It was about five o’clock in the afternoon of the 1st of March, 1815, that Napoleon landed at Cannes, in the Gulf of Juan. From thence he proceeded toward Paris with his little army, then consisting only of 500 grenadiers, of the guard, 200 dragoons and one hundred Polish lancers; these last being without horses, were obliged to carry their saddles on their backs.

When between Mure and Vizele, Cambronne, who commanded the advance guard of forty grenadiers, met a battalion which had been sent from Grenoble to arrest their march. Colonel La Badoyere, who headed the battalion, refused to parley with Cambronne; upon which the Emperor, without hesitation, advanced alone; followed at some distance by 100 grenadiers with their arms reversed. There was profound silence until Napoleon had approached within a few paces, when he halted, and throwing open his surtout exclaimed, “If there be amongst you a soldier who would kill his general—his Emperor, let him do it now!—Here I am!” The cry of Vive l’Empereur burst instantaneously from every lip. Napoleon threw himself among them, and taking a veteran, covered with chevrons and medals, by the arm, said, “Speak honestly, old moustache, couldst thou have had the heart to kill thy Emperor?” The man dropped his ramrod into his piece to show that it was unloaded, and answered, “Judge if I could have done thee much harm,—all the rest are the same.”