rch
continued; the irregular attacks of the enemy were becoming more and
more numerous; so that the troops, continually halting and forming into
squares to receive the charge of the cavalry by day, and forced to keep
up great watches at night, experienced the extremes of fatigue as well
as of privation. In the midst of this misery the common men beheld with
no friendly eyes the troop of _savans_ mounted on asses (the common
conveyance of the country), with all their instruments, books and
baggage. They began to suspect that the expedition had been undertaken
for some merely scientific purposes; and when, on any alarm, they were
ordered to open the square and give the learned party safe footing
within, they used to receive them with military jeerings. "Room for the
asses:--stand back, here come the _savans_ and the _demi-savans_."

On the 21st of July the army came within sight of the Pyramids, which,
but for the regularity of the outline, might have been taken for a
distant ridge of rocky mountains. While every eye was fixed on these
hoary monuments of the past, they gained the brow of a gentle eminence,
and saw at length spread out before them the vast army of the beys, its
right posted on an entrenched camp by the Nile, its centre and left
composed of that brilliant cavalry with which they were by this time
acquainted. Napoleon, riding forwards to reconnoitre, perceived (what
escaped the observation of all his staff) that the guns on the
entrenched camp were not provided with carriages; and instantly decided
on his plan of attack. He prepared to throw his force on the left, where
the guns could not be available. Mourad Bey, who commanded in chief,
speedily penetrated his design; and the Mamelukes advanced gallantly to
the encounter. "Soldiers," said Napoleon, "from the summit of yonder
pyramids forty ages behold you;" and the battle began.

The French formed into separate squares, and awaited the assault of the
Mamelukes. These came on with impetuous speed and wild cries, and
practised every means to force their passage into the serried ranks of
their new opponents. They rushed on the line of bayonets, backed their
horses upon them, and at last, maddened by the firmness which they could
not shake, dashed their pistols and carbines into the faces of the men.
They who had fallen wounded from their seats, would crawl along the
sand, and hew at the legs of their enemies with their scimitars. Nothing
could move the French