THE THREE CHILDREN.
[Illustration 075]
I.
PLUS QUAM CIVILIA BELLA.
The summer of 1792 had been a very rainy one; but that of 1793 was
so extremely warm that, although the civil war had gone far towards
ruining the roads in Brittany, the people--thanks to the fine
weather--were able to travel from place to place, for a dry soil makes
the best road.
At the close of a clear July day, about an hour after sunset, a man
on horseback, riding from the direction of Avranches, stopped before
the little inn called the Croix-Blanchard, situated at the entrance of
Pontorson. For some years its sign had borne the following inscription:
"Good cider obtained here." The day had been a very warm one, but now
the wind was beginning to rise.
The traveller was wrapped in an ample cloak that fell over his horse's
back. He wore a broad-brimmed hat, ornamented with a tricolored
cockade, which was rather a bold thing to do in a country like this,
with its hedges and sharpshooting, for which a cockade offered an
excellent target. The cloak fastened around his neck was pushed back,
leaving his arms free, and revealing at the same time a tricolored
belt and the butts of two pistols protruding from it, while a sabre
hung down below the cloak. At the sound of the horses hoofs stopping
before the inn the door opened, and the landlord came out, holding a
lantern in his hand. It was just at twilight, when it is still light
out of doors, although dark within.
The host glanced at the cockade.
"Do you mean to stop here, citizen?"
"No."
"Where are you going, then?"
"To Dol."
"In that case, you would do better to return to Avranches, or else
remain at Pontorson."
"Why so?"
"Because they are fighting at Dol."
"Ah!" said the rider; then he continued, "Give my horse some oats."
The host, having brought the trough and poured the oats into it,
proceeded to unbridle the horse, which began at once snuffing and
champing, while the dialogue went on.
"Is this one of the requisition horses, citizen?" "No."
"Does it belong to you?"
"Yes. I bought him and paid for him."
"Where do you come from?"
"From Paris."
"Not directly?"
"No."
"I should say not. The roads are blocked; but the post still runs."
"As far as Alençon. I left it there."
"Ah, it will not be long before we shall have no more posts in France.
The horses are all gone; one worth three hundred francs costs six
hundred, and the price of fodder is beyond all reason. I used to be a
postmaster; and now, you see, I keep a tavern. Out of thirteen hundred
and thirteen postmasters, two hundred have resigned. Have you been
travelling according to the new tariff, citizen?"
"You mean the tariff of the 1st of May? Yes."
"Twenty sous a post for a carriage, twelve for a gig, five for a van.
Did you not buy this horse at Alençon?"
"Yes."
"And you have been travelling all day?"
"Yes, since dawn."
"And yesterday?"
"And the day before."
"I should think so. You came by the way of Domfront and Mortain."
"And Avranches."
"You had better take my advice, and rest, citizen. Are you not tired?
Your horse certainly is."
"Horses may be tired, but men have no right to give way to fatigue."
Again the host gazed at the traveller, whose face, grave, calm, and
severe, was framed by gray hair.
Casting a glance along the road, that was deserted as far as the eye
could reach, he said,--
"And so you are travelling alone."
"I have an escort."
"Where is it?"
"My sabre and pistols."
The innkeeper went for a pail of water; and while he was watering the
horse he contemplated the traveller, saying to himself, "He looks like
a priest, all the same."
The rider continued,--
"You say there is fighting at Dol?"
"Yes. They are just about ready to begin."
"Who is fighting?"
"One ci-devant against another."
"How is that?"
"I mean that the ci-devant who is a Republican is fighting against
another who takes sides with the king."
"But there is no longer a king."
"There is the little fellow. But the strangest part is that the two
ci-devants are related to each other."
Here the rider listened attentively, while the innkeeper continued:--
"One is a young man, and the other an old one. It is the grand-nephew
fighting against his great-uncle. The uncle is a Royalist, while the
nephew is a patriot; the uncle commands the Whites, the nephew the
Blues. Ah! they will show no mercy to each other, you may be sure! It
is a war to death!"
"Death?"
"Yes, citizen. Perhaps you might like to see the polite speeches they
fling at each other's head. Here is a placard, which the old man has
managed to post on all the houses and trees, and which I found had been
stuck on my very door."
The host held up his lantern to a square bit of paper glued upon one of
the panels of his door, and as it was written in very large characters,
the rider was able to read it as he sat in his saddle:--
"The Marquis de Lantenac has the honor to inform his grand-nephew the
Viscount Gauvain that if the Marquis is so fortunate as to take him
prisoner, M. le Viscount may rest assured that he will be speedily
shot."
"And here is the reply," continued the innkeeper.
He turned so as to throw the light of his lantern upon a second placard
on the other panel of the door, directly opposite the first one.
"Gauvain warns Lantenac that if he catches him he will
have him shot."
"Yesterday the first placard was posted on my door," said the host,
"and this morning came the second. He was not kept waiting for his
answer."
The traveller, in an undertone, as though speaking to himself, uttered
certain words which the innkeeper caught without fully understanding
their meaning:--
"Yes, this is more than waging war against one's native land; it
is carrying it into the family. And it must needs be done; great
regenerations are only to be purchased at this price."
And the traveller, with his eyes still riveted to the second placard,
lifted his hand to his hat and saluted it.
The host continued:--
"You see, citizen, this is the way matters stand. In the cities and in
larger towns we are in favor of revolution, but in the country they are
opposed to it; which amounts to saying that we are Frenchmen in the
cities, and Bretons in the villages. It is a war between the peasants
and the townspeople. They call us _patauds_,[1] and we call them
_rustauds._[2] They have the nobles and the priests on their side."
"Not all of them," interrupted the rider.
"That is true, citizen, for here we have a Viscount fighting against a
Marquis; and I verily believe," he added aside, "that I am speaking to
a priest at this minute."
"Which of the two is likely to gain the day?"
"I should say the Viscount, so far. But he has a hard time of it. The
old man is a tough customer. They belong to the Gauvains, a noble
family in these parts, of which there are two branches; the Marquis
de Lantenac is the head of the older, and the Viscount Gauvain of
the younger branch. To-day the two branches are fighting each other.
You never see this among trees, but often among men. This Marquis de
Lantenac is all-powerful in Brittany; the peasants regard him as a
prince. On the very day he landed he rallied eight thousand men; in
a week three hundred parishes had risen. If he had only been able
to establish a foothold on the coast, the English would have made a
descent. Luckily Gauvain, who, strange to say, is his grand-nephew,
was on the spot. He is a Republican commander, and has got the upper
hand of his great-uncle. And then, as good luck would have it, this
Lantenac at the time of his arrival, when he was massacring a multitude
of prisoners, gave orders to have two women shot, one of whom had three
children, who had been adopted by a Paris battalion. This roused the
rage of the battalion, which is called the Bonnet-Rouge. There are but
few of the original Parisians left, but they are desperate fighters.
