The Casque's Lark Part 21

After the young general issued his last orders, he alighted from his horse the moment he saw his mother, walked over to where she was, and said:

"The hour has come, mother. I have taken with the other captains the last dispositions on the plan of battle that I submitted to you and which you approved. I have reserved ten thousand men under the command of Robert, one of the most experienced chiefs, for the protection of the camp. He is to receive orders from you. May the G.o.ds look down favorably upon our arms. Adieu, mother. I shall do my best--"

Saying this he bent his knee.

"Adieu, my son. Come not back, unless you come back victorious over the barbarians!"

As she said these words, the Mother of the Camps stooped down from her horse and reached her hand to Victorin, who kissed it and rose.

"Be brave, my young Caesar!" the Governor of Gascony called out to my foster-sister's son. "The fate of Gaul is in your hands--and, thanks to the G.o.ds, your hands are powerful. Furnish me the opportunity to write an ode on this fresh victory."

Victorin remounted his horse. A moment later our army set itself upon the march, with the scouts on horseback riding ahead of the vanguard.

Victorin placed himself at the head of the army. We had the bank of the Rhine on our right. A few light bodies of mounted archers rode forward as scouts, to the end of guarding our left wing against a surprise.

Victorin called me to his side; I drove my horse abreast his own, and as he hastened the step of his mount we were soon beyond the escort that accompanied him.

"Schanvoch," he said to me, "you are an old and experienced soldier. I wish to explain my plans to you. I confided the plan to the chief who is to take my place in the event of my being killed. I wish you also to be posted on it. You will be all the better able to help in its execution."

"I listen. Speak, Victorin."

"It is now nearly three hours since the rafts of the Franks were seen by our scouts at about the middle of the river. Those rafts, towed by barks and loaded with troops navigate slowly. It must have taken them fully an hour to reach the bank and disembark on this side of the Rhine--"

"Your calculation is correct. But why did you not hasten the march of the army in order to arrive at the spot before the Franks disembarked?

Landing forces are always in disorder. Their disorder would have favored our attack."

"Two reasons kept me from doing so. I shall tell them to you. How long, do you calculate, did it take the officer, who notified us of the enemy's approach, to ride in all haste from our advanced posts to Mayence?"

"About an hour and a half. It is nearly five leagues from there to Mayence."

"And how long will it take an army to cover the same distance, even at forced marches, but not rapid enough to be tired out and breathless when it reaches the spot and offers battle?"

"It would take about three hours and a half."

"Accordingly, you will perceive, Schanvoch, that it would have been impossible for us to have arrived in time to attack the Franks at the moment of their landing. Those barbarians' lack of discipline is surprising. They must have consumed considerable time in forming their ranks. This will enable us to arrive before and wait for them at the defile of Armstadt--the only military route open to them in order to attack our camp, unless they throw themselves across the marsh and the forests, where their cavalry, their princ.i.p.al arm, could not deploy."

"That is true."

"I temporized in order to give the Franks time to approach the defile."

"If they undertake the pa.s.sage, they are lost."

"I hope so. With our swords in their loins we shall drive them back towards the river bank. Our hundred and sixty well armed barks, that left port under my orders and at the same time that we started on the march, will scatter the barbarians' rafts and cut off their retreat.

Besides that, Captain Marion crossed the river with a picked body of men; he will effect a juncture with the friendly tribes on the other bank, and will march straight upon the Frankish camp, where the enemy must have left a strong reserve force together with all their wagons.

These will all be destroyed!"

Victorin was thus engaged in unfolding to me his ably conceived plan of battle, when we saw several of the scouts, who were sent forward, running back to us at full gallop. One of these reined in his foaming steed and cried out to Victorin:

"The army of the Franks is advancing. It can be seen at a distance from the top of the hills. Their scouts approached the defile; they were all shot down by the arrows of our archers who were ambushed behind the shrubs. Not one of the Frankish scouts escaped with his life."

"Well done," replied Victorin. "Those scouts would have ridden back and warned the Frankish army of our approach. It might not then have entered the defile. But I shall ride forward and judge the enemy's position myself. Follow me, Schanvoch!"

Victorin put his horse to a gallop; I did likewise. The escort followed us; we quickly overtook and pa.s.sed our vanguard, to whom Victorin gave the order to halt. We arrived at a place that dominated the defile of Armstadt. The rather broad road lay at our feet, hemmed in by two steep escarpments. The one to the right seemed cut with the pick, it rose so perpendicular over the road and formed a sort of promontory on the side of the Rhine. The escarpment to the left consisted of a rocky series of shelves, and served, so to speak, as the basis to the vast plateau through the heart of which the deep and wide gully was cut. The gully or road dipped gently till it ran out into a vast plain, bordered to the east and north by the curve of the river, to the west by woods and marshes, and behind us by the elevated plateau where our troops were ordered to halt. We presently distinguished at a great distance from where we stood and down in the direction of the plain, a large and confused black ma.s.s. It was the army of the Franks.

Victorin remained silent for a few seconds; he attentively examined the disposition of the enemy's forces and the field at our feet.

