The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Vol. 4 (of 4)

Napoleon himself did not apparently expect the Prussians to rally as they did. He spent the hours from dawn, when the rain ceased, in careful reconnoitering. The mud was so thick in places that he required help to draw his feet out of his own tracks. At breakfast, according to a contemporary anecdote, he expressed himself as having never been more favored by fortune; and when reminded that Blücher might effect a union with the English, he replied that the Prussians would need three days to form again. This opinion is in accord with his exaggerated but reiterated estimates of the disaster produced in Blücher's ranks after Ligny, and taken in connection with the difficulty of moving artillery, which is not a sufficient explanation in itself, affords the only conceivable reason for his delay in attacking on the eighteenth. It also explains his remissness in leaving Grouchy to exercise full discretion as to his movements. At eight the plan of battle was sketched; at nine the orders for the day were despatched throughout the lines; about ten the weary but self-confident Emperor threw himself down and slept for an hour; at eleven he mounted, and rode by the Brussels highway to the farm of Belle Alliance. It was probably during the Emperor's nap that Soult forwarded to Grouchy a despatch, marked ten in the morning, instructing that general to manœuver toward the main army by way of Wavre. Although, according to Marbot, Napoleon expected Grouchy in the afternoon by way of Moustier, at one o'clock a second despatch, of which the Emperor certainly had cognizance, was forwarded to Grouchy, expressing approval of his intention to move on Wavre by Sart-à-Walhain, but instructing him "always to manœuver in our direction." The postscript of this second order enjoins haste, since it was thought Bülow was already on the heights of St. Lambert.

The one central idea of Napoleon and Soult was clearly to leave a wide discretion for Grouchy, provided always that he kept his communications with the main army open, and that his general direction was one which would insure easy connection, in order either to cut off or check the Prussians. But, however this may be, the hours of Napoleon's inactivity were precious to his enemies; by twelve Bülow was at St. Lambert, and at the same hour two other Prussian corps were leaving Wavre. These movements were apparently tardy, but Gneisenau, feeling that Wellington had been a poor reliance at Ligny, and very much doubting whether he really intended to stand at Waterloo, was unwilling that Blücher should despatch his troops until it was certain that the Prussian army would not again be left in the lurch. Should the Anglo-Dutch retreat to Brussels, the Prussians must either retreat by Louvain, or be again defeated. Anxiety was not dispelled until the roar of cannon was heard between eleven and twelve. Then the Prussians first exerted themselves to the utmost; it was about four when they were within striking distance, ready to take Napoleon's army on its flank. When Grouchy reached Wavre, at the same hour, he found there but one of Blücher's corps, the rear under Thielemann.

From Belle Alliance Napoleon returned, and took his station on the height of Rossomme. In front was a vale something less than a mile in width. The highway stretched before him in a straight line until it skirted the large farmstead of La Haye Sainte on the opposite side; then, ascending by a slant to the first crest, it passed the hamlet of Mont St. Jean, only to ascend still higher to the top of the ridge before falling again into a second depression. At Mont St. Jean was Wellington's center. The road from Nivelles to Brussels crosses the valley about a quarter of a mile westward, and on it, midway between the two slopes, lay another farm-house, with its barns, that of Hougomont. More than half a mile eastward, in the direction from which the Prussians were expected, lay scattered the farm buildings of Papelotte, La Haye, Smohain, and Frischermont. The valley was covered with rich crops. Unobstructed by ditches or hedges, it was cut longitudinally about the middle by a cruciform ridge, with spurs reaching toward Belle Alliance on one side, and past Hougomont on the other; the road passed by a cut through the longitudinal arm. Hougomont was almost a fortress, having strong brick walls and a moat; it stood in a large orchard, which was surrounded by a thick hedge. The house at La Haye Sainte was brick also, and formed one side of a quadrangle, inclosed further by two brick barns and a strong wall of the same material; though not as large or solid as Hougomont, it was a strong advance redoubt for Mont St. Jean.

The right and center of Wellington were thus well protected, the left was admirably screened by the places already enumerated. His army was deployed in three lines, the front plainly visible to the French, the second partly concealed by the crest of the hill, and the third entirely so. His headquarters were two miles north, at Waterloo; his lines of retreat, though broken by the forest of Soignes, were open either toward Wavre or toward the sea. The latter line was well protected by the troops at Hal. Uneasy about the character of his Dutch-Belgian troops, the duke had carefully disposed them among the reliable English and Germans, in order to preclude the possibility of a panic.

In the foreground of Napoleon's position was the French army, also deployed in three lines. The front, extending from the mansion of Frischermont to the Nivelles road, consisted of two infantry corps, one on each side of Belle Alliance, and of two corps of cavalry, one on the extreme right wing, one on the left; of this line Ney had command. The second was shorter, its wings being cavalry, and its center in two divisions, of cavalry and infantry respectively. The third, or reserve, was the guard. Each of the lines had its due proportion of artillery, stationed in all three along the road. This disposition gave the French array, as seen from beyond, a fan-like appearance, the sticks, or columns, converging toward the rear. The array was brilliant; every man and horse was in sight; the number was superior by about four thousand to that of the enemy; the ground was, by eleven, almost dry enough to secure the fullest advantage from superiority in artillery; deserters from the foe came in from time to time. Surely the moral effect of such a scene upon the somewhat motley throng across the valley must be very powerful. Yet the road to Charleroi was the single available line of retreat, and it passed through a deep cut; the soldiers were tired and not really first-rate, fifty per cent. of the line being recruits, and nearly a quarter of the guard untrained men; the tried officers had all been promoted, and those who replaced them needed such careful watching that deep formations had been adopted, and these must not merely diminish the volume of fire, but present vulnerable targets; the cavalry had been hastily gathered, and was far from being as efficient as the British veterans of the German legion.

