nest examples can conquer. Old associations and feelings not
effaced might have slackened the efforts of a few, directed against
former comrades or personal friends whom the stern necessity of
politics had placed in opposing ranks. Raw troops might here
and there have shrunk from attacks the most desperate on record;
but that the great principle of public duty, on grounds purely
national, pervaded the army, is to be found in the official reports
of its loss; two thousand and fifty-eight men killed and one
thousand nine hundred and thirty-six wounded prove indelibly
that the troops of the Netherlands had their full share in the
honor of the day. The victory was cemented by the blood of the
Prince of Orange, who stood the brunt of the fight with his gallant
soldiers. His conduct was conformable to the character of his
whole race, and to his own reputation during a long series of
service with the British army in the Spanish peninsula. He stood
bravely at the head of his troops during the murderous conflict;
or, like Wellington, in whose school he was formed and whose
example was beside him, rode from rank to rank and column to
column, inspiring his men by the proofs of his untiring courage.

Several anecdotes are related of the prince's conduct throughout
the day. One is remarkable as affording an example of those pithy
epigrams of the battlefield with which history abounds, accompanied
by an act that speaks a fine knowledge of the soldier's heart. On
occasion of one peculiarly desperate charge, the prince, hurried
on by his ardor, was actually in the midst of the French, and was
in the greatest danger; when a Belgian battalion rushed forward,
and, after a fierce struggle, repulsed the enemy and disengaged the
prince. In the impulse of his admiration and gratitude, he tore
from his breast one of those decorations gained by his own conduct
on some preceding occasion, and flung it among the battalion,
calling out, "Take it, take it, my lads! you have all earned it!"
This decoration was immediately grappled for, and tied to the
regimental standard, amid loud shouts of "Long live the prince!"
and vows to defend the trophy, in the very utterance of which
many a brave fellow received the stroke of death.

A short time afterward, and just half an hour before that terrible
charge of the whole line, which decided the victory, the prince
was struck by a musket-ball in the left shoulder. He was carried
from the field, and conveyed