They had all been already crowding one upon the other, and the immense multitude heaped upon the bank pell-mell with the horses and carriages, there formed a most alarming incumbrance.  It was about the middle of the day that the first Russian bullets fell in the midst of this chaos; they were the signal of universal despair.

Then it was, as in all cases of extremity, that dispositions exhibited themselves without disguise, and actions were witnessed, most base, and others most sublime.  According to their different characters, some furious and determined, with sword in hand, cleared for themselves a horrible passage.  Others, still more cruel, opened a way for their carriages by driving them without mercy over the crowd of unfortunate persons who stood in the way, whom they crushed to death.  Their detestable avarice made them sacrifice their companions in misfortune to the preservation of their baggage.  Others, seized with a disgusting terror, wept, supplicated, and sunk under the influence of that passion, which completed the exhaustion of their strength.  Some were observed, (and these were principally the sick and wounded,) who, renouncing life, went aside and sat down resigned, looking with a fixed eye on the snow which was shortly to be their tomb.

Numbers of those who started first among this crowd of desperadoes missed the bridge, and 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 ice, with their children in their arms, raising them as they felt themselves sinking, and even when completely immerged, their stiffened arms still held them above them.

In the midst of this horrible disorder, the artillery bridge burst and broke down.  The column, entangled in this narrow passage, in vain attempted to retrograde.  The crowds of men who came behind, unaware of the calamity, and not hearing the cries of those before them, pushed them on, and threw them into the gulf, into which they were precipitated in their turn.

Every one then attempted to pass by the other bridge.  A number of large ammunition waggons, heavy carriages, and cannon crowded to it from all parts.  Directed by their drivers, and carried along rapidly over a rough and unequal declivity, in the midst of heaps of men, they ground to powder the poor wretches who were unlucky enough to get between them; after which, the greater part, driving violently against each other and getting overturned, killed in their fall those who surrounded them.  Whole rows of these desperate creatures being pushed against these obstacles, got entangled among them, were thrown down and crushed to pieces by masses of other unfortunates who succeeded each other uninterruptedly.

Crowds of them were rolling in this way, one over the other, nothing was heard but cries of rage and suffering.  In this frightful medley, those who were trod under and stifled, struggled under the feet of their companions, whom they laid hold of with their nails and teeth, and by whom they were repelled without mercy, as if they had been enemies.