head, General Zach himself was obliged to surrender.” The fight continued, Kellerman charged again and again, while Lannes and Saint Cyr showed that they had lost none of their prowess. The Austrian cavalry was driven back by Bessières and Eugene Beauharnais. “The confusion at the bridges of the Bormida,” adds Thiers, “became every moment still more irremediable. Infantry, cavalry, and artillery crowded together in disorder, the bridges could not afford a passage for the entire army, then _en masse_; multitudes threw themselves into the Bormida for the purpose of fording it. An artilleryman attempted to cross it with his gun, and succeeded. The entire artillery then followed his example, but without success, as several of the carriages stuck fast in the bed of the river. The French, now hotly pursuing, took men, horses, guns, and baggage. The unfortunate Baron Melas, who, but two hours before, had left his army in possession of victory, galloped up on report of this disaster, and could scarcely credit what he saw; he gave himself up to despair.” “Tell the First Consul,” gasped the dying Desaix, “that my only regret in dying is to have perished before having done enough to live in the recollection of posterity.” His fame, however, will always be recorded in connection with the battle of Marengo. “A glorious day’s work,” said Napoleon. “If only I could have embraced Desaix upon the battlefield! I should have made him Minister of War, and a prince, too, had it been in my power.” During his weary exile Napoleon also spoke lovingly of the fallen general, as he did of Kléber, who perished on the same day in Egypt, the victim of an assassin’s dagger. “Of all the generals I ever had under my command,” said the fallen Emperor, “Desaix and Kléber possessed the greatest talent--Desaix pre-eminently, as Kléber loved glory only as the means of acquiring wealth and pleasure. Desaix loved glory for itself, and despised every other consideration. To him riches and pleasure were of no value, nor did he ever give them a moment’s thought. He was a little, black-looking man, about an inch shorter than myself, always badly dressed, sometimes even ragged, and despising alike comfort and convenience. Enveloped in a cloak, Desaix would throw himself under a gun and sleep as contentedly as if reposing in a palace. Luxury had for him no charms. Frank and honest in all his proceedings, he was called by the Arabs, ‘Sultan the Just.’ Nature intended him to figure as a consummate general. Kléber and Desaix were irreparable losses to France.” Melas, broken in spirit and wounded, requested an armistice. After considerable dallying on the part of the Court of Vienna and ruthless determination to have his own way on that of Napoleon, hostilities were resumed in November, 1800.