"'I cannot get up.'
"Then he hastily dismounted from his horse, gave his bridle to his orderly, went up to me, raised me in his arms, carried me to his carriage, and laid me down there among sweet-smelling hay.
"I felt just as if I had been placed in Paradise.
"Then he threw his mantle over me. It was cold outside now, and a strong wind was blowing.
"But his care for me went even further than that.
"'There is food in my knapsack, lady Elizabeth. I suppose you have had no supper to-day? Take whatever you find there. There's some drink, too, in my flask. It will do you good. You have nothing more to fear. The finger-pointing virgin still stands there on the bastions of our fortress.'
"Then he mounted his horse again, and continued commanding his men loudly and authoritatively to force their way through the crush of carts and carriages with their convoy of hay. I fancied that I saw before me an archangel.
"I didn't wait to be asked twice. As soon as I was able to get hold of the knapsack of victuals, I stuffed myself indiscriminately with all it contained—ham, cake, rolls. I gorged like a wild beast broken loose from a menagerie. I verily believe that if my bliss in Heaven had depended upon it, I would have renounced it for that couch of soft straw and those greedily devoured delicacies.
"When I had satisfied my appetite as I had never done before, I unscrewed the top of the flask and put it to my mouth. I didn't taste what was in it, but I gulped and gulped so long as I had any breath in my body, as much as my thirst craved. I fancy it must have been brandy. When I couldn't drink any more I looked all about me. The burning town was a grand illumination; in the midst of it was the Calvinist church tower—only it was now not one tower, but three. The silly thing was dancing a pas seul, and wagging its head now to the right, and now to the left, and all the people, and the horses, and the coachmen, and the hay-carts were leaping and dancing, like wedding-guests considerably the worse for liquor.
"When next day I awoke out of a twenty-hours' sleep, I found myself in the room of a peasant's house. Two men were holding a consultation over me—the camp-surgeon and 'he.' 'How do you find yourself, lady Elizabeth? You are in my little room.'