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being generally the bare pavement which served ing them, was scandalised by this breach of both for bed and table.' discipline: Is this then what you understand by war, and are we come here to grow tender and have attacks of nerves? What then will come of it when the grapeshot is sweeping us away by the dozen? Come, face about.' And, pride getting the better of fear and pity, the waverers returned to their ranks, braced instead of shaken by this catastrophe.

The corps of Gamber slept in their ranks in the main street, sitting back to back with their muskets between their legs. When morning dawned it was found necessary to evacuate the town, the students, with Gamber, gallantly bringing up the rear. They ascertained afterwards that the garrison of the tower could not have held out many hours longer for want of Instead of harassing the Chouans in their retreat, their first step was to throw themselves all black and panting into the river.

water.

This check had the usual effect of sowing discontent and dissension amongst the unsuccessful party, who loudly accused their General of incapacity-not without reason, for his former sufferings in the cause had fairly worn him out, and he was both bodily and mentally effete. All their hopes were now fixed on the speedy arrival of a vessel laden with arms and ammunition

that had been promised, and they were drawing towards the coast to cover the disembarkation, when their courage was put to the proof under circumstances which might have shaken the stoutest veterans.

Separated from the enemy by a river; they were dispersed through a village and asleep, when a sudden attempt was made to get at them across a bridge. Cadoudal was instantly on the spot with five or six of his best men, and succeeded in checking the advance till the rest of the troops, including the students, had got under arms, but their situation was still precarious in the extreme. Gamber was at some distance with his battalion, and, though Cadoudal might succeed in making good the defence of the bridge first attempted, there was another at a short distance by which the position might be turned. This post was assigned to the students, and they had not been two minutes upon the ground when the cannon-balls began to fall amongst them. By way of keeping up their spirits, a lad named Le Thiée, the bard of the party, struck up a song of defiance

'Si jamais le fer d'une lance

Me frappe au milieu des combats,
Je chanterai—'

There ended his song-a ball shattered his head to pieces, and covered his comrades with his blood and brains. A momentary disorder was created by this event, and, whilst some stood stupified with fear and horror, others hurried to raise the body. An old sergeant, who had assisted in drill

They were condemned, in the first instance, to undergo the severest of trialsto watch the result of a battle by which their own fate would be decided, without taking part in it. The enemy made a Cadoudal; and it was not until they were second attempt on the position occupied by again repulsed in this quarter that they assailed that entrusted to the students. Making light of such opponents, they rushed head of the column was half over, they at once upon the bridge; but before the found reason to repent of their rashness. Follow me, my children,' exclaimed Marforemost dead. His young lieutenant was gadel, and, springing forward, he shot the in the act of taking aim at the second, when he received a bullet through the heart, and fell back into the arms of his brother, who was mortally wounded almost at the same instant. This time, however, the nerves of the band were steeled, and they fought under the impulse of a kind of phrenzied smoke and choked with powder, up to the intoxication-rushing, half blinded with

very

and not firing till their own were stopped muzzle of their adversaries' muskets, by the body of an enemy. When the fire

slackened and the smoke cleared away, the Blues were bridge; fortunately for the students, who, seen retiring from the by the end of the skirmish, had not above two cartridges apiece left. Expecting an immediate renewal of the attack, they were giving up all for lost, when the white caps of a troop of women appeared in the dis

tance.

came to take care of the wounded—but it It was thought at first that they was neither lint nor food that their aprons were loaded with; they brought cartridges made upon the instant; for the manufacture of which, in default of lead, they had melted their tin cooking utensils.'

The situation of affairs was still most critical. Two cannon were brought to bear upon the students with effect, and under cover of a sustained discharge of grapeshot the enemy's skirmishers were gradually closing in upon them, when the videttes were seen galloping up to the imperial General with all the marks of confusion; and directly afterwards the firing ceased,

the wounded were hastily got together, and the Blues appeared in full retreat. The mystery was soon solved by the appearance of old Gamber at the head of 500 picked men, who, without a moment's hesitation, pushed on to intercept and engage a force which quadrupled his own. His skill was fortunately on a par with his audacity; so able were his dispositions, and so fiery his onslaught, that in less than five minutes the Blues gave way on all sides. The students were unable to second him for want of ammunition, and the chevalier very properly refused to expose them to be charged in their disabled state by a reserve of cavalry which kept hovering about the ground. They consequently only arrived in time to thank Gamber for his timely succour, and save the wounded from being plundered.

