foolish panics, multiply our partizans, offer traps and ambushes to harass the enemy, and inaugurate a national war. The republic demands the cooperation of all; it will utilize the courage of all its citizens, employ the capabilities of each, and according to its traditional policy will make young men its chiefs. Heaven itself will cease to favour our adversaries; the autumn rains will come, and detained and held in check by the capital, far from their homes, and troubled and anxious for the future, the Prussians will be decimated one by one by our arms, by hunger, and by nature. No, it is not possible that the genius of France should be for evermore obscured; it cannot be that a great nation shall let its place in the world be taken from it by an invasion of 500,000 men! Up then in a mass, and let us die rather than suffer the shame of dismemberment! In the midst of our disasters we have still the sentiment left of French unity, and the indivisibility of the Republic. Paris, surrounded by the enemy, affirms more loudly and more gloriously than ever the immortal device which is dictated to the whole of France:--Long live the Republic! Long live France! Long live the Republic, one and indivisible.""

While the minister of the new French republic was careering through the clouds in a balloon, another and more celebrated republican was hastening from an opposite direction to meet him. Till lately Garibaldi had been virtually a prisoner in his island home, the Italian government keeping a vigilant eye on him. Ever since the fall of the empire, however, it had been his anxious desire to come to the assistance of the newly declared republic. His services in the field were at once offered, but the reply of the delegate government to his offer had been delayed. A brief but characteristic letter to his son-in-law, M. Canzio, explains his position in the meantime:

| vigilance, and escaping to France in what was there known as a yack. He arrived in Tours the same day as Gambetta (October 9), and so unexpectedly, that no preparations had been made for his reception. On the news of his arrival becoming known, however, a large number of franc-tireurs assembled before the prefecture window, at which the general presented himself, and in reply to the enthusiastic cheers with which he was greeted, said :-" My children, your welcome and that of your brothers overwhelms me. I am only a soldier like yourselves. I come to place myself among you, to fight for the holy republic!"

Garibaldi brought with him a name, but little more, to the aid of the republic he loved. The liberator of Italy, whose kindly face, loose grey cloak, and scarlet shirt, were familiar to every child in Christendom, more fitly represented the idea of a republic than any other man in Europe; and it was hoped that his presence in France at this time would give to the popular rising throughout the country an impetus, such as the appeals and proclamations of the new government had failed to impart. The state of his health, however, totally unfitted him for regular warfare; he knew little of the duties of a general in command of a large army; and he was looked on as the most dangerous and wicked of men by a large portion of the French, and by such persons as Colonel Charette and the pontifical zouaves, whose aid in this moment of need had also been tendered to and accepted by the French government. Singularly enough, Colonel Charette was also at Tours on this memorable day, exercising his troops, fresh from the defence of the pope.

To General Cambriels, who commanded in the east, Garibaldi was despatched to Besançon, to take command of the free corps and of a brigade of mobiles in the Vosges. He carried a strong letter of recommendation from Gambetta, and he seems to have been received with the utmost

consideration by the civil and military authorities, as well as with great enthusiasm by the people.

M. Gambetta at the head of affairs, issuing commissions to parties so antagonistic as Garibaldi and the champions of the temporal power, offered to the imagination a strange, if not grotesque, combination of circumstances. But although he and his curious allies or subordinates were all animated with the most intense desire to benefit France, it seemed impossible that elements so dis

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cordant should long cohere, unless welded together for a time by a success which they shared in common. At present a bright spot in the fortunes of France was nowhere visible; but the courage and resources of her people were great, and their feelings of hatred against the invaders intense; and in these circumstances it was impossible to say what change to the better might not yet take place. Even a small advantage gained over a German force in a fair fight, might have the effect of reviving the confidence of the French, and inciting them to put forth the great power they undoubtedly possessed. With all the energy of which he was capable, M. Gambetta set about organizing armies in all the provinces of France, admonishing prefects, displacing and appointing generals, and showing himself whereever his presence could stimulate flagging patriotism or remove the depression caused by reverses. He issued a decree, establishing four military régions: 1, the Northern, to be commanded by Bourbaki, at Lille; 2, the Western, with General Fiereck commander, and Le Mans for headquarters; 3, the Central, commanded by General Polhès, at Bourges; 4, the Eastern, commanded by General Cambriels, at Besançon. Besides these, General La Motte Rouge on the Loire, General Esterhazy at Lyons, Count Keratry in the west, and Garibaldi in the east held distinct commissions; eight in all, acting independently of each other. The wonderful energy thus displayed by M. Gambetta had a very inspiriting effect on the country, and the despair almost universally depicted on the countenance of French patriots shortly before gave way to hope.

Meanwhile the Prussians, on their part, were carrying out a preconcerted programme in their movements to the north and south of Paris, and in the east of France. The whole district between Paris and Orleans was daily scoured by them for requisitions. At Toury a large force under Prince Albert of Prussia protected the operations for supplying the army of Paris, and an immense quantity of provisions, sheep, and cattle had been collected here from the plains of La Beauce.

Early in October the efforts of the French to raise an army behind the Loire had produced some little result; and on the 5th General Reyan, having re-occupied Orleans, which General Polhès had abandoned so hastily some ten days before, pushed northwards to Arthenay and Toury with

10,000 men against the German foraging forces. An engagement took place at Toury, which lasted from seven a.m. till twelve. The German artillery dismounted several of the French guns, but by his great superiority of numbers General Reyan obtained an easy victory, and pursued the enemy for several hours. About fifty prisoners were taken, and a number of cattle and sheep, which the Germans were unable to carry with them.

