"I come," said he; "Dea, behold, I come!"

  One step more; there was no bulwark; the void was before him; he strode into it. He fell. The night was thick and dull, the water deep. It swallowed him up. He disappeared calmly and silently. None saw nor heard him. The ship sailed on, and the river flowed.

  Shortly afterwards the ship reached the sea.

  When Ursus returned to consciousness, he found that Gwynplaine was no longer with him, and he saw Homo by the edge of the deck baying in the shadow and looking down upon the water.

  THE END.

  NINETY-THREE

  CONTENTS

  PART FIRST.—AT SEA.

  BOOK FIRST.—THE WOODS OF LA SAUDRAIE.

  BOOK SECOND.— THE CORVETTE "CLAYMORE."

  CHAPTER I.

  ENGLAND AND FRANCE.

  CHAPTER II.

  A NIGHT ON SHIPBOARD, AND CONCERNING THE PASSENGER.

  CHAPTER III.

  NOBLE AND PLEBEIAN IN ALLIANCE.

  CHAPTER IV.

  TORMENTUM BELLI.

  CHAPTER V.

  VIS ET VIR.

  CHAPTER VI.

  THE TWO SCALES OF THE BALANCE.

  CHAPTER VII.

  A VOYAGE IS A LOTTERY.

  CHAPTER VIII.

  9—380.

  CHAPTER IX.

  SOME ONE ESCAPES.

  CHAPTER X.

  DOES HE ESCAPE?

  BOOK THIRD.— HALMALO.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE PERSUASIVE POWER OF HUMAN SPEECH.

  CHAPTER II.

  A PEASANT'S MEMORY IS WORTH A CAPTAIN'S KNOWLEDGE

  BOOK FOURTH.— TELLMARCH.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE TOP OF THE DUNE.

  CHAPTER II.

  AURES HABET ET NON AUDIET.

  CHAPTER III.

  THE ADVANTAGE OF LARGE LETTERS.

  CHAPTER IV.

  THE CAIMAND.

  CHAPTER V.

  SIGNED "GAUVAIN."

  CHAPTER VI.

  THE SUDDEN CHANGES OF CIVIL WAR.

  CHAPTER VII.

  NO MERCY: THE WATCHWORD OF THE COMMUNE. NO QUARTER: THE WATCHWORD OF THE PRINCES.

  PART SECOND— IN PARIS.

  BOOK FIRST.—CIMOURDAIN.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE STREETS OF PARIS AT THIS PERIOD.

  CHAPTER II.

  CIMOURDAIN.

  CHAPTER III.

  A HEEL NOT DIPPED IN THE STYX.

  BOOK SECOND.—THE PUBLIC HOUSE OF THE RUE DU PAON.

  CHAPTER I.

  MINOS, ÆACUS, AND RHADAMANTHUS.

  CHAPTER II.

  MAGNA TESTANTUR VOCE PER UMBRAS.

  CHAPTER III.

  THE THRILL OF HIDDEN CHORDS.

  BOOK THIRD.—THE CONVENTION.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE CONVENTION.

  CHAPTER II.

  MARAT IN THE LOBBY.

  PART THIRD.— IN VENDEE.

  BOOK FIRST.—LA VENDEE.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE FORESTS.

  CHAPTER II.

  THE MEN.

  CHAPTER III.

  MEN AND FORESTS IN CONNIVANCE.

  CHAPTER IV.

  THEIR LIFE UNDERGROUND.

  CHAPTER V.

  THEIR LIFE IN TIME OF WAR.

  CHAPTER VI.

  THE SOUL OF THE EARTH ABSORBED BY MEN.

  CHAPTER VII.

  LA VENDÉE WAS THE END OF BRITTANY.

  BOOK SECOND.—THE THREE CHILDREN.

  CHAPTER I.

  PLUS QUAM CIVILIA BELLA.

  CHAPTER II.

  DOL.

  CHAPTER III.

  SMALL ARMIES AND GREAT BATTLES.

  CHAPTER IV.

  IT IS THE SECOND TIME.

  CHAPTER V.

  THE DROP OF COLD WATER.

  CHAPTER VI.

  HEALED BREAST, A BLEEDING HEART.

