ng as a man
remained they could not hold the hill, and he was half-way down the
slope before he took it in. He had brought his gun with him, and he
clutched it convulsively as if he could withstand alone the whole
Prussian army. "He might have taken a younger man to do his trotting,"
he muttered to himself as he stalked along, not knowing that his wound
had occasioned his selection. "Pierre--" but, no, Pierre must stay where
he would have the opportunity to distinguish himself.

It was no holiday promenade that the old soldier was taking; for his
path lay right across the track swept by the German batteries, and the
whole distance was strewn with dead, killed as they had advanced in the
morning. But the old Sergeant got safely across. He found the General
with one or two members of his staff sitting on horseback in the road
near the park gate, receiving and answering dispatches. He delivered his
message.

"Go back and tell him he _must_ hold it," was the reply. "Upon it
depends the fate of the day; perhaps of France. Or wait, you are
wounded; I will send some one else; you go to the rear." And he gave
the order to one of his staff, who saluted and dashed off on his horse.
"Hold it for France," he called after him.

The words were heard perfectly clear even above the din of battle which
was steadily increasing all along the line, and they stirred the old
soldier like a trumpet. No rear for him! He turned and pushed back up
the hill at a run. The road had somewhat changed since he left, but
he marked it not; shot and shell were ploughing across his path more
thickly, but he did not heed them; in his ears rang the words--"For
France." They came like an echo from the past; it was the same cry he
had heard at Waterloo, when the soldiers of France that summer day
had died for France and the emperor, with a cheer on their lips. "For
France": the words were consecrated; the emperor himself had used them.
He had heard him, and would have died then; should he not die now for
her! Was it not glorious to die for France, and have men say that he had
fought for her when a babe, and had died for her when an old man!

With these thoughts was mingled the thought of Pierre--Pierre also would
die for France! They would save her or die together; and he pressed his
hand with a proud caress over the cross on his breast. It was the emblem
of glory.

He was almost back with his men now; he knew it by the roar, but the
smoke hid everythin