They recollected that Napoleon had ruled as the master of Madrid, of Lisbon, of Munich, of Warsaw, of Hamburgh, of Berlin, of Vienna, of Milan, of Amsterdam, of Rome, of Moscow, of Cairo.
Some recalled the memory of the day of Lodi. They saw him standing on the bridge re-animating his dispirited followers, defying danger and death whilst he waved the national flag, and drove the enemy from their entrenchments, and blasted their glory. Others pointed him out whilst crossing the perpetual snows and yawning chasms of Mount St. Bernard, and then victorious on the plains of Marengo, where he won that battle which insured the peace and glory of the country.
Austerlitz had its chroniclers, who described Napoleon as he fell with the rapidity and violence of the thunderbolt on the battalions of the Austrian and the Russian, and when he afforded to those trembling monarchs an example of magnanimity which they knew not how to imitate when generosity became their duty. Nor did his enthusiastic advocates omit the field of Jena, where his victorious ensigns chased the flying troops of Frederic, who, deceived by their recollections, yet held themselves to be the paragons of military worth. They retraced his paths amidst the burning sands of Egypt, amidst the icy wastes of Muscovy; and in either region Napoleon supported fire and frost without ostentation, and taught resignation and endurance to his soldiers by his unshaken constancy.
More recent and more painful victories contributed equally to endear him. They saw Napoleon in Champagne, when his veteran army scarcely equalled one of the numerous divisions of the enemy. At the head of his scanty troops he watched, and avoided, and surprised the Austrians, the Russians, and the Prussians: wounding them on all sides by his victorious weapons, and with such promptitude, that he seemed to have bestowed wings upon iron and death. They placed him at Arcis sur Aube, advancing before his squadrons, and rushing forward to meet the balls and bullets of the enemy; for he sought to sacrifice on the field of battle that life, which he foresaw he could no longer dedicate on the throne, to the glory and prosperity of the nation.
In short, generals, officers, and soldiers, all vied with each other in calling to mind the marches, the sieges, the conflicts, the attacks, the days, which had immortalized their general[24]; and is there a heart amongst us which does not beat higher at these recollections?