The Republican

Waterloo's Battle-Field
[A Buffalonian Abroad.]

The battle-field of Waterloo as it lies to-day is an uninspiring spectacle—a good place to sit down and muse on life and men and the vanity of human things: but we had a vivacious little guide who spared no time for musing, but engaged us with a very dramatic recital in broken, though quite intelligible, English, of the stirring things that happened on that bloody Sunday in 1815, when Bonaparte's brief candle went out and the European kaleidoscope rattled itself into a fresh combination.

I can't help sympathizing with the bottom dog. The dramatic symmetry of Napoleon's career wins us against our reason.

I went out to Waterloo with some Englishmen, and I took solid comfort in giving them my small opinion of their Iron Duke, although we must allow that he did his business very handsomely.

But that guide. I shall not soon forget him. He made more of an impression on me than all the books I have read on the subject of Waterloo. He omitted nothing: he opened his soul to us, and he suited the action to the word. He gesticulated: he attitudinized—in short, he fought the battle over again for us. His English was doubly English. He was especially happy in his "hup, guards, and hat 'em!" He recited this thrilling incident over his shoulder as he led us down the two hundred and odd steps that mount to the summit of the Mound of the Lion, and it was only by the most extraordinary presence of mind that I grasped the railing in time to escape a fall.

The Mound of the Lion is an artificial elevation which has been reared (very ill-advisedly, I think) in the midst of the field and of its earth thereby modifying the configuration of the landscape, so that one cannot now gain so accurate an idea of the battle-ground as might have otherwise been obtained—unless, indeed, the loss is compensated by the fact that the summit of the mound affords a commanding view.

The tranquility of the scene is impressive, and one is reminded of Byron's line:

"How that red rain has made the harvests grow!"

I never saw a fairer stretch of country—hills and valleys and winding roads and shining villages. Every feature of this sweet landscape played its part in the drama of that day. On the right is the chateau of Hougoumont, against which all day long the French lines beat like the waves of the sea—the key of the English position, held to the last by the gallant Coldstream guards, though the house was burned over their heads. The old brick wall around the orchard still stands pierced with loopholes, worn away by the pelting rain of musket-balls. If you have any sort of imagination you can stand there to-day and see the fight. I suppose there has scarcely been a closer, hotter, bloodier battle in modern times. The lines were posted only a mile apart, and from the moment of the first assault upon Hougoumont, to the low, despairing cry of the French general: "Tout est perdu! Sauve qui peut!" the battle was like the straining struggle of well-matched wrestlers.