It is not in the presence of the enemy that differences in the manner and
bearing of soldiers can be remarked, for the requirements of the service
completely engross both the ideas and time of officers, whatever their
grade, and uniformity of occupation produces also a kind of uniformity of
habit and character; but, in the monotonous life of the camp, differences
due to nature and education reassert themselves. I noted this many times
after the truces and treaties of peace which crowned the most glorious
campaigns of the Emperor, and had occasion to renew my observations on
this point during the long sojourn which we made at Schoenbrunn with the
army. Military tone in the army is a most difficult thing to define, and
differs according to rank, time of service, and kind of service; and
there are no genuine soldiers except those who form part of the line, or
who command it. In the soldiers' opinion, the Prince de Neuchatel and
his brilliant staff, the grand marshal, Generals Bertrand, Bacler d'Albe,
etc., were only men of the cabinet council, whose experience might be of
some use in such deliberations, but to whom bravery was not
indispensable.
The chief generals, such as Prince Eugene, Marshals Oudinot, Davoust,
Bessieres, and his Majesty's aides-decamp, Rapp, Lebrun, Lauriston,
Mouton, etc., were exceedingly affable, and every one was most politely
received by them; their dignity never became haughtiness, nor their ease
an excessive familiarity, though their manners were at all times slightly
tinged by the austerity inseparable from the character of a warrior.
This was not the idea held in the army in regard to a few of the ordnance
and staff officers (aides-de-camp); for, while according them all the
consideration due both to their education and their courage, they called
them the jay-birds of the army; receiving favors which others deserved;
obtaining cordons and promotions for carrying a few letters into camp,
often without having even seen the enemy; insulting by their luxury the
modest temperance of the braver officers; and more foppish in the midst
of their battalions than in the boudoirs of their mistresses. The
silver-gilt box of one of these gentlemen was a complete portable
dressing-case, and contained, instead of cartridges, essence bottles,
brushes, a mirror, a tongue-scraper, a shell-comb, and--I do not know
that it lacked even a pot of rouge. It could not be said that they were
not brave, for they would allow themselves to be killed for a glance;
but they were very, rarely exposed to danger. Foreigners would be right
in maintaining the assertion that the French soldier is frivolous,
presumptuous, impertinent, and immoral, if they formed their judgment
alone from these officers by courtesy, who, in place of study and
faithful service, had often no other title to their rank than the merit
of having emigrated.
The officers of the line, who had served in several campaigns and had
gained their epaulettes on the field of battle, held a very different
position in the army. Always grave, polite, and considerate, there was a
kind of fraternity among them; and having known suffering and misery
themselves, they were always ready to help others; and their
conversation, though not distinguished by brilliant information, was
often full of interest. In nearly every case boasting quitted them with
their youth, and the bravest were always the most modest. Influenced by
no imaginary points of honor, they estimated themselves at their real
worth; and all fear of being suspected of cowardice was beneath them.
With these brave soldiers, who often united to the greatest kindness of
heart a mettle no less great, a flat contradiction or even a little hasty
abuse from one of their brothers in arms was not obliged to be washed out
in blood; and examples of the moderation which true courage alone has a
right to show were not rare in the army. Those who cared least for
money, and were most generous, were most exposed, the artillerymen and
the hussars, for instance. At Wagram I saw a lieutenant pay a louis for
a bottle of brandy, and immediately divide it among the soldiers of his
company; and brave officers often formed such an attachment to their
regiment, especially if it had distinguished itself, that they sometimes
refused promotion rather than be separated from their children, as they
called them. In them we behold the true model of the French soldier; and
it is this kindness, mingled with the austerity of a warrior, this
attachment of the chief to the soldier, which the latter is so capable of
appreciating, and an impregnable honor, which serve to distinguish our
soldiers from all others, and not, as foreigners think, presumption,
braggadocio, and libertinage, which latter are ever the characteristics
of the parasites of glory alone.
