from defeat. The French, under Ney, had held him
up. He would even have suffered a reverse had Ney attacked promptly and
strongly earlier in the day of Friday the 16th, but Ney had not acted
promptly and strongly.

All day long reinforcements had come in one after the other, much later
than the Duke intended, but in a sufficient measure to meet the tardy and
too cautious development of Ney's attack. Finally, the real peril under
which the Duke lay (though he did not know it)--the junction of Erlon and
his forces with Ney--had not taken place until darkness fell, and Erlon's
20,000 had been wasted in the futile fashion which has been described and
analysed.

The upshot, therefore, of the whole business at Quatre Bras was, that
during the night between Friday and Saturday the 16th and the 17th the
English and the French lay upon their positions, neither seriously
incommoding the other.

During that night further reinforcements reached Wellington where his
troops had bivouacked upon the positions they had held so well. Lord
Uxbridge, in command of the British cavalry, and Ompteda's brigade both
came up with the morning, as did also Clinton's division and Colville's
division, and so did the reserve artillery.

In spite of all these reinforcements, in spite even of the great mass of
horse which Uxbridge had brought up, and of the new guns, Wellington's
position upon that morning of Saturday the 17th of June was, though he did
not yet know it, very perilous.

He still believed that the Prussians were holding on to Ligny, and that
they had kept their positions during the night, which night he had himself
spent at Genappe, to the rear of the battlefield of Quatre Bras.[14]

When Wellington awoke on the morning of Saturday in Genappe, there were
rumours in the place that the Prussians had been defeated the day before
at Ligny. The Duke went at once to Quatre Bras; sent Colonel Gordon off
eastward with a detachment of the Tenth Hussars to find out what had
happened, and that officer, finding the road from Ligny in the hands of
the French, had the sense to scout up northwards, came upon the tail of
the Prussian retreat, and returned to Wellington at Quatre Bras by
half-past seven with the whole story: the Prussians had indeed been
beaten; they were in full retreat; but a chance of retreat had lain open
towards the north, and that was the road they had taken.

Wellington knew, therefore, before eight o'clock on that Saturday