THE SKETCH BOOK.

* * * * *


WATERLOO, THE DAY AFTER THE BATTLE.

_By an eye witness._

[For the following very interesting Narrative, our acknowledgments are
due to the _United Service Journal,_--a work which has just started with
the year, and to which, in the "customary" phrase, we wish "many happy
returns."]

The summer of 1815 found me at Brussels. The town was then crowded to
excess--it seemed a city of splendour; the bright and varied uniforms of
so many different nations, mingled with the gay dresses of female beauty
in the Park, and the _Allée Verte_ was thronged with superb horses and
brilliant equipages. The _tables d'hôte_ resounded with a confusion of
tongues which might have rivalled the Tower of Babel, and the shops
actually glittered with showy toys hung out to tempt money from the
pockets of the English, whom the Flemings seemed to consider as walking
bags of gold. Balls and plays, routs and dinners were the only topics of
conversation; and though some occasional rumours were spread that the
French had made an incursion within the lines, and carried off a few
head of cattle, the tales were too vague to excite the least alarm. I
was then lodging with a Madame Tissand, on the Place du Sablon, and I
occasionally chatted with my hostess on the critical posture of affairs.
Every Frenchwoman loves politics, and Madame Tissand, who was deeply