"At that madame jumped up so sprightly and started to walk so fast that I was afraid the lieutenant would suspect her. But that is just like the French, Mr. Washington. One minute they are in the dolly dumps, so that you would think they could not live, and the next they are capering about and laughing and singing as if they never had the dolly dumps in their lives. Off we set for the main gate. We walked along the intrenchments, and I kept my eyes open, and in spite of the half-darkness I saw a good many things that they would rather we hadn't seen. Their works were in a bad way, and our siege-guns had done their duty.
"Arrived at the gate-house, the young lieutenant asked for the officer in command—Captain Saussier. So Captain Saussier came out, and madame went through all her story again. The captain ogled her, and it was all I could do to keep my countenance when I saw that the captain and the lieutenant were trying to cut one another out. They made no bones at all of taking her to see the commandant, particularly as she said she did not wish to stay, except until daylight the next morning; for in a besieged town they don't want any non-combatants to eat up the provender. But although they were willing enough for her to go in, they refused to let me. She made no objection to this, which surprised me; but in a moment she fell into one of those fits we had rehearsed for the commandant's benefit, when he should tell her, as we knew he would, that he had never seen or heard of her husband. I came forward then with smelling-salts, and presently she revived. That scared the officers a little, for the bravest officer in the world would rather be out of the way when a woman begins to cry and kick and scream. As soon as they led her towards the gate she had another fit, and as good a fit as I ever saw in my life, sir. Then I came running, of course, with the smelling-salts. The captain evidently did not want her on his hands entirely as long as she was in that condition, so he said perhaps—ahem!—it might be better to take her servant along.
"'Oh, my good faithful Jacques!' cried she. 'It would be a great comfort if I could have him with me in this trying time!' So they passed me in the gates along with her.
"She never stopped chattering for a moment while she was walking through the streets with the captain, telling a long rigmarole about her travels; but she used her eyes as well as I used mine. The town was horribly knocked to pieces—houses falling down, the streets encumbered with rubbish, and several breaches made in the walls. They had managed to repair the breaches after a fashion, for the French understand fortifications better than we do; but there was no doubt, from what we saw in that walk at nine o'clock at night, that the town and fortifications had suffered terribly. And there were no women or children to be seen, which showed that they had sent them all away; for some will remain in a besieged town as long as there is anything to feed them on.
"When we reached the citadel we noticed there were not near enough cannon to defend it; so we knew that they had been forced to take the guns to place on the ramparts. At last, after going through many long passages and winding stairs, we were ushered into the commandant's presence. He was a tall, soldierly-looking man, and he received madame very politely. The captain told the story of her tremendous efforts to get there and her trouble, madame all the time sighing and weeping. But here came in a frightful thing, sir. There had been a Captain Geoffroy, an officer in Marshal Villars's army, and I felt myself turning pale when the commandant offered to let madame remain in the town twenty-four hours, until he could find out something about this Geoffroy. But madame's wit saved her.
"'Pray,' said she, clasping her hands, 'what was this M. Geoffroy like?"
"'Tall,' said the commandant, 'with a swarthy skin and black hair.'
"'Ah,' cried she, muffling her face in her handkerchief, 'it could not have been my husband. He was short, and had light hair, and had lost a part of his right ear in a duel; it disfigured him very much.'
"'Then, madame,' answered the commandant, 'I can give you no further information, for that is the only Geoffroy in the army of whom I know anything, and from your description he cannot be your husband. I will make inquiries among my officers, but I can give you but little hope.'
"Madame sighed and groaned some more, and then said she would be ready to depart in the morning at daylight, to begin her search over again. The commandant offered her a room in the citadel, warning her that it would be necessary for her to get out before daybreak, as the English began their cannonading as soon as it was light enough to see the French lines. Madame agreed tearfully to this, and the commandant offered her some supper, smiling when he told her it was not exactly the kind of fare he was used to offering ladies. But she declined—we had not the heart to eat up anything from those poor devils. So she was shown to a room, and I lay down at the door and pretended to sleep; but you may depend upon it, sir, that neither one of us slept a wink. Towards daylight the captain of the guard came to waken us, and told us it was time to leave. The commandant was up to bid madame adieu, as they call it in the French lingo; and after thanking him for his politeness, madame was escorted to the gate, I following her, and thence as far as the picket-line. And here, after the officer had left us, for the first time we aroused suspicion. We were walking pretty fast, and something in the supposed lady's gait made the sentry suspect us. There was another soldier, not a sentry, with him, and this fellow called after us to stop. We were near the entrance to the bog then, and we knew the way across it, particularly as there was now daylight enough to see, so the only notice we took of him was to walk a little faster. The soldier followed us clear into the underbrush, when my lord—for so I will call him now—deliberately dropped his hoop and petticoat, revealing a pair of legs that evidently belonged to the British army, and a rapier, while from the waist up he wore a woman's sack, and had a hood on his head. The apparition dazed the soldier for a moment, when my lord made at him with the rapier, and he turned and ran—giving the alarm, however. We took to our heels and gained the causeway, when the French fired a regular fusillade after us, although not a shot struck; and our own people, seeing us running towards them, thought we were escaped prisoners, and we got within our own lines without trouble. My lord had some valuable information to give the Duke, and the adventure got out in the army and made a hero of him. The French kept monstrous quiet about it; you see, sir, we had taken the commandant himself in. My lord repaid his politeness, though, by sending him a box of wine, which we knew he needed for his sick; but the commandant was the most chagrined man in the French army. They made a sortie soon after that, but it did them no good, and within a week they surrendered. The Duke granted them all the honors of war, and the garrison marched out with drums beating and colors flying. They had made a gallant defence, and had not surrendered until they were starving. That was the end of my serving with the great Duke of Marlborough, for that was his last campaign. And soon after my lord left the army. And I'll be leaving his service by the toe of his boot if I don't go to him now, so good-night, sir, and excuse me if I have kept you out of bed too long."