They have been incorporated into Commandant Gauvain's division.
Nothing can resist them. Their great object is to avenge the women and
recapture the children. No one knows what the old Marquis did with
the little ones, and that is what infuriates the Parisian grenadiers.
Had not these children been mixed up in it, this war would not have
been what it is. The Viscount is a good and brave young fellow; but
the old man is a terrible Marquis. The peasants call this the war of
Saint Michel against Beelzebub. You know, maybe, that Saint Michel is
the patron of these parts. There is a mountain named after him in the
middle of the bay. They give him credit for conquering the Devil and
burying him under another hill not far away, called Tombelaine."
"Yes," murmured the rider. "Tumba Beleni,--the tomb of Belenus, Belus,
Bel, Belial, Beelzebub."
"I see that you are well informed." And the host said to himself,--
"He knows Latin; surely he must be a priest." Then he added:--
"Well, citizen, this war is beginning all over again for the peasants.
No doubt they think the Royalist general is Saint Michel, and the
patriot commander Beelzebub; but if there is a devil it is Lantenac,
and Gauvain is an angel if there ever was one. Will you take nothing,
citizen?"
"I have my gourd and a bit of bread. But you have not told me what is
going on at Dol."
"To be sure; well, Gauvain is in command of the exploring division of
the coast. Now, Lantenac's plan was to stir up a general insurrection,
to bring Lower Normandy to the aid of Lower Brittany, to throw open
the door to Pitt, and to lend a helping hand to the great Vendean
army in the shape of twenty thousand English and two hundred thousand
peasants. Gauvain has checkmated this plan. He holds the coast and
drives Lantenac back into the interior and the English into the sea.
Lantenac was here, but Gauvain dislodged him, recaptured Pont-au-Beau,
drove him out from Avranches and Villedieu, and prevented him from
reaching Granville. He is manoeuvring now to force him to retreat into
the forest of Fougères, and there to surround him. Yesterday everything
was favorable, and Gauvain was here with his division. All at once,
mind you, the old man, who is a shrewd one, made a point; the news
came that he had marched on Dol. If he should take it, and succeeds in
establishing a battery on Mont-Dol,--for he has artillery,--that will
give the English a chance to land, and then all is lost. That is the
reason why Gauvain, who has a head on his shoulders, knowing there was
not a moment to be lost, consulted no one; nor did he wait for orders,
but giving the signal to saddle, and harnessing his artillery, he
collected his troops, drew his sabre, and while Lantenac is hurrying
towards Dol, Gauvain is all ready to pounce upon Lantenac; and Dol is
to be the place where these two Breton heads will clash, and a famous
crash it will be. They are at it now."
"How long does it take to reach Dol?"
"For troops with artillery carriages, at least three hours; but they
are there now."
The traveller, as he listened, said,--
"You are right; I think I can hear the cannon." The host, too, was
listening.
"Yes, citizen, and the firing is steady. You had better spend the night
here. There is nothing to be gained by going over there."
"I cannot stop. I must continue my journey."
"You are wrong. I do not know anything about your business, but the
risk is great, and unless all that you hold dearest in the world is at
stake--"
"That is precisely the state of things," replied the rider.
"Now, supposing your son--"
"You are very near the truth," said the rider.
The innkeeper raised his head as he said to himself,--
"And yet I thought this citizen was a priest." Then, after a moment's
reflection, he added: "But a priest may have children, after all."
"Put the bridle back on my horse," said the traveller. "How much do I
owe you?"
After receiving his pay, the host put the trough and bucket against the
wall, and came back to the traveller.
"Since you are determined to go, take my advice. You must be going
to Saint-Malo. Now, then, do not go by the way of Dol. There are
two roads,--one leading through Dol, and the other along the coast.
There is very little difference in their length. The road along
the coast passes through Saint-Georges-de-Brehaigne, Cherrueix,
and Hirelle-Vivier. You leave Dol to the south, and Cancale to the
north, and at the end of this street, citizen, you will come to a
place where the two roads fork,--that of Dol to the left, that of
Saint-Georges-de-Brehaigne to the right. Mark my words: if you go to
Dol, you will plunge headlong into the massacre; so do not take the
left-hand turning, but keep to the right."
"Thank you," said the traveller.
And he set spurs to his horse.
As it was now quite dark, he soon vanished in the gloom, and the
innkeeper lost sight of him.
When the traveller reached the end of the street where the two roads
forked, he heard the voice of the innkeeper calling to him from the
distance,--
"Turn to your right!"
He turned to the left.
II.
DOL.
[Illustration 076]
Dol, a Franco-Spanish city in Brittany, as the old records call it,
is not really a city; it is a street,--a grand old Gothic street,
with rows of houses supported by pillars on both sides of it. These
houses are not built in straight lines, but stand irregularly, now
and then elbowing into the street, which is, to be sure, a very wide
one. The rest of the town is a mere network of lanes, all leading
into this great diametrical street,--emptying into it, one might
say, like streams into a river, with Mont-Dol towering above it. The
city, with neither gates nor walls, could not have withstood a siege;
but the street was quite capable of sustaining one. The houses, like
promontories, which but fifty years ago were still standing, and the
two pillared galleries bordering the street, made it a strong and
well-nigh impregnable redoubt. Each of the houses was a fortress in
itself, and the enemy would have found himself forced to capture them
one by one. Almost in the middle of the street stood the old market.
The innkeeper of the Croix-Branchard had told the truth; a furious
battle was raging in Dol even while he was speaking. A nocturnal
duel between the Whites who arrived in the morning and the Blues who
appeared at night had burst suddenly upon the town. The forces were
unequal, the Whites numbering six thousand, while the Blues were only
fifteen hundred; but they fought with equal fury. Surprising as it may
seem, it was the fifteen hundred who attacked the six thousand.
A mob pitted against a phalanx. On one side were six thousand peasants,
with images of the Sacred Heart upon their leathern waistcoats, white
ribbons on their round hats, Christian emblems on their leather cuffs,
rosaries hanging from their belts, carrying pitchforks oftener than
sabres, and carbines without bayonets, dragging along cannon by means
of ropes, wretchedly equipped, undisciplined, with no suitable weapons,
yet mad with rage. On the other side were fifteen thousand soldiers,
wearing three-cornered hats with the tricolored cockade, long-tailed
coats, with broad lapels, and shoulder-belts crossed, short sabres with
copper hilts, muskets with long bayonets, well-drilled and disciplined,
obedient though savage, knowing how to obey like men who could at need
command, volunteers like the others, but patriots withal, although
barefooted and in rags; paladins in the shape of peasants fighting in
defence of Monarchy; barefooted heroes in the ranks of the Revolution;
while the life and soul of both Royalists and Republicans was centred
in their leaders,--Lantenac, the man advanced in years, and the young
Gauvain.