For some moments after reaching his position Napoleon stood impassive. He was clad in his familiar costume of cocked hat and gray surtout. Throughout his lines he had been received with enthusiasm, and his presence was clearly magnetic, as of old. The direction of affairs in this momentous crisis was his, and he dreamed of two implacable enemies routed, of appeasing the two who were less directly interested, of glory won, of empire regained. Reason must have told him how empty was such a vision; for, since the armistice of Poischwitz, Austria and Russia had been quite as bitter, and more tortuous, than the other powers. His expression mirrored pain, both physical and intellectual; his over-confidence and consequent delay were signs of degenerate power; his exertions for three days past had been beyond any human strength, especially when the faculties of body and mind had previously been harassed for more than two months, as his had been.

It was the first day of the week, but there was a calm more profound than that of the Sabbath; the sky was dull, the misty air was heavy with summer heat; but there was the expectant silence of a great host, the deep determination of two grim and obstinate armies. Wellington, with his western lines protected, would be safe when the Prussian army should appear where he knew its van already was, and he must manœuver eastward to keep in touch. Napoleon must crush the British center and left, and roll up the line to its right, in order to separate the parts of his dual foe. To this end he had determined to make a feint against Hougomont; should Wellington throw in his reserves at that point on his right, one strong push might create confusion among the rest, and hurl the whole force westward, away from Brussels. It was a simple plan, great in its simplicity, as had been every strategic conception of Napoleon from the opening of the campaign. But its execution was like that of every other movement attempted since the first great march of concentration—tardy, slack, and feeble. Personal bravery was abundant among the French, but the orderly coöperation of regiment, division, and corps in all the arms, the courage of self-restraint, and the self-sacrifice of individuals in organized movement, with the invigorating ubiquity of a master mind—these were lacking from the first.

CHAPTER XVII

Waterloo[24]

Hougomont — La Haye Sainte — d'Erlon Repulsed — Ney's Cavalry Attack — Napoleon's One Chance Lost — Plancenoit — Union of Wellington and Blücher — Napoleon's Convulsive Effort — Charge of the Guard — The Rout — Napoleon's Flight.

Napoleon's salute to Wellington was a cannonade from a hundred and twenty guns. The fire was directed toward the enemy's center and left, but it was ineffectual, except as the smoke partially masked the first French movement, which was the attack on Hougomont by their left, the corps of Reille. This was in three divisions, commanded respectively by Bachelu, Foy, and the Emperor's brother Jerome, whose director was Guillemenot. Preceded by skirmishers, the column of Jerome gained partial shelter in a wood to the southwest of their goal, but the resistance to their advance was vigorous; on the skirts of the grove were Nassauers, Hanoverians, and a detachment of the English guards, all picked men, and behind, on higher ground, was an English battery. The two other divisions pressed on behind, and for a time their gains were apparently substantial. But, checked in front by artillery fire, and by a murderous fusillade from loopholes cut in the walls of Hougomont, the besiegers hesitated. Their fiery energy was not scientifically directed; but such was their zeal, and so great were their numbers, that one brigade doubled on the rear of the fortalice, drove back the English guards from before the entrance to the courtyard on the north, and charged for the opening. Some of the French actually forced a passage, and the success of Napoleon's first move was in sight when five gallant Englishmen, by sheer physical strength, shut the stout gate in the face of the assailants. A fearless French grenadier scaled the wall, but he and his comrades within were killed. A second assault on the same spot failed; so, too, a third from the west, and still another from the east, all of which were repelled by the English guards, who moved down from above, and drove the French into the wood, where they held their own. These close and bloody encounters were contrary to Reille's orders, but in the thick of combat his various detachments could not be restrained.

The second division of the battle was the main attack on Wellington's left by d'Erlon's corps. Between twelve and one a Prussian hussar was captured with a message from Blücher to Wellington announcing the Prussian advance. At once the postscript was added to the second despatch to Grouchy, already mentioned, and Napoleon made ready for his great effort. Unable to sit his horse, he had dismounted, and, seated at the table on which his map was spread, had been frequently seen to nod and doze. Ney and d'Erlon, left to their own judgment, had evolved a scheme of formation so complex that when tried, as it now was, it proved unworkable. The confusion was veiled by a terrific, continuous, and destructive artillery fire. After some delay, and a readjustment involving preparations against the possible flank attack of the Prussians, d'Erlon's corps advanced in four columns, under Donzelot, Allix, Marcognet, and Durutte respectively. Opposed was Picton's decimated corps, with Bylandt's Dutch-Belgian brigade, which had been all along a target for the strongest French battery, one of seventy-eight guns,[25] and was now to bear the first onset of the French troops. Bylandt's men had stood firm under the awful artillery fire, but their uniforms were like those of the French, and in a mêlée this fact might draw upon them the fire of their own associates, as later in the day at Hougomont it actually did, and they grew very uneasy. Durutte, on the extreme right, seized Papelotte, but lost it almost immediately. The conflict then focused about La Haye Sainte, where the garden and orchard were seized by an overwhelming force. The buildings had been inadequately fortified, but Major Baring, with his garrison, displayed prodigies of valor, and held them.

