On the 4th of October (called in the revolutionary almanack the 13th Vendemaire) the affray accordingly occurred. Thirty thousand National Guards advanced, about two p.m., by different streets, to the siege of the palace: but its defence was now in far other hands than those of Louis XVI.
Buonaparte, having planted artillery on all the bridges, had effectually secured the command of the river, and the safety of the Tuileries on one side. He had placed cannon also at all the crossings of the streets by which the National Guard could advance towards the other front; and having posted his battalions in the garden of the Tuileries and Place du Carousel, he awaited the attack.
The insurgents had no cannon; and they came along the narrow streets of Paris in close and heavy columns. When one party reached the church of St. Roche, in the Rue St. Honoré, they found a body of Buonaparte's troops drawn up there, with two cannons. It is disputed on which side the firing began; but in an instant the artillery swept the streets and lanes, scattering grape-shot among the National Guards, and producing such confusion that they were compelled to give way. The first shot was a signal for all the batteries which Buonaparte had established; the quays of the Seine, opposite to the Tuileries, were commanded by his guns below the Palace and on the bridges. In less than an hour the action was over. The insurgents fled in all directions, leaving the streets covered with dead and wounded: the troops of the Convention marched into the various sections, disarmed the terrified inhabitants, and before nightfall everything was quiet.
This eminent service secured the triumph of the Conventionalists, who now, assuming new names, continued in effect to discharge their old functions. Barras took his place at the head of the Directory, having Sieyes, Carnot, and other less celebrated persons, for his colleagues; and the First Director took care to reward the hand to which he owed his elevation. Within five days from the day of the Sections Buonaparte was named second in command of the army of the interior; and shortly afterwards, Barras, finding his duties as Director sufficient to occupy his time, gave up the command-in-chief of the same army to his "little Corsican officer."
He had no lack of duties to perform in this new character. The National Guard was to be re-organised; a separate guard for the representative body to be formed; the ordnance and military stores were all in a dilapidated condition. The want of bread, too, was continually producing popular riots, which could rarely be suppressed but by force of arms. On one of these last occasions, a huge sturdy fishwife exhorted the mob to keep to their places, when Buonaparte had almost persuaded them to disperse. "These coxcombs with their epaulettes and gorgets," said she, "care nothing for us; provided they feed well and fatten, we may starve." "Good woman," cried the general of the interior, who at this time was about the leanest of his race, "only look at me,—and decide yourself which of the two is the fatter." The woman could not help laughing: the joke pleased the multitude, and harmony was restored.
Buonaparte, holding the chief military command in the capital, and daily rising in importance from the zeal and firmness of his conduct in this high post, had now passed into the order of marked and distinguished men. He continued, nevertheless, to lead in private a quiet and modest life, studying as hard as ever, and but little seen in the circles of gaiety. An accident which occurred one morning at his military levee, gave at once a new turn to his mode of life, and a fresh impetus to the advance of his fortunes.
A fine boy, of ten or twelve years of age, presented himself; stated to the general that his name was Eugene Beauharnois, son of Viscount Beauharnois, who had served as a general officer in the Republican armies on the Rhine, and been murdered by Robespierre; and said his errand was to recover the sword of his father. Buonaparte caused the request to be complied with; and the tears of the boy, as he received and kissed the relic, excited his interest. He treated Eugene so kindly, that next day his mother, Josephine de Beauharnois, came to thank him; and her beauty and singular gracefulness of address made a strong impression.
This charming lady, the daughter of a planter, by name Tascher de la Pagerie, was born in the island of Martinico, 24th June, 1763. While yet an infant, according to a story which she afterwards repeated, a negro sorceress had prophesied that "she should one day be greater than a queen, and yet outlive her dignity."[7]
The widow of Beauharnois had been herself imprisoned until the downfall of Robespierre. In that confinement she had formed a strict friendship with another lady who was now married to Tallien, one of the most eminent of the leaders of the Convention. Madame Tallien had introduced Josephine to her husband's friends; and Barras, the First Director, having now begun to hold a sort of court at the Luxembourg, these two beautiful women were the chief ornaments of its society. It was commonly said—indeed it was universally believed—that Josephine, whose character was in some respects indifferent, possessed more than legitimate influence over the First Director. Buonaparte, however, offered her his hand; she, after some hesitation, accepted it; and the young general by this marriage (9th March, 1796) cemented his connection with the society of the Luxembourg, and in particular with Barras and Tallien, at that moment the most powerful men in France.
Napoleon had a strong tendency to the superstition of fatalism, and he always believed that his fortunes were bound up in some mysterious manner with those of this graceful woman. She loved him warmly, and served him well. Her influence over him was great, and it was always exerted on the side of humanity. She, and she alone, could overrule, by gentleness, the excesses of passion to which he was liable; and her subsequent fate will always form one of the darkest pages in the history of her lord.
Tranquillity was now restored in Paris; and the Directory had leisure to turn their attention to the affairs of the army of Italy, which were in a most confused and unsatisfactory condition. They determined to give it a new general; and Buonaparte was appointed to the splendid command. It is acknowledged, in one of Josephine's letters, that the First Director had promised to procure it for him before their marriage took place. "Advance this man," said Barras to his colleagues, "or he will advance himself without you."
Buonaparte quitted his wife ten days after their marriage; paid a short visit to his mother at Marseilles; and arrived, after a rapid journey, at the headquarters at Nice. From that moment opened the most brilliant scene of his existence; yet, during the months of victory and glory that composed it, his letters, full of love and home-sickness, attest the reluctance with which he had so soon abandoned his bride.
CHAPTER IV
The Army of Italy—Tactics of Buonaparte—Battle of Monte Notte—Battle of Millesimo—Battle of Mondovi—Armistice of Cherasco—Close of the Campaign of Piedmont—Peace granted to Sardinia.
Buonaparte at the age of twenty-six assumed the command of the army of Italy; exulting in the knowledge that, if he should conquer, the honour would be all his own. He had worked for others at Toulon, at the Col di Tende, at Saorgio: even in the affair of the Sections the first command had been nominally in the hands of Barras. Henceforth he was to have no rivals within the camp. "In three months," said he, "I shall be either at Milan or at Paris." He had already expressed the same feeling in a still nobler form. "You are too young," said one of the Directors, hesitating about his appointment as general. "In a year," answered Napoleon, "I shall be either old or dead."
He found the army in numbers about 50,000; but wretchedly deficient in cavalry, in stores of every kind,[8] in clothing and even in food; and watched by an enemy greatly more numerous. It was under such circumstances that he at once avowed the daring scheme of forcing a passage to Italy, and converting the richest territory of the enemy himself into the theatre of the war. "Soldiers," said he, "you are hungry and naked; the Republic owes you much, but she has not the means to pay her debts. I am come to lead you into the most fertile plains that the sun beholds. Rich provinces, opulent towns, all shall be at your disposal. Soldiers! with such a prospect before you, can you fail in courage and constancy?" This was his first address to his army. The sinking hearts of the men beat high with hope and confidence when they heard the voice of the young and fearless leader; and Augereau, Massena, Serrurier, Joubert, Lannes—distinguished officers might themselves have aspired to the chief command—felt, from the moment they began to understand his character and system, that the true road to glory would be to follow the star of Napoleon.
He perceived that the time was come for turning a new leaf in the history of war. With such numbers of troops as the infant Republic could afford him, he saw that no considerable advantages could be obtained against the vast and highly-disciplined armies of Austria and her allies, unless the established rules and etiquettes of strategy were abandoned. It was only by such rapidity of motion as should utterly transcend the suspicion of his adversaries, that he could hope to concentrate the whole pith and energy of a small force upon some one point of a much greater force opposed to it, and thus rob them (according to his own favourite phrase) of the victory. To effect such rapid marches, it was necessary that the soldiery should make up their minds to consider tents and baggage as idle luxuries; and that, instead of a long and complicated chain of reserves and stores, they should dare to rely wholly for the means of subsistence on the resources of the countries into which their leader might conduct them. They must be contented to conquer at whatever hazard; to consider no sacrifices or hardships as worthy of a thought. The risk of destroying the character and discipline of the men, by accustoming them to pillage, was obvious. Buonaparte trusted to victory, the high natural spirit of the nation, and the influence of his own genius, for the means of avoiding this danger; and many years, it must be admitted, elapsed, before he found much reason personally to repent of the system which he adopted. Against the enemies of the Republic its success was splendid, even beyond his hopes.
The objects of the approaching expedition were three: first, to compel the King of Sardinia, who had already lost Savoy and Nice, but still maintained a powerful army on the frontiers of Piedmont, to abandon the alliance of Austria: secondly, to compel the Emperor, by a bold invasion of Lombardy, to make such exertions in that quarter as might weaken those armies which had so long hovered on the Rhine; and, if possible, to stir up the Italian subjects of that crown to adopt the revolutionary system and emancipate themselves for ever from its yoke. The third object, though more distant, was not less important. The influence of the Romish Church was considered by the Directory as the chief, though secret, support of the cause of royalism within their own territory; and to reduce the Vatican into insignificance, or at least force it to submission and quiescence, appeared indispensable to the internal tranquillity of France. The Revolutionary Government, besides this general cause of hatred and suspicion, had a distinct injury to avenge. Their agent, Basseville, had three years before been assassinated in a popular tumult at Rome: the Papal troops had not interfered to protect him, nor the Pope to punish his murderers; and the haughty Republic considered this as an insult which could only be washed out with a sea of blood.
Napoleon's plan for gaining access to the fair regions of Italy differed from that of all former conquerors: they had uniformly penetrated the Alps at some point or other of that mighty range of mountains: he judged that the same end might be accomplished more easily by advancing along the narrow strip of comparatively level country which intervenes between those enormous barriers and the Mediterranean Sea, and forcing a passage at the point where the last of the Alps melt, as it were, into the first and lowest of the Apennine range. No sooner did he begin to concentrate his troops towards this region, than the Austrian general, Beaulieu, took measures for protecting Genoa, and the entrance of Italy. He himself took post with one column of his army at Voltri, a town within ten miles of Genoa: he placed D'Argenteau with another Austrian column at Monte Notte, a strong height further to the westward; and the Sardinians, under Colli, occupied Ceva—which thus formed the extreme right of the whole line of the allied army. The French could not advance towards Genoa but by confronting some one of the three armies thus strongly posted, and sufficiently, as Beaulieu supposed, in communication with each other.
It was now that Buonaparte made his first effort to baffle the science of those who fancied there was nothing new to be done in warfare. On the 10th of April, D'Argenteau came down upon Monte Notte, and attacked some French redoubts, in front of that mountain and the villages which bear its name, at Montelegino. At the same time General Cervoni and the French van were attacked by Beaulieu near Voltri, and compelled to retreat. The determined valour of Colonel Rampon, who commanded at Montelegino, held D'Argenteau at bay during the 10th and 11th: and Buonaparte, contenting himself with watching Beaulieu, determined to strike his effectual blow at the centre of the enemy's line. During the night of the 11th various columns were marched upon Montelegino, that of Cervoni and that of Laharpe from the van of the French line, those of Augereau and Massena from its rear. On the morning of the 12th, D'Argenteau, preparing to renew his attack on the redoubts of Montelegino, found he had no longer Rampon only and his brave band to deal with; that French columns were in his rear, on his flank, and drawn up also behind the works at Montelegino; in a word, that he was surrounded. He was compelled to retreat among the mountains; he left his colours and cannon behind him, 1000 killed, and 2000 prisoners. The centre of the allied army had been utterly routed, before either the Commander-in-Chief at the left, or General Colli at the right of the line, had any notion that a battle was going on.
Such was the battle of Monte Notte, the first of Napoleon's fields. Beaulieu, in order that he might re-establish his communication with Colli (much endangered by the defeat of D'Argenteau) was obliged to retreat upon Dego; the Sardinian, with the same purpose in view, fell back also, and took post at Millesimo; while D'Argenteau was striving to re-organise his dispirited troops in the difficult country between. It was their object to keep fast in these positions until succours could come up from Lombardy; but Napoleon had no mind to give them such respite.
The very next day after this victory he commanded a general assault on the Austrian line. Augereau, with a fresh division, marched at the left upon Millesimo; Massena led the centre towards Dego; and Laharpe, with the French right wing, manœuvred to turn the left flank of Beaulieu.
Augereau rushed upon the outposts of Millesimo, seized and retained the gorge which defends that place, and cut off Provera with two thousand Austrians, who occupied an eminence called Cossaria, from the main body of Colli's army. Next morning Buonaparte himself arrived at that scene of the operations. He forced Colli to accept battle, utterly broke and scattered him, and Provera, thus abandoned, was obliged to yield at discretion.
Meanwhile Massena on the same day had assaulted the heights of Biastro, and carrying them at the point of the bayonet, cut off Beaulieu's communication with Colli; then Laparpe came in front and in flank also upon the village of Dego, and after a most desperate conflict, drove the Austrian commander-in-chief from his post. From this moment Colli and Beaulieu were entirely separated. After the affairs of Dego and Millesimo, the former retreated in disorder upon Ceva; the latter, hotly pursued, upon Aqui; Colli, of course, being eager to cover Turin, while the Austrian had his anxious thoughts already upon Milan. Colli was again defeated at Mondovi in his disastrous retreat; he there lost his cannon, his baggage, and the best part of his troops. The Sardinian army might be said to be annihilated. The conqueror took possession of Cherasco, within 10 miles of Turin, and there dictated the terms on which the King of Sardinia was to be permitted to retain any shadow of sovereign power.
Thus, in less than a month, did Napoleon lay the gates of Italy open before him. He had defeated in three battles forces much superior to his own; inflicted on them in killed, wounded and prisoners, a loss of 25,000 men; taken eighty guns and twenty-one standards; reduced the Austrians to inaction; utterly destroyed the Sardinian king's army; and lastly, wrested from his hands Coni and Tortona, the two great fortresses called "the keys of the Alps,"—and indeed, except Turin itself, every place of any consequence in his dominions. This unfortunate prince did not long survive such humiliation. He was father-in-law to both of the brothers of Louis XVI., and, considering their cause and his own dignity as equally at an end, died of a broken heart, within a few days after he had signed the treaty of Cherasco.
Buonaparte meanwhile had paused for a moment to consolidate his columns on the heights, from which the vast plain of Lombardy, rich and cultivated like a garden, and watered with innumerable fertilising streams, lay at length within the full view of his victorious soldiery. "Hannibal forced the Alps," said he gaily, as he now looked back on those stupendous barriers, "and we have turned them."
"Hitherto" (he thus addressed his troops) "you have been fighting for barren rocks, memorable for your valour, but useless to your country; but now your exploits equal those of the armies of Holland and the Rhine. You were utterly destitute, and you have supplied all your wants. You have gained battles without cannon, passed rivers without bridges, performed forced marches without shoes, bivouacked without strong liquors, and often without bread. None but republican phalanxes, soldiers of liberty, could have endured such things. Thanks for your perseverance! But, soldiers, you have done nothing—for there remains much to do. Milan is not yet ours. The ashes of the conquerors of Tarquin are still trampled by the assassins of Basseville."
The consummate genius of this brief campaign could not be disputed; and the modest language of the young general's despatches to the Directory, lent additional grace to his fame. At this time the name of Buonaparte was spotless: and the eyes of all Europe were fixed in admiration on his career.
CHAPTER V
The French cross the Po at Placenza—The Battle of Fombio—The Bridge of Lodi—Napoleon occupies Milan—Resigns, and resumes his command—Insurrection of Pavia—Military Executions—The French pass the Mincio at Borghetto—Beaulieu retreats behind the Adige—Mantua besieged—Peace with the King of the Two Sicilies—The Pope buys a Respite.
Piedmont being now in the hands of Buonaparte, the Austrian general concentrated his army behind the Po, with the purpose of preventing the invader from passing that great river and making his way to the capital of Lombardy.
Napoleon employed every device to make Beaulieu believe that he designed to attempt the passage of the Po at Valenza; and the Austrian, a man of routine, who had himself crossed the river at that point, was easily persuaded that these demonstrations were sincere. Meanwhile his crafty antagonist executed a march of incredible celerity upon Placenza, fifty miles lower down the river; and appeared there on the 7th of May, to the utter consternation of a couple of Austrian squadrons, who happened to be reconnoitring in that quarter. He had to convey his men across that great stream in the common ferry boats, and could never have succeeded had there been anything like an army to oppose him. Andreossi (afterwards so celebrated) was commander of the advanced guard; Lannes (who became in the sequel Marshal Duke of Montebello) was the first to throw himself ashore at the head of some grenadiers. The German hussars were driven rapidly from their position. Buonaparte himself has said that no operation in war is more critical than the passage of a great river; on this occasion the skill of his arrangements enabled him to pass one of the greatest in the world without the loss of a single man.
Beaulieu, as soon as he ascertained how he had been outwitted, advanced upon Placenza, in the hope of making the invader accept battle with the Po in his rear, and therefore under circumstances which must render any check in the highest degree disastrous. Buonaparte, in the meantime, had no intention to await the Austrian on ground so dangerous, and was marching rapidly towards Fomboi, where he knew he should have room to manœuvre. The advanced divisions of the hostile armies met at that village on the 8th of May. The Imperialists occupied the steeples and houses, and hoped to hold out until Beaulieu could bring up his main body. But the French charged so impetuously with the bayonet, that the Austrian, after seeing one-third of his men fall, was obliged to retreat, in great confusion, leaving all his cannon behind him, across the Adda; a large river which, descending from the Tyrolese mountains, joins the Po at Pizzighitone—and thus forms the immediate defence of the better part of the Milanese against any enemy advancing from Piedmont. Behind this river Beaulieu now concentrated his army, establishing strong guards at every ford and bridge, and especially at Lodi, where as he guessed (for once rightly) the French general designed to force his passage.
The wooden bridge of Lodi formed the scene of one of the most celebrated actions of the war; and will ever be peculiarly mixed up with the name of Buonaparte himself. It was a great neglect in Beaulieu to leave it standing when he removed his headquarters to the east bank of the Adda: his outposts were driven rapidly through the old struggling town of Lodi on the 10th; and the French sheltering themselves behind the walls and houses, lay ready to attempt the passage of the bridge. Beaulieu had placed a battery of thirty cannon so as to sweep it completely; and the enterprise of storming it in the face of this artillery, and the whole army drawn up behind, is one of the most daring on record.
Buonaparte's first care was to place as many guns as he could get in order in direct opposition to this Austrian battery. A furious cannonade on his side of the river also now commenced. The General himself appeared in the midst of the fire, pointing with his own hand two guns in such a manner as to cut off the Austrians from the only path by which they could have advanced to undermine the bridge; and it was on this occasion that the soldiery, delighted with his dauntless exposure of his person, conferred on him his honorary nickname of The Little Corporal. In the meantime he had sent General Beaumont and the cavalry to attempt the passage of the river by a distant ford (which they had much difficulty in effecting), and awaited with anxiety the moment when they should appear on the enemy's flank. When that took place, Beaulieu's line, of course, showed some confusion, and Napoleon instantly gave the word. A column of grenadiers, whom he had kept ready drawn up close to the bridge, but under shelter of the houses, were in a moment wheeled to the left, and their leading files placed upon the bridge. They rushed on, shouting Vive la Republique! but the storm of grape-shot for a moment checked them. Buonaparte, Lannes, Berthier, and Lallemagne, hurried to the front, and rallied and cheered the men. The column dashed across the bridge in despite of the tempest of fire that thinned them. The brave Lannes was the first who reached the other side, Napoleon himself the second. The Austrian artillerymen were bayoneted at their guns, before the other troops, whom Beaulieu had removed too far back, in his anxiety to avoid the French battery, could come to their assistance. Beaumont pressing gallantly with his horse upon the flank, and Napoleon's infantry forming rapidly as they passed the bridge, and charging on the instant, the Austrian line became involved in inextricable confusion, broke up, and fled. The slaughter on their side was great; on the French there fell only 200 men. With such rapidity, and consequently with so little loss, did Buonaparte execute this dazzling adventure—"the terrible passage," as he himself called it, "of the bridge of Lodi."
It was indeed, terrible to the enemy. It deprived them of another excellent line of defence, and blew up the enthusiasm of the French soldiery to a pitch of irresistible daring. Beaulieu, nevertheless, contrived to withdraw his troops in much better style than Buonaparte had anticipated. He gathered the scattered fragments of his force together, and soon threw the line of the Mincio, another tributary of the Po, between himself and his enemy. The great object, however, had been attained: the Austrian general escaped, and might yet defend Mantua, but no obstacle remained between the victorious invader and the rich and noble capital of Lombardy. The garrison of Pizzighitone, seeing themselves effectually cut off from the Austrian army, capitulated. The French cavalry pursued Beaulieu as far as Cremona, which town they seized; and Napoleon himself prepared to march at once upon Milan.
It was after one of these affairs that an old Hungarian officer was brought prisoner to Buonaparte, who entered into conversation with him, and among other matters questioned him "what he thought of the state of the war?" "Nothing," replied the old gentleman, who did not know he was addressing the general-in-chief,—"nothing can be worse. Here is a young man who knows absolutely nothing of the rules of war; to-day he is in our rear, to-morrow on our flank, next day again in our front. Such violations of the principles of the art of war are intolerable!"
The Archduke, who governed in Lombardy for the Emperor, had made many a long prayer and procession; but the saints appeared to take no compassion on him, and he now withdrew from the capital. A revolutionary party had always existed there, as indeed in every part of the Austrian dominions beyond the Alps; and the tricolor cockade, the emblem of France, was now mounted by multitudes of the inhabitants. The municipality hastened to invite the conqueror to appear among them as their friend and protector; and on the 14th of May, four days after Lodi, Napoleon accordingly entered, in all the splendour of a military triumph, the venerable and opulent city of the old Lombard kings.
He was not, however, to be flattered into the conduct, as to serious matters, of a friendly general. He levied immediately a heavy contribution (eight hundred thousand pounds sterling) at Milan,—taking possession, besides, of twenty of the finest pictures in the Ambrosian gallery.
The conqueror now paused to look about and behind him; and proceeded still farther to replenish his chest by exactions, for which no justification can be adduced from the ordinary rules of international law. With Sardinia he had already reckoned; of the Austrian capital in Italy he had possession; there was only one more of the Italian governments (Naples) with which the French Republic was actually at war; although, indeed, he had never concealed his intention of revenging the fate of Basseville on the court of Rome. The other powers of Italy were, at worst, neutrals; with Tuscany and Venice, France had friendly relations. But Napoleon knew or believed, that all the Italian governments, without exception, considered the French invasion of Italy as a common calamity; the personal wishes of most of the minor princes (nearly connected as these were, by blood or alliance, with the imperial house of Austria) he, not unreasonably, concluded were strongly against his own success in this great enterprise. Such were his pretences—more or less feasible; the temptation was, in fact, great; and he resolved to consider and treat whatever had not been with him as if it had been against him. The weak but wealthy princes of Parma and Modena, and others of the same order, were forthwith compelled to purchase his clemency not less dearly than if they had been in arms. Besides money, of which he made them disburse large sums, he demanded from each a tribute of pictures and statues, to be selected at the discretion of Citizen Monge and other French connoisseurs, who now attended his march for such purposes.
In modern warfare the works of art had hitherto been considered as a species of property entitled in all cases to be held sacred; and Buonaparte's violent and rapacious infraction of this rule now excited a mighty clamour throughout Europe. Whether the new system originated with himself, or in the commands of the Directory, is doubtful. But from this time the formation of a great national gallery of pictures and statues at Paris was considered as an object of the first importance; and every victorious general was expected to bring trophies of this kind in his train. Whether the fine arts themselves are likely to be improved in consequence of the accumulation in any one place of such vast treasures as the Louvre were long exhibited, there has been, and will no doubt continue to be, much controversy. It is certain that the arts of France derived no solid advantage from Napoleon's museum. The collection was a mighty heap of incense for the benefit of the national vanity; and the hand which brought it together was preparing the means of inflicting on that vanity one of the most intolerable of wounds, in its ultimate dispersion.
The Duke of Modena would fain have redeemed the famous St. Jerome, of Correggio, at the price of £80,000; and Buonaparte's lieutenants urged him to accept the money. "No," said he, "the duke's two millions of francs would soon be spent; but his Correggio will remain for ages to adorn Paris, and inspire the arts of France." The prophecy was not inspired. Of one thing there can be no doubt; namely, that the abstraction of these precious monuments of art from the Italian collections was deeply and permanently resented by the Italian people. This sacrilege, as those enthusiastic and intelligent lovers of all the elegant arts considered it, turned back many a half-made convert from the principles of the French Revolution.
Buonaparte remained but five days in Milan; the citadel of that place still held out against him; but he left a detachment to blockade it, and proceeded himself in pursuit of Beaulieu. The Austrian had now planted the remains of his army behind the Mincio, having his left on the great and strong city of Mantua, which has been termed "the citadel of Italy," and his right at Peschiera a Venetian fortress, of which he took possession in spite of the remonstrances of the Doge. Peschiera stands where the Mincio flows out of "its parent lake," the Lago di Guarda. That great body of waters, stretching many miles backwards towards the Tyrolese Alps, at once extended the line of defence, and kept the communication open with Vienna. The Austrian veteran occupied one of the strongest positions that it is possible to imagine. The invader hastened once more to dislodge him.
The French Directory, meanwhile, had begun to entertain certain not unnatural suspicions as to the ultimate designs of their young general, whose success and fame had already reached so astonishing a height. They determined to check, if they could, the career of an ambition which they apprehended might outgrow their control. Buonaparte was ordered to take half his army, and lead it against the Pope and the King of Naples, and leave the other half to terminate the contest with Beaulieu, under the orders of Kellerman. But he acted on this occasion with the decision which these Directors in vain desired to emulate. He answered by resigning his command. "One half of the army of Italy," said he, "cannot suffice to finish the matter with the Austrian. It is only by keeping my force entire that I have been able to gain so many battles and to be now in Milan. You had better have one bad general than two good ones." The Directory durst not persist in displacing the chief whose name was considered as the pledge of victory. Napoleon resumed the undivided command, to which now, for the last time, his right had been questioned.
Another unlooked-for occurrence delayed, for a few days longer, the march upon Mantua. The heavy exactions of the French, and even more perhaps the wanton contempt with which they treated the churches and the clergy, had produced or fostered the indignation of a large part of the population throughout Lombardy. Reports of new Austrian levies being poured down the passes of the Tyrol were spread and believed. Popular insurrections against the conqueror took place in various districts: at least 30,000 were in arms. At Pavia the insurgents were entirely triumphant; they had seized the town, and compelled the French garrison to surrender.
This flame, had it been suffered to spread, threatened immeasurable evil to the French cause. Lannes instantly marched to Benasco, stormed the place, plundered and burnt it, and put the inhabitants to the sword without mercy. The general in person appeared before Pavia; blew the gates open; easily scattered the townspeople; and caused the leaders to be executed, as if they had committed a crime in endeavouring to rescue their country from the arm of a foreign invader. Everywhere the same ferocious system was acted on. The insurgent commanders were tried by courts-martial, and shot without ceremony. At Lugo, where a French squadron of horse had been gallantly and disastrously defeated, the whole of the male inhabitants were massacred. These bloody examples quelled the insurrections; but they fixed the first dark and indelible stain on the name of Napoleon Buonaparte.
The spirit of the Austrian and Catholic parties in Lombardy thus crushed, the French advanced on the Mincio. The general made such disposition of his troops, that Beaulieu doubted not he meant to pass that river, if he could, at Peschiera. Meantime he had been preparing to repeat the scene of Placenza;—and actually, on the 30th of May, forced the passage of the Mincio, not at Peschiera, but further down at Borghetto. The Austrian garrison at Borghetto in vain destroyed one arch of the bridge. Buonaparte supplied the breach with planks; and his men, flushed with so many victories, charged with a fury not to be resisted. Beaulieu was obliged to abandon the Mincio, as he had before the Adda and the Po, and to take up the new line of the Adige.
Meanwhile an occurrence, which may be called accidental, had nearly done more than repay the Austrians for all their reverses. The left of their line, stationed still further down the Mincio,—at Puzzuolo, no sooner learned from the cannonade that the French were at Borghetto, than they hastened to ascend the stream, with the view of assisting the defence of their friends. They came too late for this; the commander at Borghetto had retreated before they arrived. They, however, came unexpectedly; and, such was the chance, reached Valleggio after the French army had pursued the Austrians through it and onwards—and, at the moment when Buonaparte and a few friends, considering the work of the day to be over, and this village as altogether in the rear of both armies, were about to sit down to dinner in security. Sebetendorff, who commanded the Puzzuolo division, came rapidly, little guessing what a prize was near him, into the village. The French general's attendants had barely time to shut the gates of the inn, and alarm their chief by the cry "To arms." Buonaparte threw himself on horseback, and galloping out by a back passage, effected the narrowest of escapes from the most urgent of dangers. Sebetendorff was soon assaulted by a French column, and retreated, after Beaulieu's example, on the line of the Adige. Buonaparte, profiting by the perilous adventure of Valleggio, instituted a small corps of picked men, called Guides, to watch continually over his personal safety. Such was the germ from which sprung the famous Imperial Guard of Napoleon.
The Austrian had, in effect, abandoned for the time the open country of Italy. He now lay on the frontier, between the vast tract of rich provinces which Napoleon had conquered, and the Tyrol. The citadel of Milan, indeed, still held out; but the force there was not great, and, cooped up on every side, could not be expected to resist much longer. Mantua, which possessed prodigious natural advantages, and into which the retreating general had flung a garrison of full 15,000 men, was, in truth, the last and only Italian possession of the imperial crown, which, as it seemed, there might still be a possibility of saving. Beaulieu anxiously waited the approach of new troops from Germany, to attempt the relief of this great city; and his antagonist, eager to anticipate the efforts of the imperial government, sat down immediately before it.
Mantua lies on an island, being cut off on all sides from the main land by the branches of the Mincio, and approachable only by five narrow causeways, of which three were defended by strong and regular fortresses or entrenched camps, the other two by gates, drawbridges, and batteries. Situated amidst stagnant waters and morasses, its air is pestilential, especially to strangers. The garrison were prepared to maintain the position with their usual bravery; and it remained to be seen whether the French general possessed any new system of attack, capable of abridging the usual operations of the siege, as effectually as he had already done by those of the march and the battle. His commencement was alarming: of the five causeways, by sudden and overwhelming assaults, he obtained four; and the garrison were cut off from the main land, except only at the fifth causeway, the strongest of them all, named, from a palace near it, La Favorita. It seemed necessary, however, in order that this blockade might be complete, that the Venetian territory, lying immediately beyond Mantua, should be occupied by the French. The power of this ancient government was no longer such as to inspire much respect, and Buonaparte resolved that the claim of neutrality should form no obstacle to his measures. The French Directory had already most ungenerously trampled on the dignity of Venice, by demanding that she should no longer afford a retreat to the illustrious exile, the Count of Provence, eldest surviving brother of Louis XVI.[9] That unfortunate prince had, accordingly, though most reluctantly, been desired to quit the Venetian states, and had already passed to the Rhine, where his gallant cousin, the Prince of Condé, had long been at the head of a small and devoted army composed of the expatriated gentry of France. Buonaparte, however, chose to treat the reluctance with which Venice had been driven to this violation of her hospitality, as a new injury to his government: he argued that a power who had harboured in friendship, and unwillingly expelled, the Pretender to the French monarchy, had lost all title to forbearance on the part of the Revolutionary forces. This was a gross and ungenerous insult, and it was a gratuitous one; for he had a far better argument behind. The imperial general had, as we have seen, neglected the reclamations of the Doge, when it suited his purpose to occupy Peschiera. "You are too weak," said Buonaparte, when the Venetian envoy reached his headquarters, "to enforce neutrality on hostile nations such as France and Austria. Beaulieu did not respect your territory when his interest bade him violate it; nor shall I hesitate to occupy whatever falls within the line of the Adige." In effect, garrisons were placed forthwith in Verona, and all the strong places of that domain. The tricolor flag now waved at the mouth of the Tyrolese passes; and Napoleon, leaving Serrurier to blockade Mantua, returned to Milan, where he had important business to arrange.
