The story of d’Erlon’s charge has been often told.[708] How the soldiers of the unfortunate brigade of Bylandt, utterly unable, as they were, after having been exposed to the fire of the great battery for an hour and a half, to resist alone the impact of such an enormous force, broke in confusion and fell to the rear amid the undeserved curses of their English allies;[709] how the French in their unwieldy masses pressed forward to the crest of the ridge to receive the fire at short range of the brigades of Pack and Kempt, which only the leading battalions were able, owing to the faulty formation of the columns, to return at all; and how, when staggered by the fire, and while endeavoring to disengage their closely following ranks, Ponsonby’s brigade of heavy cavalry charged them furiously, riding down between the columns, throwing them into confusion, cutting down the exposed foot-soldiers, capturing two eagles, and many prisoners, disabling some 15 guns, and forcing the three left columns to fall back in disorder,—all this is familiar to all readers of the story of Waterloo. It is difficult to find a parallel to this clumsily executed movement of d’Erlon’s. At the same time, faulty as the formation of the columns was, the troops got actually on the crest of the British position; and had there been any timidity or hesitation on the part of their adversaries, the columns would undoubtedly have forced their way through the British line. But the necessary time was not allowed them. Sir Thomas Picton was alive to the danger; he was prompt to seize the opportunity; his troops by their close and deadly fire threw the heads of the columns into confusion, and then charged them with the bayonet. Lord Uxbridge, who commanded the cavalry, rode over from his own position on the other side of the turnpike, and ordered Ponsonby to charge. He then returned to lead Somerset’s cavalry brigade in a successful charge on the west of the pike. The whole affair was a great and deserved success for the English. Their cavalry, however, was very severely handled on returning to its original positions. Shortly before d’Erlon moved out, Napoleon had seen a body of troops on the heights of St. Lambert, far off on his right. It was soon ascertained that they were Prussians. He then sent off the 1 P.M. order to Grouchy.[710] By the time that the unfortunate charge of the 1st Corps had resulted in the repulse narrated above, certainly before 3 P.M., Napoleon had decided that he must employ the 6th Corps in resisting the Prussians, and not in supporting the 1st Corps in further operations against the English, as he had originally intended to do. But whatever shape the next movement might assume, the first thing to be done was evidently to carry the farmhouse of La Haye Sainte, which had just been unsuccessfully attempted.