Standing side by side in the Revolution with young giants like Danton,
Saint-Just, and Robespierre, were the ideal and youthful forms of Hoche
and Marceau, and like unto them was Gauvain.
Gauvain was thirty years of age, with the chest of Hercules, the
solemn eye of a prophet, and the laugh of a child. He never smoked; he
neither drank nor swore. He carried a dressing-case with him throughout
the entire war, and took great care of his nails, his teeth, and his
luxuriant brown hair. Whenever they halted, it was his habit carefully
to shake his commander's uniform, riddled with balls and whitened with
dust as it was. Though always rushing headlong into the thickest of the
fray, he had never been wounded. His voice, unusually melodious, could
assume at need the imperative ring of command. He set the example of
sleeping on the ground, in the wind, the rain, and the snow, wrapped
in his cloak, with his charming head resting on a stone. His was a
heroic and innocent soul. Let him but take a sabre in his hand, he was
straightway transformed. He had that effeminate aspect that changes to
something formidable in battle.
A thinker and philosopher withal; in short, a youthful sage. Beautiful
to look upon as Alcibiades, his speech showed the wisdom of Socrates.
In that grand improvisation which men called the French Revolution,
this young man at once became a leader.
The division which he had formed was like a Roman legion; an army on a
small scale, complete in itself; it consisted of infantry and cavalry;
it had its scouts, its pioneers, its sappers, its engineers; and as
the Roman legion had its catapults, this army had its cannon. Three
well-mounted pieces strengthened the division, while leaving it easy to
handle.
Lantenac was also a military leader, but a more accomplished one,--more
cautious, and at the same time more daring. The veritable old hero
is cooler than a younger man, because he is farther removed from the
heyday of life, and more daring from the consciousness that he is
nearer death. What has he to lose? So slight a matter. This explains
the bold and yet scientific manoeuvres of Lantenac. Yet on the whole,
in this obstinate wrestling-match between the old and the young,
Gauvain almost always had the advantage, and he owed this rather to
chance than to anything in himself. Every sort of good-fortune, even
though it may be terrible, falls to the lot of youth. Victory has
something feminine in its nature.
Lantenac was exasperated with Gauvain; first, because his nephew had
defeated him, and second, because he was his nephew. What possessed him
to be Jacobin?--a Gauvain! Unruly youngster that he was. His heir,--for
the Marquis had no children,--a great-nephew, almost a grandchild!
"Ah!" cried this quasi grandfather, "if he falls into my hands, I will
kill him like a dog."
The Republic, moreover, had good reason to feel uneasy about this
Marquis de Lantenac. He had no sooner landed than its terror began.
The mere utterance of his name was like a powder-train spread through
the Vendean insurrection, of which he straightway became the centre.
In a revolt of this kind, where each one is jealous of his neighbor,
where each has his bush or his ravine, if a superior leader appears,
the separate chiefs who have been on a level will rally round him and
submit themselves to his authority. Nearly all the forest captains
had joined Lantenac, and whether near or remote, they all obeyed him.
Only Gavard, who had been the first to join him, had departed. And why
was this? Because he had enjoyed the confidence of the Republic and
been in a position of authority. Gavard had held all the secrets and
had adopted the old-fashioned system of civil war, which Lantenac had
come to change and replace. A successor can hardly agree with a man of
that stamp. The shoe of La Rouarie was not a fit for Lantenac, and so
Gavard had gone to join Bonchamp.
Lantenac belonged to the military school of Frederic II.; he understood
the art of warfare, which consists of combining the greater with the
lesser; he favored neither the great Catholic and Royal army, that
"mass of confusion" destined to be crushed, nor the guerilla troops
scattered through the thickets and hedges, useful to harass, but
powerless to crush. There is either no end to guerilla warfare, or else
it comes to an unfortunate one: it begins by attacking the Republic and
ends by robbing a diligence. Lantenac did not propose to carry on the
Breton war altogether in the open country like La Rochejaquelein, nor
yet in the forest like Chouan. He neither approved of the Vendée nor
of the Chouannerie; he believed in real warfare; he was willing to use
the peasant, but he wished to support him by the soldier. He required
bands for strategy and regiments for tactics. The village armies so
easily disbanded he considered excellent for an attack, an ambush,
or a surprise, but he felt that they lacked solidity; they were like
water in his hands; he sought a solid foundation for this unstable
and diffusive warfare; to the savage army of the forest he proposed
to add regular troops as a sort of pivot about which to manoeuvre the
peasants. Had this scheme, deep-laid and terrible as it was, proved
successful, the Vendée would never have been conquered.
But where could regular troops be found? Where look for soldiers? Where
seek for regiments, and find a ready-made army? In England. Hence
Lantenac's determination that the English should effect a landing. Thus
do parties compromise with their consciences. He quite lost sight of
the red coat, eclipsed as it was by the white cockade. Lantenac had but
one idea,--first to seize upon some point on the coast, and then to
deliver it into the hands of Pitt. It was with this object that, seeing
Dol unprotected, he had thrown himself upon it, knowing that once in
possession of Dol, he could readily gain Mont-Dol, and by means of the
latter gain a footing on the coast.
The spot was well chosen. From Mont-Dol the cannon would sweep Fresnois
on one side; and Saint-Brelade, on the other, would keep the fleet of
Cancale at a distance, and leave the whole beach, from Raz-sur-Couesnon
to Saint-Mêloir-des-Ondes, open to an attack.
In order to insure success, Lantenac had brought with him six thousand
of the most active men in the regiment at his disposal, together with
all his artillery,--ten sixteen-pound culverins, one demi-culverin,
and one four-pounder. He proposed to establish a strong battery on
Mont-Dol, on the principle that a thousand shots fired from ten cannon
do more execution than fifteen hundred fired from five cannon.
With six thousand men, he felt sure of success. In the direction of
Avranches they had nothing to fear but Gauvain with his fifteen hundred
men. Towards Dina there was Léchelle, to be sure, with twenty-five
thousand; but he was twenty leagues away. In regard to the latter,
Lantenac felt quite safe, the distance offsetting the numbers; and
as for Gauvain though he was quite near, his force was very small.
WE may here remark that Léchelle was a fool, who afterwards allowed
his twenty-five thousand men to be slaughtered on the moors of
Croix-Bataille,--a mistake for which he strove to atone by suicide.
