is a veritable parade ground
among the mountains, almost cut off from them by the ceaseless action
of water, and destined for the defence of the plains of Italy. A small
force posted at the head of the winding roadway can hold at bay an
army toiling up from the valley; but, as at Thermopylae, the position
is liable to be outflanked by an enterprising foe, who should scale
the footpath leading over the western offshoots of Monte Baldo, and,
fording the stream at its foot, should then advance eastwards against
the village. This, in part, was Alvintzy's plan, and having nearly
28,000 men,[71] he doubted not that his enveloping tactics must
capture Joubert's division of 10,000 men. So daunted was even this
brave general by the superior force of his foes that he had ordered a
retreat southwards when an aide-de-camp arrived at full gallop and
ordered him to hold Rivoli at all costs. Bonaparte's arrival at 4 a.m.
explained the order, and an attack made during the darkness wrested
from the Austrians the chapel on the San Marco ridge which stands on
the ridge above the zigzag track. The reflection of the Austrian
watch-fires in the wintry sky showed him their general position. To an
unskilled observer the wide sweep of the glare portended ruin for the
French. To the eye of Bonaparte the sight brought hope. It proved that
his foes were still bent on their old plan of enveloping him: and from
information which he treacherously received from Alvintzy's staff he
must have known that that commander had far fewer than the 45,000 men
which he ascribed to him in bulletins.

[Illustration: NEIGHBOURHOOD OF RIVOLI.]

Yet the full dawn of that January day saw the Imperialists flushed
with success, as their six separate columns drove in the French
outposts and moved towards Rivoli. Of these, one was on the eastern
side of the Adige and merely cannonaded across the valley: another
column wound painfully with most of the artillery and cavalry along
the western bank, making for the village of Incanale and the foot of
the zigzag leading up to Rivoli: three others denied over Monte Baldo
by difficult paths impassable to cannon: while the sixth and
westernmost column, winding along the ridge near Lake Garda, likewise
lacked the power which field-guns and horsemen would have added to its
important turning movement. Never have natural obstacles told more
potently on the fortunes of war than at Rivoli; for on the side where
the assailants most ne