In the camp of Lobau on the evening before the battle of Wagram, the
Emperor, as he was walking outside his tent, stopped a moment watching
the grenadiers of his guard who were breakfasting. "Well, my children,
what do you think of the wine?"--"It will not make us tipsy, Sire; there
is our cellar," said a soldier pointing to the Danube. The Emperor, who
had ordered a bottle of good wine to be distributed to each soldier, was
surprised to see that they were so abstemious the evening before a
battle. He inquired of the Prince de Neuchatel the cause of this; and
upon investigation, it was learned that two storekeepers and an employee
in the commissary department had sold forty thousand bottles of the wine
which the Emperor had ordered to be distributed, and had replaced it with
some of inferior quality. This wine had been seized by the Imperial
Guard in a rich abbey, and was valued at thirty thousand florins. The
culprits were arrested, tried, and condemned to death.
There was in the camp at Lobau a dog which I think all the army knew by
the name of corps-de-garde. He was old, emaciated, and ugly; but his
moral qualities caused his exterior defects to be quickly lost sight of.
He was sometimes called the brave dog of the Empire; since he had
received a bayonet stroke at Marengo, and had a paw broken by a gun at
Austerlitz, being at that time attached to a regiment of dragoons. He
had no master. He was in the habit of attaching himself to a corps, and
continuing faithful so long as they fed him well and did not beat him.
A kick or a blow with the flat of a sword would cause him to desert this
regiment, and pass on to another. He was unusually intelligent; and
whatever position of the corps in which he might be the was serving, he
did not abandon it, or confound it with any other, and in the thickest of
the fight was always near the banner he had chosen; and if in the camp he
met a soldier from the regiment he had deserted, he would droop his ears,
drop his tail between his legs, and scamper off quickly to rejoin his new
brothers in arms. When his regiment was on the march he circled as a
scout all around it, and gave warning by a bark if he found anything
unusual, thus on more than one occasion saving his comrades from ambush.
Among the officers who perished at the battle of Wagram, or rather in a
small engagement which took place after the battle had ended, one of
those most regretted by the soldiers was General Oudet. He was one of
the bravest generals of the army; but what brings his name especially to
mind, among all those whom the army lost on that memorable day, is a note
which I have preserved of a conversation I held several years after this
battle with an excellent officer who was one of my sincerest friends.
In a conversation with Lieutenant-colonel B---- in 1812, he remarked, "I
must tell you, my dear Constant, of a strange adventure which happened to
me at Wagram. I did not tell you at the time, because I had promised to
be silent; but since at the present time no one can be compromised by my
indiscretion, and since those who then had most to fear if their singular
ideas (for I can call them by no other name) had been revealed, would now
be first to laugh at them, I can well inform you of the mysterious
discovery I made at that period.
"You well know that I was much attached to poor F---- whom we so much
regretted; and he was one of our most popular and attractive officers,
his good qualities winning the hearts of all, especially of those who
like himself had an unfailing fund of frankness and good humor. All at
once I noticed a great change in his manner, as well as in that of his
habitual companions; they appeared gloomy, and met together no more for
gay conversation, but on the contrary spoke in low tones and with an air
of mystery. More than once this sudden change had struck me; and if by
chance I met them in retired places, instead of receiving me cordially as
had always been their custom, they seemed as if trying to avoid me. At
last, weary of this inexplicable mystery, I took F---- aside, and asked
him what this strange conduct meant. 'You have forestalled me, my dear
friend,' said he. 'I was on the point of making an important disclosure;
I trust you will not accuse me of want of confidence, but swear to me
before I confide in you that you will tell no living soul what I am now
going to reveal.' When I had taken this oath, which he demanded of me in
a tone of gravity which surprised me inexpressibly, he continued, 'If I
have not already told you of the 'Philadelphi', it is only because I knew
that reasons which I respect would prevent your ever joining them; but
since you have asked this secret, it would be a want of confidence in
