At once he changed his plan and at 1 a.m. sent off four despatches ordering his Guards and all available troops to succour St. Cyr.  Vandamme’s corps alone was now charged with the task of creeping round the enemy’s rear, while the Guards long before dawn resumed their march through the rain and mud.  The Emperor followed and passed them at a gallop, reaching the capital at 9 a.m. with Latour-Maubourg’s cuirassiers; and, early in the afternoon, the bearskins of the Guards were seen on the heights east of Dresden, while the dark masses of the allies were gathering on the south and west for their reconnaissance in force.

[Illustration:  BATTLE OF DRESDEN]

Lowering clouds and pitiless rain robbed the scene of all brilliance, but wreathed it with a certain sombre majesty.  On the one side was the fair city, the centre of German art and culture, hastily girdled with redoubts and intrenchments manned now by some 120,000 defenders.  Fears and murmurings had vanished as soon as the Emperor appeared; and though in many homes men still longed for the triumph of the allies, yet loyalty to their King and awe of Napoleon held the great mass of the citizens true to his alliance.  As for the French soldiery, their enthusiasm was unbounded.  As regiment after regiment tramped in wearily from the east over the Elbe bridge and the men saw that well-known figure in the gray overcoat, fatigues and discomforts were forgotten; thunderous shouts of “Vive l’Empereur” rent the air and rolled along the stream, carrying inspiration to the defenders, doubt and dismay to the hostile lines.  Yet these too were being strengthened, until they finally mustered close on 200,000 men, who crowned the slopes south of Dresden with a war-cloud that promised to sweep away its hasty defences—­had not Napoleon been there.

The news of his arrival shook the nerves of the Russian Emperor, and it was reserved for the usually diffident King of Prussia to combat all notion of retreat.  Schwarzenberg’s reconnaissance in force therefore took place punctually at four o’clock, when the French, after a brief rest, were well prepared to meet them.  The Prussians had already seized the “Great Garden” which lines the Pirna road; and from this point of vantage they now sought to drive St. Cyr from the works thrown up on its flank and rear.  But their masses were torn by a deadly fire and finally fell back shattered.  The Russians, on their right, fared no better.  At the allied centre and left, the attack at one time promised success.  Under cover of a heavy cannonade from their slopes, the Austrians carried two redoubts:  but, with a desperate charge, the Old Guard drove in through the gorges of these works and bayoneted the victors of an hour.  As night fell, the assailants drew off baffled, after sustaining serious losses.