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She stopped an appreciable time, and created a flutter in many anxious hearts by a loud hoot of her siren. It did not occur to anyone at the moment that she was signaling to the troops bivouacked on South Point. De Sylva was the first to read this riddle aright. He whispered his belief, and it soon won credence, since the warship continued her scrutiny of the coast-line.
At nightfall the troops bivouacked on the beach. Just before a postillion, in a splendid livery, had been brought to Napoleon. It turned out that this man had formerly been a domestic of the Empress Josephine, and was now in the service of the Prince of Monaco, who himself had been equerry to the Empress.
Although the familiar sounds of artillery boomed away quite close to them they were not deployed, and when it was dark they bivouacked along the side of the road. That night the Colonel addressed the Officers at some length. "The old man" always had an impressive way of speaking, and darkness and overwrought nerves doubtless magnified this.
The left column, under the command of Melas, took up its position in front of the Cassano entrenchments; and the Austrian division, under Generals Zopf and Ott, which formed the centre, concentrated at Canonia, ready at a given moment to seize Vaprio. The Russian and Austrian troops bivouacked within cannon-shot of the French outposts.
But I must not stop to describe the various incidents of our journey, or attempt to portray the scenery of the country we traversed. It varied greatly; sometimes being grand and beautiful, at others monotonous. Sometimes we slept at the cottages of the natives, at others we bivouacked in the woods, or under the shelter of lofty rocks.
After some difficulty we succeeded, with a small gun-flint, which I found in my pocket, and we bivouacked upon the snow, before an insufficient fire, from the scanty wood we were able to collect.
The other division, which included Bourgain-Desfeuilles' brigade, bivouacked on a wide plateau, bordered by an oak wood, behind the church. There was such confusion in locating the bodies of troops that it was dark before the 106th could move into its position at the edge of the wood. "Zut!" said Chouteau in a furious rage, "no eating for me; I want to sleep!"
Here we bivouacked for the night, and were awakened before daylight in the morning by the sound of artillery and musketry at the river, where Russell's brigade, of the First division, was forcing a passage across the stream. The Second division only had been allowed to rest quietly during the night.
With him it was "Come, boys," not "Go." Wadsworth's division and Baxter's brigade of the 2d division were sent to reinforce Hancock and Getty; but the density of the intervening forest was such that, there being no road to march upon, they did not get up with the head of column until night, and bivouacked where they were without getting into position.
On the night of the 10th he bivouacked some six or seven miles east of Trevilian, while Fitz-Hugh Lee was the same night at Trevilian Station and Hampton but a few miles away. During the night Hampton ordered an advance on Sheridan, hoping, no doubt, to surprise and very badly cripple him.
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