But it was the love of life that kept them alive.

They directed their souls to this idea exclusively, and clung to existence by an effort of the will that prolonged it.
The most stoical kept close to one another, seated in a circle here and there, among the dead in the middle of the plain; and wrapped in their cloaks they gave themselves up silently to their sadness.
Those who had been born in towns recalled the resounding streets, the taverns, theatres, baths, and the barbers' shops where there are tales to be heard.

Others could once more see country districts at sunset, when the yellow corn waves, and the great oxen ascend the hills again with the ploughshares on their necks.

Travellers dreamed of cisterns, hunters of their forests, veterans of battles; and in the somnolence that benumbed them their thoughts jostled one another with the precipitancy and clearness of dreams.

Hallucinations came suddenly upon them; they sought for a door in the mountain in order to flee, and tried to pass through it.