flourished joyfully, and throughout the whole thicket sticks were seen rising with brown woollen caps whirling on the end of them.
It was a Vendean band, which surrounded him. This band fell on their knees when they saw him.
A legend runs that in the old Thuringian forests there used to be strange beings, a race of giants, more or less than men, who were considered by the Romans as horrible beasts, and by the Germans as divine incarnations, and who, according to the occasion, ran the risk of being exterminated or worshipped.
The marquis felt something the same as one of these beings must have done, when, expecting to be treated as a monster, he was straightway worshipped as a god.
All these eyes, full of a terrible fire, were fixed on the marquis with a sort of savage love.
This tumultuous crowd was armed with guns, swords, scythes, poles, sticks; all had large felt hats, or brown caps, with white cockades, a profusion of rosaries and amulets, wide breeches open at the knee, sheepskin jackets, leather gaiters, bare legs, long hair, and while some looked fierce, all had a frank expression in their faces.
A young, handsome-looking man made his way through the kneeling soldiers, and with long strides went up towards the marquis. Like the peasants, this man wore a felt hat with turned-up rim and a white cockade, and a sheepskin jacket, but his hands were white and his linen fine, and he wore outside his vest a scarf of white silk, from which hung a sword with a gold hilt.
When he reached the hure, he threw down his hat, unfastened his scarf, knelt on one knee, presented scarf and sword to the marquis, and said,—
"We were searching for you, and we have found you. Here is the sword of command. These men are now yours. I was their commander, I am promoted to a higher rank, I am your soldier. Accept our homage, monseigneur. Give your orders, general."
Then he made a sign, and the men bearing the tricolored flag, came out of the woods. They climbed up to where the marquis stood, and laid down the flag at his feet. It was the flag he had just caught a glimpse of through the trees.
"General," said the young man who had presented him
