But it may be said as a rule, that every Englishman in the Duke of
Wellington's army paid his way. The remembrance of such a fact surely
becomes a nation of shopkeepers. It was a blessing for a
commerce-loving country to be overrun by such an army of customers: and
to have such creditable warriors to feed. And the country which they
came to protect is not military. For a long period of history they
have let other people fight there. When the present writer went to
survey with eagle glance the field of Waterloo, we asked the conductor
of the diligence, a portly warlike-looking veteran, whether he had been
at the battle. "Pas si bete"--such an answer and sentiment as no
Frenchman would own to--was his reply. But, on the other hand, the
postilion who drove us was a Viscount, a son of some bankrupt Imperial
General, who accepted a pennyworth of beer on the road. The moral is
surely a good one.
This flat, flourishing, easy country never could have looked more rich
and prosperous than in that opening summer of 1815, when its green
fields and quiet cities were enlivened by multiplied red-coats: when
its wide chaussees swarmed with brilliant English equipages: when its
great canal-boats, gliding by rich pastures and pleasant quaint old
villages, by old chateaux lying amongst old trees, were all crowded
with well-to-do English travellers: when the soldier who drank at the
village inn, not only drank, but paid his score; and Donald, the
Highlander, billeted in the Flemish farm-house, rocked the baby's
cradle, while Jean and Jeannette were out getting in the hay. As our
painters are bent on military subjects just now, I throw out this as a
good subject for the pencil, to illustrate the principle of an honest
English war. All looked as brilliant and harmless as a Hyde Park
review. Meanwhile, Napoleon screened behind his curtain of
frontier-fortresses, was preparing for the outbreak which was to drive
all these orderly people into fury and blood; and lay so many of them
low.
Everybody had such a perfect feeling of confidence in the leader (for
the resolute faith which the Duke of Wellington had inspired in the
whole English nation was as intense as that more frantic enthusiasm
with which at one time the French regarded Napoleon), the country
seemed in so perfect a state of orderly defence, and the help at hand
in case of need so near and overwhelming, that alarm was unknown, and
our travellers, among whom two were naturally of a very timid sort,
were, like all the other multiplied English tourists, entirely at ease.
The famous regiment, with so many of whose officers we have made
acquaintance, was drafted in canal boats to Bruges and Ghent, thence to
march to Brussels. Jos accompanied the ladies in the public boats; the
which all old travellers in Flanders must remember for the luxury and
accommodation they afforded. So prodigiously good was the eating and
drinking on board these sluggish but most comfortable vessels, that
there are legends extant of an English traveller, who, coming to
Belgium for a week, and travelling in one of these boats, was so
delighted with the fare there that he went backwards and forwards from
Ghent to Bruges perpetually until the railroads were invented, when he
drowned himself on the last trip of the passage-boat. Jos's death was
not to be of this sort, but his comfort was exceeding, and Mrs. O'Dowd
insisted that he only wanted her sister Glorvina to make his happiness
complete. He sate on the roof of the cabin all day drinking Flemish
beer, shouting for Isidor, his servant, and talking gallantly to the
ladies.