Out walking, just now, we had paused for a moment, dazzled by the beauty of the evening. We were on the strip of greyish-white pasture which arches along the edge of the pine wood, and looked like the woolly back of a sheep. Before us, seemingly at our very feet, the Danubian plain, with its gentle undulations, stretched away through the iridescent haze. The sun had just set. A breeze was blowing from the west, chasing before it golden mist-wreaths. The branches and faded foliage of the oaks, dry and nipped by the frost, rustled in the chill wind; the pine needles, interlaced with gossamer, reddened by many sunsets, whispered and murmured. We were a silent company, Baron von Stengel, Major Langlois, MM. Jeandidier, Cavaillé, Lœbre, Romant, Bouvat, my friend Laloux, and myself. The vastness of the prospect, the silence of the fields, the fading of the light, the shivering of the undergrowth in the twilight, the strange sensation of being suddenly plunged into the heart of winter—all these influences combined to keep us mute.
What a waste of time! I thought. Already three months in prison. Three months lost beyond recall. And the baron had just said to me, “England is intractable. I hardly think you will get away before next autumn.” More than a year lived through for nothing, suffered for nothing. A whole year cut out from the short span of our days. I was prey to a cold, hard sadness. Then, my thoughts turned to you.… All at once a song rose from the road. The recruits quartered at Hepperg were returning to quarters, marching with that slow and heavy German pace which will never be a match for our French step.
They were singing the famous
Nun ade, wir müssen Abschied nehmen.…
with which all the Feldgrau, before going to the front, have made the quiet Bavarian taverns ring, sitting over their great tankards, each holding the beloved one’s hand. I was familiar with the strains. The little sergeant of whom I have previously written to you had made his men sing it to me one evening in the guardroom, and had copied out the text for me:
Now farewell. We must take leave. We must charge our muskets. With stout hearts we shall give to the war and to the fields of battle the finest days of our youth. Farewell, dear parents, brothers, and sisters. Shake hands for the last time. If we are never to meet again, let us hope for a reunion in a better world.
Farewell, best beloved, you who know that our parting is harder to bear than death. It may be that we shall never meet again. Yet every day, when night falls, let us renew our hopes.
The shells are whistling through the air. The bayonets are fixed. The flags are waving in the breeze. Our dread is concealed beneath the smoke of the combat. As we fight we cry, hurrah, hurrah!
We are in the thick of it, like good Bavarians.