Ravine Pourrie. Christophe is there, five leagues from Port-de-Paix

Meanwhile the soldiers had broken ranks and scattered through the town, some to plunder, others to see their kinsfolk. A moment later Captain Jules Derré, whom Pourcely had sent to Christophe to announce the occupation of the Trois Pavillons, arrived in the middle of the parade ground. Many soldiers wanted to massacre him. But Alain checked their fury with these words: “Jules Derré is a soldier; if General Pourcely had sent you to Le Cap, you would have done your duty as he did; why do you wish to murder him?” His voice was heeded. He asked Jules Derré where he had left Christophe. The courier answered that it was at the Ravine Pourrie, five leagues from Port-de-Paix. This news at once ran through the whole town. Rébecca came back at a gallop to the parade ground, still in his grenadier’s uniform, and had the general alarm beaten. But he could gather only about twenty men, the rest being given over to plunder. Then, to stop this disorder and compel the soldiers and the inhabitants to abandon the town, he set fire to it. In a few hours Port-de-Paix became one vast blaze. The women, the children and the old, loaded with bundles of clothing and accompanied by the soldiers who were their kin, took the road to the mountain. Rébecca had the thousand gourdes deposited at the office of the place carried off, entrusted the three flags of the 9th to the twenty grenadiers, no more, whom he had been able to gather, and led them into the road to the Trois Pavillons, after having put in safety his mother, the citizeness Élisabeth, and his wife, Suzanne Leroux.