; he opened
his arms and, with a great sob, clasped her in a long embrace, and she,
beside herself with the grief of parting, returned his kiss. Then the
horse started, he turned about in his seat, there was a waving of hands,
while again and again two sorrowful voices repeated in choking accents:

"Farewell! Farewell!"

On her return to Remilly that evening Henriette reported for duty at
the hospital. During the silent watches of the night she was visited
by another convulsive attack of sobbing, and wept, wept as if her tears
would never cease to flow, clasping her hands before her as if between
them to strangle her bitter sorrow.

VII.

On the day succeeding the battle of Sedan the mighty hosts of the two
German armies, without the delay of a moment, commenced their march on
Paris, the army of the Meuse coming in by the north through the
valley of the Marne, while the third army, passing the Seine at
Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, turned the city to the south and moved on
Versailles; and when, on that bright, warm September morning, General
Ducrot, to whom had been assigned the command of the as yet incomplete
14th corps, determined to attack the latter force while it was marching
by the flank, Maurice's new regiment, the 115th, encamped in the woods
to the left of Meudon, did not receive its orders to advance until the
day was lost. A few shells from the enemy sufficed to do the work; the
panic started with a regiment of zouaves made up of raw recruits, and
quickly spreading to the other troops, all were swept away in a headlong
rout that never ceased until they were safe behind the walls of Paris,
where the utmost consternation prevailed. Every position in advance of
the southern line of fortifications was lost, and that evening the wires
of the Western Railway telegraph, the city's sole remaining means of
communicating with the rest of France, were cut. Paris was cut off from
the world.

The condition of their affairs caused Maurice a terrible dejection. Had
the Germans been more enterprising they might have pitched their tents
that night in the Place du Carrousel, but with the prudence of their
race they had determined that the siege should be conducted according
to rule and precept, and had already fixed upon the exact lines of
investment, the position of the army of the Meuse being at the north,
stretching from Croissy to the Marne, through Epinay, the cordon of the
third army at the south, from Chennevie