"What an oversight that the general didn't put us on his staff!" said Rakoczy. "We could have given him a lot of useful information."
"There's the bugle, gentlemen! Ach!" as some one opened the door; "what a blast!"
I wrapped my mantle round me closely, took another pull at the hot coffee, and went into the barrack-yard.
Two or three hundred men were drawn up in waiting. They were to convoy a huge store of food and ammunition to Waitzen.
Rather to my disgust, I found that Rakoczy and I were to look after the carts, and a wretched time of it we had.
For several hours we trudged along in the blackness of the night, while the hailstorm beat down upon us in fury.
The roads were execrable, and frequently we were compelled to stop while the teamsters got their animals out of the holes into which they stumbled.
This first spell of active service was hardly to my liking, and even upon reaching Waitzen things were very little better.
However, a merry heart is a golden cure for most ills, and it was not easy to be miserable where Rakoczy was.
He laughed at everything, found amusement in the storm, made light of the bitter cold, professed that half a dinner was better than a full one, and that he preferred to sleep on the floor, because there was no chance of falling out of bed.