It was the season of the year, and they were swarming.
AUCTOR. So be it. Then if you will hear nothing of what interests me,
I see no reason for setting down with minute care what interests you,
and I may leave out all mention of the Girl who could only speak
German, of the Arrest of the Criminal, and even of the House of
Marshal Turenne - - this last something quite exceptionally
entertaining. But do not let us continue thus, nor push things to an
open quarrel. You must imagine for yourself about six miles of road,
and then - then in the increasing heat, the dust rising in spite of the
morning rain, and the road most wearisome, I heard again the sound of
bugles and the sombre excitement of the drums.
It is a thought-provoking thing, this passing from one great garrison
to another all the way down the frontier. I had started from the busy
order of Toul; I had passed through the silence and peace of all that
Moselle country, the valley like a long garden, and I had come to the
guns and the tramp of Epinal. I had left Epinal and counted the miles
and miles of silence in the forests, I had crossed the great hills and
come down into quite another plain draining to another sea, and I
heard again all the clamour that goes with soldiery, and looking
backward then over my four days, one felt - one almost saw - the new
system of fortification, the vast entrenched camps each holding an
army, the ungarnished gaps between.
As I came nearer to Belfort, I saw the guns going at a trot down a
side road, and, a little later, I saw marching on my right, a long way
off, the irregular column, the dust and the invincible gaiety of the
French line. The sun here and there glinted on the ends of
rifle-barrels and the polished pouches. Their heavy pack made their
tramp loud and thudding. They were singing a song.
I had already passed the outer forts; I had noted a work close to the
road; I had gone on a mile or so and had entered the long and ugly
suburb where the tramway lines began, when, on one of the ramshackle
houses of that burning, paved, and noisy endless street, I saw written
up the words,
Wine; shut or open.
As it is a great rule to examine every new thing, and to suck honey
out of every flower, I did not - as some would - think the phrase odd
and pass on. I stood stock-still gazing at the house and imagining a
hundred explanations. I had never in my life heard wine divided into
shut and open wine. I determined to acquire yet one more great
experience, and going in I found a great number of tin cans, such as
the French carry up water in, without covers, tapering to the top, and
standing about three feet high; on these were pasted large printed
labels, '30', '40', and '50', and they were brimming with wine.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 48 of 189
Words from 24571 to 25090
of 97758
