"I will take the Count your message, my lord!" I cried, and without waiting for a reply turned my horse's head, and dashed into the whirlpool.
The battle-field was a hideous scene. Wherever the eye could reach, men were fighting and dying. There was no order even among the conquerors. I came across a little knot of Huguenot gentlemen who had turned furiously at bay.
"For the Admiral!" I cried, plunging in wild excitement into the midst of the hostile sworders. "For the Admiral!" Perhaps my comrades thought me mad, and in sober truth they would not have been far wrong; but they were generous souls, and with a yell of defiance they cut their way through after me.
"Count Louis," I said breathlessly to the first man, as we emerged on the other side, "where is he?"
"I do not know; he was on our right wing when the crash came."
"I must find him; I have a message from the chief"
"Let us try the right wing," he said, "they are making a stand there."
A dozen gentlemen had followed me, one of them carrying a flag, and as we galloped forward others joined us until we were fifty or sixty strong. It was like riding into the very jaws of death, but they asked no questions; the sight of the flag was sufficient. A body of infantry barred our path; we turned neither to right nor left, but crashed straight through them. A few foot-soldiers ran with us, holding by the stirrups, going cheerfully to death, rather than seek safety in shameful flight.
Suddenly a burst of cheering in a foreign tongue reached us. "Hurrah! Hurrah! For the Admiral!" and a troop of horse came tearing down. It was the band of gallant Englishmen, and I recognized Roger Braund still bearing the captured trophy. Fearing they might mistake us for royalists I rode forward hastily, crying in English, "Friends! Friends! We are Huguenots!"