on the advancing troops as soon as they came within range.  This was the most terrible part to me of all.  We were no longer looking on to save life, but firing on the loyal and on the army where my son was.  Suppose the brave boy had broken away and ridden on!  I was foolish enough to feel as if they were aiming at his heart when the fire and smoke burst from the mouths of those old brass guns, and the massive tower seemed to rock under our feet, and the roar was in our ears, and Madame de Fiesque and the other ladies screamed in chorus, and when the smoke rolled away from before our eyes we could see that the foremost ranks were broken, that all had halted, and that dead and wounded were being picked up.

In very truth that prompt decision of Mademoiselle’s saved the Prince’s army.  Turenne could not send on his troops in the face of the fire of the Bastille, and, for aught he knew, of the resistance of all his army through the Porte St. Antoine without the loss of one wounded man or a single gun.  Mademoiselle, having seen the effect of her cannon, came down again to provide for wine and food being sent to the exhausted soldiers, who had been fighting all day in such scorching heat that we heard that at the first moment of respite, M. le Prince hurried into an orchard, took off every fragment of clothing, and rolled about on the grass under the trees to cool himself after the intolerable heat.

Just as I emerged from the court of the Bastille, some one touched me, and said, ‘Pardon me, Madame,’ and, looking round, I saw M. Darpent, with his hat in his hand.  ‘Madame,’ he entreated, ’is it possible to you to come to poor M. d’Aubepine?  I have fetched her to her husband, but there will be piteous work when his wound is visited, and she will need all the support that can be given to her.  My mother and sister are doing all in their power, but they have many other patients on their hands.’

I hurried to my Princess, and with some difficulty obtained a hearing.  She called up M. Darpent, and made him tell her the names of all the five sufferers that he and his sister had taken into the Verdon house, and how they were wounded, for Conde’s followers being almost all noble, she knew who every one was.  Two were only slightly wounded, but two were evidently dying, and as none of their friends were within reach, Madame Darpent and her daughter were forced to devote themselves to these, though fortunately they had not been brought in till her son had piloted M. d’Aubepine through the crowded streets—­poor little Cecile! who had hardly ever set foot on the pavement before.  Her Count was in a terrible state, his right leg having been torn off by a cannon-ball below the knee, and he would have bled to death long before reaching home had not Clement Darpent observed his condition and taken him into the house, where Madame had enough of the hereditary surgical skill acquired in the civil wars to check the bleeding, and put a temporary dressing on the wounds until a doctor could be obtained; for, alas! they were only too busy on that dreadful day.