So Lantenac felt quite safe. His entrance into Dol had been sudden and
stern. The Marquis de Lantenac enjoyed a hard reputation; and knowing
him to be merciless, the terrified inhabitants shut themselves up
in their houses without attempting resistance, and the six thousand
Vendeans installed themselves in the city after the disorderly fashion
of a band of rustics. It was almost like a market-ground; in default of
quartermasters, they chose their own quarters, camping at haphazard,
cooking, in the open air, dispersing hither and yonder through the
churches, dropping their muskets to take up their rosaries. Lantenac,
accompanied by a few artillery officers, proceeded without delay to
reconnoitre Mont-Dol, leaving Gouge-le-Bruant, whom he had appointed
field-sergeant, in command. This Gouge-le-Bruant has left but an
indistinct trace in history. He had two nicknames,-_Brise-Bleu_ in
token of his massacre of the patriots, and _Imânus_, because there was
something indescribably horrible about him. _Imânus_ is derived from
_immanis_, and old Low-Norman word, which expresses a superhuman degree
of ugliness, almost godlike in its terror,--a demon, a satyr, an ogre.
An old manuscript says, "With my own eyes I beheld Imânus." To-day the
old people in Brittany no longer know who Gouge-le-Bruant was, nor what
Brise-Bleu means; but they have a vague idea of the Imânus, whose name
is interwoven with all the local superstitions. He still is spoken of
in Trémorel and Plumaugat,--the two villages where Gouge-le-Bruant has
left the impress of his ill-omened footstep. In the Vendée, where all
the inhabitants were savages, Gouge-le-Bruant was the barbarian. He was
a sort of Cacique tattooed all over with crucifixes and fleurs-de-lis.
Upon his face was the hideous, almost supernatural glow of a soul
unlike that of any other human being. He was as brave in battle as
Satan himself, and atrociously cruel when the battle was over. His
heart, full of mysterious determinations, now urged him to acts of
devotion, now to deeds of wildest fury. Did he use his reason? Yes,
after a serpentine fashion. Heroism was his starting-point, murder his
goal. It was impossible to conceive how his resolutions, often grand in
their very monstrosity, could have entered his mind. He was capable of
any horror, when least expected. His ferocity was on a scale of epic
grandeur.
Hence his peculiar surname, Imânus.
The Marquis de Lantenac relied upon his cruelty; but while none could
dispute the fact that he excelled in cruelty, in matters of strategy
and tactics he was less efficient, and it may perhaps have been a
mistake on the part of the Marquis when he made him his field-sergeant.
But however that may be, he left him behind in charge, with the
injunction to look after matters in general.
Gouge-le-Bruant was more of a fighter than a soldier, and guarding
a town was not so much in his line as massacring a clan would have
been; still, he posted sentries. When at nightfall the Marquis, having
decided upon the position of his battery, was returning to Dol, he
suddenly caught the sound of cannon. Looking in the direction of
the sound, he saw a red smoke rising from the street. This meant a
surprise, an invasion, an attack; fighting was going on in the town.
Although not easily taken by surprise, he was now utterly amazed, for
he had anticipated nothing of the sort. What could it mean? Evidently
not Gauvain, for a man would hardly attack an enemy outnumbering him
four to one. Could it be Léchelle? But was it possible for him to have
made such a forced march? Léchelle was improbable, Gauvain impossible.
Lantenac urged on his horse. On the way he met some of the inhabitants
in the act of flight; but when he questioned them, they seemed beside
themselves with terror, crying, "The Blues! the Blues!" And on his
arrival he found the situation a bad one.
This is what had happened.
III.
SMALL ARMIES AND GREAT BATTLES.
[Illustration 077]
On their arrival at Dol, the peasants, as we have seen, had dispersed
through town, each man guided by his own fancy, as it often happens
when "on obéit d'amitié," as the Vendeans expressed it,--a form of
obedience that may produce heroes, but not well-disciplined soldiers.
They had stored their artillery, together with the baggage, under
the arches of the old market, and feeling weary, when they had eaten
and drunk and said their beads, they stretched themselves out in
the middle of the principal street, that was encumbered rather than
guarded. As night came on most of them fell asleep, pillowing their
heads on their knapsacks, some having their wives beside them; for it
often happened that the peasant women followed the men. In the Vendée,
women about to become mothers frequently acted as spies. It was a mild
July night The constellations shone forth against the deep-blue sky.
The entire bivouac, which might have been mistaken for the halt of a
caravan rather than for a military encampment, gave itself up to quiet
slumber. Suddenly by the glimmering twilight those who were still awake
perceived three cannon levelled at the entrance of the principal street.
It was Gauvain. He had surprised the guard, had entered the town, and
with his division held the entrance of the street.
A peasant started up, crying, "Who goes there?" and fired off his
musket. A cannon-shot, followed by a terrific volley of musketry, was
the reply. The whole sleeping crowd sprang up with a start. It was a
rude shock to be roused by a volley of grape-shot from a peaceful sleep
beneath the stars.
The first moment was terrific. There is nothing more tragic than the
confusion of a panic-stricken crowd. They snatched their weapons.
Many fell as they ran yelling to and fro. Confused by the unexpected
assault, the lads lost their heads and fired madly at one another.
The townspeople, bewildered by all this confusion, rushed in and out
of their houses, shouting to each other as they wandered helplessly
about,--a dismal struggle in which women and children played a part.
The balls whistling through the air left streaks of light in the
darkness behind them. Amid the smoke and tumult a constant firing
issued from every dark corner. The entanglement of the baggage-wagons
and cannon-carriages was added to the general confusion. The horses,
rearing, trampled upon the wounded, whose groans could be heard on
every side. Some were horror-stricken, others stupefied. Officers were
looking for their men, and soldiers for their officers. In the midst
of all this some there were who displayed a stolid indifference. One
woman, seated on the fragment of a wall, was nursing her new-born
babe, while her husband, with bleeding wounds and a broken leg, leaned
against it as he calmly loaded his musket and fired at random in the
darkness, killing or not, as it happened. Men lying flat on the ground
fired between the spokes of the wagon-wheels. At times there rose a
hideous din of clamors, and again the thundering voice of the cannon
would overwhelm all. It was frightful,--like the felling of trees when
one falls upon the other.
[Illustration 078]
Gauvain from his ambush aimed with precision, and lost but few men.
But at last the peasants, intrepid in spite of the disaster, ended by
taking the defensive. They fell back on the market, which was like
a great dark fortress, with its forest of stone pillars. There they
made a stand; anything that resembled a forest inspired them with
courage. The Imânus did his best to atone for the absence of Lantenac.
They had cannon; but, to the great surprise of Gauvain, they made no
use of them. This was due to the fact that the artillery officers had
gone with the Marquis to reconnoitre Mont-Dol, and the peasants did
not know how to manage the culverins and demi-culverins; but they
riddled with balls the Blues who cannonaded them. The peasants answered
the grape-shot by a volley of musketry. They now had the advantage
of a shelter, having heaped up the drays, the carts, the baggage,
and all the small casks that were lying about in the old market,
thus improvising a high barricade, with openings through which they
could pass their muskets, and from which they opened a deadly fire.
