From midnight until six o'clock in the morning, a bright flame shone through the darkness on the summit of the Falkenstein, and the whole mountain was astir. All the friends of Hullin, of Marc Divès, and of Dame Lefévre, their legs encased in long gaiters, their old guns slung over their shoulders, were silently marching through the woods in the deep stillness of the night towards the gorges of the Valtin. The thought of the enemy crossing the plains of Alsace to come and surprise the dwellers in the defiles and mountains was uppermost in the minds of all. The tocsins of Dagsburg, of Abreschwiller, of Walsch, of Saint-Quirin, and of all the other villages, never ceased summoning the defenders of their country to arms. You must now picture to yourself the Jägerthal at the foot of the old _burg_ during the period of an extraordinary fall of snow, at that early hour of the morning when the tall shadows of the trees begin to be visible through the gloom, and the piercing cold of the night is lessened at the approach of dawn. You must picture to yourself the old saw-works, with its broad flat roof, its heavy wheel loaded with icicles, the low interior dimly lit up by a fire of fir-logs, whose glow is beginning to pale in the faint but clear light of early morning; and all around this fire is a confused jumble of seal-skin caps, felt hats, dark profiles towering one above the other, and pressed close together like a living wall. Farther on, the whole length of the woods, in all the windings of the valley, other beacon-fires lighted up, in their crimson glow, groups of men and women huddling together in the snow. The agitation was beginning to grow calmer. As the daylight grew stronger and stronger, people began to recognise each other. "Holloa! cousin Daniel of Soldatenthal! you are here too, then?" "Why, yes, as you see, Heinrich, and my wife, too." "What, Cousin Nanette! Why, where is she, then?" "Down below there, near the great oak, by Uncle Hans's fire." There were hearty hand-shakings everywhere. Some were giving vent to long and loud yawns, while others again were engaged in throwing sticks and logs of wood on the fire. Some were handing flasks about to each other, while others were drawing back from the circle round the fire to make room for their neighbours, who were shivering with the cold. But in spite of these various means of passing the time, signs of impatience began to show themselves among the crowd. "But, I say," exclaimed one, "we didn't come here to warm the soles of our feet, did we? It's time to look about, to understand each other." "Yes, yes," was the general response; "let us come to an understanding; let us appoint our leaders." "No! everyone is not here yet. Look; there are some from Dagsburg and St. Quirin arriving now."