CHAPTER VIII

WATERLOO

Why had the Emperor been so late in getting into motion on the morning of the 16th? Why had he not started at five o’clock, and caught Zieten’s corps unsupported? Why did he give Blücher time to concentrate? Why did he not press the attack farther on the evening of the day when the Prussians were in full retreat? Why did he fail to give Grouchy the customary order to pursue with all the cavalry?

Satisfactory answers cannot be made. That Napoleon’s conceptions were as grand as ever is apparent, but his failure in matters of detail is equally clear. Perhaps mental and physical weariness after several hours of sustained exertion and anxiety, furnish the most plausible explanation of these errors.

At any rate, when he threw himself on his bed at Fluerus on the night of the 16th, Napoleon was worn out. Yet he did not know the true state of the Prussian army, nor what Ney had done at Quatre Bras. Soult sent no dispatches to Ney, and Ney sent none to Soult.

The Emperor went to sleep _believing_ but not _knowing_ that Blücher had been so badly battered that it would take him at least two days to gather together the remnant of his army. More unfortunately still, Napoleon believed that the Prussians had taken up a line of retreat which would carry them beyond supporting distance of the English.

To the contrary of both these convictions of the Emperor, the bulk of the Prussian army was preserving its formation, and Gneisenau, acting for Blücher, who was believed to be dead or a prisoner, had directed the retreat on Wavre. Thus the Prussians were keeping within supporting distance of the English, although this was not Gneisenau’s motive in issuing the order. He chose Wavre for the reason that at Wavre the separated corps of the army could best reunite.

* * * * *

The morning of the 17th of June dawns, and Napoleon has Wellington in his power. _But neither Wellington nor Napoleon knows it._ The Duke does not know what has become of the Prussians, and the Emperor does not know that the English are where he and Ney, acting in concert, can utterly destroy them.

It seems incredible that Ney sent no report to Napoleon, and that the Emperor sent no courier to Ney. But that is just the fact. It was not until _after_ Wellington had received the report of the Prussian retreat, had realized his peril, and was backing away from it, that Napoleon awoke to a sense of the opportunity which fortune had held for him all that morning, while he lay supinely upon his bed, or idly talked Parisian politics with his officers.

When he _did_ realize what might have been, he was ablaze with a fierce desire to make up for lost time. Too late. Wellington was already at a safe distance, in full retreat on Brussels, and Ney had not molested him by firing a single shot.

Soon the Emperor reached Quatre Bras, but what could he do? True, he could dash after the English cavalry and chase it as the hunter chases the hare, but even the rearguard of the enemy made good its escape.

They say that as the black storm cloud spread over the heavens to the North the hills behind were still bathed in sunlight, and that as the English officer, Lord Uxbridge, looked back, he saw a horseman suddenly emerge from a dip in the road and appear on the hill in front--and they knew it to be Napoleon, leading the pursuit.

A battery galloped up, took position, opened fire. And as it did so, the thunder from the storm-cloud mingled with the thunder of the guns, and the great rain of June 17th had begun to pour down.

“Gallop faster, men! For God’s sake, gallop, or you will be taken!” It was Lord Uxbridge speeding his flying cavalry.

After them streamed the French. Almost, but not quite, the English were overtaken. So close came the French that the English heard their curses and jeers, just as Sir John Moore’s retreating men heard them as they took to their boats after the death-grapple at Corunna.

Torrents of rain were pouring down. The roads became bogs. Where the highways passed between embankments each road was a rushing stream. Horses mired to their knees. Cannon carriages sank to the hubs. The infantry was soaked with water and covered with mud. The labor of getting forward was exhausting to man and beast. But the French pressed on until they reached the hills opposite the heights of Mont-Saint-Jean. Upon those heights, and between the French and Brussels, Wellington had come to a stand.

A reconnaissance in force caused the English to unmask, and Napoleon was happy. The English army was before him. That he would crush it on the morrow, he had not the slightest doubt. He not only believed this, but had good reason to believe it. Had not the Prussians gone away to Namur, out of supporting distance? Such was his firm conviction, based partly on the knowledge of what would be the natural course for the retreating army to take, and partly on the report of his scouts. Besides, had he not sent Grouchy, Vandamme, and Gérard to take care of Blücher?

Could the great soldier believe that his lieutenants, trained in his own school by years of service in the field, could manage so stupidly as to allow the Prussians to take him in flank, while he was giving battle to the English?

Regarding the vexed question as to whether the order given to Grouchy was sufficient, a civilian can but say that it would seem that Grouchy ought to have known what was expected of him even if he had not been specially instructed. The very size of the army entrusted to him was enough to denote its purpose. The fact that Napoleon was going after Wellington and was sending Grouchy after Blücher said as plainly as words, “You take care of Blücher, while I take care of Wellington.” By necessary implication, the mere sending of Grouchy with 33,000 men after Blücher meant that Grouchy’s mission was to keep the Prussians off Napoleon while Napoleon was fighting the English.

This was the common sense of it, and the Emperor had every reason to believe that no intelligent officer of his army could possibly understand it otherwise.

Therefore, when he saw that Wellington meant to give battle, he felt the stern joy of the warrior who expects a fair fight and a brilliant victory.

To Napoleon, a victory there meant even more. It meant the possible end of arduous warfare, an era of peace for France, the return to his arms of his son, and the crowning of his wonderful career by the continuation and completion of that system of internal improvements and beneficent institutions to which Europe owes so much. Therefore, when he plowed through the mud, drenched with rain, and went the rounds of his army posts, peering through the mists toward the English lines, listening for any sound of an army breaking camp to retreat, he was happy to be convinced, “They mean to fight.”

No one could shake his belief that the Prussians had gone off toward Namur. That they had retired by a parallel line with the English was incredible. That Blücher would appear on the morrow, _and strike his flank within two hours after the signal for battle was fired_, was a thought which could not possibly have been driven into Napoleon’s head.

In vain did his brother Jerome tell him of what a servant of the inn had overheard the English officers say, that very afternoon--that Blücher was to come to their aid the next day. Napoleon scouted the story. To his dying day, it is doubtful whether he believed that Wellington’s decision to stay and fight was based upon the practical certainty that Blücher would come to his aid. To that effect Blücher had given his promise--and Wellington knew that Blücher was not the man to make his ally a false promise to induce him to fight.

Although Napoleon had slept but little on Saturday night (the 17th) and had been out in the rain and mud for hours making the rounds of his outposts, a distance of two miles, he seemed fresh and cheerful at breakfast, and chatted freely with his officers.

There was a question of fixing the hour of the attack. To give the ground time to become drier and firmer under sun and wind, hour after hour was suffered to pass. All this while the more energetic Blücher was plowing his way toward the field, over ground just as wet. To a civilian it would seem if the soil was firm enough to march on, it was firm enough to fight on. If the Prussians could drag their artillery through the defiles of the Lasne, the French should have been able to handle theirs in the valleys of Smohaine and Braine-L’Alleud.

Therefore, it would seem to this writer that on the morning of June 18th, when Napoleon Bonaparte sat idly in his lines waiting for sun and wind to harden the ground, he had no one but himself to blame for giving Blücher time to reach the field. During these hours of waiting it appears singular that no details of the plan of attack were discussed. It seems strange that no preparations were made to cannonade the château of Hougoumont and its outbuildings and walls. It seems strange that no battery was planted to shell the farmhouses of La Haye-Sainte. It seems equally strange that nails and hammers were not provided for the spiking of captured cannon.

* * * * *

One of the most horribly fascinating of historical manuscripts is the warrant against his enemies which Robespierre was signing when Bourdon broke into the room and shot him. There is the incomplete signature of the erstwhile Dictator, and there are the stains made by the blood which spurted from his shattered jaw.

Even more profoundly interesting are a few words written in pencil by Marshal Ney, upon an order which Soult was about to send to General D’Erlon: “Count D’Erlon will understand that the action is to commence on the left, not on the right. Communicate this new arrangement to General Reilé.”

Why had the Emperor changed his mind? At St. Helena, he appears not to have recalled the fact that he changed his plan of battle because Ney reported that a small stream, which was on the line of advance to the right, had been swollen by the rains and it was impassable.

Stonewall Jackson was one of the many military experts who studied the field of Waterloo, and who said that the attack should have been made on the right. It was there that Wellington was weakest. Had the French struck him there, Hougoumont would have been worthless to him and would not have cost such a frightful loss to the French. But the Emperor, at the last moment, changed his mind.

THE LAST BATTLE

“_Magnificent! Magnificent!_” exclaimed Napoleon as he overlooked the legions that were moving over the plateau, going into position.

Seated on his white mare, his gray dust-coat covering all but the front of the green uniform, on his head the small cocked hat of the Brienne school, silver spurs on the riding-boots which reached the knee, and at his side the sword of Marengo--the great Captain was never more radiant, never surer of success than now.

_Vive l’Empereur!_ rolled in thunder tones as the troops marched before him. The drum-beat was drowned in the mighty shout of the legions as they went down into the valley of the shadow of death. It was, on the vastest scale, the old, old cry of the gladiators as they trooped past the imperial box to take their stations in the arena--“_Caesar! we, who are about to die, salute you!_”

As the regiments passed in review, the eagles were dipped to the Emperor, every saber flashed in the sun, every bayonet waved a hat or cap, every pennon was wildly shaken, every band struck up the national air, “_Let us watch over the safety of the Empire_”--and over everything, drowning the roll of the drums and the call of the bugles, rose that frantic cry of frenzied devotion, “_Vive l’Empereur!_”

Napoleon’s eye dilated, his breast expanded with pride--for the last time, the very last time. Proud he had often been, and in most instances he had won the right to be so. On the heights of Rossomme and on the plateau of La Belle Alliance, he was, this Sunday morning, deservedly proud. He had reconquered an empire without drawing the sword, had almost done what Pompey had boasted that he could do--_called forth an army by the stamp of his foot_; had smitten his enemies and put them to rout, and now while his lieutenant, on the right, would “cut off the Prussians from Wellington,”--as Grouchy had written that he would,--he, Napoleon, would crush the English, and so win back peace with honor.

A more magnificent army than that which he proudly views has never been marshalled for battle, for here are heroes whose record reaches all the way back through Montmirail, Dresden, Wagram, Jena, Borodino, Austerlitz, Eylau and Friedland, to Marengo.

And Napoleon is proud, this last time.

* * * * *

In the field Napoleon had 74,000 men and 246 guns; Wellington had 67,000 men and 184 guns. But the British position was strong. The hollow road of Ohain gave them the benefit of its trench for 400 yards. There were barricades of felled trees on the Brussels and Nivelles roads. There was a sand-pit which served as an intrenchment, and the strong buildings and enclosure of Hougoumont, La Haye-Sainte and Papelotte were formidable defences.

Yet General Haxo, who was sent by Napoleon to inspect the enemy’s lines, reported that he could not perceive any fortifications!

In addition to the hollow road, the natural advantage of the position of the English was that, from the crest which they were to defend, the ground fell away so as to form a declivity behind the crest, and along this hillside the English were partially sheltered from the French fire and altogether hidden from view. From where he was, Napoleon could not see more than half of Wellington’s army. Another natural protection to the English position were the tall, thick hedges, impassable to the French cavalry.

All things considered, the attempt of the Emperor to break the center of an English army, so well posted as this, can be fairly compared to Lee’s efforts to storm the heights of Gettysburg. And in each case the attack was made in ignorance of vitally important facts.

Well might Napoleon afterward reproach himself for not having reconnoitered the English position.

* * * * *

At thirty-five minutes past eleven the first gun was fired.

