Every possible approach was closed and guarded, and, thus caged
in, the Chasseurs remained for three nights and days without food or
drink. At length, by a sudden and desperate dash, on the morning
of September 20th, the seventy heroes, bearing their ten wounded
comrades, succeeded in breaking through the line of Arab sentinels,
and escaped to a neighboring chain of hills. Thither they were pursued
by their wild foemen, who, although infuriated at the daring and
success of this sally, had a sufficient respect for the heavy
carabines of the French, and merely hovered closely on their rear,
awaiting some favorable opportunity to dash in upon them. This moment
soon came. The French soldiers, no longer able to withstand the
torments of thirst, descending from the hills, in spite of the
entreaties of their officers, dashed into a neighboring stream to cool
their burning lips. The instant of doom had come, and, in less time
than it takes to recite the narrative, all but twelve of the little
band were massacred by the exulting Arabs. The twelve escaped to
Djemaa only after terrible privations and sufferings.

We might readily fill a volume with episodes equally glorious and
equally gloomy in the career of the Chasseurs. They were in nearly
all the brilliant actions of the ensuing Algerian campaigns, and, at
Zaatcha, Isly, and other famed engagements, they contended side by
side with the renowned Zouaves for the palm of military excellence.
Their agility, their promptitude in action, their ardor in attack, and
their solidity in retreat, their endurance on the march, their skill
and intelligence in availing themselves of every inequality of ground
and in turning everything to account, made them so conspicuously
preferable, as an infantry corps, for certain operations, that Marshal
Bugeaud caused the number of battalions employed in Africa to be
increased to six. From that time to the present, continual progress
has been, made in the organization, discipline, and instruction of
the Chasseurs, and all the objections which at different periods were,
raised against the special composition and details of the force having
been one by one met and obviated, France now counts no less than
twenty-one battalions of them in her army.

It was for a long time thought by some, that, although the Chasseurs,
like the Zouaves, had been successful in the skirmishing engagements
of Algeria, they would not be found so useful in European warfare.
T