The assailants, supported hitherto by batteries firing over their heads, now charged up the hill; as they reached the crest, their own guns were silenced, but their yells of defiance rent the air. The Dutch-Belgians of the first rank harkened an instant, and, followed by the jeers and menaces of the British grenadiers and Royal Scots, fled incontinently until they reached a place of safety, when they reformed and stood. Picton was thus left unsupported, but at that decisive moment Donzelot tried the new tactics again, and his ranks fell into momentary confusion. Picton charged, the British artillery opened, and though the English general fell, mortally wounded, his men hurled back the French. This first success enabled Wellington to bring in more of his infantry, with the Scots Greys, and to throw in his cavalry, the First Royal Dragoons and the Enniskillens, for action against a body of French riders, under Roussel, which, having swept the fields around La Haye Sainte, was now coming on. His order was for Somerset and Ponsonby to charge. The shock was terrific, the French cavalry yielded, and the whole of d'Erlon's line rolled back in disorder. Efforts were made by the daring Englishmen to create complete confusion, but they were not entirely successful, for Durutte's column maintained its formation, while the French lancers and dragoons wrought fearful havoc among the British infantry somewhat disorganized by victory. Ponsonby fell among his men, and it was due to Vandeleur's horse that the French advance was checked. This ended the effort upon which Napoleon had based his hope of success; there was still desultory fighting at Hougomont, and the Prussians, though not visible, were forming behind the forest of Paris.

There was a long and ominous pause before the next renewal of conflict. Wellington used it to repair his shattered left and brought in Lambert's Peninsular veterans, twenty-two hundred strong. Napoleon quickly formed a corps, under Lobau, intended to repel the flank attack of the Prussians. Ney was determined to redeem his repulse by a second front attack, and Napoleon, either by word or silence, gave consent. While the batteries kept up their fire, the marshal gathered in the center the largest mass of horsemen which had ever charged on a European battle-field—twelve thousand men, light and heavy cavalry. His aim was to supplement Reille, still engaged at Hougomont, and dash in upon the allied right center. Donzelot's column, now reformed, was hurled directly against La Haye Sainte, and the mass of the cavalry surged up the hill. The gunners of Wellington's artillery, unprotected even by breastworks, stood to their pieces until the attacking line was within forty yards; then they delivered their final salvo, and fled. Wavering for an instant, the French advanced with a cheer. Before them stood the enemy in hollow squares, four ranks deep, the front kneeling, the second at the charge, the two others ready to fire. The horsemen dared not rush on those bristling lines. In and out among the serried ranks they flowed and foamed, discharging their pistols and slashing with their sabers, until, discouraged by losses and exhausted by useless exertion, their efforts grew feeble. Dubois's brigade, according to a doubtful tradition, dashed in ignorance over the brow of a certain shallow ravine, men and horses rolling in horrid confusion into the unsuspected pit. The hollow was undoubtedly there at the time, although it has since been filled up, and, it is believed, was likewise the grave of the fifteen hundred men and two thousand horses that were eventually collected from round about. The British reserve cavalry, supported by the infantry fire and a few hastily collected batteries, completed the defeat of Ney's first charge. A second was repulsed in the same way. The undaunted marshal then waited for reinforcements. No fewer than thirty-seven squadrons came in, Napoleon sending Kellermann's heavy dragoons as a last resort. Guyot's division of the heavy cavalry of the guard was also there—some say they had been summoned by Ney, others that they came of their own accord; the question arises because, in the next stage of the battle, their absence from the station assigned to them was a serious matter. Another time, and still another, this mighty force moved against the foe. Pouring in and out, backward and forward, among the squares, they lost cohesion and force until, in the very moment of Wellington's extremity, they withdrew, as before, exhausted and spent.

The energy and zeal of the English commander had been in strange contrast to Napoleon's growing apathy; Wellington had further strengthened his line by two Brunswick regiments and Mercer's battery, and at the last by Adam's brigade with the King's Germans under Dupont. This done, his stand had been superb to the last. Yet he was now at the end of his resources. It was six, and to his repeated messages calling for Blücher's aid there had been no response. Although a portion of Bülow's men had been fighting for more than an hour, yet the Prussian army was not yet fully engaged and he himself, having no reinforcement nor relief, seemed face to face with defeat. Baring had held La Haye Sainte with unsurpassed gallantry; his calls for men had been answered, but his requisitions for ammunition were strangely neglected. Ney, seeing how vain his cavalry charges were, withdrew before the last one took place, arrayed Bachelu's division, collected a number of field-pieces, and fell furiously, with cannonade and bayonet charge, upon the farm-house. His success was complete; the garrison fled, his pursuit was hot, and, leading in person, he broke through the opposing line at its very heart. Had he been supported by a strong reserve, the battle would have been won. Müffling, Wellington's Prussian aide, dashed away to the Prussian lines, and, as he drew near the head of Ziethen's division, shouted: "The battle is lost if the corps do not press on and at once support the English army." Ney's adjutant, demanding infantry to complete the breach he had made, was received by Napoleon with petulance. One brigade from Bülow's corps had attacked at about half-past four; repulsed at first, their onset was growing fiercer, for two other brigades had come in. Soult had opposed Ney's waste of cavalry. But the latter was desperate, and with the other generals was displaying a wilfulness bordering on insubordination. A portion of the guard had just been detached for Lobau's support. To Ney's demand for infantry the Emperor replied: "Where do you expect me to get them from? Am I to make them?" In truth, his mind and energies were now more concerned with Blücher than with Wellington, and he was already fighting the advance of Bülow in his plans. But had the old Bonaparte spirit moved the chieftain to put himself at the head of what remained of the guard infantry, and to make a desperate dash for Ney's support, a temporary advantage would almost certainly have been won; then, with a remnant flushed by victory, he could have turned to Lobau's assistance before the main Prussian army came in. Thus was lost Napoleon's one chance to deal Wellington a decisive blow.

