It was past five o'clock, day was drawing to a close, the Austrians were still advancing, when the arrival of Dessaix checked the farther retreat of the French. He stationed his division, consisting of 6000 men with twelve pieces of artillery, in front of the village of San Giuliano, where some vines and patches of trees concealed them from view. Kellerman's brigade of cavalry was on his right, the other troops took post on the flanks and in the rear, as they could be collected and reformed. Biographers make Napoleon remind his soldiers that "he was accustomed to sleep on the field of battle;" but as we shall see, victory was not achieved by idle words. At a mile from the village, General Zach formed three battalions, and supported by cavalry and artillery, led them on to the attack; arrived within range, they were received with so heavy a fire of grape and musketry, that they instantly gave way, the artillerymen withdrawing the guns after the first few rounds. This was the signal for the whole French division to advance: their gallant leader Dessaix fell at the first onset; and as the Austrian grenadiers stood firm, the combat soon reached the point when the slightest additional blow dealt by one party or the other is sure to give the decision. It was here given by Kellerman at the head of 1200 horse men. Posted on the right of Dessaix's division, he accompanied them in their advance, and no sooner perceived the Austrian grenadiers engaged in a closely balanced combat with the French infantry, than wheeling to the left he fell upon their unguarded flank with one part of his brigade, while the other, bearing right onwards, charged the Austrian cavalry by whom they were supported. One instant changed the fate of battle: the Austrian cavalry, unworthy of their fame, fled without striking a blow; the infantry, surprised and left to their fate, were trodden under hoof, sabred, or captured. General Zach, 37 officers, and 1600 men, were taken prisoners. Encouraged by this splendid and unexpected success, the whole French army again started forward. Far in front, Kellerman and his daring horsemen still led the way to victory. When he reached the second Austrian division, a melancholy repetition of the scene of shame just described again occurred. The 2000 cavalry of the main column fled panic-struck, without awaiting the onset; some galloped away to General Ott's corps, others rushed madly along the high road, overthrowing in their disgraceful career their very infantry, which was endea vouring to form. The astonished battalions, broken by friends, were unable to withstand the onset of foes; they were charged and dispersed, and would have been utterly destroyed, had not Kellerman halted to reform his ranks and await the rest of the army, which was still far behind. And where, during this scene of death and shame, were the victorious corps of Ott and O'Reily; and why did they not close in and crush between them the confused mass of pur suers, disordered even by their own unexpected success? This is a question which history cannot yet answer: the character of individuals, the views, practices, and opinions of the armies in which they serve, must sometimes account for the feeble actions even of the bold and the resolute. The six reserve battalions seeing the general route, formed on the left of the road, and allowed the crowd of fugitives to roll on towards Marengo: not finding themselves attacked they retired towards the village, which they maintained till the flanking columns had gained the bridge-head. General Ott had nearly reached Ghilina when he observed the action near San Giuliano; he instantly prepared to fall on the right flank of the French, but the rapidity with which the fire flew back towards Marengo, unfortunately made him conclude that his aid would be too late. He retired to Castel-Ceriolo, drove out some French who had already occupied the place, and reached the bridge-head without difficulty. The victors pursued their flying foes to the very ditch of the works, nor did the confusion of the routed cease even within the ramparts. Infantry, cavalry, artillery, all hurried to the bridges, that were soon blocked up. An artillery driver, fancying that safety could only be gained on the opposite bank, plunged with his gun into the stream and effected a passage; others, seeing what had happened, followed the example, but the marshy bed of the river giving way beneath the additional weight, between thirty and forty guns and ammunition-wagons remained fast in the water. As the French made no attempt to carry the works of the bridge-head, the action ceased between nine and ten o'clock, both parties resuming the positions they had held in the morning. On the part of the Austrians, 6 generals, 246 officers, and 6229 men were killed or wounded; and 1 general, 74 officers, and 2846 taken: 13 guns fell into the hands of the conqueror. The French in their bulletin acknowledge a loss of only 600 killed, 1500 wounded, and 900 taken prisoners; though it is evident, from the nature of the action, that they could not, in killed and wounded, have sustained a loss much inferior to that of the enemy. Brossier, in the Mémoire already quoted, allows that 6000 men were placed hors de combat. If we believe a widely circulated and generally accredited anecdote, the victor was not on this occasion so great as his victory; he had not ordered the brilliant onset which decided the day. Kellerman saw and seized the opportunity for striking the blow, and the chieftain deigned, it seems, to be a little jealous of the fame the subordinate had acquired. When the real victor entered the room in which Napoleon was at sup per after the battle with his staff and a number of generals, the latter only said, "Ah, Kellerman, you made a pretty good charge there!"-une assez belle charge; to which the offended general replied, "Yes, I have placed the crown upon your head! an answer that caused Kellerman to be ever afterwards kept in the background. It was while bending under the heavy calamity which had just burst upon him, that the aged commander of the Austrian army was forced to decide on the measures best calculated to save the remnants of his defeated host. He had it in his power to try the fate of another battle, or to cross the Po at Cassal, and endeavour to reach the Mincio. Lastly, he could throw himself into Genoa, and depend on the British fleet for his supplies. The reduced numbers and broken spirits of the troops held out little prospect of success against the whole French army united; the march towards the Mincio was long, and certain of being attended with loss and difficulty, even if the situation of Moncey's troops should leave it practicable; the movement on Genoa held out better prospects of success. A few days before the action, Melas had written to Lord Keith, stating that, in case of reverse, he should throw himself into that fortress; and the admiral had informed him, in reply, that every assistance the fleet could render should be at his disposal. When we consider the great advantages the Austrians had derived from the defence made by Mantua in 1796, it is not easy to understand what induced Melas to forego the intention of marching to Genoa, where an English army under Sir Ralph Abercromby was hourly expected, and where, indeed, it arrived on the 22d of June, exactly like all the English armies of the period, in time to be too late. Besides these expedients, which Melas submitted to a council of war, he also suggested to them whether, considering the reverses sustained in Germany, and the exposed situation of the Austrian dominions, it might not be advisable to negotiate with the Consul, and obtain a safe retreat for the army, on condition of yielding up some of the conquests of the previous campaign? When we consider the influence which the opinion of a commander-in-chief must always exercise, and take the depressed spi rits of the assembly into account, we need not be surprised at their yielding unanimous consent to his proposal. A flag of truce was sent out accordingly, and on condition that the Austrians should evacuate the bridgehead and retire to the left bank of the Bormida, Napoleon granted a suspension of arms for forty-eight hours, willing to enter into a negotiation that promised far greater results than any which had yet been achieved in the field. The Austrian negotiator had, at first, only authority to offer the restitution of Piedmont and Genoa, and as an English army was daily expected to arrive at the latter place, these terms would probably have been accepted had further concessions been resolutely declined; but Napoleon insisting on the line of the Po and the Mincio, his demand was complied with, and the convention of Alessandria signed on the very day after the battle. By this act, Lombardy, Piedmont, and the Riviera, together with the fortresses of Turin, Coni, Alessandria, Tortona, Genoa, Pizzightone, Savona, Piacenza, Mailam, Čeva, Arona, and Urbino, which, if properly defended, might have arrested armies during entire campaigns, were given up without a blow or effort. Nothing equal to this illfated convention had ever before been known in military history; it remained for subsequent events to give it the appearance of an absolute deed of heroism. The result of this treaty, which again placed Italy under the dominion of France, lent a lustre to the battle of Marengo and the passage of the Alps far exceeding any reflected from the brightest military actions performed in modern times. And Napoleon, conscious that arms could effect nothing greater for the moment, made from the very battlefield itself proposals of peace to the Austrian government. Having despatched these by Count St. Julian, an Austrian officer, he set out for Milan to reorganise the Cisalpine republic. He was received with acclamations, and attended divine service in the cathedral, when Te Deum was sung for the victory gained. "It was the first religious ceremony," says Norvins, "at which he had been present, since he presided in Egypt over the festival of Mahommet." During his stay at Milan, the restorer of the liberties of nations and the reformer of morals, acted in a manner hardly consistent with the character so liberally ascribed to him by biographers. Marchesi, a wretched singer, refused to sing before the First Consul, and having expressed himself with silly impertinence on the occasion, was, properly enough, perhaps, kicked out of the apartment. Not satisfied with this, however, Napoleon sent an order for him to be thrown into prison :-a regular lettre de cachet, worthy of the old Bastile days, sent by the chief magistrate of one republic and the restorer of others, to punish a musician for refusing to sing a song! The attention publicly shewn to Madame Grassini, the celebrated vocalist, we should not have noticed, had it not been the custom of bio graphers to extol Napoleon for his scrupulous attention to decorum. Resuming his journey, the Consul reached the Tuileries on the 3d of July. The enthusiasm of the Parisians was boundless. Success so vast, brilliant, and unexpected, seemed to change all political opinions and animosities into an idolatrous admiration of the fortunate conqueror. Day after day the palace was surrounded by crowds eager to obtain a moment's sight of the man whose actions, seen through the dazzling halo that victory casts around the events of war, appeared to border almost on the fabulous. As the campaign of Marengo is generally looked upon as furnishing brilliant evidence of the great mili tary genius ascribed to the French emperor, it will be right here to enter into some examination of its merits. Early in May, and a month before the fall of Genoa, the Consul had assembled 60,000 men on the Swiss long Massena would be able to hold side of the Alps. He knew how out, and was, of course, fully aware that 60,000 men, mostly tried sol diers, thrown into the scale, would be sure, as affairs stood in Italy, to turn the balance at once in favour of the French. On this point there could not be a shadow of doubt. Under these circumstances, the shortest, simplest, and most evident course seemed to be a junction with Thurau and Suchet, and an advance with these united forces to the relief of Genoa, leaving Moncey to cross the St. Gothard. As Melas could not, after the reduction of Genoa and his junction with Ott and Kaim, assemble more than 30,000 men for the battle of Marengo, it is evident that he would not before the surrender of Massena, and before Ott's troops were disposable, have been able to collect a force capable of facing the army that might have been brought to act against him. The toilsome march over the St. Bernard, the difficult passage under Fort Bard, and all the hazards encountered in this boasted undertaking, only brought Napoleon into the plains of Chiavasso, which he could have reached with far greater facility, and with greater numbers, by joining Thurau. The march upon Milan is still more extraordinary. It allowed Genoa to fall, placed the remnants of Ott's corps at the disposal of Melas, and gave the Austrian time to collect his dispersed forces, while it did not place an additional soldier at the disposal of Napoleon, who fought his decisive battle with 28,000 men, while he had 80,000 scattered up and down the country. That by the position of these detached corps he cut off Melas' retreat to Mantua is probably true; but by his own position he also cut himself off from all communication with France: and in a hostile country, surrounded by numerous fortresses, it is not easy to see what could have saved his army from complete destruction had the battle of Marengo been lost, as so nearly proved the case. All these boasted strategical movements tended in nothing whatever to augment the chances of victory in the field, where their value was ultimately to be tried; and not effecting this object, they must naturally be condemned, independent of the hazards to which they exposed the army and the success of the enterprise. That the circumstances under which the battle was fought-Moncey on the Adda, Napoleon to the south of Alessandria-the results of victory were sure to be heightened is certain; but the results must have been heightened to either party, and Napoleon's previous movements tended in nothing to augment his chances of success, and to double the stakes is no proof of the skill of the player. As to the battle itself, it offers no evidence whatever of military skill, nor of anything but great gallantry on the part of the French officers and soldiers, and a firm resolution to fight it out to the last. The slow pursuit of the Austrians, which allowed Dessaix to arrive and the retiring troops to form around him, together with a single charge of cavalry, which Napoleon did not even order, decided the fate of the day and of the campaign. The Austrians were guilty of some extraordinary faults. By an unaccountable miscalculation of time and distance they believed Suchet, who was before Savona, to be at Aqui, and, as we have seen, detached 2300 cavalry in that direction on the very morning of the battle. About noon, and after the first success had been gained, Count O'Reily with his division of infantry proceeded to Frugarolo, to observe the same phantom host. And, lastly, when fortune had turned, and when the French army were in pursuit, and, as eye-witnesses allow, in such total confusion that 2000 men could nowhere be assembled round their colours, the flanking corps of Ott and O'Reily, that were in perfect order, retired without striking one blow at the disordered mass, which, in the darkness of night, that always magnifies the foe, and in a state of complete disorganisation into which their hurried advance had thrown them, would probably have been dispersed by the slightest effort. Add to these great errors on the part of the Austrians the advantages which, in point of personal position and the description of his troops, Napoleon formerly possessed over Beaulieu, and which he now possessed in a far greater degree over Melas, and we shall easily understand how his army vanquished an equal number of adversaries, without any great degree of military genius being necessarily evinced on the occasion. The shameful and now well-known attempt to forge a little fame on this occasion, shews that he was not altcgether unconscious of this himself. In General Berthier's Relation de lu Bataille de Marengo, written by Napoleon's order, and under his very inspection, the flight, or rather the retreat, of the French from Marengo to San Giuliano, is neither flight nor retreat, but a grand conception of the Consul's, who threw back the left of the army towards San Giuliano while resting the right on the village of Castel-Ceriolo. In all languages a number of writers have repeated this idle fable, though its utter folly should have been apparent at the very first glance; and not only were the Austrians in possession of Castel-Ceriolo, but General Ott's division, which had captured it in the morning, was actually advancing along the road from the village to La Ghilina at the very time this pretended movement must have been made. The Austrians must, therefore, as a single look at the map will shew, have passed close along the rear of this new French line-must have brushed the very knapsacks of the soldiers of whom it was composed! But if the passage of the St. Bernard deserve far more blame than praise as a military operation, the reverse is the case if considered as a political one; for if its object were to dazzle and astonish with a view to aid in Napoleon's elevation, then certainly nothing could be better calculated. The novelty of the undertaking, its real and exaggerated difficulties, the march of an army ice that cover the highest summits of over the lofty barriers of snow and the Alps, the breaking into the fair fields of Italy from the seats of eternal frost, and bursting on the astonished foe, as the avalanche bursts from the lofty regions whence the invaders descended, had something striking and romantic that could not, if attended with success, fail to captivate the easily excited imaginations of the French people. It offered the Parisians subjects for description and declamation; "enabled them," as the German historian, Schlösser, the extravagant admirer of Napoleon, says, " to praise their own nation, according to custom, beyond all bounds and measure;" and tended naturally to make them idolise the man who, to be the first among the French, had performed actions that, as represented, seemed almost to border on the miraculous. If looked upon in this point of view, and as a road towards a crown, for which every thing was to be risked, then the passage of the St. Bernard was a great conception. If it be examined as a strategical monument, and tried by the fate of Genoa, the small army brought into the field of Marengo, and by the situation of battle-day, then it is little, indeed. affairs at one o'clock on the decisive 1 |