In the last stage of the battle the French limbered up their guns in the belief that a vast reserve of Austrian cavalry was galloping into action. What made them think so was a dense yellowish wall advancing through the air. Had they been natives, they would have recognised the approach of one of those frightful storms which bring devastation in their train, and which, as they move forward in what appears a solid mass, look to the inexperienced eye exactly like the clouds of dust raised by innumerable horsemen. The bursting of the storm hastened the end of the fight. All the day another fight, separate from this, had been going on between Benedek and the Sardinian army near the knoll of San Martino, overlooking the lake of Garda. The battle, which began in the early morning among the cypresses that crown the hillock, raged till seven p.m. with a fury which cost the Piedmontese over 4,000 in dead and wounded. It consisted largely in hand-to-hand fighting, which now gave an advantage to the Austrians, now to the Italians; many of the positions were lost and re-taken more than half-a-dozen times; the issue seemed long doubtful, and when Benedek, who commanded his side with unquestionable ability, received orders from the field of Solferino to begin a retreat, each combatant was firmly convinced that he was getting the best of it. Austrian writers allege that this order saved the Sardinians from defeat, while in both Italian and French narratives, the Piedmontese are represented as having been already sure of success. The courage shown alike by Piedmontese and Austrians could not be surpassed. Victor Emmanuel, as usual, set an example to his men. An incident in the battle brings into striking relief what it was this bloody strife was meant to end. An Austrian corporal fell, mortally wounded by a Bersagliere whom he conjured, in Italian, to listen to what he had got to say. It was this: Forced into the Austrian army, he had been obliged to serve through the war, but had never fired his rifle on his fellow-countrymen; now he preferred to die rather than defend himself. So he yielded up his breath with his hand clasped in the hand which had slain him. The Austrians lost, on the 24th of June, 13,000 men in killed and wounded; the French, 10,000. It was said that the frightful scene of carnage on the battlefield after Solferino influenced Napoleon III. in his desire to stop the war. Had that scene vanished from his recollection in June 1870?