"I am charged, commandant, to offer you the honors of war, if you consent to surrender your position. You have no provisions, as we are well aware. A few days from now, you will be compelled to lay down your arms. The esteem the general bears you alone impelled him to offer you these honorable conditions. Longer resistance is useless. We are masters of Donon; our corps d'armée is passing into Lorraine. The campaign will not be decided here; so that you have no interest in defending a useless position. We wish to spare you the horrors of famine upon this rock. Decide, commandant."
Hullin turned to the partisans, and said simply,
"You have heard. I refuse the conditions; but I will submit, if all accept the enemy's propositions."
"We all refuse them," cried Jerome.
"Yes; all, all!" repeated the others.
Catherine Lefevre, till then so stern, happened to glance at Louise, and then her firmness gave way. She took her by the arm, and leading her to the officer, said:
"We have a child among us; is there no means of sending her to one of her friends in Laverne?"
Louise had scarce heard the words when, throwing herself in Hullin's arms, she cried affrightedly,
"No, no! I will stay with you, Father Jean-Claude! I will die with you!"
"Go, sir," said Hullin, with bloodless lips, "tell your general what you have seen; tell him that Falkenstein we will hold to the death! Kasper, Frantz, lead back the officer."