not executed. He condemns Ney for not having advanced beyond Quatre Bras before his chief, and for not having fallen on Wellington's army while Napoleon was on his way from Ligny; and this neglect, with the heavy rain which impeded the Emperor's march on the 17th, is the reason why the Duke was not caught and compelled to fight far in front of Waterloo. We shall only say that no trace of this scheme appears in Napoleon's correspondence; that the state of his army made it impracticable; and that, as the Duke had the whole morning to effect his retreat exactly as he pleased, it must have proved completely abortive.

Compared, however, with what follows, this little invention is not worth noticing. Despite of positive proof to the contraryproof evidenced by Napoleon's orders, and by the tenor of his whole operations-M. Thiers actually would have us believe, that in the forenoon of the 17th, the Emperor had anticipated the probability of Blucher joining Wellington by Wavre, and had ordered Grouchy to thwart this movement. And Grouchy is to bear the responsibility of having thoughtlessly diverged upon Namur, and not having taken the exact line which would have brought him within reach of the Prussians. If this were correct, M. Thiers not only must give a new sense to Napoleon's correspondence, which points out Namur as the retreat of Blucher, but he must make us suppose the Emperor a fool, who deliberately allowed an eccentric movement which he must have known would be ruinous to him; or, that Grouchy was an insubordinate lieutenant, who disobeyed his own commander, and under that commander's eyes persisted wilfully in his disobedience. This is really somewhat too much to assume, so we leave M. Thiers to this dilemma.

Napoleon followed the Duke's army until it reached the position of Waterloo. Against the enemy's force in his front, 69,000 men and 150 guns were already gathered round Wellington's standards; 15,000 more were near, on his right; and he had received a promise from Blucher that three corps, 'if not the whole Prussian army, should be on the field of 'battle early.' M. Thiers's account of this movement, and of the tactics of our commander, is not the least curious part of his narrative. Not a word is said of the admirable skill with which the retreat from Quatre Bras was conducted, nor yet of the heavy blows inflicted by our rearguard upon the French cavalry. On the contrary, we read that the road at Genappe 'was strewn with hideous remains of the enemy;' and much art is employed to show that the retreat was as hurried as possible. M. Thiers also informs us confidentially that the

Positions of the Contending Armies on the Night of the 17th. 21

Duke was wrong in halting at Waterloo; that he should have fallen still farther back, and rejoined the Prussians behind the forest of Soignes; and he adds, that the 'vain ambition 'of measuring swords with Napoleon separately,' which caused this strategical error, was well-nigh costing England a catastrophe. It is perhaps allowable that a worshipper of Napoleon should, in view of Waterloo, sneer at the Duke; but that he should be censured for not having abandoned a field of defence he had long studied, when he had every reasonable prospect of success, will surprise any one who knows the facts; while Englishmen will, of course, believe that Wellington was capable of imperilling his country for the sake of gratifying the basest vanity!

We pass, however, from this silly ebullition to a much more serious misrepresentation. When, on the night of the 17th, Napoleon and Wellington lay in front of each other, the four corps of the Prussian army, not less than 95,000 strong, had reached the parallel line of Wavre, and, encamped on either bank of the Dyle, were ready to march next morning on Waterloo. Meanwhile, Grouchy, by the Emperor's orders, had been recalled from the route to Namur,* and had been directed to reach Gembloux, in order to move next day upon Wavre by the still eccentric line of Corbaix, and then to act as an opportunity might offer. The Marshal arrived at Gembloux at nightfall, dividing his forces in the neighbourhood; and thus he was twenty-two miles away from the main army under Napoleon, and separated from it by the Dyle, which could only be crossed in front of Wavre; while at the same time he was nearly as far from the enemy he had been detached to intercept, who at this moment was fully prepared to make a march of twelve miles upon Waterloo. And at the same time, while Blucher and Wellington were communicating with each other during the night, not a troop of cavalry was sent by Napoleon to patrol on his right in search of an enemy, though the Prussians already were nearer his flank than the friendly corps he had intended to cover it. Thus, while the English and Prussian armies were within a very short distance from each other, their movements perfectly well connected, and their concentration at Waterloo arranged, the main French army under Napoleon was altogether unprotected on its right, and unconscious of any peril from that side; while Grouchy was idly 'in the air,' cut off from Napoleon by an impassable stream, and disabled, at least for many

Compare the order of Bertrand on the 17th with that of Soult in the forenoon of the 18th-the only written orders in existence-and there can be no doubt of this.

hours, from either bringing aid to his chief, or coming up with his immediate antagonist, no matter how great his zeal or dexterity.

Disastrous as this position appears in the clear light of subsequent events, Napoleon was the author of it, and the reason of this is visible in his despatches. In the afternoon of the 17th, he had received the news that a Prussian column had marched upon Wavre by Mont St. Guibert; but though this did not open his eyes in the least to the real object of Blucher's movements, it made him recall the corps of Grouchy and fix its operations with precision. He conceived that the hostile column in question was rejoining laterally the Prussian army, which, though still moving upon its base of operations, he thought might sweep round by Liege and Louvain, and connect itself with the Duke's forces at some point in the rear of the forest of Soignes. With this view he directed Grouchy upon Gembloux, with orders to march the next day upon Wavre by the route of Corbaix; and it is probable that he afterwards told the Marshal to detach from Wavre a division on Waterloo, in order to fall on Wellington's flank,* in fact, to imitate the very manœuvre which had been preconcerted by the allies. On the supposition that the Prussian army was far away upon the long arc described by Liege, Louvain, and Brussels, these movements become at once intelligible, and are obviously those of a great commander. Had Napoleon's hypothesis been correct, the position he had assigned to Grouchy would have placed that Marshal in a central point, from which he could operate against the Prussians, sustain the army of the Emperor, and perhaps send off a considerable force to attack Wellington on the field of Waterloo. And in that case there would be no need to detach a man from the main French army in order to cover its right flank; on the contrary, it would be wrong to do so; for that flank would be protected by Grouchy, and the blow that was to be aimed at Wellington should be given with as much strength as possible. Hence Napoleon's operations and recorded expressions; the position in which he placed Grouchy; his security as to his right flank; his anxiety for a battle next day; his doubt whether Wellington really would stand; and his perfect confidence in the issue. Believing that Blucher was many leagues distant, that Grouchy was interposed between, that aid from that Marshal was not improbable, he might reasonably concentrate his whole force upon the enemy in his front, and declare that victory was all but certain.

