In France Louis XVIII. was little better than a shadow upon a throne. The reaction that had set in against Napoleon at the time of his abdication had been altogether submerged by the impatience with which the French people regarded the deliberations of the Allies. The pride of France was touched, and the pride of France has ever soared very high. Like many another exile Napoleon by his absence attained a greater hold upon the imagination of his countrymen than he had ever possessed before. Those old soldiers who had been victorious under his standards were never tired of foretelling the time when the ‘Little Corporal’ would again return and sweep all the armies of the Allies before him like forest leaves. We may be perfectly sure that Napoleon was now, as always, in touch with the spirit of France, and that when he struck it was with everything as much in his favour as could be. On a dark March evening, when the British war-ships were riding at anchor, and no whisper of danger reached the watching sailors, he left Elba and set foot upon the shores of France. The news of his arrival sped like wildfire through every village of the south, and was flung from lip to lip until it reached Paris itself. The mere presence of Napoleon, without arms, without money, without anything to win back an Empire, sent Louis XVIII. scurrying into exile! It was a triumph indeed. But Napoleon was not foolish enough to ignore the apprehensions of the French people; whatever feelings were hidden within his own heart he stifled them for the moment under a pretence of peace. It was England who refused to discuss the situation on any terms. Napoleon was declared an outlaw and the enemy of Europe. As our countrymen pledged themselves a hundred years later to crush and overthrow Prussianism, so they pledged themselves then to fight until the danger was averted. The arrival of Napoleon had been so swift that it was quite impossible to assemble the Allies. The Austrian and Russian forces had to travel great distances, and only the Prussian army on the Rhine under Blücher, the English in Belgium under Wellington, with some Hanoverians, Belgians, and Dutch, were ready to withstand the swift onrush of the French.