were
known to be Dutch and Belgian, who had no great desire to fight against
us. Of good troops he had not fifty thousand. Finding himself in
the presence of the Emperor in person with eighty thousand men, this
Englishman was so paralysed with fear that he could neither move himself
nor his army. You have seen the rabbit when the snake approaches. So
stood the English upon the ridge of Waterloo. The night before, the
Emperor, who had lost an aide-de-camp at Ligny, ordered me to join his
staff, and I had left my Hussars to the charge of Major Victor. I know
not which of us was the most grieved, they or I, that I should be
called away upon the eve of battle, but an order is an order, and a good
soldier can but shrug his shoulders and obey. With the Emperor I rode
across the front of the enemy's position on the morning of the 18th, he
looking at them through his glass and planning which was the shortest
way to destroy them. Soult was at his elbow, and Ney and Foy and others
who had fought the English in Portugal and Spain. "Have a care, Sire,"
said Soult. "The English infantry is very solid."

"You think them good soldiers because they have beaten you," said the
Emperor, and we younger men turned away our faces and smiled. But Ney
and Foy were grave and serious. All the time the English line, chequered
with red and blue and dotted with batteries, was drawn up silent and
watchful within a long musket-shot of us. On the other side of the
shallow valley our own people, having finished their soup, were
assembling for the battle. It had rained very heavily, but at this
moment the sun shone out and beat upon the French army, turning our
brigades of cavalry into so many dazzling rivers of steel, and twinkling
and sparkling on the innumerable bayonets of the infantry. At the sight
of that splendid army, and the beauty and majesty of its appearance, I
could contain myself no longer, but, rising in my stirrups, I waved my
busby and cried, "Vive l'Empereur!" a shout which growled and roared
and clattered from one end of the line to the other, while the horsemen
waved their swords and the footmen held up their shakos upon their
bayonets. The English remained petrified upon their ridge. They knew
that their hour had come.

And so it would have come if at that moment the word had been given and
the whole army had been permitted to advance. We had but to fall upon
them and to sweep them from the face of the earth. To put aside all
que