'A spectacle entirely new for both conquerors and conquered then presented itself. Children, whose hearts were choking with suppressed tears, protecting veteran soldiers who had just been killing their comrades! A grenadier with long moustachios, who appeared to suffer horribly since he had been pulled about with a view to plunder, was doubled up in a puddle of his own blood, his eyes closed, his hands con

of Francheville, who on their first joining inquired whether the central committee had provided nurses enough for such numbers of children. Still they were destined to undergo one deep mortification. A cargo of arms arrived, amongst which were a quantity of light carbines of elegant manufacture, looking as if made on purpose for them. To these they instantly laid claim; but in vain did they recapitulate their services; in vain did they strip off their jackets to exhibit their shoulders, bruised and lacerated by the large clumsy muskets they had been loaded with; the tempting carbines were awarded to a newly-formed company of decayed gentlemen who had just emerged from their hiding-places. But we are anticipating. This disappointment did not befall them until they had fought the most fatal of their fights, the murderous conflict around and in the town of Aury.

The Chouans were again posted with a river in their front; but this time there were six bridges instead of two, and by a strange oversight no one thought of destroying them. General Bigarre, the imperial commander, came in sight in the afternoon; but as his troops were fatigued by a vulsed, and his mouth open, not to cry Mercy! long march, he quartered them for the night but to blaspheme and curse. He believed that in the cloisters of a neighbouring chapel, his executioners were still there, ready to tor- where he shrewdly calculated, the Chouans ture him by new acts of violence. What was would deem it sacrilegious to annoy him by his surprise, on opening his eyes, to see his de- their shot. Gamber himself had no scrufender, whose mild and feminine physiognomy ples of the sort, and proposed to scale the hardly announced fifteen years, putting back the walls, but his opinion was overruled, and curious and ill-disposed with his carbine, and from that moment the old chief gave up all tracing around his protégé a magic circle that none of them dared to cross! At this sight the for lost. One of the patrols found him in old soldier burst into tears, and, stammering tears, and inquired if any misfortune had out some words which were no longer curses, befallen him.-'Not yet,' was the reply, he searched his pocket and his pouch as if look-but I weep beforehand for that which caning for a watch or purse to offer to his protector. not fail to befall us to-morrow.' These brigands"-he exclaimed with a tone of regret rather than reproach-" have left me nothing except this gourd" he added, all radiant with joy when he found it was not empty -"after five hours' fighting you must be both hot and thirsty come, my child, drink to my health: it will do you good, and me too."

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Even civil war is softened by such episodes. It is melancholy to be obliged to add, that in the very next engagement this gallant boy was numbered with the dead. One of the youngest, named Leray, being struck by a bullet in the side, began to cry. He had already given proofs of the highest courage, and 'this indulgence of an instinct congenial to his age,' adds M. Rio, 'by no means diminished our admiration.'

Their defence of the bridge made the students the heroes and favourites of the army, and they heard no more sarcastic allusions to their size-such as fell from the sailors

At sunrise Bigarre issued from his quarters, resolved to force his way into Auray before night. The main body of the Chouans were posted directly in his path, but their cannon, on which they mainly relied, had not come up, and one division, that of Secillon, was seized with a panic and fled, whilst their leader tore his hair with rage.

