Читать книгу Saragossa (Historical Novel) - Benito Pérez Galdós - Страница 10

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The following day, the twenty-second, Palafox said to the messenger who came under a flag of truce from Moncey to propose terms of surrender.

"I do not know how to surrender. After death, we will talk about that."

He followed this with a long and eloquent article which was published in the "Gazette;" but, according to general opinion, neither that document nor any of the proclamations which appeared with the signature of the commanding general were his own composition, but that of his friend, Basilio Boggiero, a man of great judgment, who was often seen in situations of danger, in the company of patriots and military leaders.

It is excusable to say that the army of the defence was very much inspired by the glorious action of the twenty-first. It was necessary to give expression to this ardor, to arrange a sortie, and so in effect it was done; but it happened that all wished to take part in this at the same time, and it was necessary to bury the dead. The sorties, arranged with prudence, were expedient; because the French, extending their lines around the city, were preparing for a regular siege, and had begun upon their outer works.

The district of Saragossa contained many people, which seemed to the common mind a great advantage, but which seemed to the intelligent a great danger, because of the immense destruction of human life which hunger would quickly bring—hunger, that terrible general who is always the conqueror of overcrowded besieged cities. Because of this excess of people, the sorties were timely.

Renovales made one on the twenty-fourth with the troops of the fortress of San José, and cut down an olive grove which hid the works of the enemy.

Don John O'Neill made a sally from the suburb on the twenty-fifth with the volunteers of Aragon and Huesca, taking the chance of advantage from the enemy's lack of preparation, and killing many of the enemy's men.

On the thirty-first was made the most telling sally of all, striking in two distinct places and with considerable forces. During the early part of the day we had divided to perfection the works of the first French parallel, thrown up about three hundred and twenty yards from the walls. They were working actively, not resting by night, and we could see that they had signals of colored lanterns along the whole line. From time to time we discharged our guns, but we caused very little destruction. If troops were especially needed for a reconnoissance, they were despatched in less than no time.

The morning of the thirty-first arrived, and my battalion was charged to be ready to march upon orders from Renovales to attack the enemy in their centre, from the Torrero to the Muela road, while General Butron did the same by the Bernardona, that is to say, by the French left, sallying with sufficient forces of infantry and cavalry by the gates of Sancho and Portillo.

In order to distract the attention of the French, the general commanded that a battalion should be divided into skirmishing parties by the Tenerias, calling the attention of the enemy in that direction. In the mean time, with some of the soldiers of Olivenza and part of those of Valencia, we advanced by the Madrid road straight towards the French lines. The skirmishing parties were on both sides of the road when the enemy became aware of our presence, and now we were quicker than deer in doing up the first troop of French infantry which came to meet us. Behind a half-ruined country house some fortifications had been thrown up, and they began firing with good aim and much slaughter. For an instant we remained undecided, then some twenty men of us flanked the country house, while the rest followed the high road, pursuing the fugitives; but Renovales dashed forward and led us on, cutting down and bayoneting those who were defending the house. At the moment when we set foot within the first defence I noticed that my rank was thinned out. I saw some of my companions fall, breathing their last sighs. I looked to my right, fearing not to find my beloved friend among the living; but God had preserved him. Montoria and I were unharmed.

We could not spend much time in communicating to each other the satisfaction that we felt at finding ourselves still alive, because Renovales gave orders to follow on, in the direction of the line of intrenchments that the French were raising. We abandoned the high road and made a deflection, turning to the right with the intention of joining the volunteers of Huesca, who were attacking by the Muela road.

It may be understood by what I have related that the French did not expect that sortie, and that, taken completely unawares, they were holding there, besides the scanty force that kept the works, the engineers occupied in digging the trenches of the first parallel. We attacked them vigorously, turning upon them a murderous fire, improving the minutes well before the dreaded reinforcements should arrive. We took prisoners those whom we met without arms; we shot those who had them. We took the picks and spades—all this with unequalled energy, animating one another with fiery words, exalted above all by the thought that they were watching us from the city.

In this attack we were fortunate, for while we were destroying those at work on the intrenchments, the troops who had made the sortie on the left were carrying on a successful struggle with the detachments which the enemy had in the Bernardona. While the volunteers of Huesca, the grenadiers of Palafox, and the Walloon guards defeated the French infantry, the squadron of Numancia and Olivenza cavalry cautiously emerged through the Puerta de Sancho, and making a wide détour occupied the Alagon road on one side, and the Muela on the other, exactly when the French drew back from the left to the centre, in need of greater auxiliary forces. Finding themselves in their element, our fiery cavalry sprang forward, destroying whatever was encountered in the way, and then the disgraced infantry, who were fleeing towards Torrero, fell, and were trampled underfoot.

