He seems to have been educated with more care than is common with youths of his humble condition, as, at thirteen years of age, we find him employed in the office of a public notary. But this sedentary life was but ill suited to his habits; and after some time he ran off and enlisted into a regiment of hussars. In this congenial sphere, his activity and boldness were soon rewarded: at the battles of Nerwinde, Louvain, Valenciennes, and Grand Prés, his distinguished himself so highly that he was rapidly promoted through the subordinate ranks; in 1793 he was made lieutenant, and in the year following had his company. It was also in 1974 that he became known to General Kleber, by whom he was appointed to head a body of 500 partisans.

These partisans were very different from the regular troops. They received no pay, but subsisted by plunder: knowing very little of discipline, they yet exceeded all other men on in the impetuosity of their attacks, and were ready for any enterprise, however daring or desperate. To execute missions of extraordinary peril, -- to traverse the enemy's lines, to reconnoitre his positions and strength, to cut off his convoys, and to destroy or make prisoners such separate detachments as they might encounter -- such were their usual tasks; and it was in this adventurous service that Ney acquired the surname of the Indefatigable. His promotion corresponded with his fame; in three or four years more he had fought his way up to the command of a division.

November 1799.] The city of Mannheim was separated from the French army by the Rhine, and defended by a numerous garrison. Its position is so advantageous, that it may he termed the key of Germany on that frontier; it abounded with provisions and stores of every description, and on every account to gain possession of it was an object of extreme anxiety with the French. But by open force the attempt was not likely to succeed, -- at least not without heavy loss. Besides the soldiers within the walls, a great number were cantoned outside the city, down to the river side; all were alike ready to resist the passage of the French, and if defeated on the open plain, they could all retire within the fortifications. While the generals were deliberating as to the best mode of making the attack, it struck Ney that a small trusty band might cross the river, march round the enemy's cantonments reach the foot of the walls on the other side without observation, and take the place by surprise before a sufficient force could be collected on that unexpected point of attack. Before hazarding such an attempt, it was most necessary to reconnoitre accurately the situation of the enemy, and General Ney, distrusting professional spies, resolved to go in person. Accordingly one evening he assumed the disguise of a Prussian peasant, passed the river, and the following day was admitted into the city, where he ascertained the strength of the garrison and fortifications at various points, and made himself fully acquainted with the nature of the ground, and the position of the troops encamped on the plain. Had he been detected in such a step -- so rash in an officer of his rank and importance -- he could have expected no other than the ignominious death of the spy; but the German was his native language, his manners were not above those of his assumed character, and he escaped without suspicion. On his return he selected one hundred and fifty of his boldest men, accompanied by whom he again passed the Rhine at eight o'clock in the evening. At eleven he reached the walls, and fell furiously on the outposts. The garrison made a sortie which was instantly repulsed, and Ney entered at the same time with the fugitives. Amidst the darkness and confusion all around, the smallness of his force could not be recognized: the fury of his attacks spread terror and dismay among the defenders, and after a short but desperate struggle, he obtained possession of the place. This achievement put the seal to his celebrity: from the beginning he was held in high esteem by the First Consul, and he was one of the marshals of the creation, (i. e. one of those who received their batons at the commencement of the Empire of Napoleon.)

On the breaking out of the war with Austria, the mandial left Boulogne with the sixth corps, crossed the Rhine into Alsace, and fought the well-contested battle in memory of which he was, two years afterwards, created Duke of Elchingen. His station was on the right of the grand army, and his opponent the Archduke John, whom, after a series of brilliant successes, he chased from the Tyrol, and whose rear he cut in pieces at the foot of Mount Brenner, just as Napoleon conquered at Austerlitz. The peace of Presburg, which soon followed, probably saved the Archduke from utter destruction. -- But the campaign of 1806-7 was that which, above all preceding ones, raised the fame of this marshal. Such had been his conduct during the whole of this extraordinary campaign, that the veteran conquerors of the Continent unanimously dignified him with the title of Bravest of the Brave.

1808.] The next theatre on which we find this great soldier is the Peninsula; but of that war he had won experience enough to be convinced that it must, in the end, prove disastrous; and with his characteristic bluntness he did not hesitate to express his views to the emperor. A remarkable conversation between the two is given us by a French officer of rank, who was himself present. -- After a grand review of troops at Madrid, the emperor entered the room where Ney and many other officers were assembled: he was in the best spirits from some favourable despatches he had just received. "Every thing goes on well (said he): Romana will be reduced in a fortnight: the English are defeated, and will be unable to advance. In three months this war will be finished!" None of the other generals ventured to reply, but the duke of Elchingen shook his head, and with a dissatisfied look, said: "Sire, the way has lasted long already, and I cannot perceive like you that our affairs are much improved. These people are obstinate; even their women and children fight: they massacre our men in detail. Certainly the contest has a bad aspect. To-day we cut the enemy in pieces; to-morrow we have to oppose another twice as numerous. It is not an army we have to fight; it is a whole nation: I see no end to the business." While he was speaking, the emperor regarded him with a fixed look: when Ney had ceased, he turned to the other officers and said: "This country is a Vendée -- but have I not subdued Vendée? The Calabrians were formerly insurgents -- wherever there are mountains, there will be insurrections, -- but now the kingdom of Naples is peaceable enough. Here the people are instigated to resistance by the clergy; but the Romans subdued them; so did the Moors, and they are not to be compared with their ancestors. I will strengthen the government, I will bind the grandees to my interests, and fire on the rabble. If Julius Cæsar had been daunted by difficulties, would he have conquered Gaul? -- The population is said to be against us: -- this Spain is but a solitude; not five inhabitants to a square league. But let the question be decided by numbers, -- I will bring all Europe over the Pyrenees."

