“A gulf was Lindenau; and dead
Were fifties, hundreds, tens;
And every current rippled red
With Marshal’s blood and men’s.
“The smart Macdonald swam therein,
And barely won the verge;
Bold Poniatowski plunged him in
Never to re-emerge.
“Then stayed the strife. The remnants wound
Their Rhineward way pell-mell;
And thus did Leipzig City sound
An Empire’s passing bell;
“While in cavalcade, with band and blade,
Came Marshals, Princes, Kings;
And the town was theirs . . . Ay, as simple maid,
My mother saw these things!
“And whenever those notes in the street begin,
I recall her, and that far scene,
And her acting of how the Allies marched in,
And her touse of the tambourine!”
THE PEASANT’S CONFESSION
“Si le maréchal Grouchy avait été rejoint par l’officier que Napoléon lui avait expédié la veille à dix heures du soir, toute question eût disparu. Mais cet officier n’était point parvenu à sa destination, ainsi que le maréchal n’a cessé de l’affirmer toute sa vie, et il faut l’en croire, car autrement il n’aurait eu aucune raison pour hésiter. Cet officier avait-il été pris? avait-il passé à l’ennemi? C’est ce qu’on a toujours ignoré.”
—Thiers: Histoire de l’Empire. “Waterloo.”
Good Father! . . . ’Twas an eve in middle June,
And war was waged anew
By great Napoleon, who for years had strewn
Men’s bones all Europe through.
Three nights ere this, with columned corps he’d crossed
The Sambre at Charleroi,
To move on Brussels, where the English host
Dallied in Parc and Bois.