Chapter 7

There was a moment's silence; Marc Divès knit his brow, and did not seem at all convinced.

"We will die!" he exclaimed, scratching the back of his head. "For my part, I don't at all see why we should die; that does not enter into my ideas, there are too many people who would be delighted at it!"

"What would you do, then?" said Hullin, in a dry tone—"would you surrender?"

"I surrender!" exclaimed the smuggler. "Do you take me for a coward?"

"Then explain yourself."

"This evening I set out for Phalsbourg: I risk my skin by crossing the enemy's lines, but I like that better than to cross my arms here and perish by famine. I shall either enter the place at the first sortie or endeavour to gain an outpost. The Governor, Meunier, knows me. I have sold him tobacco for the last three years. Like you, he has served in the campaigns of Italy and Egypt. Well, I shall lay the case before him. I shall see Gaspard Lefévre. I will do so much that they will perhaps give us a company. We want nothing but the uniform, do you see, Jean-Claude, and we are saved. All that are left of our brave fellows will join Piorette, and, in any case, we may be relieved. In short, that is my idea; what do you think of it?"

He looked at Hullin, whose fixed and gloomy eye disturbed him.

"Come, is there not a chance?"

"It is an idea," said Jean-Claude at length. "I do not oppose it."

And, in his turn, looking the smuggler straight in the face:

"You swear to me to do your utmost to gain entrance to the place?"

"I swear nothing at all," replied Marc, whose brown cheeks were suffused with a sudden red. "I leave here all that I have: my property, my wife, my comrades, Catherine Lefévre, and yourself—my oldest friend. If I do not return, I shall be a traitor; but, if I do return, Jean-Claude, you shall give me a little explanation ofthe question you have just put to me: we have a little account to settle together!"

"Marc," said Hullin, "forgive me; I have suffered too much these last few days! I have been wrong; misfortune makes me mistrustful. Give me your hand! Go, save us, save Catherine, save my child! I say this to you now; we have no resource but in you."

Hullin's voice trembled: Divès allowed himself to be moved by it; only he added:

"For all that, Jean-Claude, you should not have spoken so to me at such a moment; let us never speak of it again! I will leave my skin by the way, or else return to deliver you; this very evening at night time, I will set forth! Thekaiserlicksare already encircling the mountain; no matter, I have a good horse, and, besides, I've always been lucky."

By six o'clock the loftiest of the mountain tops were wrapped in darkness. Hundreds of fires sparkling at the bottom of the gorges announced that the Germans were preparing their evening meal. Marc Divès descended the footpath on tiptoe. Hullin listened a few seconds longer to the sound of his comrade's footsteps; then he directed his own, in a meditative mood, towards the old tower where the head-quarters had been established. He raised the thick woollen covering which shut in the owl's nest, and saw Catherine, Louise, and the others crouching round a little fire which threw its feeble light upon the grey walls. The old farm-mistress, seated on a block of oak, with her hands clasped round her knees, was watching the flame with fixed eye, compressed lips, and livid complexion; Louise, leaning with her back against the wall, seemed absorbed in a dream; Jerôme, standing behind Catherine, with his hands crossed upon his stick, touched with his thick otter-skin cap the rotten roof. All were sad and dispirited. Hexe-Baizel, who was lifting up the lid of a saucepan, and Doctor Lorquin, who was scraping the mortar of the old wall with the point of his sword, alone preserved their wonted aspect.

"Here we are," said the doctor, "come back to the time of the Triboques. These walls are more than two thousand years old. A good quantity of water must have flowed from the heights of the Falkenstein and the Grosmann, by the Sarre to the Rhine, since a fire was lit in this tower."

"Yes," replied Catherine, like one awaking from a dream; "and many others beside us have suffered here cold, hunger, and poverty. Who has known of it? No one. And in a hundred, two hundred, three hundred years, others, perhaps, will come again to seek shelter in this same place. They will find, like us, the cold wall, the damp earth. They will make a little fire. They will look round as we do. And they will say, like us: 'Who has suffered before us here? Why have they suffered? They were then pursued, hunted, as we are, to come and hide themselves in this miserable hole.' And they will think of times past, and none will be able to reply to them!"

Jean-Claude had approached. In a few seconds, the old farm-mistress, raising her head, began to say, as she regarded him:

"Well! We are surrounded—the enemy wants to reduce us by famine!"

"It is true, Catherine," replied Hullin. "I did not expect that. I reckoned on an attack by main force; but thekaiserlicksare not yet quite as far advanced asthey think. Divès has just set out for Phalsbourg; he is acquainted with the governor of the place. And if they will send only a few hundred men to our succour——"

"We must not count upon it," interrupted the old woman. "Marc may be taken or killed by the Germans. And then, even suppose that he succeeds in crossing their lines, how will he be able to enter Phalsbourg? You know well that the place is besieged by the Russians!"

Then every one became silent.

Hexe-Baizel soon after brought the soup, and they made a circle round the steaming bowl.

illustration

CHAPTER XXVI.

