Night interrupted the
action; the Austrians exulting in their partial success; Napoleon
surprised that he should not have been wholly victorious. On either side
the carnage had been terrible, and the pathways of the villages were
literally choked with the dead.

Next morning the battle recommenced with equal fury; the French
recovered the church of Asperne; but the Austrian right wing renewed
their assaults on that point with more and more vigour, and in such
numbers, that Napoleon guessed the centre and left had been weakened for
the purpose of strengthening the right. Upon this he instantly moved
such masses, _en echelon_, on the Austrian centre, that the Archduke's
line was shaken; and for a moment it seemed as if victory was secure.

At this critical moment, by means of Austrian fireships suddenly sent
down the swollen and rapid river, the bridge connecting the island of
Lobau with the right bank was wholly swept away. Buonaparte perceived
that if he wished to preserve his communications with the right of the
Danube, where his reserve still lay, he must instantly fall back on
Lobau; and no sooner did his troops commence their backward movement,
than the Austrians recovered their order and zeal, charged in turn and
finally made themselves masters of Asperne. Essling, where Massena
commanded, held firm, and under the protection of that village and
numerous batteries erected near it, Napoleon succeeded in withdrawing
his whole force during the night. On the morning of the 23rd the French
were cooped up in Lobau and the adjacant islands--Asperne, Essling, the
whole left bank of the river, remaining in the possession of the
Austrians. On either side a great victory was claimed; and with equal
injustice. But the situation of the French Emperor was imminently
hazardous: he was separated from Davoust and his reserve; and had the
enemy either attacked him in the islands, or passed the river higher up,
and so overwhelmed Davoust and relieved Vienna, the results might have
been fatal. But the Archduke's loss in these two days had been great;
and, in place of risking any offensive movement, he contented himself
with strengthening the position of Asperne and Essling, and awaiting
quietly the moment when his enemy should choose to attempt once more
the passage to the left bank, and the re-occupation of these hardly
contested villages.

Napoleon availed himself of this pause with his usual skill. That he had
been checked was t