never was seen! One of
the guns they carried off with them; the tackle of the other broke, and
the drivers, jumping off their saddles, took to their legs at once. Our
lads were over the walls, through the windows, between the stockades,
every where, in fact, in a minute, and once inside, they carried all
before them. The village was taken at the point of the bayonet, and in
less than an hour the whole force of the brigade was advancing in full
march on the enemy's flank. There was little resistance made after that,
and Kaunitz only saved his artillery by leaving his rear guard to be cut
to pieces."

The cannonier nodded, as if in full assent, and Pierre looked around him
with the air of a man who has vindicated his claim to greatness.

"Of course," said he, "the dispatch said little about Pierre Canot, but
a great deal about Moreau, and Kleber, and the rest of them."

While some were well satisfied that Pierre had well established his
merits as the conqueror of "Grandrengs," others quizzed him about the
heroism of lying hid in a well, and owing all his glory to a skin of
parchment.

"An' thou went with the army of Italy, Pierre," said the hussar, "thou'd
have seen men march boldly to victory, and not skulk under ground like a
mole."

"I am tired of your song about this army of Italy," broke in the
cannonier; "we who have served in La Vendee and the North know what
fighting means, as well, mayhap, as men whose boldest feats are scaling
rocks and clambering up precipices. Your Bonaparte, is more like one of
these guerilla chiefs they have in the 'Basque,' than the general of a
French army."

"The man who insults the army of Italy, or its chief, insults _me_!"
said the corporal, springing up, and casting a sort of haughty defiance
around him.

"And then?" asked the other.

"And then--if he be a French soldier--he knows what should follow."

"Parbleu!" said the cannonier, coolly, "there would be little glory in
cutting you down, and even less in being wounded by you; but if you will
have it so, it's not an old soldier of the artillery will balk your
humor."

As he spoke, he slowly arose from the ground, and tightening his
waist-belt, seemed prepared to follow the other. The rest sprung to
their feet at the same time, but not, as I anticipated, to offer a
friendly mediation between the angry parties, but in full approval of
their readiness to decide by the sword a matter too trivial to be called
a quarrel.

I