Out of chaos he produced order; a new Government was formed, a new army created: five days after his entry the Allied Sovereigns declared him an outlaw; on the 1st June he distributed Eagles to his troops, and took an oath of allegiance to the new Constitution. But Europe had meanwhile flown to arms, and 300,000 Austrians were to enter France by Switzerland and the Rhine; 200,000 Russians were marching on Alsace; Prussia had 236,000, half of whom were ready for action, so that, including our English 80,000, the Netherland contingent and the minor States of Germany, he had to face the onslaught of more than 1,000,000 men, with only 214,000 at his immediate command. England and Prussia were the first to arrive; it would be July before the others could reach the frontier, so, Napoleon, leaving armies of observation at various points, marched against Belgium, hoping to defeat Wellington and Blücher in time to turn about and face the storm clouds gathering in the east. * * * * * It was the month of June, and the weather was intensely warm. An army under Wellington, some 100,000 strong, including British, King’s German Legion, Hanoverian, Brunswick, Dutch, Belgian, and Nassau troops, was distributed in cantonments from the Scheldt to the Charleroi _chaussée_. It was a heterogeneous force, hastily got together, and a large proportion of it by no means to be depended upon. Of the British regiments, many were formed of weak second and third battalions which had never been under fire, and nearly 800 militiamen fought in the ranks of the 3rd Guards and 42nd Highlanders, those in the Guards actually wearing their Surrey jackets. Blücher’s force, seasoned veterans for the most part, lay in four separate corps on the frontier south of Brussels, and so masterly were Napoleon’s movements, that until the lights of his bivouac fires were suddenly seen glowing redly in the darkness beyond Charleroi, no one knew exactly where he was. * * * * * Brussels swarmed with fashionable folk, and the families of officers who were with the army. [Illustration: THE FARM OF QUATRE BRAS.] The Duchess of Richmond gave a ball on the night of the 15th June, the list of invited guests being curious, and not a little melancholy. Among the two hundred odd names we read those of Wellington, Uxbridge, and Hussey Vivian; two Ponsonbys, one of whom was to die three days later; Hay, the handsome lad who had won a sweepstake at Grammont the Tuesday before, and whose young life ebbed out on the Friday at Quatre Bras; Cameron, of Fassifern, who also fell there; Dick of the 42nd, killed at Sobraon in ’46; and _aide-de-camp_ Cathcart, who lived till Inkerman, where a ball and three bayonet thrusts closed his strange career. These and many others of more or less note danced in the long, low-roofed, barn-like room which His Grace of Richmond had hired for the occasion from his neighbour, Van Asch, the coachbuilder.