I SHUDDERED IN MY VERY SOUL AND MY HAIR BRISTLED.I SHUDDERED IN MY VERY SOUL AND MY HAIR BRISTLED.
I SHUDDERED IN MY VERY SOUL AND MY HAIR BRISTLED.I SHUDDERED IN MY VERY SOUL AND MY HAIR BRISTLED.
But what shows the spirit of wisdom and prudence which the Lord puts into his creatures, when he means to spare them for a good old age, is that immediately afterward, in spite of my trembling knees, I went and sat under the first wagon, where the blows of the lances could not reach me; and there I saw the veterans finish the extermination of the rascals, who had retreated into the court, and not one of whom escaped.
Five or six were in a heap before the door, and three others were stretched upon the highway.
This did not take more than ten minutes; then all was dark again, and I heard the sergeant call: "Cease firing!"
Heitz, who had come down from his hay-loft, had just lighted a lantern; the sergeant seeing me under the wagon, called out: "Are you wounded, Father Moses?"
"No," I replied, "but a Cossack tried to thrust his lance into me, and I got into a safe place."
He laughed aloud, and gave me his hand to help me to rise.
"Father Moses," said he, "I was frightened about you. Wipe your back; people might think you were not brave."
I laughed too, and thought: "People may think what they please! The great thing is to live in good health as long as possible."
We had only one wounded, Corporal Duhem, an old man, who bandaged his own leg, and tried to walk. He had had a blow from a lance in the right calf. He was placed on the first wagon, and Lehnel, Heitz's granddaughter, came and gave him a drop of cherry-brandy, which at once restored his strength and even his good spirits.
"It is the fifteenth," he exclaimed. "I am in for a week at the hospital; but leave me the bottle for the compresses."
I was delighted to see my twelve pipes on the wagons, for Schweyer and his two boys had run away, and without their help we could hardly have reloaded.
I tapped at once at the bung-hole of the hindmost cask to find out how much was missing. These scamps of Cossacks had already drunk nearly half a measure of spirits; Father Heitz told me that some of them scarcely added a drop of water. Such creatures must have throats of tin; the oldest topers among us could not bear a glass of three-six without being upset.
At last all was ready and we had only to return to the city. When I think of it, it all seems before me now: Heitz's large dapple-gray horses going out of the stable one by one; the sergeant standing by the dark door with his lantern in his hand, and calling out, "Come, hurry up! The rascals may come back!" On the road in front of the inn, the veterans surrounded the wagons; farther on the right some peasants, who had hastened to the scene with pitchforks and mattocks, were looking at the dead Cossacks, and myself, standing on the stairs above, singing praises to God in my heart as I thought how glad Sorlé and Zeffen and little Sâfel would be to see me come back with our goods.
And then when all is ready, when the little bells jingle, when the whip snaps, and we start on the way—what delight!
Ah Fritz! everything looks bright after thirty years; we forget fears, anxieties, and fatigues; but the memory of good men and happy hours remains with us forever!
The veterans, on both sides of the wagons, with their muskets under their arms, escorted my twelve pipes as if they were the tabernacle; Heitz led the horses, and the sergeant and I walked behind.
"Well, Father Moses!" said he laughing, "it has all gone off well; are you satisfied?"
"More than I can possibly tell, sergeant! What would have been my ruin will make the fortune of my family, and we owe it all to you."
"Go along," said he, "you are joking."
He laughed, but I felt deeply; to have been in danger of losing everything, and then to regain it all and make profit out of it—it makes one feel deeply.
I exclaimed inwardly: "I will praise thee, O Lord, among the people; and I will sing praises unto thee among the nations.
"For thy mercy is great above the heavens, and thy truth reacheth unto the clouds."
Now I must tell you about our return to Phalsburg.
You may suppose that my wife and children, after seeing me take my gun and go away, were in a state of great anxiety. About five o'clock Sorlé went out with Zeffen to try to learn what was going on, and only then they heard that I had started for Mittelbronn with a detachment of veterans.
Imagine their terror!
The rumor of these extraordinary proceedings had spread through the city, and quantities of people were on the bastion of the artillery barracks, looking on from the distance. Burguet was there, with the mayor, and other persons of distinction, and a number of women and children, all trying to see through the darkness. Some insisted that Moses marched with the detachment, but nobody would believe it, and Burguet exclaimed: "It is not possible that a sensible man like Moses would go and risk his life in fighting Cossacks—no, it is not possible!"
