“But he was no sooner gone, than an officer bringing up some troops, and happening to halt where I lay, stooped down, and addressing me, said, he feared I was badly wounded. I answered that I was, and expressed a wish to be moved to the rear. He said it was against orders, to remove even their own men; but that, if they gained the day, (and he understood that the duke of Wellington was killed, and that six of our battalions had surrendered,) every attention in his power should be shown me. I complained of thirst, and he held his brandy bottle to my lips, directing one of his soldiers to lay me straight on my side, and place a knapsack under my head: they then passed on into action, soon perhaps to want, though not to receive, the same assistance; and I shall never know to whose generosity I was indebted, as I believe, for my life. “By and by, another skirmisher came up, a fine young man, full of ardour, loading and firing: he knelt down and fired over me many times, conversing with me very gaily all the while: at last he ran off, saying, ‘_Vous serez bien aise d’apprendre que nous allons nous retirer. Bonjour, mon ami._’ (‘You will be pleased to learn that we are going to fall back. Good day, my friend.’) It was dusk, when two squadrons of Prussian cavalry crossed the valley in full trot, lifting me from the ground, and tumbling me about cruelly. “The battle was now over, and the groans of the wounded all around me, became more and more audible: I thought the night never would end. About this time, I found a soldier lying across my legs, and his weight, his convulsive motions, his noises, and the air issuing through a wound in his side, distressed me greatly; the last circumstance most of all, as I had a wound of the same nature myself. It was not a dark night, and the Prussians were wandering about to plunder: many of them stopped to look at me as they passed; at last one of them stopped to examine me: I told him that I was a British officer, and had been already plundered. He did not however desist, and pulled me about roughly. “An hour before midnight, I saw a man in an English uniform, coming towards me; he was, I suspected, on the same errand. I spoke instantly, telling him who I was: he belonged to the 40th, and had missed his regiment. He released me from the dying soldier, took up a sword, and stood over me as sentinel. Day broke, and at six o’clock in the morning a messenger was sent to Hervé: a cart came for me, and I was conveyed to the village of Waterloo, and laid in the bed, as I afterwards understood, from which Gordon had but just before been carried out. I had received seven wounds; a surgeon slept in my room, and I was saved by excessive bleeding.” _Related by an officer._