you, and at the same time perhaps an imprudence, not to reveal it. Some
patriots have united themselves under the title of 'Philadelphi', in
order to save our country from the dangers to which it is exposed. The
Emperor Napoleon has tarnished the glory of the First Consul Bonaparte;
he had saved our liberty, but he has since destroyed it by the
reestablishment of the nobility and by the Concordat. The society of the
'Philadelphi' has as yet no well-defined plans for preventing the evils
with which ambition will continue to overwhelm France; but when peace is
restored we shall see if it is impossible to force Bonaparte to restore
republican institutions, and meanwhile we are overcome by grief and
despair. The brave chief of the 'Philadelphi', the pure Oudet, has been
assassinated, and who is worthy to take his place? Poor Oudet! never
was one braver or more eloquent than he! With a noble haughtiness and an
immovable firmness of character, he possessed an excellent heart. His
first battle showed his intrepid spirit. When cut down at Saint
Bartholomew by a ball, his comrades wished to bear him away, "No, no,"
cried he; "don't waste time over me. The Spaniards! the Spaniards!"--
"Shall we leave you to the enemy?" said one of those who had advanced
towards him. "Well, drive them back if you do not wish me to be left
with them." At the beginning of the campaign of Wagram, he was colonel
of the Ninth regiment of the line, and was made general of brigade on the
evening before the battle, his corps forming part of the left wing
commanded by Massena. Our line was broken on this side for a moment, and
Oudet made heroic efforts to reform it; and after he had been wounded by
three bayonet strokes, with the loss of much blood, and dragged away by
those of us who were forced to fall back, still had himself fastened on
his horse in order that he might not be forced to leave the battlefield.
"'After the battle, he received orders to advance to the front, and to
place himself with his regiment in an advantageous position for
observation, and then return immediately to headquarters, with a certain
number of his officers, to receive new orders. He executed these orders,
and was returning in the night, when a discharge of musketry was suddenly
heard, and he fell into an ambush; he fought furiously in the darkness,
knowing neither the number nor character of his adversaries, and at break
of day was found, covered with wounds, in the midst of twenty officers
who had been slain around him. He was still breathing, and lived three
days; but the only words he pronounced were those of commiseration for
the fate of his country. When his body was taken from the hospital to
prepare it for burial, several of the wounded in their despair tore the
bandages from their wounds, a sergeant-major threw himself on his sword
near the grave, and a lieutenant there blew out his brains. Behold,'
said F----, 'a death that plunges us into the deepest despair!' I tried
to prove to him that he was mistaken, and that the plans of the
'Philadelphi' were mad, but succeeded very imperfectly; and though he
listened to my advice, he again earnestly recommended secrecy."
The day after the battle of Wagram, I think, a large number of officers
were breakfasting near the Emperor's tent, the generals seated on the
grass, and the officers standing around them. They discussed the battle
at length, and related numerous remarkable anecdotes, some of which
remain engraven on my memory. A staff-officer of his Majesty said, "I
thought I had lost my finest horse. As I had ridden him on the 5th and
wished him to rest, I gave him to my servant to hold by the bridle; and
when he left him one moment to attend to his own, the horse was stolen in
a flash by a dragoon, who instantly sold him to a dismounted captain,
telling him he was a captured horse. I recognized him in the ranks, and
claimed him, proving by my saddle-bags and their contents that he was not
a horse taken from the Austrians, and had to repay the captain the five
louis which he had paid to the dragoon for this horse which had cost me
sixty."
The best anecdote, perhaps, of the day was this: M. Salsdorf, a Saxon,
and surgeon in Prince Christian's regiment, in the beginning of the
battle had his leg fractured by a shell. Lying on the ground, he saw,
fifteen paces from him, M. Amedee de Kerbourg, who was wounded by a
bullet, and vomiting blood. He saw that this officer would die of
apoplexy if something was not done for him, and collecting all his
strength, dragged himself along in the dust, bled him, and saved his
life.
M. de Kerbourg had no opportunity to embrace the one who had saved his
life; for M. de Salsdorf was carried to Vienna, and only survived the
amputation four days.