“Remain at your posts,” said he calmly. “I know well how to die alone. We must not for one man lose six.”
Finally the tide, which comes in every great battle, turned in favor of the French. General Doctoroff and Kienmayer effected a painful retreat, under the fire of the French batteries, by a narrow embankment separating the two lakes of Melintz and Falnitz. The awful day came to a close with French shouts of victory.
Napoleon, as was customary, harangued his army.
“Soldiers,” said he, “I am satisfied with you. You have justified all that I expected from you. An army of 100,000 men commanded by the Emperors of Russia and Austria has been in less than four hours either cut up or dispersed, and what escaped from your steel is drowned in the lakes. Forty flags or standards of the Imperial Guard of Russia, 120 pieces of cannon, 20 generals and more than 30,000 prisoners are the results of this ever memorable day. In three months this third coalition has been vanquished and dissolved. Soldiers, when all that is necessary in order to assure the happiness and prosperity of France shall be accomplished, I will lead you back into France. There you will be the object of my most tender solicitude.”
Prior to this the French troops had pressed on into Vienna. A detachment hurried to the prison where Charles Louis Schulmeister was awaiting his execution. They arrived in the nick of time and released him from what seemed to be certain death. He was calmer and more collected than any one in the crowd.
“Frenchmen,” he cried, with a mixture of irony and joy, “I greet you. I welcome you to the City of Vienna.”
Schulmeister was naturally one of the heroes of the day and when Napoleon went to meet the Emperor Francis on the following day he formed one of the small bodyguard that accompanied the great soldier. The conference between the two crowned heads took place at the mill of Paleny, between Nasiedlowitz and Urschitz. The spy kept in the background and was not observed by the vanquished monarch.
Napoleon treated his fallen foe with great courtesy and made excuses for the poor place in which he was compelled to receive Francis II.
“These are the palaces,” said he, “which Your Majesty has compelled me to inhabit for the last three months.”
“Your visit has succeeded sufficiently well for you to have no right to bear me any grudge,” replied the Austrian Emperor.