“At three o’clock Napoleon had despatched a courier to Paris with the news that victory was certain: a few hours afterwards he had no longer an army.”
The French accounts, Gourgaud’s, Napoleon’s, &c., written long after, endeavour to diminish the defeat by representing that within a week as many us 60 or 65,000 men were re-assembled at Laon. Some one attempted to make a representation of this sort in the French Chamber of Peers, on the 24th of June; when Marshal Ney rose in his place, and declared all such accounts to be deceptive. “It is a mere illusion to suppose that 60,000 men can be collected. Marshal Grouchy,” said he, “cannot have more than 20,000, or 25,000 at the most.”
Fortunately, however, the question is set at rest by Fleury de Chaboulon, Napoleon’s secretary, who describes very vividly what followed immediately after the battle. He tells us, how, in his flight, on meeting Maret, “the Emperor could not repress his emotion; a large tear, escaping from his eyes, betrayed the efforts of his soul.” Again he says, “The Emperor stopped beyond Rocroi to take some refreshment. We were all in a pitiable state: our eyes swelled with tears, our countenances haggard, our clothes covered with dust or blood.” And, on arriving at Paris, when one of his ministers spoke of the army, Napoleon exclaimed, “I have no longer an army! I have nothing but fugitives!”[41]
It was this absolute destruction of the French army which made Waterloo one of the greatest and most important of all victories. Thus, Jules Maurel, a French historian, says:—
“From a comparison of all the documents, it appears, that Bonaparte was already beaten when the mass of the Prussian army appeared on the field; but the arrival of Bulow had powerfully assisted the British, and the arrival of Blucher changed the defeat into an unparalleled disaster.”
Lamartine, another Frenchman, adds:—
“This defeat left nothing undecided,—nothing for the future to do. Victory had given judgment: the war began and ended in a single battle.”
But let us return for a moment to the great victor of the day. At a road-side house, near Rossomme, he left Blucher, who gladly undertook the pursuit, and after twelve hours of constant exertion, he turned his charger’s head once more towards Mont St. Jean and Waterloo. Darkness now shrouded a thousand scenes of horror, over which it had been useless to pause. At his quarters the Duke found assembled the survivors of his staff, the representatives of the allied powers, and a few other friends. All sorely needed rest and food, and the meal was ready. On leaving his quarters in the morning, he had desired his domestics to have dinner ready to place on the table “whenever it might be wanted” and his cook excited amusement by the confidence with which he asserted, that “his master had ordered dinner, and would certainly return to eat it.” But the thoughts which would throng into the conqueror’s mind, at that moment, must have been such as few men have ever experienced.
The foremost considerations with the Duke of Wellington always were, his country, and his duty. But besides these there was a personal question, little spoken of by him, but which could not be excluded from his thoughts.