“They shot him immediately. The soldiers fired at him, reloaded their guns, and fired again with the rage of brutes. They fought with each other for their turn to shoot, and, still firing, they filed past the corpse as you file past a coffin to sprinkle it with holy water.
“Then suddenly the cry arose: ‘The Prussians! The Prussians!’ And from every side I heard the tremendous uproar of the panic-stricken army in full flight.
“The panic due to the firing at the vagabond had maddened the executioners themselves, who, not understanding that they were responsible for the terror they felt, fled and disappeared into the darkness.
“I was left alone with the body and the two gendarmes whose duty compelled them to stay with me.
“They lifted up the battered mass of bruised and bleeding flesh. ‘He must be searched,’ I said, handing them a box of candle-matches which I had in my pocket. One of the gendarmes held the light for the other. I stood between the two.
“The gendarme who was examining the body declared:
“ ‘Clothed in a blue workman’s blouse, a white shirt, trousers, and a pair of shoes.’
“The first match went out, and a second was lighted. The man, turning out the pockets, continued: ‘A horn-handled knife, check handkerchief, snuffbox, piece of string, and piece of bread.’
“The second match went out, a third was lighted. After having carefully felt the corpse, the gendarme said: ‘That’s all.’
“I said: ‘Strip him. We may find something next his skin,’ and to enable the two gendarmes to work together, I held the match for them. By its fugitive light I saw them gradually strip the body and expose to view the bleeding mass of flesh, still warm in death.
“Suddenly one of them stammered: ‘Damn it all, Major; it’s a woman!’
“I cannot describe my strange, poignant feeling of anguish. I could not believe it, and knelt down in the snow beside the shapeless pulp to see for myself: it was a woman!
“The two gendarmes, speechless and demoralised, waited for me to express an opinion on the matter. But I didn’t know what to think, I had no idea what could have happened. Then the brigadier drawled out: ‘Perhaps she had come to look for her son in the artillery, because she had not heard from him.’
“And the other replied:
“ ‘That may well be so.’
“And I who had seen so many terrible things began to shed tears. And beside the dead woman, in the icy cold night, in the middle of the dark plain, in the presence of this mystery, this unknown victim, I knew exactly what the word ‘horror’ meant.
“I had the same feeling last year when interrogating one of the survivors of the Flatters Mission, an Algerian sharpshooter. You know most of the details of that appalling drama, but there is still another of which you are probably ignorant.
“The colonel was going to the Sudan through the desert, crossing the immense territory of the Touaregs, who in that ocean of sand which stretches from the Atlantic to Egypt, and from the Sudan to Algeria, are pirates of a sort comparable to those who formerly plundered the high seas.
“The guides conducting the column belonged to the tribe of Shaamba from Wargla.
“Well, one day they pitched their camp in the middle of the desert, and the Arabs declared that as the spring was a little farther on they would go with all the camels to fetch water.
“One man only warned the colonel that he had been betrayed. Flatters refused to believe him and accompanied the convoy with his engineers, doctors, and most of the officers. They were massacred by the spring, and all the camels were captured.
“The captain of the Arabian Department of Wargla who had stayed behind in the camp took command of the survivors, Spahis and sharpshooters, and began to retreat, abandoning all supplies and provisions, because there were no camels.
“So they started off through the shadeless, boundless solitude, beneath the fierce sun that scorched them from early morning till night.
“One tribe surrendered, bringing dates as a peace-offering; these dates were poisoned, and nearly all the Frenchmen perished, the only remaining officer being of the number.
“Only a few Spahis were left with their quartermaster, Pobéguin, besides the native sharpshooters of the Shaamba tribe, with two camels, but these disappeared one night with two Arabs.
“Then the survivors realised that they would be obliged to eat each other, and as soon as the flight of the two Arabs with the two camels was discovered, they separated and proceeded to march one by one through the soft sand, under the fierce blaze of the sun, out of gunshot range of each other.
“They kept on like this all day and when they reached a spring each one in turn went up to drink as soon as his nearest neighbour had reached the distance decided upon. So they kept on the whole day, raising in their track across that level, burnt-up expanse those little columns of dust which in the distance show the track of travellers in the desert.
“But, one morning, one of the men swerved round and approached his neighbour, and the other stopped to look.
“The man whom the famished soldier was approaching made no attempt to run away, but lay flat on the ground and aimed at him. When he thought he was within gunshot he fired, but did not hit the other, who still advanced and, firing in his turn, shot his comrade dead.
“The others rushed up from every direction for their share of the dead body; he who had been the slaughterer cut it up and distributed the pieces.
“Then the irreconcilable allies spaced themselves as before, until the next murder should bring them together again.
“For two days they lived upon their share of human