It was to prevent a dangerous flank movement of the enemy—the advance, namely, of Bülow, with the cavalry corps of Prince William, upon Plancenoit—that Napoleon had detached the young guard, under Duhesme, a third of his precious reserve, for the support of Lobau's right; Durutte being in the rear of his left, that portion was already as strong as it could be made. Nevertheless the Prussians seized Plancenoit; at once the French rallied, and drove them out; Blücher threw in eight fresh battalions, and these, with the six already engaged, dashed for the ravine leading to the village. The passage was lined with French, and for a time it was like the valley of Hinnom; but the Prussians pressed on, and the young guard reeled. Napoleon sent in two battalions of the old guard, under Morand and Pelet; their firmness restored that of their comrades, and the place was cleared, two thousand dead remaining as the victims of that furious charge and countercharge. At seven Bülow was back again in his first position, awaiting the arrival of Pirch's corps to restore his riddled ranks. Napoleon had now left only twelve of the twenty-three battalions of the guard reserve, less than six thousand men. Wellington had repaired the breach made by Ney, and, though still hard pressed on his right, Ziethen had made good the strength of his left, whence some of his cavalry, the brigades of Vivian and Vandeleur, had been detached to repair other weak spots in the line. At this moment Ziethen conceived that Bülow was further giving way, and hesitated in his advance. The brief interval was noted by Durutte, and with a last desperate effort he carried Papelotte, La Haye, and Smohain, hoping to prevent the fatal juncture. It was half an hour before Ziethen retrieved his loss, and thus probably saved Wellington's left. By that time Pirch had come up, and with this reinforcement Bülow, behind the heavy fire of his powerful batteries, charged Lobau, and advanced on the guard at Plancenoit. Lobau, the hero of Aspern, stood like a rock until Durutte's men and the remnants of d'Erlon's corps, flying past his flank, induced a panic in his ranks. Thereupon the whole French right fell into confusion: all except the guard, who stood in the churchyard of Plancenoit until surrounded and reduced in number to about two hundred and fifty men; then, under Pelet's command, they formed a square, placed their eagle in the midst, drove off the cavalry which blocked their path, and reached the main line of retreat with scarcely enough men to keep their formation. The name of Ziethen must stand in equal renown with that of Colborne among the annals of Waterloo. The rout of the French left was the beginning of Napoleon's calamity, as that of his right under Colborne was its consummation.

Before the combined armies of Wellington and Blücher the French could not stand; but, in spite of inferior numbers and the manifest signs of defeat, General Bonaparte might have conducted an orderly retreat. The case was different with Napoleon the Emperor, even though he were now a liberator; to retreat would have been merely a postponement of the day of reckoning. Accordingly, the great adventurer, facing his destiny on the height at Rossomme, determined, in a last desperate effort, to retrieve the day, and stake all on a last cast of the dice. For an instant he appears to have contemplated a change of front, wheeling for that purpose by Hougomont, where his resistance was still strong; but he finally decided to crush the Anglo-Belgian right, if possible; roll up both armies into a confused mass, so that, perchance, they might weaken rather than strengthen each other; and then, with Grouchy's aid, strike for victory. Though indifferent to Ney's demands, he had set in array against Bülow the very choicest troops of his army; surely they might stand firm while his blow elsewhere was delivered. But he did not reckon in this with Wellington's reserve power; though the dramatic stories of the duke's mortal anxiety rest on slight foundation, there is no doubt that he felt a great relief when the Prussians entered the combat, for immediately he turned his attention, not to rest, but to the reforming of his line. Officers and men, English or German, knew nothing of Bülow's or Blücher's whereabouts when Napoleon took his resolution; but, sensible of having been strengthened, they displayed at half-past seven that evening the same grim determination they had shown at eleven in the morning. Though Wellington's task of standing firm until Blücher's arrival was accomplished, and though, perhaps, his soldiers heard the distant firing of the Prussian guns, yet nothing could be seen across the long interval, the noise attracted little attention, and neither he nor they could know what was yet before them. It was, therefore, splendid courage in general and army which kept them ever ready for any exertion, however desperate.

Against this army, in this temper, Napoleon despatched what was left of that force which was the peculiar product of his life and genius, the old and middle guard. Most of its members were the children of peasants, and had been born in ante-Revolution days. Neither intelligent in appearance nor graceful in bearing, they nevertheless had the look of perfect fighting-machines. Their huge bearskin caps and long mustaches did not diminish the fierceness of their aspect. They had been selected for size, docility, and strength; they had been well paid, well fed, and well drilled; they had, therefore, no ties but those to their Emperor, no homes but their barracks, and no enthusiasm but their passion for imperial France. They would have followed no leader unless he were distinguished in their system of life; accordingly, Ney was selected for that honor; and as they came in proud confidence up the Charleroi road, their Emperor passed them in review. Like every other division, they had been told that the distant roar was from Grouchy's guns; when informed that all was ready for the finishing-stroke, that there was to be a general advance along the whole line, and that no man was to be denied his share in certain victory, even the sick, it is said, rose up, and hurried into the ranks. The air seemed rent with their hoarse cheers as their columns swung in measured tread diagonally across the northern spur of the cruciform elevation which divided the surface of the valley.

