Had the gravediggers picked a spot fifty yards farther on for digging their trench, those two dead Frenchmen would have rested in the soil of their own country.
The sun was almost down by now, and its slanting rays slid lengthwise through the elm-tree aisles along our route.

Just as it disappeared we met a string of refugees--men, women and children--all afoot, all bearing pitiably small bundles.

They limped along silently in a straggling procession.

None of them was weeping; none of them apparently had been weeping.

During the past ten days I had seen thousands of such refugees, and I had yet to hear one of them cry out or complain or protest.
These who passed us now were like that.