Catherine Lefévre went out of the old cavern about seven o'clock in the morning; Louise and Hexe-Baizel were still asleep; but broad daylight, the splendid daylight of the upper regions, was already streaming through every abyss. At the bottom, through the bright azure, were outlined the woods, the valleys, and the rocks as clearly as the mosses and pebbles of a lake beneath its crystal waters. Not a breath disturbed the air; and Catherine, in presence of this spectacle of boundless nature, felt herself calmer, more tranquil than even in sleep.

"What," said she, to herself, "are our petty troubles of a day, our trials and vexations? Why weary Heaven with our murmurs? Why dread the future? All this only lasts but for a second. Our complaints are of no more account than the cry of the grasshopper in autumn: do its cries prevent winter from coming? Must not the times and seasons be accomplished, and all die to be born again? We have been dead before and have returned again; we shall die again, and again return. And the mountains, with their forests, their rocks, and their ruins, will be ever there to say to us: 'Remember! Remember! Thou hast seen me; behold me again; and thou shalt see me again from generation to generation!'"

Thus mused the old woman, and the future no longer made her afraid; thoughts for her were only memories.

And while she was standing there for a few moments, all of a sudden a hum of voices struck upon her ear; she turned, and saw Hullin with the three smugglers, who were conversing gravely together on the other side of the plateau. They had not perceived her, and seemed engaged in a serious discussion.

Old Brenn, standing on the edge of the rock, with the blackened stump of a pipe between his teeth, his cheek wrinkled like an old cabbage-leaf, his round nose, gray moustache, flabby eyelid drooping over his blood-shot eye, and the long sleeves of his gaberdine falling by his side, was looking at the different points which Hullin was showing him on the mountain; and the two others, wrapped in their long gray cloaks, were pacing to and fro, shading their brows with their hands, and seeming absorbed in profound attention.

Catherine drew near, and soon she heard:

"Then you do not believe it will be possible to descend on either side?"

"No, Jean-Claude, there is no way," replied Brenn, "those brigands know the country, every inch of it; all the paths are guarded. See, look at the deer pasture all along that pond; the preventive officers never had a thought of even noticing it; well, the Allies are defending it. And, below there, the passage of the Rothstein, a regular goat-walk, which you never pass above once in ten years—you can see the glitter of a bayonet behind the rock, can you not? And that other here, where I have carried on my little game foreight years without ever meeting a gendarme—they are holding that too. The very devil himself must have shown them the defiles."

"Yes!" exclaimed the tall Toubac, "and if it is not the devil who has put his foot in it, it must, at least, be Yégof."

"But," replied Hullin, "it seems to me as if three or four firm determined men might carry one of those outposts."

"No, they are supported one by the other; at the first report of a gun, you would have a regiment upon your back," replied Brenn. "Besides, supposing we should have a chance of passing, how should we return with provisions? For my part, this is my opinion: The thing is impossible!"

There was a silence of some moments.

"But still," said Toubac, "if Hullin wishes it, we will try, all the same."

"We will try what?" said Brenn, "to break our backs in trying to escape ourselves, and leave the others in the net. It's all the same to me; if the rest go—I go! But as to saying that we shall return with provisions, I maintain that it's impossible. Let us see, Toubac, by which way would you pass, and by which way would you return? It's no use in this case promising; you must perform. If you know a passage, tell it me. For twenty years I have beaten the mountain with Marc, and I know every road, every path within ten leagues from here, and I do not see any other passage than in heaven!"

Hullin turned round at this moment and saw Dame Lefévre, who was standing a few paces off, and listening attentively.

"What! were you there, Catherine?" said he. "Our affairs are beginning to take a bad turn."

"Yes, I understand: there are no means of renewing our provisions."

"Our provisions," said Brenn, with a strange smile. "Do you know, Dame Lefévre, for how long we have enough?"

"Why, for a fortnight," replied the brave woman.

"We have enough for a week," said the smuggler, emptying the ashes of his pipe upon his nail.

"It is the truth," said Hullin; "Marc Divès and I believed in an attack on the Falkenstein; we never thought the enemy would dream of beleaguering it like a fortified place. We have been mistaken!"

"And what are we going to do?" asked Catherine, turning quite pale.

"We are going to reduce every one's rations to half. If in a fortnight Marc does not arrive, we shall have nothing more—and then we shall see!"

So saying, Hullin, Catherine, and the smugglers, with heads bowed down, took their way back by the gap. They had just set foot on the descent, when at thirty paces above them appeared Materne, who was scrambling, quite out of breath, through the ruins, and clinging to the bushes to get along quicker.

"Well," exclaimed Jean-Claude, "what's going on, old fellow?"

"Ah! there you are—I was looking for you. An officer from the enemy's camp is advancing along the wall of the oldburg, with a little white flag; he seems as if he wishes to speak with us."

Hullin, immediately continuing his way towards thedeclivity of the rock, saw, in effect, a German officer standing on the wall, and who seemed to be waiting till they made a sign to him to ascend. He was within two gun-shots; farther off were stationed five or six soldiers, with grounded arms. After having inspected this group, Jean-Claude turned and said:

"It is an officer, who comes, no doubt, to summon us to surrender the place."

