There was one woman on the raft, and the villains had thrown her overboard during the struggle, together with her husband, who had heroically defended her. M. Correard, gashed with saber-wounds as he was, leaped into the sea with a rope and rescued the wife, while Lavilette, the head workman, swam after the husband and hauled him to the raft. [Illustration: THE BRIG, WHICH HAD MADE A LONG TACK AND WAS NOW STEERING STRAIGHT TOWARD THE RAFT] The first thing the poor woman did, after recovering her senses, was to acquaint herself with the name of the person who had saved her and to express to him her liveliest gratitude. Finding that her words but ill reflected her feelings, she recollected that she had in her pocket a little snuff and instantly offered it to him. Touched with the gift but unable to use it, M. Correard gave it to a wounded sailor, which served him two or three days. But it is impossible to describe a still more affecting scene,--the joy this unfortunate couple testified when they were again conscious, at finding they were both saved. The woman was a native of the Swiss Alps who had followed the armies of France as a sutler, or vivandière, for twenty years, through many of Napoleon’s campaigns. Bronzed, intrepid, facing death with a gesture, she said to M. Correard: I am a useful woman, you see, a veteran of great and glorious wars. Therefore, if you please, be so good as to continue to preserve my life. Ah, if you knew how often I have ventured upon the fields of battle and braved the bullets to carry assistance to our gallant men! Whether they had money or not, I always let them have my goods. Sometimes a battle would deprive me of my poor debtors, but after the victory others would pay me double or triple for what they had consumed before the engagement. Thus I came in for a share of the victories. It was during a lull of the dreadful conflict among these pitiful castaways that M. Savigny was moved to exclaim: The moon lighted with her melancholy rays this disastrous raft, this narrow space on which were found united so many torturing anxieties, a madness so insensate, a courage so heroic, and the most generous, the most amiable sentiments of nature and humanity. Another night came, and the crazed mutineers made an attack even more savage. It was not altogether impelled by the blind instinct of survival, for again they tried to tear the raft apart and destroy themselves with it. They were so many ravening beasts. Those who resisted them displayed many instances of brave and beautiful self-sacrifice. One of the loyal laborers was seized by four of the rebels, who were about to kill him, but Lavilette, formerly a sergeant of Napoleon’s Old Guard, rushed in and subdued them with the butt of a carbine and so saved the victim of their rage.