attle was lost.

We closed around our chief, perhaps a score of us, some even of that
number already desperately wounded. No one spoke, but we set our teeth
hard, resolving grimly that there should be twenty corpses before
Anjou's victorious troopers reached him.

"We must stop them," said Coligny, speaking in evident pain, "turn them
back, beg them to fight, or the Cause is lost."

Again and again we endeavoured to make a stand; calling on the fugitives
to halt, to remember they were Frenchmen, to look their foes in the
face--it was useless, every little group that formed for a moment being
swept away by the raging, human torrent.

"Some one must find Count Louis of Nassau," said our general, "and say I
trust to him to cover the retreat. We may yet rally the runaways."

We looked at each other in doubt. It was not the fear of death that kept
us tongue-tied, though death lay in our rear, but each man wished to
spend his life for our beloved leader.

"Let three or four of you go," he said; "one may reach him," and as he
spoke his glance seemed to light on my face.

"I will take the Count your message, my lord!" I cried, and without
waiting for a reply turned my horse's head, and dashed into the
whirlpool.

The battle-field was a hideous scene. Wherever the eye could reach, men
were fighting and dying. There was no order even among the conquerors. I
came across a little knot of Huguenot gentlemen who had turned furiously
at bay.

"For the Admiral!" I cried, plunging in wild excitement into the midst
of the hostile sworders. "For the Admiral!" Perhaps my comrades thought
me mad, and in sober truth they would not have been far wrong; but they
were generous souls, and with a yell of defiance they cut their way
through after me.

"Count Louis," I said breathlessly to the first man, as we emerged on
the other side, "where is he?"

"I do not know; he was on our right wing when the crash came."

"I must find him; I have a message from the chief"

"Let us try the right wing," he said, "they are making a stand there."

A dozen gentlemen had followed me, one of them carrying a flag, and as
we galloped forward others joined us until we were fifty or sixty
strong. It was like riding into the very jaws of death, but they asked
no questions; the sight of the flag was sufficient. A body of infantry
barred our path; we turned neither to right nor left, but crashed
straight through them. A few foot-soldiers ran with us, h