At length a dome appears at the termination of the avenue. It is the church of Waterloo. They were preparing for a mass and procession, and the houses were most of them adorned with festoons of flowers or branches of trees....

...We turned to the right down the Nivelle road, for it was there Donald's gun was placed, and some labourers who were ploughing on the spot brought us some iron shot and fragments of shell which they had just turned up. The hedges were still tolerably sprinkled with bits of cartridge-paper, and remnants of hats, caps, straps, and shoes were discernible all over the plains. Hougoumont was a heap of ruins, for it had taken fire during the action, and presented a very perfect idea of the fracas which had taken place that day year. How different now! A large flock of sheep, with their shepherd, were browsing at the gate, and the larks were singing over its ruins on one of the sweetest days we could have chosen for the visit. As I was taking a sketch in a quiet corner I heard a vociferation so loud, so vehement, and so varied, that I really thought two or three people were quarrelling close to me. In a moment the vociferator (for it was but one) appeared at my elbow with an explosion of French oaths and gesticulations equal to any discharge of grape-shot on the day of attack. "Comment, Monsieur," said[266] I, "What is the matter?" "Oh, les coquins! les sacrés coquins" and away he went, abusing the coquins in so ambiguous a style that I doubted whether his wrath was venting against Napoleon or against his opponents. "Oui," remarked I, "ils sont coquins; et Buonaparte, que pensez-vous de lui?" This was a sort of opening which I trusted would bring him to the point without a previous committal of myself. It certainly did bring him to the point, for he gave a bounce and a jump and his tongue came out, and his mouth foamed, and his eyes rolled, as with a jerk he ejaculated, "Napoleon! qu'est-ce que je pense de lui?" It was well for poor Napoleon that he was quiet and comfortable in St. Helena, for had he been at Hougoumont, I am perfectly convinced that my communicant would have sent him to moulder with his brethren in arms. Having vented his rage, I asked him if the French had ever got within the walls. "Yes," he said, "three times; but they were always repulsed"; he assured me he had been there during the attack and that he saw them within; but added, "How they came in at that door" (pointing to the gate by which we were standing and which was drilled with bullets), "or when they came in, or how or where they got out I cannot tell you, for what with the noise, and the fire, and the smoke, I scarcely knew where I was myself."

One of the farm servants begged me to observe the chapel, which he hinted had been indebted to a miracle for its safety, and certainly as a good[267] Catholic he had a fair foundation for his belief, as the flames had merely burnt about a yard of the floor, having been checked, as he conceived, by the presence of the crucifix suspended over the door, which had received no other injury than the loss of part of its feet. He had remained there till morning, when, seeing the French advance and guessing their drift, he contrived to make good his escape, but returned the following day. What he then saw you may guess when I tell you that at the very door I stood upon a mound composed of earth and ashes upon which 800 bodies had been burnt. Every tree bore marks of death, and every ditch was one continued grave.

From Hougoumont we walked to La Belle Alliance,[111] crossing the neutral ground between the armies; a few days ago a couple of gold watches had been found, and I daresay many a similar treasure yet remains. At La Belle Alliance, a squalid farm house, we rested to take some refreshment. For a few biscuits and a bottle of common wine the woman asked us five francs, which being paid, I followed her into the house. Not perceiving me at the door, she met her husband, and bursting into a loud laugh, with a fly-up of arms and legs (for nothing in this country is done without gesticulation), she exclaimed, "Only think! ces gens-là m'ont donné cinq francs." In this miserable pot-house did the possessor find 280 wounded wretches[268] jammed together and weltering in blood when he returned on Monday morning. If I proceed to more particulars I foresee I should fill folios.

I must carry you at once to La Haye Sainte.[112] It was along a hedge that the severest work took place; it made me shudder to think that upon a space of fifty square yards 4,000 bodies were found dead. The ditches and the field formed one great grave. The earth told in very visible terms what occasioned its elasticity; upon forcing a stick down and turning up a clod, human bodies in an offensive state of decay immediately presented themselves. I found four Belgian peasants commenting upon one figure which was scarcely interred, and on walking under the outer wall of La Haye Sainte a hole was tenanted by myriads of maggots feasting upon a corpse.

Here stands the Wellington tree,[113] peppered with shot and stripped as high as a man can jump of its twigs and leaves, for every passenger jumps up for a relic. We stood upon the road where Buonaparte (defended by high banks) sent on, but didn't lead, 6,000 of his old Imperial Guard. They charged along the road up to La Haye Sainte, dwindling as they went by the incessant fire of 80 pieces of[269] Artillery, many of them within a few yards, till their number did not exceed 300. Then Napoleon turned round to Bertrand, lifted his hand, cried out, "C'est tout perdu, c'est tout fini," and galloped off with La Corte and Bertrand,[114] quitting most probably for ever a field of battle.