"I rejoined the regiment on the evening of the 4th September. I found
the colonel at the bivouac. At first he received me rather roughly; but
after reading General B's. letter of recommendation, he changed his
manner, and spoke a few obliging words. He presented me to my captain,
who had just returned from a reconnoissance. This captain, whom I had
little opportunity to become acquainted with, was a tall dark man, of
hard and repulsive physiognomy. He had been a private soldier, and had
won his cross and his epaulets on the battle-field. His voice, hoarse
and weak, contrasted strangely with his gigantic stature. They told me
he was indebted for this singular voice to a bullet that had passed
completely through his body at Jena.
"On hearing that I came from the school at Fontainbleau, he made a wry
face, and said, 'My lieutenant died yesterday.'--I understood that he
meant to say, 'You are to replace him, and you are not able.' A sharp
word rose to my lips, but I repressed it.
"The moon rose behind the redoubt of Cheverino, situate at twice
cannon-shot from our bivouac. She was large and red, as is common at her
rising; but that night she seemed to me of extraordinary size. For an
instant the black outline of the redoubt stood out against the moon's
brilliant disc, resembling the cone of a volcano at the moment of an
eruption.
"An old soldier who stood near me, noticed the colour of the moon. 'She
is very red,' he said; ''tis a sign that yon famous redoubt will cost us
dear.' I was always superstitious, and this augury, just at that moment,
affected me. I lay down, but could not sleep; I got up and walked for
some time, gazing at the immense line of fires covering the heights
beyond the village of Cheverino.
"When I deemed my blood sufficient cooled by the fresh night air, I
returned to the fire, wrapped myself carefully in my cloak, and shut my
eyes, hoping not to re-open them till daylight. But sleep shunned me.
Insensibly my thoughts took a gloomy turn. I said to myself, that I had
not one friend amongst the hundred thousand men covering that plain. If
I were wounded, I should be in an hospital, carelessly treated by
ignorant surgeons. All that I had heard of surgical operations returned
to my memory. My heart beat violently; and mechanically I arranged, as a
species of cuirass, the handkerchief and portfolio that I carried in the
breast of my uniform. I was overwhelmed by fatigue, and continually fell
into a doze, but as often as I did so, some sinister idea awoke me with
a start. Fatigue, however, at last got the upper hand, and I was fast
asleep when the _reveille_ sounded. We formed up, the roll was called,
then arms were piled, and according to all appearance the day was to
pass quietly.
"Towards three o'clock an aid-de-camp arrived with an order. We resumed
our arms; our skirmishers spread themselves over the plain; we followed
slowly; and in twenty minutes we saw the Russian pickets withdraw to the
redoubt. A battery of artillery took post on our right hand, another on
our left, but both considerably in advance. They opened a vigorous fire
upon the enemy, who replied with energy, and soon the redoubt of
Cheverino disappeared behind a cloud of smoke.
"Our regiment was almost protected from the Russian fire by a ridge.
Their bullets, which seldom came in our direction--for they preferred
aiming them at the artillery--passed over our heads, or at most sent
earth and pebbles in our faces.
"When we had received the order to advance, my captain looked at me with
an attention which made me pass my hand two or three times over my young
mustache, in the most cavalier manner I could assume. I felt no fear,
save that of being thought to feel it. These harmless cannon-balls
contributed to maintain me in my heroic calmness. My vanity told me that
I ran a real danger, since I was under fire of a battery. I was
enchanted to feel myself so much at my ease, and I thought with what
pleasure I should narrate the capture of the redoubt of Cheverino in the
drawing-room of Madame de B----, Rue de Provence.
"The colonel passed along the front of our company and spoke to me.
'Well!' he said, 'you will see sharp work for your first affair.'
"I smiled most martially, and brushed my coat-sleeve, on which a ball,
fallen about thirty paces from me, had sent a little dust.
"It seems the Russians perceived how small was the effect of their round
shot, for they replaced them by shells, which could reach us better in
the hollow where we were posted. A tolerably large fragment of one of
these knocked off my shako and killed a mail beside me.
"'I congratulate you,' said the captain, as I picked up my shako. 'You
are safe for to-day.' I knew the military superstition which holds the
maxim _Non bis in idem_ to be as applicable on a battle-field as in a
court of justice. I proudly replaced my shako on my head. 'An
unceremonious way of making people bow,' said I, as gaily as I could.
Under the circumstances, this poor joke appeared excellent. 'I
congratulate you,' repeated the captain; 'you will not be hit again, and
to-night you will command a company, for I feel that my turn is coming.
Every time I have been wounded, the officer near me has received a spent
ball, and,' he added in a low voice, and almost ashamed, 'all their
names began with a P.'
"I affected to laugh at such superstitions. Many would have done as I
did--many would have been struck, as I was, by these prophetic words. As
a raw recruit I understood that I must keep my feelings to myself, and
always appear coldly intrepid.
"After half an hour the Russian fire sensibly slackened; then we emerged
from our cover to march against the redoubt. Our regiment was composed
of three battalions. The second was charged to take the redoubt in flank
on the side of the gorge; the two others were to deliver the assault. I
was in the third battalion.
"On appearing from behind the sort of ridge that had protected us, we
were received by several volleys of musketry, which did little harm in
our ranks. The whistling of the bullets surprised me: I turned my head
several times, thus incurring the jokes of my comrades, to whom the
noise was more familiar. 'All things considered,' said I to myself, 'a
battle is not such a terrible thing.'