So rapidly had they worked, that in a quarter of an hour the market
presented an impregnable front.
Matters were beginning to look serious for Gauvain. The sudden
transformation of a market into a fortress, and the peasants assembled
in a solid mass within, was a condition of affairs which he had not
anticipated. He had taken them by surprise, it is true; but he had not
succeeded in routing them. He had dismounted, and holding his sword
by the hilt, he stood with folded arms, gazing steadfastly into the
gloom, his own figure distinctly revealed by the flame of the torch
that lighted the battery,--a target for the men of the barricade; of
which fact he took no heed, as he stood there lost in thought, while a
shower of balls from the barricade fell around him.
He set his cannon against their rifles; and victory is ever on the side
of the cannon-ball. He who has artillery is sure to win the day, and
his well-manned battery gave him the advantage.
Suddenly a flash of lightning burst forth from the dark market; there
came a report like a peal of thunder, and a bullet went crashing
through a house over Gauvain's head.
The barricade was paying him back in his own coin.
What was going on? This was a new development. The artillery was no
longer confined to one side.
A second ball followed the first, embedding itself in the wall close to
Gauvain; and a third ball knocked off his hat.
These balls were of a calibre so heavy that they must have been fired
from a sixteen-pounder.
"They are aiming at you, commander," cried the gunners, as they put out
the torch; and Gauvain, still absorbed in his reverie, stooped to pick
up his hat.
Some one was indeed aiming at Gauvain, and it was Lantenac.
The Marquis had just reached the barricade from the opposite side.
The Imânus hastened to meet him.
"Monseigneur, we have been taken by surprise."
"By whom?"
"I do not know."
"Is the road to Dinan open?"
"I believe so."
"We must begin to retreat."
"We have done so. Many have already fled."
"I am not speaking of flight, but of retreat. Why did you not use the
artillery?"
"The men were beside themselves, and then the officers were absent."
"I was to be here."
"Monseigneur, I sent everything I could on to Fougères,--the women, the
baggage, and all useless incumbrances; but what is to be done with the
three little prisoners?"
"Do you mean the children?"
"Yes."
"They are our hostages. Send them on to the Tourgue."
So saying, the Marquis started for the barricade, and directly after
his arrival things took on another aspect. The barricade was not
well constructed for artillery; there was room for but two cannon;
the Marquis placed in position the two sixteen-pounders for which
embrasures were made. As he was leaning on one of the cannon, watching
the enemy's battery through the embrasure, he caught sight of Gauvain.
"It is he!" he cried.
Then, taking the swab and the ramrod, he loaded the piece, adjusted the
sight, and took aim.
Three times he aimed at Gauvain and missed him, but the third shot
knocked off his hat.
"Bungler!" murmured Lantenac. "A little lower, and I should have had
his head."
Suddenly the torch went out, and he had only darkness before him.
"Well, let it go," he said.
And turning to the peasant gunners, he exclaimed:
"Let them have the grape-shot!"
Gauvain for his part was also in deadly earnest. The situation had
become a serious one since the development of this new phase of the
conflict, and the barricade was now cannonading him. Who could tell
how soon it might pass from the defensive to the offensive? The enemy
numbered at least five thousand, even allowing for the dead and the
fugitives, while he had no more than twelve hundred service-able men
at his command. What would happen to the Republicans if the enemy
should become aware of their limited number? Their rôles would soon
be reversed; from playing the part of assailants, he would become the
object of assault. If the barricade were to make a sortie, all would be
lost.
What was to be done? It was out of the question to think of attacking
the barricade in front; an attempt to capture it by main strength
would be folly; twelve hundred men could not dislodge five thousand.
Imperative as it was to make an end of it, knowing as he did that delay
was fatal, still he realized that to force the enemy's hand would be
impossible. What was he to do?
Gauvain belonged to this neighborhood; he was familiar with the
town, and knew that behind the old market, where the Vendeans were
intrenched, was a labyrinth of narrow and crooked streets.
He turned to his lieutenant, the brave Captain Guéchamp, who afterwards
became famous for clearing the forest of Concise, where Jean Chouan was
born, and who prevented the capture of Bourgneuf by cutting the rebels
off from the highway that led to the pond of La Chaine.
"Guéchamp," said Gauvain, "I intrust you with the command. Fire as
rapidly as possible. Riddle the barricade with cannon-balls, and keep
them busy over yonder."
"I understand," said Guéchamp.
"Mass the whole column with their guns loaded, and hold them in
readiness for an attack."
He whispered a few words in Guéchamp's ear.
"It shall be done," said the latter.
Gauvain continued,--
"Are all our drummers ready?"
"Yes"
"We have nine. Keep two and give me seven."
The seven drummers silently ranged themselves in front of Gauvain.
"Step forward, battalion of the Bonnet-Rouge!" exclaimed Gauvain.
Twelve soldiers, one of whom was a sergeant, stepped from the ranks.
"I called for the whole battalion," said Gauvain.
"Here it is," replied the sergeant.
"Are there but twelve?"
"Only twelve of us left."
"Very well," said Gauvain.
This sergeant was that very Radoub, the rough and kindly soldier who in
the name of the battalion had adopted the three children found in the
forest of La Saudraie.
It will be remarked that only half that battalion was massacred at
Herbe-en-Pail, and Radoub, by good luck, was not among them.
A forage-wagon was standing near, and Gauvain pointed it out to the
sergeant.
"Let your men weave ropes of straw and bind them around their muskets
to deaden the noise when they clash against each other."
A minute went by; the order was silently executed in the darkness.
"It is done," said the sergeant.
"Take off your shoes, soldiers," continued Gauvain.
"We have none," replied the sergeant.
Including the drummers, they numbered nineteen men; Gauvain was the
twentieth.
"Follow me, in single file!" cried Gauvain. "Let the drummers go before
the battalion. You will command the battalion, sergeant!"
He placed himself at the head of this column, and while the cannonading
still continued on both sides, these twenty men glided along like
shadows and plunged into the deserted lanes.
Thus they proceeded for some time, skirting along the fronts of the
houses. It seemed as though the whole town were dead; the citizens had
taken refuge in their cellars. Every door was barred and every shutter
closed. Not a light was to be seen anywhere.
But through this silence they still heard the awful din on the
principal street: the cannonading went on; the Republican battery and
the Royal barricade spit out their grape-shot with unabated fury.
[Illustration 079]
After marching twenty minutes, winding in and out, Gauvain, who had led
the way unerringly through this darkness, reached the end of a lane
that led into the principal street; they were now, however, on the
other side of the market.
The position was changed. On that side there was no intrenchment,--a
common mistake of barricade builders; the market was open, and one
could walk in under the pillars, where several baggage-wagons stood
ready to leave. Gauvain and his nineteen men were in the presence of
the five thousand Vendeans as before, only instead of facing them they
found themselves in their rear.
