Meanwhile Marc Divès, in about half an hour, had gone round the ravine, and, from the back of his tall horse, began to perceive the two companies of Germans, with grounded arms, about a hundred feet behind the guns, which were being fired upon the trench. Then, approaching the mountaineers, he said to them, in a stifled voice, while the reports of the cannon were re-echoed in the gorge and in the distance the noise of battle was heard: "Comrades, you must attack the infantry with your bayonets: I and my men will be answerable for the rest. Is it understood?" "Yes, it is understood." "Then, forward!" The whole troop advanced in good order toward the outskirts of the wood, big Piercy of Soldatenthal at their head. Nearly at the same instant the _Wer da?_ ("Who there?") of a sentinel was heard; then two shots; a loud cry of "Vive la France!" and the trampling of many feet in a charge. The brave mountaineers threw themselves like wolves on the enemy. Divès stood up in his stirrups and watched them with great glee. "That is well," said he. The _mêlée_ was a terrible one; the ground trembled with it. The Germans were firing no more than the partisans: the affair was passing in silence; the clashing of bayonets and the sound of sabre-strokes, with here and there a rifle-shot, shouts of anger and a great tumult: except these, one could hear nothing else. The smugglers, with outstretched necks and sword in hand, sniffed the carnage and awaited the signal from their chief with impatience. "Now, it is our turn," said Divès, at length. "The guns must be ours." And out of the underwood they sprang, and their large cloaks flying behind them like wings, they dashed forward, bending in their saddles and pointing their swords. "Never mind cutting! Run them through!" cried Divès once more. That was all he said. In a second, the twelve vultures were down upon the guns. Among their number were four old Spanish dragoons and two cuirassiers of the guard, whom a life of danger had attached to Marc: so I leave you to imagine how they fought. Blows from lever, rammer, and sabre, the only arms the gunners had to hand, rained upon them like hail; they parried them all, and every cut they made brought down a man. Marc Divès received two pistol-shots, of which one singed his left cheek and the other carried away his hat. But, at the same time, bending over his saddle, his long arms stretched out, he transfixed the big officer with the fair mustaches to his gun; then raising himself deliberately, and gazing round him with a frown, said, in a sententious manner: "We have cleared out the rubbish! the guns are ours."