See accordingly, on all Frontiers, how the Sons of Night, astonished after short triumph, do recoil;—­the Sons of the Republic flying at them, with wild ca-ira or Marseillese Aux armes, with the temper of cat-o’-mountain, or demon incarnate; which no Son of Night can stand!  Spain, which came bursting through the Pyrenees, rustling with Bourbon banners, and went conquering here and there for a season, falters at such cat-o’-mountain welcome; draws itself in again; too happy now were the Pyrenees impassable.  Not only does Dugommier, conqueror of Toulon, drive Spain back; he invades Spain.  General Dugommier invades it by the Eastern Pyrenees; General Dugommier invades it by the Eastern Pyrenees; General Muller shall invade it by the Western.  Shall, that is the word:  Committee of Salut Public has said it; Representative Cavaignac, on mission there, must see it done.  Impossible! cries Muller,—­Infallible! answers Cavaignac.  Difficulty, impossibility, is to no purpose.  “The Committee is deaf on that side of its head,” answers Cavaignac, “n’entend pas de cette oreille la.  How many wantest thou, of men, of horses, cannons?  Thou shalt have them.  Conquerors, conquered or hanged, forward we must.” (There is, in Prudhomme, an atrocity a la Captain-Kirk reported of this Cavaignac; which has been copied into Dictionaries of Hommes Marquans, of Biographie Universelle, &c.; which not only has no truth in it, but, much more singular, is still capable of being proved to have none.) Which things also, even as the Representative spake them, were done.  The Spring of the new Year sees Spain invaded:  and redoubts are carried, and Passes and Heights of the most scarped description; Spanish Field-officerism struck mute at such cat-o’-mountain spirit, the cannon forgetting to fire. (Deux Amis, xiii. 205-30; Toulongeon, &c.) Swept are the Pyrenees; Town after Town flies up, burst by terror or the petard.  In the course of another year, Spain will crave Peace; acknowledge its sins and the Republic; nay, in Madrid, there will be joy as for a victory, that even Peace is got.

Few things, we repeat, can be notabler than these Convention Representatives, with their power more than kingly.  Nay at bottom are they not Kings, Ablemen, of a sort; chosen from the Seven Hundred and Forty-nine French Kings; with this order, Do thy duty?  Representative Levasseur, of small stature, by trade a mere pacific Surgeon-Accoucheur, has mutinies to quell; mad hosts (mad at the Doom of Custine) bellowing far and wide; he alone amid them, the one small Representative,—­small, but as hard as flint, which also carries fire in it!  So too, at Hondschooten, far in the afternoon, he declares that the battle is not lost; that it must be gained; and fights, himself, with his own obstetric hand;—­horse shot under him, or say on foot, ’up to the haunches in tide-water;’ cutting stoccado and passado there, in defiance of Water, Earth, Air and Fire, the choleric little Representative that he was!  Whereby, as natural, Royal Highness of York had to withdraw,—­occasionally at full gallop; like to be swallowed by the tide:  and his Siege of Dunkirk became a dream, realising only much loss of beautiful siege-artillery and of brave lives. (Levasseur, Memoires, ii. c. 2-7.)