"Let them send a shot at him!" exclaimed Catherine; "it's the best answer we can make him."

All the others appeared of the same opinion, except Hullin, who, without making any observation, descended to the terrace, where the rest of the volunteers were.

"My children," said he, "the enemy sends us an envoy. We do not know what they want of us. I suppose it is a summons to lay down our arms, but it is possible it may be something else. Frantz and Kasper will go to meet him; they will bandage his eyes at the foot of the rock, and lead him here."

No one having any objection to make, the sons of Materne slung their carbines over their shoulders, and withdrew beneath the winding archway. At the end of about ten minutes the two tall red hunters came up to the officer. There was a rapid conference between them, after which they all began to ascend the Falkenstein. As the little group came gradually nearer, they were better able to distinguish the uniform of the envoy, and even his physiognomy. He was a spare man, with rather light hair, a well-formed figure, and resolute movements. At the foot of the rock, Frantz and Kasper bandaged his eyes, and in a short time their footsteps were heard beneath the vault. Jean-Claude going himself to meet them, untied the handkerchief, saying:

"You desire to communicate something to me, sir; I am ready to listen to you."

Tho mountaineers were about fifteen paces from this group. Catherine Lefévre, who was the foremost, was knitting her brows. Her bony figure, her long and hooked nose, the three or four locks of her gray hair straggling over her flat temples, and the bones of her hollow cheeks, the compression of her lips, and the fixity of her look, seemed at first to attract the attention of the German officer; then the gentle and pale face of Louise behind her; then Jerôme, with his long sandy beard, draped in his tunic of coarse cloth; then old Materne, leaning upon his short carbine; then the others; and, finally, the high red vault, the colossal masses of which, built up of flint and granite, hung over the precipice with some withered brambles. Hexe-Baizel, behind Materne, her long besom of green broom in her hand, outstretched neck, and heel on the very edge of the rock, seemed to astonish him for a second.

He himself was the object of marked attention. You recognised in his attitude, in his long face, with its sharp outline and brown skin, in his clear grey eyes, in his slender moustache, in the delicacy of his limbs hardened by the toils of war, the marks of an aristocratic race. He had about him a mixture of the old campaigner and the man of the world—the swordsman and the diplomatist.

This reciprocal inspection terminating in the twinkling of an eye, the envoy said, in good French—

"Is it to Commander Hullin that I have the honour to address myself?"

"Yes, sir," replied Jean-Claude; and as the other was casting an undecided look around the circle: "Speak out, sir," he exclaimed, "that every one may hear you! When the question is one of honour and country there is no one in France that may not hear what we have to say—the women are as much concerned in the affair as we are. You have propositions to make to me; and, in the first place, on the part of whom?"

"On the part of the General commanding-in-chief. Here is my commission."

"Good! We will hear you, sir."

Then the officer, raising his voice, said in a firm tone:

"Permit me first, Commander, to tell you that you have magnificently fulfilled your duty. You have compelled the esteem of your enemies."

"In the matter of duty," replied Hullin, "there is neither more nor less; we have done our best."

"Yes," added Catherine, drily; "and since our enemies esteem us on account of that, well, they will esteem us still more in a week or a fortnight—for we are not at the end of the strife. We shall see some more of it."

The officer turned his head, and stood like one stupefied at the savage energy imprinted in the looks of the old woman.

"These are noble sentiments," he replied, after a moment's silence; "but humanity has its rights, and to shed blood wantonly is to render evil for evil."

"Then, why do you come into our country?" cried Catherine, in her sharp eagle's voice. "Quit it, and we will leave you in peace!" Then she added: "You make war like robbers; you steal, you plunder, youburn! You deserve all to be hung. You ought to be thrown from that rock as an example!"

The officer turned pale, for the old woman appeared to him quite capable of executing her threat; he, however, recovered himself almost immediately, and replied, in a calm tone:

"I know that the Cossacks have set fire to the farm which is to be seen opposite this rock—they are ruffians, such as are to be found in the train of every army—but this solitary act proves nothing against the discipline of our troops. Your French soldiers did many such things in Germany, and particularly in the Tyrol; not content with plundering and setting fire to the villages, they mercilessly shot down every mountaineer suspected of having taken up arms in defence of his country. We might make reprisals; it would only be our right, but we are not savages; we can appreciate all that is great and noble in patriotism, even in its most unfortunate inspirations. Moreover, it is not against the French people that we are making war; it is against the Emperor Napoleon. Besides, the General, on hearing of the conduct of the Cossacks, has publicly denounced this act of vandalism, and, in addition, has decided that an indemnity should be granted to the proprietor of the farm."

"I want nothing from you," sharply interrupted Catherine; "I prefer to be left with my injustice—and to avenge myself!"

