ses of black smoke arose above the roofs; shattered
tiles fell into the streets, and shot buried themselves an the walls,
or crashed through the beams with a horrible noise.

At the same time, our soldiers rushed in through the lanes, over the
hedges and fences, turning from time to time to fire on the enemy. Men
of all arms were mingled, some without shakos or knapsacks, their
clothes torn and covered with blood; but they retreated furiously, and
were nearly all mere children, boys of fifteen or twenty; but courage
is inborn in the French people.

The Prussians--led by old officers who shouted "_Forwaerts!
Forwaerts!_"--followed like packs of wolves, but we turned and opened
fire from the hedges, and fences, and houses. How many of them bit the
dust I know not, but others always supplied the places of those who
fell. Hundreds of balls whistled by our ears and flattened themselves
on the stone walls; the plaster was broken from the walls, and the
thatch hung from the rafters, and as I turned for the twentieth time to
fire, my musket dropped from my hand; I stooped to lift it, but I fell
too: I had received a shot in the left shoulder and the blood ran like
warm water down my breast. I tried to rise, but all that I could do
was to seat myself against the wall while the blood continued to run
down even to my thighs, and I shuddered at the thought that I was to
die there.

Still the fight went on.

Fearful that another bullet might reach me, I crawled to the corner of
a house, and fell into a little trench which brought water from the
street to the garden. My left arm was heavy as lead; my head swam; I
still heard the firing, but it seemed a dream, and I closed my eyes.

When I again opened them, night was coming on, and the Prussians filled
the village. In the garden, before me, was an old general, with white
hair, on a tall brown horse. He shouted in a trumpet-like voice to
bring on the cannon, and officers hurried away with his orders. Near
him, standing on a little wall, two surgeons were bandaging his arm.
Behind, on the other side, was a little Russian officer, whose plume of
green feathers almost covered his hat. I saw all this at a glance--the
old man with his large nose and broad forehead, his quick glancing
eyes, and bold air; the others around him; the surgeon, a little bald
man with spectacles, and five or six hundred paces away, between two
houses, our soldiers re-forming.

The firing had cease