The Reign of George III - (Continued.) page 6

Meantime, Buonaparte, who had crossed the Rhine only on the 26th of September, had, by the 13th of October, taken no fewer than twenty thousand prisoners. These were sent off to France, and distributed amongst the farmers in the country, so that they might pay for their maintenance by their labour. This was contrary to all the usages of war; but then, Buonaparte was always violating these usages; and, with the Germans, it succeeded very well, for they were accustomed to field labour, and much preferred it to being cooped up in barracks with nothing to do. Whilst these poor fellows were marching towards France, Buonaparte was deluding Mack, and seducing his officers, by constantly sending his German spies into Ulm, to buy up the Austrian spies, to give false information as to facts, and to corrupt the officers. One Schulmeister, a German, an especial tool of Fouché's, was a great agent in these proceedings. Fouché tells us that the emperor of Austria's spies were most easily purchased, and that nearly all the staff officers were gained over; that he had furnished Savary with his secret notes upon Germany; and that lie used these at the grand head- quarters to so me purpose. Buonaparte had now shut up Mack in Ulm as completely as old Wurmser had been shut up in Mantua; still he expected that Mack would, at the last, make a desperate résistance. After the surrender of Spangenberg, at Memmingen, Buonaparte received a visit from prince Maurice Lichtenstein, under a flag of truce from Mack, proposing to surrender Ulm, on condition of being permitted to retire unmolested into Austria. Buonaparte laughed, saying the whole army would be in his power within a week. Prince Maurice, as if to terrify Buonaparte into compliance, said, if he did not consent to those terms, Mack would not leave the place. Buonaparte replied: - " No; I shall not let him! " lie then gave orders for investing the town, and issued a proclamation, declaring that the soldiers should plunder Ulm, as some slight recompense for the loss of the sack of London: - " Soldiers! But for the army now in front of you, we should this day have been in London: we should have avenged ourselves for six centuries of insults, and have restored the freedom of the seas! Bear in mind that, tomorrow, you are fighting against the allies of England! "

On the 16th of October Mack published an order of the day, announcing that two great armies - one Russian, the other Austrian - were approaching to raise the blockade, and that ho would kill his horses and live on horse-flesh, rather than surrender. On the very next day he did surrender - at least, signed the conditions for that act. Buonaparte had sent Ségur into the city with a flag of truce, and that general saw that Mack had really made no preparations for fighting ' at all. Napoleon saw that the city was his. On Ségur's report, Napoleon sent him back, accompanied by general Berthier, both of whom were suffered to go through the city with their eyes unbandaged, and without any of the precautions which a general of so great a reputation, as a tactician, as Mack, would be supposed to take. Berthier saw at a glance that Ségur's report - the wholly neglected state of defence - was correct. They granted Mack eight days' delay, but stipulated that they should date from the time that the French had taken up position before the city, which was two days before. This was, in fact, only six days, and, should the Austrians or Russians appear in the meantime, he was to be allowed to march out with arms and baggage, and join them. These were mere words, for the French were sure to prevent ail approach of such armies. This was settled on the I7th of October; but, on the 19th, two days after, Mack rode out of the city, and paid a visit to Napoleon in his quarters - the old abbey of Elchingen. What occurred there has never been known; but Mack must have come away as he went - a coward or a traitor - for he had agreed to give up Ulm the very next day. On coming away, he was overheard by Ségur throwing ail the blame, like a poor, mean scoundrel as he was, on the archduke Ferdinand, who, he said, had really commanded in and ordered the arrangements of the campaign.

Accordingly, the next day, the 20th of October, the Austrians marched out of Ulm, and piled their arms, the cavalry, at the same time, dismounting and giving up their horses. Mack had the pusillanimity to seek pity from the French officers, saying to them, " I am the unhappy Mack! ' and Buonaparte, who must have had a most thorough con- tempt for him, said, " Yes; the emperor of Austria has betrayed his army, has compelled me to fight for I do not know what; for I really do not desire any further conquests on the continent; 'ships, colonies, and commerce' are ail I wish for." It was the very next day, the 21st of October, that ail his hopes of ships, colonies, and commerce were scattered to the winds by the battle of Trafalgar.