"My calculation and expectation did not deceive me," he observed. "The Frankish army is twice as large as ours. If their tactics were less savage, instead of entering the defile, as they will surely do, they would, despite the difficulty that accompanies that sort of a.s.sault, climb the plateau at several places simultaneously, and thereby compel me to divide my much inferior forces in order to attack them at a large number of places. Nevertheless, for greater certainty, and so as to lure the enemy into the defile, I shall resort to a ruse of war. Let us return to our vanguard; Schanvoch, the hour of battle has sounded!"

"And such an hour," I answered, "is always solemn!"

"Yes," he replied melancholically, "such an hour is always solemn, especially for the general, who, at this b.l.o.o.d.y game of war, plays with the lives of his soldiers and has his country's fate for stake. Come, let us ride back, Schanvoch--and may my mother's star protect me!"

I rode back with Victorin to our troops, asking myself due to what singular contradiction that young man, always so firm and so calculating at the great crises of his life, showed himself below mediocrity in the power to combat his foibles.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE BATTLE OF THE RHINE.

The young general was not long in rejoining the vanguard. After a hurried conference with the officers, the troops took their posts of battle. Three cohorts of infantry, each one thousand strong, received orders to march through the defile into the open plain, engage the vanguard of the Franks, and draw the bulk of the enemy's army into the dangerous pa.s.sage. Victorin, several officers and myself stood grouped upon one of the highest bluffs that dominated the field on which the scrimmage was to take place. From where we stood we had a complete view of the immense Frankish army. Ma.s.sed in a compact body, the bulk of their forces was still far away. A swarm of hors.e.m.e.n rode in advance and extended beyond the two wings. Our three cohorts had barely emerged from the pa.s.s into the plain when the Frankish hors.e.m.e.n rushed like a swarm of hornets towards them from all sides and sought to envelop them.

Intent only upon taking the lead of one another, these hors.e.m.e.n gave the rein to their mounts, and tumultuously, without any order whatever, galloped towards our troops. When the former had drawn near enough, the latter formed themselves into a wedge in order to sustain the first shock of the cavalry; they were thereupon to feign a retreat back into the defile. The Frankish hors.e.m.e.n emitted such loud yells that, despite the considerable distance that separated us from the plain and the elevation of the plateau, their savage cries reached us like a m.u.f.fled roar pierced from time to time by the distant notes of their wind instruments. As ordered, our soldiers did not yield to the first impetuous attack. In an instant we could see through the thick cloud of dust, raised by the Frankish horse, only a confused ma.s.s, in the midst of which our soldiers could be distinguished by their brilliant armor.

Presently our troops began to operate their retreat towards the defile, yielding the ground before them foot by foot to the swarm of Frankish a.s.sailants, who received every moment fresh accessions from the cavalry of their vanguard, while their main body began to move at a quickened step.

"By heaven!" cried Victorin, his fiery eyes fixed upon the field, "our brave Firmian who commands those three cohorts seems to have forgotten in his ardor for the fray that he was steadily to fall back into the defile so as to draw the enemy in after him. Firmian is no longer retreating; he has stopped and does not budge back an inch--he will cause his troops to be uselessly sacrificed--"

And addressing one of the officers:

"Ride quick to Ruper, and order him to proceed with his three veteran cohorts to the support of Firmian's retreat. Ruper is to order the retreat to be made rapidly. The bulk of the Frankish army is now only a hundred bow-shots from the entrance of the defile."

The officer departed at a gallop. Obedient to the orders that he carried, the three veteran cohorts speedily emerged from the defile at the double quick; they hastened to join and sustain Firmian's troops; a little later the feigned retreat was effected in good order. Seeing the Gauls yield, the Franks set up a shout of savage joy, and charged impetuously upon our cohorts. The Frankish vanguard was soon close to the mouth of the defile. Suddenly Victorin grew pale. Anxiety was depicted on his face as he cried:

"By my father's sword! Can I have been mistaken as to the barbarians'

plans? Do you perceive their movement?"

"Yes," I said, "instead of following their vanguard into the defile, the Frankish army has halted; it is forming into numerous separate columns of attack, and these are marching towards the plateau! Malediction! They are resorting to the skilful manoeuvre that you feared. Oh, we have taught the barbarians the art of war!"

Victorin did not reply. He seemed to be counting the enemy's columns of attack. Thereupon he galloped back to our main army and cried:

"My boys! It is not now in the defile that we are to await these barbarians--we shall have to fight them in the open field. Fall upon them from the height of the plateau that they are seeking to climb--drive their hordes into the Rhine! They are three to our one--so much the better! This evening, when we shall be back in camp, our mother, Victoria, will say to us: 'Children, you were brave!'"

At these words, Rolla, the druid bard, improvised the following war song, which he struck up with a powerful, resonant voice:

"This morning we say:-- 'How many are there of these barbarous hordes, Who thievishly aspire to rob us of land.

Of homes, of wives, and of suns.h.i.+ne?

Yes, how many are there of these Franks?'

"This evening we'll say:-- 'Make answer, thou sod, red drenched In the blood of the stranger; Make answer, ye deep-rolling waves of the Rhine; Make answer, ye crows that flutter for carrion, Make answer--make answer!

How many were they, These robbers of land, of homes, of wives and of suns.h.i.+ne?