stripping themselves,
selecting, throwing away, taking up again, and falling at length through
exhaustion and grief upon the frozen bank of the river. The narrators
appeared to shudder again at the recollection of the horrible sight of
so many men scattered over that abyss, of the continual noise of persons
falling, of the cries of such as sank in, and, above all, of the wailing
and despair of the wounded, who, from their carts, which could not be
trusted to this weak support, stretched out their hands to their
companions, and entreated them not to leave them behind.

Their leader at length determined to attempt the passage of several
wagons, loaded with these poor creatures; but in the middle of the
stream the ice sank down and separated. Then were heard proceeding from
the gulf, first cries of anguish long and piercing, then stifled and
feeble groans, quickly succeeded by an awful silence. All had
disappeared!

But at length Ney had succeeded in reaching Orcha; from this time
forward he was the hero of the retreat.

When Napoleon, who was two leagues farther on, heard that Ney had again
made his appearance, he leaped and shouted for joy, exclaiming, "Then I
have saved my honor! I would have given three hundred millions from my
exchequer sooner than have lost such a man."

Sec. 20. Capture of Minsk by the Russians.

The army had thus for the third and last time repassed the Dnieper, a
river half Russian and half Polish, but having its source in Russia. It
runs from east to west as far as Orcha, where it appears as if it would
penetrate into Poland; but there the high lands of Lithuania oppose its
farther progress, and compel it to turn abruptly towards the south, and
to become the frontier of the two countries.

Kutusoff and his eighty thousand Russians halted before this feeble
obstacle. Hitherto they had been rather the spectators than the authors
of our calamities; but from this time we saw them no more, and were at
last delivered from the punishment of their joy.

On the 22d of November the army had a disagreeable march from Orcha to
Borizoff, on a wide road skirted by a double row of large birch-trees,
the snow having melted, and the mud being very deep. The weakest here
found their graves; and those of our wounded who, in expectation of a
continuance of the frost, had exchanged their wagons for sleighs, were
left behind, and fell into the hands of the Cossacks.

It was during the early part of the marc