The surrender of Ulm was far superior to a great victory by battle: the French thus annihilated the Austrian army without losing a man. Betwixt twenty thousand and thirty thousand Austrians surrendered, including eight general officers. Ail the officers were liberated on parole, but the men were marched after the other prisoners over the Rhine, to till the fields of France. Thus, above forty thousand Austrians, or one half of Mack's army, within a single month, had been captured and sent to France. Besides this, there was an immense quantity of arms, artillery, baggage, and military stores given up, and a place of strength, which, in the hands of the French, would have enabled "them, had it been necessary, to hold out long against overwhelming armies. But no such armies appeared, and Buonaparte talked in lofty strain to the Austrian officers of his still great desire of peace with their emperor, and that he would be ruined if he continued to follow the counsels of England, and to oppose him. Mack had the folly to say that the emperor had been forced into the war by Russia; on which Buonaparte sharply replied, " So, then, you are no longer an independent power; you are the slaves of" Russia." The empty reputation of Mack, one of the great delusions of Germany, was at an end for ever. On re- turning to Austria, he was thrown into prison at Brunn, in Moravia, and thence transferred to Josephstadt, in Bohemia. He was tried by court-martial, and condemned to death; but his sentence was commuted into two years imprisonment, and what afterwards became of him appears to have excited no one's curiosity. The absurd bubble of his military reputation must have burst long before in any martial country except Austria.

On the day after the surrender of Ulm, Buonaparte announced by proclamation to the army that he was going to annihilate the Russians, as he had done the Austrians; that Austria, in fact, had no generals with whom it was any glory to compete; and that Russia was only brought by the gold of England from the ends of the earth, for them to chastise them. They were, he said, about to commence a second campaign, in which lie should spare the blood of his soldiers as much as possible, for his soldiers were his children. Napoleon replaced Maximilian Joseph in his capital of Munich, where he visited him, and thence issued a number of bulletins, proclaiming his attachment to his treaties, having, he observed, only commenced this war in compliance with his engagements to his ally; and that he was proceeding to destroy the enemies who still threatened his safety. At the end of October, accordingly, he commenced his march on Vienna.

In making this advance, he had Ney on his right, to defend him against any descent of Austrian forces from the Tyrol; Murat was on the left, guarding against the approach of the archduke Ferdinand from Bohemia. Augereau, who had brought up an army of reserve from France, occupied with it part of Suabia, to prevent any attack from the side of the Vorarlberg, or from Prussia, should that uncertain power determine suddenly for the allies. Had Prussia at this moment thrown its weight spiritedly into the scale, Augereau's division would have had little chance against it, and the end of the campaign might have been very différent to what it was; but Prussia had not sufficient German feeling to take so honourable a part, and therefore reserved herself for a proper punishment on the field of Jena in the following year. Napoleon had before him a mixed army of Russians and Austrians, under general Buxhowden, who had been in rapid march to relieve Ulm, when he heard of its fall. These troops, though much inferior in numbers to the French, disputed the ground with much bravery, and gave the French van some smart checks. Murat, who was in advance with the cavalry, like another prince Rupert, went dashing on, and not only exposed his soldiers to severe chastisements, but exposed the following columns of Mortier to be intercepted and destroyed by the enemy. Buonaparte exclaimed that Murat was acting like a blind man, saying, " These Russians are devils! Hasten, Berthier, and stop Murat! " In fact, the French discovered that the Russian infantry were far more terrible than the Austrians, and that it was necessary to be on their guard with them.

The emperor Francis did not attempt to defend his capital - that capital which had twice repelled all the efforts of the Turks - but fled into Moravia, to join his Russian ally, the czar Alexander, who was there at, the head of his army. On the 7th of November Francis took his departure, and on the same day he dispatched count Giulay to Buonaparte, to propose an armistice, as a prelude to peace. Buonaparte refused to listen to the overture unless Venice and the Tyrol were given up to him, and the alliance instantly dissolved with Russia and England. Count Giulay said these conditions were too hard, and lie returned to his master.

