The moment of supreme despair came. France was not fighting now, but mining. It was necessary to destroy the soil of the nation in order to conquer it. Half the Coso was hers, but Spain retreated only to the opposite pavement. By Las Tenerias and in the suburb on the left they had obtained some advantages; and their little mines did not rest for an instant.
At last—it seems like a lie—we became accustomed to the explosions, as before we had become accustomed to the bombardment. At worst we heard a noise like that of a thousand thunderclaps all at once. What has happened? Nothing, the University, the Chapel de la Sangre, the Casa de Aranda, such a convent or chapel exists no longer. It was not like living on our peaceful and quiet planet. It was like having the birthplace of thunderbolts for a dwelling-place, like being in a disordered world, where everything was heaving up and unhinging. There was no place to live, because the ground was no longer ground. Under every shrub or plant a crater was opening. And yet those men went on defending themselves against the crushing horrors of a never-stilled volcano and a ceaseless tempest. Lacking fortresses, they had used the convents; lacking convents, the palaces; when the palaces failed, the humble houses. There were still some partition walls. They did not eat now. Of what use, when death was expected from one moment to the next? Thousands of men perished in the explosions, and the epidemic had risen to its height of horror. One might go by chance unharmed through the shower of balls, then on turning a street corner, dreadful chills and fever would suddenly take possession of his frame, and in a little while he would be dead. There were no longer kinsfolk or friends; men did not even know one another, their faces blackened by smoke, by earth, by blood, disfigured, cadaverous. Meeting one another after a combat they would ask, “Who are you?”
The belfries no longer sounded the alarm, because there were no bell-ringers. One heard no more the proclamations by criers, because proclamations were no longer published. Mass was not said, because there were no more priests. Nobody sang the jota now. The voices of the dying people were husky in their throats. From hour to hour a funereal silence was conquering the city. Only the cannon spoke. The advance guards of the two nations no longer took the trouble to exchange insults. Instead of madness, everybody was full of sadness; and the dying city fought on in silence, so that no atom of strength need be lost in idle words.
The necessity of surrender was now the general idea; but none showed it, guarding it in the depths of conscience as he would conceal a crime which he was about to commit. Surrender! It seemed an impossibility, a word too difficult. To perish would be easier!
One day passed after the explosion of San Francisco; it was a horrible day which seemed to have no existence in time, but only in the fanciful realm of the imagination. I had been in the Calle de las Arcadas a little before the greater number of its houses fell. I ran afterwards to the Coso, to fulfil a commission with which I had been charged, and I remember that the heavy infected air choked me so that I could scarcely walk. On the way I saw the same child that I had seen several days before, alone and crying in the quarter of Las Tenerias. He was still alone and crying, and the poor child had his hands in his mouth as if he were eating his fingers. In spite of that, nobody noticed him. I also passed him by indifferently; but, afterwards a little voice reproached me, and I turned back, and took him with me, giving him some bits of bread. My commission accomplished, I ran to the Plazuela de San Felipe, where, since the affair of Las Arcadas, were the few men of my battalion who were still alive. It was now night; and although there had been firing in the Coso between one sidewalk and the other, my comrades were held in reserve for the following day, because they were dropping with fatigue. On arriving, I saw a man who wrapped in his military cloak was walking up and down, taking notice of nobody. It was Augustine Montoria.
“Augustine, is it thou?” I asked, going up to him. “How pale and changed thou art? Have they wounded thee?”
“Let me alone,” he answered bitterly, “I am in no mood for comrades.”
“Are you mad? What has happened to you?”
“Leave me,” he answered, pushing me away, “I tell you that I want to be alone. I do not want to see anybody.”
“Friend!” I cried, understanding that some terrible trouble was on the soul of my companion, “if misfortune is upon you, tell it to me, and let me share your sorrow.”
“Do you not know it, then?”
“I know nothing. You know that I was sent with twenty men to the Calle de las Arcadas. Since yesterday, since the explosion of San Francisco, you and I have not seen each other.”
“It is true,” he replied. “I have sought death in this barricade of the Coso, and death has passed me by. Numberless comrades fell beside me, and there was not one ball for me. Gabriel, my dear friend, put the barrel of one of your pistols to my temple and tear out my life. Would you believe it? A little while ago I tried to kill myself. I do not know—but it seemed as if an invisible hand came and took the weapon from my temple, then another hand, soft and warm, passed over my brow.”
“Calm yourself, Augustine, and tell me what is the matter.”
“What the matter is with me? What time
