The Man-at-Arms; or, Henry De Cerons. Volumes I and II

by G. P. R. James

The troops that the Prince de Condé had thrown forward were met by the cavalry of Souline, Monsalis, and La Vallette, and driven back for some way at the point of the sword; but the famous Count de Montgomery and several other distinguished officers caused the cannon to be brought forward upon the height, and opened a sharp fire upon the duke's encampment. Each party was animated by the same courage and spirit; the troops on both sides were fighting under the eyes of their most celebrated leaders; and the advantages of the day remained so completely balanced, that if the admiral had come up in time, the camp of the duke must have been forced, and his army in all probability annihilated.

In the mean time, Martigue, at the head of three cornets of horse, had come out to reconnoitre my strength; but it luckily so happened that the small body of men which had been placed under my command in addition to my own troop, consisted principally of horse arquebusiers, and I contrived, by thinly lining the hedges with these soldiers dismounted, while I filled up the gaps with my cavalry, to make my force appear much larger than it really was. Martigue, who was an old and experienced soldier, at first seemed to entertain great suspicions of what was really the case, and advanced up the hill with a resolute face, as if he had been determined to dislodge me.

Although I had no chance in contending with him, I determined not to give way till I was forced; and, suffering him calmly to come completely within shot, I ordered the arquebusiers to fire and then spring upon their horses. This was done through the hedges with considerable effect, several of the shots telling in the midst of Martigue's own troop, and producing great confusion, while what seemed to them a body of fresh cavalry appeared behind the hedges, and decided their retreat. The shortness of the daylight at that period of the year favoured not a little the Duke of Anjou; for, or the arrival of the admiral, who had been led several miles out of his way, the day was found to be too near the close for any farther advantage to be gained.

Not a few difficulties and dangers, however, presented themselves to the Protestant army when it contemplated a retreat, and the prince determined to stop upon the ground he had occupied. Just as it was turning dark, this resolution was notified to me by an officer, who brought me also high praises from the prince, not for having fought well, but for having avoided fighting. His orders now were to retreat a little from the ground I occupied, to do my best to cover my right flank, and to send him instant notice in case of attack, making what head against the enemy I could, in order to give him time for preparation. He would have sent me more men, he said, but the position that both he and the admiral occupied was so hazardous that he could not spare any.

My retreat was easily effected; but, as I came down the hill, I was somewhat alarmed and surprised by seeing a large body of men moving up in the dusk across one of the wide open fields of that part of the country. In the dim twilight I could not distinguish anything farther than that there must be two or three thousand men, with what seemed to be artillery; and I was upon the point of sending off intelligence of the fact to the Prince de Condé, when the sound of some bells, such as they hang round the necks of the draught oxen, caught my ear, and made me comprehend at once what sort of apparition this was. It proved that a rascally guide, who had accompanied the attendants, camp followers, and others who were bringing up the baggage, had misled this important body also, and was guiding it direct into the midst of the Duke of Anjou's men. An immense booty it certainly would have been to the Catholics had I not fortunately met the mass of rabble horseboys, suttlers, bad men, bad women, and baggage wagons that were thus trooping on into the hands of the enemy. Approaching cautiously, that I might be quite sure I was right, I called out as soon as I had ascertained the fact, and commanded this great procession to halt. At the very first word, the guide, it seems, would have fled; but the leader of the party, who was a man of execution and an old soldier, had entertained suspicions for some time that all was not right, and, on the man's attempt to spur away, shot him through the head. As soon as some explanations had taken place between myself and the rest, a stratagem struck me, which I instantly proceeded to put in practice.

All the men who had just come up were very willing to put themselves under my command; and, returning up the hill till I came within sight of the lights of the enemy's camp, I formed an encampment there, defending it as well as I could with carts and wagons. I then collected together all the most likely varlets that I could find, put my own men in command over them, and arming them to the best of my power, prepared to defend that post in case of need, making sure that, for an hour or two at least, I could completely cover the right of the Prince de Condé. I despatched a messenger to him, however, to tell him what had occurred, and to say that, if he thought fit, when he and the admiral fired their cannon at nine o'clock, as was very customary, I would do the same, as there was an old dismounted culverine in one of the baggage-wagons, which would the more completely serve to impose upon the enemy.

On his return the messenger told me the prince laughed heartily; and, entering into the spirit of the thing at once, bade me follow out my plan according to my own proposal. It took some time, indeed, to get out the culverine, to place it in such a position that it could be fired without danger, and to draw out a nail which had been driven into the touchhole. This was all accomplished, however, before the hour appointed; and no sooner was the gun fired from the quarters of the Prince de Condé, than the admiral on one hill and I on the other shot off our ordnance, doubtless much to the surprise, and somewhat to the consternation, of the camp below.

Indeed, our position formed a scene altogether not a little striking and beautiful; and somewhat imposing and majestic it must have appeared to the enemy, who could see it all at once. I had gone forth to fire the culverine myself, fancying that, what between its antiquity and the quantity of powder with which it had been crammed, in order to make the report the louder, it might do what it did not, and burst under the operation. I then gazed, with feelings near akin to awe, along the range of the camp, and the immense numbers of fires lighted all along the lines to keep the people warm, blazing lightly over a great extent of the opposite hill, and sweeping quite down across the mouth of the valley where the Prince de Condé's division remained, till the illumination was taken up again by the people who were with me on those heights. There, too, at about the distance of three quarters of a mile, were the fires and lights of various kinds in the camp of the Duke of Anjou, while between that globe of flame and the semicircle of fire that surrounded it on our side, there remained a dark black ring, on which the struggle of the morning had been carried on, and in which nothing was now to be seen but a single lantern, or a torch wandering here and there, and seeking for the wounded or the dead.

As I stood and gazed, the murmur of merriment which was kept up by the varlets and the people of the little encampment behind me was carried away by the wind, which blew strong from the northeast, and borne upon its wings from the camp of the admiral came suddenly one of the Protestant psalms, sung by several thousands of voices at once, and sweeping mournfully but sweetly through the dark and solemn night. If I joined not in the melody, I joined at least in the prayer that it conveyed on high; and I was listening still with no small delight, when the youth Andriot plucked me by the sleeve, and told me that there was somebody who wished to speak with me in the encampment.

There was a meaning look in the youth's face--a mixture of joy and archness which I did not at all understand; but I followed without farther question to a tent which had been prepared for me, and towards which he now led the way. There were lights within, and a good number of people standing round it; and in drawing back the flap of the tent, I saw a table laid out with a very splendid supper, which, as I afterward found, had been prepared for the Prince de Condé, and who, probably, that night went without. But that which surprised me much more (for I was well aware that the whole provisions of the army were with my part of the encampment) was to see a respectable-looking elderly lady with her back towards me, and an old man with white hair bending down to point out to her something in a book upon the table. The little noise I made in entering did not disturb them; but my first step in the tent caused the old man to raise his head, and, to my inexpressible astonishment, I beheld good old Monsieur La Tour; while the old lady, turning round, displayed to my sight the well-known features of her who had been the faithful attendant of the former Baroness de Blancford and her daughter for several years.