Reillé had been ordered to occupy the approaches to Hougoumont, and had entrusted the movement to Jerome Bonaparte. At the head of the 1st Light Infantry he charged the wood held by Nassau and Hanoverian carbineers. An hour of furious fighting in the dense thickets--in which General Bauduin was killed--resulted in clearing the woods of the enemy; but on getting clear of the thicket the French found themselves coming upon the strong walls and the large buildings of the château.

Jerome had no orders to lead infantry against a fortress like this, but he did it, nevertheless. Wellington had thrown a garrison into Hougoumont; the walls were loopholed for musketry; and the French were led to slaughter. It was impossible for infantry to break these thick walls of solid masonry, yet Jerome, in spite of the advice of his chief of staff and the orders of his immediate superior, Reillé, persisted until Hougoumont had cost the lives of 1,600 Frenchmen and had called away from the main battle nearly 11,000 men.

Why it was that the walls were not breached with cannon before the infantry was led against them can only be explained upon the hypothesis that the Emperor never once thought his brother capable of so mad an undertaking.

It was nearly one o’clock when Napoleon formed a battery of eighty guns and was ready to make a great attack on the English center. Before giving word to Ney, who was to lead it, the Emperor carefully scanned the entire battlefield through his glass.

_What is that black cloud which has come upon the distant horizon, there on the northeast?_ Every staff officer turns his glasses to the heights of Chapelle-Saint-Lambert. “Trees,” say some. But Napoleon knows better. Those are troops. But whose? Are they his? Is it Grouchy? Suppose it is the advance guard of Blücher!

A hush, a chill falls upon the staff. A cavalry squad is sent to reconnoiter; but before it has even cleared itself of the French lines, a prisoner taken by Marbot’s hussars is brought to the Emperor. This prisoner was the bearer of a letter from Bülow to Wellington to announce the arrival of the Prussians! Even now the Emperor does not realize his danger, does not suspect the truth of the situation, for he believes that Grouchy is so maneuvering as to protect the French right and to prevent the Prussians from falling on his flank. Napoleon sends him the dispatch: “A letter which has just been intercepted tells us that General Bülow is to attack our right flank. We believe we can perceive the corps on the heights of Chapelle-Saint-Lambert. Therefore do not lose a minute to draw nearer to us and to join us and crush Bülow, whom you will catch in the very act.”

Immediately the Emperor detached the cavalry divisions of Domon and Subervie to the right to be ready to hold the Prussians in check, and the 6th Corps (Lobau) was ordered to move up behind this cavalry.

_Thus from half-past one in the afternoon Napoleon had two armies with which to deal._

Had he suspected that Blücher had left Thielman’s corps to amuse Grouchy while the bulk of the Prussian army was hastening to join Bülow on the right flank of the French, the Emperor would probably not have gone deeper into this fight. Expecting every moment to hear the roar of Grouchy’s guns in Bülow’s rear, the Emperor now ordered Ney to the grand attack on the English line.

Eighty cannon thundered against Mont-Saint-Jean, and the English batteries roared in reply. For half an hour the earth quivered with the shock, and in Brussels, twenty miles away, every living soul hung upon the roar of the guns. Merchants closed their stores; business of all sorts suspended; eager crowds hurried to the Namur gate to listen, to question stragglers from the front; timid travellers, who had come in the train of Wellington’s army, hastily secured conveyances and fled by the Ghent road. In the churches, women prayed.

Is Blücher the only man who could play the game of leaving a part of his troops to detain the enemy? Cannot Grouchy leave 10,000 men to die, if necessary, in holding Thielman, while with the remainder he pushes for the distant battlefield?

There are those who say he could not have arrived in time had he made the effort. How can anybody know that? Certainly his cavalry could have covered the distance, and the infantry in all probability would have arrived in time to take the exhausted English in the rear, after their advance to La Belle Alliance, and cut the surprised troops to pieces.

Thus while the Prussians were chasing Napoleon, Grouchy would have been chasing Wellington, with the net result that the Prussians, within a few days, would have been caught between Napoleon’s rallied troops and the victorious army of Grouchy. But it was not to be so. Grouchy did precisely what Blücher wanted him to do--spent the golden hours with Thielman at Wavre.

