Not a word was spoken as the great ships-of-the-line bore majestically up towards their point, while the lighter vessels skimmed the sea, as in sport, and made haste in, as if racing with one another, or anxious to be in waiting, to welcome their superiors. Nearer and nearer they closed in, till the waters seemed to be covered with the foe. When Toussaint was assured that he had seen them all—when he had again and again silently counted over the fifty-four ships-of-war—he turned to his friend with a countenance of anguish, such as even that friend of many years had never seen.
“Henri,” said he, “we must all perish. All France has come to Saint Domingo!”
“Then we will perish,” replied Henri.
“Undoubtedly: it is not much to perish, if that were all. But the world will be the worse for ever. Trance is deceived. She comes, in an error, to avenge herself, and to enslave the blacks. Trance has been deceived.”
“If we were but all together,” said Henri, “so that there were no moments of weakness to fear.—If your sons were but with us—”
“Fear no moments of weakness from me,” said Toussaint, its wonted fire now glowing in his eye. “My colour imposes on me duties above nature; and while my boys are hostages, they shall be to me as if they no longer existed.”
“They may possibly be on board the fleet,” said Christophe. “If by caution we could obtain possession of them—”
“Speak no more of them now,” said Toussaint.—Presently, as if thinking aloud, and with his eyes still bent on the moving ships, he went on:
“No, those on board those ships are not boys, with life before them, and eager alike for arts and arms. I see who they are that are there. There are the troops of the Rhine—troops that have conquered a fairer river than our Artibonite, storming the castles on her steeps, and crowning themselves from her vineyards. There are the troops of the Alps—troops that have soared above the eagle, and stormed the clouds, and plucked the ice-king by the beard upon his throne. There are the troops of Italy—troops that have trodden the old Roman ways, and fought over again the old Roman wars—that have drunk of the Tiber, and once more conquered the armies of the Danube. There are the troops of Egypt—troops that have heard the war-cry of the desert tribes, and encamped in the shadow of the pyramids.”
“Yet he is not afraid,” said Henri to himself, as he watched the countenance of his friend.