IV.—­The Hour of Disaster

I have often heard veterans describe the order of battle given by the emperor.  But all I remember of that terrible day is that we marched out with the bands playing, that we got to close quarters with the English, were repulsed, and were assisted by regiments of cuirassiers, that we carried La Haie-Sainte with terrible slaughter at Ney’s command.  Hougomont we could not carry.  When we thought we were winning, the news was spread that Bluecher, with 60,000 men, was advancing on our flank, and that unless Grouchy, with his 30,000, arrived in time to reinforce us the day might be lost.

All the world knows now that Grouchy did not arrive, that we threw ourselves again and again upon the English squares, and that at last, when regiment after regiment had tried in vain to break the enemy’s line, the Old Guard were called up by the emperor.  It was the last chance of retrieving the day, the grand stroke—­and it failed.

The four battalions of the Guards, reduced from 3,000 to 1,200 men, were assailed by so fierce a fire that they were compelled to retire.  They retired slowly, defending themselves with muskets and bayonets, but with their retirement, and the approach of night, the battle ended for us in the confusion of a rout.  It was like a flood.  We were surrounded on all sides when Bluecher arrived.  The Old Guard formed a square for the emperor and his officers, and the rest of us simply straggled away, back to France.  The most awful thing of all was the beating of the drum of the Old Guard in that hour of disaster.  It was like a fire-bell, the last appeal of a burning nation.

Buche was by my side in the retreat.  Several times the Prussians attacked us.  We heard that the emperor had departed for Paris, and we struggled on, only hoping to escape with our lives.  At Charleroi the inhabitants shut the city gates in our face, and Buche shared in the general rage, and proposed to destroy the town.  But I thought we had had enough massacres, and that it was not right we should be killing our own countrymen, and I persuaded Buche to come on with me.

In a few days we felt ourselves safe from pursuing Prussians, and at the village of Bouvigny I wrote a letter to Catherine, telling her I was safe.  In this village some officers of our regiment, the 6th of the Line, found us, and we had to rejoin.  Presently we saw all that was left of Grouchy’s army corps in retreat, and a day or two later we heard of the emperor’s abdication.  On July 1, we reached Paris, and outside the city, near the village of Issy, we once more fell in with the Prussians; for two days we fought them with fury, and then some generals announced that peace had been made.

We believed that this truce was to give the enemy time to leave the country, and that otherwise France would rise, as it rose in ’92, and drive them out.

Unhappily, we soon learnt that the Prussians and English were to occupy Paris, and that the remains of the French army were to be kept beyond the Loire.  We all felt that we had been betrayed, and the old officers, pale with anger, wept in their misery.  Paris in the hands of the Prussians!  Besides, were we to go to the other side of the Loire at the command of Bluecher?