HOW TO GET STRONG
through your glass,' he said to his faithful Fitzroy Somerset. 'When they reach yonder copse, near the gap in the hills, wake me.' And wrapping himself in his cloak lay down behind a furze bush and was soon sound asleep. At the appointed moment he was aroused, refreshed and alert for the fight.
"'I have done, according to the very best of my judgment,' he once said, 'all that can be done; therefore I care not either for the enemy in front; nor for anything they may say at home.'
"He reached London on the 23d of June, immediately after Toulouse. He was the great hero of the hour. The mob dragged his carriage through the streets. He was the chosen honored companion of the allied sovereigns, just then the guests of England. Now he took his seat in the House of Lords—passing through every grade of the peerage at one and the same time—saluted in succession 'Baron,' 'Viscount,' 'Earl,' 'Marquis,' and 'Duke.' He received the thanks of the Commons, clad in the full dress of a Field - Marshal; and was presented with the noble gift of four hundred thousand pounds; last of all carried the sword of State at the public thanksgiving in St. Paul's.
"The startling news of Napoleon's return from Elba after the capitulation of Paris in 1814 was everywhere received with indignation and alarm. England, Russia, Austria, and Prussia bound themselves by solemn treaty to furnish each one hundred and fifty thousand men; and to remain under arms till the great object of the war had been attained. All eyes were turned on Wellington; and it is reported that the Czar Alexander said to him as he placed his hand familiarly upon his shoulder, 'C'est pour vous encore sauver le monde.' Vast preparations were at once set on foot. Austria slowly collected a gigantic host upon the Rhine frontier. Russia called out a quarter of a million men to act in support of Austria. England and Prussia, concentrating more rapidly, soon filled Belgium, 'the cock-pit of Europe,' with troops. By the end of May, Wellington had under his orders a mixed force of one hundred thousand men with one hundred and ninety-four guns. Marshal Blucher commanded an army of one hundred and twenty thousand, all Prussian, and with three hundred guns.…
"A keen judge of character, possessing an almost intuitive penetration, he reckoned men up quickly at their exact value.
"How true it is that in all military operations time is everything. In all great actions there is risk.
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