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They crossed the road obliquely and went down into the valley between Hougoumont and Haie-Sainte. I saw that they were going to attack the squares of the English, and that our fate was to be decided. We could hear the voices of the English artillery officers, giving their orders, above the tumult and the innumerable shouts of "Vive l'Empereur."
At the end of a second he pointed toward Haie-Sainte with his sword, and exclaimed: "We are going to take that, you will have the whole at once, it is the turning-point of the battle. I am going to lead you myself. Battalions by file to the left!" We started at a quick step on the road, marching by companies in three ranks. I was in the second.
This displeased Wellington. After the taking of La Haie-Sainte the battle wavered. There is in this day an obscure interval, from mid-day to four o'clock; the middle portion of this battle is almost indistinct, and participates in the sombreness of the hand-to-hand conflict. Twilight reigns over it.
Now you can all see the position of the English on our front, the road to Brussels which traversed it, the cross-road which covered it, the plateau in the rear where the reserves were, and the three farms, Hougoumont, Haie-Sainte, and Papelotte in front, well garrisoned. You can all see that it would be very difficult to force.
Of course the English had filled it with troops like a sort of demilune, but if we could take it we should be close to their centre and could throw our attacking columns upon them, without remaining long under their fire. Nothing could be better for us. This place was called Haie-Sainte, as we found out afterward.
Mont-Saint-Jean was cannonaded, Hougomont was burned, La Haie-Sainte was taken by assault, Papelotte was burned, Plancenoit was burned, La Belle-Alliance beheld the embrace of the two conquerors; these names are hardly known, and Waterloo, which worked not in the battle, bears off all the honor.
These were all that remained of the two battalions of Nassau troops which were intrusted with the defence of Haie-Sainte.
And for centuries, until this war came, they had endured. After the battle of Waterloo some of these stone farmhouses found themselves famous. In them Napoleon or Wellington had spread his maps or set up his cot, and until this war the farmhouses of Mont-Saint-Jean, of Caillou, of Haie-Sainte, of the Belle-Alliance remained as they were on the day of the great battle a hundred years ago.
Thanks to the thousands upon thousands of cartloads of earth employed in the hillock one hundred and fifty feet in height and half a mile in circumference, the plateau of Mont-Saint-Jean is now accessible by an easy slope. On the day of battle, particularly on the side of La Haie-Sainte, it was abrupt and difficult of approach.
At the very moment when the English had captured from the French the flag of the 105th of the line, the French had killed the English general, Picton, with a bullet through the head. The battle had, for Wellington, two bases of action, Hougomont and La Haie-Sainte; Hougomont still held out, but was on fire; La Haie-Sainte was taken.
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