What they have not got they want.  There are treasures among the squad long coveted by all; the two-liter water-bottle, for instance, preserved by Barque, that a skillful rifle-shot with a blank cartridge has stretched to the capacity of two and a half liters; and Bertrand’s famous great knife with the horn handle.

Among the heaving swarm there are sidelong glances that skim these curiosities, and then each man resumes “eyes right,” devotes himself to his belongings, and concentrates upon getting it in order.

They are mournful belongings, indeed.  Everything made for the soldier is commonplace, ugly, and of bad quality; from his cardboard boots, attached to the uppers by a criss-cross of worthless thread, to his badly cut, badly shaped, and badly sewn clothes, made of shoddy and transparent cloth—­blotting-paper—­that one day of sunshine fades and an hour of rain wets through, to his emaciated leathers, brittle as shavings and torn by the buckle spikes, to his flannel underwear that is thinner than cotton, to his straw-like tobacco.

Marthereau is beside me, and he points to our comrades:  “Look at them, these poor chaps gaping into their bags o’ tricks.  You’d say it was a mothers’ meeting, ogling their kids.  Hark to ’em.  They’re calling for their knick-knacks.  Tiens, that one, the times he says ‘My knife!’ same as if be was calling ‘Lon,’ or ‘Charles,’ or ‘Dolphus.’  And you know it’s impossible for them to make their load any less.  Can’t be did.  It isn’t that they don’t want—­our job isn’t one that makes us any stronger, eh?  But they can’t.  Too proud of ’em.”

The burdens to be borne are formidable, and one knows well enough, parbleu, that every item makes them more severe, each little addition is one bruise more.

For it is not merely a matter of what one buries in his pockets and pouches.  To complete the burden there is what one carries on his back.  The knapsack is the trunk and even the cupboard; and the old soldier is familiar with the art of enlarging it almost miraculously by the judicious disposal of his household goods and provisions.  Besides the regulation and obligatory contents—­two tins of pressed beef, a dozen biscuits, two tablets of coffee and two packets of dried soup, the bag of sugar, fatigue smock, and spare boots—­we find a way of getting in some pots of jam, tobacco, chocolate, candles, soft-soled shoes; and even soap, a spirit lamp, some solidified spirit, and some woolen things.  With the blanket, sheet, tentcloth, trenching-tool, water-bottle, and an item of the field-cooking kit, [note 1] the burden gets heavier and taller and wider, monumental and crushing.  And my neighbor says truly that every time he reaches his goal after some miles of highway and communication trenches, the poilu swears hard that the next time he’ll leave a heap of things behind and give his shoulders a little relief from the yoke of the knapsack.  But every time he is preparing for departure, he assumes again the same overbearing and almost superhuman load; he never lets it go, though he curses it always.