubet's knapsack, by the way, was celebrated for its contents, which comprised something of everything: linen, spare shoes, needles and thread, brushes, chocolate, a metal cup, a spoon and fork, without counting the regulation provisions, biscuits and coffee; and, although he also had his cartridges inside it, and a rolled blanket, a shelter tent and pegs strapped to it outside, the whole seemed to be wonderfully light, so accomplished was he in the art of packing.
'A beastly part!' muttered Chouteau, from time to time, as he cast a disdainful glance at the mournful plains of 'la Champagne pouilleuse.'
The vast expanses of chalky soil still stretched out on either side in endless monotony. Not a farm nor a human being was to be seen; nothing but some flights of crows dotting the grey immensity. Afar off, on the left, some dark green pine woods crowned the gentle undulations that limited the horizon; whilst on the right a long line of trees indicated the course of the river Vesle; and on that side, for the last league or so, some dense smoke had been seen rising from behind the hills, its mingled coils at last blotting out the horizon with the huge, frightful cloud of a conflagration.
'What's burning over there?' the men asked on every side.