"Darn, me, but I'll tame her yet, and break her spirit or her heart!"
A little cry escaped her—a cry of joy, but more she dared not utter, for lo! from the windows of the room she could see, advancing over the waste of far extending snow through which the great Montreal road lay, the dark masses of the approaching troops, dark because all were in their grey overcoats; but the fixed bayonets glittered like a grey steely forest; the bright colours, crimson, blue, and gold, were waving in the sun, here and there the rays of the latter were reflected from a brass drum.
The heads of the infantry columns halted, and a distant flash or gleam seemed to pass along the ranks as the arms were "ordered" and the men stood "at ease;" the artillery were all well to the front, unlimbered and wheeled round, the horses untraced and taken to the rear, and while one solitary officer was seen galloping towards St. Eustache, a ferocious interjection escaped Ithuriel Smash, and a roar of voices burst over all the place, when some thousand men grasped their arms—weapons of every description.
How wildly with hope beat the heart of Aurelia at this moment! But she closed her ears to the cries she heard around her, from the colonists and their American sympathisers.
"Sacré Anglais! Blood for blood!"
"Down with the Red slaves of Queen Victoria!"
"Death to the island savages!"
"We'll whip the 'tarnal Britishers into the sea!"
And so forth, the phrases only alike in their spirit of ferocity. Meanwhile the solitary and adventurous officer was coming galloping on. At last he drew near that portion of the rudely-constructed works or fortifications (that connected all the houses and gardens of St. Eustache) which was immediately overlooked by the windows of the room in which she was compelled to remain with Ithuriel Smash, who, on the officer reining in his horse and waving his flag of truce, threw up a sash to hear what he had to say.
"Listen, my good people," he cried, displaying a paper, "to the proclamation of Lieutenant-General Sir John Colborne, G.C.B. and G.C.H., Commander-in-Chief of all Her Britannic Majesty's forces in Canada:—