  CHAPTER VII.

  THE TWO POLES OF TRUTH.

  CHAPTER VIII.

  DOLOROSA.

  CHAPTER IX.

  A PROVINCIAL BASTILLE.

  CHAPTER X.

  THE HOSTAGES.

  CHAPTER XI.

  TERRIBLE AS IN ANCIENT DAYS.

  CHAPTER XII.

  A SCHEME FOR ESCAPE.

  CHAPTER XIII.

  WHAT THE MARQUIS DOES.

  CHAPTER XIV.

  WHAT L'IMANUS DOES.

  BOOK THIRD.—THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (I).

  CHAPTER II.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (II).

  CHAPTER III.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (III).

  CHAPTER IV.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (IV).

  CHAPTER V.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (V).

  CHAPTER VI.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (VI).

  CHAPTER VII.

  THE MASSACRE OF SAINT BARTHOLOMEW (VII).

  BOOK FOURTH.— THE MOTHER.

  CHAPTER I.

  DEATH PASSES BY.

  CHAPTER II.

  DEATH SPEAKS.

  CHAPTER III.

  MURMURINGS OF THE PEASANTS.

  CHAPTER IV.

  A MISTAKE.

  CHAPTER V.

  VOX OF DESSERTO.

  CHAPTER VI.

  THE SITUATION.

  CHAPTER VII.

  PRELIMINARIES.

  CHAPTER VIII.

  THE SUMMONS AND THE REPLY.

  CHAPTER IX.

  TITANS AGAINST GIANTS.

  CHAPTER X.

  RADOUB.

  CHAPTER XI.

  THE DESPERATE.

  CHAPTER XII.

  A DELIVERER.

  CHAPTER XIII.

  THE EXECUTIONER.

  CHAPTER XIV.

  L'IMANUS ALSO ESCAPES.

  CHAPTER XV.

  NEVER PUT A WATCH AND A KEY IN THE SAME POCKET.

  BOOK FIFTH—IN DÆMONE DEUS.

  CHAPTER I.

  FOUND BUT LOST.

  CHAPTER II.

  FROM THE STONE DOOR TO THE IRON DOOR.

  CHAPTER III.

  THE CHILDREN AWAKEN.

  BOOK SIXTH—THE BATTLE AFTER THE VICTORY.

  CHAPTER I.

  LANTENAC TAKEN.

  CHAPTER II.

  FREEDOM OR DEATH—WHICH?

  CHAPTER III.

  THE GENERAL'S CLOAK.

  BOOK SEVENTH.—FEUDALISM AND REVOLUTION.

  CHAPTER I.

  THE ANCESTOR.

  CHAPTER II.

  THE COURT-MARTIAL.

  CHAPTER III.

  THE VOTES.

  CHAPTER IV.

  AFTER CIMOURDAIN AS A JUDGE, CIMOURDAIN AS MASTER.

  CHAPTER V.

  THE DUNGEON.

  CHAPTER VI.

  NEVERTHELESS, THE SUN RISES.

  PART FIRST.—AT SEA.

  BOOK FIRST.—THE WOODS OF LA SAUDRAIE.

  During the last of May, 1793, one of the Parisian battalions led into Brittany by Santerre was scouring the terrible woods of La Saudraie in Astillé. The battalion had only three hundred men left, for it had been decimated by the cruel war. It was at the time when after Argonne, Jemmapes, and Valmy, there remained of the first battalion of Paris, originally numbering six hundred volunteers, twenty-seven men; of the second battalion, thirty-three men; and of the third, fifty-seven. It was a time of epic conflicts.

  The battalions sent from Paris to La Vendeé numbered nine hundred and twelve men. Each battalion had three pieces of cannon. The troops had been quickly raised. On the twenty-fifth of April, Gohier being minister of justice, and Bouchotte minister of war, the section of the Bon Conseil, had proposed to send battalions of volunteers to La Vendée. Lubin, member of the commune, had made the report: the first of May, Santerre was ready to send out twelve thousand soldiers, thirty field-pieces and a battalion of gunners. These battalions organized hastily were so well organized, that they serve as models to-day; the companies of the line are made up on the principle governing them; the only change has been in the proportion between the number of soldiers and non-commissioned officers.

