The dangerous manœuvre was executed with lightning-like rapidity; the drivers wheeled round again, bringing back the limbers, to which the gunners at once hooked the carriage trails. Whilst this was being accomplished, however, a lengthy front was developed, at sight of which the enemy redoubled his fire. Three more men thereupon fell to the ground. Then the battery dashed off at a fast trot, describing an arc through the fields, and establishing itself some fifty yards farther away on the right, upon a little plateau on the other side of the position held by the 106th. The guns were unlimbered, the drivers again found themselves confronting the foe, and the fire began afresh, without a pause, and with so much commotion that the ground did not cease shaking. All at once Maurice raised a cry. In three shots the Prussian batteries had again regulated their fire, and the third shell had fallen upon Honoré's gun. Honoré was seen to dart forward and feel the freshly made wound with a trembling hand; a large piece had been chipped off the bronze muzzle. The gun could still be worked, however, and as soon as the wheels had been cleared of the corpse of another gunner, whose blood had splashed the carriage, the practice was resumed. 'No, it isn't little Louis,' continued Maurice, venting his thoughts aloud. 'There he is aiming; he must be wounded, however, for he's only using his left arm. Ah! little Louis--he got on so well with Adolphe, on condition though that the gunner, the footman, should, in spite of his superior education, act as the humble servant of the driver, the mounted man----' At this moment Jean, hitherto silent, interrupted Maurice with a cry of anguish: 'They can never stay there; we are done for!' In less than five minutes, indeed, this new position had become as untenable as the previous one. The enemy's projectiles rained upon it with precisely the same accuracy. One shell smashed a gun and killed a lieutenant and two men. Every shot took effect, to such a degree, in fact, that if they obstinately lingered there neither a gun nor an artilleryman would soon remain. The enemy's fire was destruction incarnate; it swept everything away. And so, for the second time, the captain's voice rang out, ordering up the limbers. Once more was the manœuvre executed, the drivers setting their horses at a gallop, and wheeling so that the gunners might again limber the pieces. This time, however, during the movement, a splinter gashed Louis' throat and tore away his jaw, and he fell across the block-trail which he had been raising. And just as Adolphe came up, at the moment when the enemy obtained a flank view of the line of teams, a furious volley swooped down. Adolphe fell, with his chest split open, and his arms outstretched, and in a last convulsion he caught hold of his comrade; and there they lay embracing, fiercely contorted, coupled together even in death.