destructive cross-fire from the houses, while the old castle hurled its storm of lead on their heads; these brave soldiers were compelled to retire, leaving twothirds of their number stretched on the pavement. But Massena ordered up fresh battalions, which, marching through the tempest that swept the bridge, joined their companions, and regaining the village, stormed the castle itself. Along the narrow lanes that led to it the dead lay in swathes, and no sooner did the mangled head of the column reach the castle walls than it disappeared before the dreadful fire from the battlements as if it sunk into the earth. Strengthened by a new reinforcement, the dauntless French returned to the assault, and battering down the doors compelled the garrison to surrender. The Austrian army, however, made good their position on the pinecovered ridge behind the village, and disputed every inch of ground with the most stubborn resolution. The French cavalry, now across, came on a plunging gallop through the streets of the village, trampling on the dead and dying, and amid the flames of the burning houses, and through the smoke that rolled over their pathway, hurried on with exulting shouts and rattling armor to the charge. Still the Austrians held out, till threatened with a flank attack they were compelled to retreat. There was not a more desperate passage in the whole war than this. Massena was compelled to throw his brave soldiers, whether dead or wounded, into the stream, to clear a passage for the columns. Whole companies falling at a time, they choked up the way and increased the obstacles to be overcome. These must be sacrificed, or the whole shattered column that was maintaining their desperate position on the farther side be annihilated. It was an awful spectacle to see the advancing soldiers, amid the most destructive fire, themselves pitch their wounded comrades, while calling out most piteously to be spared, by scores and hundreds into the torrent. Le Grand fought nobly that day. Amid the choked-up defile and the deadly fire of the batteries, he fiercely pressed on, and in answer to the advice of his superior officer, deigned only the stern reply, Room for the head of my columns-none of your advice and rushed up to the very walls of the castle. The nature of the contest, and the narrow bridge and streets in which it raged, gave to the

The

field of battle a most horrid aspect. dead lay in heaps and ridges piled one across the other, mangled and torn in the most dreadful manner by the hoofs of the cavalry and the wheels of the artillery which were compelled to pass over them. Twelve thousand men thus lay heaped, packed and trampled together, while across them were stretched burning rafters and timbers, which wrung still more terrible cries and shrieks from the dying mass. Even Bonaparte, when he arrived, shuddered at the appalling sight, and turned with horror from the scene. The streets were one mass of mangled, bleeding, trampled men, overlaid with burning ruins. Napoleon blamed Massena for this act, saying that he should have waited for the flank movement of Lannes; but I suspect this was done simply as a salvo to his own conscience as he looked at the spectacle before him. If Massena had not made the attempt he would, undoubtedly, have been blamed still more.

This opened Vienna to the French army, and eighteen days after the battle of Aspern was fought. I have already, when speaking of Marshal Lannes, described this engagement. It will be seen by referring to that description that Massena and Lannes were the two heroes of that disastrous battle. They occupied the two villages of Aspern and Essling, which formed the two extremities of the French lines. Could Bonaparte have had another such point of defence in the centre as Wellington had at Waterloo, the fate of the battle might have been different. At the commencement of the fight, Massena's position was in the cemetery of Aspern. Here he stood under the trees that overshadowed the church, and directed the attack. Calm and collected as he ever was in the heat of the conflict, he surveyed without alarm the dangers that environed him. The onset of the Austrian battalions was terrific, as they came on with shouts that rang over the roar of cannon. But Massena calmly stood, and watching every assailed point supported it in the moment of need, while the huge branches above his head were constantly rending with the storm of cannon balls that swept through them, and the steeple and roof of the church rattled with the hail-storm of bullets that the close batteries hurled upon it. The conflict here became desperate and murderous, but never did he exhibit greater courage or more heroic firmness.

