"Well, if they push you, you can push them in return, and if you fall, you can get up again."
"Yes, and freeze my hands by putting them upon the ice."
"Oh! you are afraid of freezing your hands; poor child! what would you have done, if, like me, you had fallen into a deep ditch, in the midst of a battle, and when it was intensely cold?"
"Into a ditch? Oh! they would soon have come and taken me out."
"You think so, do you? but I can tell you, that before any one would have come and taken you out, you would have been frozen to death. Oh! if I had not broken my leg, how I should have returned to the action!"
"If your leg was broken, how did you get out of the ditch?"
"The deuce! would you have had me remain in it? It was not very comfortable there, I assure you. I dragged myself along upon my hands, and in less than five minutes I was out of it."
"And what did they do to your leg afterwards?"