Wellington, informed of the French movement, as it is thought by a deserter, issued hurried orders to the center, ordered Maitland's brigade to where the charge must be met, and posted himself, with Napier's battery, somewhat to its right. While yet his words of warning were scarcely uttered, the head of the French column appeared. The English batteries belched forth a welcome; but although Ney's horse, the fifth that day, was shot, the men he led suffered little, and with him on foot at their side they came steadily onward. The British guards were lying behind the hill-crest, and the French could discern no foe—only a few mounted officers, of whom Wellington was one. Astonished and incredulous, the assailants pressed steadily on until within twenty yards of the English line. "Up, guards! make ready!" rang out the duke's well-known call. The British jumped up and fired; about three hundred of Ney's gallant soldiers fell. But there was no confusion; on both sides volley succeeded volley, and this lasted until the British charged. Then, and then only, the French withdrew. Simultaneously Donzelot had fallen upon Alten's division; but he was leading a forlorn hope, and making no impression.

As Ney fell back, a body of French cuirassiers advanced upon the English batteries. Their success was partial, and behind them a second column of the guard was formed. Again the assault was renewed; but the second attempt fared worse than the first. To the right of Maitland, Adam's brigade, with the Fifty-second regiment, had taken stand; wheeling now, these drove a deadly flank fire into the advancing French, while the others poured in a devastating hail of bullets from the front. The front ranks of the French replied with spirit, but when the British had completed their manœuver, Colborne gave the order, his men cheered in response, and the countercharge began. "Vive l'Empereur!" came the responsive cheer from the thinning ranks of the assailants, and still they came on. But in the awful crash they reeled, confusion followed, and almost in the twinkling of an eye the rout began. A division of the old guard, the two battalions under Cambronne, retreated in fair order to the center of the valley, where they made their last gallant stand against the overwhelming numbers of Hugh Halkett's German brigade. They fought until but a hundred and fifty survived. From far away the despairing cry of "Sauve qui peut!" seemed to ring on their ears. To the first summons of surrender the leader had replied with dogged defiance; the second was made soon after, about three in the afternoon, and to this he yielded. He and his men filed to the English rear without a murmur, but in deep dejection. This occurrence has passed into tradition as an epic event; what Cambronne might well have said, "The guard dies, but never surrenders," was not uttered by him, but it epitomizes their character, and in the phrase which seems to have been shouted by the men themselves in their last desperate struggle, they and their leader have found immortality.

The last charge of what remained of the guard took place almost at the moment when Durutte was finally routed. Wellington then sent in the fresh cavalry brigades of Vivian and Vandeleur against the column of Donzelot and the remnants of the French cavalry. These swept all before them, and then the duke gave the order for a general advance. The French left fell into panic, and fled toward Belle Alliance. Before La Haye Sainte stood two squares of French soldiers, the favored legion chosen to protect the imperial headquarters. In the fatal hour it splendidly vindicated the choice, and amid the chaos stood in perfect order. Throughout the famous charge of his devoted men Napoleon rode hither and thither, from Rossomme to Belle Alliance. His looks grew dark, but at the very last he called hoarsely to the masses of disorganized troops that came whirling by, bidding them to stand fast. All in vain; and as the last square came on he pressed inside its serried wall. It was not too soon, for the Prussians had now joined the forward movement, and in the supreme disorder consequent the other square dissolved. Napoleon's convoy withstood the shock of a charge from the Twelfth British light dragoons, and again of a Prussian charge at Rossomme, where Gneisenau took up the fierce pursuit. Though assaulted, and hard beset by musketry, the square moved silently on. There were no words except an occasional remark addressed by Napoleon to his brother Jerome, or to one of the officers. At eleven Genappe was reached; there, such was the activity of the pursuers, all hope of an orderly retreat vanished, and the square melted away. Napoleon had become an object of pity—his eyes set, his frame collapsed, his great head rolling in a drowsy stupor. Monthyon and Bertrand set him as best they could upon a horse, and, one on each side, supported him as they rode. They had an escort of forty men. At Quatre Bras they despatched a messenger to summon Grouchy, bidding him to retire on Namur. The Prussians were only one hour behind. At daybreak the hunted Emperor reached Charleroi, but his attendants dared not delay; two rickety carriages were secured, and it was not until the wretched caravan reached Philippeville that the fugitives obtained a few hours' repose.

CHAPTER XVIII

The Surrender[26]

Nature of Napoleon's Defeat — Its Political Consequences — Napoleon's Fatal Resolution — The State of Paris — Napoleon at the Élysée — His Departure for Rochefort — Thoughts of Return — Procrastination — Wild Schemes of Flight — A Refuge in England — His Only Resource — The White Terror and the Allies.

