liked to speak to you. The only consolation is that our love needs no
expression.

Very little to tell you. I was quite stupefied by the day's work
yesterday, spent entirely in darkness. From my place I had only a
glimpse of a pretty tree against the sky.

To-day, in the charming early morning I saw a beautiful and extremely
brilliant star. I had gone to fetch some coal and water, and on the way
back, when daylight had already come, that extraordinary star still
persisted. My corporal, who, like me, was dodging from bush to bush back
to our house, said:

'Do you know what that star is? It is the sign for the enemy's patrol to
rally.'

It was true, and at first I felt outraged at this profanation of the
sky, and then (apart from the ingenuity of the thing) I told myself that
this star meant, for those poor creatures on the other side, that they
could take the direction of safety. I felt less angry about it then. The
sign had given me so much joy as a star that I decided to stick to my
first impression.


_December 30._

Your Christmas letter came last night. Perhaps in this very hour when I
am writing to you, mine of the same day is reaching you. At that time,
in spite of the risk, I was enjoying all the beauty, but to-day I
confess it is poisoned for me by what we hear of the last slaughter.