  On the twenty-eighth of April the commune of Paris gave this order to Santerre's volunteers: "No mercy, no quarter." At the end of May, of the twelve thousand Parisian troops, two-thirds were dead.

  The battalion engaged in the woods of La Saudraie was proceeding cautiously. They took their time. They looked to the right and to the left, in front of them and behind them at the same time. Kléber has said: "The soldier has an eye in his back." They had been marching for hours. What time could it be? What part of the day was it? It would have been difficult to say, for there is always a sort of twilight in such wild thickets, and it is never light in these woods.

  The forest of La Saudraie was tragic. It was in these woods that the civil war began its crimes in the month of November, 1792. The ferocious cripple, Mousqueton, had come out of these gloomy depths; the number of murders committed there made one's hair stand on end. There was no place more frightful. The soldiers penetrated there cautiously. Everywhere was abundance of flowers; one was surrounded with a trembling wall of branches, from which hung the charming freshness of the foliage; sunbeams here and there made their way through the green shade; on the ground the gladiolus, the yellow swamp flag, the meadow narcissus, the gênotte, the herald of fine weather, and the spring crocus formed the embroidery and decoration of a thick carpet of vegetation, luxuriant in every kind of moss, from that resembling velvet, to that like stars. The soldiers advanced step by step in silence, noiselessly pushing aside the underbrush. The birds warbled above their bayonets.

  La Saudraie was one of those thickets where formerly in times of peace they used to hold the Houicheba,—hunting birds at night; now they were hunting men there.

  The wood was full of birch trees, beeches, and oaks; the ground flat; the moss and thick grass deadened the sound of the marching men; every path lost itself abruptly among the holly, wild sloe, ferns, hedges of rest-harrow, tall briers; it was impossible to see a man ten feet away.

  Occasionally, a heron or a waterfowl passed through the branches, showing that there were swamps near by.

  They marched on. They went at haphazard, full of anxiety, and fearing to find what they they sought. From time to time they came across traces of encampments, burnt places, trodden-down grass, sticks in the form of a cross, bloody branches. There soup had been made, there mass had been said, there wounds had been dressed. But those who had passed this way had disappeared. Where were they? Far away, perhaps. Perhaps close by, concealed, gun in hand. The woods seemed deserted. The battalion redoubled its precaution. Solitude and suspicion. There was nobody to be seen; the more reason for fearing somebody. They had to do with a forest of ill-repute. An ambuscade was probable.

  Thirty grenadiers, detached as scouts and commanded by a sergeant, were marching in advance at a considerable distance from the main body of the troop. The vivandière of the battalion accompanied them. The vivandières join the vanguards from choice. They run a risk, but they expect to see something. Curiosity is one form of feminine bravery.

  Suddenly the soldiers in this little squad experienced that thrill familiar to huntsmen, which indicates that they have reached their prey. They had heard something like a whisper in the midst of a thicket, and it seemed that some one had just seen a movement among the leaves. The soldiers made signs to each other.

  In the sort of watch and search entrusted to scouts, the officers do not need to take part; whatever must be done is done of itself.

  In less than a minute, the spot where the movement had been seen was surrounded; a circle of pointed muskets enclosed it, the obscure centre of the thicket was aimed at from all sides at once, and the soldiers with fingers on the trigger and eyes on the suspected place, only waited for the sergeant's command to riddle it with bullets. The vivandière, however, ventured to look through the brambles, and at the instant when the sergeant was about to cry: "Fire!" this woman cried: "Halt!"

  And turning towards the soldiers: "Don't shoot, comrades!"

  She rushed headlong into the thicket. They followed her.

  There was, indeed, some one there.

  In the densest part of the thicket, on the edge of one of those little round clearings made in the woods by the charcoal furnaces in burning roots of trees, in a sort of recess among the branches, a kind of leafy chamber, half open like an alcove, a woman was sitting ou the moss, with an infant at the breast, and in her lap the blond heads of two sleeping children.

  This was the ambuscade.

  "What are you doing here?" cried the vivandière.

  The woman raised her head.

