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of the pursuing and the pursued; the palaces of nobles demolished, the houses of the rich pillaged, the chastity of virgins and of matrons violated; and every age, sex, and rank, mingled in promiscuous massacre and ruin."
Description of the Battle of Waterloo,
By an Officer present.
As we stood on our commanding spot, the first thought was most naturally of the numbers of the contending armies respectively. The British were stated by Buonaparte himself, at 80,060 and certainly they have never been made out to have been more. Marshal Blucher estimates them at the same number. Of these not more than 30,000 were actually British; the rest were Germans, Belgians, and Dutch. There were assuredly no corps of Prussians in the battle before the evening.
The French army certainly were 130,000[1] making the enormous balance in their favour of 50,000 men; and, be it never forgotten, all French, and the best troops in France.
In truth, the British army were a mile and a half from the nearest skirts of the wood, and never had one man within it; and so far from being crushed and overlaid, the masses, and of the French guard too, were often routed by the bold dash of an almost incredibly small proportion of their numbers,—nay sometimes, as will afterwards be told of the Highlanders and Scotch Greys, and it happened in many other parts of the field besides,
- ↑ According to the account given of the Port Folio, found in Buonaparte's carriage, he passed the French frontier with 110,000 men only.
