The water was swiftly moving blue in the channels in late summer of that year
Leaves, stirred by the wind, fell early, the dust rising
Leaves all fell from the chestnut trees, dead with the autumn
The road, bare and white, the trunks black with rain,
All the country was wet.

There were big guns too, troops marching under the window,
Covered with green branches and fighting in the mountains
It was like summer lightning
But there was not the feeling of a storm coming.

Trucks splashed mud on the road and
The troops were muddy.
To the north was another mountain,
And there was fighting for that mountain too,
But it was unsuccessful.

At the start of winter
Came the permanent rain, came the cholera.
In the end only seven thousand died of it.
Things went very badly.