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Updated: June 7, 2025
The Colonel of Tirailleurs lifted his eyes; a slight, pale effeminate, dark-eyed Parisian, who looked scarcely stronger than a hot-house flower, yet who, as many an African chronicle could tell, was swift as fire, keen as steel, unerring as a leopard's leap, untiring as an Indian on trail, once in the field with his Indigenes.
Fortune, and the well known cowardice of the Spaniards, released me from this jeopardy; they surrendered the citadel, after which the castle was of no use, and we ran down to our boats as fast as we could; and notwithstanding the very assiduous fire of the watchful tirailleurs on the hill, we all got on board without accident. There was one very singular feature in this affair.
The battalions of Zouaves and of Zephyrs; the brigade of Chasseurs d'Afrique; the squadrons of Spahis; the regiments of Tirailleurs and Turcos; the batteries of Flying Artillery, were all massed there, reassembled from the various camps and stations of the southern provinces to do honor to the day to do honor in especial to one by whom the glory of the Tricolor had been saved unstained.
United in groups, the Carabiniers could thus produce severe effect, and actually formed a sort of hand artillery, to use an expression often employed concerning them. The Tirailleurs thus composed were, owing to the shortness of their carabines, drawn up in two ranks, instead of in the regimental style of three ranks.
When the priest drew close to the tent Domini saw that it was not he who carried the lantern, but a native soldier, one of the Tirailleurs, formerly called Turcos, who walked beside him. The soldier saluted her, and the priest took off his broad, fluffy black hat. "Good-evening, Madame," he said, speaking French with the accent of Marseilles.
"Yes, if your man knew his business he would have his left about your house, his centre on Corriemuir, and his right over near the doctor's house, with his tirailleurs pushed out thickly in front. His horse, of course, would try to cut us up as we deployed on the beach. But once let us form, and we should soon know what to do. There's the weak point, there at the gap.
No one could have entered that awful mêlée and faced the bayonet charge of Pelet's cuirassiers and the hail of bullets from their tirailleurs without taking imminent risk of death. Yet Clyffurde had done it. Why? Maurice wide-eyed and sullen could only find one answer to that insistent question.
Captain Auita sends a few State capitas with us and Captain Meilleur lends us some French soldiers belonging to the 1st Senegalese Tirailleurs, a splendid set of fellows, very smart in their khaki uniforms.
They had long since made up their minds that they had seen the last of us; and it was quite amusing to witness these brave tirailleurs as they gathered around Lincoln and his comrades to hear the story of our adventures. In a few minutes our greetings were over. Twing moved on, taking with him his squadron of mounted men.
As he spoke, the music of our tirailleurs' bugles arose from the glen in front of our centre, where, in a thick beech-wood, the light infantry regiments were posted. "What is it, D'Esterre?" said he to an officer who galloped up at the moment. "They say the Russian Guard, sir, is moving to the front; our skirmishers have orders to fall back without firing."
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