'In his despair he mingled curses with threats, and told Rohu to fire upon them, which he would certainly have done himself if he had had a loaded musket in his hands. With his best men, determined to atone for the defection of their comrades by their bravery, he hastened to place himself alongside of Cadoudal, who fulfilled that day, much more in reality than De Sol, the duties of commander-in-chief, and was himself furious at the delay of the guns, on which he founded his last hope of victory. He had just interrupted, with very little ceremony, the fine compliments of the Marquis de la Boissière,

to tell him to gallop as fast as he could and | dren,' was his address, I insist on being hasten the advance of the artillerymen, who your only leader to-day; promise me not ought to have been there an hour ago, and to quit me during the action, and to execute already our major-general (de la Boissière) was turning to execute this commission with all the faithfully whatever I may command.' An zeal of an aide-de-camp, when Rohu, whose unanimous acclamation of assent was the anti-aristocratic instincts sometimes showed reply, and they proceeded to post themthemselves under brutal forms, seeing him turn selves on a ridge commanding the road, rehis back on the field of battle, ran and fastened solved on making the Blues pay a heavy on the mane of his horse, swearing that he toll before passing. They opened so close should not move a step farther, and asking if and well-aimed a fire on the foremost column his title of marquis dispensed him from risking that it stopped short. An adjutant major his person like the rest. There arose then so was killed, the commander-in-chief receivgreat a tumult around the two disputants, that much precious time was lost in explanations be- ed a wound long deemed mortal, and one of fore the intractable Rohu could be induced to his aides-de-camp was stretched beside him. let go his hold.’ But the reserve, like the main body, was soon hemmed in by skirmishers, and so thick a storm of shot was hailed upon them that they were almost blinded by the leaves and branches cut from some chestnut trees above their heads. Margadel, conceiving that enough had been done for honour, now gave the signal for retreat. The Blues followed close, but a little nearer the town they were encountered by another reserve posted in a cemetery, which it cost them dear to dislodge. The very gate was the scene of a third heroic effort. A gentleman of Auray, M. de Molien, at the head of a few royalists, resolutely barred the passage of the Blues. Repeatedly was he borne to the ground, yet again and again did he rush upon their bayonets, till he fell senseless, and was left for dead in the street.

This bears a curious resemblance to an incident at Bothwell Brigg, described in Old Mortality,' when Henry Morton's retrograde movement to bring up fresh troops is similarly misconstrued. The Blues in the mean time had moved up, and were on the point of charging with the bayonet, when they received an unexpected check from Gamber-who opened so effective a fire upon their flank, that, if the reserve and artillery had been there to second him, the affair might have ended in their defeat; but their general, finding that he had greatly the advantage of numbers, kept his ground, and sent out such a multitude of skirmishers that the Chouans soon found themselves outflanked and outmanœuvred in their turn. A vigorous charge of cavalry being made at the same time against the barrier in their front, they at length fell into irremediable disorder, and the road to Auray was covered with the fugitives. The guns arrived just as the flight began, and the gunners, firing one long shot by way of announcing their presence, gallopped off in the direction of the town, which they traversed in haste, and forthwith deposited their trust in a field of corn close to the main road. Such was their hurry, that they did not even stay to unharness the horses, so that the enemy's attention was immediately attracted, and the whole artillery of the Chouans fell into their hands.

The reserve, at the head of which were the students, was quartered in Auray. No orders arrived until the streets were choked with runaways, when a staff officer gave the word Les écoliers au Champ de Martyrs,' which naturally enough struck a chill into their hearts. The Chevalier de Margadel, who had given vent to a paroxysm of rage at every fresh blunder, now thought only of the best manner of averting the useless sacrifice of his company. His first care was to put them on their guard against the impetuosity of the old sergeant: My chil

The place was carried, but the reserve kept together and formed a rallying point, to which the disconcerted Chouans soon repaired in sufficient numbers to form a fresh army. After one more engagement, however, in which a party of the Blues were seized with an unaccountable panic and rushed like madmen from the field, the struggle grew languid at the news of Waterloo, and was finally terminated by the second abdication of Buonaparte.

