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BATTLE OF WATTIGNIES. 51 
It is these shades, cleverly seized, artistically repro- 
duced, that from the first day struck the public with such 
a lively admiration for the productions of David. One 
day, an officer of the Empire, known for his brilliant 
valour, said to me in the library of the Institute, “I 
cannot reconcile myself to seeing General Carnot in a 
man dressed in short breeches and blue stockings.” I 
took the opposite view; upon which he added, “ Well, 
be it so! blue stockings may suit a general who was 
never baptized by fire!” Yesterday, also, with less 
roughness it is true, in word, one of our co-academicians 
reproduced in my presence the same thought. I shall 
then fulfil a duty by proving that, when occasion required, 
the man in blue stockings knew well how to risk his life. 
The Prince of Cobourg, at the head of sixty thousand 
men, occupied all the outlets of the forest of Mormale, 
and blockaded Maubeuge. This town once taken, the 
Austrians would have met with no more serious obstacles 
to their reaching Paris. Carnot perceives the danger ; 
he persuades his colleagues in the Committee of Public 
Safety that our army, notwithstanding its numerical infe- 
riority, can give battle ; that it must attack the enemy in 
its apparently impregnable positions. It was one of those 
critical moments that decide the fate, the existence of 
nations. General Jourdan hesitates under such a terrible 
responsibility. Carnot goes to the army; in a few hours 
all is arranged, all is agreed upon ; the troops open out, 
they fall upon their enemies ; but the latter are so numer- 
ous, they occupy so well chosen a position, they have dug 
so many entrenchments, they have furnished them so for- 
midably with artillery, that success is uncertain. At the 
close of the day, our right wing had gained some ground; 
but the left wing had perhaps lost more. It had more- 
