Anvils, with powder placed
between, were touched off with a bar of red-hot iron, making a vast noise
and drawing applausive crowds to the smithy. On the hill beside the
Cure's house was a little old cannon brought from the battle-field of
Ticonderoga, and its boisterous salutations were replied to from the
Seigneury, by a still more ancient piece of ordnance. Sixty of Valmond's
recruits, under Lajeunesse the blacksmith, marched up and down the
streets, firing salutes with a happy, casual intrepidity, and setting
themselves off before the crowds with a good many airs and nods and
simple vanities.
In the early evening the good Cure blessed and lighted the great bonfire
before the church; and immediately, at this signal, an answering fire
sprang up on a hill at the other side of the village. Then fire on fire
glittered and multiplied, till all the village was in a glow. This was a
custom set in memory of the old days when fires flashed intelligence,
after a fixed code, across the great rivers and lakes, and from hill to
hill.
Far up against Dalgrothe Mountain appeared a sumptuous star, mystical and
red. Valmond saw it from his window, and knew it to be Parpon's
watchfire, by the grave of his brother Gabriel.
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