We incline to think that the celebrated verbal order of Napoleon to Grouchy, said to have been sent at 10 p.m. on the 17th, was in fact sent, and pointed to this operation. It harmonizes with all Napoleon's movements.

False Movements of Napoleon and Grouchy.

23

Unluckily, however, the hypothesis was false upon which all this strategy was based; and on the night of the 17th, the positions of the opposing armies were full of peril to the French Emperor. M. Thiers feels this; so, instead of admitting that Napoleon could make a false calculation-an error from which no general is exempt, and which in this case was founded on reasonings repeatedly verified by his experience-he proceeds to assert that on the night of the 17th the allies' plans were suspected by the Emperor; that Grouchy had been warned against them; and that he was so placed as to be able to thwart them. Napoleon had conceived the probability of a flank march from Wavre on Waterloo; and 'nothing was easier' than for Grouchy at Gembloux to arrest it by moving according to his orders!

It is enough to say, that the truth of this assertion is contradicted by Napoleon's despatches, and by the whole tenor of his operations. But, were it correct, M. Thiers would convict his idol, not of a mere miscalculation, but of fatuity well-nigh unparalleled. If Napoleon suspected on the night of the 17th that four Prussian corps were within twelve miles of him, all ready for a march on Waterloo, would he, knowing where Grouchy was, have failed to send aide-de-camp after aide-decamp to the Marshal, and to adjure him, in the name of the safety of France, to break up from Gembloux that instant, to push to Moustier at any risk, to cross the Dyle at that point, and either to get round on his flank, or to fall upon the flank of the Prussians, if there was yet time to arrest their progress? Would he have left his right entirely uncovered, and not detached a single division to protect it, although there were good positions for this object at the stream of the Lasne and the wood of Frischermont? Would he have paused in either retreating at once or attacking Wellington at break of day, in the hope of snatching a victory from him before Blucher could come to his assistance? Above all, would he have directed Grouchy to move on Wavre, not towards himself, but by the eccentric route of Corbaix ? Το suppose Napoleon, had he known the real state of affairs on that night, would have disregarded these obvious precautions, and have acted as he actually did when misled by a false impression, would be to place him on the level of a Mack; and it is strange that M. Thiers will not see that in asserting his perfect prescience he impliedly charges him with thorough incapacity.

that

M. Thiers's description of the hostile armies that confronted each other on the morning of the 18th, and of the antagonists' plans of battle, is marked with his usual exaggeration and partiality.

The mere numbers were not very unequal-72,000 or 73,000 against 69,000 or 70,000— but this proportion is not a test of the real comparative strength of the combatants. In the composition of part of his troops, in cavalry, and above all in artillery, Napoleon had an enormous superiority; for the Duke had at most 45,000 men on whom he could rely with confidence, his Belgian, Nassau, and some other levies, being of little value for the shock of battle. In truth, he never would have thought of setting the fortunes of England in such a cast, had he not been assured that Blucher would arrive at an early hour upon the 18th; and it is one of the many proofs of his tactical genius that, though this hope was long deferred, he was yet enabled to maintain his position. All this M. Thiers conveniently omits, not telling us that the French guns were 246 against 150, and that their cavalry were as three to two, not discriminating between the Duke's forces, and craftily inverting by about 4,000 men the real numerical proportion of the antagonists.

As for the scheme of attack devised by Napoleon, we fully concur with M. Theirs that, on the supposition of the absence of the Prussians, it was grand, imposing, and very formidable. The long lines of infantry deployed in front, and on either wing supported by cavalry, while behind them were massed in the Emperor's hands his heavy columns, ready for action—an array of battle calculated at once to inspire awe, to encourage his men, and to mask his movements as long as possible-have been repeatedly admired by critics; while the plan of a feint on the British right, and of grand attacks on the left and centre, has been always acknowledged as excellent. Assume, however, that he conceived it possible that a Prussian army would fall upon his right, and his flank, perfectly bare and unprotected beyond his immediate line of battle, would at once condemn his whole arrangements, a censure not to be lightly hazarded in the case of such a man as Napoleon. If, however, the scheme of attack was brilliant, the scheme of defence was not less remarkable, though M. Thiers hardly deigns to notice it. The Duke's left was his weakest point, because he expected Blucher to support it; yet, resting on Ter-la-Haye and Papelotte, it was sheltered from fire to a great extent, and it proved strong enough to resist all efforts. His centre, with La Haye Sainte in front, and Hougoumont stretching towards the right, was guarded thus by a double outwork; a cross-road facilitated its operations, and it was so posted that it could alike command the slopes up which the enemy must advance, and form again upon a second line behind the crest of the first position. As for the right,