"Those years will pass for you, brother, as a day—sweetened by the tenderness of your wife, by the love of your children, by the fulfilment of your civic duties."
Then, just as a lamp before its dying flicker casts still some bright beams, the young woman rose to a sitting position. Her great black eyes shone radiantly from within; her voice, erstwhile choked and gasping, became sonorous and full; her beautiful features glowed with enthusiasm; she exclaimed:
"Ah, brother, I feel it—my spirit is shaking off my present body, in order to inhabit a new envelope beyond. The future unrolls before me—
"Hail to that beautiful day predicted by Victoria the Great! Hail! Radiant is its dawn! I see shattered irons, crumbled Bastilles, thrones and altars in dust, and crowning the ruins of the old world a scaffold, the reckoning of Kings! Hail, holy scaffold, symbol of popular justice! O, Republic! Radiant is your birthday! Glorious your sun rises over Europe! Your star, full-orbed, O Republic, pours its torrents of light upon a regenerate world! It buds—It flowers—It bursts into bloom—It sheds in peace its treasures, its riches, its glories, its wonders, amid the joy of its children, free and equal, freed forever from the double yoke of Church and Misery—and united forever by the brotherly solidarity of the confederated peoples—"
The witnesses of the scene, carried away by Victoria's words, deceived by the clearness of her glance and the superexcitation of which she was capable in a supreme burst of energy, forgot that the young woman was dying. Her eyes half-closed, her countenance ashy pale and bathed in an icy sweat, Victoria fell back in her brother's arms; after a moment's agony she passed out of this life to live again in those worlds whither we shall all go.
CHAPTER XXXI.
ONRUSH OF THE REVOLUTION.
The army was to move at break of day. Before dawn John Lebrenn and Castillon dug Victoria's grave on the heights of Geisberg. Thither she was carried on a funeral litter borne by Captain Martin, Castillon, Duchemin and Oliver. John Lebrenn, leaning because of his wounded knee upon the arm of the young volunteer Duresnel, followed his sister's bier in deep grief. It was snowing, and Victoria's last resting place soon disappeared beneath the white blanket that fell upon the heights as the army marched from its bivouac to advance upon Weissenburg, which might still be defended by the Austrian army. But the Austrians left their trenches during the night; they evacuated Weissenburg; the hordes of the monarchs fled before the legions of the Republic.
Oliver was made under-lieutenant in the Third Hussars. Captain Martin was elected commander of the battalion of Paris Volunteers, succeeding the former commander, who was killed in the siege of Geisberg. The standard captured from the Gerolstein Cuirassiers was carried to General Hoche by John Lebrenn, who received from the hands of the young general, in honor and memory of the glorious defense, a sword taken from the enemy on that day.
On the 10th Nivose, General Donadieu, denounced before the revolutionary tribunal, and convicted of treason, was condemned to death, a penalty which he paid on the scaffold.
Hoche's victory, of the Lines of Weissenburg, decided the success of the whole campaign. On the 12th Nivose the Convention, upon motion of Barrere, rendered this decree: