76 STORIES FROM DAUDET

face, as much as to say, ‘Try and take
it, then!’ Nobody did take it, not
even Death. After Borny, after Grave-
lotte, the most bloody of battlefields,
the flag went, split, torn, transparent
with wounds; but it was always old
Hornus who bore it.

III

Then September came, and the army
beneath Metz, the blockade, and that
long halt in the mire, where the
cannons rusted, and the first troops in
the world, demoralised by inaction,
want of food, want of news, died of
fever and weariness beside their piled
arms. All trust was gone in chiefs and
soldiers alike. Neither officers nor
soldiers hoped any more; only Hornus,
he still felt confident. His tricoloured
rag was all and everything to him, and
while he knew that was safe, it seemed
to him that nothing was lost. Un-
happily, as there was to be no more
fighting, the colonel kept the flags at