Amongst the most pleasing passages of the book are the meeting between the offcers of the two parties at a sort of reconciliation festival, and the reception of the students on their return. The table-talk at the festival turned naturally on the stirring scenes in which the guests had been engaged:

"They had too high an opinion of one another to avoid any subject of conversation. General Rousseau spoke of his campaign against the Chouans in a manner to excite a lively indig words were repeated, and who persevered in nation amongst certain bourgeois, to whom his He complimented de Sol on the fine bearing of seeing in us nothing but rogues and brigands. our little army during the battle of Muzillac,

and the heroism with which the students had defended their position. He then desired to know who commanded a certain battalion of peasants, who, towards the close of the action, had manoeuvred on his left flank, and induced him to beat a retreat. The Chouan officers to whom this question was addressed were standing round him, and prevented it from reaching the ear of a bald and infirm peasant, who was sitting by himself in a corner of the room, his head leaning on his breast, and his hands hanging between his legs, and who knew better than anybody of whom General Rousseau was speak-pitched upon a key which made criticism iming. The General, not receiving a satisfactory answer, repeated his question, which was then better understood, and his auditors, instead of replying to it themselves, indicated by looks and gestures the old man to whom this praise referred, and who was too modest to claim it. "How! is it you, then, who did me that turn?" exclaimed Rousseau, approaching Gamber, who, at Muzillac as at other places, had no notion that he had played anything but a very subordinate part. "Come, give me your hand; I swear to you that a colonel of the imperial army could not have done better."'

Our military readers will remember the embarrassment into which the Duke of Wellington was thrown some years ago by the bequest of a thousand pounds to the man who showed most bravery at Waterloo, whom His Grace was consequently required to name. The royalist officer despatched to Vannes for the purpose encountered the same difficulty in naming a couple of students to receive the cross of the legion of honour; but he fixed at last on two who had been distinguished throughout the campaign as much by their friendship as by their bravery, and they were solemnly installed on an altar raised in the centre of the town. The description is thoroughly and charmingly French:

An expiatory mass, with a chivalrous ceremony, at which the ladies were present as in the middle age, struck no one as out of keeping; As soon as the officiating priest had descended the steps of the altar, two elegantly dressed women were seen ascending it, the sight of whom convinced the two friends about to be decorated that the memory of this day could not be equally sweet for both of them. The one who, in her quality of wife of the first magistrate of the department, occupied the right, was a venerable matron, full of feeling and dignity; but her companion, who figured in this ceremony with reluctance and out of deference to paternal authority, was an object of ecstatic admiration to all of us, less on account of her dazzling beauty than of an indefinable charm diffused over her whole person. That day the enthusiasm which pierced visibly through the embarrassment her part occasioned her, appeared to animate her naturally sad and subdued look. The officer who presided at the ceremonial, after whispering a few words into her ear, went

to fetch the two champions, the youngest of whom was in consternation at the lot which his inferiority of age and college-rank portended. His joy may be imagined when he learnt that it was precisely the reverse; that not only was he to receive the cross of honour from the hands of Mademoiselle d'Olonne upon his knees, but that, in rising from this suppliant attitude, he would be privileged to salute her on both cheeks. It required all the Breton naïveté not to be a little startled at this noble kiss, given on the very steps of an altar. But our imaginations were possible. When the pair-friends, brothers in arms, and fellow-pupils at once-advanced to kneel before their ladies, applauses and cries of joy resounded from all sides; these redoubled at the most interesting part of the ceremony, and became deafening as the thunder-clap, when, deferring to the wish passionately expressed by the assembly, Mademoiselle d'Olonne, herself an object of enthusiasm, graciously returned the salute of her knight. As for him, he was in a state of intoxication which prevented him from hearing or seeing anything, not even the steps of the altar he had to descend. He was obliged to be held up by his comrade to prevent his falling. Never before was head so young upset to this extant by the fumes of glory.'

Mademoiselle d'Olonne took the veil, and died many years ago, so that her knight may record his feelings on the occasion without any risk of exciting the jealousy of Madame. The young hero, thus kissed and kissing, was M. Rio himself.

