L O N 
baggage, and military cheflr, Ney himfelf efcaped, wound¬ 
ed, by flight aerols the Dnieper. 
In the further retreat to the banks of the Berezyna, va¬ 
rious encounters took place, the refult of which is, as 
Ufua), very differently related by the two parties. The 
mod confiderable was one which terminated, on the 28th, 
in the capture, by general* Wittgenftein, of a French di- 
vifion, faid to confift of 8800 men. During this time the 
cold was intenfely fevere, occafioning dreadful fufferings 
to the fugitives, and almoft annihilating their cavalry. 
When they arrived at the fpot w'here the roads to Minfk 
and Wilna divide, they took the route to the latter town, 
flrft fending off their wounded, with the baggage. In 
thefe movements, Napoleon always inarched in the midit 
of his guards, whom, by care and indulgence, he had pre- 
ferved in tolerable plight. It is mentioned in the French 
accounts, that to fueh a degree was the cavalry of the 
army difmounted, that it was necefiary to colleCt the offi¬ 
cers who had ftill a liorfe remaining, in order to form four 
companies of 150 men each. This facred fquadron, as it 
is termed, in which generals performed the functions of 
captains, and colonels of fubalterns, never lofl fight of the 
emperor." At length, all danger from the purfuers being 
palt, Napoleon, on December 5, having called together his 
principal officers, and informed them of the appointment 
of the king of Naples as his lieutenant-general, let off in 
a Angle fledge ; parted through Wilna, Warfaw, Drefden, 
Leipfic, and Mentz; and arrived at Paris 011 the 18th, at 
half part eleven at night. 
Thus terminated a campaign, which for its importance 
may vie with any one of modern or ancient times; but, 
at the fame time, a campaign which will for ever ftigma- 
tize the ruler of France, and which has been, more than 
any other, injurious to his political interells and military 
reputation. Ten times more mad than the fon of Philip, 
when, the torch of deftruCtion blazing in his hand, he was 
rufhing to the conflagration of Perfepolis, Napoleon left 
his capital to invade the unlimited ffates of the emperor 
of all the Rufiias; and, having witnefled the fall of the 
holy city of Mofcow into allies, he was conftrained to flee 
back to thofe blifsful regions he fhould never have aban¬ 
doned, and that in difguife and as a difgraced fugitive: 
Quantum mutatus ab illo HeBore! Wrapped in the cloak of 
miftruft and fear, drawn clandeftinely through a world of 
fnovv, on an humble fledge, in countries where he had of¬ 
ten before fpurred his animated charger to victory ; where 
Ills word, the glance of his eye, a motion of his hand, had 
decided the fate of thoufands ;—Napoleon fneaks back to 
his uftirped kingdom ; and, wondrous to tell, (till medi¬ 
tates the humiliation of the north. Fatal blindnefs ! in- 
iatiable luff of power! The emperor of the French feels 
at this moment how rafli he was, after fuch a lerton from 
liis northern teachers, to ftir up again the juft vengeance 
of pall: injuries. He had long, as we have obferved be¬ 
fore, broken with eafe, upon his knee, the divided flicks 
of Mithridates; but, as foon as they were united in a bun¬ 
dle, his ftrength was found unequal to the deed. 
In exploring the ample page of hiftory, it is impoflible 
for the molt patient induftry, or "the moft aCtive refearch, 
to produce a more impreffive and inftruCtive example than 
that which is afforded by the life of this enterprifing ad¬ 
venturer, and hitherto highly-favoured loldier of fortune. 
