Footnote 36: These were schools intended for finishing public education.—Tr.[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 37: The Duke of Otranto excelled in the art of bending facts to his own liking. He exaggerated or extenuated them with so much skill, grasped them with so much address, and deduced consequences from them so naturally, that he was often able, to fascinate Napoleon. More securely to deceive and seduce him, he loaded him in his reports with protestations of attachment and fidelity; and he took care to contrive occasions of adding marginal notes with his own hand, in which he adroitly displayed in a distinguished manner his devotion, discernment, and activity. All his reports in general bore the same stamp: with much of cunning, and much of talent, they offered to the eye a rare and valuable assemblage of quickness and judgment, of moderation and firmness: at every word you might discover the able minister, the profound politician, the consummate statesman: in short, M. Fouché would have wanted nothing, to place him in the rank of great ministers, had he been what I shall call an honest statesman (un ministre honnête homme.)[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 38: The 5th corps became the army of the Rhine, and the 6th, which at first was only a corps of reserve, took its place, without changing its number.[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 39: Surely the army of the Alps must have been on its right, and that of the Rhine on its left, unless it was stationed with its rear to the enemy.—Tr.[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 40: The ascendancy he possessed over the minds and courage of the soldiers was truly incomprehensible. A word, a gesture, was sufficient, to inspire them with enthusiasm, and make them face with joyful blindness the most terrible dangers. If he ordered them mal-à-propos, to rush to such a point, to attack such another, the inconsistency or temerity of the manœuvre at first struck the good sense of the soldiers: but immediately they thought, that their general would not have given such an order, without a motive for it, and would not have exposed them wantonly. "He knows what he is about," they would say, and immediately rush on death, with shouts of "Long live the Emperor!"[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 41: These agents, paid by the king, went and came from Ghent to Paris, and from Paris to Ghent. The Duke of Otranto, who, no doubt, had good reasons for knowing them, offered the Emperor, to procure him news of what passed beyond the frontiers; and it was by their means the Emperor knew in great part the position of the enemies' armies. Thus the Duke of Otranto, if we may credit appearances, with one hand betrayed to the enemy the secrets of France, and with the other to Napoleon the secrets of the Bourbons and the foreign powers.[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 42: The Emperor, before he quitted Paris, had conceived the design of rendering the plains of Fleurus witnesses to new battles. He had sent for Marshal Jourdan, and had obtained from him a great deal of very important strategical information.[Back to Main Text.]
Footnote 43: The Duke of Treviso, to whom Napoleon had entrusted the command of the young guard, was attacked at Beaumont with a sciatica, that obliged him to take to his bed.[Back to Main Text.]
| LEFT. | |
| Under Marshal Ney. | |
| 1st Corps. | |
| Infantry | 16,500 |
| Cavalry | 1,500 |
| 2d Corps. | |
| Infantry | 21,000 |
| Cavalry | 1,500 |
| Cavalry of Desnouettes | 2,100 |
| Cuirassiers of Kellerman | 2,600 |
| ——— | |
| 45,200 | |
| Artillery, horse and foot | 2,400 |
| And 116 pieces of ordnance. | |
| RIGHT. | |
| Under Marshal Grouchy. | |
| 3d Corps. | |
| Infantry | 13,000 |
| Cavalry | 1,500 |
| 4th Corps. | |
| Infantry | 12,000 |
| Cavalry | 1,500 |
| Cavalry of Pajol | 2,500 |
| ——— | |
| 30,500 | |
| Cavalry of Excelmans | 2,600 |
| Cuirassiers of Milhaud | 2,600 |
| 35,700 | |
| Artillery, horse and foot | 2,250 |
| And 112 pieces of ordnance. | |
| CENTRE AND RESERVE. | |
| Under the Emperor. | |
| 6th Corps. | |
| Infantry | 11,000 |
| Old guard | 5,000 |
| Middle guard | 5,000 |
| Middle guard | 5,000 |
| Young guard | 4,000 |
| Horse grenadiers | 1,200 |
| Dragoons | 1,200 |
| 27,400 | |
| Artillery, horse and foot | 2,700 |
| And 134 pieces of ordnance. | |
| Recapitulation. | |
| Infantry | 87,500 |
| Cavalry | 20,800 |
| Artillery, horse and foot | 7,350 |
| Engineers | 2,200 |
| Total | 111,850 |
| Pieces of ordnance 362[Back to Main Text.] | |