He was everywhere present, steadying his men by his calm, clear voice, and reckless exposure of his person, and again and again wringing victory out of the very grasp of the enemy. Thus, hour after hour, he fought, until night closed over the scene and then, by the light of blazing bombs and burning houses, and flash of Austrian batteries, he continued the contest with the desperation of one who would not be beat. When an advancing column recoiled before the deadly fire to which it was exposed, he would rush to its head, and crying "Forward!" to his men, with his hat on the point of his sword over his head for a banner, carry them into the very jaws of death. In the midst of one most desperate charge, every one of his guard fell around him dead or wounded, and he stood all alone amid the storm that wasted so fearfully where he passed; yet, strange to say, he was not even wounded. But at length, after the most superhuman efforts, he was forced from the village amid the victorious shouts of the Austrians. But he would not be driven off, and returned to the assault with unbroken courage, and succeeded in wringing some of the houses from the victors, which he retained through the night. The next morning, being always ready to fight a lost battle over again, he made a desperate assault on Aspern, and carried it. Again he stood in the churchyard where he so calmly commenced the battle; but it was now literally loaded with the dead, which outnumbered those above whose tombs they lay. But after the most heroic defence he was again driven out, and the repulse of Lannes' column on the centre, soon after, completed the disaster. In the awful ret. eat of the French army across the Danube in the midst of the battle, Massena exhibited his unconquerable tenacity of will, which disputed every inch of ground as if his life were there. When the victorious Austrians pressed on the retreating army crowded on the banks of the Danube, he and Lannes alone prevented an utter rout. They fought side by side with a heroism that astonished even Napoleon. Lannes fell, but this only increased Massena's almost superhuman exertions to save the army. Now on horseback, while the artillery swept down everything around him, and now on foot to steady the shaking ranks or head a desperate charge, he multiplied

with the dangers that encompassed him. He acted as if he bore a charmed life, and rode and charged through the tempest of balls with a daring that filled the soldiers with astonishment, and animated them with tenfold courage. His eye burned like fire, and his countenance, lit up by the terrible excitement that mastered him, gave him the most heroic appearance as he stormed through the battle. No wonder that Bonaparte, as he leaned on his shoulder afterwards, exclaimed, "Behold my right arm!" For his heroic courage in this engagement he received the title of " Prince of Essling."

Massena was with Bonaparte while he lay cooped up in the island of Lobau waiting for reinforcements, so that he could retrieve his heavy losses. Here again he was the victim of an accident that well nigh deprived him of life. Though he had moved unharmed amid so many conflicts, and bore a charmed life when death was abroad on the battle-field mowing down men by thousands, and exposed his person with a recklessness that seemed downright madness, with perfect impunity; yet here, while superintending some works on the Danube, his horse stumbling he fell to the ground, and was so injured that he was unable for a long time to sit on horseback. There seems a fatality about some men. Massena had more than once fallen from his dying steed in the headlong fight, and moved in front of his column into a perfect storm of musketry without receiving a scratch; and yet in a peaceful hunt, where there was no apparent danger, he lost an eye, and, riding leisurely along the shores of the Danube, was well nigh killed by a fall from his horse. But this last accident did not keep him out of battle. He was too important a leader to be missed from the field. Lannes was gone, and to lose two such men was like losing thirty thousand soldiers.

At the terrible fight at Wagram, which took place soon after, he went into the field at the head of his corps in a calash. Being still an invalid, one of the surgeons belonging to the medical staff accompanied him, as he did in several other battles. It is said, that Massena was exceedingly amused by the agitation of the timorous doctor the moment the carriage came within range of the enemy's batteries. He would start at every explosion of the artillery, and then address some careless remark to the old marshal, as much as to

say,

"You see I am not frightened at all;" and then, as a cannon ball went whizzing by, or ploughed up the ground near the wheels, he would grow pale, and turn and twist in the greatest agitation, asking of the probabilities and chances of being hit. The old veteran enjoyed his alarm exceedingly, and would laugh and joke at his fears in great delight. But when the storm grew thick, and the battle hot, his face would take its stern aspect, and, forgetful of the poor doctor by his side, he would drive hither and thither amid the falling ranks, giving his orders in a tone that startled this son of Esculapius almost as much as the explosion of cannon.

On the second day of the fight at Wagram, Massena's troops, after having carried the village of Aderklaa, were repulsed by a terrible discharge of grape shot and musketry, and a charge of Austrian cavalry, followed up by an onset from the Archduke Charles himself with his grenadiers, so that they fell back in confusion on the German soldiers, who also breaking and fleeing overturned Massena in his carriage. He was so enraged at the panic of his soldiers, that he ordered the dragoons about his person to charge them as enemies. But it seemed impossible to arrest the disorder. Spreading every moment, this part of the field appeared about to be lost. Massena, unable to mount his horse or head his columns, chafed like a lion in the toils. Disdain ing to fly, he strove with his wonted bravery to rally his fugitive army. It was all in vain, and the disabled veteran was left almost alone in his chariot in the midst of the plain. Bonaparte, in the distance, saw the distress of his marshal, and came at a headlong gallop over the field, pressed hard after by his brave cuirassiers and the horse artillery of the guard, which made the plain smoke and tremble in their passage.

