While the address, in reply to the emperor's speech, was under discussion, fresh evidence was given of that laudable watchfulness with which the new parliament had determined to guard themselves from every suspicion of undue deference and adulation towards the constitutional monarch. On the day after the opening of the session a proposal was made by Felix Lepelletier, to decree in the address the title of Saviour of his Country to Napoleon, in imitation of the title of Louis The Desired, given by his senators to the French King. This unpopular proposal, grounded upon so inauspicious a model, was received in all parts of the house with tumultuous cries for the order of the day; and M. Dupin, mounting the tribune, exclaimed, "We are here to counsel, not to flatter, our emperor; would you suffer the poisoned breath of adulation to find its way already within these walls? If we anticipate events, what means will be reserved by which we shall demonstrate our gratitude at the moment when the emperor shall have saved the country?" The president, having put Lepelletier's proposal to the vote, the whole assembly rose to pass to the order of the day.

Four days elapsed before the addresses of the chambers in answer to the speech of the emperor were completely prepared. That of the peers expressed sentiments honourable to the independence of that body; and while they promised not to be depressed by adversity, they

added, that their constitutions guaranteed to all Europe, that the French government could not be carried away by the seductions of victory. To this latter sentiment Napoleon replied, in the very opening of his answer, and sufficiently evinced his feeling of the censure it conveyed on his former conduct, when he said "The struggle in which we are engaged is serious. The seduction of prosperity is not the danger which menaces us at this moment. It is under the caudine forks that our enemies would now force us to pass."

The address of the deputies was conceived in the same spirit of firmness and moderation; and, at the same time that it expressed their determination to make the establishment of a free constitution their first care, and declared, that the will even of a victorious prince would be impotent in the endeavour to draw the nation beyond the limits necessary for its defence, it declared, that they were ready to co-operate to the utmost with the monarch of their choice in every effort for maintaining the liberty, the honour, and the dignity of France.

To these declarations Napoleon replied, that he recognized with satisfaction his own sentiments in those expressed by the deputies; and added, "I depart this night to place myself at the head of the army." The expression-"I depart this night," thrilled through the whole assembly. Already the army had marched to the frontier, and the moment now approached when the fate of Europe was to be decided, in a battle more tremendous in its immediate effects, and more important in its ultimate consequences, than any engagement of modern times.

CHAP. VI. 1815

*

BOOK V. estness by the Duke of Wellington, and before the end of June a force was accumulated by that power amounting to two hundred and thirty thousand men, by which the interval was filled up between the army of the Upper Rhine and that of the Netherlands. This army was divided into seven corps, four of which formed the army of the Lower Rhine-the 1st, under Lieutenantgeneral Ziethen, stationed at Fleurus; the 2d, under Lieutenant-general Count Bulow, between Liege and Hannut; the 3d, under Lieutenantgeneral Borstel, at Binch; and the 4th, under Lieutenant-general Thielman, at Namur; the four corps forming an army of 120,000 men, under the chief command of Field-marshal Blucher. On placing himself at the head of his troops, the illustrious veteran issued the following proclamation from his head-quarters at Liege :

"COMRADES! His majesty the king has been pleased to confide to me the chief command of the army. I receive this favour with most lively gratitude. I am rejoiced to see you again-to find you on the field of honour prepared for a new contest, full of new hopes. It is given to us again to combat for the great cause-for general peace. I congratulate you upon it. The course of glory is again open to you. An opportunity offers, to increase, by new deeds, the military renown which you have already acquired. Placed at your head, I doubt not of certain and glorious success. Show me, in this new struggle, the confidence you placed in me during the last, and I am convinced that you will gloriously extend the fame of your

brilliant deeds in arms.'

The Duke of Wellington had joined his troops in the month of April, and established his head-quarters at Brussels, in the neighbourhood of which city his army was so disposed that it might be concentrated in twenty-four hours, and directed on any point of the French frontiers. The first corps, commanded by the Prince of Orange, occupied Enghien, Braine-le-Comte, and Nivelles, and consisted of the first and third British divisions, under Generals Cooke and Alten; the first and second Hanoverian divisions; and the second and third Belgic divisions. The second corps, commanded by Lord Hill, included the second and fourth British divisions, under Generals Clinton and Hinuber; the third and sixth Hanoverian, and the first Belgic divisions, were established at Ath, Oudenarde, and Grammont. The reserve, stationed at Brussels and Ghent, comprised the fifth and sixth British divisions, under Generals Picton and Cole, and the fourth, fifth, and seventh Hanoverian divisions; the cavalry occupying Grammont and Ninove. Of this force thirty-eight thousand were British; the German legion consisted of

eight thousand men; the Hanoverian troops comprised fourteen thousand five hundred; and the Belgians, Brunswickers, and Nassau troops amounted to twenty-two thousand; making an aggregate of eighty-two thousand five hundred

men.

No part of Napoleon's political life, marked. as it has always been by the most rapid and extraordinary promptitude in military preparations, affords such a display of activity, as was manifested during the hundred days which formed the duration of his second reign. Amidst all his political pursuits, he was never for an instant diverted from his military operations. Cannons, muskets, and arms of every description, were forged and issued from the manufactories and arsenals with incredible celerity. The old corps were recruited; the regular army, which on his return from Elba consisted but of one hundred and seventy-five thousand men, was swelled to three hundred and seventy-five thousand;† new levies were instituted under the various names of free-corps, federés, and volunteers; the martial spirit of France was again reused to hope and energy; and the whole kingdom seemed trans · formed at once into an immense camp, of which Napoleon was the spring and the leader. large army defiled towards Belgium, where the neighbourhood of the English and the Prussian bled in Alsace, in Lorraine, in Franche Compté, troops excited alarm; other armies were assemat the foot of the Alps, and on the confines of the Pyrenees.

One

But it was in Belgium where the decisive blow was to be struck, and quitting Paris early in the morning of the 12th of June, attended by Marshal Soult, his major-general, Napoleon passed Laon on the 13th, and on the 14th presented himself at the head of a formidable army on the old battle-field of Europe.

The French army, already in the highest order, was still further augmented in number and equipments.

The marches and combinations of the various corps d'armée were marked in a distinguished manner by that high military talent which planned Napoleon's most fortunate campaigns. In the same day, and almost at the same hour, three armies-the army of Laon, headed. by the emperor in person; the army of the Ardennes, commanded by General Vandamme; and the army of the Moselle, under the orders of General Girard; having broken up from the different cantonments, attained by a simultaneous movement an united alignment upon the frontiers of Belgium. The troops, thus combined, composed five corps of infantry, com