"Our question is simply one of fact," said the duke.
"Yes, and of a fact on which the fate of Europe hinges at this moment! The monarchy of France is already cloven down. What wild shape of power is now to take up its fallen sword? The sovereignty of time, laws, and loyalty are in the grave, and the funeral rites will be bloody; but what hand is to make the ground of that grave firm enough to bear the foundations of a new throne?
"The heels of our boots and the hoofs of our horses will trample it solid enough!" exclaimed Varnhorst.
"The much stronger probability is," replied Guiscard, "that they will trample it into a mire so deep, that we may reckon the Allied powers fortunate if they can draw themselves out of it. France is revolutionized irrecoverably. Three things have been done within the last three months, any one of which would overthrow the strongest government on the Continent. By confiscating the property of the nobles, she has set the precedent for breaking down all property, thrown the prize into the hands of the populace, and thus, after corrupting them by the robbery, has bound them by the bribe. By destroying and banishing the persons of the nobility, she has done more than extinguish an antagonist to the mob—she has swept away a protector of the people. The provinces will henceforth be helpless; Paris will be the sovereign, and Paris itself will have the mob for its master. And by her third step, the ruin of the church, she has given the death-blow to the few and feeble feelings which acknowledged higher objects than those of the hour. The pressing point for us, is, how the Revolution will act upon the military spirit of the nation. The French nay succumb; but they make good soldiers, they are the only nation in Europe who have an actual fondness for war, who contemplate it as a pastime, and, in spite of all their defeats, regard it as their natural path to power."
"But they fly before our squadrons," observed the duke.
"Yes, as schoolboys fly before their master, until they are strong enough to rebel; or as the Indians fled before the lances and horses of Cortes, until they became accustomed to them. It would be infinitely wiser to leave the republicans to struggle with each other, than unite them by a national attack. Mobs, like the wolves, always fall upon the first wounded. The first faction that receives a blow in those campaigns of the Palais Royal, will have all the others tearing it to fragments. The custom will spread; every new drop of blood will let loose a torrent in retaliation; and when France has thus been drained of her fever, will be the time, either to restore her, or to paralyse for ever her power of disturbing the world."
The sound of a gun from either flank of the army, reminded us that the hour of the evening hymn had come. It broke up our council. The incomparable harmony of so many thousand voices ascended into the air; and at the discharge of another gun, all was still once more. The night had now fallen, and the fatigues of the day made repose welcome. But the conversation of the last hour made me anxious to obtain all the knowledge of the actual state of the country, and the prospects of the campaign, which could be obtained from Guiscard. Varnhorst, full of a soldier's impetuosity, was gone to the quarters of his grenadiers, and was busy with hurried preparations for the morrow. The duke had retired, and, through the curtains of his tent, I could see the lamps by whose light his secretaries were in attendance, and with whom he would probably pass the greater part of the next twelve hours. With Guiscard I continued pacing up and down in front of our quarters, listening to the observations of a mind as richly stored, and as original, as I have ever met. He still persisted in his conviction, "that we had come at the wrong time, either too early or too late; before the nation had grown weary of anarchy, and after they had triumphed over the throne. "The rebound," said he energetically, "will be terrible. Ten times our force would be thrown away in this war. The army may drive all things before its front; but it will be assailed in the rear, in the flanks—every where. It is like the lava which I have seen pour down from Etna into the sea. It drove the tide before it, and threw the water up in vapour; but they were too powerful for it after all. And there stands the lava fixed and cold, and there roll the surges once again, burying it from the sight of man."
A sudden harmony of trumpets, from various points of the vast encampment, pierced the ear, and in another moment the whole line of the hills was crowned with flame. The signal for lighting the fires of the Austrian and Prussian outposts had been given, and the effect was almost magical. In this army all things were done with a regularity almost perfect. The trumpet spoke, and the answer was instantaneous. All comparisons are feeble to realities of this order—seen, too, while the heart of man is quickened to enjoy and wonder, and feels scarcely less than a new existence in the stirring events every where round him. The first comparison that struck me was the vague one of a shower of stars. The mountain pinnacles were in a blaze. The general fires of the bivouacs soon spread through the forest, and down the slopes of the hills, all round to the horizon.
The night was fine, the air flowed refreshingly from the verdure of the immense woods, and the scent of the thyme and flowers of the heath, pressed by my foot, rose "wooingly on the air." All was calm and odorous. The flourish of the evening trumpets still continued to swell in the rich harmonies which German skill alone can breathe, and thoughts of the past and the future began to steal over my mind. I was once more in England, gazing on the splendid beauty of Clotilde; and imagining the thousand forms in which my weary fortunes must be shaped, before I dared offer her a share in my hopes of happiness. I saw Mariamne once more, with her smile reminding me of Shakspeare's exquisite picture—
"Oh, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful,