the
advantage by driving in the enemy's centre. Gallantly the French
advanced. Their leading regiment, the 14th, had seized a hillock which
commanded the enemy's lines,[123] when, amidst a whirlwind of snow
that beat in their faces, a deadly storm of grape and canister almost
annihilated the corps. Its shattered lines fell back, leaving the 14th
to its fate. But a cloud of Cossacks now swept on the retiring
companies, stabbing with their long spears; and it was a scanty band
that found safety in their former position. Russian cannon and cavalry
also stopped the advance of Davoust, and the fighting for a time
resolved itself into confused but murderous charges at close quarters.
As if to increase the horrors of the scene, snowstorms again swept
over the field, dazing the French and shrouding with friendly wings
the fierce charges of Cossacks. Yet the Grand Army fought on with
devoted heroism; and the chief, determined to snatch at victory,
launched eighty squadrons of horse against the Russian centre.
Sweeping aside the Cossacks, and defying the cannon that riddled their
files, they poured upon the first line of Russian infantry: for a time
they were stemmed, but, finding some weaker places, the cuirassiers
burst through, only to be thrown back by the second line; and, when
furiously charged by Cossacks, they fell back in disorder. "These
Russians fight like bulls," said the French. The simile was just. Even
while Murat was hacking at their centre a column of 4,000 Russian
grenadiers, detaching itself from their mangled line, marched straight
forward on the village of Eylau. With the same blind courage that
nerved Solmes' division at Steinkirk, they beat aside the French light
horse and foot, and were now threatening the cemetery where Napoleon
and his staff were standing.

"I never was so much struck with anything in my life," said
General Bertrand at St. Helena, "as by the Emperor at Eylau when
he was almost trodden under foot by the Russian column. He kept
his ground as the Russians advanced, saying frequently, 'What
boldness.'"

But, when all around him trembled, and Berthier ordered up the horses
as if for retreat, he himself quietly signalled for his Guards. These
sturdy troops, long fuming at their inaction, marched forward with a
stern joy. As at Steinkirk the French Household Brigade disdained to
fire on the bull-dogs, so now the Guards rushed on the Muscovites with
the cold steel. The sho