The envoy saw by the old woman's tone that he could not make her listen to reason, and that it was even dangerous to make her a reply. So he turned towards Hullin, and said:

"I am commissioned, Commander, to offer you thehonours of war, if you surrender this position. You have no provisions—we know it. In a few days, at latest, you will be compelled to lay down your arms. The esteem the General-in-Chief feels for you has alone decided him to propose to you these honourable conditions. A longer resistance would lead to no good. We are masters of the Donon; the body of our army has passed into Lorraine; it is not here the campaign will be decided—you have, therefore, no interest in defending a useless position. We wish to spare you the horrors of famine upon this rock. Come, Commander, decide!"

Hullin turned to his followers, and said to them simply: "You have heard? For my part, I refuse but I will submit if every one else accepts the proposition of the enemy?"

"We all refuse!" said Jerôme.

"Yes—yes, all!" repeated the others.

Catherine Lefévre, hitherto inflexible, happening to look at Louise, seemed touched; she took her by the arm, and turning to the envoy, she said:

"We have a child with us; would there be no means of sending her to one of our relations at Saverne?"

No sooner had Louise heard these words, than throwing herself into Hullin's arms, with a sort of terror, she exclaimed:

"No—no! I will stay with you, Papa Jean-Claude. I will die with you!"

"'Tis well, sir," said Hullin, quite pale; "go tell your General what you have seen; tell him that the Falkenstein will remain with us till death! Kasper, Frantz, lead back the envoy."

The officer seemed to hesitate; but as he was opening his mouth to speak, Catherine, quite livid with rage, exclaimed:

"Go—go! You are not yet where you think. It is that brigand of a Yégof who has told you that we had no provisions, but we have enough for two months; and in two months our army will have exterminated you all. The traitors will not always have it their own way. Woe be to you!"

And, as she was getting more and more excited, the officer judged it prudent to retire. He turned towards his guides, who replaced the bandage, and conducted him to the foot of the Falkenstein.

That which Hullin had ordered on the subject of the provisions was executed on that very day; each one received his half-ration for the day. A sentinel was placed before the cavern of Hexe-Baizel, where the provisions were kept; the entrance was barricaded, and Jean-Claude decided that the distributions should be made in the presence of all, in order to prevent injustice. But all these precautions could not preserve these unfortunate creatures from the horrors of famine.

For three days provisions had completely failed at the Falkenstein, and Divès had not given signs of life. How many times, during these long days of agony, had the mountaineers turned their eyes towards Phalsbourg! how many times had they listened, thinking they heard the steps of the smuggler, whilst the vague murmur of the air alone filled space!

It was amid the tortures of hunger that the whole of the nineteenth day since the arrival of the confederates at the Falkenstein was passed. They spoke no more;crouched on the ground, with pinched faces, they remained lost in an endless reverie. At times they looked at each other with flashing eye, as if ready to devour each other; then they grew calm and gloomy again.

When Yégof's raven, flying from peak to peak, was seen approaching this scene of misfortune, old Materne shouldered his carbine; but immediately the bird of ill-omen would take flight at its utmost speed, uttering dismal croakings; and the arm of the old hunter fell powerless.

illustration

CHAPTER XXVII.

As if the exhaustion of hunger had not sufficed to fill up the measure of the misery they were enduring, the unhappy mountaineers, keeping their dreary vigils on the Falkenstein, only opened their mouths to threaten and accuse each other.

"Don't touch me!" screamed Hexe-Baizel, in a voice like a polecat's, to those who looked at her, "don't touch me, or I will bite you!"

Louise grew delirious; her large blue eyes, in place of real objects, saw only shadows flitting over the plateau, skimming over the tops of the trees, and plant themselves on the old tower.

"Here are provisions!" she would exclaim.

Then the others would be furious against the poor child, crying out angrily that she wanted to make game of them, and that she had best beware.

Jerôme alone still remained perfectly calm; but the great quantity of snow which he had drunk to appease the inward anguish that was consuming him, bathed all his body and his face with a cold sweat.

Doctor Lorquin had tied a handkerchief round his loins, and tightened it more and more, declaring that he thus satisfied his stomach. He was seated against the tower, with his eyes shut; from hour to hour he opened them, saying:

"We are at the first—at the second—at the third period. One day more, and all will be over!"

He would then begin a dissertation upon the Druids, on Odin, Brahma, Pythagoras, making Latin and Greek quotations, announcing the approaching transformation of the people of Harberg into wolves, into foxes, into animals of all sorts.

"For my part," he would exclaim, "I shall be a lion! I will eat fifteen pounds of beef a-day!"

Then, recovering himself:

"No, I will be a man; I will preach peace, fraternity, justice! Ah! my friends," he would say, "we suffer by our own fault. What have we done, on the other side of the Rhine, for the last ten years? By what right did we want to impose masters on those peoples? Why did we not exchange our ideas, our sentiments, the products of our arts and of our industry, with them? Why did we not go to seek them as brothers, instead of wishing to subjugate them? We should have been well received. What must they have suffered—the unfortunates—during those ten years of violence and rapine? Now they avenge themselves; and it is justice! May the curse of Heaven alight on the wretches who divide the peoples to oppress them!"

After these moments of excitement, he would sink fainting against the wall of the tower, murmuring:

"Bread. Oh, for nothing but a morsel of bread!"

