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and a turbid wine of this year's vintage. It tastes wonderful, and works powerfully in the legs, so we are the more content to sit. Clouds of tobacco smoke drift through the low room; the wine smells of the earth and of summer; we fetch out our tins of preserved meat, carve off great slices and lay them on thick slabs of buttered bread, stick our knives upright beside us in the big wooden table and eat. The oil lamp beams down upon us all like a mother.
    Night makes the world beautiful. Not in front-line trenches, of course, but in peace. This afternoon we marched in here dejected; now we begin to revive. The little band playing in the corner soon gets reinforcement from our fellows. We can supply not merely pianists and virtuosos with the mouth-organ—there is even a Bavarian with a zither. Willy Homeyer will not be out, of it. He has rigged himself up a sort of devil's fiddle and with the aid of a couple of enormous pot-lids is treating us to the combined glory and clash of cymbals, kettle-drums and rattles.
    But the unusual thing, that goes to our heads even more than the wine, is the girls. They are quite other than they seemed this afternoon, they smile and are complaisant. Or are these different ones, perhaps? It is so long now since we have seen any girls.
    At first we are both eager and shy at the same time; we are not quite sure of ourselves; we seem to have forgotten how to get along with them. At last Ferdinand Kosole waltzes off with one, a husky wench with massive breastworks that should afford his gun a good he. Now all the others are following his lead.
    The heavy, sweet wine sings pleasantly in the head, the girls are whirling by, and the music plays. We are sitting in a group in one corner gathered about Adolf Bethke. "Well, boys," says he, "tomorrow or next day we'll be home again. Yes—my wife—ten months it is now——"
    I lean across the table and speak to Valentin Laher who is looking the girls over coolly, with a superior air. There is a blonde sitting beside him, but he is paying her little attention. As I lean forward something in my tunic pocket presses against the edge of the table. I feel to find out what it is. Wessling's watch.
    Jupp has hooked the fattest dame. He is dancing like a question-mark. His paw lies fiat upon her ample buttocks and is playing the piano there. With moist lips she is smiling up into his face, and he is growing bolder every minute. Finally he waltzes out through the door into the yard and vanishes.
    A few minutes later I go out and make for the nearest corner. But already a perspiring sergeant is standing there with a lass. I trundle off into the garden and am just about to begin when there is a terrific crash immediately behind me. I turn round to see Jupp rolling with Fatty on the ground. A garden table has given way beneath them. The fat lady guffaws when she sees me and puts out her tongue. Jupp hisses. I disappear hastily behind some bushes and tread on someone's hand—a hell of a night! "Can't you walk, you clumsy cow?" asks a deep voice.
    "How was I to know there was a worm there?" I retort peevishly, moving off to find a quiet corner at last.
    A cool wind, very good after the smoke inside there. Dark roofs and gables, boughs overhanging, stillness, and the peaceful plashing as I piddle.
    Albert comes and stands beside me. The moon is shining. We piss bright silver.
    "Man, but it's good, eh, Ernst?" says Albert.
    I nod. We gaze a while into the moon.
    "To think that damned show is over, Albert, eh?"
    "My bloody oath "
    There is creaking and crackling behind us. Girls laugh out clear among the bushes and are as suddenly hushed. The night is like a thunder storm, heavy with fever of life, erupting, wildly and swiftly flashing from one point to another and kindling.
    Someone groans in the garden. An answering giggle. Shadows clamber down from the hay loft. Two are standing on a ladder. The man buries his head like a madman among the girl's skirts and stammers