Bernadotte, were striving to break the French lines, and had already driven back slowly Massena's 18,000 men by sending against them the corps of Klenau, Kollowrath, and Lichtenstein, 50,000 strong.

The Marshal Massena, the "Enfant chéri de la victoire," injured by a fall from his horse, commanded from an open four-horse carriage in which he lay bandaged, and upon which the Austrians, imagining that it contained some person of importance, poured their fire, until the ground about the Marshal's carriage was covered with the wounded and the dead. The Carra St. Cyr division, driven back from Aderklaa, threw Massena's troops into some confusion, but the Emperor, coming up at that moment, got into the Marshal's carriage, and His Majesty's presence at once restored order. And now through Aderklaa the Aspre grenadiers were advancing victoriously, led by the Archduke Charles. The Emperor looked at them through his glass and went on quietly talking to Massena and outlining the manoeuvres he desired him to execute. He ordered the Marshal Duke of Rivoli, with the Molitor and Legrand divisions formed in close columns, to wheel to the right and advance to the Danube to the aid of Boudet, already hard pressed by the Austrian cavalry. Massena drove off to carry out these orders, while the Emperor mounted his horse and dispatched an aide-de-camp for General Macdonald and the army of Italy; a second for the fusileers and mounted grenadiers of the Guard; a third for the cuirassiers of General Nansouty; a fourth for Lauriston with sixty guns from the Guard; a fifth for Drouot with forty guns from the French and Bavarian artillery. For it was His Majesty's intention to shake the Aus

trian centre with the fire of a hundred guns, and then to pierce it with the infantry of Macdonald and the cavalry of Nansouty.

The right wing of the French was driving back the left wing of the Austrians; the right wing of the Austrians was driving back the left wing of the French, and about the ground quitted by Massena, slowly up and down before the line of the Carra St. Cyr division, waiting for the artillery he had ordered, rode the Emperor on the white Euphrates, while behind him on a coal-black stallion came the aide-de-camp Savary.

The Austrian cannon were firing as fast as musketry now, and the white Euphrates, with his neck arched and his red nostrils expanded, quivered a little at each detonation, and snorted, and shook the foam from his bits. Let us not forget them, those sturdy white Arabians-Marengo, Ali, Bishop, Soliman, Euphrates -that upon so many battlefields bore, amid the shells and cannon-smoke, the fate of France!

Thus they rode, and every moment came from the officers of the Carra St. Cyr division the short words of command, "Serrez les rangs!" as many a brave man pitched forward on his face, struck by the Austrian balls. But no ball struck the aide-de-camp Savary, no ball struck the white Euphrates, no ball struck the green-coated little Emperor!

So for an hour backward and forward before the line rode the Emperor, his eyes fixed ever upon that fardistant point across the Marchfeld where were stationed his artillery reserves, while with his hand he patted the neck of his horse. There they came at last, making the earth tremble-sixty guns belonging to the Guard, and forty from the French and Bavarian

artillery. They were wheeled into line-a long dark line of deep-booming, roar-fulminating, death-belching mouths—and then they fired, and the Austrian cannon answered with a will, and the most terrific cannonade of the Empire began in multisonous thunder.

Firing continually upon the double line of the Austrian centre, the French guns pierced it with balls and dismounted the Austrian artillery. But the Austrian centre still stood firm, and then the Imperial tactician prepared his coup de grâce and ordered General Macdonald and the Army of Italy to charge. So into the plain of the Marchfeld, with the Broussier and Seras divisions in single file, Lamarque's divisions on the wings, and, behind all, twenty-four squadrons of Nansouty's cuirassiers, advances Macdonald. Into them, in front, and on the left, and on the right, the Austrians pour their fire. The first ranks melt away, but over their bodies, leaving behind them a long dark trail of dead and dying, the gallant corps goes on. And now at full speed come the horsemen of the Prince John de Lichtenstein, swift-galloping, bent to retrieve the fortunes of Imperial Austria. Macdonald meets them with three lines of fire, and the proudlycharging cuirassiers dash all in vain against his bayonets. Have they not done enough, these grenadiers of Italy, as they stand there far on the Marchfeld among their heaps of dead, the horsemen of de Lichtenstein retreating, and a sea of fire all about them? Ah, no! Their mission is yet unfulfilled. The Austrian centre still stands firm. While life shall last, march on! And so, over the blazing Marchfeld and the wrecks of the Austrian cavalry, over the débris of all those brave soldiers who have perished there since

morning, closing their rent, torn, and bloody ranks, bearing above them their eagle, and fixing their eyes on the iron Macdonald, while upon them from every side is poured a hail of shot and shell, they go to the very heights of Deutsch-Wagram, where, through the smoke and the flame they can see the white coats of Imperial Austria. Shall they pause here? No! No! The Austrian centre still stands firm! While life shall last, march on!

See! See! upon the right, beyond the towers of Neusiedel appear the fires of Davoût; Friant, Gudin, and Morand are driving back the Austrian left. And on the left, Massena, with Boudet, Legrand, and Molitor, is crushing out the Austrian right. While in the centre, far in advance, in the very heart of the Austrian position, surrounded by the torn and bleeding remnants of his regiments, under the tattered shreds. of a tricolor, floats the white plume of Macdonald. The Emperor lowered his spy-glass, and turned to the Prince of Neufchâtel, saying, “The battle is won!"

CHAPTER XIX

A MARSHAL OF FRANCE

Great is the glory, for the strife is hard.

-WORDSWORTH, To Haydon.

""Tis o'er! and France, foredoom'd to sway
Where'er her flashing eagle shone,

Hears the proud victor named that day
In victory's shout-' Napoleon!'"

ON the following morning the Emperor, surrounded by his staff, rode over the battlefield to superintend, according to his custom, the removal of the wounded. Then he rode to the bivouac of Macdonald's corps, and, when he saw the General Macdonald, he held out his hand and said, "You have behaved valiantly and have rendered me the greatest services. On the battlefield of your glory, where I owe you so large a part of yesterday's success, I make you a Marshal of France."

"Sire," answered the Marshal Macdonald, "since you are satisfied with us, let the rewards and recompenses be apportioned and distributed among my army corps, beginning with Generals Lamarque, Broussier and others, who so ably seconded me.

"Anything you please," replied the Emperor, "I have nothing to refuse you."

So it was.

And the Marshal Berthier, Prince of Neufchâtel, the Duke of Bassano, Secretary of State,