Nothing had been seen of the enemy for many days. Canrobert was furious, but he said nothing, and ordered his officers to remain silent. He rode to Woippy, saw his troops, and returned to the Emperor. His Majesty, bombarded by telegrams from the Empress and Palikao, gave way. By half-past two o’clock that day Lebœuf had ceased to be Major-General, and Bazaine was Commander-in-Chief of the French army, vice Napoleon III., resigned!
Canrobert saw at the Metz Préfecture the ghost of an Emperor. Overwhelmed, pale as death, seated at a large table, Napoleon held in one hand a pocket-handkerchief, with which he continually wiped his mouth. Either he had had a nephritic attack or had taken an over-dose of extrait thébaïgne; for he was inert.
Canrobert left Lebœuf, Bazaine, and the Emperor together at the Préfecture. The Emperor never told anyone what Bazaine and he had discussed. General Lebrun has put it on record that the Emperor told Bazaine he wished the army to retreat, and that Bazaine made no reply. In the evening Napoleon wrote to Bazaine: “See what can be done, and if we are not attacked to-morrow we will come to a decision.”
Marshal Bazaine, tried by a court-martial--presided over by H.R.H. the Duc d’Aumale--for dereliction of duty, was found guilty, deprived of his military rank, and sentenced to imprisonment for life. I doubt very much whether the guilt or innocence of Bazaine will ever be satisfactorily established. The temper of the French people at the time of his trial required a victim, and he was freely offered up by his companions-in-arms on the altar of National Vanity. Nothing throughout the war was more remarkable than the discussions, the rivalries, the petty jealousies, which characterized the relations of Napoleon’s Marshals and Generals. A friend of mine who was at Metz in the early period of the war assured me that he had never seen anything more pitiable than the look of sheer despondency which he saw on the Emperor’s face as he sat presiding at a council of war, and listening to the noisy and even brutal recriminations of one General after another as he rose to defend his own movements, or attack the tactics of a brother officer. Naturally, Bazaine had few friends among the Commanders of Corps. They were only too glad to be able to point to his retirement on Metz, and his subsequent surrender, as the proximate causes of the overthrow of the French army. Each one felt his military honour less seriously impeached when the court-martial ordered Bazaine’s name to be struck off the roll of the Legion of Honour.