We started yesterday morning at four o'clock from Namur. The whole road between Namur and Mons presents a fine, rich open country abounding in wheat, but not many trees. We stopped to breakfast at Fleurus, at an inn where there were some Prussian officers. One of them, a lieutenant in the 2nd West Prussian Regiment, had the kindness to conduct us to see the field of battle where the French under Jourdan defeated the Austrians in 1794. It is at a very short distance from the town; he explained the position of the two armies in a manner perfectly clear and satisfactory to us. The Prussian officers all seem very eager for the commencement of hostilities, and their only fear is now that all these mighty preparations will end in nothing; viz., either that the French people, alarmed at the magnitude of the preparations against them, will compel the Emperor Napoleon to abdicate, or that the Allies will grow cool and, under the influence of Austria, bring about a negotiation which may end in a recognition of the Imperial title and dynasty. They would compound for a defeat at first, provided the war were likely to be prolonged. In the meantime, reinforcements continue to arrive daily for their army. We hear but little news of the intentions or movements of the other Allies; it being forbidden to enter into political discussions, it is difficult to ascertain the true state of affairs. We continued our journey through Charleroy and Binch to this place. At a small village between Binch and Mons we were stopped by a sentinel at a Prussian outpost and our passports demanded. Neither the sentinel, however, nor the sergeant, nor any of the soldiers present, could read or understand French, in which language the passport was drawn up; but the sergeant told me that the officers were in a house about a quarter of a mile distant and that he would conduct me thither, but that he himself could not presume to let us pass, from not knowing the tenor of our passport. I went accordingly with the sergeant to this house, There I found the officer commanding the piquet and several others sitting at table, carousing with beer and tobacco and nearly invisible from the clouds of smoke which pervaded the room. I explained to the officer who we were and requested him to put on the passport his _visa_ in the German language, so that the non-commissioned officers at the various posts through which we might pass would be able to understand it and let us pass without hindrance. This he did accordingly and we proceeded on our journey.