"Hey! Joseph; if we were only there!"
But I felt bitterly, indeed, when, about seven o'clock, three wagons came to distribute provisions and ammunition among us, and it became evident that we were to become the rear-guard. In spite of my hunger, I felt like throwing my bread against a wall. A few moments after, two squadrons of Polish lancers appeared coming up the bank, and behind them five or six generals, Poniatowski among the number. He was a man of about fifty, tall, slight, and with a melancholy expression. He passed without looking at us. General Fournier, who now commanded our brigade, spurred from among his staff, and cried:
"By file, left!"
I never so felt my heart sink. I would have sold my life for two farthings; but nevertheless, we had to move on, and turn our backs to the bridge.
We soon arrived at a place called Hinterthor—an old gate on the road to Caunewitz. To the right and left stretched ancient ramparts, and behind, rows of houses. We were posted in covered roads, near this gate, which the sappers had strongly barricaded. Captain Vidal then commanded the battalion, reduced to three hundred and twenty-five men. A few worm-eaten palisades served us for intrenchments, and, on all the roads before us, the enemy were advancing. This time they wore white coats and flat caps, with a raised piece in front, on which we could see the two-headed eagle of the kreutzers. Old Pinto, who recognized them at once, cried:
"Those fellows are the kaiserliks! We have beaten them fifty times since 1793; but if the father of Marie Louise had a heart, they would be with us now instead of against us."
For some moments a cannonade had been going on at the other side of the city, where Blücher was attacking the faubourg of Halle.
Soon after, the firing stretched along to the right; it was Bernadotte attacking the faubourg of Kohlgartenthor, and at the same time the first shells of the Austrians fell in our covered ways; they followed in file; many passing over Hinterthor, burst in the houses and the streets of the faubourg.
At nine o'clock the Austrians formed their columns of attack on the Caunewitz road, and poured down on us from all sides. Nevertheless we held our own until about ten o'clock, and then were forced back to the old ramparts, through the breaches of which the Kaiserliks pursued us under the cross-fire of the Fourteenth and Twenty-ninth of the line. The poor Austrians were not inspired with the fury of the Prussians, but nevertheless, showed a true courage; for, at half-past ten they had won the ramparts, and although, from all the neighboring windows, we kept up a deadly fire, we could not force them back. Six months before it would have horrified me to think of men being thus slaughtered, but now I was as insensible as any old soldier, and the death of one man or of a hundred would not cost me a thought.
Until this time all had gone well, but how were we to get out of the houses? Unless we climbed on the roof, retreat was no longer possible. This again was one of those terrible moments I shall never forget. All at once the idea struck me that we should be caught like foxes which they smoke in their holes. The enemy held every avenue. I went to a window in the rear, and saw that it looked out on a yard, and that the yard had no gate except in front. I thought it not unlikely that the Austrians, in revenge for the loss we had inflicted upon them, might put us to the point of the bayonet. It would have been natural enough. Thinking thus, I ran back to a room, where a dozen of us yet remained, and there I saw Sergeant Pinto leaning against the wall, his arms hanging by his sides, and his face as white as paper. He had just received a bullet in the breast, but the old man's warrior soul was still strong within him, as he cried: