minal on the eve of his
execution. To her eyes all nature was shrouded in a seething vapor; even
common things assumed fantastic shapes. The one thought, "If I do not
succeed they will kill themselves," fell upon her soul with reiterated
blows, as the bar of the executioner fell upon the victim's members when
tortured on the wheel. She felt herself breaking; she lost her energy in
this terrible waiting for the cruel moment, short and decisive, when she
should find herself face to face with that man on whom the fate of the
condemned depended. She chose to yield to her depression rather
than waste her strength uselessly. The marquis, who was incapable of
understanding this resolve of firm minds, which often assumes quite
diverse aspects (for in such moments of tension certain superior minds
give way to surprising gaiety), began to fear that he might never bring
Laurence alive to the momentous interview, solemn to them only, and yet
beyond the ordinary limits of private life. To Laurence, the necessity
of humiliating herself before that man, the object of her hatred and
contempt, meant the sacrifice of all her noblest feelings.

"After this," she said, "the Laurence who survives will bear no likeness
to her who is now to perish."

The travellers could not fail to be aware of the vast movement of men
and material which surrounded them the moment they entered Prussia. The
campaign of Jena had just begun. Laurence and the marquis beheld the
magnificent divisions of the French army deploying and parading as if
at the Tuileries. In this display of military power, which can be
adequately described only with the words and images of the Bible, the
proportions of the Man whose spirit moved these masses grew gigantic to
Laurence's imagination. Soon, the cry of victory resounded in her ears.
The Imperial arms had just obtained two signal advantages. The Prince
of Prussia had been killed the evening before the day on which the
travellers arrived at Saalfeld on their endeavor to overtake Napoleon,
who was marching with the rapidity of lightning.

At last, on the 13th of October (date of ill-omen) Mademoiselle de
Cinq-Cygne was skirting a river in the midst of the Grand Army, seeing
nought but confusion, sent hither and thither from one village to
another, from division to division, frightened at finding herself
alone with one old man tossed about in an ocean of a hundred and fifty
thousand armed men facing a hundred and fifty thousan