If I had been in his place I should have said the same of him. But what can you do, Fritz? The most prudent of men become blind when their property is at stake; blind, I say, and terrible, for they lose sight of danger.
This crowd was waiting, as I said, and soon Zeffen and Sorlé came, as pale as death, with their large shawls over their heads. They went up the rampart and stood there, with their feet in the snow, too much frightened to speak.
I learned these things afterward.
When Zeffen and her mother went up on the bastion, it was, perhaps, half-past five; there was not a star to be seen. Just at that time, Schweyer and his boys ran away, and five minutes later the skirmish began.
Burguet told me afterward that, notwithstanding the darkness and the distance, they saw the flash of the muskets around the inn as plainly as if they were a hundred paces off, and everybody was still and listened to hear the shots, which were repeated by the echoes of the Bois-de-Chênes and Lutzelburg.
When they ceased Sorlé descended from the slope leaning on Zeffen's arm, for she could not support herself. Burguet helped them to reach the street, and took them into old Frise's house on the corner, where they found him warming himself gloomily by his hearth.
"My last day has come!" said Sorlé. Zeffen wept bitterly.
I have often reproached myself for having caused this sorrow, but who can answer for his own wisdom? Has not the wise man himself said: "I turned myself to behold wisdom, and madness, and folly; and I saw that wisdom excelleth folly; and I myself perceived that one event happeneth to the wise man and the fool. Wherefore, I said in my heart, that wisdom also is vanity."
Burguet was going out from Father Frise's when Schweyer and his sons came up the postern stairs, crying out that we were surrounded by Cossacks and lost. Fortunately my wife and daughter could not hear them, and the mayor soon came along and ordered them to stop talking and go home quickly, if they did not want to be sent to prison.
They obeyed, but that did not prevent people from believing what they said, especially as it was all dark again in the direction of Mittelbronn.
The crowd came down from the ramparts and filled the street; many of them went to their homes thinking they should never see us again, when, just as the clock struck seven, the sentinel of the outworks called out, "Who goes there?"
We had reached the gate.
The crowd was soon on the ramparts again. The squad in front of the sergeant on duty flew to arms; they had just recognized us.
We heard the murmur, without knowing what it was. So, when, after a reconnoissance, the gates were slowly opened to us, and the two bridges lowered for us to pass, what was our surprise at hearing the shouts: "Hurrah for Father Moses! Hurrah for the spirits of wine!"
The tears came to my eyes. And my wagons rolling heavily under the gates, the soldiers presented arms to us, the great crowd surrounding us, shouting: "Moses! Hey, Moses! are you all right? you have not been killed?" the shouts of laughter, the people seizing my arm to hear me tell about the fight,—all these things were very pleasant.
Everybody wanted to talk with me, even the mayor, and I had not time to answer them.
But all this was nothing compared with the joy I felt at seeing Sorlé, Zeffen, and little Sâfel run from Father Frise's and throw themselves all at once into my arms, exclaiming: "He is safe! he is safe!"
Ah, Fritz! what are honors by the side of such love? What is all the glory of the world compared with the joy of seeing our beloved ones? The others might have cried out, "Hurrah for Moses!" a hundred years, and I would not even have turned my head; but I was terribly moved by the sight of my family.
I gave Sâfel my gun, and while the wagons, escorted by the veterans, went on toward the little market, I led Zeffen and Sorlé through the crowd to old Frise's, and there, when we were alone, we began to hug each other again.
Without, the shouts of joy were redoubled; you would have thought that the spirits of wine belonged to the whole city. But within the room, my wife and daughter burst into tears, and I confessed my imprudence.
So, instead of telling them of the dangers I had experienced, I told them that the Cossacks ran away as soon as they saw us, and that we had only to put horses to the wagons before starting.
A quarter of an hour afterward, when the cries and tumult had ceased, I went out, with Zeffen and Sorlé on my arms, and little Sâfel in front, with my gun on his shoulder, and in this way we went home, to see to the unlading of the brandy.
I wanted to put everything in order before morning, so as to begin to sell at double price as soon as possible.
When a man runs such risks he ought to make something by it; for if he should sell at cost price, as some persons wish, nobody would be willing to run any risk for the sake of others; and if it should come to pass that a man should sacrifice himself for other people, he would be thought a blockhead; we have seen it a hundred times, and it will always be so.
Thank God! such ideas never entered into my head! I have always thought that the true idea of trade was to make as much profit as we can, honestly and lawfully.
That is according to justice and good sense.
As we turned at the corner of the market, our two wagons were already unharnessed before our house. Heitz was running back with his horses, so as to take advantage of the open gates, and the veterans, with their arms at will, were going up the street toward the infantry quarters.
It might have been eight o'clock. Zeffen and Sorlé went to bed, and I sent Sâfel for Gros the cooper, to come and unload the casks. Quantities of people came and offered to help us. Gros came soon with his boys, and the work began.
It is very pleasant, Fritz, to see great tuns going into your cellar, and to say to yourself, "These splendid tuns are mine: it is spirits which cost me twenty sous the quart, and which I am going to sell for three francs!" This shows the beauty of trade; but everybody can imagine the pleasure for himself—there is no use in speaking of it.
About midnight my twelve pipes were down on the stands, and there was nothing left to do but to broach them.
While the crowd was dispersing, I engaged Gros to come in the morning to help me mix the spirits with water, and we went up, well pleased with our day's work. We closed the double oak door, and I fastened the padlock and went to bed.
What a pleasure it is to own something and feel that it is all safe!
This is how my twelve pipes were saved.
You see now, Fritz, what anxieties and fears we had at that time. Nobody was sure of anything; for you must not suppose that I was the only one living like a bird on the branch; there were hundreds of others who were not able to close their eyes. You should have seen how the citizens looked every morning, when they heard that the Austrians and Russians occupied Alsace, that the Prussians were marching upon Sarrebruck, or when an order was published for domiciliary visits, or for days' labor to wall up the posterns and orillons of the place, or to form companies of firemen to remove at once all inflammable matter, or to report to the governor the situation of the city treasury, and the list of the principal persons subject to taxes for the supply of shoes, caps, bed-linen, and so forth.
You should have seen how people looked at each other.
In war times civil life is nothing, and they will take from you your last shirt, giving you the governor's receipt for it. The first men of the land are zeros when the governor has spoken. This is why I have often thought that everybody who wishes for war, or at least wants to be a soldier, is either demented or half ruined, and hopes to better himself by the ruin of everybody else. It must be so.
But notwithstanding all these troubles, I could not lose time, and I spent all the next day in mixing my spirits. I took off my cloak, and drew out with great gusto. Gros and his boys brought jugs, and emptied them in the casks which I had bought beforehand, so that by evening these casks were brimful of good white brandy, eighteen degrees.
I had caramel prepared, also, to give the brandy a good color of old cognac, and when I turned the faucet, and raised the glass before the candle, and saw that it was exactly the right tint, I was in ecstasies, and exclaimed: "Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts! Let him drink and remember his misery no more."
Father Gros, standing at my side on his great flat feet, smiled quietly, and his boys looked well pleased.
I filled the glass for them; they passed it to each other and were delighted with it.
About five o'clock we went upstairs. Sâfel, on the same day, had brought three workmen, and had them remove our old iron into the court under the shed. The old rickety storehouse was cleaned. Desmarets, the joiner, put up some shelves behind the door in the arch, for holding bottles, and glasses, and tin measures, when the time for selling should come, and his son put together the planks of the counter. This was all done at once, as at a time of great pressure, when people like to make a good sum of money quickly.
I looked at it all with a good deal of satisfaction. Zeffen, with her baby in her arms, and Sorlé, had also come down. I showed my wife the place behind the counter, and said, "That is the place where you are to sit, with your feet in loose slippers, and a warm tippet on your shoulders, and sell our brandy."
She smiled as she thought of it.
Our neighbors, Bailly the armorer, Koffel the little weaver, and several others, came and looked on without speaking; they were astonished to see what quick work we were making.
At six o'clock, just as Desmarets laid aside his hammer, the sergeant arrived in great glee, on his return from the cantine.
"Well, Father Moses!" he exclaimed, "the work goes on! But there is still something wanting."