Reining up his steed beside Massena's carriage, Bonaparte dismounted and springing into the seat beside the marshal began to discourse, in his rapid way, of his plans. With his finger pointing now towards the steeples of Wagram, and now towards the tower of Neufriedel, he explained in a few seconds the grand movement he was about to make. Remount ing his milk-white charger he restored order by his presence and personal exposure, so that the designed movements were successfully made. Massena commanded the advance guard after this

battle, and pursued the Archduke to Znaym, where the Austrians made a stand. The position was an admirable one for defence, and there was evidently to be a desperate struggle before it could be carried. But Massena advanced boldly to the assault. After various successes and defeats amid the most dreadful carnage, enraged at the obstinacy of the resistance and the frequent recoil of his own troops, he declared his resolution, disabled as he was, to mount on horseback and charge at the head of his columns in person. His staff strove in vain to prevent him. With a single glance at his recoiling columns, he leaped from his carriage and sprung to his saddle. His feet had scarcely touched the earth, before a cannon ball crashed through the centre of the vehicle, tearing it into fragments. If he had remained a moment longer he would have been killed instantaneously. Fate seemed to have a peculiar watch over him in battle, leaving him quite at the mercy of the most ordinary chance when out of it.

The

In 1810, this "favored child of victory" was appointed to the command of the army in Portugal. With a force of between seventy and eighty thousand men, he was directed to drive Wellington out of the kingdom. The French army was superior in numbers to that of the English, which, after the siege and fall of Ciudad Rodrigo, commenced a retreat. charge of cruelty and dishonesty against Massena is based chiefly on his conduct in this invasion of Portugal, and subsequent retreat. I do not design to follow him through this disastrous campaign; neither shall I enter here into a defence or palliation of his conduct. That there are grounds for this accusation, there can be no doubt-the palliations of his conduct are to be found in his position; still, there can be no excuse for his breach of faith towards the inhabitants of Ciudad Rodrigo and Almeida.

Probably, Massena, in no part of his military career, exhibited the qualities of a great commander so strikingly as in this campaign. Like the headlong avalanche in a charge-firm as a rock in the hour of disaster-possessed with a power of endurance seldom equaled by any man-he here demonstrated also his great abilities when left alone to plan and execute a protracted war.

It would be uninteresting to go over the details of this memorable pursuit and

retreat. From the first of June to the middle of October, he chased Wellington through Portugal, and for four months and a half crowded the ablest general in Europe backwards until he came to the lines of the Torres Vedras. The English had been engaged on these lines for a year, and they now rose before Massena, an impregnable barrier from which the tide of success must at last recoil. This monument of human skill and enterprise consisted of three lines of intrenchments -one within another-extending for nearly thirty miles. On these lines were a hundred and fifty redoubts and six hundred mounted cannon. This impregnable defence received Wellington and his exhausted army into its bosom, and Massena saw his foe retire from his grasp, and take up his position where his utmost exertions to dislodge him must prove abortive. To add to the security of Wellington, he here received reinforcements that swelled his army to a hundred and thirty thousand men, or more than double that of the French Marshal. To march his weary and diminished army on these stupendous fortifications, defended by such a host, Massena saw would be utter madness. His experienced eye could sometimes see the way to success through the most overwhelming obstacles, but here there was none. Besides the defences which here protected Wellington, there were twenty British ships of the line, and a hundred transports ready to receive the army if forced to retire. Unwilling to retreat, Massena sat down before the Torres Vedras, hoping first to draw Wellington forth with his superior force to a pitched battle in the open field. But the British commander was too wary to do this, and chose rather to provoke an assault on his intrenchments, or starve his enemy into a retreat. Massena sent off to the emperor for instructions, and then began to look about for means to provision his army. For a month the scenes of Genoa were acted over again. The army was reduced to starvation, but still Massena, with his wonted tenacity, refused to retreat. Wellington, in speaking of the position of the French army at this time, declared that Massena provisioned his 60,000 men and 20,000 horses for two months where he could not have maintained a single division of English soldiers. But at length, driven to the last extremity, and seeing that he must either commence a retreat at once,