Whether we look to his ludden and wonderful elevation 
to the higheft pinnacle of human grandeur, or to the ra¬ 
pid and accumulated difafters that have at length over¬ 
taken and nearly overwhelmed hint, our imagination is 
equally bewildered, and the faculties of our minds al¬ 
moft paralyfed at the bare contemplation. The abfolute 
defpotifm fo long praCtifed under the corrupt and vici¬ 
ous dynafty of the Bourbons, juftly awakened in the 
enflaved and opprefled people of France one univerfal 
burft of indignation, and provoked them to drake off 
their yoke, and break their chains on the heads of their 
eppreflbrs. The propitious moment arrived' that gave a 
free vent to this virtuous feeling * and, the haughty houfe 
D O N. 2Q() 
that had fo long ruled with a rod of iron, and trampled 
upon the liberties of the nation, was deprived of the royal 
feeptre, and driven from the throne, never perhaps to 
afeend it again. It was at this critical period, and 
amidft the convulfive throbs of the infant revolution, 
that Napoleon Bonaparte, the prefent emperor of the 
French, ftepped forward on the grand theatre of public 
affairs, and became an active and diffinguiffied partifan in 
the new order of things. His military genius and daunt- 
lefs fpirit foon acquired him confiderable celebrity and 
rapid promotion ; until, by a concatenation of events, as 
extraordinary in their nature as they have proved almoft 
miraculous in their refult, he was ultimately placed upon 
the throne of France, with the general content and ap¬ 
probation of the people. Here, when feated at this lofty 
height, and arrived at the full confummation of his labours, 
had he hut proved a fincere friend to liberty and the fa-- 
cred rights of nations, never would a character have (hone 
more illuilrious in the annals of fame, nor more defervedly 
have obtained the univerfal love and veneration of man¬ 
kind. But, oh! how cruelly and fatally has he difap- 
pointed our anxious hopes and wiflies I Like the “ bafe 
Judean,” he has thrown “a pearl away richer than all his 
tribe.” Giddy at the unexpected eminence he had at¬ 
tained, and inflated with ambition, in an evil hour he for¬ 
got that the foundation of his own greatnefs was built alone 
on the deltruction of the tyranny and defpotifm of his pre- 
deceffors. Inftead of becoming the "protestor of liberty, 
and the promoter of free difeufiion, he aflumed in his turn 
the dictatorial power of the revolutionary tyrants whom he 
had overwhelmed and fubdued. The freedom of the prefs 
was annihilated at a fingle blow; and, at the point of the 
fangumary bayonet and the roaring cannon’s mouth, he 
projected his fchemes of conqueft and his hopes of uni¬ 
versal dominion ! Never fince the days of Tiberius, was 
a more inflexible tyrant feated on a throne! Wherever 
rage or fury has infpired him, he has been urging his law- 
lels and unbounded career, not with the noble view of de- 
(troying abules and ameliorating the condition of man¬ 
kind, but for the hideous and impious purpofe of con¬ 
quering and enflaving nations, purfuing his fanguinary and 
deftruCtive conquelts without remorle or forbearance 5. 
and floating, as it were at his own arbitrary will and ca¬ 
price, the veffel of his boundlefs ambition, on a vaft ocean 
of human blood! Never has there been exhibited upon 
earth a loftier, a more ruinous, or a more reprehenfible^ 
fpirit of ambition. From this fatal fource has arifen an 
odious fyftem of opprefiion and perfecution, which has 
not only tarnifhed all his former glory, but rendered him 
an objeCft of univerfal horror and detellation. Like other 
cruel and infidious tyrants, his chief and Heady aim has 
been to coerce into lilence every man who has dared to 
exprefs his opinions, and to perfecute and proferibe even 
the flighted breath of free inquiry. By thefe and other 
equally deteftable aCts, he fucceeded in corrupting and 
overawing every branch of the legiflative, and rendered 
his whole fyftem of government a complete unmitigated, 
avowed, ferocious, military defpotifm. Such has been the 
deplorable lot of the French people under the aufpices of 
this once-obfcure individual, whom, in the excels of their 
miftakeh zeal and confidence, they raifed to the higheft 
fummit of power, and placed upon the imperial throne ! 
What an irnmenfity of power was accumulated in the 
hands of this one man, and what an awful lerton does 
his fudden reverfes furnilh to furrounding monarchs, 
and to the world at large! Fora long leries of time, and 
during a rapid fucceflion of events, every thing deemed to 
confpire to raife him above all thofe monarchs to whom 
Heaven has intruded the government of the earth. Had 
he but known when and where to fet bounds to his am¬ 
bition, and refted content with giving profperity and fe- 
curity to France, he might have obtained for himfelf ever- 
lafting glory, and dictated terms of peace to the whole 
world. But, during the period of his profperous reign, 
from his firft accelhon to power to the prefent eventful 
moment!,. 
