The troops entered with bayonets set, flags flying, bands playing, and all the pomp and circumstance which are usual on such occasions, and the air resounded with a storm of military music. It was noteworthy, indeed, to see that host pass by, consisting of 130,000 as fine-looking men as any country in the world could produce; and what was most astonishing about them was the neatness and cleanliness of their dress, the brightness of their arms and accoutrements, and their general well-dressed appearance, reminding me more of our handful of soldiers at home, as they marched past the Lord Lieutenant in the Phœnix Park on a field day, than of an army that had been fighting all the past week, and had endured the privations and hardships of a six months' campaign.
The sun shone through the frosty air, and, as the mist had now cleared off, the helmets and bayonets of that mighty array flashed and glistened everywhere. While these sturdy, well-built and well-fed fellows passed on, I compared them mentally with the regiments I had seen straggling onward to the bridge. The difference spoke eloquently in favour of that elaborate and admirable scheme of military organisation which had brought them to such a degree of perfection. It also elicited from a British officer who was with me at the time, a remark that, unless we ourselves take up some more comprehensive system of organising our forces, we shall be thrashed by this ambitious race of soldiers the first time we come into conflict with them. Nay, more, it is possible that they might invade and overrun England in a short campaign, should they ever become as great adepts in the art of war on the high seas as they are on land.
Many of the German officers whom I have met were of opinion that such an enterprise was not beyond the scope of German ambition and German energy. More than once I heard them anticipating that the result of their victorious career would be to bring all the nations of Europe under the wing of their Imperial eagle. And though willing to allow that England would be the last to come in, since without a mighty fleet they could not get at her, yet she too must share the fate of her neighbours. It amused,—perhaps it angered us,—to find these highly intellectual men of the world holding such views, gravely arguing among themselves and with us, that such would be the inevitable result of a united Germany, and that all she wanted to annex Europe, and carry out the ideas of Alexander the First of Russia, was a little time, and a favourable opportunity.
The army of Prince Frederick Charles, now marching through Orleans, was on its road to Blois, and in pursuit of General Chanzy. Turning from this splendid sight, I went back to St. Euverte; and there spent the remainder of that day—and a long day it was—in assisting at the operation-table, and dressing and attending to the wounded who were brought to us in crowds. As we had only accommodation for 250, we were obliged to send out into the houses of the Rue de St. Aignan all who were not seriously wounded; after which we still found it necessary to lay a number of those who were gravely wounded on the floor, with straw under them. These latter were not at all so badly off, when we consider that some half score waggon-loads of men had to remain out in the frost and snow for a whole night and part of the next day, so greatly did the demand exceed the supply of accommodation in Orleans just then. To add to their misfortune—and I am speaking literally of hundreds,—there followed a great scarcity of bread, which was felt chiefly by the civil population, and by those quartered on them. It did not affect the garrison in the least; for their commissariat never failed.
An army entering thus, devours, like a swarm of locusts, in a few hours everything that is eatable in a town, and leaves the inhabitants nothing but what they can supply from their secret stores—which, however, they always manage to reserve. The condition of chronic hunger, from which the inhabitants of Orleans suffered for several weeks at this period, was truly distressing to witness.
By noon on the 6th of December, all was quiet again, the garrison had been billeted in their quarters, the sentries were at their accustomed posts, and everything in Orleans betokened the return of the old orderly régime, to which we had been so long accustomed. There was an entire absence of that wild disorder, and noisy confusion, which had lasted, not for hours but for days, after the French took possession of the town, and which I have endeavoured to describe, but have not adequately depicted in the words at my command. And thus began the second German occupation of Orleans.
CHAPTER XXIV.
DESECRATION OF THE CATHEDRAL.—MY FIRST CAPITAL
OPERATION.—MORE FIGHTING.—WOUNDED BAVARIANS.
Soon after the mayor had issued his parlementaire, all the French prisoners, to the number, as I have said, of 10,000, were marched into the Cathedral, where they were confined until such time as preparations could be made for their transport into Germany.