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Animated by their brilliant successes, the patriots no longer stood on the defensive, but, flocking from all quarters to the standard of Hofer, assembled in great multitudes on Mount Isel, the scene of their former triumphs, and destined to be immortalized by a still more extraordinary victory.
There I met my friends again, and parted from them and the Dolomites the next day, with regret. For they were "stepping westward;" but in order to get to the Gross-Venediger I must make a detour to the east, through the Pusterthal, and come up through the valley of the Isel to the great chain of mountains called the Hohe Tauern.
Did you see me tremble did you hear me complain at that time? Did I not stand up cheerfully in the battle on Mount Isel, without weeping or murmuring, and bearing in mind only that I was fighting for liberty, the fatherland, and the emperor? It was not until we had gained the victory, and obtained our freedom, that I went home to mourn and weep on the smoking ruins of my houses.
But he was always thinking, thinking, thinking, for all that; and under his little sheepskin winter coat and his rough hempen summer shirt his heart had and much courage in it as Hofer's ever had, great Hofer, who is a household word in all the Innthal, and whom August always reverently remembered when he went to the city of Innspruck and ran out by the foaming water-mill and under the wooded height of Berg Isel.
Napoleon's defeat, about this time, at Aspern having however compelled Lefebvre to return hastily to the Danube, leaving merely a part of the Bavarians with General Deroy in Innsbruck, the Tyrolese instantly seized the opportunity, and Hofer, Eisenstecken, and the gallant Speckbacher boldly assembled the whole of the peasantry on the mountain of Isel.
"And I say it is no misfortune at all that the Austrians have left us," cried the Capuchin, vehemently. "The cause of the fatherland has not suffered much by the retreat of the Austrians. Who assisted us at the battle of Mount Isel? Who helped us to drive the enemy twice from the country? Not an Austrian did! We accomplished all that was great and glorious in the short and decisive struggle.
Dear, noble gentleman! he does not move alone in our imaginations, for our own memories supply his splendid society. We too have seen, how often and how often, the bitter fight of the misty morning on the Isel the ringing charge, the fatal fall. A thousand times we saw the same true Sidney heart that, dying, gave the cup of cold water to a fellow-soldier.
I believe there will be another battle on Mount Isel, for the enemy is always intent on forcing his way to Innspruck, believing that the whole Tyrol is subjugated so soon as the capital has fallen into his hands. We must strive, therefore, to meet him there once more; for you know the old prophecy, saying that Mount Isel will be a lucky place for the Tyrolese."
Deroy, repulsed from the mountain of Isel with a loss of almost three thousand men, simulated an intention to capitulate, and withdrew unheard during the night by muffling the horses' hoofs and the wheels of the artillery carriages and enjoining silence under pain of death. Speckbacher attempted to impede his retreat at Hall, but arrived too late.
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