at me, if you like, but the thought came like a whisper from heaven. Perhaps it is the last wish you will see fulfilled,' said I to myself. And as if some invisible guide had led me, I made my way to your very carriage, just as the twelve-pounder played you the trick. Only see now how hearty the child is; it grows like its mother! Ah! if I only had something for you, poor darling! Were we but in Paris, that I might give you a pocketful of bonbons!'

"And in fondling and chattering with the infant, he forgot both his crushed arm and the destruction that raged so actively around. The storm of shot had no terrors for him; twenty battles had accustomed him to it. But the sweet emotions of paternal love were new to him, and a secret voice seemed to warn him that he would not long enjoy them.

"Ludwig now came up and greeted the colonel. Bianca gave the child to Jeannette, for Regnard, with only one arm, could not hold it, and she felt that her strength was giving way amidst this complication of horrors. She leaned against the wheel of the carriage. Bernard observed her faltering, and encircling her tenderly with his arm, he kissed her pale cheek. "See yonder woman,' he said; 'take pattern by her; see, dearest sister! how calm she is amidst the ravages of death.'

About twenty paces off, a tall female figure sat upon a horse, a child of three years old in her arms, and gazed steadily at the tumult. A black veil was twined round her head, but left her noble and striking countenance exposed. She could but just have arrived, otherwise her appearance was too remarkable not to have attracted attention, even in that hour of confusion when few thought of any thing but their danger.

"Calm?' said Bianca, after a long look, calm, say you? Petrified, you should say. See you not the tears that roll over her rigid countenance, and the despairing gaze she directs to heaven? Alas, poor woman!'

'She is the widow of Colonel Lavagnac,' said Regnard; her husband fell three weeks ago at Wiazma; the child in her lap is her daughter.'

"All eyes were fixed in pity on the

mourning figure, when a cannon-ball boomed through the air, and struck her and her horse to the ground. A cry of horror escaped the bystanders. The unhappy woman had disappeared. One could not see her for the throng. Bernard, Ludwig, and Regnard forced a passage through the mob of men and horses, but with all their efforts their progress was slow. Bianca followed them, led partly by pity and partly by fear of separation from her protectors.

"Silent and uncomplaining, the lady sat upon the ensanguined snow, her tall, dignified form supported against an overturned cart, her child clasped in her arms. The shot had shattered both her feet, but her infant appeared unhurt, and anxiously clasped its mother's neck with its little hands. None thought of succouring the poor creatures; all were too engrossed with their own selfish misery, and few vouchsafed her more than a passing glance as they struggled onwards. She would hardly have escaped being trampled under foot, had not her wounded horse, lashing out convulsively in the agonies of death, cleared a space around her. Whilst Bernard supported his trembling sister, Ludwig and Regnard attempted to climb over the cart which intervened between them and the wounded lady. But at that moment the noble sufferer took a strong hair-chain from her neck, twisted it, before any could stay her hand, around her infant's throat, and with a sudden exertion of strength drew it tight. The little creature drooped its head and fell strangled on its mother's knees. In a last frantic convulsion, the unhappy parent clasped her child to her bosom, gave an agonised sigh, a glance to heaven, and fell back, dead. At that moment Ludwig and Regnard reached her, but it was too late. Bianca hid her face in her brother's bosom."

A fragment of a shell knocks over the faithful Willhofen. The fire from the Russian batteries becomes more terrible than ever, the crowd more agitated and frantic.

"Let us keep together!' cried Regnard-' once separated, we shall never meet again.' And he stretched out his hand to grasp that of Ludwig, when a ball passed between them, overthrowing the colonel.

""Regnard!' cried Ludwig, springing to his assistance, are you badly hit?'

"Bernard raised the wounded man by the shoulders, and bent over him. "I have got my allowance,' said Regnard, faintly. 'Where is my little daughter?',

"Shuddering, but with resolute step, Bianca came forward, the child in her arms. She kneeled beside the dying soldier and held it out to him. Regnard looked mournfully at the little creature so soon to be an orphan.

"Farewell!' he said, kissing it for the last time. You have no longer a father-but a mother-has she not?' added he, imploringly to Bianca. Greetings to Rasinski, if he still lives to receive them. Long live the Emperor !'

เ

"Upon this last exclamation, uttered in a hoarse soldier-like tone, the final breath of the dying man was expended. The next instant his soul had fled."

