barbe, monsieur"—The Hat wept, trying to kneel.—"Ta gueule or I'll cut your throat," the planton replied amiably; and The Frog, after another look, obeyed. And lo, the beard squirmed gently upon the floor, alive with a rhythm of its own; squirmed and curled crisply as it lay.... When The Hat was utterly shorn, he was bathed and became comparatively unremarkable, save for the worn long coat which he clutched about him, shivering. And he borrowed five francs from me twice, and paid me punctually each time when his own money arrived, and presented me with chocolate into the bargain, tipping his hat quickly and bowing (as he always did whenever he addressed anyone). Poor Old Hat, B. and I and the Zulu were the only men at La Ferté who liked you.
Fifth, a fat, jolly, decently dressed man.—He had been to a camp where everyone danced, because an entire ship's crew was interned there, and the crew were enormously musical, and the captain (having sold his ship) was rich and tipped the Director regularly; so everyone danced night and day, and the crew played, for the crew had brought their music with them.—He had a way of borrowing the paper (Le Matin) which we bought from one of the lesser plantons who went to the town and got Le Matin there; borrowing it before we had read it—by the sunset. And his favourite observations were:
"It's a rotten country. Dirty weather."
Fifth and sixth, a vacillating, staggering, decrepit creature with wildish white beard and eyes, who had been arrested—incredibly enough—for "rape." With him his son, a pleasant youth quiet of demeanour, inquisitive of nature, with whom we sometimes conversed on the subject of the English Army.
Such were the individuals whose concerted arrival taxed to its utmost the capacity of The Enormous Room. And now for my incident:
In the doorway, one day shortly after the arrival of the gentlemen mentioned, quietly stood a well-dressed handsomely middle-aged man, with a sensitive face culminating in a groomed Van Dyck beard. I thought for a moment that the Mayor of Orne, or whatever his title is, had dropped in for an
