their old plan of enveloping him: and from
information which he treacherously received from Alvintzy's staff he
must have known that that commander had far fewer than the 45,000 men
which he ascribed to him in bulletins.

[Illustration: NEIGHBOURHOOD OF RIVOLI.]

Yet the full dawn of that January day saw the Imperialists flushed
with success, as their six separate columns drove in the French
outposts and moved towards Rivoli. Of these, one was on the eastern
side of the Adige and merely cannonaded across the valley: another
column wound painfully with most of the artillery and cavalry along
the western bank, making for the village of Incanale and the foot of
the zigzag leading up to Rivoli: three others denied over Monte Baldo
by difficult paths impassable to cannon: while the sixth and
westernmost column, winding along the ridge near Lake Garda, likewise
lacked the power which field-guns and horsemen would have added to its
important turning movement. Never have natural obstacles told more
potently on the fortunes of war than at Rivoli; for on the side where
the assailants most needed horses and guns they could not be used;
while on the eastern edge of their broken front their cannon and
horse, crowded together in the valley of the Adige, had to climb the
winding road under the plunging fire of the French infantry and
artillery. Nevertheless, such was the ardour of the Austrian attack,
that the tide of battle at first set strongly in their favour. Driving
the French from the San Marco ridge and pressing their centre hard
between Monte Baldo and Rivoli, they made it possible for their troops
in the valley to struggle on towards the foot of the zigzag; and on
the west their distant right wing was already beginning to threaten
the French rear. Despite the arrival of Massena's troops from Verona
about 9 a.m., the republicans showed signs of unsteadiness. Joubert on
the ground above the Adige, Berthier in the centre, and Massena on the
left, were gradually forced back. An Austrian column, advancing from
the side of Monte Baldo by the narrow ravine, stole round the flank of
a French regiment in front of Massena's division, and by a vigorous
charge sent it flying in a panic which promised to spread to another
regiment thus uncovered. This was too much for the veteran, already
dubbed "the spoilt child of victory "; he rushed to its captain,
bitterly upbraided him and the other officers, and finally showered
blows on them wit