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Read books online » Fiction » The Forest of Swords: A Story of Paris and the Marne by Joseph A. Altsheler (i like reading TXT) 📖

Book online «The Forest of Swords: A Story of Paris and the Marne by Joseph A. Altsheler (i like reading TXT) 📖». Author Joseph A. Altsheler



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*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FOREST OF SWORDS *** Produced by Kentuckiana Digital Library, David Garcia, Jon King and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. THE FOREST OF SWORDS



BOOKS BY JOSEPH A. ALTSHELER THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR SERIES The Hunters of the Hills   The Shadow of the North The Rulers of the Lakes   The Masters of the Peaks The Lords of the Wild   The Sun of Quebec   THE YOUNG TRAILERS SERIES The Young Trailers   The Free Rangers The Forest Runners   The Riflemen of the Ohio The Keepers of the Trail   The Scouts of the Valley The Eyes of the Woods   The Border Watch   THE TEXAN SERIES The Texan Star The Texan Scouts   The Texan Triumph   THE CIVIL WAR SERIES The Guns of Bull Run   The Star of Gettysburg The Guns of Shiloh   The Rock of Chickamauga The Scouts of Stonewall   The Shades of the Wilderness The Sword of Antietam   The Tree of Appomattox   THE GREAT WEST SERIES The Lost Hunters   The Great Sioux Trail   THE WORLD WAR SERIES The Guns of Europe The Forest of Swords   The Hosts of the Air   BOOKS NOT IN SERIES Apache Gold   A Soldier of Manhattan The Quest of the Four   The Sun of Saratoga The Last of the Chiefs   A Herald of the West In Circling Camps   The Wilderness Road The Last Rebel   My Captive The Candidate D. APPLETON AND COMPANY New York   London

Frontispiece

"He heard a shock near him and, ... saw a huddled mass of wreckage."

WORLD WAR SERIES


THE FOREST
OF SWORDS A STORY OF PARIS
AND THE MARNE


BY


JOSEPH A. ALTSHELER AUTHOR OF "THE GUNS OF EUROPE,"
"THE STAR OF GETTYSBURG," ETC.



D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
NEW YORK AND LONDON
1928 COPYRIGHT, 1915, BY
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY Printed in the United States of America FOREWORD

"The Forest of Swords," while an independent story, based upon the World War, continues the fortunes of John Scott, Philip Lannes, and their friends who have appeared already in "The Guns of Europe." As was stated in the first volume, the author was in Austria and Germany for a month after the war began, and then went to England. He saw the arrival of the Emperor, Francis Joseph, in Vienna, the first striking event in the gigantic struggle, and witnessed the mobilization of their armies by three great nations.

CONTENTS
Chapter I. In Paris Chapter II. The Message Chapter III. In the French Camp Chapter IV. The Invisible Hand Chapter V. Seen from Above Chapter VI. In Hostile Hands Chapter VII. The Two Princes Chapter VIII. The Sport of Kings Chapter IX. The Puzzling Signal Chapter X. Old Friends Chapter XI. The Continuing Battle Chapter XII. Julie Lannes Chapter XIII. The Middle Ages Chapter XIV. A Promise Kept Chapter XV. The Rescue THE
FOREST OF SWORDS CHAPTER I IN PARIS

John Scott and Philip Lannes walked together down a great boulevard of Paris. The young American's heart was filled with grief and anger. The Frenchman felt the same grief, but mingled with it was a fierce, burning passion, so deep and bitter that it took a much stronger word than anger to describe it.

Both had heard that morning the mutter of cannon on the horizon, and they knew the German conquerors were advancing. They were always advancing. Nothing had stopped them. The metal and masonry of the defenses at Liège had crumbled before their huge guns like china breaking under stone. The giant shells had scooped out the forts at Maubeuge, Maubeuge the untakable, as if they had been mere eggshells, and the mighty Teutonic host came on, almost without a check.

John had read of the German march on Paris, nearly a half-century before, how everything had been made complete by the genius of Bismarck and von Moltke, how the ready had sprung upon and crushed the unready, but the present swoop of the imperial eagle seemed far more vast and terrible than the earlier rush could have been.

A month and the legions were already before the City of Light. Men with glasses could see from the top of the Eiffel Tower the gray ranks that were to hem in devoted Paris once more, and the government had fled already to Bordeaux. It seemed that everything was lost before the war was fairly begun. The coming of the English army, far too small in numbers, had availed nothing. It had been swept up with the others, escaping from capture or destruction only by a hair, and was now driven back with the French on the capital.

John had witnessed two battles, and in neither had the Germans stopped long. Disregarding their own losses they drove forward, immense, overwhelming, triumphant. He felt yet their very physical weight, pressing upon him, crushing him, giving him no time to breathe. The German war machine was magnificent, invincible, and for the fourth time in a century the Germans, the exulting Kaiser at their head, might enter Paris.

The Emperor himself might be nothing, mere sound and glitter, but back of him was the greatest army that ever trod the planet, taught for half a century to believe in the divine right of kings, and assured now that might and right were the same.

Every instinct in him revolted at the thought that Paris should be trodden under foot once more by the conqueror. The great capital had truly deserved its claim to be the city of light and leading, and if Paris and France were lost the whole world would lose. He could never forget the unpaid debt that his own America owed to France, and he felt how closely interwoven the two republics were in their beliefs and aspirations.

"Why are you so silent?" asked Lannes, half angrily, although John knew that the anger was not for him.

"I've said as much as you have," he replied with an attempt at humor.

"You notice the sunlight falling on it?" said Lannes, pointing to the Arc de Triomphe, rising before them.

"Yes, and I believe I know what you are thinking."

"You are right. I wish he was here now."

John gazed at the great arch which the sun was gilding with glory and he shared with Lannes his wish that the mighty man who had built it to commemorate his triumphs was back with France—for a while at least. He was never able to make up his mind whether Napoleon was good or evil. Perhaps he was a mixture of both, highly magnified, but now of all times, with the German millions at the gates, he was needed most.

"I think France could afford to take him back," he said, "and risk any demands he might make or enforce."

"John," said Lannes, "you've fought with us and suffered with us, and so you're one of us. You understand what I felt this morning when on the edge of Paris I heard the German guns. They say that we can fight on, after our foes have taken the capital, and that the English will come in greater force to help us. But if victorious Germans march once through the Arc de Triomphe I shall feel that we can never again win back all that we have lost."

A note, low but deep and menacing, came from the far horizon. It might be a German gun or it might be a French gun, but the effect was the same. The threat was there. A shudder shook the frame of Lannes, but John saw a sudden flame of sunlight shoot like a glittering lance from the Arc de Triomphe.

"A sign! a sign!" he exclaimed, his imaginative mind on fire in an instant. "I saw a flash from the

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