The 12th of January, 1797, was a dark, stormy winter's day. The sleet, swept by the gale over the bleak mountains, covered the earth with an icy mantle. The swollen streams, clogged with ice, roared through the ravines. As the sun went down a clear belt of cloudless sky appeared brilliant in the west. The storm passed away. The cold north wind blew furiously, and the stars with unwonted lustre, adorned the wintry night. As the twilight was fading a courier galloped into the camp with the intelligence that the Austrians had made their appearance in vast numbers upon the plains of Rivoli, and that they were attacking with great fury the advanced post of the French stationed there. At the same time another courier arrived informing him that a powerful division of the Austrian army was moving in another direction to carry relief to Mantua. It was a fearful dilemma. Should Napoleon wait for the junction of these two armies to assail him in front, while the garrison in Mantua, emerging from the walls should attack him in the rear, his situation would be hopeless. Should he march to attack one army, he must leave the road open for the other to enter Mantua with reinforcements and relief. But Napoleon lost not one moment in deliberation. Instinctively he decided upon the only course to be pursued. "The French," said the Austrians, "do not march; they fly." With a rapidity of movement which seems almost miraculous, before two o'clock in the morning, Napoleon, with thirty thousand men, stood upon the snow-clad heights overlooking the encampment of his sleeping foes. It was a sublime and an appalling spectacle which burst upon his view. For miles and miles the watch-fires of the mighty host filled the extended plain. The night was clear, cold, and beautiful. Gloomy firs and pines frowned along the sides of the mountains, silvered by the rays of an unclouded moon. The keen eye of Napoleon instantly detected that there were fifty thousand men, in five divisions of ten thousand each, whom he, with thirty thousand was to encounter upon that plain. He also correctly judged, from the position of the divisions, that the artillery had not arrived, and resolved upon an immediate attack. At four o'clock in the morning, the Austrians were roused from their slumbers by the rush of Napoleon's battalions and by the thunders of his artillery. The day of Rivoli! It was a long, long day of blood and woe. The tide of victory ebbed and flowed. Again and again Napoleon seemed ruined. Night came, and the genius of Napoleon had again triumphed. The whole plain was covered with the dead and the dying. The Austrians, in wild terror, were flying before the impetuous charges of the French cavalry; while from every eminence cannon-balls were plunged into the dense ranks of the fugitives. The genius of this stern warrior never appeared more terrible than in the unsparing energy with which he rained down his blows upon a defeated army.