camp. These wise counsels and express injunctions were alike disregarded; the officers of the Archduke John's staff being unwilling to forego the bril liant results which they anticipated from a battle, and he himself reluctant, by placing his force under the immediate direction of his brother, to lose the lustre of a separate command. 11. The day following, being the 14th June, was the anniversary of the battle of Marengo: the Viceroy was naturally anxious to combat on that auspicious day, and the Austrian gene With these forces united to his own, he retired to Kormend in Hungary, which is on the right of the Danube; so that he was in the disadvantageous situation of being separated by that river from the main Austrian army, and exposed to any accumulations of force which Napoleon, on his side of the river, might choose to direct against him. He had the advantage, however, of having the communication open in his rear with the reinforcements which were expected from the Hungarian insurrection; and, in the middle of June, he formed a junction with his brother the Archduke Palatine, who command-rals made no attempt to frustrate his ed that irregular force, at RAAB. Their united forces amounted to twenty-two thousand regular troops, and eighteen thousand of the insurrection; and they took post in a strong position on the ridges which lie in front of that town. Their right rested on the village of Szabadghedy, and the heights of the same name; their left was covered by a morass; their centre ran through the farm of Kismeyger; numerous light horse were disposed along the front of the line, while a thousand chosen troops occupied a square stone edifice still farther in advance of the centre, which was loopholed, and strengthened by a few works, besides a deep rivulet, which formed a sort of natural fosse to the post. In this position the Archduke John resolved to give battle to the enemy, under Eugene Beauharnais, who were now coming up in great strength from the west; although he had just received a despatch from his brother, the generalissimo, containing the sage instructions, by no means to fight in the open plain, but to throw himself into the intrenched camp in his rear, under the cannon of Raab; to blend the inexperienced levies with the veteran troops, and accustom them to military discipline before he trusted them against the enemy; to keep open his communication with the main army at Essling, and detach seven thousand men to Presburg for that purpose; and to fight only in the event of the enemy forcing the passage of the Raab, and menacing the left of the intrenched designs. At ten o'clock the signal for battle was given, and the French advanced with enthusiasm to the attack. Grenier commanded the centre; Baraguay d'Hilliers the left; Montbrun, with the light cavalry, and Grouchy with the heavy dragoons, were on the right; Pacthod with his numerous division was in reserve, behind the centre and left. Eugene formed his troops in columns of division in echelon, the right in advance; but, before the action had become serious, that order was abandoned by the rapid advance of the centre and left, and the battle became general in parallel lines. His forces were about thirty-five thousand in number, inferior by five thousand to those of the enemy; but this disadvantage was more than compensated by the experienced character of the men, while nearly half of those opposed to them were raw levies or volunteers who had never encountered a hostile fire. The first troops which came into action were those of Serras, which attacked the square building in advance of Kismeyger. The Austrians were speedily driven within the walls; but there they made a desperate resistance, and, while numbers of the assailants fell under the fatal fire frona the loopholes, others sank in the deep marshes of the rivulet, which on three sides encircled the building. In a few minutes seven hundred men perished in this disastrous manner, without one of the defences of the place being carried by the assailants. While success was thus arrested around this formid. was going forward on the Austrian left, where Montbrun and Grouchy were opposed to the whole weight of the Hungarian horse. This formidable body of cavalry, seven thousand strong, in the first instance overwhelmed Montbrun and his division, who had advanced to support the brigade of Colbert, which was endeavouring to turn the square farm-house in front, which still prolonged its defence. But Grouchy came up with his terrible cuirassiers, and charged the enemy, when blown by their pursuit, with such vigour, that they were driven back so far as to leave the heroic defenders of that now isolated post entirely to their own resources. able post, the village of Kismeyger in | right of the enemy into confusion. its rear was menaced by Durutte, who, Meanwhile a furious combat of horse with a chosen division of infantry, had advanced through the open ground between its houses and the buildings of Szabadghedy, and had already got abreast of the former. But he was there met by the fire of a battery of twelve pieces, the grapeshot from which made