coupée à pic, 'with an escarpment,' 'scarped

1. 38. son bonnet d'évêque, i.e. shaped like a mitre; table-napkins are sometimes folded en bonnet cPévîque.

1. 16. du côté de Reims, 'on the side towards Rheims,' i.e. his orders were to get between Rheims and the corps de garde, E.B. 132.

1. 19. Craonne, March 7, 1814. Blucher having retreated across the Aisne at Soissons, Napoleon crossed higher up and attacked him on the plateau of Craonne, where he won a brilliant but fruitless victory. Two days later he was unsuccessful in his attack upon Laon, a strong position further north on the road to Belgium.

1. 20. piquée des vers, literally 'wormeaten.' It means that the victory of Craonne was in the speaker's opinion a real one, not a mere semblance of a victory. We may suppose that the unsuccessful attack on Laon was not then known to the division advancing on Rheims.

1. 30. autrement sombre, 'very much darker,' E.B. 111, Obs. 4.

1. 35. Ils avaient r habitude des Russes, ' were used to.' There is an expression, perhaps a little old-fashioned, avoir habitude avec, ' to be intimate with.'