Napoleon said, and it cannot be seriously disputed, that the heavy cavalry of the Guard, the division of Guyot, went in without his orders. Whether Ney ordered it in is, however, doubtful. His chief-of-staff, Colonel Heymès, denies that he did. He says that the cavalry of the Guard went in of its own accord. (Doc. Inéd., pp. 16, 17.) At any rate, it was a great mistake, whoever committed it, as all the authorities freely say. It destroyed the last cavalry-reserve of the army. While these operations were going on in front, Napoleon was personally superintending the desperate and gallant fight made by the two divisions of the 6th Corps under Lobau against Bülow’s advance. The two leading divisions of the IVth Corps, which moved out about 4.30 P.M., were easily checked at first; but they rallied, and were reinforced by the rest of the corps; and, between 5 and 6 P.M., Lobau was driven back, and Planchenoit itself was threatened. The Emperor was obliged to put in the Young Guard, which, with three batteries, occupied Planchenoit, while the 6th Corps extended on its left so as to connect with the right of the 1st Corps. But the Prussians drove the Young Guard out of the village; and the Emperor had to order in three battalions of the Old and Middle Guard with two batteries. These troops, gallantly supported by the Young Guard, retook the town, and the Prussians fell back some distance. Napoleon then seems to have thought that the attack of the Prussians was exhausted. It was nearly seven o’clock.[717] In this action the fighting on both sides was very obstinate. The French troops were superior in point of experience to those of Bülow,—those of the 6th Corps were led by a very able officer, Lobau, and the regiments of the Guard were the _élite_ of the army. Hence, though much inferior in numbers, they obtained this success, which under other circumstances, would have been decisive. But in this case their enemies had reinforcements at hand. Pirch I., at the head of the IId Corps, was only two miles in rear. This, however, Napoleon of course could not know. Hence, thinking that the danger from the Prussians was practically over, he hastened towards the front, where for the last hour, ever since the conclusion of the cavalry attacks, the battle had languished. It had in fact consisted during this period only of a general skirmish firing along the centre of the English position to the west of the Brussels pike, the result of which, however, was, undoubtedly, to weaken perceptibly the strength and _moral_ of the allied troops. This part of the English line was in fact in a bad way at this period of the battle.[718] As Sir James Shaw-Kennedy, who was on this part of the line on the staff of the 3d division, says:—[719]