Fortunately, the panic of the mountaineers lasted but a second; they all felt that a moment's hesitation, and they were lost. Two scaling-ladders were already having their grappling-irons fixed to the side of the mountain in spite of the heavy fire poured on the assailants. This sight brought every one to the trench, and the combat was renewed more fiercely--more desperately than at the first attack. Hullin had remarked the ladders before Materne, and his indignation against Divès was increased by the sight; but as, in such a case, indignation is of no earthly use whatever, he had despatched Lagarmitte to desire Frantz Materne, who was posted on the other side of the Donon, to come to him with all haste with half of his men. I leave you to imagine whether the brave lad, forewarned of the danger his father was running, lost a second in obeying the order. Already the broad felt hats were seen ascending the mountain's side through the snow, the men with their carbines slung over their shoulders. They were running as fast as they could, and yet Jean-Claude, hastening to meet them, with the large drops of sweat standing on his forehead, and his eye wild and haggard, shouted to them, in a ringing voice: "Come on, there, quicker! you will never get here at that rate." He was actually trembling with rage, attributing the whole misfortune to the smuggler. In the meanwhile, Mark Divès, at the end of about half an hour, had made the round of the ravine, and from the back of his tall horse was just beginning to discover the two companies of Germans with grounded arms, a hundred paces behind the guns, which were firing on the entrenchments. Then, approaching the mountaineers, he said to them, in a stifled voice, while the explosions of the cannon were awakening every echo in the gorge, and in the distance the clamours of the assault resounded: "Comrades, you will charge the infantry with fixed bayonets; I and my men will undertake the rest. Is that understood?" "Yes, that's understood." "Well, then, forward!" The whole body advanced in good order towards the outskirts of the wood, with the tall Piercy of Soldatenthal at their head. Nearly at the same instant there was the "_verda_" (challenge) of a sentinel; then two shots; then a great shout, "Hurrah for France!" and the heavy dull sound of rushing footsteps; the brave mountaineers were falling upon the enemy like a troop of wolves! Divès, standing upright in his stirrups, with his long nose and bristling moustaches, was laughingly looking on: "It's all right," he kept saying to himself. It was a fearful conflict; the ground trembled under it. The Germans were not, any more than the confederates, opening fire; all was passing in silence; the clashing of bayonets, the heavy thud of the musket-stocks, intermingled from time to time by a shot, cries of rage, groans, tumult; nothing else was heard.