’Twas worth ten years of peaceful life,
One glance at this array.”
Picture their infantry in front, in two lines sixty yards apart, flanked by lancers with their fluttering flags. In rear of the centre of the infantry wings were the cuirassiers, also in two lines. In rear of the cuirassiers, on the right, the lancers and chasseurs of the Imperial guard, in their splendid but gaudy uniforms: the former clad in scarlet; the latter like hussars, in rifle-green fur-trimmed pelisse, gold lace, bear-skin cap. In rear of the cuirassiers on the left, the horse-grenadiers and dragoons of the Imperial guard, with their dazzling arms.
Immediately in rear of the centre was the reserve, composed of the 6th corps, in columns; on the left, and on the right of the Genappe road, were two divisions of light cavalry.
In rear of the whole, was the infantry of the Imperial guard in columns, a dense, dark mass, which, with the 6th corps and cavalry, were flanked by their numerous artillery. Nearly seventy-two thousand men, and two hundred and forty-six guns, ranged with matches lighted, gave an awful presage of the approaching conflict.
The enemy were quite in hand, all within call, there was nothing to prevent a movement being made. Why tarries Napoleon, so often termed “the thunderbolt of war?” Every minute’s delay is loss to him, and gain to Wellington, whose game it was to stand fast until the Prussians arrived. Was the Emperor tampering with a portion of the allies who had formerly fought in his ranks, and who might again rally round his eagles, (as he had been led to believe,) should a favourable opportunity present itself? French writers reply, and with some justice, that Napoleon waited for the partial drying of the ground, which the night’s rain had rendered very unfavourable for cavalry and artillery. The grand martial display was calculated to heighten the enthusiasm of his legions, at the same time that it gratified the Emperor’s unbounded ambition.
The allied army, a motley group, of nearly sixty-eight thousand men and a hundred and fifty-six guns, though almost as numerous as that of the enemy, did not present so imposing a spectacle, being for the most part drawn up in chequered columns of battalions at deploying intervals, the cavalry being on the flanks and in the rear. According to the nature of the ground, the guns were skilfully ranged at points whence the melancholy work of destruction could be best effected; yet, from its undulating form, it concealed from the enemy’s view a great portion of our force.
“Never,” said Napoleon, “had his troops been animated with such spirit, nor taken up their ground with such precision. The earth seemed proud of being trodden by such combatants.... Never yet, I believe,” said he at St.-Helena, “has there been such devotion shown by soldiers, as mine have manifested to me; never has man been served more faithfully by his troops.”
The two armies were now fairly in presence of each other.
The French lines being completed, the Emperor passed along them, attended by a brilliant and numerous staff: a forest of plumes waved around him. The troops hailed him with repeated shouts of Vive l’Empereur! the infantry raising their caps upon their bayonets, and the cavalry their casques or helmets upon their swords and lances. The parade over, the whole instantly formed columns.