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in the middle of August, and united with the corps which had already been dispatched to Rügen. The Danish government was summoned to place its navy in the hands of Great Britain, in order that it might remain as a deposit in some British port until the conclusion of peace. While demanding this sacrifice of Danish neutrality, England undertook to protect the Danish nation and colonies from the hostility of Napoleon, and to place at the disposal of the government every means of naval and military defense. Failing the surrender of the fleet, the English declared that they would bombard Copenhagen. The reply given to this summons was such as might be expected from a courageous nation exasperated against Great Britain by its harsh treatment of neutral ships of commerce, and inclined to submit to the despot of the Continent rather than to the tyrant of the seas. More honor," the crown-prince is reported to have answered, "is to be expected from the pirates of Barbary than from the British government. Your allies, vainly expecting your succors for an entire year, have taught us what is the worth of English friendship." Negotiations proved fruitless, and, on the 2d of September, the English opened fire on Copenhagen. For three days and nights the city underwent a bombardment of cruel efficiency. Eighteen hundred houses were leveled, the town was set on fire in several places, and a large number of inhabitants lost their lives. At length the commander found himself compelled to capitulate. The fleet was handed over to Great Britain, with all the stores in the arsenal at Copenhagen. It was brought to England, no longer under the terms of a friendly neutrality, but as a prize of war.

The captors themselves were ashamed of their spoil. England received an armament which had been taken from a people who were not our enemies, and by an attack which was not war, with more misgiving than applause.* In Europe

* Yet the House of Commons approved of the action of the ministry by

a vote of more than two to one.

the seemingly unprovoked assault upon a weak neutral state excited the utmost indignation. The British ministry, who were prevented from making public the evidence which they had received of the intention of the two emperors, were believed to have invented the story of the secret treaty. The Danish government denied that Napoleon had demanded their co-operation; Napoleon and Alexander themselves assumed the air of indignant astonishment. But the facts alleged by Canning and his colleagues were correct. The conspiracy of the two emperors was no fiction. The only question still remaining open relates to the engagements entered into by the Danish government itself. Napoleon, in his correspondence of this date, alludes to certain promises made to him by the court of Denmark, but he also complains that these promises had not been fulfilled; and the context of the letter renders it almost certain that nothing more was promised than that the ports of Denmark should be closed to English vessels. If the British cabinet possessed evidence of the determination of the Danish government to transfer its fleet to Napoleon without resistance, the attack upon Denmark, considered as virtually an act of war, was not unjust. If no such evidence existed, the conspiracy of the emperors against Danish neutrality was no sufficient ground. for an action on the part of Great Britain which went so far beyond the mere frustration of their designs. The surrender of the Danish fleet demanded by England would have been an unqualified act of war on the part of Denmark against Napoleon; it was no mere guarantee for a continued neutrality. Nor had the British government the last excuse of an urgent and overwhelming necessity. Nineteen Danish men-of-war would not have turned the scale against England. The memory of Trafalgar might well have given a British ministry courage to meet its enemies by the ordinary methods of war. Had the forces of Denmark been far larger than they actually were, the peril of Great Britain was not so ex

treme as to excuse the wrong done to mankind by an example encouraging all future belligerents to anticipate one another in forcing neutrals to take part with themselves.

LIX.

BATTLE OF WATERLOO-CREASY.

[The failure of his attempt to subjugate Spain, which was made in the year following the humiliation of Denmark by England, marked the turning-point in Napoleon's career. Fortune, indeed, did not desert him in his brilliant campaign against Austria, in 1809; but his insane invasion of Russia, in 1812, and the obstinacy with which he rejected all overtures of peace during the campaigns of 1813 and 1814 led to his downfall in the latter year, in spite of the almost superhuman activity and energy he displayed. By the treaty of Paris (1814) the island of Elba was assigned to him as a place of residence; but in the spring of 1815, while the congress of Vienna was busy in re-arranging the map of Europe, he escaped from the island. France welcomed him, Europe combined against him, and he was finally overthrown by the English and Prussian armies on the field of Waterloo. The crisis of the battle is described below.]

BETWEEN seven and eight

o'clock the infantry of the Old Guard was formed into two columns, on the declivity near La Belle Alliance. Ney was placed at their head. Napoleon himself rode forward to a spot by which his veterans were to pass; and as they approached he raised his arm, and pointed to the position of the allies, as if to tell them that their path lay there.

DUKE OF WELLINGTON.

They answered with loud cries of "Vive l'Empereur!" and descended the hill from their own side into that "valley of

the shadow of death," while their batteries thundered with redoubled vigor over their heads upon the British line. The line of march of the columns of the Guard was directed between Hougoumont and La Haye Sainte, against the British right center; and at the same time, Donzelot and the French who had possession of La Haye Sainte, commenced a fierce. attack upon the British center, a little more to its left. This part of the battle has drawn less attention than the celebrated attack of the Old Guard; but it formed the most perilous crisis for the allied army; and if the Young Guard had been there to support Donzelot, instead of being engaged with the Prussians at Planchenoit, the consequences to the allies in that part of the field must have been most serious. The French tirailleurs, who were posted in clouds in La Haye Sainte, and the sheltered spots near it, completely disabled the artillery-men of the English batteries near them; and, taking advantage of the crippled state of the English guns, the French brought some field-pieces up to La Haye Sainte, and commenced firing grape from them on the infantry of the allies, at a distance of not more than a hundred paces. The allied infantry here consisted of some German brigades, who were formed in squares, as it was believed that Donzelot had cavalry ready behind La Haye Sainte to charge them with, if they left that order of formation. In this state the Germans remained for some time with heroic fortitude, though the grape-shot was tearing gaps in their ranks, and the side of one square was literally blown away by one tremendous volley which the French gunners poured into it. The prince of Orange in vain endeavored to lead some Nassau troops to their aid. The Nassauers would not or could not face the French; and some battalions of Brunswickers, whom the duke of Wellington had ordered up as a re-enforcement, at first fell back, until the duke in person rallied them and led them on. The duke then galloped off to the right to lead his men who were exposed to the attack

of the Imperial Guard. He had saved one part of his center from being routed; but the French had gained ground here, and the pressure on the allied line was severe, until it was relieved by the decisive success which the British in the right center achieved over the columns of the Guard.

The British troops on the crest of that part of the position, which the first column of Napoleon's Guard assailed, were Maitland's brigade of British Guards, having Adam's brigade on their right. Maitland's men were lying down, in order to avoid, as far as possible, the destructive effect of the French artillery, which kept up an unremitting fire from the opposite heights, until the first column of the Imperial Guard had advanced so far up the slope toward the British position that any further firing of the French artillery-men would endanger their own comrades. Meanwhile, the British guns were not idle; but shot and shell plowed fast through the ranks of the stately array of veterans that still moved imposingly on. Several of the French superior officers were at its head. Ney's horse was shot under him, but he still led the way on foot, sword in hand. The front of the massive column now was on the ridge of the hill. To their surprise they saw no troops before them. All they could discern through the smoke was a small band of mounted officers. One of these was the duke himself. The French advanced to about fifty yards from where the British Guards were lying down, when the voice of one of the band of British officers was heard calling, as if to the ground before him, "Up, Guards, and at them!" It was the duke who gave the order; and at the words, as if by magic, up started before them a line of the British Guards four deep, and in the most compact and perfect order. They poured an instantaneous volley upon the head of the French column, by which no less than three hundred of those chosen veterans are said to have fallen. The French officers rushed forward, and, conspicuous in front of their men, attempted to deploy them into a more extended line, so as to enable them