Angela read of the siege of Dunkirk, where Fareham had fought; of the
tempestuous weather; the camp in the midst of salt marshes and quicksands,
and all the sufferings and perils of life in the trenches. He had been
in more than one of those battles which mademoiselle's conscientious pen
depicted with such graphic power, the _Gazette_ at her elbow as she wrote.
The names of battles, sieges, Generals, had been on his lips in his
delirious ravings. He had talked of the taking of Charenton, the key to
Paris, a stronghold dominating Seine and Marne; of Clanleu, the brave
defender of the fortress; of Chatillon, who led the charge--both killed
there--Chatillon, the friend of Conde, who wept bitterest tears for a loss
that poisoned victory. Read by these lights, the "Grand Cyrus" was a book
to be pored over, a book to bend over in the grey winter dusk, reading
by the broad blaze of the logs that flamed and crackled on wrought-iron
standards. Just as merrily the blaze had spread its ruddy light over the
room when it was a monkish refectory, and when the droning of a youthful
brother reading aloud to the fraternity as they ate their supper was the
only sound, except the clattering of knives and grinding of jaws.
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