"That is easily seen," said he; "you are fat as a beadle. They fed you on chickens down there, while we were eating cow-beef."
I looked around at my sleeping neighbors. He was right; the poor conscripts were mere skin and bone. They were bronzed as veterans, and scarcely seemed able to stand.
The old man, in a moment, continued his train of questions:
"You were wounded?"
"Yes; at Lutzen."
"Four months in the hospital!" said he whistling; "what luck! I have just returned from Spain, flattering myself that I was going to meet the Kaiserliks of 1807 once more—sheep, regular sheep—but they have become worse than guerrillas. Things are spoiling."
He said the most of this to himself, without according me much of his attention, all the while sewing his shoe, which from time to time he tried on, to be sure that the sewn part would not hurt his foot. At last he put the thread in his knapsack and the shoe upon his foot, and stretched himself upon a truss of straw.
I was too fatigued to sleep at once, and for an hour lay awake.
In the morning I set out again with the quartermaster Poitevin, and three other soldiers of Sonham's division. Our route lay along the bank of the Elbe; the weather was wet and the wind swept fiercely over the river, throwing the spray far on the land.
We hastened on for an hour, when suddenly the quartermaster cried: