In spite of the rain which continued to fall and our great fatigue, we could talk of nothing but this terrible campaign. I related the story of the battle of Waterloo, and he told me that the 4th battalion on leaving Fleurus had taken the route toward Wavre with the whole of Grouchy's corps, and that in the afternoon of the next day, the 18th, they heard the cannon on their left and that they all wanted to go in that direction, even the generals, but the marshal having received positive orders, had continued on the route to Wavre. It was between six and seven o'clock, before they were convinced that the Prussians had escaped; then they changed their course to the left in order to rejoin the Emperor, but unfortunately, it was too late, and toward midnight they were obliged to take a position in the fields. Each battalion formed in a square. At three o'clock in the morning the cannon of the Prussians had awakened the bivouacs, and they had skirmished until two o'clock in the afternoon, when the order to retreat reached them. Again, Martin said they were too late, for a part of the enemy's force which had been engaged with that of the Emperor, was in their rear, and they were obliged to march all the rest of that day and the night following in order to escape from their pursuers. At six o'clock the battalion had taken a position near the village of Temploux, and at ten the Prussians came up in superior force. They opposed them in the most vigorous manner in order to give the baggage and artillery time to get over the bridge at Namur. Fortunately the whole army corps had escaped from the village except the 4th battalion which, through a mistake of the commandant, had turned off the road at the left, and was obliged to throw itself into the Sambre in order to escape being cut off. Some of the men were taken prisoners and some were drowned in trying to swim across the river. This was all that Martin told me; he had no news from home. That same day we passed through Givet; the battalion bivouacked near the village of Hierches half a league farther on. The next day we passed through Fumay and Rocroy, and slept at Bourg-Fideles, the 23d of June at Blombay, the 24th at Saulsse-Lenoy--where we heard of the abdication of the Emperor--and the days following at Vitry, near Rheims, at Jonchery, and at Soissons. From there the battalion took the route toward Ville-Cotterets, but the enemy was already before us, and we changed our course to Ferte-Milon, and bivouacked at Neuchelles, a village destroyed by the invasion of 1814, and which had not yet been rebuilt. We left that place on the 29th, about one o'clock in the morning, passing through Meaux. Here we were obliged to take the road to Laguy, because the Prussians occupied that which led to Claye. We marched all that day and the night following. On the 30th, at five in the morning, we were at the bridge of Saint-Maur.