"Your speech is sooth, Douarnek; it is just because that song is particularly glorious to me--that you see me so deeply moved." "That song is particularly glorious to you? I do not understand you." "Hena was the daughter of one of my ancestors." "What say you!" "Hena was the daughter of Joel, the brenn of the tribe of Karnak, who died, together with his wife and almost all his family, at the great battle of Vannes--a battle that was fought on land and water nearly three centuries ago. From father to son, I descend from Joel." "Do you know, Schanvoch," replied Douarnek, "that even kings would be proud of such an ancestry?" "The blood shed for our country and for liberty by all of us Gauls is our national patent of nobility," I said to him. "It is for that reason that our old songs are so popular among us." "When one considers," put in one of the younger soldiers, "that it is now more than three hundred years since Hena, the saintly maid, surrendered her own life for the deliverance of the country, and that her name still reaches us!" "Although it took the young virgin's voice more than two centuries to rise to the ears of Hesus," replied Douarnek, "her voice did finally reach him, seeing that to-day we can say--Victory to our arms! Victory and freedom!" We had now arrived at about the middle of the river, where the stream is very rapid. Raising his oar, Douarnek asked me: "Shall we enter the strong current? That would be a waste of strength, unless we are either to ascend or descend the river a distance equal to that that now separates us from the shore." "We are to cross the Rhine in its full breadth, friend Douarnek." "Cross it!" cried the veteran with amazement. "Cross the Rhine! And what for?" "To land on the opposite shore." "Do you know what that means, Schanvoch? Is not the army of those Frankish bandits, if one can honor those savage hordes with the name of army, encamped on the opposite shore?" "It is to those very barbarians that I am bound." For a few moments all the four oars rested motionless in their oarlocks. The soldiers looked at one another speechless, as if they could not believe what they heard me say. Douarnek was the first to break the silence. With a soldier's unconcern he said to me: "Is it, then, a sacrifice that we are to offer to Hesus by delivering our hides to those hide-tanners? If such be the orders, forward! Bend to your oars, my lads!" "Have you forgotten, Douarnek, that we have a truce of eight days with the Franks?" "There is no such thing as a truce to those brigands." "As you will notice, I have made the signal of peace by ornamenting the prow of our bark with green boughs. I shall proceed alone into the enemy's camp, with an oak branch in my hand." "And they will slay you despite all your oak branches, as they have slain other envoys during previous truces."