of fire, had advanced onto a small hillock some seven or eight
hundred paces in front of the infantry division to which it belonged.
The commander of this artillery believed that he was quite safe
because the position he occupied dominated the whole French line, and
he thought that if any troops set out to attack him, he would see
them and would have time to regain the safety of the Austrian lines.
He had not considered that a little clump of trees, close to where he
was, could conceal a party of French troops, and had thought no more
about it. But young Pertelay resolved to lead his men there, and
from there to fall upon the Austrian battery.

Pertelay, knowing that on the battlefield no one takes much notice
of a single horseman, explained his plan to us, which was for us to
go individually, a detour by a sunken road, to arrive one by
one behind the wood on the left of the enemy battery, and from there
to make a sudden assault on it, without the fear of cannon-balls,
because we would be approaching from the side. We would capture the
guns and take them to the French lines. The first part of this plan
was executed without the Austrian gunners noticing; we reached the
back of the little wood, where we re-formed the sections. Pertelay
put himself at our head. We went through the wood, and sabre in
hand, threw ourselves on the enemy battery at the moment when it was
directing a murderous fire on our troops. We sabred some of the
gunners, but the rest hid under their ammunition wagons, where our
sabres could not reach them. As instructed by Pertelay, we did not
kill or wound the men on the limbers, but forced them at sword point
to make their horses pull the guns toward the French lines. This
order was obeyed in respect of six guns whose riders had remained on
horseback, but the riders for the two other guns had dismounted, and
although some of the Hussars took the horses by the bridle, they