waiting for an attack.

The news that all La Vendee was in insurrection astonished and
infuriated the Convention, which at once took steps to suppress it.
On the second of April a military commission was appointed, with
power to execute all peasants taken with arms in their hands, and
all who should be denounced as suspicious persons. General Berruyer
was sent down to take the command. The large army that had been
raised, principally from the mob of Paris for the defence of that
city, marched down; and Berruyer, at the head of this force,
entered the Bocage on the tenth of April.

The time had passed quietly at the chateau. The peasants had
dispersed at once and, except that the principal leaders and a
small body of men remained together, watching the course of events,
all was as quiet as if profound peace reigned.

Jean Martin had returned home. Two days after arriving, he had
called all the tenants on the estate together, and had endeavoured
to rouse them to the necessity of acquiring a certain amount of
discipline. He had brought with him a waggon load of muskets and
ammunition, which had been discovered at Chollet after the main
bulk of the peasants had departed; and Cathelineau had allowed him
to carry them off, in order that the peasantry in the neighbourhood
of the chateau should be provided with a proportion of guns, when
the day of action arrived. The peasants gladly received the
firearms, but could not be persuaded to endeavour to fight in any
sort of order.

"They did not do it at Chollet, or elsewhere," they exclaimed, "and
yet they beat the Blues easily. What good did discipline do to the
enemy? None. Why, then, should we bother ourselves about it? When
the enemy comes, we will rush upon them when they are tangled in
our thickets."

Leigh was somewhat more successful. The fact that he had fought at
Chollet, and was their seigneur's brother-in-law, had established a
position for him in the eyes of peasants of his own age; and as he
went from house to house, talking with them, he succeeded in
getting some twenty boys to agree to follow him. He had been
nominated an officer by the three generals, who had picked out,
without reference to rank or age, those who they thought would,
either from position, energy, or determination, fill the posts
well. Thus one company was commanded by a noble, the next by a
peasant; and each would, on the day of battle, fight equally well.

Leigh's arguments were such as