For Spring:

Germinal (the Budding month, March 21 to April 19), Floreal (the Flowery month, April 20 to May 19), Prairial (the Pasture month, May 20 to June 18).

For Summer:

Messidor (the Harvest month, June 19 to July 18), Thermidor (the Hot month, July 19 to August 17), Fructidor (the Fruit month, August 18 to September 16).[13]

12th BRUMAIRE, YEAR II (November 2, 1793).—The detail of arms is completed, and Castillon and I leave day after to-morrow to join at Lille the Seventh Battalion, Paris Volunteers.

CHAPTER XXVI.
A REVOLUTIONARY OUTPOST.

On the 5th Nivose of the year II (December 25, 1793), an advance post of the main body of the Army of the Republic lay in military occupancy of an isolated tavern some quarter of a league's distance from Ingelsheim, a French burg about twelve leagues from Strasburg. Hoche and Pichegru, the Generals of the detachments called "of the Rhine and Moselle," had removed their headquarters to Ingelsheim, after several advantages gained over Marshal Wurmser, the Duke of Brunswick and the Prince of Condé. The republican troops were bivouacked about the city. The light of their campfires struggled with difficulty through the mists of a black winter's night. A line of scouts and pickets covered the position of the post, which was composed of a company of the Seventh Battalion, Paris Volunteers, among whom were John Lebrenn and his foreman Castillon.

The company was gathered in the large hall of the inn, and in the kitchen, where blazed a great fire. The greater part of the men, worn out with fatigue, sought repose on beds of fresh straw laid along the walls, making shift to use their knapsacks as pillows. Others furbished their arms, or blacked their cartridge-boxes; still others were mending their dilapidated garments or exercising their wits to cobble their shoes into a semblance of serviceableness; for neither the stores of the army nor draughts on nature sufficed to clothe and shoe all the citizens called to the flag in the last levies, or to replenish their wardrobes against the havocs of war. Few, indeed, of the volunteers, wore the complete uniform decreed by the Convention and which was already covered with the glory of so many victories. This consisted of a coat of deep blue, with facings and trimmings of red, and large white lapels, which left displayed the vest of white cloth, like the trousers; black knit leggins, with leather buttons, reaching to the knee; a flat three-cornered hat, surmounted with a plume of red horse-hair, falling beside the cockade; and a knapsack of white calf or buffalo-skin. Only the most recent recruits to the battalion were dressed correctly in accord with the decree.

The company was in command of a captain named Martin, a pupil of the painter David, the Convention member. Martin had enrolled after the days of September and at once left for the front. He had already advanced through all the elective ranks. Twice wounded, full of bravery and dash, and knowing how to win obedience in the moment of action, Captain Martin showed himself always jovial, open, and engaging in his relations with the volunteers. Although he had now followed war for fifteen months, David's young pupil did not renounce his former profession. He only awaited peace to lay down his sword, take up his brushes, and attempt to open a new field in his art by depicting the battles of the Revolution, and episodes of camp life. Seated at one corner of a table that was lighted by an iron lamp, Captain Martin was even now amusing himself with sketching, in a little pocket sketch-book, the figure, at once pitiable and grotesque, of the frightened innkeeper. Although a native of Alsace, the latter spoke an unintelligible dialect, and understood no French. Castillon, who was addressing him, indicated with a gesture a young volunteer in spick-and-span new uniform, scrupulously combed and shaven, and altogether looking, as they say, as if he had stepped out of a band-box, and explained:

"This citizen asks for twenty bottles of Moselle wine, to be paid for, of course. Isn't what I'm saying to you clear enough—barbarian!"