The Blockade of Phalsburg Part 29

* Who goes there?

It was very cold, a dry cold, notwithstanding the fog.

Soon, from the direction of the square in the interior of the city, a number of men went up the street; if they had kept step the enemy would have heard them from the distance upon the glacis; but they came pell-mell, and turned near us into the postern stair-way. It took full ten minutes for them to pa.s.s. You can imagine whether I watched them, and yet I could not recognize our sergeant in the darkness.

The two companies formed again in the trenches after their defiling, and all was still.

My feet were perfectly numb, it was so cold; but curiosity kept me there.

At last, after about half an hour, a pale line stretched behind the bottom-land of Fiquet, around the woods of La Bonne-Fontaine. Captain Rolfo, the other citizens, and myself, leaned against the rampart, and looked at the snow-covered plain, where some German patrols were wandering in the fog, and nearer to us, at the foot of the glacis, the Wurtemburg sentinel stood motionless in the poplar alley which leads to the large shed of the tile-kiln.

Everything was still gray and indistinct; though the winter sun, as white as snow, rose above the dark line of firs. Our soldiers stood motionless, with grounded arms, in the covered ways. The "_Verdas!_"

and "_Soudas!_" went their rounds. It grew lighter every moment.

No one would have believed that a fight was preparing, when six o'clock sounded from the mayoralty, and suddenly our two companies, without command, started, shouldering their arms, from the covered ways, and silently descended the glacis.

In less than a minute, they reached the road which stretches along the gardens, and defiled to the left, following the hedges.

You cannot imagine my fright when I found that the fight was about to begin. It was not yet clear daylight, but still the enemy's sentinel saw the line of bayonets filing behind the hedges, and called out in a terrible way: "_Verda!_"

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SORTIE FROM THE LIME-KILN.]

"Forward!" replied Captain Vigneron, in a voice like thunder, and the heavy soles of our soldiers sounded on the hard ground like an avalanche.

The sentinel fired, and then ran up the alley, shouting I know not what. Fifteen of the landwehr, who formed the outpost under the old shed used for drying bricks, started at once; they did not have time for repentance, but were all ma.s.sacred without mercy.

We could not see very well at that distance, through the hedges and poplars, but after the post was carried, the firing of the musketry and the horrible cries were heard even in the city.

All the unfortunate landwehr who were quartered in the Pernette farm-house--a large number of whom were undressed, like respectable men at home, so as to sleep more comfortably--jumped from the windows in their pantaloons, in their drawers, in their shirts, with their cartridge-boxes on their backs, and ranged themselves behind the tile-kiln, in the large Seltier meadow. Their officers urged them on, and gave their orders in the midst of the tumult.

There must have been six or seven hundred of them there, almost naked in the snow, and, notwithstanding their being thus surprised, they opened a running fire which was well sustained, when our two pieces on the bastion began to take part in the contest.

Oh! what carnage!

Looking down upon them, you should have seen the bullets. .h.i.t, and the shirts fly in the air! And, what was worst for these poor wretches, they had to close ranks, because, after destroying everything in the tile-kiln, our soldiers went out to make an attack with their bayonets!

What a situation!--just imagine it, Fritz, for respectable citizens, merchants, bankers, brewers, innkeepers--peaceable men who wanted nothing but peace and quietness.

I have always thought, since then, that the landwehr system is a very bad one, and that it is much better to pay a good army of volunteers, who are attached to the country, and know that their pay, pensions, and decorations come from the nation and not from the government; young men devoted to their country like those of '92, and full of enthusiasm, because they are respected and honored in proportion to their sacrifices. Yes, this is what they ought to be--and not men who are thinking of their wives and children.

Our b.a.l.l.s struck down these poor fathers and husbands by the dozen. To add to all these abominations, two other companies, sent out with the greatest secrecy by the council of defence from the posterns of the guard and of the German gate, and which came up, one by the Saverne road, and the other by the road of Pet.i.t-Saint-Jean, now began to outflank them, and forming behind them, fired upon them in the rear.

It must be confessed that these old soldiers of the Empire had a diabolical talent for stratagem! Who would ever have imagined such a stroke!

On seeing this, the remnant of the landwehr disbanded on the great white plain like a whirlwind of sparrows. Those who had not had time to put on their shoes did not mind the stones or briers or thorns of the Fiquet bottom; they ran like stags, the stoutest as fast as the rest.

Our soldiers followed them as skirmishers, stopping not a second except to make ready and fire. All the ground in front, up to the old beech in the middle of the meadow of Quatre-Vents, was covered with their bodies.

Their colonel, a burgomaster doubtless, galloped before them on horseback, his shirt flying out behind him.

If the Baden soldiers, quartered in the village, had not come to their a.s.sistance, they would all have been exterminated. But two battalions of Baden men being deployed at the right of Quatre-Vents, our trumpets sounded the recall, and the four companies formed in the alley _des Dames_ to await them.