or his famine-stricken army would be too weak to march, he broke up his position, and began slowly to retrace his victorious steps. Arranging his army into a compact mass, he covered it with a rearguard under the command of Ney, and, without confusion or disorder, deliberately retired from the Torres Vedras. Wellington immediately commenced the pursuit, and hovered like a destroying angel over his flight. But it was here that the extraordinary abilities of Massena shone forth in their greatest splendor. Not at Aspern, where he fought with a heroism that made him a host in himself, nor at Wagram, nor at Znaym, did he display such qualities as a great military leader as in this retreat. It will ever stand as a model in military history. He showed no haste or perturbation in his movements, but retired in such order and with such skill, that Wellington found it impossible to assail him with success. Taking advantage of every position offered by the country, the French Marshal would make a stand till the main body of the army and the military wagons passed on

Thus for more than four months in the

dead of winter-from the middle of November to the first of May-did Massena slowly retreat towards the frontier of Portugal. At Almeida he made a stand, and the two armies prepared for battle. Wellington was posted along the heights opposite the town. Massena commenced the assault, and fell with such vehemence on the British that they were driven from their position in the village of Fuentes d'Onoro. A counter-charge by the English retrieved a part of the village, and night closed the conflict. Early next morning Massena again commenced the attack, and in a short time the battle became general. So severely was Wellington handled, that he was compelled to abandon his position and take up another on a row of heights in rear of the first. In his retreat he was compelled to cross a plateau four miles in breadth which was perfectly curtained in with French cavalry. Making his left wing a pivot, he swung his entire right in admirable order across the plateau to the heights he wished to occupy. None but English infantry could have performed this perilous movement. Formed into squares, they moved steadily forward while the artillery of Ney was thundering in their rear, and his strong columns rolled like a

resistless torrent against them. Those brave squares would at times be lost to view in the cloud of the enemy that enveloped them, and then emerge from the disorder and smoke of battle without a square broken, steadily executing the required movement on which the contest hung. Had they given way, Wellington would have been lost. The English infantry, as heavy troops, are the best in the world, and the English commander knew he could trust them.

It was during this day that three regiments of English soldiery met the Imperial Guard in full shock, and both disdaining to yield, for the first time during the war bayonets crossed, and the forest of steel of those two formidable masses of infantry lay leveled against each others' bosoms. The onset was made by the British, and so terrible was the shock that many of the steadfast Guard were lifted from the ground, and sent as if hurled from a catapult through the air. The clatter of the crossing steel and the intermingling in such wild conflict of two such bodies of men, is described as being terrible in the extreme.

At night the English were forced back from all their positions; but the new stand Wellington had made was too formidable to be assailed, and after remaining three days before it Massena again commenced his retreat. This ended the pursuit, and Massena fell back to Salamanca, having lost since his invasion of Portugal more than a third of his army.

The cruelties practiced during this re

treat have given rise to severe accusations on the part of the British. But it remains to be shown, before they can be made good, that these were not necessary in order to harrass the enemy. All war is cruel; and the desolation and barrenness that followed in the track of the French army, wasting the inhabitants with famine, were a powerful check on Wellington in his pursuit. The sympathy of the inhabitants with the English doubtless made Massena less careful of their wants and sufferings; but his barbarity has been greatly exaggerated by Walter Scott, and other English historians. The track of a retreating and starving army must always be covered with woe; and one might as well complain of the cruelty of a besieging army, because the innocent women and children of the invested town die by thousands with hunger.

We have already spoken of Massena during the Russian campaign, and the three hundred days that preceded the campaign of Waterloo.

In 1816 the old marshal was accused in the Chamber of Deputies of plotting a conspiracy to bring back Napoleon. He indignantly and successfully repelled the charge, but the blow it gave his feelings hastened, it is thought, his death; and he died the next year at the age of fifty-nine.

Massena had two sons and one daughter. The daughter married his favorite aid-de-camp, Count Reille. The eldest son having died, the second succeeded to the father's estates and titles.