The sons of Materne, crouching among the bushes, gun on shoulder, seemed to be awaiting the passage of game which never arrived; the idea of perpetual ambush sustained their expiring strength.

Some, bent double, were shivering, and felt consumedby fever; they accused Jean-Claude of having led them to the Falkenstein.

Hullin, with superhuman strength of character, still went and came, observing what was passing in the surrounding valleys, without saying anything.

At times he advanced to the very edge of the rock, and with his large compressed jaws, and flashing eye, watched Yégof sitting before a large fire, on the plateau of the Bois-des-Chênes, in the midst of a troop of Cossacks. Since the arrival of the Germans in the valley of the Charmes, the fool had not quitted this post; he seemed, from there, to gloat over the agony of his victims.

Such was the aspect of these unfortunates under the vast canopy of heaven.

The punishment of hunger at the bottom of a dungeon is frightful, no doubt, but beneath a sky bathed in light, in the eyes of a whole country, in face of the resources of nature, it passes all expression.

Now at the close of this nineteenth day, between four and five o'clock in the evening, the weather had lowered: large grey clouds rose behind the snowy summit of the Grosmann; the sun, red as a bullet just out of the furnace, was casting his last rays athwart the murky sky. The silence on the rock was profound. Louise gave no more sign of life. Kasper and Frantz continued motionless among the shrubs like stones. Catherine Lefévre, crouching on the ground, her sharp knees between her skinny arms, her rigid and hard features, her hair hanging over her livid cheeks, with haggard eye, and chin as sharp as a vice, resembled some old sibyl sitting in the midst of the bushes. She spoke no more. That evening, Hullin, Jerôme, old Materne, andDoctor Lorquin had assembled round the old farm-mistress to die together. They were all silent, and the last faint rays of twilight illumined the dismal group. To the right, behind a jutting point of the rock, some fires of the Germans glimmered in the abyss. And as they sat there, all at once the old woman, coming out of her long reverie, murmured at first some unintelligible words.

"Divès is here!" said she at length, in a low voice. "I see him; he is leaving the postern, to the right of the arsenal. Gaspard follows him, and——"

Then she counted slowly:

"Two hundred and fifty men," said she; "national guards and soldiers. They cross the bridge; they mount behind the half-moon. Gaspard is speaking with Marc. What is he saying?"

She appeared to listen:

"'Let us make haste;' yes, make haste; time presses; there they are upon the glacis!"

There was a moment's silence. Then all at once the old woman, drawing herself up to her full height, her arms tossed wildly aloft, hair erect, and mouth quite wide open, shouted, in a terrible voice:

"Courage! kill! kill! ah! ah!"

And she fell heavily back.

This fearful cry awakened everybody; it would have awakened the dead. All the besieged seemed to be born again. Something was in the air. Was it hope, life, soul? I know not; but all came hurrying along like a troop of deer, holding their breath to hear. Louise herself moved softly and raised her head. Frantz and Kasper dragged themselves along upon their knees; and, strange to say, Hullin, casting his eyes through thedarkness in the direction of Phalsbourg, thought he saw the fire and smoke of a volley of musketry announcing a sortie.

Catherine had resumed her former attitude; but her cheeks, just now as lifeless as a plaster mask, shook violently; her eye was again covered with a dreamy film. All the others listened; it might have been said that their existence hung upon her lips. Nearly a quarter of an hour had passed, when the old woman slowly continued:

"They have crossed the enemy's lines. They are hastening to Lutzelbourg. I see them. Gaspard and Divès are in front, with Desmarets, Ulrich, Weber, and our friends from the city. They come! They come!"

She was silent anew; a long while yet she listened; but the vision was gone. Seconds succeeded to seconds, slow as centuries, when suddenly Hexe-Baizel began to say, in a sharp voice:

"She is mad! she has seen nothing. Marc, I know him. He is laughing finely at us. What is it to him if we perish? Provided he has his bottle of wine and chitterlings, and can smoke his pipe quietly in the chimney-corner, it's all the same to him. Ah! the wretch!"

Then all relapsed into silence, and the unfortunates, a moment revived by the hope of a near deliverance, fell back again into despair.

"It is a dream," thought they; "Hexe-Baizel is right; we are condemned to die of hunger."

In the meantime, night was come. When the moon rose behind the tall fir-trees, casting her pale rays on the sorrowful groups of the besieged, Hullin only was still watching, though burnt up with fever. He heardfar, very far off in the gorges the voices of the German sentinels calling out "Wer dà! Wer dà!" the camp patrols going their rounds through the woods, the shrill neighing of the horses at picket, their stamping, and the shouts of their keepers. Towards midnight the brave man ended, however, by going to sleep like the rest. When he awoke, the village clock of Charmes was striking four. Hullin, at the sound of its distant vibrations, aroused himself from his stupor; he opened his eyelids, and as he was looking round, in a sort of bewildered manner, striving to recover his faculties, the dim light of a torch passed before his eyes; a fear came over him, and he said to himself:—"Am I going mad? The night is quite dark, and yet I see torches."

