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 arch! It was the soul of the Great Captain speaking! I tell you, Philip, the Republic is not yet lost! I've read somewhere, and so have you, that the Romans sold at auction at a high price the land on which Hannibal's victorious army was camped, when it lay before Rome!" "It's so! And France has her glorious traditions, too! We won't give up until we're beaten--and not then!" The gray eyes of Lannes flamed, and his figure seemed to swell.