Directly after this the company, led by the company commander, reached the railway embankment. At this spot a waterway led through the embankment; before the culvert lay a civilian with a sort of carbine, shot dead; in the dark culvert people were seen. From the top of the embankment the officer advancing with another company shouted down that he had been shot at from the culvert. The company commander called out loudly, "Sortez, on ne vous fera rien" ("Come out; nothing will be done to you"). No answer came from the culvert, neither did the people leave it who were concealed there. Thereupon a number of volleys were fired into the culvert. The Grenadiers continued their advance over the railway embankment and up the heights. The detachment left behind for clearing and guarding the culvert brought out about thirty-five to forty civilians, men, half-grown lads, women, and children, and with them about eight to ten rifles, not sporting-guns, but apparently military rifles. A portion of the civilians had been killed or wounded by the fire of the Grenadiers (App. 40). In the meantime everything had still remained quiet in Les Rivages. The first person who showed himself was a lame man. He described himself as the Mayor, and protested that the inhabitants of Les Rivages were peaceable in contrast to those of Neffe. He was therefore sent over to Neffe for the purpose of warning the population in that place to keep the peace, as in that case nothing would happen to them. The commanding officer of Grenadier Regiment No. 101 forcibly collected a large number of persons from the nearest houses in order to hold them as hostages against the hostile action of the populace. It was made clear to them that their lives were guarantee for the safety of the troops. The causes for this measure were the notorious hostility of the population of Dinant, and the report just made by an officer that, close by, to the south of Les Rivages, towards Anseremme, shots had been fired from the houses. The men were placed against a garden wall to the left of the place of crossing, the women and children who came with them out of the houses, somewhat farther down the river. The bridge-building and crossing were in progress. When the bridge had been built out about 40 metres alike from the houses of Les Rivages and from the rocky slopes close to the south of the "Rocher Bayard," francs-tireurs began to direct a hot fire upon the Grenadiers, who were waiting in close order for crossing, and on the working pioneers. The greatest consternation and confusion ensued. In consequence of this the male hostages assembled by the garden wall were shot. The shooting of the hostages, evidently visible to the unseen francs-tireurs, resulted in the cessation of the firing and a continuation of the bridge-building (Apps. 46, 48).