looked back and waved the blood- stained sabre in the air. For
the moment I was exalted --superb!

Ah! how I should have loved to have waited to have received the
congratulations of these generous enemies.

There were fifty of them in sight, and not one who was not waving
his hand and shouting. They are not really such a phlegmatic
race, the English. A gallant deed in war or in sport will always
warm their hearts. As to the old huntsman, he was the nearest to
me, and I could see with my own eyes how overcome he was by what
he had seen. He was like a man paralysed, his mouth open, his
hand, with outspread fingers, raised in the air. For a moment my
inclination was to return and to embrace him.

But already the call of duty was sounding in my ears, and these
English, in spite of all the fraternity which exists among
sportsmen, would certainly have made me prisoner. There was no
hope for my mission now, and I had done all that I could do. I
could see the lines of Massena's camp no very great distance off,
for, by a lucky chance, the chase had taken us in that direction.

I turned from the dead fox, saluted with my sabre, and galloped
away.

But they would not leave me so easily, these gallant huntsmen. I
was the fox now, and the chase swept bravely over the plain. It
was only at the moment when I started for the camp that they
could have known that I was a Frenchman, and now the whole swarm
of them were at my heels. We were within gunshot of our pickets