Cambray will not surrender! She believes in her defender and her saviour!—in his words that France will presently come with invincible might and powerful armies, when all her sufferings will be turned to relief and to joy. And every evening when lights are put out and darkness settles down upon the stricken city, wrapping under her beneficent mantle all the misery, the terrors and the heroism, men and women lay themselves down to their broken rest with a last murmur of hope, a last invocation to God for the return of the hero in whom lies their trust.
V
And in the Town Hall the city fathers sit in Council, with Messire de Balagny there, and Monseigneur d'Inchy presiding. They, too, appear grimly resolved to endure and to hold out; the fire of patriotism and of enthusiasm burns in their hearts, as it does in the heart of every burgher, noble or churl in the city. But, side by side with enthusiasm, stalks the grim shadow of prescience—knowledge of the resources which go, diminishing bit by bit, until the inevitable hour when hands and mouths will still be stretched out for food and there will be nothing left to give.
Even now, it is less than bare subsistence which can be doled out day by day; and in more than one face assembled this day around the Council Board, there is limned the grim line of nascent despair.
It is only d'Inchy who has not lost one particle of his faith, one particle of self-confidence and of belief in ultimate triumph.
'If ye begin to doubt,' he exclaims with tragic directness, 'how will ye infuse trust in the hearts of your people?'
The Chief Magistrate shakes his head; the Provosts are silent. More than one man wipes a surreptitious tear.
'We must give the people something to hearten them,' has been the persistent call from those in authority.
De Balagny interposes:
'Our spies have succeeded in evading the Spanish lines more than once. One of them returned yesterday from La Fère. He says the Duc d'Anjou is wellnigh ready. The next month should see the end of our miseries.'