on into the citadel, and capturing three hundred cannons and
enormous quantities of muskets, ammunition, and military stores. The
French army was saved from ruin only by the great ability of its
commander, who led it to Genoa in four days over a mountain path.
The czar Paul rewarded his victorious general with the honorable
designation of Italienski, or the Italian, and, in his grandiloquent
fashion, issued a ukase commanding all people to regard Suwarrow as the
greatest commander the world had ever known.
We cannot describe the whole course of events. Other victories were won
in Italy, but finally Suwarrow was weakened by the jealousy of the
Austrians, who withdrew their troops, and subsequently was obliged to go
to the relief of his fellow-commander, Korsakof, who, with twenty
thousand men, had imprudently allowed himself to be hemmed in by a
French army at Zurich. He finally forced his way through the enemy,
losing all his artillery and half his host.
Of this Suwarrow knew nothing, as he made his way across the Alps to the
aid of the beleaguered general. He attempted to force his way over the
St. Gothard pass, meeting with fierce opposition at every point. There
was a sharp fight at the Devil's Bridge, which the French blew up, but
failed to keep back Suwarrow and his men, who crossed the rocky gorge of
the Unerloch, dashed through the foaming Reuss, and drove the French
from their post of vantage.
At length, with his men barefoot, his provisions almost exhausted, the
Russian general reached Muotta, to find to his chagrin that Korsakof had
been defeated and put to flight. He at once began his retreat, followed
in force by Massena, who was driven off by the rear-guard. On October 1
Suwarrow reached Glarus. Here he rested till the 4th, then crossed the
Panixer Mountains through snow two feet deep to the valley of the Rhine,
which he reached on the 10th, having lost two hundred of his men and
all his beasts of burden over the precipices. Thus ended this
extraordinary march, which had cost Suwarrow all his artillery, nearly
all his horses, and a third of his men.
These losses in the Russian armies stirred the czar to immeasurable
rage. All the missing officers--who were prisoners in France--were
branded as deserters, and Suwarrow was deprived of his command,
ostensibly for his failure, but largely for the sarcasm already
mentioned. He returned home to die, having experienced what a misfortune
it is for a great
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