"My sons," said Joel to us, looking towards the bay of Morbihan, "your brother Albinik advances to the fight on the water as we begin the fight on land. See—our fleet has met the Roman galleys."
Mikael and I looked in the direction the brenn was pointing, and saw our ships with their heavy leathern sails, bent on iron chains, grappling with the galleys. The brenn spoke true. The battle was joined on land and sea simultaneously. On that double combat depended the freedom or slavery of Gaul. But as I turned my attention from the two fleets back to our own army, I was struck to the heart with a sinister omen. The Gallic troops, ordinarily such chatterers, so gay in the hour of battle that from their ranks rise continually playful provocations to the enemy, or jests upon the dangers of war, were now sober and silent, resolved to win or die.
The signal for battle was given. The cymbals of the bards spoke back to the Roman clarions. The Chief of the Hundred Valleys, dismounting from his horse, put himself some paces ahead of the line of battle. Several druids and bards took up their station on either side of him. He brandished his sword and started on a run down the steep hill-side. The druids and bards kept even pace with him, striking as they went upon their golden harps. At that signal, our whole army precipitated itself upon the enemy, who, now across the river, were re-forming their cohorts.
The Mahrek-Ha-Droad, cavalry and footmen, of the tribes near that of Karnak, which my father commanded, darted down the slope with the rest of the army. Mikael, holding his axe in his right hand, was, during this impetuous descent, almost continually suspended from the mane of my horse, which he had seized with his left. At the foot of the slope, that troop of the Romans called the Iron Legion, because of their heavy armor, formed in a wedge. Immovable as a wall of steel, bristling with spears, it made ready to receive our charge on the points of its lances. I carried, in common with all the Gallic horsemen, a saber at my left side, an axe at my right, and in my hand a heavy staff capped with iron. For helmet I had a bonnet of fur, for breastplate a jacket of boar-hide, and strips of leather were wrapped around my legs where the breeches did not cover them. Mikael was armed with a tipped staff and a saber, and carried a light shield on his left arm.
"Leap on the crupper!" I cried to my brother at the moment when the horses, now no longer under control, arrived at full gallop on the lances of the Iron Legion. Immediately we arrived within range we hurled our iron capped staffs full at the heads of the Romans with all our might. My staff struck hard and square on the helmet of a legionary, who, falling backward, dragged down with him the soldier behind. Through this gap my horse plunged into the thickest of the legion. Others followed me. In the melee the fight grew sharp. Mikael, always at my side, leaped sometimes, in order to deliver a blow from a greater height, to my horse's crupper, other times he made of the animal a rampart. He fought valorously. Once I was half unhorsed. Mikael protected me with his weapon till I regained my seat. The other foot-soldiers of the Mahrek-Ha-Droad fought in the same manner, each one beside his own horseman.
"Brother, you are wounded," I said to Mikael. "See, your blouse is red."
"You too, brother," he responded. "Look at your bloody breeches."
And, in truth, in the heat of combat, we do not feel these wounds.
My father, chief of the Mahrek-Ha-Droad, was not accompanied by a foot-soldier. Twice we joined him in the midst of the fight. His arm, strong for all his age, struck incessantly. His heavy axe resounded on the iron armors like a hammer on the anvil. His stallion Tom-Bras bit furiously all the Romans within reach. One of them he almost lifted off the ground in his rearing. He held the man by the nape of the neck, and the blood was spurting. When the tide of the combat again carried Mikael and myself near our father, he was wounded. I overcame one of the brenn's assailants by trampling him under my horse's feet; then we were again separated from my father. Mikael and myself knew nothing of the other movements of the battle. Engaged in the conflict before us, we had no other thought than to tumble the Iron Legion into the river. To that end we struggled hard. Already our horses were stumbling over corpses as if in a quagmire. We heard, not far off, the piercing voices of the bards; their voices were heard over the tumult.
"Victory to Gaul!—Liberty! Liberty! Another blow with the axe! Another effort! Strike, strike, ye Gauls.—And the Roman is vanquished.—And Gaul delivered. Liberty! Liberty! Strike the Roman hard! Strike harder!—Strike, ye Gauls!"