At the
table d'hote were a number of French officers belonging to the Gardes du
Corps. On entering into conversation with one of them, I found that he as
well as several others of them had served under Napoleon, and had even been
patronised and promoted by him; but I suppose that being the sons of the
ancient noblesse they thought that gratitude to a parvenu like him was
rather too plebeian a virtue. Some of them, however, with whom I conversed
after dinner seemed to regret the step they had taken. "If we are
successful," said they, "it can only be by means of the Allied Armies, and
who knows what conditions they may impose on France? If we should be
unsuccessful, we are exiled probably for life from our country." During
dinner, two pretty looking girls with musical instruments entered the hall,
and regaled our ears with singing some romances, among which were Dunois
le Troubadour and La Sentinelle. They sang with much taste and feeling.
I surmise this is not the only profession they exercise, if I might judge
from the doux yeux they occasionally directed to some of the officers.
These girls did not at least seem by their demeanour as if likely to incur
the anathema of Rinaldo in the Orlando Furioso:
meritamente muoro Una crudele,
but rather more disposed to
dar vita all'amator fidele.[3]
Alost is a neat, clean town or large village, and the same description will
serve for all the towns and villages in Brabant and Flanders, as they are
built on the same plan. We arrived at Bruxelles late in the evening and put
up at the Hotel d'Angleterre.
This morning, the General and myself went to pay our respects to the Gran
Capitano of the Holy League, and we left our cards. He is, I hear, very
confident of the result of the campaign, and no doubt he has for him the
prayers of all the pious in England against those atheistical fellows the
French; and these prayers will surely elicit a "host of angels" to come
down to aid in the destruction of the Pandemonium of Paris where Satan's
lieutenant sits enthroned. The reflecting people here are astonished that
Napoleon does not begin the attack. The inhabitants of Belgium are in
general, from all that I can hear or see, not at all pleased with the
present order of things, and they much lament the being severed from
France. The two people, the Belgians and Hollanders, do not seem to
amalgamate; and the former, though they render ample justice to the
moderation, good sense, and beneficent intentions of the present monarch,
who is personally respected by every one, yet do not disguise their wish to
be reunited to France and do not hesitate to avow their attachment to the
Emperor Napoleon. This union does not please the Hollanders either, on
other grounds.
