'Instantly,' roared the Frenchman, whose passion was now boiling over.
'In that case, gentlemen, take charge of the team.' So saying, he handed the reins to the passive gendarmes, who took them, without well knowing why. 'I have only a piece of advice,' continued Phil, as he slowly descended the side—'keep a steady hand on the near-side leader, and don't let the bar strike her; and now, good-bye.'
He flourished his four-in-hand whip as he spoke, and with one tremendous cut came down on the team, from leader to wheeler, accompanying the stroke with a yell there was no mistaking. The heavy carriage bounded from the earth as the infuriated cattle broke away at full gallop. A narrow street and a sharp angle lay straight in front; but few of those on the drag waited for the turn, as at every step some bearskin shako shot into the air, followed by a tall figure, whose heavy boots seemed ill-adapted for flying in. The corporal himself had abandoned the reins, and held on manfully by the rail of the box. On every side they fell, in every attitude of distress. But already the leaders had reached the corner; round went the swingle-bars, the wheelers followed, the coach rocked to one side, sprang clean off the pavement, came down with a crash, and then fell right over, while the maddened horses, breaking away, dashed through the town, the harness in fragments behind them, and the pavement flying at every step.
The immediate consequences of this affair were some severe bruises, and no small discouragement to the gendarmerie of St. Omer; the remoter ones, an appeal from the municipal authorities to the Commander-in-chief, by whom the matter was referred for examination to the Adjutant-General. O'Grady was accordingly summoned to Paris to explain, if he could, his conduct in the matter. The order for his appearance there came down at once, and I, having nothing to detain me at St. Omer, resolved to accompany my friend for a few days at least, before I returned to England. Our arrangements were easily made; and the same night we received the Adjutant-General's letter we started by post for Paris.
CHAPTER LVI. ST. DENIS
We were both suddenly awakened from a sound sleep in the calèche by the loud cracking of the postillion's whip, the sounds of street noises, and the increased rattle of the wheels over the unequal pavement. We started up just as, turning round in his saddle and pointing with his long whip to either side of him, the fellow called out—
'Paris, Messieurs, Paris! This is Faubourg St. Denis; there before you lies the Rue St. Denis. Sacristi! the streets are as crowded as at noonday.'
By this time we had rubbed the sleep from our eyelids and looked about us, and truly the scene before us was one to excite all our astonishment. The Quartier St. Denis was then in the occupation of the Austrian troops, who were not only billeted in the houses, but bivouacked in the open streets—their horses picketed in long files along the pavé, the men asleep around their watch-fires, or burnishing arms and accoutrements beside them. The white-clad cuirassier from the Danube, the active and sinewy Hungarian, the tall and swarthy Croat were all there, mixed up among groups of peasant girls coming in to market with fowls and eggs. Carts of forage and waggons full of all manner of provisions were surrounded by groups of soldiers and country-people, trading amicably with one another as though the circumstances which had brought them together were among the ordinary events of commerce.
Threading our way slowly through these, we came upon the Jager encampment, their dark-green uniform and brown carbines giving that air of sombre to their appearance so striking after the steel-clad cuirassier and the bright helmets of the dragoons. Farther on, around a fountain, were a body of dismounted dragoons, their tall colbacks and scarlet trousers bespeaking them Polish lancers; their small but beautifully formed white horses pawed the ground, and splashed the water round them, till the dust and foam rose high above them. But the strangest of all were the tall, gigantic figures, who, stretched alongside of their horses, slept in the very middle of the wide street. Lifting their heads lazily for a moment, they gazed on us as we passed, and then lay down again to sleep. Their red beards hung in masses far down upon their breasts, and their loose trousers of a reddish dye but half concealed boots of undressed skin. Their tall lances were piled around them; but these were not wanting to prove that the savage, fierce-looking figures before us were the Cossacks of the Don, thus come for many a hundred mile to avenge the slaughter of Borodino and the burning of Moscow. As we penetrated farther into the city, the mixture of nation and costume became still more remarkable. The erect and soldierlike figure of the Prussian; the loose, wild-eyed Tartar; the brown-clad Russian, with russet beard and curved sabre; the stalwart Highlander, with nodding plume and waving tartan; the Bashkir, with naked scimitar; the gorgeous hussar of Hungary; the tall and manly form of the English guardsman—all passed and repassed before us, adding, by the babel of discordant sound, to the wild confusion of the scene.