From the heights of Studianka the beaten French now pour down, and Bianca loses her female attendant, who perishes miserably, crushed by a gun-carriage. It will be seen that there is a considerable accumulation of horrors at this part of the romance; but tender-hearted persons, whom narratives of human suffering too painfully affect, will naturally avoid a book founded on such a campaign as that of 1812. The passage of the Beresina has been too often described to be worth dwelling upon here; and the more so as Mr Rellstab very judiciously has not attempted to alter or improve upon the reality, of itself sufficiently extraordinary and harrowing. He makes Rasinski execute the famous feat of Jacqueminot, Oudinot's aide-de-camp, who, after swimming the Beresina in spite of the piercing cold and of the floating blocks of ice that bruised and cut his horse's chest and flanks, galloped after the stragglers from Tchaplitz's retreating column, caught one, disarmed him, put him before him on his horse and swam back with him to Napoleon, who had expressed a wish for a prisoner from whom to get information.

Hopeless of crossing the crowded bridge, where a fearful struggle for precedence now goes on amongst the

mob of desperate fugitives, Bianca and her two companions take their course up stream, still bearing with them Regnard's orphan daughter, and hoping to find rest and shelter by passing themselves off as Russians. At last, seeing no signs of house or village, they sit down in despair upon the snow and await their fate; when, in accordance with Mr Rellstab's practice of bringing about opportune meetings, Rasinski and his handful of lancers ride up to them, and after the due amount of kisses and tears, a Lithuanian peasant guides them to a ford, and they get through the river in safety. At Zembin_they procure a small sledge, and Bernard and Ludwig urge Bianca to hurry forward to Wilna. Neither of them offer to accompany her, which they might with great propriety have done, seeing that they are dismounted and useless, but propose confiding her to a wounded dragoon, a proposal which she naturally enough declines, and declares she will stick to the ship-in other words to the regiment-and rough it with the rest. After which plucky decision there is no more talk of parting company till they reach Wilna. Before getting there, however, there is much to be gone through. winter sets in, and the tortures of cutting cold are added to those previously endured, slaying the sick and wounded by hundreds of a night. Overpowered by the fatigues of the day, they lie down to sleep beside their watchfires, and in the morning are stiff and cold. The northwest wind suddenly surrounds the harassed Frenchmen with the terrible atmosphere of the north pole, the air is filled with an icy dust, lips and cheeks crack and blister, the eyes are inflamed by the glittering whiteness of the snow. The horses die from extreme cold, and it is just as well for their riders, who would otherwise be frozen in their saddles. Thus Rasinski and his comrades find themselves dismounted, and Bianca's sledge becomes useless. They pursue their way on foot, amidst scenes of inconceivable suffering and woe. Few of those around them show fortitude in this extremity of misery. In some instances despair and madness lead to violence and shameful excesses.

For

at Smolensko. Military honour was the condition of the veteran's existence; he thought himself degraded beyond redemption by the murderous aggression to which misery, pain, and despair, had driven him; a woman had surpassed him in courage, and that was more than he could bear. A rigorous judge, he had pronounced his own doom, and executed it with his own hand.

"Deeply moved, Bernard knelt beside the body; he gathered up the scrap of tarnished ribbon which the departed soldier had prized above all earthly goods, and laid it upon the breast of the corpse.

666 Who shall deprive you of it?' he said. 'May it adorn you beyond the grave, amidst the throng of the valiant who have preceded you!'

"And they continued their journey, for the times admitted not of delay.' That night they have to fight for their quarters in the village of Malodeczno, and use their artillery for the last time, being compelled to abandon it for the want of horses. Boleslaw is killed in the action. Soon afterwards, the Emperor leaves the army, and his departure dispirits even those who admit its propriety. Things get worse and worse. Often, after a fatiguing day's march, no shelter is obtainable, and Bianca and her tender charge are fain to brave the inclemency of the bivouac, whilst the men watch by turns to keep off wolves and marauders. One night, when performing this duty, Jaromir is startled by a loud laugh, sounding strangely horrible in that scene of misery and desolation.

"From out of the surrounding darkness a grim figure stalked into the circle of fire-light. It was a gigantic cuirassier, wrapped in a tattered cloak, a bloody cloth bound round his head beneath his helmet. In his hand he carried a young fir tree, as a staff to support his steps. "Good evening,' he said, in a hollow voice to Jaromir. 'Good evening, comrade. You seem merry here.' "What seek you?' demanded Jaromir, amazed at this hideous apparition! There is no place for you here. Begone!'

"The cuirassier stared at him with his hollow eyes, twisted his mouth

into a frightful grin, and gnashed his teeth like some infuriated beast.

666

Ha, ha, ha!' he laughed, or rather yelled; 'Sleep you then so sound, ye idlers?' And as he spoke he stamped with his foot on a frozen corpse upon which he stood. Awake, awake! he cried, and come with me!'

"For a moment he stood as if listening to some distant sound, then tottered painfully forward to the fire.

"Back!' cried Jaromir, Back, or I shoot you on the spot! And he drew a pistol; but his hand, trembling with fever, had not strength to level it.

