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Not having luggage to be examined, we fearlessly passed the red-trousered custom officials in the building and crossed the busy docks to the carriages in waiting. At the docks many vessels were lying, and the wharves were filled with outgoing and incoming freight.

Consider every type which a great army could show: some in hunting dress, but the most in uniforms; blue dragoons, red dragoons, red-trousered hussars, green riflemen, artillerymen, gold-slashed lancers, and most of all red, red, red, for the infantry officers ride as hard as the cavalry.

They sat together outside the locked station unable to speak, pale and panic-stricken. The first object that caught the general's eye as he slowly turned into the square by the little station was their four red-trousered legs then he caught the glint of their two brass trombones. The next instant heads appeared at the windows. It was as if a bomb had suddenly exploded in the square.

"That the soldiers are committing atrocities." "It is a miracle that those Hottentots have not searched the house! I declare that if I see one of the red-trousered gentry enter the house, I shall fall down speechless." "This is a nice condition of things!" said Remedios, exhaling half her soul in a sigh.

Already there were a few people about, hurrying beachward; and when I reached the level of the firm, yellow sand, there were the red-trousered men of the bathing-machines, in full activity, getting their horses into the traces, while dogs raced wildly over sand-hillocks, and children played with bright, sea-washed shells the waves had flung them.

She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying.

His new greatcoat, much too large for him, made him appear still more dumpy, and with his red-trousered legs wide apart, and his large peaked cap swinging before him, he presented both a comical and pathetic sight his plump, stupid little person plainly betraying the rustic, although he wore a uniform. Helene desired to obtain some information from him. "You left Beauce a week ago?" she asked.

In the Place de Gouvernment, one of the centers of business and religious life of the city, we met turbaned Arabs, barefoot negroes, red-trousered soldiers, French civilians, American tourists, Hebrew traders, Kabyle mountaineers. In this motley crowd the native men and women especially attracted our attention.

"Lobsters bein' land sodgers, my dears," remarked Adams, in explanation, "so-called 'cause of their bein' all red-coated; but the French sodgers are only red-trousered, coats bein' blue. Axin' your pardon, Brace, go on." The seaman, who had availed himself of the interruption to stir up and stuff down his pipe, resumed.

They looked like ghosts in the moonlight; no cheer escaped them as we passed, no hand waved an exuberant greeting. In the twilight we had already seen red-trousered soldiers, vivid as poppies against the grass, digging trenches along the line, and at one point a group of sappers improvising a wire footbridge across the river.