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"I am not jesting," Bilibin went on. "Nothing is truer or sadder.

These gentlemen ride onto the bridge alone and wave white

handkerchiefs; they assure the officer on duty that they, the

marshals, are on their way to negotiate with Prince Auersperg. He

lets them enter the tete-de-pont. * They spin him a thousand

gasconades, saying that the war is over, that the Emperor Francis

is arranging a meeting with Bonaparte, that they desire to see

Prince Auersperg, and so on. The officer sends for Auersperg;

these gentlemen embrace the officers, crack jokes, sit on the

cannon, and meanwhile a French battalion gets to the bridge

unobserved, flings the bags of incendiary material into the

water, and approaches the tete-de-pont. At length appears the

lieutenant general, our dear Prince Auersperg von Mautern

himself. 'Dearest foe! Flower of the Austrian army, hero of the

Turkish wars! Hostilities are ended, we can shake one another's

hand....