Page:The Works of Honoré de Balzac Volume 29.djvu/47

Rh blithe and friendly at once. Families who had been ready to fly at each other's throats the day before, supped without danger under the same roof.

The moment that Hulot became aware of the treacherous secrets revealed by Marche-à-Terre's goatskin apparel, his conviction was confirmed; the auspicious peace inaugurated through Hoche's ability was now at an end ; its longer duration indeed seemed to him impossible. It was in this manner that war broke out again, after three years of inaction, and in a more formidable guise than hitherto. Perhaps the temper of the Revolution, which had grown milder since the Ninth of Thermidor, was about to revert to the ferocity which had made it hateful to every rightly constituted mind. English gold, as usual, contributed to bring about discord in France. If the Republic were abandoned by the young Bonaparte, who seemed to be its tutelary genius, it seemed as if it would be utterly unable to make a stand against so many foes, and the last to appear were the bitterest among them. Civil war, heralded by numberless risings of little importance, assumed a gravity before unknown, from the moment that Chouans conceived the idea of attacking so strong an escort. This, in a concise form, was the substance of Hulot's reflections, when he believed that in Marche-à-Terre's sudden appearance he saw the signs of a skilfully prepared trap. And he alone, for no one else was in the secret of the danger.

The pause which ensued after the commandant's prophetic remark to Gérard, and which put an end to the previous scene, sufficed for Hulot to regain his composure. The veteran's brain had almost reeled; he could not shake off the gloom which covered his brow as he thought that he was even then surrounded by the horrors of a warfare marked by atrocities from which, perhaps, even cannibals would shrink. His captain, Merle, and the adjutant Gérard, both of them friends of his, tried to understand the terror, quite new in their experience, of which their leader's face gave evidence; then they looked at Marche-à-Terre, who was eating his ban-