Buonaparte continued his march, and on the 13th of November he entered Vienna without any opposition. The French were not a little astonished to find that the Austrians had left to them all their military stores, arms, clothing - everything. The surrender of Ulm had not been more uncalculating - more disgraceful. Their allies in Moravia were in want of everything; but, instead of sending to them provisions, arms, ammunition, ail that they needed, they had kept these in Vienna, and now left them for the enemy to use against them. Savary says: - " In the magazines and arsenals of Vienna were found artillery and ammunition enough for two campaigns. We had no farther occasion to draw upon our stores at Strasburg or Metz, but could, on the contrary, dispatch a considerable materiel to those two great establishments."

Napoleon bestowed part of these spoils on his ally, the elector of Bavaria, who was fighting along with him, and rejoicing in the humiliation of his countryman, the emperor of Austria. Napoleon took up his abode at the palace of Schönbrun, in the suburbs of Vienna; and the frivolous, pleasure-loving Viennese, so far from seeming disgusted at seeing their capital in the hands of an enemy, flocked to the splendid gardens of Schönbrun to make acquaintance with the French officers, and invite them to their salons. Whilst Napoleon remained at Vienna, acting just as if he were emperor of Austria as well as of France, he continued to receive the most cheering accounts of the success of his arms in Italy against the Austrians. There, Massena, on hearing of the capitulation of Ulm, made a general attack on the army of the archduke Charles, near Caldiero. The arch- duke had about eighty thousand men, Massena many more than that number. The Austrians, having great confidence in their commander, fought bravely; but general Hellinger suffered himself to be surrounded, with a body of five thousand men, who were compelled to surrender, when they were expected to be attacking the French in the rear. The French were victorious, and were soon joined by general St. Cyr, from Naples, with twenty-five thousand men. At the moment of this defeat, the archduke received the news of the fall of Ulm, and the march of the French on Vienna. He determined, therefore, to leave Italy to its fate, and endeavour to save the capital of the empire. He commenced his retreat in the night of November the 1st, and resolved to make for Hungary. On reaching Laybach, pressed continually in his rear by the troops of Massena, he heard that his brother, the archduke John, was evacuating the Tyrol before the troops of Ney - co-operating with an army of Bavarians - who had taken the strong positions of Schwartz, Neustadt, and Innspruck. The two brothers, by a great effort, managed to effect a junction, leaving, however, behind them several insulated bodies of Austrians, who were compelled to surrender to the French. The chief of these were the divisions of Jellachich, in the Vorarlberg, and of the prince de Rökan, in Lombardy. Thus, all the passes of the Tyrol and all Upper Italy were left in possession of the French. But the two brothers, the archdukes Charles and John, were become formidable by their union, and were soon reinforced by volunteers from Croatia, the Tyrol, and all the mountainous districts, which had long furnished Austria with her finest soldiers. Massena, on the other hand, had established himself at Clagenfurt, the capital of Carinthia, where he was not too distant to come to the aid of Napoleon, if necessary. Still, he had been obliged to leave too many of his troops behind, to secure Upper Italy, to add much weight to Buonaparte's operations.

Napoleon had so far executed his plans with wonderful success. He had rescued Bavaria, reduced the enemy's army and prestige at once by the capture of Ulm and Vienna, and had driven the Austrians simultaneously from Upper Italy and the Tyrol. But still his situation, for any general but himself, was very critical. The defeated army of the emperor Francis had united itself to that of the young emperor of Russia, in Moravia; the two archdukes were mustering great bodies of troops on the confines of Hungary, ready to rush forward and swell the Austro-Russian army; and the king of Prussia was watching the movements of the two parties, ready to strike, if France met with a reverse. Napoleon saw that his only security lay in a bold and decisive blow. He therefore crossed the Danube on the 23rd of November, and began a brisk march into the heart of Moravia, to attack the main body of the allies under their two emperors. He was soon before Brunn, its little capital, and the allies retreated, at his approach, as far as Olmütz, nearly at the other extremity of Moravia. This movement was, however, made to form a junction with the twenty- four thousand men under Buxhowden. This being effected, they amounted to about eighty thousand men, but of these many of the Austrians were troops already discouraged by defeat, and many more were raw recruits. The French were in number about equal, but consisting of Veteran soldiers flushed with victory.