After the cannonade of half an hour, Ney and D’Erlon led the grand attack on the English position. And a worse managed affair it would be difficult to imagine. Instead of forming columns of attack, admitting of easy and rapid deployment, the troops were massed in compact phalanxes, with a front of 166 to 200 files, with a depth of twenty-four men. The destruction which canister causes on dense masses like these, exposed in the open field, is something horrible to contemplate. The error was so glaring that one of the division commanders, Durutte, flatly refused to allow his men to be formed in that way.

Where was the eagle glance of Napoleon that he did not detect the faulty formation which Ney and D’Erlon were making? Is such a detail beneath the notice of a commander-in-chief?

If the Emperor saw the mistake he gave no sign, and the troops of D’Erlon, ashamed of not having been in the fights of the 16th, rushed into the valley shouting, “_Vive l’Empereur!_”

“Into the jaws of death” they marched, for as they crossed the valley and mounted the slopes beyond, the English batteries cut long lanes through their deep, dense lines and they fell by the hundreds.

A part of the attacking force was thrown against the walls and buildings of La Haye-Sainte, and here, as at Hougoumont, infantry were slaughtered from behind unbreached walls. But the great charge against the English position went on heedless of such detail as the attack on La Haye-Sainte. Through the rye, which was breast-high, and over ground into which they mired at every step, the columns of D’Erlon pressed upward, crying “_Vive l’Empereur!_”

The defenders of the sand pit were driven out and thrown beyond the hedges. The Netherlanders and Dutch broke, and in their flight behind the hedges disordered the ranks of an English regiment. The Nassau troops, which held the Papelotte farm, were dislodged by the French under Durutte, and the great charge seemed to be on the point of succeeding. But the faulty formation of the attacking columns ruined all. When the attempt was made to deploy, so much time was consumed that the English gunners had only to fire at the dense mass of men to litter the earth with the wounded and the dead. The carnage was frightful.

Picton, the English general, seeing the efforts of the French to deploy, seized the opportunity, led a brigade against the French column, delivered a volley, and then ordered a bayonet charge. Pouring from behind the hedges, the English rushed upon the confused mass of French, and a terrible fight at close quarters took place. It was here that Picton was killed.

While the column of Donzelot was engaged in this desperate struggle, the column of Marcognet had broken through the hedges and was advancing to take a battery. But as the French shouted “Victory,” the sound of the bag-pipes was heard, and the Highlanders opened fire. Owing to their faulty formation, the French could only reply by a volley from the front line of a single battalion. Their only hope was to charge with the bayonet. While desperately engaged with the Scotch troops, Lord Uxbridge dashed upon them with his cavalry.

The issue could not be doubtful. The French could not deploy; the confused mass could not defend itself against infantry or cavalry. They were raked by cannon shot, and by musketry, and the English cavalry hacked them to pieces. The slaughter was pitiable and was mainly due to a formation which gave these brave men no chance to fight.

In their exultation the English carried their charges too far. The Scotch Greys, indeed, dashed up the slope upon which the French were posted, captured the division of batteries of Durutte and attempted to carry the main battery. Napoleon himself ordered the countercharge which swept the English cavalry beyond La Haye-Sainte.

All this while, Jerome Bonaparte was still assaulting Hougoumont. Defenders and assailants had each been reinforced. The Emperor ordered a battery of howitzers to shell the buildings. Fire broke out, and the château and its outbuildings were consumed. The English threw themselves into the chapel, the barn, the farmer’s house, a sunken road, and continued to hold the position.

It was now half-past three o’clock. Wellington and Napoleon were both becoming uneasy--the former because Blücher’s troops were not yet in line, the latter because he had begun to doubt that Grouchy would come. The Emperor ordered Ney to make another attack on La Haye-Sainte. The English, from behind hedges of the Ohain road, repulsed it.

