166 VICTORIES 



whose aim at universal conquest the peo^^le of Europe 

 Avere called upon to sacrifice their homes, their children, 

 and their liberties. 



The disasters of his Russian campaign were crowned 

 by the battle of Beresina, where, as one of our most 

 eloquent English authors says — had he been the hero he 

 vaunted himself, " on the bridGfe of Beresina he would 

 have died," and not have survived the loss of those brave 

 and numerous cohorts that his insane ambition led into 

 the frozen regions of Northern Europe — a force that 

 more resembled the army of a Cyrus or a Xerxes than 

 that of a modern European power. 



This decisive and ruinous conflict sealed the first act of 

 his downfall ; while, in the ensuing campaign in Germany, 

 the battles of Lutzen and Bautzen sustained him for a 

 time, till the issue of the well-contested field before 

 Leipsic induced him, for his own personal safety, to enact 

 the same bloody tragedy on the Elster he had practised 

 before on the Beresina, Avhich as effectuallv closed the 

 second act. And now the curtain drew up for the third 

 and last. 



My friend and I read Avith joy the repeated accounts of 

 the advance of the allies towards the French metropolis, 

 and joined in the general exultation that the bold achieve- 

 ments of our countrvmen under the o^reat Duke called 

 forth, on their passing the Pyrenees, and slaking their 

 horses' thirst in the pellucid streams of the French 

 territorv. The constant excitement that existed in our 

 town only served to add to the inflation which had chiefly 

 buoyed up the fortunes of its inhabitants for so many 

 years ; but as every successive account arrived of the 



