aide-de-camp was killed. The athletic grenadier was safe and
sound. Philippe in defending Hippolyte had received a bayonet in his
shoulder; but he clung to his horse's mane, and clasped him so tightly
with his knees that the animal was held as in a vice.

"God be praised!" cried the major, finding his orderly untouched, and
the carriage in its place.

"If you are just, my officer, you will get me the cross for this," said
the man. "We've played a fine game of guns and sabres here, I can tell
you."

"We have done nothing yet--Harness the horses. Take these ropes."

"They are not long enough."

"Grenadier, turn over those sleepers, and take their shawls and linen,
to eke out."

"Tiens! that's one dead," said the grenadier, stripping the first man he
came to. "Bless me! what a joke, they are all dead!"

"All?"

"Yes, all; seems as if horse-meat must be indigestible if eaten with
snow."

The words made Philippe tremble. The cold was increasing.

"My God! to lose the woman I have saved a dozen times!"

The major shook the countess.

"Stephanie! Stephanie!"

The young woman opened her eyes.

"Madame! we are saved."

"Saved!" she repeated, sinking down again.

The horses were harnessed as best they could. The major, holding his
sabre in his well hand, with his pistols in his belt, gathered up the
reins with the other hand and mounted one horse while the grenadier
mounted the other. The orderly, whose feet were frozen, was thrown
inside the carriage, across the general and the countess. Excited by
pricks from a sabre, the horses drew the carriage rapidly, with a sort
of fury, to the plain, where innumerable obstacles awaited it. It was
impossible to force a way without danger of crushing the sleeping men,
women, and even children, who refused to move when the grenadier awoke
them. In vain did Monsieur de Sucy endeavor to find the swathe cut
by the rear-guard through the mass of human beings; it was already
obliterated, like the wake of a vessel through the sea. They could only
creep along, being often stopped by soldiers who threatened to kill
their horses.

"Do you want to reach the bridge?" said the grenadier.

"At the cost of my life--at the cost of the whole world!"

"Then forward, march! you can't make omelets without breaking eggs."

And the grenadier of the guard urged the horses over men and bivouacs
with bloody wheels and a double line of corpses on either side of them.
We must do him the jus