"What is that, sergeant?"
"Hi! It is all right, only you must put a screen up above, or look out for the shells!"
I saw that he was right, and we were all well frightened, except the neighbors, who laughed to see our surprise.
"Yes," said the sergeant, "we must have it."
This took away all my pleasure; I saw that our troubles were not yet at an end.
Sorlé, Zeffen, and I went up, while Desmarets closed the door. Supper was ready; we sat down thoughtfully, and little Sâfel brought the keys.
The noise had ceased without; now and then a citizen on patrol passed by.
The sergeant came to smoke his pipe as usual. He explained how the screens were made, by crossing beams in the form of a sentry-box, the two sides supported against the gables, but while he maintained that it would hold like an arch, I did not think it strong enough, and I saw by Sorlé's face that she thought as I did.
We sat there talking till ten o'clock, and then all went to bed.
About one o'clock in the morning of the sixth of January, the day of the feast of the Kings, the enemy arrived on the hill of Saverne.
It was terribly cold, our windows under the persiennes were white with frost. I woke as the clock struck one; they were beating the call at the infantry barracks.
You can have no idea how it sounded in the silence of the night.
"Dost thou hear, Moses?" whispered Sorlé.
"Yes, I hear," said I, almost without breathing.
After a minute some windows were opened in our street, and we knew that others too were listening; then we heard running, and suddenly the cry, "To arms! to arms!"
It made one's hair stand on end.
I had just risen, and was lighting a lamp, when we heard two knocks at our door.
"Come in!" said Sorlé, trembling.
The sergeant opened the door. He was in marching equipments, with his gaiters on his legs, his large gray cap turned up at the sides, his musket on his shoulder, and his sabre and cartridge-box on his back.
"Father Moses," said he, "go back to bed and be quiet: it is the battalion call at the barracks, and has nothing to do with you."
And we saw at once that he was right, for the drums did not come up the street two by two, as when the National Guard was called in.
"Thank you, sergeant," I said.
"Go to sleep!" said he, and he went down the stairs.
The door of the alley below slammed to. Then the children, who had waked up, began to cry. Zeffen came in, very pale, with her baby in her arms, exclaiming, "Mercy! What is the matter?"
"It is nothing, Zeffen," said Sorlé. "It is nothing, my child: they are beating the call for the soldiers."
At the same moment the battalion came down the main street. We heard them march as far as to the Place d'Armes, and beyond it toward the German gate.
We shut the windows, Zeffen went back to her room, and I lay down again.
But how could I sleep after such a start? My head was full of a thousand thoughts: I fancied the arrival of the Russians on the hill this cold night, and our soldiers marching to meet them, or manning the ramparts. I thought of all the blindages and block-houses, and batteries inside the bastions, and that all these great works had been made to guard against bombs and shells, and I exclaimed inwardly: "Before the enemy has demolished all these works, our houses will be crushed, and we shall be exterminated to the last man."
I took on in this way for about half an hour, thinking of all the calamities which threatened us, when I heard outside the city, toward Quatre-Vents, a kind of heavy rolling, rising and falling like the murmur of running water. This was repeated every second. I raised myself on my elbow to listen, and I knew that it was a fight far more terrible than that at Mittelbronn, for the rolling did not stop, but seemed rather to increase.
"How they are fighting, Sorlé, how they are fighting!" I exclaimed, as I pictured to myself the fury of those men murdering each other at the dead of night, not knowing what they were doing. "Listen! Sorlé, listen! If that does not make one shudder!"
"Yes," said she. "I hope our sergeant will not be wounded; I hope he will come back safe!"
"May the Lord watch over him!" I replied, jumping from my bed, and lighting a candle.
I could not control myself. I dressed myself as quickly as if I were going to run away; and afterward I listened to that terrible rolling, which came nearer or died away with every gust of wind.
When once dressed, I opened a window, to try to see something. The street was still black; but toward the ramparts, above the dark line of the arsenal bastions, was stretched a line of red.
The smoke of powder is red on account of the musket shots which light it up. It looked like a great fire. All the windows in the street were open: nothing could be seen, but I heard our neighbor the armorer say to his wife, "It is growing warm down there! It is the beginning of the dance, Annette; but they have not got the big drum yet; that will come, by and by!"
