dred little napoleons to build your house again," answered the Emperor. He motioned to his aide-decamp, who opened a purse and poured the gold into the astounded Heinrich's hands. And thus came true that saying of the soldiers, that no foeman, however humble, could speak to His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor of the French, without receiving some reward. Toward evening, after visiting the various quarters of the city, the Emperor went to see the brave regiments that had led in the assault, and when he came to the square where the 115th were bivouacked, he said to the Captain who saluted him: "Where is he who opened the gate and guarded the lady?" 66 Legrand!" called the Captain, and the sturdy grenadier came forward. "Ah! It is you!" cried the Emperor. "You are one of my old 'grumblers' of Italy!" And he pulled Legrand's mustache. 66 "I may be a grumbler, sire, but I march always." "Why, so you do, and fight too!" said the Emperor. Come, sit down here and tell me about your old father. Does he not live at Chalons-sur-Marne?" "He does, sire," answered the grenadier. And so upon the blackened timbers of a half-burned house in the Ratisbon Market they two sat down-the great, stalwart grenadier, with his towering plume and bearskin, and the short, gray-coated Emperor, kicking the debris with his boots and flicking the sand with his riding-whip. Old Francois Legrand and his good friend the Little Corporal! And the Emperor asked him many questions about himself and about his family. "Why! it seems you were with me in Italy and Egypt and at Austerlitz! Well, what have you gotten for it all?" 66 I have the cross, sire," answered Legrand proudly. "And you have no commission?" "It will come some time or other," replied the soldier. 66 It has come," rejoined the Emperor. He rose and tapped the grenadier lightly with his riding-whip, saying, "We'll march to-morrow to Vienna, Captain Legrand!" CHAPTER XIII The Bold Duke Maximilian He who fights and runs away —Goldsmith, The Art of Poetry. ON the 10th of May, the French appeared before Vienna, that great city on the Danube, with its parks and palaces, its Prater and its moated Laxenburg— Vienna the Kaiserstadt, or Imperial City, whose boulevards the Prater Strasse, the Karnthner Strasse, the Tabor Strasse, and the Graben—radiate from St. Stephen's Platz, where towers the great Cathedral of St. Stephen, upon whose roof of colored tiles a colossal mosaic of the Austrian eagle looks with one head toward Schonbrunn and with the other toward Aspern, Essling, and Deutsch-Wagram. Twenty-seven days had passed since the Emperor set out from Paris; Tengen, Abensburg, Eckmuhl had been fought; Landshut, Ratisbon, Ebersberg had been stormed; 60,000 Austrians had been killed or taken prisoners, more than one hundred cannon had been captured, the Archduke's army had been driven back. into Bohemia, and for the second time the Viennese saw Napoleon at their gates. The good people of Vienna were much astonished. when they saw the French forces. "Don't be alarmed," the Archduke Maximilian had been telling "The French have been defeated. them. The Archduke Charles stays a long time in Bohemia, it is true, but it is a part of a series of skilful manoeuvres that he is executing. The French may send a detachment to Vienna, but I will thrash them fast enough if they come! Don't worry!" And now here was the whole French army pouring down upon Vienna—Napoleon at their head! The people ran through the streets howling with rage, and persons of quiet temperament got into their houses and locked the doors. When a French soldier bearing a flag of truce rode into the suburbs, the people grabbed him; Hans Loibel, the butcher's boy, who lived in Backer Strasse, ran him through, and the greasy mob put Hans upon the soldier's horse and trotted him about in triumph. "Down with the French!" they cried. "Where is our great Archduke Maximilian, who promised to blow them into little bits? Come out, Duke Maximilian, and keep your word!" In an apartment of the Hofburg sat the Archduke Maximilian and his second in command, General O'Reilly. "Well, they are here!" said the Archduke Maximilian. "Indeed they are!" said General O'Reilly. We will show them a thing or two before we finish with them!" said the Archduke Maximilian. "Indeed we will!" said General O'Reilly. "What point shall we fortify against them?" asked the Archduke Maximilian. "I don't know!" said General O'Reilly. In the bright May sunshine the Emperor Napoleon and the Marshal Massena rode round the fortifications on the southern side of the city. Opposite Lusthaus flows an arm of the river called the Danube canal, beyond is the promenade of the Prater, and further on the great Tabor bridge across the Danube. This the Emperor determined to take, for then he could prevent the Archduke Charles from marching to relieve Vienna, could shut up the Archduke Maximilian in the city and compel him to surrender. The Emperor and the Marshal rode near the bank of the Danube canal, and the Emperor examined the position. "There are some boats over there at the left bank," said he, "Massena, send some swimmers after them." The Marshal dispatched his aide-de-camp Sigaldi to the Boudet division, which was stationed not far away toward Kaiser-Ebersdorf. Soon twenty-five sturdy fellows from the 115th came marching up. There were Andre Marceau, Pierre Pasquin, Robert Despienne, Charles Roidot, Henri Vatel, and twenty more. Swim across and bring back those boats," said the Marshal Massena. 66 They hurried down to the bank and stripped off their clothes. Robert Despienne was in the water first—Robert was always quick. Pierre was second, old Andre Marceau was third, and the rest followed together. They struck out vigorously, but the Austrians at the advanced posts had seen them and opened fire. The balls splashed in the water about them. Pierre was swimming hard after Robert Despienne, whose black head was moving along before him. He could hear Andre Marceau puffing not far away. A musket-ball dropped into the water before him and |