, and
once more we found ourselves upon the banks of the Rhine, no longer an
advancing army, high in hope, and flushed with victory, but beaten,
harassed, and retreating!

The last few days of that retreat presented a scene of disaster such as I
can never forget. To avoid the furious charges of the Austrian cavalry,
against which our own could no longer make resistance, we had fallen back
upon a line of country cut up into rocky cliffs and precipices, and
covered by a dense pine forest. Here, necessarily broken up into small
parties, we were assailed by the light troops of the enemy, led on through
the various passes by the peasantry, whose animosity our own severity had
excited. It was, therefore, a continual hand-to-hand struggle, in which,
opposed as we were to over numbers, well acquainted with every advantage
of the ground, our loss was terrific. It is said that nigh seven thousand
men fell--an immense number, when no general action had occurred. Whatever
the actual loss, such were the circumstances of our army, that Moreau
hastened to propose an armistice, on the condition of the Rhine being the
boundary between the two armies, while Kehl was still to be held by the
French.

The proposal was rejected by the Austrians, who at once commenced
preparations for a siege of the fortress with forty thousand troops, under
Latour's command. The earlier months of winter now passed in the labors of
the siege, and on the morning of New Year's Day the first attack was made;
the second line was carried a few days after, and, after a glorious
defense by Desaix, the garrison capitulated, and evacuated the fortress on
the 9th of the month. Thus, in the space of six short months, had we
advanced with a conquering army into the very heart of the Empire, and now
we were back again within our own frontier; not one single trophy of all
our victories remaining, two-thirds of our army dead or wounded, more than
all, the prestige of our superiority fatally injured, and that of the
enemy's valor and prowess as signally elevated.

The short annals of a successful soldier are often comprised in the few
words which state how he was made lieutenant at such a date, promoted to
his company here, obtained his majority there, succeeded to the command of
his regiment at such a place, and so on. Now my exploits may even be more
briefly written as regards this campaign, for whether at Kehl at
Nauendorf, on the Etz, or at Huningen, I ended as I begun