aide-de-camp, in a solemn voice; and then, his feelings getting the
better of him, he added, "if the damned fool would only push on!"--which
set us all laughing in the flank company.

But now anyone could see that the French army was breaking up.
The columns and squadrons which had stood so squarely all day were now
all ragged at the edges; and where there had been thick fringes of
skirmishers in front, there were now a spray of stragglers in the rear.
The Guard thinned out in front of us as we pushed on, and we found
twelve guns looking us in the face, but we were over them in a moment;
and I saw our youngest subaltern, next to him who had been killed by the
lancer, scribbling great 71's with a lump of chalk upon them, like the
schoolboy that he was. It was at that moment that we heard a roar of
cheering behind us, and saw the whole British army flood over the crest
of the ridge, and come pouring down upon the remains of their enemies.
The guns, too, came bounding and rattling forward, and our light
cavalry--as much as was left of it--kept pace with our brigade upon the
right. There was no battle after that. The advance went on without a
check, until our army stood lined upon the very ground which the French
had held in the morning. Their guns were ours, their foot were a rabble
spread over the face of the country, and their gallant cavalry alone was
able to preserve some sort of order and to draw off unbroken from the
field. Then at last, just as the night began to gather, our weary and
starving men were able to let the Prussians take the job over, and to
pile their arms upon the ground that they had won. That was as much as
I saw or can tell you about the Battle of Waterloo, except that I ate a
two-pound rye loaf for my supper that night, with as much salt meat as
they would let me have, and a good pitcher of red wine, until I had to
bore a new hole at the end of my belt, and then it fitted me as tight as
a hoop to a barrel. After that I lay down in the straw where the rest