The Bronze Eagle Part 42

"Stop that rumour from spreading to the ears of our men! In G.o.d's name don't let them know it," adjures Napoleon in a message to Ney.

And he himself sends his own staff officers to every point of the field of battle to shout and proclaim the news that it is Grouchy who is nigh, Grouchy with reinforcements, Grouchy with the victorious troops from Ligny, fresh from conquered laurels!

And the news gives fresh heart to the Imperial troops:

"Vive l'Empereur!" they shout, more certain than ever of victory.

III

The grey day has yielded at last to the kiss of the sun. Far away at Braine l'Alleud a vivid streak of gold has rent the bank of heavy clouds. It is now close on seven o'clock--there are two more hours to nightfall and Blucher is not yet here.

Some of the Prussians have certainly debouched on Plancenoit, but Napoleon's Old Guard have turned them out again, and from Limale now comes the sound of heavy cannonade as if Grouchy had come upon Blucher after all and all hopes of reinforcements for the British troops were finally at an end.

Napoleon--Emperor still and still flushed with victory--looks through his gla.s.ses on the British lines: to him it seems that these are shaken, that Wellington is fighting with the last of his men. This is the hour then when victory waits--attentive, ready to bestow her crown on him who can hold out and fight the longest--on him who at the last can deliver the irresistible attack.

And Napoleon gives the order for the final attack, which must be more formidable, more overpowering than any that have gone before. The plateau of Mont Saint Jean, he commands, must be carried at all costs!

Cuira.s.siers, lancers and grenadiers, then, once more to the charge!

strew once more the plains of Waterloo with your dying and your dead!

Up, Milhaud, with your guards! Poret with your grenadiers! Michel with your cha.s.seurs! Up, ye heroes of a dozen campaigns, of a hundred victories! Up, ye old growlers with the fur bonnets--Napoleon's invincible Old Guard! With Ney himself to lead you! a hero among heroes!

the bravest where all are brave!

Have you ever seen a tidal wave of steel rising and surging under the lash of the gale? So they come now, those cuira.s.siers and lancers and cha.s.seurs, their helmets, their swords, their lances gleaming in the golden light of the sinking sun; in closed ranks, stirrup to stirrup they swoop down into the valley, and rise again scaling the muddy heights. Superb as on parade, with their finest generals at their head: Milhaud, Hanrion, Michel, Mallet! and Ney between them all.

Splendid they are and certain of victory: they gallop past as if at a revue on the Place du Carrousel opposite the windows of the Tuileries; all to the repeated cry of "Vive l'Empereur!"

And as they gallop past the wounded and the dying lift themselves up from the blood-stained earth, and raise their feeble voices to join in that triumphant call: "Vive l'Empereur!" There's an old veteran there, who fought at Austerlitz and at Jena; he has three stripes upon his sleeve, but both his legs are shattered and he lies on the roadside propped up against a hedge, and as the superb cavalry ride proudly by he shouts l.u.s.tily: "Forward, comrades! a last victorious charge! Long live the Emperor!"

After that who was to blame? Was human agency to blame? Did Ney--the finest cavalry leader in Napoleon's magnificent army, the veteran of an hundred glorious victories--did he make the one blunder of his military career by dividing his troops into too many separate columns rather than concentrating them for the one all-powerful attack upon the British centres? Did he indeed mistake the way and lead his splendid cavalry by round-about crossways to the plateau instead of by the straight Brussels road?

Or did the obscure traitor--over whom history has thrown a veil of mystery--betray this fresh advance against the British centre to Wellington?

Was any man to blame? Was it not rather the hand of G.o.d that had already fallen with almighty and divine weight upon the ambitious and reckless adventurer?--was it not the voice of G.o.d that spoke to him through the cannon's roar of Waterloo: "So far but no farther shalt thou go! Enough of thy will and thy power and thy ambition!--Enough of this scourge of bloodshed and of misery which I have allowed thee to wield for so long!--Enough of devastated homes, of starvation and of poverty! enough of the fatherless and of the widow!"

And up above on the plateau the British troops hear the thunder of thousands of horses' hoofs, galloping--galloping to this last charge which must be irresistible. And st.u.r.dy, wearied hands, black with powder and stained with blood, grasp more firmly still the bayonet, the rifle or the carbine, and they wait--those exhausted, intrepid, valiant men!

they wait for that thundering charge, with wide-open eyes fixed upon the crest of the hill--they wait for the charge--they are ready for death--but they are not prepared to yield.

Along the edge of the plateau in a huge semicircle that extends from Hougoumont to the Brussels road the British gunners wait for the order to fire.

Behind them Wellington--eagle-eyed and calm, warned by G.o.d--or by a traitor but still by G.o.d--of the coming a.s.sault on his positions--scours the British lines from end to end: valiant Maitland is there with his brigade of guards, and Adam with his artillery: there are Vandeleur's and Vivian's cavalry and Colin Halkett's guards! heroes all! ready to die and hearing the approach of Death in that distant roar of thunder--the onrush of Napoleon's invincible cavalry.