The King of Naples, utterly confounded by the successes of the French, was now anxious to procure peace, almost on whatever terms, with the apparently irresistible Republic. Nor did it, for the moment, suit Buonaparte's views to contemn his advances. A peace with this prince would withdraw some valuable divisions from the army of Beaulieu; and the distance of the Neapolitan territory was such, that the French had no means of carrying the war thither with advantage, so long as Austria retained the power of sending new forces into Italy by the way of the Tyrol. He concluded an armistice accordingly, which was soon followed by a formal peace, with the King of the Two Sicilies; and the Neapolitan troops, who had recently behaved with eminent gallantry, abandoning the Austrian general, began their march to the south of Italy.
This transaction placed another of Napoleon's destined victims entirely within his grasp. With no friend behind him, the Pope saw himself at the mercy of the invader; and in terror prepared to submit. Buonaparte occupied immediately his legations of Bologna and Ferrara, making prisoners in the latter of these towns four hundred of the papal troops, and a cardinal, under whose orders they were. The churchman militant was dismissed on parole; but, being recalled to headquarters, answered that his master, the Pope, had given him a dispensation to break his promise. This exercise of the old dispensing power excited the merriment of the conquerors. The Vatican, meanwhile, perceived that no time was to be lost. The Spanish resident at the Roman court was despatched to Milan; and the terms on which the holy father was to obtain a brief respite were at length arranged. Buonaparte demanded and obtained a million sterling, a hundred of the finest pictures and statues in the papal gallery, a large supply of military stores, and the cession of Ancona, Ferrara, and Bologna, with their respective domains.
He next turned his attention to the grand duke of Tuscany,—a prince who had not only not taken any part in the war against the Republic, but had been the very first of the European rulers to recognise its establishment, and had kept on terms of friendship with all its successive authorities. Buonaparte, however, in pursuance of his system, resolved that the brother of the emperor should pay for his presumed inclinations. For the present, the Florentine museum and the grand duke's treasury were spared; but Leghorn, the seaport of Tuscany and great feeder of its wealth, was seized without ceremony; the English goods in that town were confiscated to the ruin of the merchants; and a great number of English vessels in the harbour made a narrow escape. The grand duke, in place of resenting these injuries, was obliged to receive Buonaparte with all the appearances of cordiality at Florence; and the spoiler repaid his courtesy by telling him, rubbing his hands with glee, during the princely entertainment provided for him, "I have just received letters from Milan; the citadel has fallen;—your brother has no longer a foot of land in Lombardy." "It is a sad case," said Napoleon himself long afterwards—speaking of these scenes of exaction and insolence,—"it is a sad case when the dwarf comes into the embrace of the giant; he is like enough to be suffocated—but 'tis the giant's nature to squeeze hard."
In the meantime the general did not neglect the great and darling plan of the French government, of thoroughly revolutionising the North of Italy, and establishing there a group of Republics modelled after their own likeness, and prepared to act as subservient allies in their mighty contest with the European monarchies. The peculiar circumstances of Northern Italy, as a land of ancient fame and high spirit, long split into fragments, and ruled, for the most part, by governors of German origin, presented many facilities for the realisation of this design; and Buonaparte was urged constantly by his government at Paris, and by a powerful party in Lombardy, to hasten its execution. He, however, had by this time learned to think of many idols of the Directory with about as little reverence as they bestowed on the shrines of Catholicism; in his opinion more was to be gained by temporising with both the governments and the people of Italy, than by any hasty measures of the kind recommended. He saw well the deep disgust which his exactions had excited. "You cannot," said he, "at one and the same moment rob people and persuade them you are their friends." He fancied, moreover, that the Pope and other nerveless rulers of the land might be converted into at least as convenient ministers of French exaction, as any new establishments he could raise in their room. Finally he perceived that whenever the Directory were to arrange seriously the terms of a settlement with the great monarchy of Austria, their best method would be to restore Lombardy, and thereby purchase the continued possession of the more conveniently situated territories of Belgium and the Luxembourg. The general, therefore, temporised; content, in the meantime, with draining the exchequers of the governments, and cajoling from day to day the population. The Directory were with difficulty persuaded to let him follow his own course; but he now despised their remonstrances, and they had been taught effectually to dread his strength.
Napoleon, it is clear enough, had no intention to grant these Italian governments anything but a respite; nor is it to be doubted that their disposition to take part with Austria remained as it had been before they entered into these treaties with France. That the purpose of deceit was mutual, affords, however, no plea of justification—least of all to the stronger party. "It will be well," says Sir Walter Scott, "with the world, when falsehood and finesse are as thoroughly exploded in international communication as they are among individuals in civilised countries."
CHAPTER VI
Wurmser supersedes Beaulieu—Jourdan and Moreau march into Germany, and are forced to retreat again—The Austrians advance from the Tyrol—Battle of Lonato—Escape of Napoleon—Battle near Castiglione—Wurmser retreats on Trent, and is recruited—Battle of Roveredo—Battle of Primolano—Battle of Bassano—Battle of St. George—Wurmser shut up in Mantua.
The general was now recalled to the war. The cabinet of Vienna, apt to be slow, but sure to be persevering, had at last resolved upon sending efficient aid to the Italian frontier. Beulieu had been too often unfortunate to be trusted longer: Wurmser, who enjoyed a reputation of the highest class, was sent to replace him: 300,000 men were drafted from the armies on the Rhine to accompany the new general; and he carried orders to strengthen himself further, on his march, by whatever recruits he could raise among the warlike and loyal population of the Tyrol.
