When Sir John again sent me after them with an order to halt, I found them briskly engaged with a small band of fugitives who had thrown themselves into a little cottage by the wayside, over which a gigantic chestnut threw its ample shadow. From the garden wall and barricaded door and windows, the French maintained a spirited fire, to defend a standard and eagle which Regnier’s son, a young sub-lieutenant, had carried in there instead of continuing his flight. This rural post was enveloped in the blaze of musketry and clouds of snow-white smoke: steel bayonets bristled above the green hedges, through which, and the shattered casements, red flashes broke incessantly; while fierce faces, pale with anger and chagrin, appeared at every opening. "Shall I ride to Le Moine, to send up a four-pounder, and blow the place about their ears?" said I to Kempt. "Cannon against a shelling!" exclaimed Macleod, backing his horse over the heaps of dead. "No, no; let the Buffs storm it. I will lead them on. Forward the Ross-shiremen!" "Forward!" I added; "for the cavalry have halted, and seem disposed to return and engage. On, then, colonel; and a dozen of wine from the last officer over the wall!" "CUIDICH’N RHI!" (the motto of the regiment), cried Macleod, dashing spurs into his horse. "Charge, Seventy-eighth!" A shout burst from the ranks, and the brave fellows rushed to closer conflict. I urged forward Cartouche, and the spirited horse shook the foam from his bit, as snorting and rearing up he bounded over the enclosure of the garden, and came down crash among the mass of Frenchmen, whose bayonets formed a steel hedge around me. I must have been destroyed in a moment, but for the strenuous exertions of Macleod and his gallant Buffs; who came pouring in at the gap my horse had made, and engaged the enemy hand to hand—fighting with that fierce and unconquerable ardour which has enabled those brave sons of the north to sweep all the troops of Europe before them. I was not slow in seconding their efforts, and made good use of my sabre: one instant it descended upon musket barrels and bear-skin caps, and the next inflicted some deadly wound, which at that wild and exciting time was a matter of exulting triumph to me. Terrible were the bayonet wounds given and received in that short encounter; many poor fellows who were beaten to the earth were trodden to death beneath the hoofs of our horses, and in five minutes the defenders of the cottage surrendered. The walls without and within were piled up with dead and dying, and its once blooming garden was trodden flat, cumbered with bodies, and drenched with blood. But another desperate encounter was yet before me. "The colours! the eagle!" exclaimed Macleod, breaking in amongst the prisoners; "where is the officer who bore the eagle?"