The battle of Waterloo is so called because Wellington's despatch to England was dated from his headquarters at that place. The world-wide celebrity of the fight was due to the failure of a tremendous cause and the extinction of a tremendous genius. That genius had been so colossal as to confuse human judgment. Even yet mankind forgets that its possessor was a finite being and attributes his fall to any cause except the true one. Western Europe had paid dearly for the education, but it had been educated, learning his novel and original methods in both war and diplomacy. We have followed the gradual decline of the master's ability, physical, mental, and moral; we have noted the rise of the forces opposed to him, military, diplomatic, and national. Waterloo is a name of the highest import because it marks the final collapse of personal genius, the beginning of reaction toward an order old in name but new in spirit. Waterloo was not great by reason of the numbers engaged, for on the side of the allies were about a hundred and thirty thousand men, on the other seventy-two thousand approximately; nor was there any special brilliancy in its conduct. Wellington defended a strong position well and carefully selected. But he wilfully left himself with inferior numbers; he did not heartily coöperate with Blücher; both were unready; Gneisenau was suspicious; and the battle of Ligny was a Prussian blunder. Napoleon committed, between dawn and dusk of June eighteenth, a series of petty mistakes, each of which can be explained, but not excused. He began too late; he did not follow up his assaults; he did not retreat when beaten; he could attend to only one thing at a time; he failed in control of his subordinates; he was neither calm nor alert. His return from Elba had made him the idol of the majority in France, but his conduct throughout the Hundred Days was that of a broken man. His genius seemed bright at the opening of his last campaign, but every day saw the day's task delayed. His great lieutenants grew uneasy and untrustworthy, though, like his patient, enduring, and gallant men, they displayed prodigies of personal valor. Ney and Grouchy used their discretion, but it was the discretion of caution most unlike that of Desaix at Marengo, or of Ney himself at Eylau. Their ignorance cannot be condoned; Grouchy's decision at Walhain, though justified in a measure by Soult's later order, was possibly the immediate cause of final disaster. But such considerations do not excuse Napoleon's failure to give explicit orders, nor his nervous interference with Ney's formation before Quatre Bras, nor his deliberate iterations during his captivity that he had expected Grouchy throughout the battle. Moreover, the interest of Waterloo is connected with its immediate and dramatic consequences rather than with its decisive character. If Napoleon had won on that day, the allies would have been far from annihilation; both Wellington and Blücher had kept open their respective lines of retreat. The national uprising of Europe would have been more determined than ever; 1815 would have been but a repetition of 1814. Finally, the losses, though terrible, were not unparalleled. Grouchy won at Wavre, and, hearing of the disaster at Mont St. Jean, first contemplated falling on the Prussian rear as they swept onward in pursuit. But he quickly abandoned this chimerical idea, and on receipt of Napoleon's order from Quatre Bras, withdrew to Namur, and thence, by a masterly retreat, conducted his army back into France. Including those who fell at Wavre, the allies lost about twenty-two thousand five hundred men, of whom seven thousand were British and a like number Prussians. The records at Paris are very imperfect, but they indicate that the French losses were about thirty-one thousand.

The booty captured after Waterloo was unimportant; but the political spoils were immense, and they belonged to the Prussians. Their high expectation of seizing Napoleon's person was disappointed; but the one great result—the realization, namely, of all the tyrannical plans formed at Vienna for the humiliation of liberal France—that they secured by their instant, hot pursuit. It is hard to discern the facts in the dust of controversy. Prussia, Austria, Russia, and Great Britain have each the national conviction of having laid the Corsican specter; France has long been busy explaining the facts of her defeat, but seems to have at last completed the task; the most conspicuous monument on the battle-field is that to the Dutch-Belgians!

Napoleon was fully aware that at Waterloo he had made the last cast of the dice and that he had lost. It cannot be proven, but the charge is made, that far earlier he had ceased to reckon with facts and had begun to juggle with unrealities. The return from Elba has all the elements of romance, but events proved that it was based on a sound judgment. Had the allied powers been willing to give France the privilege of choosing her own government, which in spite of all that had occurred was hers by every principle known to international law, Europe would have enjoyed some years of repose, at any rate; considering Napoleon's shattered health and premature old age, France might for a long period have ceased to be a disturber of the public peace, working out then as now, perhaps in equal tribulation, the enduring principles of the Revolution; forty years of turmoil might have been spared to the Continent and the gory floods poured on the ground at Quatre Bras, Ligny, and Waterloo might have coursed unmolested in the veins of the innocent men from which they welled out. The responsibility for all the blood which was shed after the first treaty of Paris must be shared with Napoleon by dynastic Europe, in particular by the diplomatists who represented the hate of Russia, Austria, and Prussia and suffered it to find an outlet in a war of revenge; a portion too belongs to the factious bitterness which reigned supreme in the various French parties, awakening civil strife and endangering French nationality. From first to last there had been little consistency or continuity in Napoleon's character—it is by no means certain that he might not well have played, and perhaps magisterially, the rôle of a national ruler; it is of course also possible that he might have remained the same untamed, cosmopolitan adventurer to the end. In view of the political history of France during the Hundred Days, the former is more probable. But after Waterloo he was clearly aware that he could no longer be either the one or the other. It was not to be expected that every instinct would disappear at once, that he would resign himself to obscurity without an effort.

After a short rest at Philippeville, Napoleon composed the customary bulletins concerning his campaign, and despatched them to the capital, together with a letter counseling Joseph to stand firm and keep the legislature in hand. If Grouchy had escaped, he wrote, he could already array fifty thousand men on the spot; with the means at hand, he could soon organize a hundred and fifty thousand; the troops in regimental depots, together with the national guard, would raise the number to three hundred thousand. These representations were based on a habit of mind, and not on genuine conviction. He believed Grouchy's force to have been annihilated, and though he paused at Laon as if to reorganize an army, he went through the form of consulting such officers as he could collect, and then, under their advice, pressed on to Paris. The officers urged that the army and the majority of the people were loyal, but that the aristocracy, the royalists, and the liberal deputies were utterly untrustworthy. "My real place is here," was the response. "I shall go to Paris, but you drive me to a foolish course." This was the voice of reason, but he obeyed the behest of inclination. Yet he halted at the threshold, and, entering the city on the night of June twenty-first, made no public announcement of his presence. On the contrary, he almost slunk into the silent halls of the Élysée, where a sleepy attendant or two received the unexpected guest without realizing what had happened. He must have felt that the moral effect of Waterloo had been his undoing; unlike any other of his defeats, it had not ruined him as general alone, nor as ruler alone: his prestige as both monarch and soldier was gone.

