might have succeeded,
let the reader consider the dispositions of the battle of Ligny.

The battlefield named in history after the village of Ligny consists of a
number of communes, of which that village is the central one. The Prussian
army held the villages marked on the map by the names of Tongrinelle and
Tongrinne, to the east of Ligny; it held Brye, St Amand, and Wagnelee to
the east. It held also the heights behind upon the great road leading from
Nivelles to Namur. When Napoleon had at last got his latest troops over
from beyond the Sambre on to the field of battle, which was not until just
on two o'clock in the afternoon, the plan he formed was to hold the
Prussian left and centre by a vigorous attack, that is, to pin the
Prussians down to Tongrinne, Tongrinelle, and Ligny, while, on the other
front, the east and south front of the Prussians, another vigorous attack
should be driving them back out of Wagnelee and St Amand.

[Illustration]

The plan can be further elucidated by considering the elements of the
battle as they are sketched in the map over leaf. Napoleon's troops at C C
C were to hold the Prussian left at H, to attack the Prussian right at D,
with the Guard at E left in reserve for the final effort.

By thus holding the Prussians at H and pushing them in at D, he would here
begin to pen them back, and it needed but the arrival on the field of a
fresh French force attacking the Prussians along A B to destroy the force
so contained and hemmed in. For that fresh force Napoleon depended upon
new and changed instructions which he despatched to Ney when he saw the
size of the Prussian force before him. During Napoleon's main attack, some
portion of Ney's force, and if possible the whole of it, should appear
unexpectedly from the north and west, marching down across the fields
between Wagnelee and the Nivelles-Namur road, and coming on the north of
the enemy at A B, so as to attack him not only in the flank but in the
rear. He would then be unable to retreat in the direction of _Wavre_
(W)--a broken remnant might escape towards Namur (N). But it was more
likely that the whole force would be held and destroyed.

[Illustration: Elements of Ligny.]

Supposing that Napoleon's 63,000 showed themselves capable of holding, let
alone partially driving in, the 80,000 in front of them, the sudden and
unexpected appearance of a new force in the height of the action, adding
another twenty or thirty thousa