The consequences of thus weakening the Austrian force on the Rhine were, for the moment, on that scene of the contest, inauspicious. The French, in two separate bodies, forced the passage of the Rhine—under Jourdan and Moreau; before whom the imperial generals, Wartensleben and the Archduke Charles, were compelled to retire. But the skill of the Archduke ere long enabled him to effect a junction with the columns of Wartensleben; and thus to fall upon Jourdan with a great superiority of numbers, and give him a signal defeat. The loss of the French in the field was great, and the bitter hostility of the German peasantry made their retreat a bloody one. Moreau, on the other hand, learning how Jourdan was discomfited, found himself compelled to give up the plan of pursuing his march further into Germany, and executed that famous retreat through the Black Forest which has made his name as splendid as any victory in the field could have done. But this reverse, however alleviated by the honours of Moreau's achievement, was attended with appearances of the most perilous kind. The genius of Carnot had devised a great scheme of operations, of which one half was thus at once cut short. He had meant Moreau and Jourdan, coalescing beyond the Rhine, to march upon the Tyrol; while Buonaparte should advance from the scene of his Italian conquests, join his brother generals on that frontier, and then march in union with them to dictate a peace before the gates of Vienna. All hope of this junction of forces was now at an end for this campaign. The French saw themselves compelled to resume the defensive on the western frontier of Germany; and the army of Italy had to await the overwhelming war which seemed ready to pour down upon Lombardy from the passes of the Tyrol.
Wurmser, when he fixed his headquarters at Trent, mustered in all 80,000; while Buonaparte had but 30,000, to hold a wide country, in which abhorrence of the French cause was now prevalent, to keep up the blockade of Mantua, and to oppose this fearful odds of numbers in the field. He was now, moreover, to act on the defensive, while his adversary assumed the more inspiriting character of invader. He awaited the result with calmness.
Wurmser might have learned from the successes of Buonaparte the advantages of compact movement; yet he was unwise enough to divide his great force into three separate columns, and to place one of these upon a line of march which entirely separated it from the support of the others. He himself, with his centre, came down on the left bank of the Lago di Guarda, with Mantua before him as his mark: his left wing, under Melas, was to descend the Adige, and drive the French from Verona; while the right wing, under Quasdonowich, were ordered to keep down the valley of the Chiese, in the direction of Brescia, and so to cut off the retreat of Buonaparte upon the Milanese;—in other words, to interpose the waters of the Lago di Guarda between themselves and the march of their friends—a blunder not likely to escape the eagle eye of Napoleon.
He immediately determined to march against Quasdonowich, and fight him where he could not be supported by the other two columns. This could not be done without abandoning for the time the blockade of Mantua; but it was not for Buonaparte to hesitate about purchasing a great ultimate advantage by a present sacrifice, however disagreeable. The guns were buried in the trenches during the night of the 31st July, and the French quitted the place with a precipitation which the advancing Austrians considered as the result of terror.
Napoleon meanwhile rushed against Quasdonowich, who had already come near the bottom of the Lake of Guarda. At Salo, close by the lake, and, further from it, at Lonato, two divisions of the Austrian column were attacked and overwhelmed. Augereau and Massena, leaving merely rear-guards at Borghetto and Peschiera, now marched also upon Brescia. The whole force of Quasdonowich must inevitably have been ruined by these combinations, had he stood his ground; but by this time the celerity of Napoleon had overawed him, and he was already in full retreat upon his old quarters in the Tyrol. Augereau and Massena, therefore, countermarched their columns, and returned towards the Mincio. They found that Wurmser had forced their rear-guards from their posts: that of Massena, under Pigeon, had retired in good order to Lonato; that of Augereau, under Vallette, had retreated in confusion, abandoning Castiglione to the Austrians.
Flushed with these successes, old Wurmser now resolved to throw his whole force upon the French, and resume at the point of the bayonet his communication with the scattered column of Quasdonowich. He was so fortunate as to defeat the gallant Pigeon at Lonato, and to occupy that town. But this great new success was fatal to him. In the exultation of victory he extended his line too much towards the right; and this over-anxiety to open the communication with Quasdonowich had the effect of so weakening his centre, that Massena, boldly and skilfully seizing the opportunity, poured two strong columns on Lonato, and regained the position; whereon the Austrian, perceiving that his army was cut in two, was thrown into utter confusion. Some of his troops, marching to the right, were met by those of the French, who had already defeated Quasdonowich in that quarter, and obliged to surrender: the most retreated in great disorder. At Castiglione alone a brave stand was made. But Augereau, burning to wipe out the disgrace of Vallette,[10] forced the position, though at a severe loss. Such was the battle of Lonato. Thenceforth nothing could surpass the discomfiture and disarray of the Austrians. They fled in all directions upon the Mincio, where Wurmser himself, meanwhile, had been employed in revictualling Mantua.
A mere accident had once more almost saved the Imperialist. One of the many defeated divisions of the army, wandering about in anxiety to find some means of reaching the Mincio, came suddenly on Lonato, the scene of the late battle, at a moment when Napoleon was there with only his staff and guards about him. He knew not that any considerable body of the enemy remained together in the neighbourhood; and, but for his presence of mind, must have been their prisoner. The Austrian had not the skill to profit by what fortune threw in his way; the other was able to turn even a blunder into an advantage. The officer sent to demand the surrender of the town was brought blindfolded, as is the custom, to his headquarters; Buonaparte, by a secret sign, caused his whole staff to draw up around him, and when the bandage was removed from the messenger's eyes, saluted him thus: "What means this insolence? Do you beard the French general in the middle of his army?" The German recognised the person of Napoleon, and retreated stammering and blushing. He assured his commander that Lonato was occupied by the French in numbers that made resistance impossible. Four thousand men laid down their arms; and then discovered that, if they had used them, nothing could have prevented Napoleon from being their prize.
Wurmser collected together the whole of his remaining force, and advanced to meet the conqueror. He, meanwhile, had himself determined on the assault, and was hastening to the encounter. They met between Lonato and Castiglione. Wurmser was totally defeated, and narrowly escaped being a prisoner; nor did he without great difficulty regain Trent and Roveredo, those frontier positions from which his noble army had so recently descended with all the confidence of conquerors. In this disastrous campaign the Austrians lost 40,000: Buonaparte probably understated his own loss at 7000. During the seven days which the campaign occupied he never took off his boots, nor slept except by starts. The exertions which so rapidly achieved this signal triumph were such as to demand some repose; yet Napoleon did not pause until he saw Mantua once more completely invested. The reinforcement and revictualling of that garrison were all that Wurmser could show, in requital of his lost artillery, stores, and 40,000 men.
