The whole troop advanced in good order toward the outskirts of the wood, big Piercy of Soldatenthal at their head. Nearly at the same instant the Wer da? ("Who there?") of a sentinel was heard; then two shots; a loud cry of "Vive la France!" and the trampling of many feet in a charge. The brave mountaineers threw themselves like wolves on the enemy.
Divès stood up in his stirrups and watched them with great glee. "That is well," said he.
The mêlée was a terrible one; the ground trembled with it. The Germans were firing no more than the partisans: the affair was passing in silence; the clashing of bayonets and the sound of sabre-strokes, with here and there a rifle-shot, shouts of anger and a great tumult: except these, one could hear nothing else. The smugglers, with outstretched necks and sword in hand, sniffed the carnage and awaited the signal from their chief with impatience.
"Now, it is our turn," said Divès, at length. "The guns must be ours."
And out of the underwood they sprang, and their large cloaks flying behind them like wings, they dashed forward, bending in their saddles and pointing their swords.
"Never mind cutting! Run them through!" cried Divès once more.
That was all he said.
In a second, the twelve vultures were down upon the guns. Among their number were four old Spanish dragoons and two cuirassiers of the guard, whom a life of danger had attached to Marc: so I leave you to imagine how they fought. Blows from lever, rammer, and sabre, the only arms the gunners had to hand, rained upon them like hail; they parried them all, and every cut they made brought down a man.
Marc Divès received two pistol-shots, of which one singed his left cheek and the other carried away his hat. But, at the same time, bending over his saddle, his long arms stretched out, he transfixed the big officer with the fair mustaches to his gun; then raising himself deliberately, and gazing round him with a frown, said, in a sententious manner: "We have cleared out the rubbish! the guns are ours."
To get a good idea of this terrible scene, you must imagine the crowd on the plateau of Minières. The cries, the neighings of horses, the flight of some, who threw down their arms in order to run the faster, the desperation of others;—beyond the ravine, the ladders covered with white uniforms and bristling with bayonets; the mountaineers above the escarpment defending themselves with obstinacy; the hill-sides, the road, and, above all, the space outside the breastworks, encumbered with dead and wounded;—the great numbers of the enemy, their muskets over their shoulders and their officers in the midst of them, pressing forward into action; and, finally, Materne standing on the crest of the hill, his bayonet in the air, his mouth opened wide, shouting wildly to his son Frantz, who was advancing with his troop, Master Jean-Claude at their head, to aid the mountaineers. You should have heard the fusillade, the platoon and file firing, and, above all, the distant confused shouts, intermixed with sharp wails dying away among the mountain echoes. To gain a good idea of the scene, you should imagine all these as concentrated into one moment and surveyed with a rapid glance.