Numbers of those who started first among this crowd of desperadoes, missing the bridge, attempted to scale it by the sides, but the greater part were pushed into the river. There were seen women in the midst of the stream and among the masses of floating ice, with their children in their arms, raising them by degrees as they felt themselves sinking, and when completely submerged, their stiffened arms still holding them above the water. In the midst of this horrible disorder, the artillery bridge gave way and broke down. The column entangled in this narrow passage in vain attempted to retrograde. The crowds which were following behind, ignorant of the calamity, and not hearing the cries of those before them, kept urging them on until they pushed them into the gulf, into which they in their turn were precipitated. Every one then attempted to pass by the other bridge. A great number of large ammunition wagons, heavy carriages and cannon crowded to it from all parts. Pressed on by their drivers and carried rapidly along over a rough and unequalled declivity, in the midst of masses of men, they ground to pieces the poor wretches who were unfortunate enough to get between them, until at length the greater part, furiously encountering each other, were overturned, killing in their fall those who were around them. Multitudes pressed against these obstacles, and becoming entangled among them, were thrown down, and crushed to pieces by other multitudes as they successively stumbled upon them. Thus these miserable creatures were rolling one upon the other, and nothing was heard but cries of rage and of anguish. In this frightful confusion, those who were trodden and crushed under the feet of their companions, struggling to lay hold of them with their nails and teeth, were, like so many enemies, trampled upon without mercy. Among them were wives and mothers, calling in tones of distraction upon their husbands and their children, from whom they had been separated but a moment before, never again to be united. Stretching out their arms, they entreated to be allowed to pass in order to rejoin them: but they were hurried backward and forward with the crowd, until at length, overcome by the pressure, they sank without being so much as noticed. Amid the howling of a violent tempest, the discharge of cannon, the whistling of balls, the explosion of shells, vociferations, groans, and frightful oaths, this infuriated crowd heard not the cries of the victims it was swallowing up. The more fortunate gained the bridge by scrambling over heaps of wounded, of women and children thrown down and half suffocated, whom they again trampled beneath their feet in their attempts to reach it. When at last they reached the narrow defile, they fancied that they were safe; but the fall of a horse, or the breaking or displacing of a plank, again arrested everything.