wide chasms in his line; and the Austrians, profiting by the hesitation occasioned by this unexpected discharge, made a vigorous onset, which drove back the whole centre in disorder; while at the same time Baraguay d'Hilliers, with his Italian division on the left, checked by the murderous fire which issued from the village of Szabadghedy, was also forced to give ground, and already the cries of victory were heard along the 13. Though thus left in the middle, whole of that part of the Austrian line. as it were, of the French army, Ham12. Eugene saw that the decisive mel and the heroic defenders of the moment had arrived, and he hastened farm-house abated nothing of their to the spot to arrest the disorder. He resolution. Irritated at this prolonginstantly addressed a few words to the ed opposition, Serras prepared a new flying Italians, exhorted them to re- attack: he himself, with his whole member their victories and their glory, division, assailed it on one side, while and, what was still more to the pur- Roussel, with a fresh brigade, recompose, brought forward the reserve, un-menced the attack in front. Nothing der General Pacthod, consisting almost could resist this last assault; surroundentirely of French troops, to their sup-ed on all sides, the walls of the buildport. The arrival of these veterans ing were carried by escalade, the doors changed the face of the day. The Ital- cut down by redoubled strokes of the ians, reanimated by this seasonable hatchet, and the infuriated soldiery support, returned to the charge; the rushed into the building. A frightful centre and right of the enemy were massacre began. In the tumult the forced, and Szabadghedy was carried. beams took fire; the flames spread with Upon this the Archduke John brought extraordinary rapidity, and, amidst the up his reserve, consisting of the flower death-struggle between the French and of his army; Szabadghedy was recap- Austrians, the roof fell in with a tretured, and the Italians driven back in mendous crash, and all within, friends confusion. Again Durutte and Pac- and foes, perished. This decisive sucthod made good their entrance, and a cess established Eugene in a solid manthird time the Imperialists expelled ner in the village of Kismeyger and them at the point of the bayonet. In fol- centre of the enemy, who now fought lowing up this last attack, however, the only to secure his retreat. It was conHungarian new levies extended them- ducted with more order than could selves too far, deeming victory secure, have been expected after so desperate and thinking to outflank their oppo- a struggle, and the Archduke took renents. The experienced French gene- fuge under the cannon of Komorn, rals saw their error, and returned to abandoning the intrenched camp of the charge with their troops in column, Raab, which was immediately evacucarried, and finally retained the village ated by some battalions of the Hungawhich had been so obstinately contest- rian insurrection, by whom it was occued, and threw the whole centre and pied. In this disastrous contest the Archduke John lost six thousand men, | of whom above three thousand were made prisoners, and two pieces of cannon. The loss of the French was not more than half that amount; for, though those who fell were nearly as numerous, they lost few prisoners. French army in the Hungarian plains, Marmont and Macdonald, after severally overcoming every obstacle, were rapidly approaching with the reserves from the Dalmatian shores and the mountains of Styria. The first of these generals, who had remained in command of the Illyrian provinces ever since the treaty of Tilsit, found himself, in the early part of the campaign, entirely isolated from the French armies by the advance of the Archduke John through Carniola and Styria to the banks of the Adige. In the end of April, the Austrian general Stoickewich had been detached by that prince with eight thousand men to aid the insurrectionary movements which were preparing in the mountains of Dalmatia against the French authorities; and some skirmishes had taken place between the advanced posts of the opposite parties, in which the Imperialists had the advantage. They had already descended from the hills, and made themselves masters of a considerable extent of sea-coast, including the fort of Lossin Picolo, which brought them into contact with the English cruisers in the Adriatic, when the intelligence of the retreat of the Archduke from Italy, and the near approach of Macdonald by Laybach towards their line of communication with Austria, rendered it necessary to commence a retreat. Marmont lost no time in following the retiring corps of the enemy, and a severe action took place on the 23d, on the banks of the Lika, without any decisive advantage to either party. In obedience to the orders they had received, the Imperialists continued their retreat; and Marmont, being now summoned up with his whole corps to the support of the Grand Army, pressed on in pursuit. A few days after, he arrived at Fiume, which was entered without opposition, and remained there two days to rest his troops after the laborious