While the movement was being made the main French battery of eighty guns cannonaded the English right center. “Never had the oldest soldiers heard such a cannonade,” said General Alten.

The English line moved back a short distance so as to get the protection of the edge of the plateau. Ney, mistaking this movement, ordered a cavalry charge. At first he meant to use a brigade only, but owing to some misunderstanding that cannot be cleared up, this intended charge of a brigade drew into it practically all the cavalry of the French army. Napoleon himself did not see what was happening. From his position near the “Maison Decoster” inn, Napoleon did not have a view of the ground in which the cavalry divisions were forming for this premature disastrous attack.

The English saw it all, and were glad to see it. What better could they ask? Their lines had not been disordered by artillery or by infantry; what had they to fear from cavalry? Nothing. They sprang up, formed squares and waited. The English gunners, whose batteries were in front, were ordered to reserve their fire till the last moment, and then to take shelter within the squares.

As the French advanced, they were exposed to the full fury of the English batteries. The slope up which the cavalry rode is not steep, but the tall grain and the deep mud made it extremely difficult.

Yet this magnificent body of horse, in spite of dreadful losses, drove the gunners from the batteries and took the guns!

But they had nothing to spike them with, they could not drag them away, they did not even break the cannon sponges.

Therefore when they found that the English infantry was not in disorder, but in squares upon whose walls of steel no impression could be made; when they fell into confusion because of their own numbers crowded in so small a space, when Uxbridge’s five thousand fresh horses were hurled upon the jaded French, and they fell back before the shock, the English gunners had but to run back to their guns and renew the murderous cannonade.

Yet no sooner had the wonderful soldiers of Milhaud and Lefebre-Desnoette reached the bottom of the valley than they charged up the muddy slopes again. Once more they drove in the cannoneers: once more they carried the heights, and fell upon the English squares. At this moment some of the English officers believed that the battle was lost. But Napoleon watched the cavalry charge with uneasiness and called it “premature.” Soult declared that “Ney is compromising us as he did at Jena.”

The Emperor said, “This has taken place an hour too soon, but we must stand by what is already done.” Then he sent to Kellerman and Guyot an order to charge. This carried into action the remaining cavalry. It was now after five o’clock.

In a space which offered room for the deployment of only one thousand, eight or nine thousand French cavalry went to fight unbroken infantry!

A storm of cannon balls broke upon these dense masses, and the slaughter was terrific, but nothing stopped the French. Again they swept past the guns, again they assaulted the squares, time and again and again--while an enfilading fire emptied saddles by the hundred at every volley. Some of the squares were broken, an English flag was captured, the German Legion lost its colors, the French horse rode through the English line, to be destroyed by the batteries in reserve. Wellington had taken refuge within a square, but he now came out and ordered a charge of his cavalry. For the third time the French were driven off the plateau.

Yet Ney, losing his head completely, led another cavalry charge! Again ran the gunners away from the batteries, and again the cavalry broke on the squares. In fact, the wounded and dead were piled so high in front of the squares that each had a hideous breastwork before it which made it almost impossible for the French to reach the English.

Inasmuch as the Emperor had decided to support Ney in his cavalry charges, it seems strange that neither he nor Ney used the infantry.

The 6,000 men of the Bachelu and Foy division were close by, watching the cavalry charges and eager to support them. As Ney was personally leading the cavalry, it is easy to understand how he came to forget everything else; but the Emperor’s failure to send in this infantry is not readily understood.

Only after the fourth charge of the cavalry had been repulsed, did Ney call in the infantry. But he was too late; the English batteries tore this closely packed body of men to shreds, and in a few minutes 1,500 had fallen and the column was in retreat.

It was now six o’clock. La Haye-Sainte was at length taken, with great loss of life on both sides. From this point of vantage Ney assailed the English lines. The sand pit was again abandoned by the enemy, and Ney used this and a mound near La Haye-Sainte to pour a destructive fire upon the center of Wellington’s line. The French infantry charged, drove the English, captured a flag, and there was now a gap in the very center of the English line. Wellington was in a critical condition, and had the Old Guard charged _then_, neither Blücher nor night might have come in time.

