The troops were assembling out of houses and tents, and coming from around fires, where many of them had passed an unsheltered night.
There was little of the joy, the gaiety, the _elan_ of the French soldier, to be seen in the faces of the men thus summoned to the Eagles.

They came, indeed, they answered the call, but with black looks and sullen faces and a manner almost despairing.

They had fought and fought and fought.

They had been beaten back and back and back, and when they had not been fighting they had been retreating.

And always they were hungry.