"We advanced at storming pace, preceded by skirmishers. Suddenly the
Russians gave three hurras, very distinct ones, and then remained
silent, and without firing. 'I don't like that silence,' said my
captain. 'It bodes us little good.' I thought our soldiers rather too
noisy, and I could not help internally comparing the tumultuous clamour
with the imposing stillness of the enemy.
"We rapidly attained the foot of the redoubt: the palisades had been
broken, and the earth ploughed by our cannonade. With shouts of '_Vive
l'Empereur!_' louder than might have been expected from fellows who had
already shouted so much, our soldiers dashed over the ruins.
"I looked up, and never shall I forget the spectacle I beheld. The great
mass of smoke had arisen, and hung suspended like a canopy twenty feet
above the redoubt. Through a gray mist were seen the Russian grenadiers,
erect behind their half-demolished parapet, with levelled arms, and
motionless as statues. I think I still see each individual soldier, his
left eye riveted on us, the right one hidden by his musket. In an
embrasure, a few feet from us, stood a man with a lighted fuse in his
hand.
"I shuddered, and thought my last hour was come. 'The dance is going to
begin,' cried my captain. Good-night.' They were the last words I heard
him utter.
"The roll of drums resounded in the redoubt. I saw the musket muzzles
sink. I shut my eyes, and heard a frightful noise, followed by cries and
groans. I opened my eyes surprised to find myself still alive. The
redoubt was again enveloped in smoke. Dead and wounded men lay all
around me. My captain was stretched at my feet; his head had been
smashed by a cannon-ball, and I was covered with his blood and brains.
Of the whole company, only six men and myself were on their legs.
"A moment of stupefaction followed this carnage. Then the colonel,
putting his hat on the point of his sword, ascended the parapet, crying
'_Vive l'Empereur!_' He was instantly followed by all the survivors. I
have no clear recollection of what then occurred. We entered the
redoubt, I know not how. They fought hand to hand in the middle of a
smoke so dense that they could not see each other. I believe I fought
too, for my sabre was all bloody. At last I heard a shout of victory,
and, the smoke diminishing, I saw the redoubt completely covered with
blood and dead bodies. About two hundred men in French uniform stood in
a group, without military order, some loading their muskets, others
wiping their bayonets. Eleven Russian prisoners were with them.
"Our colonel lay bleeding on a broken tumbril. Several soldiers were
attending to him, as I drew near--'Where is the senior captain?' said he
to a sergeant. The sergeant shrugged his shoulders in a most expressive
manlier. 'And the senior lieutenant?' 'Here is _Monsieur_, who joined
yesterday,' replied the sergeant, in a perfectly calm tone. The colonel
smiled bitterly. 'You command in chief, sir,' he said to me; 'make haste
to fortify the gorge of the redoubt with those carts, for the enemy is
in force; but General C. will send you a support.'--'Colonel,' said I,
'you are badly wounded.'--'_Foutre, mon cher_, but the redoubt is
taken.'"
"Carmen," M. Merimee's latest production, appeared a few months since in
the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, which appears to have got the monopoly of
his pen, as it has of many of the cleverest pens in France. "Carmen" is
a graceful and animated sketch, in style as brilliant as anything by the
same author--in the character of its incidents less strikingly original
than some of his other tales. It is a story of Spanish life, not in
cities and palaces, in court or camp, but in the barranca and the
forest, the gipsy suburb of Seville, the woodland bivouac and smuggler's
lair. Carmen is a gipsy, a sort of Spanish Esmeralda, but without the
good qualities of Hugo's charming creation. She has no Djali; she is
fickle and mercenary, the companion of robbers, the instigator of
murder. She inveigles a young soldier from his duty, leads him into
crime, deceives and betrays him, and finally meets her death at his
hand. M. Merimee has been much in Spain, and--unlike some of his
countrymen, who apparently go thither with the sole view of spying out
the nakedness of the land and making odious comparisons, and who, in
their excess of patriotic egotism, prefer Versailles to the Alhambra,
and the Bal Mabille to a village _fandango_--he has a vivid perception
of the picturesque and characteristic, of the _couleur locale_, to use
the French term, whether in men or manners, scenery or costume, and he
embodies his impressions in pointed and sparkling phrase. As an
antiquarian and linguist, he unites qualities precious for the due
appreciation of Spain. Well-versed in the Castilian, he also displays a
familiarity with the Cantabrian tongue--that strange and difficult
_Vascuense_ which the Evil One himself, according to a provincial
proverb, spent seven years of fruitless labour in endeavouring to
acquire. And he patters Romani, the mysterious jargon of the gitanos, in
a style no way inferior--so far as we can discover--to Bible Borrow
himself. That gentleman, by the bye, when next he goes a missionarying,
would find M. Merimee an invaluable auxiliary, and the joint narrative
of their adventures would doubtless be in the highest degree curious.
The grave earnestness of the Briton would contrast curiously with the
lively half-scoffing tone of the witty and learned Frenchman. Indeed,
there would be danger of persons of such opposite character falling out
upon the road, and fighting a mortal duel, with the king of the gipsies
for bottle-holder. The proverbial jealousy between persons of the same
trade might prove another motive of strife. Both are dealers in the
romantic. And "Carmen," related as the personal experience of the author
during an archaeological tour in Andalusia the autumn of 1830, is as
graphic and fascinating as any chapters of the great tract-monger's
remarkable wanderings.