mies themselves cannot refuse it.

"Soldiers, though absent, I shall mark your steps. I know all the
corps; and no one of them can obtain a signal advantage over the
enemy, without my doing justice to the courage it displays. Both you
and I have been calumniated. Men not worthy to judge of your actions
have seen, in the proofs of attachment you have given me, a zeal, of
which I was the sole object: let your future successes teach them,
that it was your country you served more especially in obeying me; and
that, if I had any share in your affection, I owe it to my ardent love
for France, our common mother.

"Soldiers, yet a few efforts, and the coalition is dissolved. Napoleon
will know you by the blows you strike.

"Save the honour, the independence of France: continue to the end such
as I have known you these twenty years, and you will be invincible."

The Emperor, who perhaps had intended by this proclamation, to turn
the remembrance and concern of his ancient soldiers toward himself,
inquired after the effect it had produced. He was informed, as was the
truth, that it had not been published in the Moniteur, and that the
army knew nothing of it. He showed no mark of vexation or discontent,
and began to talk of the two chambers.

Since the abdication, the peers and deputies had rivalled each other,
in their zeal and endeavours, to put France into a state, to awe its
enemies at home and abroad.

They had declared the war national, and summoned all Frenchmen to
their common defence.

They had authorized the government, to make requisitions in kind, for
victualling the army, and the conveyance of subsistence.

To raise the conscription of 1815.

To suspend the laws respecting personal liberty; and to arrest, or
place under inspection, every person charged with exciting
disturbances, or conveying intelligence to the enemy.

In fine, they had voted it an immense credit, for defraying
provisionally the expense of equipping and paying the army.

The committee, on its part, took, and executed with indefatigable
care, every measure, that circumstances demanded. Its task, it must be
confessed, was as difficult as perilous. Never was a government placed
in similar circumstances. They required, at least in the majority of
its members, great courage, great devotion, great patriotism: they
required an heroic disregard of ease, of liberty, of life, to assume
the responsibility incurred by power, and by events, towards