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The general and his aides nimbly mounted the steep stairway to the bridge, the launch swung loose, and then up to the mast-head flew a little bunch of bunting that broke as it reached the truck, and there fluttered in the strong salt wind whistling in from sea the eagerly awaited signal to "up anchor and follow."
They went as aides in an ambulance corps fitted out in Dublin by subscription, but, once on French soil, enlisted in the army. "Maybe we can kill as well as we can cure," said one of them. The Compagnie irlandaise, as it was called, did creditable work, and was in the last combat with the Prussians at Montbellard.
She was able to work out some of the aspirations she had cloudily conceived when she had herself been a slave. She did find it possible to be friendly with her aides, to be on tea and luncheon and gossip terms of intimacy with them, to confide in them instead of tricking them, to use frank explanations instead of arbitrary rules; and she was rewarded by their love and loyalty.
The aides started to their feet and one of them looked at Mr Bang, and touched the hilt of his sword, grinding the word 'satisfaction' between his teeth, while the other ordered the sentries to run the poor fellow, whose mirth had been so uproarious, through.
The soldiers of the garrison, no doubt, were ignorant of the whole transaction with the exception of the two or three miscreants who had acted as aides. Were the cibolero to assert such a thing in the town he would be laughed at no doubt arrested and punished. Even could he offer proofs, what authority was there to help him to justice?
They had been there for three hours, in great anxiety, when aides appeared, bidding them depart at once, the Emperor being unwilling to receive them. Much disconcerted, they made their way with difficulty through the crowd to their carriages.
The Arnauts and Albanians, of whom these refugees were almost entirely composed, cried from the windows that they were willing to surrender upon an assurance that they would be exempted from the massacre to which the town was doomed; if not, they threatened to fire on the 'aides de camp', and to defend themselves to the last extremity.
The executive, being unwilling to encounter the odium of this strong measure, advised that the extraordinary powers of the Commander-in- Chief should be used on the occasion. Lieut. Col. Alexander Hamilton, one of the General's aides, already in high estimation for his talents and zeal, was employed on this delicate business.
The top of this magnificent coach consisted of a sort of golden dome, upheld by four eagles with outspread wings, and surmounted by a huge crown. The Marshals of France and the colonels in command of the Guard rode on each side, near the doors of the carriage, the aides near the horses, the equerries near the hind wheels.
The platform, of course, was lined and partly filled with aides, lictors, equerries, pages, and other Imperial satellites before the Emperor rode up, dismounted and appeared among his retinue. He strode springily to the front and seated himself on the crimson cushion of the ivory curule seat which a lictor placed for him.
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