"The lunatic stared at him with stupified indifference, his sunken features varying in their expression from a ghastly smile to the deepest misery. Jaromir gazed at him in silent horror. The huge figure stretched its lean arms out from under the cloak, and made strange and unintelligible gestures.

"Ho! I am frozen!' howled the human spectre at last, and shook himself. Then he clutched at the flames with his fingers, like an infant, and staggered nearer and nearer till he stood close to the circle of sleepers, far within which he extended his arms. For the first time he now seemed to feel the warmth of the fire. A low whining noise escaped him, then he suddenly exclaimed, in tones between laughing and crying, 'To bed! to my warm bed!' tossed his fir-tree staff far from him, stumbled forwards over the sleeping soldiers, and threw himself, in his raging madness, into the centre of the glowing pile.

"Help, help!' cried Jaromir, his hair erect with horror, and seizing Rasinski, he shook him with all his remaining strength.

"What is it?' cried Rasinski, raising himself.

"There, there!' stammered his friend, pointing to the flames, in which the unhappy cuirassier lay writhing and bellowing with agony. Rather conjecturing than comprehending what had occurred, Rasinski started up to rescue the sufferer. But it was too late.

The heat had already stifled him; he lay motionless, the flame licking greedily round his limbs, and

a thick nauseous smoke ascending in clouds from his funeral faggots. Rasinski stepped shudderingly backward, and turned away his face to conceal his emotion; then he observed that all around him lay buried in a deathlike sleep. Not one had been aroused by the terrible catastrophe that had occurred in the midst of so many living men."

After those long days of hunger and fatigue, the bonds of slumber were of iron strength, and difficult to loosen. And it was even more dangerous than difficult to rob the survivors of the Grand Army of that brief repose, often their sole solace and refreshment during the twenty-four hours. In his turn overtaken by delirium, Jaromir's cries and complaints at last awoke the whole party round the fire. A low murmur arose amongst the soldiers, and rapidly increased. Soon they cast ominous and threatening glances at the young Pole, and at last their discontent found a voice.

"Who is the madman, and what ails him?' savagely exclaimed a bearded grenadier. He robs us of our precious sleep! Thrust him from the fire-let him freeze if he cannot be still!'

"Ay, thrust him out!' was the universal cry; and several sprang to accomplish the barbarous deed. Bianca uttered a cry of terror; Ludwig caught her in his right arm, and with his left kept off the assailants. Rasinski, who at once saw the greatness of the peril, left Jaromir in Bernard's care, and leaped with flashing eyes into the midst of the circle. Ever prompt and decided, he snatched a half consumed branch from the fire, waved it above his head, and shouted with that lion's voice so often heard above the thunder of the battle, 'Back, knaves! The first step forward costs one of you his life.'

"The angry soldiers hesitated and hung back, yielding to Rasinski's moral ascendency as much as to his threat of punishment. But then the grenadier drew his sabre and furiously exclaimed:

"What, dastards, are ye all afraid of one man? Forward! Down with the Polish dogs!'

"Down thyself, inhuman ruffian!' thundered Rasinski, and sprang to

meet his foe. Adroitly seizing the soldier by the wrist of his uplifted arm, so that he could not use his weapon, he struck him over the head with the burning branch so violently, that the charred wood shivered, and a cloud of sparks flew out. But the blow, heavy as it was, was deadened by the thick bearskin cap, and served only to convert the angry determination of the grenadier into foaming fury. Of herculean build, and at least half the head taller than his opponent, he let his sabre fall, and grappled Rasinski with the intention of throwing him into the flames. The struggle lasted but for a moment before Rasinski tottered and fell upon his knees. To all appearance his doom was sealed, the hero succumbed before the overpowering strength of the brute, when Ludwig flew to his assistance, dragged the soldier backwards, and fell with him to the ground. Rasinski picked up the sabre, with his left hand dashed the bearskin from the head of the fallen grenadier, and with the right dealt him a blow that clove his skull in twain. Then, erecting his princely form, he advanced, with the calm dignity that characterised him, into the midst of the astounded bystanders. Throw the corpse into the snow,' commanded he lie down again and sleep. It matters no more than if I knocked a wolf upon the head.'

เ

"As if he had no longer occasion for it, he threw the sabre contemptuously from him. None dared to murmur, but two soldiers obediently raised the bloody corpse of the fallen man, carried it a few paces, and threw it upon the snow-covered ground."

The following evening the little band of friends reached Wilna, but without Jaromir, who had expired on the road. Wilna, the first inhabited town the French army had seen since their entrance into Russia, had been looked forward to by the fugitives who escaped from the terrible passage of the Beresina, as a refuge and a resting-place. There they fondly expected shelter from the cold, food for the famishing, bandages and medicine for the wounded and the sick. their arrival took the Lithuanian capital by surprise. The inhabitants were still without any certain accounts

But