THE MAIN FIGHT. 345 once burst down upon it in a torrent of vehement chap. speech. ' Brothers/ ' Comrades,' ' My brave fel- ' 'lows,' 'Forward!' — these turned into French, and S'^-^'*^ repeated again, and again, and again — were some of the more predominant words which they hurled at the shaken battalion. The phrases they chose might be simple, and spoken perhaps more or less in the accents of the barbarous north ; but the great trunk column was close, and the hearers of this eager appeal were after all men of a race deeply prizing its honour in war. The French soldiery listened, nay seemed to acknowledge, and acknowledge with favour, the value of a fresh motive power. They took heart. They ceased to fall back, and perhaps if the whole bat- talion had been under the same wholesome sway, it might have not only rallied completely, but even passed into the mood for undertaking a bayonet-charge. But with the right of the battalion, meanwhile, all seemed to be going on ill. There, the soldiery were not within hearing-reach of Pennefather or the officers near him ; and despite all the vehe- ment efforts of the French officers (who were striking their men right and left with the fiat of the sword), numbers not only turned and broke in disorder, but fell back so heavily upon the friendly line of the English as to burst their way through it. This occurred at the part of the line where Vaughan had drawn up the small thread of soldiery under him. Yet, even in this the most disordered part of