The news of Ligny had been received in the city with jubilations; at the instant of Napoleon's arrival the truth about Mont St. Jean was passing all too swiftly on the thousand tongues of rumor from quarter to quarter throughout the town, creating consternation everywhere. Early in the morning, Davout, fully aware of public sentiment, and true to his instincts, advised the shrinking Emperor to prorogue the chambers, and throw himself on the army; Carnot believed the public safety required a dictatorship, and urged it; Lucien was strongly of the same opinion. But the old Napoleon was no more; vacillating almost as if in partial catalepsy, murmuring empty phrases in quick, indistinct utterance, he refused to decide. Members of the council began to gain admittance, and, waxing bolder as Napoleon grew more silent, the word "abdication" was soon on every tongue. At last a decision was taken, and such a one! Lucien was sent to parley with the chambers, and Fouché was summoned. The latter, with insidious eloquence, argued that in the legislature alone could Napoleon find a support to his throne. The talk was reported, as if by magic, in the assembly halls, and Lafayette, supported by Constant, put through a motion that any attempt to dissolve the chambers would be considered treason. Lucien pleaded in vain for a commission to treat with the invaders in his brother's name; the deputies appointed a committee of public safety, and adjourned.

Broken in spirit, Napoleon spent the evening in moody speculation, weighing and balancing, but never deciding. Should he appear at dawn before the Tuileries, summon the troops already in Paris, and prorogue the hated chambers, or should he not? The notion remained a dream. Early in June the court apothecary, Cadet de Gassicourt, had been ordered by the Emperor to prepare an infallible poison. This was done, and during this night of terrible vacillation the dose was swallowed by the desperate fugitive. But, as before at Fontainebleau, the theory of the philosopher was weaker than his instincts. In dreadful physical and mental agony, the would-be suicide summoned his pharmacist, and was furnished with the necessary antidotes. But the morning brought no courage, and when the chambers met at their accustomed hour, on the motion of an obscure member they demanded the Emperor's abdication. The message was borne by the military commander of the Palais Bourbon, where the legislature, which had now usurped the supreme power, was sitting, and he asserted of his own motion that, if compliance were refused, the chambers would declare Napoleon outlawed. The Emperor at first made a show of fierce wrath, but in the afternoon he dictated his final abdication to Lucien. No sooner was this paper received than the wild excitement of the deputies and peers subsided, and at once a new Directory, consisting of Carnot, Fouché, Caulaincourt, and Quinette, took up the reins of government. The city acquiesced, and hour after hour nothing interrupted the deep seclusion of the Élysée, except occasional shouts from passing groups of working-men, calling for Napoleon as dictator.

But there was a change as the stragglers from Waterloo began to arrive, vowing that they still had an arm for the Emperor, and denouncing those whom they believed to have betrayed him. The notion of sustaining Napoleon by force began to spread, and when the soldiers who were coming in, after suppressing the insurrection in Vendée, added their voices to those of their comrades from Waterloo, the new authorities feared Napoleon's presence as a menace to their power. Davout had been the first to suggest an appeal to force, but when Napoleon recurred at last to the idea, the marshal opposed it. On June twenty-fifth, therefore, the fallen man withdrew to Malmaison; where, in the society of Queen Hortense and a few faithful friends, during three days he abandoned himself for long intervals to the sad memories of the place. But he also wrote a farewell address to the army, and, in constant communication with a committee of the government, completed a plan for escaping to the United States, "there to fulfil his destiny," as he himself said. For this purpose two frigates were put at the disposal of "him who had lately been Emperor." All was ready on the twenty-ninth. That day a passing regiment shouted, "Long life to the Emperor," and, in a last despairing effort, Napoleon sent an offer of his services, as a simple general, to save Paris, and defeat the allies, who, though approaching the capital, were now separated. Fouché returned an insulting answer to the effect that the government could no longer be responsible for the petitioner's safety. Then, at last, Napoleon knew that all was over in that quarter. Clad in civilian's clothing, and accompanied by Bertrand, Savary, and Gourgaud, he immediately set out for Rochefort. General Becker led the party as commissioner for the provisional government.

It was the exile's intention to hurry onward, but at Rambouillet he halted, and spent the evening composing two requests, one for a supply of furniture from Paris, the other for the library in the Petit Trianon, together with copies of Visconti's "Greek Iconography" and the great work on Egypt compiled from materials gathered during his ill-starred sojourn in that country. Next morning a courier arrived from Paris with news. "It is all up with France," he exclaimed, and set out once more. Crowds lined the highways; sometimes they cheered, and they were always respectful. Such was the enthusiasm of two cavalry regiments at Niort that Becker was induced to send a despatch to the government, pleading that an army, rallied in Napoleon's name, might still exert an important influence in public affairs. Just as the general was closing the document there arrived the news of the cannonade heard before the capital on the thirtieth. Napoleon dictated a postscript: "We hope the enemy will give you time to cover Paris and bring your negotiations to an issue. If, in that case, an English cruiser stops the Emperor's departure, you can dispose of him as a common soldier."

