"The Saint of Angers is on before us," said the others; "he would let
no man see the enemy before himself. The good Cathelineau is gone to
Saumur, let us follow him!"
In this way they soon learnt to believe that both Cathelineau and
Larochejaquelin were on before them, and they were not long in hurrying
after them. Within twenty minutes, about six thousand men started off
without a leader or any defined object, to besiege the walls of Saumur;
they did not even know that a vast entrenched encampment of the enemy's
troops lay directly in their way. The men had, most of them, muskets
with three or four rounds of powder and ball each; many of them also had
bayonets. They were better armed than they had hitherto ever been, and
they consequently conceived themselves invincible. Cathelineau's men,
however, would not stir without 'Marie Jeanne,' and that devoted,
hard-worked cannon was seized by scores, and hurried off with them
towards Saumur.
De Lescure and Cathelineau were together in a farm-house, within five
hundred yards of the place where the baggage had been left, and within
half a mile of the most distant of the men who had thus taken upon
themselves to march, or rather to rush, away without orders; and some
of those who still had their senses about them, soon let their Generals
know what was going forward.
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