The woman did not answer, and I thought, "Is it possible to jest about such things! It is against nature."
The cold was so severe that after five or six minutes I shut the window. Sorlé got up and made a fire in the stove.
The whole city was in commotion; men were shouting and dogs barking. Sâfel, who had been wakened by all these noises, went to dress himself in the warm room. I looked very tenderly on this poor little one, his eyes still heavy with sleep; and as I thought that we were to be fired upon, that we must hide ourselves in cellars, and all of us be in danger of being killed for matters which did not concern us, and about which nobody had asked our opinion, I was full of indignation. But what distressed me most was to hear Zeffen sob and say that it would have been better for her and her children to stay with Baruch at Saverne and all die together.
Then the words of the prophet came to me: "Is not this thy fear, thy confidence, thy hope, and the uprightness of thy ways?
"Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished being innocent, or where were the righteous cut off.
"No, they that plough iniquity and sow wickedness, reap the same.
"By the blast of God they perish, and by the breath of his nostrils are they consumed.
"But thee, his servant, he shall redeem from death.
"Thou shalt come to thy grave in a full age, like as a shock of corn cometh in his season."
In this way I strengthened my heart, while I heard the great tumult of the panic-stricken crowd, running and trying to save their property.
About seven o'clock it was announced that the casemates were open, and that everybody might take their mattresses there, and that there must be tubs full of water in every house, and the wells left open in case of fire.
Think, Fritz, what ideas these orders suggested.
Some of our neighbors, Lisbeth Dubourg, Bével Ruppert, Camus's daughters, and some others, came up to us exclaiming, "We are all lost!"
Their husbands had gone out, right and left, to see what they could see, and these women hung on Zeffen and Sorlé's necks, repeating again and again, "Oh, dear! oh, dear! what misery!"
I could have wished them all to the devil, for instead of comforting us they only increased our fears; but at such times women will get together and cry out all at once; you can't talk reason to them; they like these loud cryings and groanings.
Just as the clock struck eight, Bailly the armorer came to find his wife: he had come from the ramparts. "The Russians," he said, "have come down in a mass from Quatre-Vents to the very gate, filling the whole plain—Cossacks, Baskirs, and rabble! Why don't they fire down upon them from the ramparts? The governor is betraying us."
"Where are our soldiers?" I asked.
"Retreating!" exclaimed he. "The wounded came back two hours ago, and our men stay yonder, with folded arms."
His bony face shook with rage. He led away his wife; then others came crying out, "The enemy has advanced to the lower part of the gardens, upon the glacis." I was astonished at these things.
The women had gone away to cry somewhere else, and just then a great noise of wheels was heard from the direction of the rampart. I looked out of the window, and saw a wagon from the arsenal, some citizen gunners; old Goulden, Holender, Jacob Cloutier, and Barrier galloped at its sides; Captain Jovis ran in front. They stopped at our door.
"Call the iron-merchant!" cried the captain. "Tell him to come down."
Baker Chanoine, the brigadier of the second battery, came up. I opened the door.
"What do you want of me?" I asked in the stairway.
"Come down, Moses," said Chanoine. And I went down.
Captain Jovis, a tall old man, with his face covered with sweat, in spite of the cold, said to me, "You are Moses, the iron-merchant?"
"Yes, sir."
"Open your storehouse. Your iron is required for the defence of the city."
So I had to lead all these people into my court, under the shed. The captain on looking round, saw some cast-iron bars, which were used at that time for closing up the backs of fireplaces. They weighed from thirty to forty pounds each, and I sold a good many in the vicinity of the city. There was no lack of old nails, rusty bolts, and old iron of all sorts.
"This is what we want," said he. "Break up these bars, and take away the old iron, quick!"
The others, with the help of our two axes, began at once to break up everything. Some of them filled a basket with the pieces of cast-iron, and ran with it to the wagon.
The captain looked at his watch, and said, "Make haste! We have just ten minutes!"
I thought to myself, "They have no need of credit; they take what they please; it is more convenient."
All my bars and old iron were broken in pieces—more than fifteen hundred pounds of iron.
As they were starting to run to the ramparts, Chanoine laughed, and said to me, "Capital grape-shot, Moses! Thou canst get ready thy pennies. We'll come and take them to-morrow."
