"There is nothing I can do for you?"
"Nothing at all. My orders are to lie still; and as I feel too weak to move, and there is no one to carry me away, and nowhere to take me to, I am not likely to disobey the order."
The officer rode off again. Karl soon had a fire lighted, sufficiently close to Fergus for him to feel its warmth. Wounded men, who had made their way down the hill, came and sat down on the other sides of it. Many other fires were lighted, as it grew dusk.
In front the battle had broken out again, as furiously as ever; and ere long wounded men began to come down again. They brought cheering news, however. The Prussians were still pressing forward, the cavalry had thrown the Austrian line into terrible confusion. No one knew exactly where any of the Prussian battalions had got to, but all agreed that things were going on well.
At five o'clock the roar gradually ceased, and soon all was quiet. The wounded now came in fast, but none could say whether the battle was won or lost; for the night was so dark that each could only speak of what had happened to his own corps.
Presently the number round the fires was swelled by the arrival of numerous Austrians, wounded and unwounded. Most of these laid their rifles by, saying:
"It is a bitter night, comrades. Will you let us have a share of the fire?"
"Come in, come in," the Prussians answered. "We are all friends for tonight, for we are all in equally bad plight. Can you tell us how matters have gone, up there?"
But these knew no more than the Prussians. They had got separated from their corps in the confusion and, losing their way altogether, had seen the glow of the fires in the forest, and had come down for warmth and shelter.
Presently Major Kaulbach rode up again.