Page:The Works of Honoré de Balzac Volume 29.djvu/65

Rh for whom the veteran was fighting. His stern face, his blue uniform faced with the worn red facings, the grimy epaulettes that hung back over his shoulders, expressed the character and the deficiencies of their owner.

The graceful attitude and expression of the younger man were not lost upon Hulot, who shouted as he tried to reach him:

"Here you, ballet-dancer! come a little nearer, so that I may get a chance at you!"

The Royalist leader, irritated by the momentary check, made a desperate forward movement; but the moment his own men saw the danger he was thus incurring, they all flung themselves upon the Blues. A clear, sweet voice suddenly rang out upon the din of conflict:

"Here it was that the sainted Lescure fell! Will you not avenge him?"

At these magical words the Chouan onset became terrible; the little troop of Republican soldiers kept their line unbroken with the greatest difficulty.

"If he had not been a youngster," said Hulot to himself, as he gave way step by step, "we should not have been attacked at all. When did Chouans offer battle before? But so much the better, they won't shoot us down like dogs along the road."

He raised his voice till the woods echoed with the words:

"Come, look alive, men; are we going to let ourselves be fooled by these bandits?"

The verb is but a feeble substitute for that of the gallant commander's choice, but old hands will be able to insert the genuine word, which certainly possesses a more soldierly flavor.

"Gérard, Merle," the commandant continued, "call in your men, form them in columns, and fall on their rear, fire on these curs, and make an end of them!"

Hulot's orders were carried out with great difficulty; for the young chief heard the voice of his antagonist, and shouted: