With peculiar propriety may it be said of the illustrious WELLINGTON, that he personified, as he ever has done, the pure ideal of the British soldier--the true character of his own followers. Resolute, yet cool, cautious and calculating in his proceedings; possessing a natural courage unshaken even under the most appalling dangers and difficulties; placing great yet not vain reliance upon physical and moral strength, as opposed to the force of numbers;--it was not surprising that he should have inspired with unbounded confidence, soldiers who could not but see in his character and conduct the reflection and stamp of their own qualities, the worth of which he so well knew, and which he had so often proved during the arduous struggle that had been brought to so brilliant and so glorious a conclusion. But besides these traits in his character, which so completely identified him with a British Army, there were others which peculiarly distinguished him as one of the greatest Captains that his own or any other nation ever produced, and which might well inspire confidence as to the result of the approaching contest, even opposed as he was to the hero of a hundred fights, with whom he was now, for the first time, to measure swords. The eagle glance with which he detected the object of every hostile movement and the promptitude with which he decided upon, and carried into effect, the measures necessary to counteract the Enemy's efforts; the lightning-like rapidity with which he conducted his attacks, founded as they frequently were upon the instantaneously discovered errors of his opponents; the noble and unexampled presence of mind with which he surveyed the battlefield, and with which he gave his orders and instructions; unaffected by merely temporary success, unembarrassed by sudden difficulties, and undismayed by unexpected danger; the many proofs which his operations in the Peninsula had afforded of his accurate knowledge, just conception, and skilful discrimination, of the true principles of the Science of Strategy--all tended to point him out as the individual best fitted by his abilities, his experience, and his character, to head the military array assembled to decide the all-important question whether the Star of NAPOLEON was to regain the ascendant, or to set in darkness; whether his iron despotism was again to erect its mighty head, or to be now struck down and crushed--finally and effectually crushed. * * * * *