Here, too, further out toward the east and the west, extending the British lines as far as Nivelles on one side and Brussels on the other, are William Halkett's Hanoverians, Duplat's German brigade, the Dutch and the Belgians, the Brunswickers, and Ompteda's decimated corps. The French royalists are here too, scattered among the foreign troops--brother prepared to fight brother to the death! St. Genis is among the Brunswickers. But Bobby Clyffurde is with Maitland's guards.

And now the wave of steel is surging up the incline: the gleam of shining metal pierces the distant haze, casques and lances glitter in the slowly sinking sun, whilst from billow to billow the echo brings to straining ears the triumphant cry "Vive l'Empereur!"

Five minutes later the British artillery ranged along the crest has made a huge breach in that solid, moving ma.s.s of horses and of steel. Quickly the breach is repaired: the ranks close up again! This is a parade! a review! The eyes of France are upon her sons! and "Vive l'Empereur!"

Still they come!

Volley after volley from the British guns makes deadly havoc among those glistering ranks!

But nevertheless they come!

No halt save for the quick closing up into serried, orderly columns. And then on with the advance!--like the surging up of a tidal wave against the cliffs--on with the advance! up the slopes toward the crest where those who are in the front ranks are mowed down by the British guns--their places taken by others from the rear--those others mowed down again, and again replaced--falling in their hundreds as they reach the crest, like the surf that shivers and dies as it strikes against the cliffs.

Ney's horse is killed under him--the fifth to-day--but he quickly extricates himself from saddle and stirrups and continues on his way--on foot, sword in hand--the sword that conquered at Austerlitz, at Eylau and at Moskowa. Round him the grenadiers of the Old Guard--they with the fur bonnets and the grizzled moustaches--tighten up their ranks.

They advance behind the cavalry! and after every volley from the British guns they shout loudly: "Vive l'Empereur!"

And anon the tidal wave--despite the ebb, despite the constant breaking of its surf--has by sheer force of weight hurled itself upon the crest of the plateau.

The Brunswickers on the left are scattered. Cleeves and Lloyd have been forced to abandon their guns: the British artillery is silenced and the cha.s.seurs of Michel hold the extreme edge of the upland, and turn a deadly fusillade upon Colin Halkett's brigade already attacked by Milhaud and his guards and now severely shaken.

"See the English General!" cries Duchaud to his cuira.s.siers, "he is between two fires. He cannot escape."

No! he cannot but he seizes the colours of the 33rd whose young lieutenant has just fallen, and who threaten to yield under the devastating cross-fire: he brandishes the tattered colours, high up above his head--as high as he can hold them--he calls to his men to rally, and then falls grievously wounded.

But his guards have rallied. They stand firm now, and Duchaud, chewing his grey moustache, murmurs his appreciation of so gallant a foe.

"That side will win," he mutters, "who can best keep on killing."

IV

"Up, guards, and at them!"

Maitland's brigade of guards had been crouching in the corn--crouching--waiting for the order to charge--red-coated lions in the ripening corn--ready to spring at the word.

And Death the harvester in chief stands by with his scythe ready for the mowing.

"Up, guards, and at them!"

It is Maitland and his gallant brigade of guards--out of the corn they rise and front the three battalions of Michel's cha.s.seurs who were the first to reach the highest point of the hill. They fire and Death with his scythe has laid three hundred low. The tricolour flag is riddled with grapeshot and General Michel has fallen.

Then indeed the mighty wave of steel can advance no longer: for it is confronted with an impenetrable wall--a wall of living, palpitating, heroic men--men who for hours have stood their ground and fought for the honour of Britain and of her flag--men who with set teeth and grim determination were ready to sell their lives dearly if lives were to be sold--men in fact who have had their orders to hold out to the last man and who are going to obey those orders now.

"Up, guards, and at them," and surprised, bewildered, staggered, the cha.s.seurs pause: three hundred of their comrades lie dead or dying on the ground. They pause: their ranks are broken: with his last dying sigh brave General Michel tries to rally them. But he breathes his last ere he succeeds: his second in command loses his head. He should have ordered a bayonet charge--sudden, swift and sure--against that red wall that rushes at them with such staggering power: but he too tries to rally his men, to reform their ranks--how can they re-form as for parade under the deadly fire of the British guards?

Confusion begins its deathly sway: the cha.s.seurs--under conflicting orders--stand for full ten minutes almost motionless under that devastating fire.

And far away on the heights of Frischemont the first line of Prussian bayonets are seen silhouetted against the sunset sky.

Wellington has seen it. Blucher has come at last! One final effort, one more mighty gigantic, superhuman struggle and the glorious end would be in sight. He gives the order for a general charge.

"Forward, boys," cries Colonel Saltoun to his brigade. "Now is the time!"