in which the Emperor displayed an activity and energy which excited to
the highest point the admiration of those who surrounded him.
Unfortunately, the advantages which he had obtained gradually exhausted
his own troops, while only creating losses in the enemy's, which they
easily repaired. It was, as M. Bourrienne has well said, a combat of an
Alpine eagle with a flock of ravens: "The eagle may kill them by
hundreds. Each blow of his beak is the death of an enemy; but the ravens
return in still greater numbers, and continue their attack on the eagle
until they at last overcome him." At Champ-Aubert, at Montmirail, at
Nangis, at Montereau, and at Arcis, and in twenty other engagements, the
Emperor obtained the advantage by his genius and by the courage of our
army; but it was all in vain. Hardly had these masses of the enemy been
scattered, before fresh ones were formed again in front of our soldiers,
exhausted by continuous battles and forced marches. The army, especially
that which Blucher commanded, seemed to revive of itself, and whenever
beaten reappeared with forces equal, if not superior, to those which had
been destroyed or dispersed. How can such an immense superiority of
numbers be indefinitely resisted?




CHAPTER XXIII.

The Emperor had never shown himself so worthy of admiration as during
this fatal campaign in France, when, struggling against misfortunes, he
performed over again the prodigies of his first wars in Italy, when
fortune smiled on him. His career had begun with an attack, and the end
was marked by the most magnificent defense recorded in the annals of war.
And it may be said with truth that at all times and everywhere his