2. Napoleon had already been crowned Emperor of France, and his amazing successes on the continent caused him to dream of Europe as an empire, with Napoleon as its emperor, and Paris as its capital. But there was one nation near his own doors that stood in his way, and whom he would fain have struck to the ground, had his arm been long enough to reach across "the silver streak." England might, perhaps, after the victory at Trafalgar, have held aloof from the strife which turned all Europe into a battle-field; she might, perhaps, have lived in ease and security in her island-home, and left the less-favoured nations on the continent to be trampled under the heel of the conqueror; but she nobly chose to stand forth and take the lion's share in the war against the tyrant. 3. Hence arose the Peninsular War which, with varying success, was persevered in for years as the most effectual way of draining the life-blood of France. That war was to France like a running sore. Napoleon sent his best generals, one after another, to put an end to the war by driving the British out of the country. To Marshal Soult he wrote, "You are to advance on the English, pursue them without ceasing, beat them and fling them into the sea. The English alone are formidable--they alone." But the English refused to be flung into the sea. On the contrary, it was the French that had, in the end, to take their flight homeward. 4. In the course of his seven campaigns in the Peninsula, Wellington found the tide of success ebb and flow. Sometimes he was able to advance and drive the enemy before him, sometimes he was compelled to retreat and stand on the defensive; but whether advancing or retiring he suffered no disaster, he lost no pitched battle. Much of Wellington's success was due to the solidity and steady discipline of his troops, still more perhaps to his own military skill and personal character. By patience and perseverance, by careful attention to details, by never letting a chance slip by, by never sparing himself, by making "duty" his watch-word; by such plain, homely virtues our Wellington fought and won. "Wellington dazzled no one," says a French writer, "but he beat us all the same." After being routed at Vittoria, in 1813, the French were compelled to beat a hasty retreat across the Pyrenees, and to seek safety in France. 5. In the meanwhile, Napoleon's great army of 400,000 men had perished in Russia, and in the retreat from the burning city of Moscow. Henceforth, Napoleon is like a hunted lion whom his enemies were gradually gathering round so as to cut off his retreat and encage him. At length, in 1814, the fallen emperor resigned his crown, and retired to the little island of Elba, which was to serve as his prison.