The Downfall

The Downfall

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Title: The Downfall
Author: Emile Zola
Release Date: October 25, 2004 [EBook #13851]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
DOWNFALL ***

Produced by Dagny, John Bickers, and David Widger

THE DOWNFALL
(LA DEBACLE) (The Smash-up)
BY
EMILE ZOLA

Translated By E. P. Robins

THE DOWNFALL

PART FIRST

I.
In the middle of the broad, fertile plain that stretches away in the
direction of the Rhine, a mile and a quarter from Mulhausen, the camp
was pitched. In the fitful light of the overcast August day, beneath the
lowering sky that was filled with heavy drifting clouds, the long lines
of squat white shelter-tents seemed to cower closer to the ground, and
the muskets, stacked at regular intervals along the regimental fronts,
made little spots of brightness, while over all the sentries with loaded
pieces kept watch and ward, motionless as statues, straining their eyes
to pierce the purplish mists that lay on the horizon and showed where
the mighty river ran.
It was about five o'clock when they had come in from Belfort; it was
now eight, and the men had only just received their rations. There could
be no distribution of wood, however, the wagons having gone astray,
and it had therefore been impossible for them to make fires and warm
their soup. They had consequently been obliged to content themselves
as best they might, washing down their dry hard-tack with copious
draughts of brandy, a proceeding that was not calculated greatly to help
their tired legs after their long march. Near the canteen, however,
behind the stacks of muskets, there were two soldiers pertinaciously
endeavoring to elicit a blaze from a small pile of green wood, the
trunks of some small trees that they had chopped down with their
sword-bayonets, and that were obstinately determined not to burn. The
cloud of thick, black smoke, rising slowly in the evening air, added to
the general cheerlessness of the scene.
There were but twelve thousand men there, all of the 7th corps that the
general, Felix Douay, had with him at the time. The 1st division had
been ordered to Froeschwiller the day before; the 3d was still at Lyons,
and it had been decided to leave Belfort and hurry to the front with the
2d division, the reserve artillery, and an incomplete division of cavalry.
Fires had been seen at Lorrach. The _sous-prefet_ at Schelestadt had
sent a telegram announcing that the Prussians were preparing to pass
the Rhine at Markolsheim. The general did not like his unsupported
position on the extreme right, where he was cut off from
communication with the other corps, and his movement in the direction

of the frontier had been accelerated by the intelligence he had received
the day before of the disastrous surprise at Wissembourg. Even if he
should not be called on to face the enemy on his own front, he felt that
he was likely at any moment to be ordered to march to the relief of the
1st corps. There must be fighting going on, away down the river near
Froeschwiller, on that dark and threatening Saturday, that ominous 6th
of August; there was premonition of it in the sultry air, and the stray
puffs of wind passed shudderingly over the camp as if fraught with
tidings of impending evil. And for two days the division had believed
that it was marching forth to battle; the men had expected to find the
Prussians in their front, at the termination of their forced march from
Belfort to Mulhausen.
The day was drawing to an end, and from a remote corner of the camp
the rattling drums and the shrill bugles sounded retreat, the sound dying
away faintly in the distance on the still air of evening. Jean Macquart,
who had been securing the tent and driving the pegs home, rose to his
feet. When it began to be rumored that there was to be war he had left
Rognes, the scene of the bloody drama in which he had lost his wife,
Francoise and the acres that she brought him; he had re-enlisted at the
age of thirty-nine, and been assigned to the 106th of the line, of which
they were at that time filling up the _cadres_, with his old rank of
corporal, and there were moments when he could not help wondering
how it ever came about that he, who after