mountain marches they had undergone. On the 3d June he reached Laybach, which was evacuated on his approach; while the corps of Giulay and Chastellar, which had abandoned 15. While these important events the Tyrol by orders from the Archduke were securing the right wing of the | John, in order to the concentration of 14. The battle of Raab, notwithstanding its calamitous result, was in the highest degree honourable to the troops of the Hungarian insurrection, who composed so large a portion of the Imperial army, and who, though brought into fire for the first time, for hours disputed the palm of victory with veteran soldiers. It was attended, however, by very disastrous consequences. Not only was the moral impression of the battle of Aspern sensibly weakened by the loss of the very next serious engagement which took place between the two powers, but the force of the Hungarian insurrection was irrecoverably broken by the ill success of its first essay in arms, and the loss of the fortress and intrenched camp of Raab, which shortly after took place. The latter was evacuated immediately after the battle; the former was shortly after besieged by Lauriston, with heavy cannon drawn from the arsenal of Vienna, and taken, with its garrison of two thousand men, chiefly militia. The possession of this fortress, though armed only with eighteen guns, was a material advantage to the French, not only as depriving the enemy of a fortified post on the right bank of the Danube, from which they would probably have derived important advantages in the progress of the campaign, but as destroying the shelter of the intrenched camp where the Hungarian insurrection might have been further trained in the military art, and brought to render the most valuable service as light troops to the regular forces. At the same time, it gave å solid point d'appui to the right flank of Napoleon, and put it in his power to call up almost the whole force of Eugene to his own standard, in the decisive action which was approaching on the Marchfeld. the forces of the monarchy in its vitals, | been detached by that prince into were painfully, and by cross roads, traversing the mountains in his front, in their march towards Gratz and the Hungarian plains. 16. These retiring generals had a most perilous task to perform in their march eastward through Styria and Carniola, where Marmont, established at Laybach, was ready to fall perpendicularly on their flank; and Macdonald, who was hastening up from Villach in Carinthia, on the traces of Eugene, threat ened their rear. It appeared almost impossible that they could escape so many dangers: but such was the skill of the Imperial commanders, and the activity of their troops, that they not only extricated themselves without any serious loss from this hazardous situation, but very nearly inflicted an important blow upon their opponents. Chastellar, obliged to evacuate the Tyrol, had descended the valley of the Drave, and assembled his troops at Villach; from thence he made a demonstration against Klagenfurth, where the Italian general Rusca had collected a few battalions; and after some sharp fighting he reached the right bank of the Drave, and succeeded, by throwing that river between him and his pursuers, in extricating himself from the dangers that threatened him. He would have been utterly destroyed if Marmont had been a little more expeditious in his movements; for had that general arrived two days sooner at Nakles, where the two roads from Klagenfurth and Villach unite, he would have occupied the only route by which the enemy could have reached the Drave; and if Chastellar had thrown himself across the mountains into the defiles of the Muhr, he would have fallen into the hands of Macdonald, who was descending the rocky banks of that romantic stream. But everything in war depends upon precision of calculation and rapidity of movement, and the most active and vigilant generals are frequently ignorant of what is passing on the enemy's part, within a few leagues of their headquarters. 17. Giulay, whose corps formed part of the army of the Archduke John, had Croatia, of which he was the Ban, to raise the landwehr of that warlike province and of Carniola, and await ulterior orders. Subsequently, the disasters and continued retreat of the Italian army rendered it necessary for the Archduke to recall him to his standards; and Giulay had turned to such good account the few weeks which he had spent in his province, that he was prepared now to take the field at the head of twenty thousand men, of whom eight thousand were regulars. With this imposing force he broke up in the beginning of June from Raun and Agram on the Save, and began his march northward for Marburg, with the design of joining the Archduke, whom he conceived to be still at Gratz in Styria. He moved, however, so slowly, that he did not reach Marburg till the 15th, the day after the battle of Raab, though the distance was only eighteen leagues, being not five miles a-day. Had he exerted himself as his strength permitted and the crisis required, he might have been on the 14th in direct communication with that prince, and in time to share in the battle. This only required him to march ten or twelve miles a-day, no great undertaking for veteran troops and hardy mountaineers; and had he done so, the battle of Raab would either not have been fought or have been converted into a victory, and the Archduke John, with sixty thousand undiscouraged troops, would have appeared with decisive effect on the field of Wagram. The first care of a general should be to accustom his soldiers to march: Napoleon's grenadiers were perfectly right when they said it was by their legs, more than their arms, that he gained his victories. 