It was because he had received, not indeed from his immediate superior, Ney himself, _but through a command of Napoleon's, which he knew to be addressed to Ney_, the order to do so. When Erlon had almost reached Napoleon he turned his army corps right about face and led it off back again towards Ney. Why did he do that? It was because he had received at that moment _a further peremptory order from Ney, his direct superior, to act in this fashion_. Such is the simple and common-sense explanation of the motives under which this fatal move and countermove, with its futile going and coming, with its apparent indecision, with its real strictness of military discipline, was conducted. As far as Erlon is concerned, it was no more than the continual obedience of orders, or supposed orders, to which a soldier is bound. With Ney's responsibility I shall deal in a moment. Let me first make the matter plainer, if I can, by an illustration. Fire breaks out in a rick near a farmer's house and at the same time in a barn half a mile away. The farmer sends ten men with water-buckets and an engine to put out the fire at the barn, while he himself, with another ten men, but without an engine, attends to the rick. He gives to his foreman, who is looking after the barn fire, the task of giving orders to the engine, and the man at the engine is told to look to the foreman and no one else for his orders. The foreman is known to be of the greatest authority with his master. Hardly has the farmer given all these instructions when he finds that the fire in the rick has spread to his house. He lets the barn go hang, and sends a messenger to the foreman with an urgent note to send back the engine at once to the house and rick. The messenger finds the man with the engine on his way to the barn, intercepts him, and tells him that the farmer has sent orders to the foreman that the engine is to go back at once to the house. The fellow turns round with his engine and is making his way towards the house when another messenger comes posthaste _from the foreman direct_, telling him at all costs to bring the engine back to the barn. The man with the engine turns once more, abandons the house, but cannot reach the barn in time to save it. The result of the shilly-shally is that the barn is burnt down, and the fire at the farmer's house only put out after it has done grave damage. The farmer is Napoleon. His rick and house are Ligny. The foreman is Ney, and the barn is Quatre Bras. The man with the engine is Erlon, and the engine is Erlon's command--the First Corps d'Armée. There was no question of _contradictory_ orders in Erlon's mind, as many historians seem to imagine; there was simply, from Erlon's standpoint, a _countermanded_ order.