The life of Europe was centered in one man; all were trying to fill their
lungs with the air which he had breathed. Every year France presented
that man with three hundred thousand of her youth; it was the tax paid to
Caesar, and, without that troop behind him, he could not follow his
fortune. It was the escort he needed that he might traverse the world,
and then perish in a little valley in a deserted island, under the
weeping willow.
Never had there been so many sleepless nights as in the time of that man;
never had there been seen, hanging over the ramparts of the cities, such
a nation of desolate mothers; never was there such a silence about those
who spoke of death. And yet there was never such joy, such life, such
fanfares of war, in all hearts. Never was there such pure sunlight as
that which dried all this blood. God made the sun for this man, they
said, and they called it the Sun of Austerlitz. But he made this sunlight
himself with his ever-thundering cannons which dispelled all clouds but
those which succeed the day of battle.
It was this air of the spotless sky, where shone so much glory, where
glistened so many swords, that the youth of the time breathed. They well
knew that they were destined to the hecatomb; but they regarded Murat as
invulnerable, and the emperor had been seen to cross a bridge where so
many bullets whistled that they wondered if he could die.
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