The English drawn up in perfect order in front, their gunners ready with their lighted matches in their hands, made us think, but did not delight us quite so much as some have pretended, and men who like to receive cannon-balls are still rather rare.
Father Goulden told me that the soldiers sang in his time, but then they went voluntarily and not from force. They fought in defence of their homes and for human rights, which they loved better than their own eyes, and it was not at all like risking our lives to find out whether we were to have an old or a new nobility. As for me, I never heard any one sing either at Leipzig or Waterloo.
On we went, the bands still playing by order from head-quarters.
The music ceased, and the silence which followed was profound. Then we were at the edge of the little valley, and about twelve hundred paces from the English left. We were in the centre of our army, with the chasseurs and lancers on our right flank.
We took our distances and closed up the intervals. The first brigade of the first division turned to the left and formed on the highway. Our battalion formed a part of the second division, and we were in the first line, with a single brigade of the first division before us. The artillery was passed up to the front, and that of the English was directly opposite and on the same level. And for a long time the other divisions were moving up to support us. It seemed as if the earth itself was in motion. The veterans would say: "There are Milhaud's cuirassiers! Here are the chasseurs of Lefebvre-Desnoëttes! Yonder is Lobau's corps!"
On every side, as far as the eye could reach, there was nothing to be seen but cuirasses, helmets, colbacks,[[1]] sabres, lances, and files of bayonets.
[[1]] Military caps of bear-skin.
"What a battle," exclaimed Buche. "Woe to the English!"
I had the same thought; I did not believe a single Englishman would escape. But it was we who were unfortunate that day, though had it not been for the Prussians I still believe we should have exterminated them.