9 P.M.--Here we are, then, back again in Forêt. Bell brought us the order to return forthwith, as the brigade was to march without delay on Landrecy, the commandant of which place refuses to surrender. We lost no time in obeying the order, and the road being now quite clear--indeed solitary--marched here in a very short time; and instead of finding the brigade ready to move, were surprised on reaching the village at seeing the Life Guardsmen quietly grooming their horses in front of the barns and stables of their billets. The place being already full, we were directed to bivouac, and accordingly I pitched upon this orchard, which is high and dry; but the trees are too young and too far apart to afford us much shade, which we want just now. The arrival of strangers attracted a concourse of villagers to our bivouac, many old women and young girls bringing quantities of very fine cherries for sale. The former were remarkably coarse and ugly, the latter generally pretty, and all had sparkling, speaking eyes. These, of course, sold their cherries first; but the article was too grateful in such a roasting day as this has been not to insure the sale of all. The costume of these women--who, by the way, seemed quite at home with us--was rather picturesque. Lofty white caps, with long flaps hanging down to the shoulders, their naked stays sometimes not very closely laced, bosom covered with a coloured handkerchief put on with a degree of taste, coarse woollen petticoats of a blue stuff striped with white or pink and reaching only to the calf of the leg, coarse woollen stockings, and clumsy wooden shoes (_sabots_). Most of them wore large gold or silver rings in their ears, and many a little golden cross suspended from the neck by a black riband or a strip of black velvet. The Duke has published a manifesto from Cateau. Several copies are stuck up in the village, and the people here seem very much pleased with it; and well they may, for it assures them they shall be treated like gentlemen, and not get the punishment which France, as a nation, so richly deserves. It calls upon the people to remain quietly at home, as we make no war on them, but ought rather to be considered as their allies; further, it goes on to assure them that the strictest discipline will be maintained in the Allied army, and that everything required by the troops must be paid for at its full value. The Forêtiens, and particularly the Forêtiennes, actually express astonishment at our generosity.