Ney saw the opportunity and sent to the Emperor for a few infantry to complete the work. “Troops?” exclaimed Napoleon to the officer who brought Ney’s message. “Where do you expect me to get them? Do you expect me to make them?”

At the same moment, one of Wellington’s lieutenants sent for reinforcements. “There are none,” he said. Suppose that at this moment Napoleon could have hurled on the English line the 16,000 men who were holding back the Prussians!

Yet the fact is that the Emperor had in hand fourteen battalions which had not been engaged, and what amazes the civilian is that, after refusing to take advantage of the impression Ney had made upon the enemy’s line, Napoleon organized another general advance against Mont-Saint-Jean an hour later.

* * * * *

Ever since two o’clock the Prussians had been operating on the French right wing. Bülow’s corps was having a bloody struggle with Lobau and the Young Guard. Time and again the Prussians were thrown back; time and again they returned to the attack. At the instant when Ney was demanding more troops, Lobau’s corps was in retreat and the Young Guard was driven out of Plancenoit. Napoleon’s own position on La Belle Alliance was threatened. To prevent the Prussians from coming upon his rear, the Emperor sent in eleven battalions of the Old Guard which, with fixed bayonets and without firing a shot, drove the Prussians out of Plancenoit and chased them six hundred yards.

It was now after seven o’clock. There were still two hours of daylight. In the distance were heard the guns of Grouchy; the sound seemed to draw nearer. The Emperor, counting too much on Grouchy always, believed that at last his tardy lieutenant was engaged with the bulk of the Prussian army, and that he himself would have to deal with the corps of Bülow only.

The Emperor swept the field of battle with his glass. On the right, Durutte’s division held Papelotte and La Haye and was advancing up the slope toward the English line. On the left, Jerome had stormed the burning château of Hougoumont, and the Lancers had crossed the Nivelles road. In the center, and above La Haye-Sainte, the French were driving the enemy along the Ohain road. The valley was crowded with the wrecks of broken French regiments.

Placing himself at the head of nine battalions of the Old Guard, Napoleon led it down into the valley, spoke to his men briefly, and launched them against the enemy. It was too late. A deserter had given Wellington full notice of the preparations for the attack and he had thrown reinforcements into the weak portions of his line. The arrival of Zeiten’s Prussians relieved the flanking squadrons of Vivian and Vandeleur, and Wellington now had 2,600 fresh horsemen to throw into the fight.

At full gallop, the Prussian Commissioner to the Allies, Muffling, rode to Zeiten, exclaiming, “The battle is lost if you do not go to the Duke’s rescue.”

On came the Prussians, striking the French flank from Smohain, and in spite of all the personal exertions of the Emperor, a panic spread throughout that part of his army.

Couriers had been sent all along the line to tell the French that Grouchy was approaching. Yet the battle on the right where Lobau and the Young Guard were struggling to keep Bülow back must have been known to thousands of the troops. Then, when they actually saw the Prussians taking them in flank, all their fears of treachery were intensified and they were filled with terror.

But the Emperor had raised his arm to strike the enemy one final blow and he could not stay his hand. Even had he tried to recall Ney, D’Erlon, Reillé, it is doubtful whether the situation would have been improved. There was so much confusion, so many shattered commands, that an orderly retreat had become impossible.

Encouraged by the report that Grouchy had come, the charging columns shouted “_Vive l’Empereur!_” and passed on.

Freeing himself from the fifth horse which had been shot under him that day, the dauntless Ney went forward on foot, sword in hand. Losing terribly at every step, the French advanced up the slope. They took some batteries, they almost gained the Crest; but suddenly Maitland’s Guards, 2,000 strong, sprang up out of the wheat where they had been lying concealed, and poured a deadly volley into the French. Why was there no officer with presence of mind enough to cry then, “_Give them the bayonet_”? That was the one hope of the French. Instead of doing this, the officers tried to place the men in line so as to exchange volleys with the enemy. Fatal mistake. Wellington, noting the confusion and the hesitation, took advantage of it like a good soldier.

