Numbers of poor wounded Highlanders were patiently sitting in the streets, shaded from the powerful rays of the sun. We had a good deal of conversation with several of the privates of the 42nd and 92nd regiments, and their account of the battle was most simple and interesting. They seemed not to have the smallest pride in what they had done; but to consider it quite as a matter of course; they uttered not the smallest complaint, but rather made light of their sufferings, and there was nothing in their words or manner that looked as if they were sensible of having done anything in the least extraordinary; nothing that laid claim to pity, admiration, or glory. The carnage among the French, both on the 16th and 18th, in their encounter with the Highland regiments, was described to us as most dreadful. The cuirassiers, men and officers, horses and riders, were rolled in death, one upon another, after the British charge with the bayonet. In vain the French returned to the attack with furious valour and reinforced numbers. Their utmost efforts could make no impression on the impenetrable squares of the infantry, and the spiked wall of the British embattled bayonets; and when they retired from the ineffectual attack, the brave Highlanders, with loud cries of "Scotland for ever!" rushed among them, bore down all resistance, and scattered their legions like withered leaves before the blast of autumn. It is but justice to these gallant men to say, that it was not from themselves we heard this relation of their own deeds. _They_ could not be induced to speak of what they had done, but it was repeated on every side; it was the theme of every tongue. The love and admiration of the whole Belgic people for the Highlanders are most remarkable. Whenever they heard them mentioned, they exclaimed, "Ah! ces braves hommes! ces bons Ecossais! ils sont si doux--et si aimables--et dans la guerre!--ah! mon Dieu! comme ils sont terribles!" They never speak of them without some epithet of affection or admiration. Their merits are the darling topic of their private circles, and their figures the favourite signs of their public-houses; in short, they are the best of soldiers and of men, according to the Belgians--nothing was ever like them, and the idea they have of their valour is quite prodigious.[18]