Leipzig, at this period, was the center of a circle in which engagements took place at numerous points and almost incessantly.  Engagements lasted during the days of the 16th, 17th, and 18th; and his Majesty, as a poor return for his clemency towards M. Moldrecht, reaped the bitter fruits of the proclamation which had been scattered in every direction through the efforts of this merchant.  On that day the Saxon army deserted our cause, and reported to Bernadotte.  This left the Emperor a force of only one hundred and ten thousand men, with an opposing force of three hundred and thirty thousand; so that if when hostilities were resumed we were only as one to two, we were now only one to three.  The day of the 18th was, as is well known, the fatal day.  In the evening the Emperor, seated on a folding stool of red morocco in the midst of the bivouac fires, was dictating to the Prince of Neuchatel his orders for the night, when two commanders of artillery were presented to his Majesty, and gave him an account of the exhausted condition of the ammunition chests.  In five days we had discharged more than two hundred thousand cannon-balls, and the ammunition being consequently exhausted there was barely enough left to maintain the fire for two hours longer; and as the nearest supplies were at Madgeburg and Erfurt, whence it would be impossible to obtain help in time, retreat was rendered absolutely necessary.

Orders were therefore given for a retreat, which began next day, the 19th, at the end of a battle in which three hundred thousand men had engaged in mortal combat, in a confined space not more than seven or eight leagues in circumference.  Before leaving Leipzig, the Emperor gave to.  Prince Poniatowski, who had just earned the baton of a marshal of France, the defense of one of the faubourgs.  “You will defend the faubourg on the south,” said his Majesty to him.  “Sire,” replied the prince, “I have very few men.”—­“You will defend it with those you have.”  “Ah, Sire, we will remain; we are all ready to die for your Majesty.”  The Emperor, moved by these words, held out his arms to the prince, who threw himself into them with tears in his eyes.  It was really a farewell scene, for this interview of the prince with the Emperor was their last; and soon the nephew of the last king of Poland found, as we shall soon see, a death equally as glorious as deplorable under the waves of the Elster.

[Prince Joseph Anthony Poniatowski, born at Warsaw, 1762.  Nephew of Stanislas Augustus, the last king of Poland.  He commanded the Polish army against Russia, 1792, and served under Kosciuszko, 1794.  He led an army of Poles under Napoleon, 1807 and 1809, and commanded a corps in the Russian campaign.  Had Napoleon succeeded in that campaign, Poniatowski would have been made king of Poland.  Wounded, and made a marshal at Liepzig, he was drowned on the retreat.]

At nine o’clock in the morning the Emperor took leave of the royal family of Saxony.  The interview was short, but distressing and most affectionate on the part of each.