"He is captain in the Sixth Dragoons."
We were searching for other names which would remind us of the youthful faces of our
younger days. Once in a while we had met some of these old comrades, bearded, bald,
married, fathers of several children, and the realization of these changes had given us an
unpleasant shudder, reminding us how short life is, how everything passes away, how
everything changes. My friend asked me:
"And Patience, fat Patience?"
"Oh! as for him, just listen to this. Four or five years ago I was in Limoges, on a tour of
inspection, and I was waiting for dinner time. I was seated before the big cafe in the Place
du Theatre, just bored to death. The tradespeople were coming by twos, threes or fours, to
take their absinthe or vermouth, talking all the time of their own or other people's
business, laughing loudly, or lowering their voices in order to impart some important or
delicate piece of news.
"I was saying to myself: 'What shall I do after dinner?' And I thought of the long evening
in this provincial town, of the slow, dreary walk through unknown streets, of the
impression of deadly gloom which these provincial people produce on the lonely
traveller, and of the whole oppressive atmosphere of the place.
"I was thinking of all these things as I watched the little jets of gas flare up, feeling my
loneliness increase with the falling shadows.
"A big, fat man sat down at the next table and called in a stentorian voice:
"The 'my' came out like the report of a cannon. I immediately understood that everything
was his in life, and not another's; that he had his nature, by Jove, his appetite, his trousers,