The wagon started through the crowd which ran behind it, and I followed too.
As we came nearer the ramparts the firing became more and more frequent. As we turned from the curate's house two sentinels stopped everybody, but they let me pass on account of my iron, which they were going to fire.
You can never imagine that mass of people, the noise around the bastion, the smoke which covered it, the orders of the infantry officers whom we heard going up the glacis, the gunners, the lighted match, caissons with the piles of bullets behind! No, in all these thirty years I have not forgotten those men with their levers, running back the cannon to load them to their mouths; those firings in file, at the bottom of the ramparts; those volleys of balls hissing in the air; the orders of the gun-captains, "Load! Ram! Prime!"
What crowds upon those gun-carriages, seven feet high, where the gunners were obliged to stand and stretch their arms to fire the cannon! And what a frightful smoke!
Men invent such machines to destroy each other, and they would think that they did a great deal if they sacrificed a quarter as much to assist their fellow-men, to instruct them in infancy, and to give them a little bread in their old age.
Ah! those who make an outcry against war, and demand a different state of things, are not in the wrong.
I was in the corner, at the left of the bastion, where the stairs go down to the postern behind the college, among three or four willow baskets as high as chimneys, and filled with clay. I ought to have stayed there quietly, and made use of the right moment to get away, but the thought seized me that I would go and see what was going on below the ramparts, and while they were loading the cannon, I climbed to the level of the glacis, and lay down flat between two enormous baskets, where there was scarcely a chance that balls could reach me.
If hundreds of others who were killed in the bastions had done as I did, how many of them might be still living, respectable fathers of families in their villages!
Lying in this place, and raising my nose, I could see over the whole plain. I saw the cordon of the rampart below, and the line of our skirmishers behind the palankas, on the other side of the moat; they did nothing but tear off their cartridges, prime, charge, and fire. There one could appreciate the beauty of drilling; there were only two companies of them, and their firing by file kept up an incessant roll.
Farther on, directly to the right, stretched the road to Quatre-Vents. The Ozillo farm, the cemetery, the horse-post-station, and George Mouton's farm at the right; the inn of La Roulette and the great poplar-walk at the left, all were full of Cossacks, and such-like rascals, who were galloping into the very gardens, to reconnoitre the environs of the place. This is what I suppose, for it is against nature to run without an object, and to risk being struck by a ball.
These people, mounted on small horses, with large gray cloaks, soft boots, fox-skin caps, like those of the Baden peasants, long beards, lances in rest, great pistols in their belts, came whirling on like birds.
They had not been fired upon as yet, because they kept themselves scattered, so that bullets would have no effect; but their trumpets sounded the rally from La Roulette, and they began to collect behind the buildings of the inn.
About thirty of our veterans, who had been kept back in the cemetery lane, were making a slow retreat; they made a few paces, at the same time hastily reloading, then turned, shouldered, fired, and began marching again among the hedges and bushes, which there had not been time to cut down in this locality.
Our sergeant was one of these; I recognized him at once, and trembled for him.
Every time these veterans gave fire, five or six Cossacks came on like the wind, with their lances lowered; but it did not frighten them: they leaned against a tree and levelled their bayonets. Other veterans came up, and then some loaded, while others parried the blows. Scarcely had they torn open their cartridges when the Cossacks fled right and left, their lances in the air. Some of them turned for a moment and fired their large pistols behind like regular bandits. At length our men began to march toward the city.
Those old soldiers, with their great shakos set square on their heads, their large capes hanging to the back of their calves, their sabres and cartridge-boxes on their backs, calm in the midst of these savages, reloading, trimming, and parrying as quietly as if they were smoking their pipes in the guard-house, were something to be admired. At last, after seeing them come out of the whirlwind two or three times, it seemed almost an easy thing to do.
Our sergeant commanded them. I understood then why he was such a favorite with the officers, and why they always took his part against the citizens: there were not many such. I wanted to call out, "Make haste, sergeant; let us make haste!" but neither he nor his men hurried in the least.
As they reached the foot of the glacis, suddenly a large mass of Cossacks, seeing that they were escaping, galloped up in two files, to cut off their retreat. It was a dangerous moment, and they formed in a square instantly.
I felt my back turn cold, as if I had been one of them.
