Brunswickers, headed by their cherished and chivalrous duke, who found Quatre-Bras to be his last battle field. Such foes occupied Ney: and Napoleon knew it not! Observe, Napoleon (who, according to French historians, could not err,) intrusting the fate of France to a flank movement by Ney, who was unable ultimately to hold his own position! He accuses Ney of having kept Reille’s and D’Erlon’s corps detached, saying, “Had he united them, not an Englishman would have escaped at Quatre-Bras;” and yet it was by Napoleon’s _own_ order, (in a pencilled note,) conveyed by colonel Laurent, that Ney was ordered to detach D’Erlon’s corps to St.-Amand! Laurent, falling in with the head of the column then marching on Frasnes, upon his own responsibility changed its direction. On inquiring for count D’Erlon, he was informed that, as was his habit, he had gone ahead to Frasnes, preceding his column. On his arrival at the latter place, Laurent found the general, and handed over to him the pencilled note, stating, at the same time, the position in which he might find the head of his column. At this time general Delcambre, chief of the staff of the 1st (D’Erlon’s) corps, went to acquaint the prince de la Moskowa of the change in the line of march. Ney, who was himself then hard pressed by Wellington, sent back Delcambre with peremptory orders to D’Erlon to march on Quatre-Bras: but _ere the order could reach_ him, he was close to St.-Amand, and consequently at too great a distance to return in time to render assistance to Ney. Could Ney therefore be made responsible for the absence of D’Erlon’s corps, its change of direction, or this assumed want of vigour consequent on either? It is evident from the tenor of the dispatch from Napoleon at two o’clock on the 16th, addressed to Ney at Gosselies, that Napoleon did not imagine that the marshal had left Gosselies _at that hour_, much less that he had attacked us. Where now was Ney’s delay when, with a _fraction_ of his force, (three divisions of Reille’s corps and Piré’s cavalry,) he attacked us at Quatre-Bras? This proves the fallacy of the assertions contained in the _Mémoires historiques de Napoléon_, and something perhaps stronger than fallacies in Gourgaud’s campaign of 1815. In these Ney is assailed for not attacking us _early_ in the morning of the 16th. We will not however leave the posthumous fame of the gallant Ney to be sacrificed to Imperial infallibility. We assert that Ney, on the 16th, did all at Quatre-Bras that circumstances warranted, and attempted more; we assert that if he failed in his attempt, (viz. of occupying Quatre-Bras,) his failure is to be, so far as Ney and his force are concerned, ascribed to British bayonets, and not to any want of skill, daring or rapidity on the part of Ney[87], or to any want of gallantry, or deadly devotion on the part of the brave troops of Reille, Piré and Kellermann.