And yet the flame re-appeared; he regarded it more closely, then rose abruptly, pressing for a few seconds his hand against his contracted face. Then, hazarding another look, he saw distinctly a fire on the Giromani, on the other side of the Blanru; a fire which swept the heavens with its purple wing, and flickered among the shadows of the fir-trees on the snow. And, recollecting that this signal had been agreed on between himself and Piorette to announce an attack, he began to tremble from head to foot; cold drops of sweat stood on his face, and walking on tiptoe through the darkness, like a blind man, with outstretched hands, he stammered:

"Catherine! Louise! Jerôme!"

But no one replied to him, and after having groped about in this way, thinking he was walking, while in reality he was not taking a single step, the unhappy man fell back, exclaiming:

"My children! Catherine! They come! We are saved!"

Immediately there was heard a vague murmur; it seemed as if the dead were re-awakening. There was a burst of dry laughter; it was Hexe-Baizel, gone mad from suffering. Then Catherine exclaimed:

"Hullin! Hullin! Who spoke?"

Jean-Claude, recovered from his emotion, exclaimed, in a firmer tone:

"Jerôme, Catherine, Materne, and you all, are you dead? Do you not see that fire down there, on the side of the Blanru? It is Piorette, who is coming to our assistance."

And, at the very same moment, a loud explosion rolled through the gorges of the Jægerthâl with the sound of a tempest. The trumpet of the last judgment would not have produced more effect on the besieged; they suddenly awoke.

"It is Piorette! It is Marc!" was screeched by voices, broken, dry—voices of mere skeletons; "they come to save us!"

And all these poor wretches strove to rise; some sobbed; but they had no more tears. A second explosion brought them to their feet.

"Surely that is platoon firing," exclaimed Hullin; "our people fire also in platoons; we have soldiers of the line; hurrah for France!"

"Yes," replied Jerôme, "Dame Catherine was right; the Phalsbourgians are coming to our relief; they are descending the hills of the Sarre, and there is Piorette, now heading the attack on the Blanru."

In effect, the firing began to resound from both sides at once, towards the plateau of the Bois-des-Chênes and the towering heights of the Kilbéri.

Then the two leaders embraced each other; and asthey walked on tiptoe through the thick darkness, trying to gain the edge of the rock, all of a sudden Materne's voice was heard, loudly exclaiming:

"Take care, my lads, the precipice is there!"

They stopped, looking down at their feet; but there was nothing to be seen; a gust of cold air coming up from the abyss alone warned you of the danger. All the mountain tops and the surrounding gorges were plunged in thick darkness. On the sides of the mountain opposite, the lights from the firing flashed like lightnings, illuminating now an old oak, the dark outline of a rock, now a cluster of furze bushes, and groups of men going and coming as in the midst of a fire. Two thousand feet below, in the depth of the gorges, were heard heavy sounds, the gallop of horses, confused clamours mingling with the word of command. At times the cry of the mountaineer hailing, that prolonged cry, echoing from one mountain top to the other, "He! oh! he!" rose to the topmost height of the Falkenstein like a sigh.

"It is Marc," said Hullin; "it is the voice of Marc."

"Yes, it is Marc who is bidding us keep up our courage," replied Jerôme.

All the others, crouching round them, with outstretched neck, and hands grasping the edge of the rock, strained their eyes to see. The firing continued with a vivacity which betrayed the fierceness of the battle, but it was impossible to see anything. Oh, what would they have given to take part in this supreme conflict, the unfortunates! With what ardour would they have thrown themselves into the fray! The dread of being again abandoned, of seeing at daylighttheir defenders in retreat, rendered them dumb with fear.

Meanwhile, day was beginning to dawn; the first pale glimmer of light was breaking over the dark tops of the mountains; some rays descended into the shadowy valleys; half-an-hour after they silvered the misty vapours of the abyss. Hullin, casting a look through these breaks in the clouds, was able at length to recognise the position. The Germans had lost the heights of the Valtin and the plateau of Bois-des-Chênes. They were now massed in the valley of Charmes, at the foot of the Falkenstein, a third part of the way up the side, to be out of the reach of their adversaries' fire. Opposite the rock, Piorette, master of Bois-des-Chênes, was ordering barricades to be thrown up on the side of Charmes. He was going hither and thither, the end of his pipe between his lips, his felt hat cocked on his ear, his carbine slung over his shoulder. The blue axes of the woodcutters glittered in the morning sun. To the left of the village, on the side of the Valtin, in the middle of the brushwood, Marc Divès, on a little black horse, with a long flowing tail, his long sword in his hand, was pointing to the ruins and theschlitteroad. An officer of infantry, and some national guards in blue coats, were listening to him. Gaspard Lefévre, alone, in advance of this group, leaning on his gun, seemed thoughtful. It might be seen from his attitude that he was forming desperate resolutions for the moment of attack. In fine, quite on the summit of the hill, against the wood, two or three hundred men, ranged in line, with grounded arms, stood watching also.

The sight of this small number of defenders wrung the hearts of the besieged; so much the more that theGermans, seven or eight times superior in numbers, were beginning to form two columns of attack to regain the positions they had lost. Their general was sending horsemen in all directions carrying orders. Rows of bayonets were beginning to defile.

