Strategically, his operations had been characterized by unusual
brilliancy. If things went as he hoped, surmised and confidently
expected, all would be well. He was absolutely sure that Bluecher was
retiring to the east, toward Namur. He dispatched Grouchy with
thirty-five thousand of his best men to pursue him in the direction
which he supposed he had taken.

Napoleon's orders were positive, and he was accustomed to exact
implicit obedience from his subordinates. He had a habit of
discouraging independent action in the sternest of ways, and for the
elimination of this great force from the subsequent battle the Emperor
himself must accept the larger responsibility. But all this does not
excuse Grouchy. He carried out his orders faithfully, to be sure, but
a more enterprising and more independent commander would have sooner
discovered that he was pursuing stragglers and would earlier have taken
the right course to regain his touch with his chief and to harry the
Prussian Field-Marshal. He did turn to the north at last, but when the
great battle was joined he was miles away and of no more use than if he
had been in Egypt. His attack on the Prussian rear-guard at Wavre,
while it brought about a smart little battle with much hard and gallant
fighting, really amounted to nothing and had absolutely no bearing on
the settlement of the main issue elsewhere. He did not disobey orders,
but many a man has gained immortality and fame by doing that very
thing. Grouchy had his chance and failed to improve it. He was a
veteran and a successful soldier, too.

Comes the day of Waterloo. Bluecher had retreated north to Wavre and
was within supporting distance of Wellington. His army had been beaten
but not crushed, its spirit was not abated. The old Prussian Marshal,
badly bruised and shaken from being unhorsed and overridden in a
cavalry charge in which he had joined like a common trooper, but
himself again, promised in a famous interview between the two to come
to the support of the younger English Marshal, should he be attacked,
with his whole army. Wellington had retreated as far as he intended
to. He established his headquarters on a hill called Mont St. Jean,
back of a ridge near a village called Waterloo, where his army
commanded the junction point of the highroads to the south and west.
He drew up his lines, his red-coated countrymen and his blue-coated
allies on the long ridge in front of Mont St. Jean, facing