Such a sign of life on the part of the army of the Loire gave some little uneasiness to the German commander at Paris; and to extinguish this first gleam of success, which was already exciting new enthusiasm in the country, the first corps of Bavarians under Von der Tann, which had arrived last at Paris from Sedan and had been purposely held in reserve, was now therefore ordered to march southwards to discover the movements of the enemy. It was strengthened by half the infantry of the twenty-second Prussian division, and by the cavalry divisions of Prince Albert and Count Stolberg, which were already in the district.

There was a more direct line of railroad than that through Orleans to Tours, diverging to the westward of it at Bretigny, and running through Châteaudun and Vendôme. This line it was necessary to watch with cavalry, in order to cover the right of Der Tann. It was the advanced guard of a column sent for this purpose which, on the night of the 7th, was surprised and cut up by the franc-tireurs at Ablis, about thirty-three miles from Paris, and which led to the destruction of that village on the following day, as stated in the early part of the chapter.

Von der Tann marched from his late quarters about Longjumeau on the 6th, and on the 8th gained Etampes, which had been held for some days previously by the foraging party driven out from Toury, twenty miles further off, by General Reyan, on the 5th. The latter had fallen back a day's march from Toury, after the trifling success reported, and left his advanced guard of a brigade of troops at Artenay, the next large village to the south. The officer in command, General de Longuerue, seems to have kept no better look-out than those who suffered for their carelessness at Wissembourg and Beaumont. Early on the morning of the 10th the Bavarians were close upon him, and soon began to drive his troops southwards. Ignorant of the enemy's strength, he hastened to support his advanced guard with

about 10,000 men, all that he had ready to his hands. Probably Der Tann's advance was mistaken for a separate and isolated detachment. At any rate, the raw French troops were soon engaged with a body of Germans of immensely superior strength, and although they fought desperately for several hours, they were of course overcome, and, with the loss of many prisoners and some guns, forced back towards Orleans, twelve miles from the scene of the morning's action. General Longuerue and a large body of the fugitives gained the forest of Orleans, where, awaiting reinforcements, they resolved to defend themselves.

The army of the Loire, now under the chief command of General La Motte Rouge, numbered at least 60,000 men. Of these, 15,000 had been left the whole of this day to withstand a force three times their numerical strength, and possessing six times their effective value as a military body, while 45,000 were idle, within easy reach of the battle-field. Although it was well known that the Germans were coming southwards by forced marches, no measures seem to have been taken to signal their approach, or to assemble reinforcements on any particular spot. The roar of the artillery in the battle of the 10th was distinctly heard in Orleans, and to bring out the mobile guard the tocsin was rung all day. In the course of the afternoon and throughout the night La Motte Rouge arranged to get together about 40,000 troops of all descriptions, including regulars, garde mobile, the foreign legion, and the pontifical zouaves; and with these he determined to prevent, if possible, the further advance of the enemy.

The renewed engagement began early on the morning of the 11th, and lasted nearly all day. The occupation by the French of the forest of Orleans, by which they obtained the cover of the wood, proved some compensation against the superior artillery of the Germans, and towards evening gave the affair the character of a skirmish rather than of a battle. At eleven o'clock the Prussian vanguard was in position at La-Croix-Briquet, between Artenay and Chevilly, close to the railway line and the main road, which passes through the village. The other corps were placed towards Artenay, facing the borders of the forest of Orleans.

The French, advancing from Chevilly and Cercottes, took up a line to cover their retreat on the forest, and extending in the direction of Orleans.

They occupied the villages of Le Vieux, Cercottes, Salan, and the château of Les Quatre-cheminées and that of La Vallée, nearly reaching Orleans.

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The two armies were soon engaged along their whole line, and the fighting was well sustained by both. The Bavarians, however, gradually gained ground. Their artillery, the arm which the French were deplorably weak, approached nearer and nearer, and occupied the best positions. The woods between Cercottes and Chartan and the village of Salan were fiercely contested, but ultimately captured. The bloodiest part of the day was the afternoon. About 3 p.m. the French were giving way on all sides towards Orleans, but at St. Jean de la Ruelle, a far-stretching suburb on the north, they made a last and desperate stand. From four till seven the fighting went on; and it can only be compared to the storming of Bazeilles. The German troops were fired on from the interior and the roofs of all the dwellings, and from the church tower; and several houses at different points were set on fire. While the great body of the Bavarians now advanced in front, the Prussian infantry division undertook a flank movement, supported by the cavalry, who could not, however, get speedily through the vineyards and narrow roads. When the bulk of the French, mobiles and franc-tireurs, saw the danger they were in of being outflanked, most of them discharged their guns at haphazard, and a panic set in, during which 3000 prisoners were made, and three guns taken.

As the conflict drew close to the city of Orleans, the shells reached the houses, and the confusion and terror was extreme. Soldiers and artillerymen crossed the Boulevards close to the railway. Their route was stopped by mobiles, but they continued their retreat, and the terrified inhabitants ran in all directions, exclaiming, "Les Prussiens! Les Prussiens!" Reinforcements arrived in the town while the battle was going on; but instead of proceeding to the field, they idled in the streets and cafés, the officers playing cards and the men roaming at discretion. When the flying army began to pass, those men hastened to join the rout, flung away their arms or broke them, and crossed the bridge over the Loire. Fortunately the principal columns of the French force had already retreated without confusion on La Ferté St. Aubin, at Olivet, on the little river Loiret. During the battle the regulars behaved very ill,