The Baden soldiers then halted, and the last of the Wurtemburgers pa.s.sed behind them, glad to escape from such a terrible destruction.

They could well say: "I know what war is--I have seen it at the worst!"

It was now seven o'clock--the whole city was on the ramparts. Soon a thick smoke rose above the tile-kiln and the surrounding buildings; some sappers had gone out with f.a.gots and set it on fire. It was all burned to cinders; nothing remained but a great black s.p.a.ce, and some rubbish behind the poplars.

Our four companies, seeing that the Baden soldiers did not mean to attack them, returned quietly, the trumpeter leading.

Long before this, I had gone down to the square, near the German gate, to meet our troops as they came back. It was one of the sights which I shall never forget; the post under arms, the veterans hanging by the chains of the lowered drawbridge; the men, women, and children pushing in the street; and outside, on the ramparts, the trumpets sounding, and answered from the distance by the echoes of the bastions and half-moon; the wounded, who, pale, tattered, covered with blood, came in first, supported on the shoulders of their comrades; Lieutenant Schnindret, in one of the tile-kiln armchairs, his face covered with sweat, with a bullet in his abdomen, shouting with thick voice and extended hand, "_Vive l'Empereur!_"; the soldiers who threw the Wurtemburg commander from his litter to put one of our own in it; the drums under the gate beating the march, while the troops, with arms at will, and bread and all kinds of provisions stuck on their bayonets, entered proudly in the midst of the shouts: "_Hurra for the Sixth Light Infantry!_" These are things which only old people can boast of having seen!

Ah, Fritz, men are not what they once were! In my time, foreigners paid the cost of war. The Emperor Napoleon had that virtue; he ruined not France, but his enemies. Nowadays we pay for our own glory.

And, in those times, the soldiers brought back booty, sacks, epaulettes, cloaks, officers' sashes, watches, etc., etc.! They remembered that General Bonaparte had said to them in 1796: "You need clothes and shoes; the Republic owes you much, she can give you nothing. I am going to lead you into the richest country in the world; there you will find honors, glory, riches!" In fine, I saw at once that we were going to sell gla.s.ses of wine at a great rate.

As the sergeant pa.s.sed I called to him from the distance, "Sergeant!"

He saw me in the crowd, and we shook hands joyfully. "All right, Father Moses! All right!" he said.

Everybody laughed.

Then, without waiting for the end of the procession, I ran to the market to open my shop.

Little Safel had also understood that we were going to have a profitable day, for, in the midst of the crowd, he had come and pulled my coat-tails, and said, "I have the key of the market; I have it; let us make haste! Let us try to get there before Frichard!"

Whatever natural wit a child may have, it shows itself at once; it is truly a gift of G.o.d.

So we ran to the shop. I opened my windows, and Safel remained while I went home to eat a morsel, and get a good quant.i.ty of sous and small change.

Sorle and Zeffen were at their counter selling small gla.s.sfuls.

Everything went well as usual. But a quarter of an hour later, when the soldiers had broken ranks and put back their muskets in their places at the barracks, the crowd at my shop in the market, of people wishing to sell me coats, sacks, watches, pistols, cloaks, epaulettes, etc., was so great that without Safel's help I never could have got out of it.

I got all these things for almost nothing. Men of this sort never trouble themselves about to-morrow; their only thought was to live well from one day to another, to have tobacco, brandy, and the other good things which are never wanting in a garrisoned town.

That day, in six hours' time, I refurnished my shop with coats, cloaks, pantaloons, and thick boots of genuine German leather, of the first quality, and I bought things of all sorts--nearly fifteen hundred pounds' worth--which I afterward sold for six or seven times more than they cost me. All those landwehr were well-to-do, and even rich citizens, with good, substantial clothes.

The soldiers, too, sold me a good many watches, which Goulden the old watchmaker did not want, because they were taken from the dead.

But what gave me more pleasure than all the rest, was that Frichard, who was sick for three or four days, could not come and open his shop.

It makes me laugh now to think of it. It gave the rascal that green jaundice which never left him as long as he lived.

At noon Safel went to fetch our dinner in a basket; we ate under the shed so as not to lose custom, and could not leave for a minute till night. Scarcely had one set gone, before two and often three others came at once.

I was sinking with fatigue, and so was Safel; nothing but our love of trade sustained us.

Another pleasant thing which I recall is that, on going home a few minutes before seven, we saw at a distance that our other shop was full. My wife and daughter had not been able to close it; they had raised the price, and the soldiers did not even notice it,--it seemed all right to them; so that not only the French money which I had just given them, but also Wurtemburg florins came to my pocket.

Two trades which help each other along are an excellent thing, Fritz: remember that! Without my brandies I should not have had the money to buy so many goods, and without the market where I gave ready money for the booty, the soldiers would not have had wherewith to buy my brandy.