The sandy waste between the fort and the mainland had miraculously become alive with quickly moving figures, groups of people running towards the fort in the greatest disorder. René could hardly believe his eyes. Children, women, old men, cattle, carts laden with household goods, on they came, a confused horde streaming down the top of the peninsula like affrighted locusts. It was only too clear what had happened—the Chouans, left without support, had been driven from their untenable positions, and were even now falling back on Quiberon, while before them poured the panic-struck inhabitants of the villages round, terrified at the prospect of being left at the mercy of the victorious Blues. As they came nearer, it was obvious that there were flying Chouans also in that advancing flood.
"Good God!" exclaimed the Comte de Contades, Puisaye's chief of staff, hurrying past, "they will take us by assault! There are only fifty men on guard. M. d'Hervilly must be informed at once!"
René watched, horrified and fascinated, from the embrasure. As yet there was no sign of an enemy—only this panting multitude full of one desire, to find safety. And soon some of the younger and more agile fugitives were swarming unchecked over the palisades of the newly erected entrenchments, clambering up the counterscarps of the fort itself. They clung weeping round the legs of the officers whom they encountered, having completely lost their heads; and in the midst of the confusion arrived the Comte d'Hervilly, who seemed as completely to have lost his. At any rate he was in his usual state of ineffective irritation.
"In God's name, get rid of all these people!" de Flavigny heard him cry, striking out right and left. But thousands of terrified fugitives were not so easily to be disposed of, especially when all the passages were blocked up by the carts which they had brought with them. And on d'Hervilly's sending for the régiment du Dresnay to come in haste and turn them out, he learnt that his command could not be at once obeyed, since the regiment was dispersed securing provisions. The mixture of calamity and farce reached its climax when some of the invading fugitives cried out, "There are the Blues!" on which all who possessed muskets instantly fired them off in every direction, to the no small danger of everybody else. In fact, the Comte de Vauban, an officer of high rank, who was at the bottom of the revetments at the moment, had only just time to save himself by throwing himself off his horse.
At last appeared, marching in good order, the Chouans of Tinténiac and Cadoudal, who had not broken, then their rearguard, and finally, a good distance behind, a hundred or so of Republican sharpshooters. A salvo from the fort dispersed these latter, and mingled with its echoes came the sound of the drums of du Dresnay, arriving to bring some order into this scene of confusion. And thus, at last, the crowd of fugitives was expelled, and driven down towards the southern extremity of the peninsula.
During all this affair the Comte de Puisaye sat very composedly at his dinner.
When René de Flavigny was able to get free of the fort, thus carried by its own defenders, he went anxiously in search of his friend among the Chouan troops. He found him, but too busy to do more than exchange a word with him.
"Hoche attacked all along our line with about thirteen thousand men," said La Vireville, wiping the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. "Ouf, what an infernal day for a retreat! Well, I am afraid we have brought you no welcome present in all these useless mouths!"
"Why, oh why, were we not allowed to come to your support!" cried the Marquis.