Gauvain whispered to the sergeant; the straw was unwound from the
muskets, and the twelve grenadiers ranged themselves in a line behind
the corner of the lane, while the seven drummers, with uplifted
drumstick, waited for the signal.
The artillery firing was intermittent, when suddenly, during the
interval between two discharges, Gauvain raised his sword, and in a
voice that rang out like a clarion upon the silence, exclaimed,--
"Two hundred men to the right, two hundred to the left, the rest in the
centre."
The drums beat and the twelve musket-shots were fired.
Then Gauvain uttered the formidable battle-cry of the Blues,--
"Charge! Bayonets!"
The effect was wonderful.
All this crowd of peasants finding themselves assailed in the rear,
imagined that another army had come up from behind. At the same time,
on hearing the beating of the drums, the column which held the upper
part of the street and was commanded by Guéchamp began to move,
sounding the charge in its turn, and starting on the run, attacked
the barricade; the peasants saw themselves between two fires. A panic
magnifies, and at such moments a pistol-shot sounds like the report of
a cannon; imagination distorts every sound, and the barking of a dog
seems like the roar of a lion. Let us add, moreover, that the peasant
takes fright as easily as a thatch catches fire, and as quickly as a
burning thatch becomes a conflagration, a panic among peasants grows
into a rout; and on this occasion the flight was beyond description.
In a few moments the market was deserted; the terrified lads scattered
in all directions, and the officers were helpless. The Imânus killed
two or three of the fugitives, but it was of no avail. Nothing could be
heard save the cry, "Sauve qui peut," and with the rapidity of a cloud
driven onward by a hurricane, the entire army scattered through the
streets as through the meshes of a sieve and vanished into the country.
Some fled towards Châteauneuf, some towards Plerguer, and others in the
direction of Antrain.
The Marquis de Lantenac, who was the last man to leave the scene,
spiked the guns with his own hands, and then quietly and calmly took
his departure, saying as he went,--
"It is evident that the peasants cannot be depended upon to stand their
ground. We need the English."
[Illustration 080]
IV.
A SECOND TIME.
[Illustration 081]
They had won the victory, and, turning to the men of the battalion of
the Bonnet-Rouge, Gauvain exclaimed,--
"Though you are but twelve, you are equal to a thousand."
One word from the chief in times like these was as good as the cross of
honor.
Guéchamp, who had been sent by Gauvain outside the city in pursuit of
the fugitives, captured many of them.
Torches were lighted, and the town was searched.
All those who had not been able to escape, surrendered themselves. The
principal street, illuminated by _pots-à-feu_, was strewn with the
dead and the wounded. The fierce struggle that always terminates a
battle was still continued by a few groups of desperate fighters, who,
however, on being surrounded, threw down their arms and surrendered.
Gauvain had observed amid the wild tumult of the flight a fearless man,
vigorous and agile as a faun, who stood his own ground while covering
the flight of the others. This peasant, after handling his musket like
an expert, alternately firing: and Rising the butt as a club, until
he had broken it, now stood grasping a pistol in one hand and a sabre
in the other, and no man dared approach him. Suddenly Gauvain saw him
reel, and lean against one of the pillars of the principal street. He
was evidently wounded, but he still held his sabre and his pistols.
Gauvain put his sword under his arm and came up to him. As he called
upon him to surrender, the man gazed steadily at him, while the blood
oozing from his wound formed a pool at his feet.
"You are my prisoner," said Gauvain. "What is your name?"
"Danse-à-l'Ombre," was the reply.
"You are a brave fellow," said Gauvain, extending his hand.
"Long live the King!" cried the man.
Then gathering all his strength, and raising both hands simultaneously,
he fired his pistol at Gauvain's heart, at the same time aiming a blow
at his head with the sabre.
This movement, tiger-like in its rapidity, was yet forestalled by the
action of another. A horseman had appeared on the scene; he had been
there for some moments without attracting attention, and when he saw
the Vendean lift his sabre and pistol, he threw himself between the
latter and Gauvain, intercepting the sabre-thrust by his own person,
while his horse was struck by the pistol-shot, and both horse and rider
fell to the ground. Thus Gauvain's life was saved. All this took place
as quickly as one would utter a cry.
The Vendean also sank to the pavement.
The blow from the sabre struck the man full in the face; he lay on the
ground in a swoon. The horse was killed.
[Illustration 082]
Gauvain drew near, asking, as he approached, if any could tell who he
was.
On looking at him more closely he saw that the blood was gushing over
the face of the wounded man, covering it as with a red mask, and
rendering it impossible to distinguish his features. One could see that
his hair was gray.
"He has saved my life," said Gauvain. "Does any one here know him?"
"Commander," said a soldier, "he has but just arrived in town. I saw
him coming from the direction of Pontorson."
The surgeon-in-chief of the division hurried up with his
instrument-case.
The wounded man was still unconscious, but after examining him the
surgeon said,--
"Oh, this is nothing but a simple cut. It can be sewed, and in eight
days he will be on his feet again. That was a fine sabre-cut."
The wounded man wore a cloak and a tricolored belt, with pistols and
a sabre. They placed him on a stretcher, and after undressing him, a
bucket of water was brought, and the surgeon washed the wound. As the
face began to appear, Gauvain studied it attentively.
"Has he any papers about him?" he asked.
The surgeon felt in his side pocket and drew out a pocket-book, which
he handed to Gauvain.
Meanwhile the wounded man, revived by the cold water, was regaining
his consciousness. His eyelids quivered slightly.
Gauvain was looking over the pocket-book, in which he discovered a
sheet of paper folded four times; he opened it and read,--
"Committee of Public Safety. Citizen Cimourdain--"
"Cimourdain!" he cried; whereupon the wounded man opened his eyes.
Gauvain was beside himself.
"It is you, Cimourdain! For the second time you have saved my life."
Cimourdain looked at Gauvain, while a sudden burst of joy, impossible
to describe, lit up his bleeding face.
Gauvain fell on his knees before him, exclaiming:
"My master!"
"Thy father!" said Cimourdain.
V.
A DROP OF COLD WATER.
It was many a year since last they met, but their hearts had never been
separated, and they knew each other again as if they had parted but
yesterday.
A hospital had been improvised in the town hall of Dol, and Cimourdain
was placed on a bed in a small room adjoining the large hall devoted to
the other wounded men. The surgeon who had sewed up his wound put a
stop to all exciting conversation between the two men, considering it
wiser to leave Cimourdain to sleep. Besides, Gauvain was called away by
the thousand duties and cares incident to victory. Cimourdain was left
alone, but he could not sleep, excited as he was by the double fever of
his wound and of his joy.
