Waterloo by Victor Hugo

Author:Victor Hugo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2015-12-12T05:00:00+00:00

The two guides

Napoleon’s tragic miscalculation is known to everyone: he looked for Grouchy but it was Blücher who came – death instead of life. Destiny is shaped by moments such as this: with his eyes upon the throne of the world, he saw the shadow of St Helena.

If the shepherd boy who acted as guide to Bülow, Blücher’s second-in-command, had advised him to come by the route above Frischemont, instead of by that below Planchenoit, the pattern of the nineteenth century might well have been different. Napoleon would have won Waterloo. Any other road, except the one below Planchenoit, would have brought the Prussian army to a ravine impassable by artillery, and Bülow would not have arrived in time. According to the Prussian General Muffling, a further hour’s delay would have spelt disaster.

There had been much delay already. Bülow had bivouacked at Dion-le-Mont and set out at dawn, but he had been greatly hindered by the state of the road. Moreover, he had had to cross the river Dyle by the narrow bridge at Wavre. The French had set fire to the village street leading to the bridge, and since the ammunition waggons could not pass between the rows of burning houses they had to wait for the fire to be put out. It was not until noon that Bülow’s advance-guard reached Chapelle-Saint-Lambert.

Had the battle begun two hours earlier it would have been over by four o’clock, and Blücher, too, would have fallen victim to Napoleon. Such are the immeasurable hazards of a Fatality beyond our grasp.

The Emperor, with his field-glass, was the first to see something on the horizon that fixed his attention. ‘A sort of cloud,’ he muttered. ‘It looks to me like troops.’ And turning to the Duke of Dalmatia he said: ‘Soult, what can you see around Chapelle-Saint-Lambert?’ Using his own glass the marshal replied: ‘Four or five thousand men, Sire. It must be Grouchy.’ All the glasses of the general staff were turned on this ‘cloud’, which remained motionless. Some officers thought that it was a halted column of men, but the majority believed it to be a grove of trees. The Emperor sent Domon’s contingent of light cavalry to reconnoitre.

The fact is that Bülow had not moved because his advance-guard was weak. His orders were to concentrate his main force before joining battle. But at five o’clock, seeing Wellington’s precarious state, Blücher ordered Bülow into the attack with the notable words: ‘We must give the English a breather.’

Shortly afterwards, the divisions of Losthin, Hiller, Hacke, and Ryssel deployed ahead of Lobau’s corps; Prince William of Prussia’s cavalry debouched from the Bois de Paris, Planchenoit was in flames, and artillery fire began to reach as far as the ranks of the Imperial Guard drawn up behind Napoleon.

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