Waterloo The Day After The Battle

On a suriace ol two square miles, ït was ascertaiued that fifty thousand raen aud horsés were lying. The luxuriant erop of grain whioh had covered the field of battle, was reduced to littcr, and beaten into the eartb; and the surface trodden down by the cavalry, and furrowed deeply by the cannoa wheels, strewed with many a relio of the fight. Helmets and cuirasses, shattered firearms and broken swords; all the variety of military ornaaieuts, lancer oaps and Highland bonnets, uniforms of every color, plume and pennon; musical instruinents, the appai'atus of artillery, drums, buglcs; but, good God ! why dweil on the harrovfing picture of a fouwhten field? - each and every ruinous display bore mute testimony to the misery of such a battlc. # (Jould the melancholy appearanco of this scène of deathbe heightenod, it would be by witnessing the researches of tbc living, amid its desolation, for tlio objects of tuoir lovo. Mothers, aud wives, and children, for days were occupiod in that mournful duty;- and tho confusión of tho corpsos - frieud and foe intermingled as they were - often rendered the attempt at recognizing individuals diffioult, and in some cases im possible. In many placea the dead lay four doep upoti each other, marking tho spot sonio Jiritish square had occupied, exposod for Lours to the murderous fire of a French battory. Outside, lancer and cuirasser were thiekly saattered on the earth. Madly attuinpting to foroe tbe serried bayoneta of the British, they had fallen in the bootless essay by the musketry of the iuner files. Farther on jou trace the spot whcre the cavalry of France aud England eneomitored; chasseurs and hussar were intermingled ; and the heavy Norman horses of the iroperial Guard were interspersud with the gray chargers which carriod Albyn's chivalry. Here the Highlauder ;nd the trailtur lay, side by side, tngethcr ; and the heai-y goon, with Eriu's green bajgo upon his helmet, was grappliug in death wi h the Polish lanoer. # On the summit of thp ridge, where tho ground was cumbered with dead, and trodden fetlock deep n mud and gore by the frequent rush of rival cavalry, the thick strewn corpse9 of the Imporial Guard pointed out the spot where Napoleon had boen defeated. Hero, in column, that favored oorpa, on whom hia laat chances rested, had been annihilattd; and the advance and repulse of tho Guard wero traceable by a masa of fallen Frencbmeo. In the hollow bülow, the ast strugglo of Franco had boon lvainly made; for there the Old Guard atternpted to maot the Britiah, and thus afford time to their disorganized companions to again rally.