Our sharpshooters behind the ammunition wagons did not fire, doubtless for fear of hitting their comrades; our gunners on the bastion leaned down to see, and the file of Cossacks stretched to the corner near the drawbridge.
There were seven or eight hundred of them. We heard them cry, "Hurra! hurra! hurra!" like crows. Several officers in green cloaks and small caps galloped at the sides of their lines, with raised sabres. I thought our poor sergeant and his thirty men were lost; I thought already, "How sorry little Sâfel and Sorlé will be!"
But then, as the Cossacks formed in a half-circle at the left of the outworks, I heard our gun-captain call out, "Fire!"
I turned my head; old Goulden struck the match, the fusee glittered, and at the same instant the bastion with its great baskets of clay shook to the very rocks of the rampart.
I looked toward the road; nothing was to be seen but men and horses on the ground.
Just then came a second shot, and I can truly say that I saw the grape-shot pass like the stroke of a scythe into that mass of cavalry; it all tumbled and fell; those who a second before were living beings were now nothing. We saw some try to raise themselves, the rest made their escape.
The firing by file began again, and our gunners, without waiting for the smoke to clear away, reloaded so quickly that the two discharges seemed to come at once.
This mass of old nails, bolts, broken bits of cast-iron, flying three hundred metres, almost to the little bridge, made such slaughter that, some days after, the Russians asked for an armistice in order to bury their dead.
Four hundred were found scattered in the ditches of the road.
This I saw myself.
And if you want to see the place where those savages were buried, you have only to go up the cemetery lane.
On the other side, at the right, in M. Adam Ottendorf's orchard, you will see a stone cross in the middle of the fence; they were all buried there, with their horses, in one great trench.
You can imagine the delight of our gunners at seeing this massacre. They lifted up their sponges and shouted, "Vive l'Empereur!"
The soldiers shouted back from the covered ways, and the air was filled with their cries.
Our sergeant, with his thirty men, their guns on their shoulders, quietly reached the glacis. The barrier was quickly opened for them, but the two companies descended together to the moat and came up again by the postern.
I was waiting for them above.
When our sergeant came up I took him by the arm, "Ah, sergeant!" said I, "how glad I am to see you out of danger!"
I wanted to embrace him. He laughed and squeezed my hand.
"Then you saw the engagement, Father Moses!" said he, with a mischievous wink. "We have shown them what stuff the Fifth is made of!"
"Oh, yes! yes! you have made me tremble."
"Bah!" said he, "you will see a good deal more of it; it is a small affair."
The two companies re-formed against the wall of thechemin de ronde, and the whole city shouted, "Vive l'Empereur!"
They went down the rampart street in the midst of the crowd. I kept near our sergeant.
As the detachment was turning our corner, Sorlé, Zeffen, and Sâfel called out from the windows, "Hurrah for the veterans! Hurrah for the Fifth!"
The sergeant saw them and made a little sign to them with his head. As I was going in I said to him, "Sergeant, don't forget your glass of cherry-brandy."
"Don't worry, Father Moses," said he.
The detachment went on to break ranks at the Place d'Armes as usual, and I went up home at a quarter to four. I was scarcely in the room before Zeffen, Sorlé, and Sâfel threw their arms round me as if I had come back from the war; little David clung to my knee, and they all wanted to know the news.
I had to tell them about the attack, the grape-shot, the routing of the Cossacks. But the table was ready. I had not had my breakfast, and I said, "Let us sit down. You shall hear the rest by and by. Let me take breath."
Just then the sergeant entered in fine spirits, and set the butt-end of his musket on the floor. We were going to meet him when we saw a tuft of red hair on the point of his bayonet, that made us tremble.
"Mercy, what is that?" said Zeffen, covering her face.
He knew nothing about it, and looked to see, much surprised.
"That?" said he, "oh! it is the beard of a Cossack that I touched as I passed him—it is not much of anything."
He took the musket at once to his own room; but we were all horror-struck, and Zeffen could not recover herself. When the sergeant came back she was still sitting in the arm-chair, with both hands before her face.
"Ah, Madame Zeffen," said he sadly, "now you are going to detest me!"
