which had been worn out and melted in his hands. But winter
and famine, still more than the Russians, had destroyed them. For the
fourth time, he remained alone before the enemy, and still unshaken, he
sought for a fifth rear-guard.

At Kowno the marshal found a company of artillery, three hundred German
soldiers who formed its garrison, and General Marchand with four hundred
men; of these he took the command. He first walked over the town to
reconnoitre its position, and to rally some additional forces, but he
found only some sick and wounded, who were endeavouring, in tears, to
follow our retreat. For the eighth time since we left Moscow, we were
obliged to abandon these _en masse_ in their hospitals, as they had been
abandoned singly along the whole march, on all our fields of battle, and
at all our bivouacs.

Several thousand soldiers covered the marketplace and the neighbouring
streets; but they were laid out stiff before the magazines of spirits
which they had broken open, and where they drank the cup of death, from
which they fancied they were to inhale fresh life. These were the only
succours which Murat had left him; Ney found himself left alone in
Russia, with seven hundred foreign recruits. At Kowno, as it had been
after the disasters of Wiazma, of Smolensk, of the Berezina, and of
Wilna, it was to him that the honour of our arms and all the peril of
the last steps of our retreat were again confided.

On the 14th, at daybreak, the Russians commenced their attack. One of
their columns made a hasty advance from the Wilna road, while another
crossed the Niemen on the ice above the town, landed on the Prussian
territory, and, proud of being the first to cross its frontier, marched
to the bridge of Kowno, to close that outlet upon Ney, and completely
cut off his retreat.

The first firing was heard at the Wilna gate; Ney ran thither, with a
view to drive away Platof's artillery with his own; but he found his
cannon had been already spiked, and that his artillerymen had fled!
Enraged, he darted forward, and elevating his sword, would have killed
the officer who commanded them, had it not been for his aide-de-camp,
who warded off the blow, and enabled this miserable fellow to make his
escape.

Ney then summoned his infantry, but only one of the two feeble
battalions of which it was composed had taken up arms; it consisted of
the three hundred Germans of the garrison. He drew them up, encouraged
them, and as th