The affair was a skirmish rather than a battle, and ended by the town being set on fire, and the thick columns of smoke from the burning houses rose from amid the trees, rolled along the railway embankments, and added to the obscurity and confusion. Amid this rang the roar of the red flashing musketry, and the horrible shrieking of the mitrailleuse. The latter we may describe for the information of the reader is a four-pound gun, divided into twenty-five compartments by as many rifle barrels, all loaded at the breech by cartridges, and all discharged at once, the loading only requiring five actions, by which seven thousand eight hundred balls can be discharged in one hour into a circle of twelve feet in diameter.
It was by the fire of one of these that Charlie saw an event which was one of the most touching scenes in the war. His skirmishers had been driven by the French 23rd close to the railway bank, and near them lay a Zouave, terribly wounded in the lungs apparently. The poor man's agony was frightful. He was past speech, and could only clasp his hands in prayer, cross himself, and point imploringly to his mouth.
A kindly sergeant of the 95th uncorked his water-bottle, and raising the Frenchman's head, was about to slake his thirst, when the shrieking sound was heard amid the smoke close by. Out of that smoke came the leaden storm of the mitrailleuse, and the Prussian and the Zouave were literally blown to fragments.
Over the railway bank the Thuringians were now driven, and everywhere the whole Prussian line was giving way! The moment the Emperor became aware of this, with generous humanity he ordered the mitrailleuses to cease firing, and thus arrested the useless carnage.
As yet Charlie Pierrepont had escaped without a scratch, though frequently the very sod beneath his feet was torn and sowed by balls. Though the French obtained possession of Saarbrück—the last troops out of which were the Thuringians—the Prussians still continued to lurk in the village of St. Johann, on the further side of the Saar, and in the thick woods beyond it, from whence the white smoke spirted out in incessant puffs as their well-concealed skirmishers kept up a galling fire on the enemy.
This gradually ceased, and the shadows of evening began to deepen over Saarbrück, and on the faces of the dead and dying who lay by the sedgy banks of the once peaceful river. The fishers had fled, abandoning their tubs and baskets; no figures were seen moving on either side now save those of men in various uniforms; and terrified by the unnatural din that then had seemed to rend the sky, the little birds were seen to grovel amid the reeds and grass, as if too scared to seek their nests in those thickets around which the tide of carnage rolled.
The advanced sentinels were posted for the night, and under the shelter of a shattered cottage wall. Charlie Pierrepont, Heinrich, and Captain Schönforst congratulated each other that they all escaped untouched, and sat down amid the debris of what had once been a cabbage-garden, to enjoy an humble repast, some German sausage, a few slices of bread, and the contents of their water-bottles, dashed with cognac.
The telegram which, on that same evening, the Baron Rhineberg so duly reported at Frankenburg, thereby piercing, as with a poniard, the heart of Ernestine, was correct in some of its details, as the first man killed in the Franco-Prussian war was an Englishman—but not Charlie.
Prior to the affair at Saarbrück, twenty Baden troopers, led by a Mr. Winslow, made a dash into France at Lauterburg, and galloping on as far as Niederbronn, in open daylight, cut all the telegraph wires along the line of railway there. They halted next morning to breakfast at a French farmhouse, when they were surprised, and, in the combat that ensued, Winslow was cut down and slain.
The terror and anxiety of Ernestine were, however, short-lived, as Heinrich's letter, written next morning, contained an enclosure for her that gave her a blessed relief.