“Up, Guards, and at ’em!” cried the Duke.

“Forward, boys, now is your time!” cried Colonel Saltoun.

The French, fighting frantically, were beaten back to the orchard of Hougoumont.

Here a fresh battalion (4th Chasseurs) came to the relief of the retreating French, and the English returned rapidly to their own lines.

Once more the Old Guard moves up the muddy slope, under the tremendous cannonade of the English guns. As they cross the Ohain road, an English brigade opens four lines of fire upon their flank; Maitland’s Guards and Halkett’s brigade oppose them in front; and a Hanoverian brigade, coming from the hedges of Hougoumont, fire upon them from the rear. The finishing blow is Colborn’s charge with fixed bayonets.

“The guard gives way!” rings over the battlefield--a wail of despair, of terror.

“Treachery!” is the cry throughout the field.

Now is the time to make an end of this panic-stricken army, and Wellington, spurring to the crest, waves his hat--the signal for an advance all along the line.

As night closes in, the English army, 40,000 strong, rush down the bloody, corpse-strewn slope, trampling the wounded and the dead, crying, “No Quarter!”

The drum, the bugle, the bagpipe quicken the march of the English and the flight of the French. Making no stand at La Haye-Sainte, none at Hougoumont, none anywhere, the French army, already honeycombed with suspicion, dissolves in terror. Never had so strong a war-weapon shown itself so brittle.

Napoleon was at La Haye-Sainte, forming another column of attack which he meant to lead in person, when he looked up and saw the Old Guard falter and stop.

“They are confused. All is lost!” Hoping to stem the tide of the English advance and to establish rallying points for his flying troops, he formed four squares from a column of the Old Guard which had not been engaged. These he posted above La Haye-Sainte. As the English horsemen came on, they dashed in vain against these walls of steel and fire. But nothing so frail as four squares could arrest the advance of 40,000 men. The English cavalry poured through the gaps which separated the squares and continued their headlong pursuit of the terrified French.

When the English infantry came up and raked the squares with musketry; when the English batteries began to hail grapeshot upon them, the Emperor gave the order to abandon the position. Attended by a small escort he galloped to the height of La Belle Alliance.

The three squares fell back, slowly, steadily, surrounded on all sides by the enemy. With the regularity of the paradeground these matchless soldiers of the Old Guard halted to fire, to reform their ranks, and then move on again.

“Fugitives from the battlefield looked back from the distance and marked the progress of the retreat by the regular flash of these guns.” On that black valley of death and vast misfortune it was the repeated flashes of lightning irradiating a stormcloud.

Filled with admiration and sympathy, let us hope, an English officer cried out, “Surrender!”

And Cambronne shot out the word which Victor Hugo indecently glorified, but which with convincing emphasis spurned the very thought of surrender. The squares, unbroken, reached the summit of La Belle Alliance, where Cambronne fell, apparently dead, from a ball which struck him in the face.

It was here that the Prussians, who had at last broken in on the right, bore down on the squares. Assailed by overwhelming odds--infantry, artillery, cavalry--they were destroyed.

Several hundred yards back there were two battalions of the Old Guard, formed in squares. Within one of these squares was the Emperor. Planting a battery of 12-pounders, he made a final effort to check the pursuit and to rally his troops. The Guard’s call to arms was sounded, but the fugitives continued to pour by and none rallied. The battery exhausted its ammunition and the gunners, refusing to fly, were cut down by the English hussars.

Upon the squares themselves the enemy could make no impression until overpowering masses of Prussian and English infantry came up. Then the Emperor ordered a retreat. In good order these veterans marched off the field, stopping from time to time to fire a volley upon their pursuers.

At the farm of Le Caillou the battalion formed in column, and on its flank slowly rode the Emperor, reeling with fatigue, so that he had to be supported in the saddle. His bridle reins were loose upon his horse’s neck.