Read "The Conscript" by Erckmann-Chatrian online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
How much were we to learn that day! At the hospital no one troubled himself about anything: when every morning you see fifty wounded come in, and when every evening you see as many depart upon the bier, you have the world before you in a narrow compass, and you think --
"After us comes the end of the universe!"