The daily morning journal and courier., 1904-02-26

were advancing from FleskoV with great expedition, and resolved to shut up Charles XII. between two armies. 4 detachment Of thirty thousand men fpom the camp before Narva was post ed at a leagues distance from the city. directly in the King of Sweden's road: twenty thousand Strelitz were placed further of, upon the same road. and five thousand others composed an ad- vance guard. Before reaching the camp. which was fortified with ram part and double fosse, Charles must necessarily force his way through all
 these troops. The King of Sweden had landed at Pernau. in the Gulf of Riga, with about sixteen thousand foot and little more than four thousand horse. From Pernau he made flying march to ReveI, followed by all his cavalry and by only four thousand foot. He al- ways marched in the van of his army,
 without waiting for the rear. He soon found himself, with his eight thousand men only, before the first post of the enemy He immediately resolved, with out the least hesitation, to attack them one after another, before they could possibly learn with what a small num-
 Der they had to engage. The Musco- vites, seeing the Swedes come upon them, imagined they had a whole army to encounter, and the advanced guard of five thousand men, posted among rocks, a station where one hundred res olute men might have stopped the march of a large army, fled at their first approach. The, twenty thousand men that lay behind them, perceiving the flight of their fellow soldiers, took the alarm, and carried their terror and confusion with them into camp. All the posts were carried in two days, and what upon other occasions would have been reckoned three distinct victories did not retard the kings march for the space of one hour. He appeared then at last with his eight thousand men, exhausted by the fatigue of so long
 march. before a camp of eighty thou sand Muscovites, defended by a hun dred and fifty pieces of cannon, and scarcely allowing his troops any time for rest, he instantly gave orders for the attack. The signal was two mus ket shots, and the watchword in Ger man, With the aid of God.' A gene ral officer, having represented to him the greatness of the danger, he said: What? Do you not think that with my eight thousand brave Swedes I may easily beat eighty thousand Russians?s But soon after, fearing that what he had said might savor too much of gas conade, he ran after the officer, and said to him: Are you not of the same opinion? Have not I a double advan- tage over the enenly-one that their cavalry can be of no service to them; the other, that, the place being narrow, their number will incommode them, and thus in reality I shall be stronger than they?" The officer did not care to differ from him. and thus they marched against the Muscovites about midday on November 30, 170o. As soon as their cannon had made a breach in their in trenchments the Swedes advanced with fixed bayonets, having furious shower of snow on their backs, which drove full in the face of the enemy. The Russians stood the shock for half an hour with out fiinehing. The king made his at tack upon the right of the camp, where the Czar's quarters lay, hoping to come to an encounter with him, as he did not know that Peter the Great had gone in quest of forty thousand men, who were daily expected to arrive. At the first discharge of the enemy's muskets the King of Sweden received a shot ff1 his neck, but as it was 8 spent ball it lodged in the folds of his black neckcloth and did him no harm His horse was killed under him, and mounting another horse with great agility, he said, These fell lows make me go through my exerci- ses,. and continued to fight and give orders with the same presence of mind. After an engagement of three hours the intrenchments were forced on all sides. The king pursued the right of the ene- my as far as the river Narva with his left wing of about four thousand men, who were in pursuit of nearly forty thousand. The bridge broke under the fugitives, and the river was immediate fly filled with dead carcasses The re- mainder returned to their camp, with tout knowing whither they went and, finding some barracks, they took post behind them. There they defended themselves a while, as they were not able to make their escape. but at last their generals, Dolgorovki Golovkin and Federovitch surrendered them selves to the king, and laid their arms lat his feet, and while they were pre- senting them to him the Duke de Croy, the commander in chief of the Russian