"It's all over!" said Hullin to Jerôme. "What can five or six hundred men do against four thousand in line of battle? The Phalsbourgians will return home, and say, 'We have done our duty!' And Piorette will be crushed."

All the others thought the same; but that which raised their despair to its height was to see all at once a long file of Cossacks debouch in the valley of Charmes at full gallop, and the fool Yégof at their head, galloping like the wind; his beard, the tail of his horse, his sheepskin, and his red hair all streaming in the wind. He looked at the rock, and brandished his lance above his head. At the bottom of the valley, he spurred straight up to where the major-general of the enemy's army stood. Arrived near him, he made some gestures indicating the other side of the plateau of Bois-des-Chênes.

"Ah! the wretch!" exclaimed Hullin. "See! he is telling him that Piorette has no barricades on that side of the mountain, and that it must be taken in the rear."

In effect a column immediately set itself on march in that direction, whilst another directed its movement towards the barricades to mask that of the first.

"Materne!" exclaimed Jean-Claude, "are there no means of sending a bullet after the fool?"

The old hunter shook his head. "No," said he, "it is impossible; he is out of reach."

At this moment, Catherine gave vent to a savage cry—a hawk's cry. "Let us crush them!—let us crush them as we did at the Blutfeld!"

And this old woman, a moment before so weak, rose and flung herself upon a mass of rock, which she lifted with her two hands; then, with her long scanty gray locks, her hooked nose drawn down to her compressed lips, lank cheeks, and bent back, she advanced with a firm step to the very edge of the abyss, and the rock cleft the air, tracing an immense curve.

A horrible noise was heard below. Splinters of fir-trees flew about in all directions, then an enormous stone was seen to rebound at a hundred paces with fresh impetus, roll down the steep descent, and, with a final bound, fall upon Yégof, and crush him at the very feet of the general of the enemy's forces. All this was accomplished in a few seconds.

Catherine, standing on the edge of the rock, laughed a laugh that sounded more like a rattle, and that seemed as if it would never come to an end.

And all the others, all those phantoms, as if inspired with a new life, threw themselves upon the crumbling ruins of the oldburg, exclaiming—"Death! death! Let us crush them as at the Blutfeld!"

Never was a more horrible scene beheld. Those beings, at the very gates of the tomb, lean and squalid as skeletons, found fresh strength for carnage. They stumbled no more; they tottered no more. They lifted each one his stone, and ran to hurl it down the precipice; then returned to take another, without even looking at what was passing below.

Now figure to yourselves the stupor of thekaiserlicksat this deluge of ruins and rocks. They had all turned round at the first sound of the stones crashing downone after another over the shrubs and the clumps of trees, and at first they remained as if petrified; but raising their eyes still higher, and seeing other stones descending and descending still, and, above all that, spectres running hither and thither, lifting up their arms, emptying them, and beginning again; seeing their comrades crushed—rows of fifteen and twenty men overthrown at a single blow—an immense cry resounded from the valley of the Charmes, as far as the Falkenstein, and in spite of the voice of the leaders, in spite of the firing, which recommenced right and left, all the Germans fled in disorder to escape this horrible death.

When the rout was at its height, the general of the enemy's army had, however, succeeded in rallying a battalion, and effecting a quiet retreat towards the village. There was something in this man, calm in the midst of disaster, grand and dignified. From time to time he turned round to cast a gloomy look at the falling masses of rock which were making bloody gaps in his column.

Jean-Claude observed him; and in spite of the intoxication of triumph, in spite of the certainty of having escaped famine, the old soldier could not restrain a feeling of admiration.

"Look," said he to Jerôme, "he does as we did on returning from the Donon and the Grosmann: he remains to the last, and only yields step by step. Truly there are men of courage in every country."

Marc Divès and Piorette, witnesses of this stroke of fortune, came down through the fir-trees to endeavour to cut off the retreat of the enemy's general, but they could not succeed in their attempt. The battalion, reduced to half, formed a square behind the village of Charmes, and slowly re-ascended the valley of the Sarre, at times stopping, like a wounded wild boar who turns upon the pack, when the men of Piorette and those of Phalsbourg tried to press it too closely.

Thus ended the great battle of Falkenstein, known in the mountain under the name of theBattle of the Rocks.

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CHAPTER XXVIII.

The battle was hardly over, about eight o'clock, when Marc Divès, Gaspard, and about thirty mountaineers, with panniers of provisions, ascended the Falkenstein. What a spectacle awaited them up there! All the besieged, stretched on the ground, seemed dead. It was in vain to shake them, to shout in their ears, "Jean-Claude! Catherine! Jerôme!"—they answered not. Gaspard Lefévre, seeing his mother and Louise motionless and with clenched teeth, told Marc that if they did not recover he would blow out his brains with his gun. Marc replied that every one was free to do as he pleased, but that, for his part, he should not blow out his brains for Hexe-Baizel. At length, old Colon having deposited his pannier on a stone, Kasper Materne suddenly sniffed its contents, opened his eyes, and, seeing the provisions, began to clash his teeth like a fox on the chase.

