rns to defeat. July 30, surrender of
Mantua, another check. August 15, battle of Novi; this time it was more
than a check, it was a defeat. Take note of it, general, for it is
the last. At the very moment we were fighting at Novi, Massena was
maintaining his position at Zug and Lucerne, and strengthening himself
on the Aar and on the Rhine; while Lecourbe, on August 14 and 15, took
the Saint-Gothard. August 19, battle of Bergen; Brune defeated the
Anglo-Russian army, forty thousand strong, and captured the Russian
general, Hermann. On the 25th, 26th and 27th of the same month, the
battles of Zurich, where Massena defeated the Austro-Russians under
Korsakoff. Hotze and three other generals are taken prisoners. The enemy
lost twelve thousand men, a hundred cannon, and all its baggage; the
Austrians, separated from the Russians, could not rejoin them until
after they were driven beyond Lake Constance. That series of victories
stopped the progress the enemy had been making since the beginning of
the campaign; from the time Zurich was retaken, France was secure from
invasion. August 30, Molitor defeated the Austrian generals, Jellachich
and Luiken, and drove them back into the Grisons. September 1, Molitor
attacked and defeated General Rosenberg in the Mutterthal. On the 2d,
Molitor forced Souvaroff to evacuate Glarus, to abandon his wounded,
his cannon, and sixteen hundred prisoners. The 6th, General Brune again
defeated the Anglo-Russians, under the command of the Duke of York.
On the 7th, General Gazan took possession of Constance. On the 8th you
landed at Frejus.--Well, general," continued Bernadotte, "as France will
probably pass into your hands, it is well that you should know the state
in which you find her, and in place of receipt, our possessions bear
witness to what we are giving you. What we are now doing, general,
is history, and it is important that those who may some day have an
interest in falsifying history shall find in their path the denial of
Bernadotte."

"Is that said for my benefit, general?"

"I say that for flatterers. You have pretended, it is said, that you
returned to France because our armies were destroyed, because France was
threatened, the Republic at bay. You may have left Egypt with that fear;
but once in France, all such fears must have given way to a totally
different belief."

"I ask no better than to believe as you do," replied Bonaparte, with
sovereign dignity; "and the more grand and