18. A brilliant enterprise, however, though of a subordinate character, awaited the Austrian general. General Broussier, with a French brigade, had been left to besiege the fort of Schlossberg, at Gratz, after Macdonald had left that town, and proceeded onward in the steps of the Viceroy towards the Grand Army; and Giulay, having learned, as he came up from the southward, the exposed situation of the besiegers, conceived the design | Imperialists, in no condition to withof surrounding and making them pri- stand so formidable an attack, withdrew soners. On the 24th, his advanced in the night, and the junction of the posts were at the gates of Gratz; and French generals was effected next day Broussier, justly apprehensive of being without opposition. They left merely cut off, had, two days before, raised a few battalions to continue the siege the siege of the castle, and retired to of the castle, and, pressing on with the bridge of Weinzittel, over the Muhr, great rapidity, arrived in the island of at the entrance of the valley of Bruck. Lobau on the 3d July, where the whole Having received intelligence, however, forces of Napoleon were now assembled in the course of the same day, of the for the decisive battle which was apreal position of the main body of the proaching. enemy's forces, which he conceived to be unable to take any part in the action which was approaching, he sent back four battalions under Colonel Gambier, who resumed his former position around the fort, and renewed the bombardment. In this situation the besiegers were attacked by a greatly superior force under Giulay, and being entirely separated from the remainder of the troops under Broussier, their destruction appeared inevitable. The heroism of Colonels Gambier and Neagle, however, joined to the intrepidity of their troops, extricated them from their dangerous situation: the Croatian landwehr were no match in close fight for the French veterans; a decisive charge with the bayonet checked the Imperialists in the first onset; when their cartridges were exhausted, the French threw themselves into a churchyard, which they defended with invincible resolution, and though weakened by the loss of half their numbers, they were still gloriously combating round their eagles, when Broussier with his remaining four battalions arrived, and cut his way through to his heroic followers. In this memorable action the French lost eight, the Austrians twelve hundred men; and Napoleon, in just testimony of his sense of the conduct of the troops engaged, made Colonel Gambier a count of the Empire, and gave to his regiment, the 84th, the motto, "Un contre Dix." Marmont, who had been summoned by Broussier to his assistance, arrived on the evening of the 26th before the walls of Gratz, and immediately made preparations, in concert with Gambier, for a general assault on the town and suburbs on the following day; but the 19. The French Emperor, at the same time, had called Prince Eugene and the Italian army to his standards. On the 2d July he received orders to repair without delay to the general rendezvous in the island of Lobau, whither Napoleon had transferred his headquarters from the palace of Schönbrunn three days before. Skilfully masking his design by a large body of heavy cavalry pushed forward to the advanced posts before Komorn, he withdrew his artillery, stores, and infantry, unperceived by the enemy, and late on the evening of the 4th reached the island of Lobau, where his arrival swelled the host to a hundred and eighty thousand men, with seven hundred pieces of cannon; while, by an unhappy fatality, the Archduke John, though entirely on the left bank of the Danube, still remained in presence of a deserted camp in the plains of Hungary. This general concentration of the French troops in front of Essling was attended with one secondary but important effect, in restoring the southern provinces of the empire to the dominion of Austria, and opening up a direct communication with the English cruisers in the Adriatic. In proportion as Croatia and Carniola were evacuated by the advance of Marmont to the Danube, those two important provinces were regained by Giulay's troops: several French detachments and depots fell into the hands of the Imperialists; Laibach, with some hundred prisoners, was taken; and the communication with the coast having been restored, a subsidy from England was disembarked in Dalmatia, and, after traversing the mountains, arrived in safety in Hungary, to the amount |