Les Misérables, v. 2/5: Cosette

  CHAPTER XIV.

  THE LAST SQUARE.

  A few squares of the Guard, standing motionless in the swash of therout, like rocks in running water, held out till night. They awaitedthe double shadow of night and death, and let them surround them. Eachregiment, isolated from the others, and no longer connected with thearmy which was broken on all sides, died where it stood. In order toperform this last exploit, they had taken up a position, some on theheights of Rossomme, others on the plain of Mont St. Jean. The gloomysquares, deserted, conquered, and terrible, struggled formidably withdeath, for Ulm, Wagram, Jena, and Friedland were dying in it. Whentwilight set in at nine in the evening, one square still remained atthe foot of the plateau of Mont St. Jean. In this mournful valley,at the foot of the slope scaled by the cuirassiers, now inundated bythe English masses, beneath the converging fire of the hostile andvictorious artillery, under a fearful hailstorm of projectiles, thissquare still resisted. It was commanded by an obscure officer of thename of Cambronne. At each volley the square diminished, but continuedto reply to the canister with musketry fire, and each moment contractedits four walls. Fugitives in the distance, stopping at moments to drawbreath, listened in the darkness to this gloomy diminishing thunder.

  When this legion had become only a handful, when their colors were buta rag, when their ammunition was exhausted, and muskets were clubbed,and when the pile of corpses was greater than the living group, thevictors felt a species of sacred awe, and the English artillery ceasedfiring. It was a sort of respite; these combatants had around them anarmy of spectres, outlines of mounted men, the black profile of guns,and the white sky visible through the wheels; the colossal death's-headwhich heroes ever glimpse in the smoke of a battle, advanced andlooked at them. They could hear in the twilight gloom that the gunswere being loaded; the lighted matches, resembling the eyes of atiger in the night, formed a circle round their heads. The linstocksof the English batteries approached the guns, and at this moment anEnglish general,--Colville according to some, Maitland according toothers,--holding the supreme moment suspended over the heads of thesemen, shouted to them, "Brave Frenchmen, surrender!"

  Cambronne answered, "Merde!"