ng impatiently on the outskirts of
the columns is MARSHAL NEY, who has as yet received no command.

As the day develops, sight and sounds to the left and right reveal
that the two outside columns have also started, and are creeping
towards the frontier abreast with the centre. That the whole forms
one great movement, co-ordinated by one mind, now becomes apparent.
Preceded by scouts the three columns converge.

The advance through dense woods by narrow paths takes time. The
head of the middles and main column forces back some outposts, and
reaches Charleroi, driving out the Prussian general ZIETEN. It
seizes the bridge over the Sambre and blows up the gates of the
town.

The point of observation now descends close to the scene.

In the midst comes the EMPEROR with the Sappers of the Guard,
the Marines, and the Young Guard. The clatter brings the scared
inhabitants to their doors and windows. Cheers arise from some
of them as NAPOLEON passes up the steep street. Just beyond the
town, in front of the Bellevue Inn, he dismounts. A chair is
brought out, in which he sits and surveys the whole valley of the
Sambre. The troops march past cheering him, and drums roll and
bugles blow. Soon the EMPEROR is found to be asleep.

When the rattle of their passing ceases the silence wakes him. His
listless eye falls upon a half-defaced poster on a wall opposite--
the Declaration of the Allies.

NAPOLEON [reading]

"... Bonaparte destroys the only legal title on which his existence
depended.... He has deprived himself of the protection of the law,
and has manifested to the Universe that there can be neither peace
nor truce with him. The Powers consequently declare that Napoleon
Bonaparte has placed himself without the pale of civil and social
relations, and that as an enemy and disturber of the tranquillity
of the world he has rendered himself liable to public vengeance."

His flesh quivers, and he turns with a start, as if fancying that
some one may be about to stab him in the back. Then he rises,
mounts, and rides on.

Meanwhile the right column crosses the Sambre without difficulty
at Chatelet, a little lower down; the left column at Marchienne a
little higher up; and the three limbs combine into one vast army.

As the curtain of the mist is falling, the point of vision soars
again, and there is afforded a brief glimpse of what i