. General Kalkreuth gazed mournfully at the
stranded British sloop-of-war, and, pointing it out to his officers, who
surrounded him in gloomy silence, said, "That is the tombstone of
Dantzic!" He then sent for the bearer of the flag of truce, and the
negotiations commenced. In the mean time, shells and red-hot shot were
poured into the city, killing alike the soldiers on the ramparts and the
citizens in their dwellings. Lamentations and shrieks, the roar of
artillery, the uninterrupted peals of the tocsin, calling out the
inhabitants, mingled with the crash of the falling houses, and the wails
of the wounded and dying.

General Kalkreuth pitied the city; he was unwilling to add the horrors
of an assault to the agony it had already undergone. He signed the
capitulation, but claimed for the garrison liberty to march out without
being made prisoners of war, and the surrender of their arms. Lefebvre
granted these conditions, but insisted that the Prussian troops should
not engage to serve against France before the expiration of a year.
General Kalkreuth accepted this clause, and the gates of Dantzic opened
to the French conqueror on the 24th of May, 1807.

The Emperor Napoleon received the news of this great victory at Castle
Finkenstein, not far from Tilsit. His face brightened, and he
immediately sent a courier to Marshal Lefebvre, to invite him to pay him
a visit at the castle. But the joy of the emperor soon disappeared. His
generals, intimate friends, and servants, endeavored to cheer him. They
tried all the arts of eloquence and flattery to dispel his sadness.
Talleyrand attempted to amuse him by reciting, with charming _medisance_
and pointed humor, passages from the rich stores of his memoirs, and by
relating, with Attic wit, the story of his first love, which had
bequeathed to him a lame foot as a remembrancer. Lannes, with the blunt
humor of a true soldier, told stories of his campaigns. Duroc smilingly
reminded the emperor of many an adventure they had had in Paris, when,
in plain gray coats, and hats drawn over their eyes, they had wandered
through the streets of the capital, to ascertain the disposition of the
people, and received many a rebuke on daring to abuse Napoleon. It is
true, the emperor was amused on hearing such anecdotes, but his
momentary laughter revealed more vividly his dark and stormy temper.

To-day the generals resorted to another method also of amusing him. They
proposed cards. He agreed,