dear Marchand," concludes M. le
Comte with a smile.

Hardly had the two men concluded this toast, when a fearful din is
heard, "regular howls" proceeding from the suburb of Bonne. The windows
of the hotel give on the ramparts and the house itself dominates the
Bonne Gate and the military ground beyond it. Hastily Marchand jumps up
from the table and throws open the window. He and the Comte step out
upon the balcony.

The din has become deafening: with a hand that slightly trembles now
General Marchand points to the extensive grounds that lie beyond the
city gate, and M. le Comte quickly smothers an exclamation of terror.

A huge crowd of peasants armed with scythes and carrying torches which
flicker in the frosty air have invaded the slopes and flats of the
military zone. They are yelling "Vive l'Empereur!" at the top of their
voices, and from walls and bastions reverberates the answering cry "Vive
l'Empereur!" vociferated by infantrymen and gunners and sapeurs, and
echoed and re-echoed with passionate enthusiasm by the people of
Grenoble assembled in their thousands in the narrow streets which abut
upon the ramparts.

And in the midst of the peasantry, surrounded by them as by a cordon,
Napoleon and his small army, just reinforced by the 7th regiment of
infantry, have halted--expectant.

Napoleon's aide-de-camp, Capitaine Raoul, accompanied by half a dozen
lancers, comes up to the palisade which bars the immediate approach to
the city gates.

"Open!" he cries loudly, so loudly that his young, firm voice rises
above the tumult around. "Open! in the name of the Emperor!"

Marchand sees it all, he hears the commanding summons, hears the
thunderous and enthusiastic cheers which greet Captain Raoul's call to
surrender. He and the Comte de Cambray are still standing upon the
balcony of the hotel that faces the gate of Bonne and dominates from its
high ground the ramparts opposite. White-cheeked and silent the two men
have gazed before them and have understood. To attempt to stem this tide
of popular enthusiasm would inevitably be fatal. The troops inside
Grenoble were as ready to cross over to "the brigand's" standard as was
Colonel de la Bedoyere's regiment of infantry.

The ramparts and the surrounding military zone were lit up by hundreds
of torches; by their flickering light the two men on the balcony could
see the faces of the people, and those of the soldiers who were even now
being ordered to fire upon Raou