during his own Reign, 
rious artillery-carriages. The . army 
succceded in getting a hundred waggons 
ver, Perit tele 7 
. On the 16th,of May, the First Consul 
slept at. the convent of Saint-Maurice, 
and, the whole army passed the Saint- 
Bernard on the J7th, 18th, 19th, and 
20th of. May.. The First Consul, him- 
self. crossed on the 20th; in the most 
difficult places, be rede a mule belonging 
to, one of the inhabitants of Saint-Pierre, 
pointed,gut by the Prior of the convent 
as the most sure-footed in all the eoun- 
trys) The, First. Consul’s guide was a 
tall robust, youth of twenty-two, who 
eonyersed freely with him, with all the 
confidence becoming his age and the 
simplicity,of .the inhabitants of | the 
mountains: he confided all his troubles 
to the First Consnl, as well as his dreams 
of happiness te come, On their arrival 
at the convent, the First Consul, who 
had till then shewn no intention to do 
any thing for the peasant, wrote a note 
and gaye it to him, desiring him to carry 
it according to its address. This note 
was an order for certain arrangements 
which were)made immediately after the 
passage, and realized all the poor fel- 
low’s hopes;\such as the building of a 
house, the purchase of a piece of ground, 
&e..,.The astouishment of the young 
mountaineer at seeing, shortly after his 
return, so. many people hurrying to 
fulfil his wishes, and riches pouring in 
upon him on all sides, was extreme. 
The first Consul. remained an hour at 
the consent of the Hospitallers, and per- 
formed the descent a-la-Ramasse, down 
an almost perpendicular glacier. 'The 
cold was still sharp; the descent of the 
Great Saint-Bernard was more difficult 
for the horses than the ascent had been; 
there hapjened, however, but few acci- 
dents. The monks of the convent were 
stored, with a great quantity of wine, 
bread, and cheese; and each soldier, as 
he passed, received a large ration from 
the good fathers, 
_ On the 16th of May, General Lannes 
with the sixth light hall-brigade,. the 
28th and 44th of the line, the Llth and 
12th, regiments of bussars, and 2lst 
echasseurs, arrived at. Aosta, a town 
whivhwas a great resource to the army. 
On, the),17th, this van-guard reached 
Chatillon, where an Austrian corps of 
trom 410 5000 men, whieh was thought 
suflicient for the defence of the valley, 
was in position; it was immediately at- 
tacked and routed; ,on this occasion 
three guns and some, hundreds of pri- 
soners were taken. 
619 
DESAIX, 
During. the battle of the 11th, Desaix 
who had returned from, Egypt, and had 
been performing quarantine!,at Toulon, 
arrived at the head-guarters, at Monte- 
bello, with his aides-de-camp, Rapp and 
Savary. The whole night,was spent in 
conferences between the First. Consul 
and Desaix, om all that had. passed in 
Egypt since the former had. quitted. that 
country—the details of the campaign of 
Upper Egypt—of the negotiations ‘of 
Ei|-Arisch, and the composition of the 
Grand Vizier’s grand Tarkish army— 
lastly, on the battle of Heliopolis, and 
the present situation of the reach, army. 
“* Flow,” said the Virst Consul,‘ could 
you, Desaix, put your name. to the ca- 
pitulation of El-Avisch ?”—*« £, did it,’’ 
replicd Desaix, ‘‘and I ,would do it 
again, because the Commander-in-chief 
was not willing to, remain in Egypt; 
and because, in an army af a distance 
from home, and beyond the influence of 
Government, the inclinations. of «the 
Commander-in-chief are equivalent. to 
those of five-sixths of the army, | Lal- 
ways had the greatest contempt forthe 
Grand Vizier’s army, which, I have eb- 
served closely. I wrote to Kieber that 
[ would undertake 10 repulse it with my 
division alone, If you had left me the 
command of the army in Egypt, and 
taken Kleber away with you, I would 
have preserved that fine province. for 
you, and you should never bave heard a 
word about capitulation; but, however, 
‘things turned out well; and Kleber made 
up at Heliopolis for the mistakes he had 
been committing, for six . months.” 
Desaix burned to sinalize himself, He 
thirsted to avenge the ill-treatment he 
had received from Admiral. Keith; at 
Leghorn; this lay at his heart...The 
Tirst Consul immediately gave him 
the command of the division of Boudet, 
MARENGO. 
On the 14th of June, 1800, at break 
of day, the Austrians defiled by the 
three bridges, of thé Bormida, and made 
a furious attack on the village of Ma- 
rengo, ‘The resistance was obstinately 
kept up for a long time. The First 
Consul, finding, from the briskness of 
the cannonade, that the Austrians bad 
commenced the attack, immediately 
dispatched orders to Gencral Desaix to 
return with his troops upon San-Juliano; 
he was half a day’s march off, to the Jett, 
The First Consul arrived on the field of 
battle at ten o’clock in the morning, be. 
tween San-Juliano and Marengo. The 
enemy had at length carried Marengo; 
an 