  The vivandière added fiercely,—

  "Are you mad to be here!"

  And she continued,—

  "A little more and you would have been killed!"

  And addressing the soldiers, she added,—

  "It is a woman."

  "By Jove, we see it is indeed!" said a grenadier.

  The vivandière continued,—

  "Come into the woods to be massacred! Did ever anybody imagine such stupidity as that?"

  The woman stupefied, frightened, petrified, saw all about her as in a dream; these guns, these sabres, these bayonets, these fierce faces.

  The two children woke up and began to cry.

  "I'm hungry," said one.

  "I'm afraid," said the other.

  The little one went on nursing.

  The vivandière spoke to it.

  "You are quite right," she said.

  The mother was dumb with fright.

  The sergeant cried out to her,—

  "Don't be afraid, we are the battalion of the Bonnet-Rouge.

  The woman trembled from head to foot. She looked at the sergeant, whose rough face showed only his eyebrows, his moustache, and two coals which were his two eyes.

  "Formerly the battalion of the Croix-Rouge, added the vivandière.

  And the sergeant continued,—

  "Who are you, madame?" The woman looked at him, terrified. She was thin, young, pale, and in rags; she wore the large hood of the Breton peasant, and the woollen cloak fastened at the neck with a string. She let her bare breast be seen with utter indifference. Her feet without stockings or shoes were bleeding.

  "She is poor," said the sergeant.

  And the vivandière in her soldierly and feminine voice, tenderly withal, resumed,—

  "What is your name?"

  The woman stammered almost indistinctly,—

  "Michelle Fléchard."

  Meanwhile the vivandière caressed the little head of the nursing child with her large hand.

  "How old is this baby?" she asked.

  The mother did not understand. The vivandière persisted.

  "I asked you the age of the child."

  "Ah!" said the mother, "eighteen months."

  "It is too old," said the vivandière. "It ought not to nurse any longer. You must wean it. We will give it some soup."

  The mother began to grow calmer. The two little ones which had awakened were more curious than frightened. They admired the plumes.

  "Ah!" said the mother, "they are very hungry."

  And she added: "I have no more milk."

  "They shall have something to eat," cried the sergeant, "and you too. But that is not all. What are your political opinions?"

  The woman looked at the sergeant, but gave no answer.

  "Did you hear my question?"

  She stammered: "I was placed in a convent when very young, but I am married, I am not a nun. The sisters taught me to speak French. The village was set on fire. We escaped in such haste that I did not have time to put on my shoes."

  "I ask what are your political opinions?"

  "I don't know."

  The sergeant continued,—

  "There are spies about. If caught, spies are shot. You see. Speak. You are not a gypsy. What is your country?"

  She still looked at him, evidently without understanding.

  The sergeant asked once more: "What is your country? "

  "I do not know," she said.

  "What, you don't know your own country."

  "Ah! my country, yes, indeed."

  "Well, what is your country?"

  The woman answered: " It is the farm of Siscoignard, in the parish of Azé."

  It was the sergeant's turn to be amazed. He remained lost in thought for a moment, then replied,—

  "What did you say?"

  "Siscoignard."

  "But that is not a country."

  "It is my country."

  And, after a moment of reflection, the woman added,—"I understand, sir. You are from France. I am from Brittany."

  "Well?"

  "It is not the same country."

  "But it is the same fatherland!" exclaimed the sergeant.

  The woman merely replied,—

  "I am from Siscoignard!"

  "Have it Siscoignard, then," replied the sergeant.

  "Does your family belong there?"

  "Yes."

  "What do they do?"

  "They are all dead. I have no relatives now."

  The sergeant, who was clever with his tongue, continued to question her.

  "People have parents, you devil, or have had them! Who are you? Speak!"

  The woman heard in amazement this ou on en a eu, which sounded more like the cry of a wild-beast than human speech.

  The vivandière felt the need of coming to her aid. She renewed her caresses to the nursing child, and patted the cheeks of the other two.

  "What do you call the baby? " she asked; "I see it is a girl,"

  The mother answered: "Georgette."

  "And the oldest? he is a man, the scamp."

  "René-Jean."

  "And the younger one? He is a man, too, and a chubby-faced fellow besides."