By a strange coincidence, English cruisers had, as a matter of fact, appeared within a few days in the offing before Rochefort. Whatever the relation between this circumstance and his suggestion, Napoleon studied every possible means of delaying his journey, and actually opened a correspondence with the commanders in Bordeaux and the Vendée, with a view to overthrowing the "traitorous" government. It was July third when he finally reached Rochefort. Again for five days he procrastinated. But the allies were entering Paris; Wellington was bringing Louis XVIII back to his throne; in forty-eight hours the monarchs of the coalition would arrive. Blücher had commissioned a Prussian detachment to seize and shoot his hated opponent, wherever found. On the eighth, therefore, the outcast Emperor embarked; but for two days the frigates were detained by unfavorable winds. On the tenth, English cruisers hove in sight, and on the eleventh Las Cases, who had been appointed Napoleon's private secretary, was sent to interview Captain Maitland, of the Bellerophon, concerning his instructions from the British government. The envoy returned, and stated that the English commander would always be ready to receive Napoleon, and conduct him to England, but he could not guarantee that the ex-Emperor could settle there, or be free to betake himself to America.

This language was almost fatal to the notion of a final refuge in England, which Napoleon had begun to discuss and consider during the days spent in Rochefort; so Las Cases sought a second interview. According to his account, Maitland then changed his tone, remarking that in England the monarch and his ministers had no arbitrary power; that the generosity of the English people, and their liberal views, were superior to those entertained by sovereigns. To the speaker this was a platitude; to the listeners it was a weighty remark. A prey to uncertainty, Napoleon entertained various schemes. He bought two small, half-decked fishing-boats, with a view to boarding a Danish ship that lay outside, but the project was quickly dropped. Two young officers of the French frigate suggested sailing all the way to New York in the little craft. Napoleon seriously considered the possibility, but recalling that such vessels must get their final supplies on the coasts of Spain or Portugal, rejected the plan, for he dared not risk falling into the hands of embittered foes. Word was brought that an American ship lay near by, in the Gironde. General Lallemand galloped in hot haste to see whether an asylum for the outlawed party could be secured under her flag. He returned with a reply that the captain would be "proud and happy to grant it."

But in the interim Napoleon had determined to throw himself on the "generosity of England." On the thirteenth Gourgaud was sent to London, with a request to the Prince Regent that the Emperor should be permitted to live unknown in some provincial English place, under the name of General Duroc. On the fifteenth Napoleon embarked on the Bellerophon, where he was received with all honors; next day the vessel sailed, and on the twenty-fourth she cast anchor in Torbay. During the voyage the passenger was often somnolent, and seemed exhausted; but he was affable in his intercourse with the officers, and to Maitland, who unwisely yielded the expected precedence. To his kindly keeper, in a sort of beseeching confidence, the prisoner showed portraits of his wife and child, lamenting with tender sensibility his enforced separation from them. The scenes in Torbay were curious. Crowds from far and near lined the shores, and boats of all descriptions thronged the waters; the sight-seers dared everything to catch a glimpse of the awful monster under the terrors of whose power a generation had reached manhood. If, perchance, they succeeded, the air was rent with cheers. After two days the ship was ordered round into Plymouth Sound, but the reckless sensation-seekers gathered there in still greater numbers.

Many have wondered at Napoleon's surrender of his person to the English. There was no other course open which seemed feasible to a broken-spirited man in his position. His admirers are correct in thinking that it was more noble for him to have survived his greatness than to have taken his own life. To have entered on a series of romantic adventures such as were suggested—concealment on the Danish vessel, flight in open boats, concealment in a water-cask on an American merchantman, and the like—would have been merely the addition of ignominy to his capture; for his presence under the American flag would have been reported by spies, and at that day the standard of the United States would have afforded him little immunity. It is possible that on the morrow of Waterloo Napoleon might, with Grouchy's army, the other survivors, and the men from Vendée, have reassembled an army in Paris, but it is doubtful. Nothing in Revolutionary annals can surpass the horror of royalist frenzy, known as the White Terror, which broke out in Provence and southern France on receipt of the news from Waterloo. The ghastly distemper spread swiftly, and when Napoleon embarked the tricolor was floating only at Rochefort, Nantes, and Bordeaux; his family was proscribed, Ney and Labédoyère were imprisoned and doomed to execution. To have surrendered either to Wellington or Blücher would have been seeking instant death; to have collected such desperate soldiers as could be got together would have been an attempt at guerrilla warfare. To take refuge with the officers of England's navy was the only dignified course with any element of safety in it, since Great Britain was the only land in Europe which afforded the privileges of asylum to certain classes of political offenders. Naturally, the negotiators did not proclaim their extremity. Considering the date of Gourgaud's embassy, it is clear they were in no position to demand formal terms, and Maitland's character forbids the conclusion that he made them. It is unfortunate that he did not commit to writing all his transactions with Lallemand, Savary, and Las Cases; perhaps he was injudiciously polite, but it is certain that, contrary to their representations, he made no promise, even by implication, that under England's flag Napoleon should find a refuge, and not a prison.

CHAPTER XIX

St. Helena[27]

Embarrassment of the English Ministry — A Strange Embassy — Napoleon's Attitude — The Transportation — The Prison and its Governor — Occupations of the Prisoner — Napoleon's Historical Writings — Failing Health and Preparations for Death — His Last Will and Testament — The End — Imprisoned Genius — The St. Helena Period — The Insatiate Curiosity of Europe — First Communications from the Island — Napoleon's Appeal — Gourgaud in Europe — His Undeserved Notoriety — Futile Efforts of Las Cases — O'Meara's Activities — Confusion During the Last Years — Documentary Evidence — The Legend as a Historical Force.