"One can't call yesterday's a big battle, but at the same time it was a tolerably serious engagement."
The senior Captain snorted.
"Donnerwetter! one would think so. Nearly fifteen hundred prisoners, and Douay's Division obliged to abandon its camp and baggage. The Crown Prince has begun well—one expected no less!"
Said the Adjutant:
"I shall advise the Herr Colonel to announce the news to the regiment at roll-call to-morrow. It will make a good moral impression upon those who are new to Active Service, when they realize that the French have been trounced."
Then they were silent a moment, but one felt that both were crowing.
We know what had happened. Before midday the Crown Prince had pounded Douay's Division into brickbats, the brave General himself was dead, the town of Wissembourg had fallen; by two o'clock the mitrailleuse-batteries on the Geisburg had been silenced, and the Chateau stormed and won.
The men of the Imperial Army in Alsace had fought magnificently. Red-capped, swarthy Turcos in baggy white breeches, Zouaves and French infantrymen, light blue Bavarian and dark blue Prussian uniforms, with what had been brave men inside them, lay scattered among the hop-gardens and vineyards on the mountain-side.
Of these no doubt the Adjutant was thinking when he threw away his cigar-butt and said, with a sigh and an oath together:
"Kreuzdonnerwetter! one does not win victories for nothing. It must have been a bloody fight, and especially in the streets; you understand me? The French fired from the windows, and from the roofs of the houses.... There was a terrible struggle at the point of the bayonet, and both sides used the butt—liberally!"