"In the first place, Monsieur Engineer Lauxford, what did you say,--that four weak spots in the fortifications were like open gates for the enemy to come in? Well, let us see. The Faubourg d'Isle side is in the greatest danger; the Spaniards are masters of the abbey, and from that point they are keeping up such a well-directed fire that our workmen don't dare to show themselves. Allow me, Monsieur Lauxford, to point out to you a very simple and very excellent way to protect them, which I saw put in practice by the besieged at Civitella this very year. It consists simply in screening our workmen from the Spanish batteries by placing old flatboats across the boulevard, piled upon one another, and filled with bags of earth. The cannon-balls waste their force in the soft soil; and behind that shelter our workmen will be as safe as if they were out of range of the cannon. At the hamlet of Remicourt, the enemy, under cover of a mantlet, are calmly undermining the wall, you say? I have with my own eyes verified the fact. But that is the place, Monsieur Engineer, where we must locate a countermine, and not at the Porte St. Jean, where the great tower makes your countermine not only useless but dangerous. So remove your sappers and miners from the western to the southern side, Monsieur Lauxford, and you will find great advantage in so doing. But the Porte St. Jean, you will ask, and the Boulevard St. Martin, are they to be left undefended? Fifty men at the first, and fifty at the second point will be enough; so Monsieur de Rambouillet himself has told us. But," he added, "these hundred men are not forthcoming. Very well! I will furnish them." A murmur of glad surprise was heard all over the room.