During this brief campaign the aversion with which the ecclesiastics of Italy regarded the French manifested itself in various quarters. At Pavia, Ferrara, and elsewhere, insurrections had broken out, and the spirit was spreading rapidly at the moment when the report of Napoleon's new victory came to re-awaken terror and paralyse revolt. The conqueror judged it best to accept for the present the resubmission, however forced, of a party too powerful to be put down by examples. The Cardinal Mattei, Archbishop of Ferrara, being brought into his presence, uttered the single word peccavi: the victor was contented with ordering him a penance of seven days' fasting and prayer in a monastery: but he had no intention to forget these occurrences whenever another day of reckoning with the Pope should come.
While he was occupied with restoring quiet in the country, Austria, ever constant in adversity, hastened to place 20,000 fresh troops under the orders of Wurmser; and the brave veteran, whose heart nothing could chill, prepared himself to make one effort more to relieve Mantua, and drive the French out of Lombardy. His army was now, as before, greatly the superior in numbers; and though the bearing of his troops was more modest, their gallantry remained unimpaired. Once more the old general divided his army; and once more he was destined to see it shattered in detail.
He marched from Trent towards Mantua, through the defiles of the Brenta, at the head of 30,000; leaving 20,000 under Davidowich at Roveredo, to cover the Tyrol. Buonaparte instantly detected the error of his opponent. He suffered him to advance unmolested as far as Bassano, and the moment he was there, and consequently completely separated from Davidowich and his rear, drew together a strong force, and darted on Roveredo, by marches such as seemed credible only after they had been accomplished.
The battle of Roveredo (Sept. 4) is one of Napoleon's most illustrious days. The enemy had a strongly entrenched camp in front of the town; and behind it, in case of misfortune, Calliano, with its castle seated on a precipice over the Adige, where that river flows between enormous rocks and mountains, appeared to offer an impregnable retreat. Nothing could withstand the ardour of the French. The Austrians, though they defended the entrenched camp with their usual obstinacy, were forced to give way by the impetuosity of Dubois and his hussars. Dubois fell, mortally wounded, in the moment of his glory: he waved his sabre, cheering his men onwards with his last breath. "I die," said he, "for the Republic;—only let me hear, ere life leaves me, that the victory is ours." The French horse, thus animated, pursued the Germans, who were driven, unable to rally, through and beyond the town. Even the gigantic defences of Calliano proved of no avail. Height after height was carried at the point of the bayonet; 7000 prisoners and fifteen cannon remained with the conquerors. The Austrians fled to Levisa, which guards one of the chief defiles of the Tyrolese Alps, and were there beaten again. Vaubois occupied this important position with the gallant division who had forced it. Massena fixed himself in Wurmser's late headquarters at Trent; and Napoleon, having thus totally cut off the field-marshal's communication with Germany, proceeded to issue proclamations calling on the inhabitants of the Tyrol to receive the French as friends, and seize the opportunity of freeing themselves for ever from the dominion of Austria. He put forth an edict declaring that the sovereignty of the district was henceforth in the French Republic, and inviting the people themselves to arrange, according to their pleasure, its interior government.
The French general made a grievous mistake when he supposed that the Tyrolese were divided in their attachment to the Imperial government, because he had found the Italian subjects of that crown to be so. The Tyrol, one of the most ancient of the Austrian possessions, had also been one of the best governed; the people enjoyed all the liberty they wished under a paternal administration. They received with scornful coldness the flattering exhortations of one in whom they saw only a cunning and rapacious enemy; and Buonaparte was soon satisfied that it would cost more time than was then at his disposal to republicanise those gallant mountaineers. They, in truth, began to arm themselves, and waited but the signal to rise everywhere upon the invaders.
Wurmser heard with dismay the utter ruin of Davidowich; and doubted not that Napoleon would now march onwards into Germany, and joining Jourdan and Moreau, whose advance he had heard of, and misguessed to have been successful, endeavour to realise the great scheme of Carnot—that of attacking Vienna itself. The old general saw no chance of converting what remained to him of his army to good purpose, but by abiding in Lombardy, where he thought he might easily excite the people in his emperor's favour, overwhelm the slender garrisons left by Buonaparte, and so cut off, at all events, the French retreat through Italy, in case they should meet with any disaster in the Tyrol or in Germany. Napoleon had intelligence which Wurmser wanted. Wurmser himself was his mark; and he returned from Trent to Primolano where the Imperialist's vanguard lay, by a forced march of not less than sixty miles performed in two days. The surprise with which this descent was received may be imagined. The Austrian van was destroyed in a twinkling. The French, pushing everything before them, halted that night at Cismone—where Napoleon was glad to have half a private soldier's ration of bread for his supper. Next day he reached Bassano where the aged Marshal once more expected the fatal rencounter. The battle of Bassano (Sept. 8) was a fatal repetition of those that had gone before it. Six thousand men laid down their arms. Quasdonowich, with one division of 4000, escaped to Friuli; while Wurmser himself, retreating to Vicenza, there collected with difficulty a remnant of 16,000 beaten and discomfited soldiers. His situation was most unhappy; his communication with Austria wholly cut off—his artillery and baggage all lost—the flower of his army no more. Nothing seemed to remain but to throw himself into Mantua, and there hold out to the last extremity, in the hope, however remote, of some succours from Vienna; and such was the resolution of this often outwitted but never dispirited veteran.
In order to execute his purpose, it was necessary to force a passage somewhere on the Adige; and the Austrian, especially as he had lost all his pontoons, would have had great difficulty in doing so, but for a mistake on the part of the French commander at Legnago, who, conceiving the attempt was to be made at Verona, marched to reinforce the corps stationed there, and thus left his proper position unguarded. Wurmser, taking advantage of this, passed with his army at Legnago, and after a series of bloody skirmishes, in which fortune divided her favours pretty equally, was at length enabled to throw himself into Mantua. Napoleon made another narrow escape, in one of these skirmishes, at Arcola. He was surrounded for a moment, and had just galloped off, when Wurmser coming up and learning that the prize was so near, gave particular directions to bring him in alive!
Buonaparte, after making himself master of some scattered corps which had not been successful in keeping up with Wurmser, re-appeared once more before Mantua. The battle of St. George—so called from one of the suburbs of the city—was fought on the 13th of September, and after prodigious slaughter, the French remained in possession of all the causeways; so that the blockade of the city and fortress was henceforth complete. The garrison, when Wurmser shut himself up, amounted to 26,000. Before October was far advanced the pestilential air of the place, and the scarcity and badness of provisions, had filled his hospitals, and left him hardly half the number in fighting condition. The misery of the besieged town was extreme; and if Austria meant to rescue Wurmser, there was no time to be lost.