allies: to withdraw
behind the Elbe. Napoleon gathered his army into three columns and
followed; but slowly and circumspectly, because without cavalry he
could not harass them. When, on May eighth, the French reached
Dresden, they found that their enemy had blown up the bridges, and
were entrenched in the Neustadt on the right, or north, shore. Thus
the victory of Luetzen was, after all, indecisive.

And yet the utmost skill and bravery had been shown by the combatants
on both sides. The field was strewn with the corpses, not of such rude
and stalwart peasants as had hitherto filled the ranks of opposing
armies, but of gentle youth from French lyceums and Prussian
universities. There were forty thousand in all, an equal number from
each army, who remained dead or wounded on the hard-contested field.
They had fallen to little purpose. The victor captured neither
prisoners nor guns in important numbers, and to him it was slight
compensation for the loss of Bessieres that Scharnhorst was killed.
The allies, though beaten, were undismayed; long experience had
sharpened their wits and toughened their purpose; there was already
much strategical ability at their headquarters, and there was about
to be more, since Moreau, summoned from America, was soon to take
service with his splendid powers against his country. Great as the
battle was, it must therefore be reckoned as an ordinary victory; it
served to prolong existing conditions, but it did not decide an issue.
It was, however, something that it gave the French a self-confidence
bordering on enthusiasm, and it was more that after Napoleon had
commenced to rebuild the Dresden bridges, Frederick Augustus, the King
of Saxony, declared himself favorable to the French. Abandoning
Austria, he summoned his forces from Torgau, and the allies retreated
eastward behind the Spree. The lower Elbe was also recovered. The King
of Denmark had despatched an auxiliary force to Hamburg. Their
commander, believing Napoleon's fortunes submerged already, at first
assisted the Russians: but after Luetzen he turned his arms to
Vandamme's assistance. The city was retaken, three thousand of
Bernadotte's force marched out, and on May thirtieth Davout, with
fifteen thousand of his own men and three thousand Danes, marched in.

Napoleon's chief purpose, however, was unfulfilled, for Austria was
neither panic-stricken nor dismayed. On the contrary, she still stood
forth as a mediator, and now with ar