ade, under
General d'Auvergne, consisting of three regiments of heavy dragoons, the
Fourth Cuirassiers, and Eighth Hussars, continued to descend the left
bank of the Danube in pursuit of a part of the Austrian garrison which
had taken that line in retreat towards Vienna. We followed as far
as Guntzburg without coming up with them; and there the news of the
capitulation of Meiningen, with its garrison of six thousand men, to
Marechal Soult, reached us, along with an order to return to Ulm.

Up to this time all I had seen of war was forced marches, bivouacs
hastily broken up, hurried movements in advance and retreat, the fatigue
of night parties, and a continual alert. At first the hourly expectation
of coming in sight of the enemy kept up our spirits; but when day after
day passed, and the same pursuit followed, where the pursued never
appeared, the younger soldiers grumbled loudly at fatigues undertaken
without object, and, as it seemed to them, by mistake.

On the night of the 17th of October we bivouacked within a league of
Ulm. Scarcely were the pickets formed for the night, when orders came
for the whole brigade to assemble under arms at daybreak. A thousand
rumors were abroad as to the meaning of the order, but none came near
the true solution; indeed, the difficulty was increased by the added
command, that the regiments should appear _en grande tenue_, or in full
dress.

I saw that my old commander made a point of keeping me in suspense as to
the morrow, and affected as much as possible an air of indifference on
the subject. He had himself arrived late from Ulm, where he had seen
the Emperor; and amused me by mentioning the surprise of an Austrian
aide-de-camp, who, sent to deliver a letter, found his Majesty sitting
with his boots off, and stretched before a bivouac fire. "Yes," said
Napoleon, divining at once his astonishment, "it is even so. Your master
wished to remind me of my old trade, and I hope that the imperial purple
has not made me forget its lessons."

By daybreak the next morning our brigade was in the saddle, and in
motion towards the quartier-general,--a gently rising ground, surmounted
by a farmhouse, where the Emperor had fixed his quarters. As we mounted
the hill we came in sight of the whole army drawn up in battle array.
They stood in columns of divisions, with artillery and cavalry between
them, the bands of the various regiments in front. The day was a
brilliant one, and heightened the e