"You have bugles, colonel?"
"Yes, sir. There is one to each company."
"Let them all come to the front and play the Assembly, as they march on.
"Now, will you ride at their head by my side, sir? Dismount one of my orderlies, and take his horse."
By the time all the preparations were completed, they had been joined by nearly two hundred more men. Just before they started, Terence said:
"Would it not be well, general, if I were to tell off a dozen parties of twenty men, each under the command of a steady non-commissioned officer, to enter the houses on each side of the road as we go along, and to clear out any soldiers they may find there?"
"Certainly. But I think that when they see the regiment marching along, and hear the bugles, they will clear out fast enough of their own accord."
With bugles blowing, the regiment started. Twenty men, with an officer, had been left behind at each of the houses they had defended; in case parties of marauders should arrive, and endeavour to obtain an entrance.
As they marched by, men appeared at the windows. Most of these were soldiers who, with an exclamation of alarm when they saw the general, followed by two battalions in perfect order, hastily ran down and made their escape by the backs of the houses; or came quietly out and, forming in some sort of order, accompanied the regiment. Several shots were heard behind, as the search parties cleared out those who had remained in the houses and, presently, the force entered the main square of the town and halted in its centre, the bugles still blowing the Assembly. Numbers of officers at once ran up, and many of the more sober soldiers.
"Form them up as they arrive," the general said to the officers.