He knew he was not sleeping, and yet he hardly felt sure that he was
awake. Could it be possible that his dream had come to pass? Cimourdain
was one of those men who have no faith in good luck, and yet it had
fallen to his lot. He had found Gauvain. He had left him a child, he
found him a man,--a grand, brave, awe-inspiring conqueror, and that in
the cause of the people. In the Vendée, Gauvain was the pillar of the
Revolution, and it was really Cimourdain himself who had bestowed this
support upon the Republic. This conqueror was his pupil. Cimourdain
beheld his own thought illumining the youthful countenance of this man,
for whom a niche in the Republican Pantheon was perhaps reserved; his
disciple, the child of his mind, was a hero from this time forth, and
would soon become famous; it seemed to Cimourdain like seeing his own
soul transformed into a genius. As he watched Gauvain in the battle
he had felt like Chiron watching Achilles. There is a certain analogy
between the priest and the Centaur, since a priest is but half a man.
The incidents of this day's adventure, added to the sleeplessness
caused by his wound, filled Cimourdain with a strange sort of
intoxication. He seemed to see a youthful destiny rising before him in
all its splendor, and the knowledge of his own absolute control of
this destiny contributed to increase his deep joy. It needed but one
more triumph like that which he had just witnessed, and at a word from
Cimourdain, the Republic would place Gauvain at the head of an army.
Nothing dazzles one so much as an unexpected success. This was the
epoch of military dreams. Every man had a longing to create a general;
Westermann was the hero of Danton's dream, Rossignol of Marat's, Ronsin
of Hébert's; and Robespierre would have liked to ruin them all. So
why not Gauvain? Cimourdain asked himself; and thereupon he proceeded
to lose himself in dreams. There were no limits to his imaginings;
as he passed from one hypothesis to another, all obstacles vanished
before him. For this is a ladder on which, having once set foot, one
never pauses; the ascent is a long one, starting from man and ending
at the stars. A great general is only the commander of an army; a
great captain is also a leader of thought; Cimourdain pictured Gauvain
as a great captain. It seemed to him--for fancies travel fast--that
he saw him on the sea, pursuing the English; on the Rhine, driving
before him the kings of the North; in the Pyrenees, repulsing Spain;
on the Alps, setting the signal for insurrection before the eyes of
Rome. Cimourdain was a man who possessed two distinct natures,--the
one tender, the other gloomy,--both of which were satisfied; for since
the inexorable was his ideal, it gratified him to see Gauvain at once
glorious and terrible. Cimourdain thought of all he had to pull down
before he could build up. "And certainly," he said to himself, "this
is no time to indulge in tender emotions. Gauvain will be up _à la
hauteur_,"[3]--an expression of the day. Cimourdain pictured Gauvain
to himself with a sword in his hand, girded in light, a flaming meteor
on his brow, spreading the grand ideal wings of justice, right, and
progress, and, like an angel of extermination, crushing the darkness
beneath his heel.
Just at the crisis of this reverie, which one might almost have called
an ecstasy, through the half-open door he heard men talking in the
great ambulance-hall adjoining his room, and he recognized Gauvain's
voice, which, in spite of years of absence, had always rung in his
ears; for the voice of the man often retains something of its childish
tones. He listened. There was a sound of footsteps, and he heard the
soldiers saying,--
"Here is the man who fired at you, commander. He had crawled into a
cellar when no one was watching; but we found him, and here he is."
Then Cimourdain heard the following conversation between Gauvain and
the man:--
"Are you wounded?"
"I am well enough to be shot."
"Put this man to bed, dress his wounds, take good care of him until he
recovers."
"I want to die."
"But you are going to live. You tried to kill me in the name of the
King; I pardon you in the name of the Republic."
A shadow crossed Cimourdain's brow. He seemed to wake as with a start,
and whispered to himself in a tone of gloomy dejection,--
"Yes, he has a merciful nature, there can be no doubt."
VI.
A HEALED BREAST, BUT A BLEEDING HEART.
A Gash is quickly healed; but there was elsewhere one more seriously
wounded than Cimourdain. This was the woman who had been shot, and whom
the beggar Tellmarch had rescued from the great pool of blood at the
farm Herbe-en-Pail.
Michelle Fléchard was in a more critical condition than Tellmarch
had supposed. There was a wound in the shoulder-blade corresponding
to that above her breast; one ball had broken her collar-bone, while
another had entered her shoulder; but as the lung was uninjured, she
might recover. Tellmarch was what in peasant language is called a
"philosopher," that is to say, a combination of doctor, surgeon, and
wizard. Upon the bed of seaweed in his underground den he nursed the
wounded woman, using those mysterious remedies called "simples;" end
thanks to his care, she lived.
The collar-bone knitted together, the wounds in the breast and the
shoulder closed, and after a few weeks the wounded woman became
convalescent.
One morning she was able to walk out of the _carnichot_, leaning on
Tellmarch; she seated herself under the trees, in the sun. Tellmarch
knew very little about her; for a wound in the breast necessitates
silence, and during the death-like agony which preceded her recovery
she had hardly spoken a word. Whenever she seemed about to open
her lips, Tellmarch would prevent her; but he could not control
her thoughts, and he observed by the expression in her eyes the
heart-rending nature of her ever-recurring fancies. This morning she
felt strong, and could almost walk alone. The doctor who has cured his
patient enjoys a sense of fatherhood; and as he watched her, Tellmarch
felt happy. The good old man began to smile as he addressed her.
"Well, it seems we are up; our wounds are healed."
"All but those of the heart."
And presently she added,--
"Then you don't know where they are?"
"Whom do you mean?" asked Tellmarch.
"My children."
The word "then" revealed a whole world of meaning; it seemed to say:
"Since you do not speak of them to me, since you have been with me for
so many days without opening your lips to me on the subject, since you
silence me every time I try to speak, since you seem to fear that I
am going to talk about them,--it must mean that you have nothing to
tell me." During the course of her fever she had often noticed that
whenever, in her delirious ramblings, she had called for her children
(the perceptions of delirium are sometimes acute), the old man would
make no reply.
The truth was that Tellmarch did not know what to tell her. It is not
easy to speak to a mother of her lost children; and besides, what did
he know? Nothing at all, in fact,--that a mother had been shot, that he
had found this mother on the ground, that when he had lifted her up she
was nearly dead, that this dying woman had three children, and lastly,
that the Marquis de Lantenac, after ordering the mother to be shot, had
carried away the children; and here his information ceased. What had
become of the children? Were they still living? Having made inquiries,
he had learned that there were two boys, and a little girl barely
weaned; and this was the extent of his knowledge. He asked himself more
questions than he could answer in regard to this unhappy family; but
the neighbors whom he had asked only shook their heads. M. de Lantenac
was a man of whom no one cared to talk.
They were equally reluctant either to speak about Lantenac or to talk
to Tellmarch. Peasants have their own peculiar superstitions. They
disliked Tellmarch. Tellmarch le Caimand was a perplexing man. Why was
he always looking up at the sky? What was he doing, what could he be
thinking about, when he stood motionless for hours at a time? Surely he
must be a very odd sort of man. While the district was in a state of
combustion and conflagration, when warfare, devastation, and carnage
were the sole occupations of life, when every man was doing his best to
burn houses, murder families, massacre outposts, and plunder villages,
thinking of nothing but setting ambushes and traps and killing one
another, here was this hermit absorbed in nature, enjoying absolute
peace of mind, gathering plants and herbs, interested only in flowers,
birds, and stars,--of course he was a dangerous character! He must be
insane. He never hid behind a bush to fire at his fellow-men. "The man
is mad!" said the passers-by. Hence he inspired a certain awe, and men
avoided him, thus increasing the isolation of his life.
[Illustration 087]
They asked him no questions, and seldom vouchsafed replies; therefore
he had been unable to get the information he wanted. The conflict had
been transferred to other districts, and the fighting was more remote.
The Marquis de Lantenac had vanished from the horizon; and war must set
its foot on a man of Tellmarch's character before he becomes aware of
its existence.
After hearing these words, "My children!" Tellmarch ceased to smile,
and the mother sank into deep thought. What was passing in her soul?
She seemed to have plunged into the depths. Suddenly she looked up at
Tellmarch, and repeated her demand almost angrily,--
"My children!"
Tellmarch bent his head like a culprit.
He was thinking of the Marquis de Lantenac, who, so far from returning
his thought, had probably forgotten his very existence. He realized the
fact as he said to himself, "When a nobleman is in danger he reckons
you among his acquaintance; but let the danger pass, and he forgets
that he ever saw you."
And he asked himself, "Why, then, did I save him?" To which question he
made reply, "Because he was a man."
For some moments he dwelt upon this thought; then he resumed the thread
of his meditations,--
"Am I sure of this?"
And presently he repeated those bitter words: "Had I but known!"
This whole experience gave him a sense of oppression, for his own
action in the affair was enigmatical to him. His thoughts were sad,
since a sense of guilt had crept into them. A kindly act may prove
in the end to have been an evil one. He who saves the wolf kills the
sheep; he who sets the vulture's wing is responsible for his talons.
The unreasoning anger of this mother was therefore justified.
Still he felt a certain consolation in the knowledge that he had saved
the mother, which partly balanced his regret for having saved the
Marquis.
"But the children?"
The mother was also thinking; and these two currents of thoughts moved
side by side, perhaps to mingle unawares in the shadowy land of reverie.
Meanwhile her eyes, gloomy as the night, rested again on Tellmarch.
"We cannot go on like this," she said.
"Hush!" rejoined Tellmarch, putting his finger on his lips.
She continued,--
"I am angry with you for saving me; you did wrong. I would rather have
died, for then I should surely see them and know where they are. They
would not see me, but I should be near them. The dead must have power
to protect."
He took her by the arm, and felt her pulse.
"You must calm yourself, or you will have a relapse."
She asked him almost harshly,--
"When can I go away?"
"Go away?"
"Yes. When shall I be fit for tramping?"
"Never, if you are unreasonable; to-morrow, if you are good."
"What do you call being good?"
"Trusting in God."
"God? What has He done with my children?"
She seemed to be wandering. Her voice had grown very gentle.
"You must see," she went on to say, "that I cannot stay like this. You
never had any children; but I am a mother: that makes a difference. One
cannot judge of a thing unless he knows what it is like. Did you ever
have any children?"
"No," replied Tellmarch.
"But I have. Can I live without my children? I should like to be told
why my children are not here. Something is happening, but what it is I
cannot understand."
"Come," said Tellmarch, "you are feverish again. You mustn't talk any
more."
She looked at him and was silent.
And from that day she kept silence again.
This implicit obedience was more than Tellmarch desired. She spent hour
after hour crouching at the foot of the old tree, like one stupefied.
She pondered in silence,--that refuge of simple souls who have sounded
the gloomy depths of woe. She seemed to give up trying to understand.
After a certain point despair becomes unintelligible to the despairing.
As Tellmarch watched her, his sympathy increased. The sight of her
suffering excited in this old man thoughts such as a woman might have
known. "She may close her lips," he said to himself, "but her eyes will
speak, and I see what ails her. She has but one idea; she cannot be
resigned to the thought that she is no longer a mother. Her mind dwells
constantly on the image of her youngest, whom she was nursing not long
ago. How charming it must be to feel a tiny rosy mouth drawing ones
soul from out one's body, feeding its own little life on the life of
its mother!"
He too was silent, realizing the impotence of speech in the presence of
such sorrow.
There is something really terrible in the silence of an unchanging
thought, and how can one expect that a mother will listen to reason?
Maternity sees but one side. It is useless to argue with it. One
sublime characteristic of a mother is her resemblance to a wild animal.
The maternal instinct is divine animalism. The mother ceases to be a
woman; she becomes a female, and her children are her cubs.
Hence we find in the mother something above reason and at the same time
below it,--a something which we call instinct. Guided as she is by the
infinite and mysterious will of the universe, her very blindness is
charged with penetration.
However anxious to make this unfortunate woman speak, Tellmarch could
not succeed. One day he said to her:--
"Unfortunately I am old, and can no longer walk. My strength is
exhausted before I reach my journey's end. I would go with you, only
that my legs give out in about fifteen minutes and I have to stop
and rest. However, it may be just as well for you that I cannot walk
far, as my company might be more dangerous than useful. Here, I am
tolerated; but the Blues suspect me because I am a peasant, and the
peasants because they believe me to be a wizard."
He waited for an answer, but she did not even raise her eyes.
A fixed idea ends either in madness or heroism. But what heroism can
be expected from a poor peasant woman? None whatever. She can be a
mother, and that is all. Each day she grew more and more absorbed in
her reverie. Tellmarch was watching her.
He tried to keep her busy. He bought her needles, thread, and a
thimble, and to the delight of the poor Caimand, she really began
to busy herself with sewing; she still dreamed, it is true, but she
worked also,--a sure sign of health,--and by degrees her strength
returned. She mended her underwear, her dress, and her shoes, her
eyes all the while preserving a strange, far-away look. As she sewed
she hummed to herself unintelligible songs. She would mutter names,
probably children's names, but not distinctly enough for Tellmarch to
understand. Sometimes she paused and listened to the birds, as though
she expected a message from them. She watched the weather, and he could
see her lips move as she talked to herself in a low voice. She had made
a bag and filled it with chestnuts, and one morning Tellmarch found her
gazing vaguely into the depths of the forest, and he saw that she was
all ready to start.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
And she replied,--
"I am going to look for them."
He made no effort to detain her.
[Illustration 084]
VII.
THE TWO POLES OF TRUTH.