Page:The Works of Honoré de Balzac Volume 29.djvu/28

4 pany upon whose loyalty the Republic could depend, for almost every one who composed it had taken part against the Government in the war of four years ago. One last distinguishing characteristic left no doubt whatever as to the divided opinions of the body of men. The Republicans alone were in spirits as they marched. As for the rest of the individuals that made up the band, obviously as they might differ in their dress, one uniform expression was visible on all faces and in the attitude of each—the expression which misfortune gives.

The faces of both townspeople and peasants bore the stamp of deep dejection; there was something sullen about the silence they kept. All of them were bowed apparently beneath the yoke of the same thought—a terrible thought, no doubt, but carefully hidden away. Every face was inscrutable; the unwonted lagging of their steps alone could betray a secret understanding. A few of them were marked out by a rosary that hung round about their necks, although they ran some risks by keeping about them this sign of a faith that had been suppressed rather than uprooted: and one of these from time to time would shake back his hair and defiantly raise his head. Then they would furtively scan the woods, the footpaths, and the crags that shut in the road on either side, much as a dog sniffs the wind as he tries to scent the game; but as they only heard the monotonous sound of the steps of their mute comrades, they hung their heads again with the forlorn faces of convicts on their way to the galleys, where they are now to live and die.

The advance of this column upon Mayenne, composed as it was of such heterogeneous elements, and representing such widely different opinions, was explained very readily by the presence of another body of troops which headed the detachment. About a hundred and fifty soldiers were marching at the head of the column under the command of the chief of a demi-brigade. It may not be unprofitable to explain, for those who have not witnessed the drama of the Revolution, that this appellation was substituted for the