otally wanting. The barracks
being thus carried by assault, a horrible massacre ensued, which lasted
for three hours. Some of the wretched men, being hunted from room to
room, jumped out of the first window they could reach, without stopping
to measure its height from the ground, and were either impaled on the
bayonets held in readiness below, or, falling on the pavement, broke
their limbs and were pitilessly despatched.

The gendarmes, who had really been called out to protect the retreat of
the garrison, seemed to imagine they were there to witness a judicial
execution, and stood immovable and impassive while these horrid deeds
went on before their eyes. But the penalty of this indifference was
swiftly exacted, for as soon as the soldiers were all done with, the
mob, finding their thirst for blood still unslacked, turned on the
gendarmes, the greater number of whom were wounded, while all lost their
horses, and some their lives.

The populace was still engaged at its bloody task when news came that
the army from Beaucaire was within sight of the town, and the murderers,
hastening to despatch some of the wounded who still showed signs of
life, went forth to meet the long expected reinforcements.

Only those who saw the advancing army with their own eyes can form any
idea of its condition and appearance, the first corps excepted. This
corps was commanded by M. de Barre, who had put himself at its head
with the noble purpose of preventing, as far as he could, massacre and
pillage. In this he was seconded by the officers under him, who
were actuated by the same philanthropic motives as their general in
identifying themselves with the corps. Owing to their exertions, the men
advanced in fairly regular order, and good discipline was maintained.
All the men carried muskets.

But the first corps was only a kind of vanguard to the second, which was
the real army, and a wonderful thing to see and hear. Never were brought
together before or since so many different kinds of howl, so many
threats of death, so many rags; so many odd weapons, from the matchlock
of the time of the Michelade to the steel-tipped goad of the bullock
drovers of La Camargue, so that when the Nimes mob; which in all
conscience was howling and ragged enough, rushed out to offer a
brotherly welcome to the strangers, its first feeling was one of
astonishment and dismay as it caught sight of the motley crew which held
out to it the right hand of fellowship