Then they understood what was the meaning of that; and Marc Divès, going from one to the other, simply held his flask under their noses, which sufficed to bring them round. They wanted to swallow all at once; but Doctor Lorquin, in spite of his delirium, had still the good sense to warn Marc not to listen to them, and that the least over-feeding would kill them. So, for this reason, each one received nothing but a littlebread, an egg, and a glass of wine, which singularly revived their moral courage. They then placed Catherine, Louise, and the others uponschlittes, and re-descended to the village.

As to painting now the enthusiasm and emotion of their friends when they saw them return, leaner than Lazarus rising from the grave, it is a thing impossible. They looked at each other, embraced; and at each fresh comer from Abreschwiller, from Dagsburg, from St. Quirin, or elsewhere, it was all gone over again.

Marc Divès was obliged to relate more than twenty times the story of his journey to Phalsbourg. The brave smuggler had not been much favoured by fortune. After having escaped by miracle from the bullets of thekaiserlicks, he had fallen, in the valley of Spartzprod, into the midst of a troop of Cossacks, who had stripped him of everything. He had been compelled to wander afterwards during two weeks round the Russian posts that encircled the town, braving the fire of the sentinels and risking twenty times to be arrested as a spy, before being able to penetrate into the place. To crown all, the governor, Meunier, alleging the weakness of the garrison, had at first refused all assistance; and it was only at the pressing solicitation of the citizens of the town that he at length consented to detach two companies.

The mountaineers, listening to this recital, admired the courage of Marc, his perseverance in the midst of dangers.

"Oh!" the big smuggler would good-humouredly reply to those who congratulated him, "I have only done my duty. Could I leave my comrades to perish? I knew well it was no easy matter. Those dogs ofCossacks are more cunning than Custom-house officers; they will scent you out like ravens. But no matter; we have outwitted them all the same."

When five or six days were passed, every one was afoot. Captain Vidal, of Phalsbourg, had left twenty-five men at the Falkenstein to guard the ammunition. Gaspard Lefévre was of the number. The young fellow came down every morning to the village. The Allies had all passed into Lorraine; no more was seen of them in Alsace, except round the strong places.

Soon news was brought of the victories of Champ Aubert and of Montmirail; but times of great misfortune were at hand. The Allies, in spite of the heroism of our army and the genius of the Emperor, entered Paris.

This was a terrible blow for Jean-Claude, Catherine, Materne, Jerôme, and all the mountaineers; but the recital of these events does not enter into our history; others have related them.

Peace made, in the spring they rebuilt the farm of Bois-des-Chênes. The woodcutters, sabôt-makers, masons, bargemen, and all the workmen of the country lent a hand.

About the same period, the army having been disbanded, Gaspard cut off his moustaches, and his marriage with Louise took place.

On that day all the combatants arrived from the Falkenstein and the Donon, and the farm received them with doors and windows wide open. Every one brought his presents to the bride and bridegroom—Jerôme, little shoes for Louise; Materne and his sons, a fine heathcock, the most amorous of birds, as everybody knows; Divès, packets of smuggled tobaccofor Gaspard; and Doctor Lorquin, a parcel of fine linen.

There was open table kept even in the barns and outhouses. What was consumed in wine, bread, meat, tarts, andkougelhof, we cannot say; but what we know is, that Jean-Claude, who had been very gloomy and depressed since the entry of the Allies into Paris, brightened himself up on that day by singing the old air of his youth as gaily as when he set off, gun on shoulder, for Valmy, Jemmapes, and Fleurus. The echoes of the Falkenstein opposite repeated from afar this old patriotic song—the grandest, the most noble that man has ever heard under heaven. Catherine Lefévre beat time upon the table with the handle of her knife; and if it is true, as many say, that the dead come to listen when we speak of them, our brave fellows must have been satisfied, and the King of Diamonds have foamed in his red beard.

Towards midnight, Hullin rose, and addressing the newly-married couple, said to them:

"You will have brave children; I will dance them upon my knees; I will teach them my old song; and then I will go and rejoin my forefathers!"

So saying, he embraced Louise, and arm-in-arm with Marc Divès and Jerôme, he went down to his little cottage followed by all the wedding guests, singing in chorus the sublime song.

Never was there seen a more beautiful night; inumerable stars sparkled in the deep blue sky; there was a gentle rustling among the shrubs at the foot of the mountain beneath which so many brave men had been interred. Every one experienced by turns feelings of joy and of regret.

On the threshold of the modest dwelling there was shaking of hands and wishing good-night; and then all, some to the right, others to the left, returned to their villages.

"Good night, Materne, Jerôme, Divès, Piorette, good-night!" exclaimed Jean-Claude.

His old friends returned the salute, waving their hats, and they all said to themselves:

"There are still days when one is very happy to be in the world. Ah! if there were never either plagues, or wars, or famines—if men could agree together, love and help each other—if no unjust quarrels rose between them, the earth would be a real Paradise!"

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