I thought, too, that Zeffen would be afraid of him, but women always like these men who risk their lives at random. I have seen it a hundred times. And Zeffen smiled as she answered: "No, sergeant, no; these Cossacks ought to stay at home and not come and trouble us! You protect us—we love you very much!"
I persuaded him to breakfast with us, and it ended by his opening a window, and calling out to some soldiers passing by to give notice at the cantine that Sergeant Trubert was not coming to breakfast.
So we were all calmed down, and seated ourselves at the table. Sorlé went down to get a bottle of good wine, and we began to eat our breakfast.
We had coffee, too, and Zeffen wanted to pour it out herself for the sergeant. He was delighted.
"Madame Zeffen," said he, "you load me with kindness!"
She laughed. We had never been happier.
While he was taking his cherry-brandy, the sergeant told us all about the attack in the night; the way in which the Wurtemberg troops had stationed themselves at La Roulette, how it had been necessary to dislodge them as they were forcing open the two large gates, the arrival of the Cossacks at daybreak, and the sending out two companies to fire at them.
He told all this so well that we could almost think we saw it. But about eleven o'clock, as I took up the bottle to pour out another glassful, he wiped his mustache, and said, as he rose: "No, Father Moses, we have something to do besides taking our ease and enjoying ourselves; to-morrow, or next day, the shells will be coming; it is time to go and screen the garret."
We all became sober at these words.
"Let us see!" said he; "I have seen in your court some long logs of wood which have not been sawed, and there are three or four large beams against the wall. Are we two strong enough to carry them up? Let us try!"
He was going to take off his cape at once; but, as the beams were very heavy, I told him to wait and I would run for the two Carabins, Nicolas, who was called theGreyhound, and Mathis, the wood-sawyer. They came at once, and, being used to heavy work, they carried up the timber. They had brought their saws and axes with them; the sergeant made them saw the beams, so as to cross them above in the form of a sentry-box. He worked himself like a regular carpenter, and Sorlé, Zeffen, and I looked on. As it took some time, my wife and daughter went down to prepare supper, and I went down with them, to get a lantern for the workmen.
I was going up again very quietly, never thinking of danger, when, suddenly, a frightful noise, a kind of terrible rumbling, passed along the roof, and almost made me drop my lantern.
The two Carabins turned pale and looked at each other.
"It is a ball!" said the sergeant.
At the same time a loud sound of cannon in the distance was heard in the darkness.
I had a terrible feeling in my stomach, and I thought to myself, "Since one ball has passed, there may be two, three, four!"
My strength was all gone. The two Carabins doubtless thought the same, for they took down at once their waistcoats, which were hanging on the gable, to go away.
"Wait!" said the sergeant. "It is nothing. Let us keep at our work—it is going on well. It will be done in an hour more."
But the elder Carabin called out, "You may do as you please!Iam not going to stay here—I have a family!"
And while he was speaking, a second ball, more frightful than the first, began to rumble upon the roof, and five or six seconds after we heard the explosion.
It was astonishing! The Russians were firing from the edge of the Bois-de-Chênes, more than a half-hour distant, and yet we saw the red flash pass before our two windows, and even under the tiles.
The sergeant tried to keep us still at work.
"Two bullets never pass in the same place," said he. "We are in a safe spot, since that has grazed the roof. Come, let us go to work!"
It was too much for us. I placed the lantern on the floor and went down, feeling as if my thighs were broken. I wanted to sit down at every step.
Out of doors they were shouting as if it were morning, and in a more frightful way. Chimneys were falling, and women running to the windows; but I paid no attention to it, I was so frightened myself.
The two Carabins had gone away paler than death.
All that night I was ill. Sorlé and Zeffen were no more at ease than myself. The sergeant kept on alone, placing the logs and making them fast. About midnight he came down.
"Father Moses," said he, "the roof is screened, but your two men are cowards; they left me alone."
I thanked him, and told him that we were all sick, and as for myself I had never felt anything like it. He laughed.
"I know what that is," said he. "Conscripts always feel so when they hear the first ball; but that is soon over—they only need to get a little used to it."
Then he went to bed, and everybody in the house, except myself, went to sleep.
The Russians did not fire after ten o'clock that night; they had only tried one or two field-pieces, to warn us of what they had in store.
All this, Fritz, was but the beginning of the blockade; you are going to hear now of the miseries we endured for three months.