A notable fact is that there were very few of his common soldiers and common people who did not stand by him to the last, and who would not have continued the struggle under his trusted and revered generalship, had he elected to fight on.  He implored the Provisional Government to give their sanction to this, and had they done so, he has stated that he could have kept the Allies at bay and would have ultimately made them sue for peace.  Most authorities declare that this would have been impossible, but his genius as a tactician was so prodigious and unrivalled, his art of enthusing his soldiers so vastly superior to that of any general that could be brought against him, his knowledge of the country on which he might select to give battle so matchless that one has substantial grounds for believing that his assertion was more than a mere flash of imagination, and that even with the shattered, loyal portion of his army, he might have succeeded in changing defeat into a victory which would have changed the whole political position of Europe.  He frequently reverted to his last campaign and his last battle at Waterloo, when he was in captivity at St. Helena, and declared he should never have lost it, as his plan of battle at every point was never better devised, and that by all the arts of war he ought to have defeated the Allies; then he would lapse into sadness and soliloquize, “It must have been fate.”

In the effort to crush a cause and a nation which had been brought out of the depths of anarchy and raised to the zenith of power by the advent of a great spirit, the British Government of that period made their country parties to the slaughter of thousands of our fellow-creatures, which, in the light of subsequent events, has left a stain upon our diplomacy that can never be effaced, no matter what form of excuse may be set forth to justify it.  Never, in the whole history of blurred diplomatic vision, has there evolved so great a calamity to the higher development of civilization.

By taking so prominent a part in preventing Napoleon from fulfilling the eternal purpose for which all nature foreshadowed he was intended, we made it possible for Germany to develop systematically a diabolical policy of treason which has involved the world in war, drenching it with human blood.  The Allies pursued Napoleon to his downfall.  Their attitude during the whole course of his rule was senselessly vindictive.  They gloated over his misfortune when he became their victim, and they consummated their vengeance by making him a martyr.  The exile of St. Helena acted differently.  When he conquered, instead of viciously overrunning the enemy’s country and spreading misery and devastation, he made what he wished to be lasting peace, and allowed the sovereigns to retain their thrones.  How often did he carry out this act of generosity towards Prussia and Austria, and who can deny that he did not act benevolently towards Alexander of Russia, when at Austerlitz and Tilsit, he formed what he regarded as lasting personal friendship with the Czar!  It is all moonshine to say that he broke the friendship.  The power of Russia, Prussia, and Austria were hopelessly wrecked more than once, and on each occasion they intrigued him into war again, and then threw themselves at his feet, grovelling supplicants for mercy, which he never withheld.