by the government to these exceptional levies. Though Brittany had
hitherto refused all kinds of military service under the Republic, the
levies were made under the new law on the faith of its promises, and
with such promptness that even the commander was startled. But he was
one of those wary old watch-dogs who are hard to catch napping. He no
sooner saw the contingents arriving one after the other than he
suspected some secret motive for such prompt action. Possibly he was
right in ascribing it to the fact of getting arms. At any rate, no
sooner were the Fougeres recruits obtained than, without delaying for
laggards, he took immediate steps to fall back towards Alencon, so as
to be near a loyal neighborhood,--though the growing disaffection
along the route made the success of this measure problematical. This
old officer, who, under instruction of his superiors, kept secret the
disasters of our armies in Italy and Germany and the disturbing news
from La Vendee, was attempting on the morning when this history
begins, to make a forced march on Mayenne, where he was resolved to
execute the law according to his own good pleasure, and fill the
half-empty companies of his own brigade with his Breton conscripts.
The word "conscript" which later became so celebrated, had just now
for the first time taken the place in the government decrees of the
word /requisitionnaire/ hitherto applied to all Republican recruits.

Before leaving Fougeres the chief secretly issued to his own men ample
supplies of ammunition and sufficient rations of bread for the whole
detachment, so as to conceal from the conscripts the length of the
march before them. He intended not to stop at Ernee (the last stage
before Mayenne), where the men of the contingent might find a way of
communicating with the Chouans who were no doubt hanging on his
flanks. The dead silence which reigned among the recruits, surprised
at the manoeuvring of the old republican, and their lagging march up