Although we have endeavoured to compress this narrative, occupying nearly four hundred pages, within the limits of a moderate article, and although many of the incidental adventures which we have omitted are full of interest, we do not think M. Rio will suffer, on the whole, from being introduced to the English public in this manner; for he is often diffuse, and sometimes philosophical. He should have set down his facts and impressions at the time, before he had lost the fire of youth and acquired the trick of authorship,-when the Chouan rising was still, in his eyes, the grandest of recorded struggles for liberty. He now mentally compares it with other struggles, glances over the scenes of his boyhood with a calm, contemplative air, rounds a paragraph with a reflection, and spreads out or

dishes

up

his incidents with a too obvious

reference to effect. Still the bold, earnest, chivalrous character of the original man is observable throughout; and there cannot be a stronger proof of this than the manner in which all the poets who have come in contact with him are affected. Wordsworth, Milnes, Landor, Mrs. Norton, Brizeux,no sooner have they heard his tale than they proceed to embalm some striking passage

in verse.
is entitled The Eagle and the Dove,' in
allusion to the cognizance of the St. Esprit
adopted by the royalist students, and the
eagle of the imperialists:

Mr. Wordsworth's contribution ART. IV.-Animal Chemistry; or the Ap

Shade of Caractacus! if spirits love
The cause they fought for in their earthly home,
To see the Eagle ruffled by the Dove
May soothe thy memory of the chains of Rome.
These children claim thee for their sire; the

breath

Of thy renown from Cambrian mountains fans
A flame within them that despises death,
And glorifies the truant youth of Vannes.

With thy own scorn of tyrants they advance,
But truth divine has sanctified their rage;
A Silver Cross, enchas'd with flowers of France,
Their badge attests the holy fight they wage.
The shrill defiance of the
crusade
young
Their veteran foes mock as an idle noise;
But unto faith and loyalty comes aid
From Heaven-gigantic force to beardless boys.'

Mr. Milnes avails himself of the opportunity to promote the pacific intentions of his friends M. Guizot and Sir Robert Peel:

'For honest men of every blood and creed
Let green La Vendée rest a sacred spot!
Be all the guilt of Quiberon forgot
In the bright memory of its martyr-deed!
And let this little book be one more seed,

Whence sympathies may spring, encumber'd

not

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plication of Organic Chemistry to the Elucidation of Physiology and Patholo gy. By Justus Liebig, M. D. Edited from the German MS. by William Gregory, M. D., Professor of Chemistry, King's College, Aberdeen. Svo. London, 1842.

THE recent progress of Chemistry, espe cially of Organic Chemistry, has been rapid and most interesting. Throughout Europe several distinguished men have for a good many years been assiduously devoted to its cultivation; and we are now beginning to reap the benefit of their exertions. In a late article we had to notice the masterly work of Professor Liebig on 'Agricultural Chemistry; and already we have, from the same pen, a no less remarkable volume on 'Animal Chemistry.' As his new theme, in one point of view, concerns us all even more nearly than that of agriculture, we shall endeavour to give our readers some notion of the kind and degree of light which our author's labours promise to throw on the obscure and difficult, but most important subject of physiology.

The readers of the Agricultural Chemistry' will remember that he has there developed, and, as we think, established by a very beautiful inductive argument, his theory of fermentation, putrefaction, and decay; or, to speak more generally, of chemical transformation or metamorphosis. In order to the understanding of the present work, it is desirable that we should state, very briefly, the nature of that theory, on which so many of its details are founded.

Professor Liebig, then, applies the name in which a given compound, by the presof metamorphosis to those chemical actions ence of a peculiar substance, is made to resolve itself into two or more new compounds: as, for example, when sugar, by the presence of ferment or yest, is made to yield alcohol and carbonic acid.

There are various forms of metamorphosis. Sometimes the elements of the ferment, or exciting body, do not enter into the composition of the new compounds: such is the case in the fermentation of sugar. At other times all the bodies present contribute to the formation of the new products. Thirdly, in one form of metamorphosis, namely, that of decay, or eremacausis, the oxygen of the air is essential to the change: as when alcohol is converted into acetic acid, or wine into vinegar. When an inodorous gas is one of the products, the process is called fermentation; when any of the products are fetid, it is

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