had just arrived: fifteen pieces in position made holes at the rate of six rounds a minute in the masses, which soon closed up again; three charges of Vendean cavalry hurled themselves one after the other upon the brazen muzzles and disappeared. This lasted two hours, Kléber pushing Lescure before him, who always rallied his men again. Kléber himself, pressed hard by the three other Vendean leaders, valiantly carried on his retreat, until a fifth army of ten thousand men, led by Donniss and la Rochejaquelein, came and threw themselves on his flanks, firing point-blank, killing at every blow, and at last dealt confusion in the Republican ranks. The head of the army, still commanded by Kléber, reached la Sèvre; the heroic general captured the bridge, crossed it and, calling a quarter-master named Schewardin, cried out, 'Stop here and be killed with two hundred men.' 'Yes, general!' was Schewardin's reply. He picked his men, kept his word and saved the army!" "Oh! yes, that was how it happened," my Chouan answered, "for I was there.... I was not quite fifteen then.... Look, monsieur," he went on, taking off his hat and lifting his hair to show me a scar that furrowed his forehead, "I got that here"--he struck the ground with his foot.--"Here! ... It was one of the general's aides-de-camp who struck me, quite a young fellow, almost as young as I was; but, before falling, I had time to thrust my bayonet in his body and to fire at the same moment.... When I came to my senses he was dead ... we had fallen on top of one another ... and all round us, for a radius of a league, lay Blues and Vendeans, so that you did not know where to place your foot for fear of stepping on them. They were buried where they had fallen, and that is why the trees here are so vigorous and the grass so green." I turned towards the column: nothing on it made mention of Kléber's courage and Schewardin's devotion, nothing but just those four Vendean names. I forgot where I was, for this one-sidedness made the blood rise to my face. "I do not know what it is prevents me from putting a bullet into the middle of that column, and signing it Schewardin and Kléber!" I said aloud, talking to myself without imparting to my man the reflections that led to this monologue. I felt my guide put a trembling hand on my shoulder, and I turned round; he was very pale. "For the Lord's sake, monsieur," he said, "don't do that; I have vowed to bring you through safe and sound, and if you were to commit any folly like that, I could no longer answer for you.... Do you know that those four men are our gods, and every Vendean peasant says his prayers here, as at the stations of the Virgin which you see at the entrance of our villages? Do not do that; or beware of the hedgerows!" We reached Tiffanges without saying another word.