In their dispersion, many fell beneath our bayonets, and if their desire to flee from the horses was great, great also was our anxiety to receive them in manner worthy of our swords. Some ran, throwing themselves into the trenches, not being able to jump over them; others surrendered at discretion, throwing down their arms; some defended themselves with heroism, permitting themselves to be slain before giving up; and at the last there failed not a few who, shutting themselves up in the brick kiln filled up with boughs and timber, set fire to it, preferring to die by roasting, rather than be taken prisoners.

All this which I have related in detail passed in a very short time, while the French commander, having seen enough in this hour, detached sufficient forces to hold back and punish our too audacious expedition. They beat the drum in Monte Torrero, and we saw a great force of cavalry coming against us; but we who were with Renovales had had our desire, the same as those with Butron, and were not obliged to wait for those horsemen who arrived at the end of the action; so we retired, giving them from a distance a "Good-day" of the most sharp and pointed phrases in our vocabulary. We still had time to make useless some pieces placed ready for employment on the following day. We took a multitude of tools and spades, and we destroyed in all haste whatever we could of their intrenchments without losing hold upon the dozens of prisoners, of which we had taken up a collection.

Juan Pirli, one of our companions in the battalion, was carrying home to Saragossa the steel helmet of an engineer for the admiration of the public, and also a frying-pan in which were still the remnants of a breakfast begun in camp before Saragossa and ended in the other world.

We had had nine killed and eight wounded in our battalion. When Augustine rejoined me near the Carmen gate, I noticed that one of his hands was stained with blood.

"Are you wounded?" I asked, examining the hand. "It is nothing more than a scratch."

"It is a scratch," he replied; "but it was not made by ball, lance, nor sabre, but by teeth, because when I gripped that Frenchman who lifted up his pick to brain me, the damned fellow set his teeth into my hand like a dog at bay."

When we entered the city, some by the Puerta del Carmen, some by the Portillo, all the pieces of the redoubts and forts of Mediodia poured a fire against the columns which were coming after us. The two sorties combined had done damage enough to the French. In addition to losing many men, a small part of their intrenchments had been made useless to them, and we had possessed ourselves of a considerable number of their tools. Besides this, the official engineers that Butron took with him on that daring venture had had time to examine the works of the besiegers, and measure them, and could give descriptions of them to the commanding general.

The rampart wall was invaded by the people. They had heard within the city the shooting of the skirmishes, and men and women, old people and children had run out to see what glorious action was bulletined on the plaza. We were received with exclamations of rejoicing, and from San José all the way to the Trinitarios, the long line of men and women, looking towards the battlefield, climbed upon the walls, and clapping their hands at our arrival, waving their handkerchiefs, presented a magnificent sight. After the cannon sounded, the redoubts together poured a fire upon the field that we had just abandoned, and their voices seemed a triumphal salvo, as it mingled with the huzzas and shouts of joy.

In the surrounding houses, the windows and balconies were filled with women, and the interest or curiosity of some of those in the streets was such that they went into the hurrying crowd in numbers, and up to the cannons, to congratulate the brave souls and soothe with kind words their nerves, high strung with the noise of artillery, which is unlike anything else in the world. It was necessary to command the multitude to depart from the fortress at the Portillo. The crowd in the Santa Engracia gave that place the aspect of a theatre, of a public festival. The fire of the cannon ceased at last, having no more need to protect our retreat, and the Castle Aljaferia alone sent an occasional shot against the works of the enemy.

In reward for our action on that day it was granted us on the next to wear a red ribbon on the breast by way of decoration; in justice to the hazards of that sortie, Father Boggiero told us, among other things uttered by the mouth of our general, "Yesterday you marked the last day of the year with an action worthy of yourselves. At the sound of the bugle your swords leaped from their scabbards and struck to the ground haughty heads humbled by your valor and patriotism. Numantia! Olivenza! I have now seen that your light horse will know how to preserve the honor of this army and the enthusiasm of these sacred walls! Wear these blood-stained swords that are the sign of your glory and the protection of your country."