drawn by the hands of these picked men, beneath the very walls of
the fortress, and within half pistol-shot of its guns. In two nights
the artillery and the baggage-trains were thus passed along, and
in a few days the fort itself was compelled to surrender.

Melas, the Austrian commander, now awoke in consternation to a sense
of his peril. Napoleon--the dreaded Napoleon--had, as by a miracle,
crossed the Alps. He had cut off all his supplies, and was shutting
the Austrians up from any possibility of retreat. Bewildered by the
magnitude of his peril, he no longer thought of forcing his march
upon Paris. The invasion of France was abandoned. His whole energies
were directed to opening for himself a passage back to Austria.
The most cruel perplexities agitated him. From the very pinnacle
of victory, he was in danger of descending to the deepest abyss of
defeat. It was also with Napoleon an hour of intense solicitude. He
had but sixty thousand men, two-thirds of whom were new soldiers,
who had never seen a shot fired in earnest, with whom he was
to arrest the march of a desperate army of one hundred and twenty
thousand veterans, abundantly provided with all the most efficient
machinery of war. There were many paths by which Melas might escape,
at leagues' distance from each other. It was necessary for Napoleon
to divide his little band that he might guard them all. He was
liable at any moment to have a division of his army attacked by
an overwhelming force, and cut to pieces before it could receive
any reinforcements. He ate not, he slept not, he rested not. Day
and night, and night and day, he was on horseback, pale, pensive,
apparently in feeble health, and interesting every beholder with
his grave and melancholy beauty. His scouts were out in every
direction. He studied all the possible movements and combinations
of his foes. Rapidly he overran Lombardy, and entered Milan in