"The Eagle of the regiment, messieurs," said old Lestoype solemnly, breaking the silence.
"Vive l'Empereur!" suddenly exclaimed a veteran port-aigle, or standard bearer, in a low but tense voice, and the mighty battle-cry swept softly through the room from man to man, in low notes, in broken whispers like a great wavering sigh from a multitude of throbbing hearts.
"Is it the same?" asked one as the sound died away.
"The very same," answered Lestoype. "It was given into my hands years ago. I had someone write down the Emperor's words then. I committed them to memory. I can hear him speak now."
"And what were those words we ask you, we, who are young in the regiment," broke out a youth who was yet a veteran of the German campaign of 1813.
"The Emperor, turning to Marshal Berthier, took the Eagle from him, he held it up thus in his own hands."
Lestoype turned to Marteau and suited the gesture to the word. He seized the Eagle and advanced a step and those who watched him so keenly noticed how he trembled. It was to him as if the Emperor were there again. Some mystic aura of his mighty presence seemed to overhang the uplifted Eagle.
"Gentlemen, we were paraded on the Champ de Mars with thousands of others. The Eagles had been marched along the line with the ruffles of drums and blare of bugles. It was raining like tonight, there was no sun, but never saw I a brighter day. The Emperor said:
"'Soldiers of the Fifth regiment of Infantry of the Line, I entrust to you the Eagle of France. It is to serve to you ever as your rallying point. You swear to me never to abandon it but with life? You swear never to suffer an affront to it for the honor of France? You swear ever to prefer death to dishonor for it? You swear?'"
As the words of the old officer died away, moved by a common impulse, the hands of the men before him went to their swords. With sweeping gestures they dragged them out of their sheaths, up into the air they heaved the shining blades.