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Maurice, who had lain down again, arose and said to Jean in great excitement:

“Look! over there on the left, that is Honore’s battery. I can recognize the men.”

Jean gave him a back-handed blow that brought him down to his recumbent position.

“Lie down, will you! and make believe dead!”

But they were both deeply interested in watching the maneuvers of the battery, and never once removed their eyes from it; it cheered their heart to witness the cool and intrepid activity of those men, who, they hoped, might yet bring victory to them.

The battery had wheeled into position on a bare summit to the left, where it brought up all standing; then, quick as a flash, the cannoneers leaped from the chests and unhooked the limbers, and the drivers, leaving the gun in position, drove fifteen yards to the rear, where they wheeled again so as to bring team and limber face to the enemy and there remained, motionless as statues. In less time than it takes to tell it the guns were in place, with the proper intervals between them, distributed into three sections of two guns each, each section commanded by a lieutenant, and over the whole a captain, a long maypole of a man, who made a terribly conspicuous landmark on the plateau. And this captain, having first made a brief calculation, was heard to shout:

“Sight for sixteen hundred yards!”

Their fire was to be directed upon a Prussian battery, screened by some bushes, to the left of Fleigneux, the shells from which were rendering the position of the Calvary untenable.

“Honore’s piece, you see,” Maurice began again, whose excitement was such that he could not keep still, “Honore’s piece is in the center section. There he is now, bending over to speak to the gunner; you remember Louis, the gunner, don’t you? the little fellow with whom we had a drink at Vouziers? And that fellow in the rear, who sits so straight on his handsome chestnut, is Adolphe, the driver–”

First came the gun with its chief and six cannoneers, then the limber with its four horses ridden by two men, beyond that the caisson with its six horses and three drivers, still further to the rear were the prolonge, forge, and battery wagon; and this array of men, horses and materiel extended to the rear in a straight unbroken line of more than a hundred yards in length; to say nothing of the spare caisson and the men and beasts who were to fill the places of those removed by casualties, who were stationed at one side, as much as possible out of the enemy’s line of fire.

And now Honore was attending to the loading of his gun. The two men whose duty it was to fetch the cartridge and the projectile returned from the caisson, where the corporal and the artificer were stationed; two other cannoneers, standing at the muzzle of the piece, slipped into the bore the cartridge, a charge of powder in an envelope of serge, and gently drove it home with the rammer, then in like manner introduced the shell, the studs of which creaked faintly in the spirals of the rifling. When the primer was inserted in the vent and all was in readiness, Honore thought he would like to point the gun himself for the first shot, and throwing himself in a semi-recumbent posture on the trail, working with one hand the screw that regulated the elevation, with the other he signaled continually to the gunner, who, standing behind him, moved the piece by imperceptible degrees to right or left with the assistance of the lever.

“That ought to be about right,” he said as he arose.

The captain came up, and stooping until his long body was bent almost double, verified the elevation. At each gun stood the assistant gunner, waiting to pull the lanyard that should ignite the fulminate by means of a serrated wire. And the orders were given in succession, deliberately, by number:

“Number one, Fire! Number two, Fire!”

Six reports were heard, the guns recoiled, and while they were being brought back to position the chiefs of detachment observed the effect of the shots and found that the range was short. They made the necessary correction and the evolution was repeated, in exactly the same manner as before; and it was that cool precision, that mechanical routine of duty, without agitation and without haste, that did so much to maintain the morale of the men. They were a little family, united by the tie of a common occupation, grouped around the gun, which they loved and reverenced as if it had been a living thing; it was the object of all their care and attention, to it all else was subservient, men, horses, caisson, everything. Thence also arose the spirit of unity and cohesion that animated the battery at large, making all its members work together for the common glory and the common good, like a well-regulated household.