Partha flows was filled with smoke; the
Prussians were already upon us--we could see their furious eyes and
wild looks; they seemed like savage beasts rushing down on us. Then
but one shout of "_Vive l'Empereur!_" smote the sky and we dashed
forward. The shock was terrible; thousands of bayonets crossed; we
drove them back, were ourselves driven back; muskets were clubbed; the
opposing ranks were confounded and mingled in one mass; the fallen were
trampled upon, while the thunder of artillery, the whistling of
bullets, and the thick white smoke enclosing all, made the valley seem
the pit of hell, peopled by contending demons. Despair urged us, and
the wish to revenge our deaths before yielding up our lives. The pride
of boasting that they once defeated Napoleon incited the Prussians; for
they are the proudest of men, and their victories at Gross-Beeren and
Katzbach had made them fools. But the river swept away them and their
pride! Three times they crossed and rushed at us. We were indeed
forced back by the shock of their numbers, and how they shouted then!
They seemed to wish to devour us. Their officers, waving their swords
in the air, cried, "_Vorwaertz! Vorwaertz!_" and all advanced like a
wall, with the greatest courage--that we cannot deny. Our cannon
opened huge gaps in their lines; still they pressed on; but at the top
of the hill we charged again, and drove them to the river. We would
have massacred them to a man, were it not for one of their batteries
before Mockern, which enfiladed us and forced us to give up the pursuit.

This lasted until two o'clock; half our officers were killed or
wounded; the colonel, Lorain, was among the first, and the commandant,
Gemeau, the latter; all along the river side were heaps of dead, or
wounded men crawling away from the struggle. Some, furious, would rise
to their knees to fire a last shot or deliver a final bayonet-thrust.
Never was anything seen like it. In the river floated long lines of
corpses, some showing their faces, others their backs, others their
feet. They followed each other like rafts of wood, and no one paid the
least attention to the sight--no one of us knew that the same might not
be his condition at any minute.

[Illustration: In the river the dead were floating by in files.]

The carnage reached from Schoenfeld to Grossdorf, along the Partha.

At length the Swedes and Prussians ceased their attacks, and started
farther up the river to t