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a month and a half.
I see that on the 3rd of August I merely note down that 'a party of German soldiers (followed closely by the English) took up their quarters in my villa for twenty-four hours.' This is what actually took place in those twenty-four hours. 
I was returning at the end of the day form our neighbours w^here we had sought refuge in the cellar (we have no actual cellar of our own) when to my surprise I saw a cannon standing in the street next to my house. The front door was open and in the hall were seated two German soldiers. One of these, an officer, was dark and small and held a whip across his knees. 'He has come to take over the ground-floor of the villa,' explained a neighbor who knew German. The little, dark officer was scowling fiercely and flicking his whip about. (Incidentally I was later to know that this was the officer who led his men in the surprise attack on Poggibonsi - a prowess much vaunted on the German side). Unable to speak German but with an adequate gesture of the arms, I questioned whether he was going to blow up my house with his cannon outside. The officer took this as a joke. was it the idea or the gesture that caused him to burst out laughing, and he shouted 'Nein! Nein!' I then set about carrying upstairs our personal belongings, for we had been using the ground-floor as sleeping quarters. It was