Thus spoke Napoleon in the pride of unbounded power; and impartiality obliges us to acknowledge that he would as surely have subdued Spain as did the Romans, the Goths and the Moors, had he not been prevented from bringing the whole of his resources to act in this warfare, by his quarrels with Austria and afterwards Russia.

But though the Duke of Elchingen had sagacity enough to augur any thing but success from the present impolitic struggle, he laboured as sedulously as if success were certain. He was not engaged in any general action, but he destroyed many of the guerrilla parties, overran Gallicia and the Asturias, defeated Sir Robert Wilson, and cut off many convoys of the allies. When Massena undertook the campaign of Portugal, Ney accompanied the expedition, and in his march reduced first Ciudad Rodrigo, then Almeida. But the campaign was worse than useless to the French: famine, and the impossibility of forcing the lines of Torres Vedras, compelled them to retreat. That retreat, however, was a most brilliant one; and conferred as much honour on the Duke of Elchingen, who commanded the rear, as the proudest victory he had ever gained. He sustained unmoved the incessant assaults of Lord Wellington's overwhelming forces, though the corps which he commanded consisted of no more than 6000 men; and thus enabled the whole army to retire in perfect order to Miranda del Corvo. Presently, however, a dispute occurred between him and the commander-in-chief, whom he flatly refused to obey, and for this act of insubordination Ney was divested of his command, and ordered to return to France.*

* Colonel Napier (History of the Peninsular War, vol. i. p. 496) has an anecdote about his brother, which does honour both to Soult and to Ney. At the battle of Coruña, Major Napier was wounded and made prisoner. "He was returned among the killed. The morning after the battle, the Duke of Dalmatia, being apprized of Major Napier's situation, had him conveyed to good quarters, and with a kindness and consideration very uncommon, wrote to Napoleon, desiring that his prisoner might not be sent to France, which (from the system of refusing exchanges) would have been destruction to his professional prospects. The marshal also obtained for the drummer (who had saved him from being murdered by a French soldier) the decoration of the Legion of Honour. The events of the war obliged Soult to depart in a few days from Coruña, but he recommended Major Napier to the attention of Marshal Ney; and that marshal also treated his prisoner with the kindness of a friend, rather than the rigour of an enemy, for he quartered him with the French consul, supplied him with money, gave him a general invitation to his house on all public occasions, and refrained from sending him to France. Nor did Marshal Ney's kindness stop there; for when the flag of truce arrived, and he became acquainted with the situation of Major Napier's family be suddenly waived all forms and instead of answering the inquiry by a cold intimation of the captive's existence, sent him, and with him the few English prisoners taken in the battle, at once to England, merely demanding that none should serve until regularly exchanged. I should not have dwelt thus. long upon the private adventures of an officer, but that gratitude demands a public acknowledgment of such generosity, and the demand is rendered imperative by the after misfortunes of Marshal Ney."

The glory of this memorable retreat was the only considerable advantage derived by the Marshal from his services in Spain. Such a train of ill success may have soured his temper: it is evident that, from whatever cause, he was less attentive, than might have been expected, to his duties as military governor in the conquered districts; and his name consequently became extremely unpopular among the Spaniards. He himself was indulgent enough, but he appears to have held but a feeble rein over is ruffian followers. Out of the field he had less energy than even Murat, and was treated with little respect by his very domestics. "On the embattled plain," says a French general, his companion in arms, "he was wholly unrivalled, but he was singularly feeble, even timid, when no danger was near. I have often seen him give way to an insolent valet in his own house!"

1812.] He expedition to Russia soon followed the duke's return to France. He was entrusted with the command of the third corps, and had an active share in whatever successes were obtained by the French in that ill-fated campaign. Like Murat he soon perceived that to penetrate, at so late a period of the year, into the heart of Russia, must endanger the safety of the invaders, and, as on a former occasion, he spoke his mind freely to Napoleon, in the council held at Smolensko. After using many forcible representations on this subject, he concluded by advising the emperor to winter at Smolensko, and to entrench the remainder of the army on the borders of the Dwina and the Dnieper. Napoleon listened with more attention than satisfaction to this prudent counsel. "Duke Of Elchingen," he replied, "I am well aware that in bravery and attachment to my person and interests you have no superior; but you do not know the Russia: they are not like the Germans, -- they will receive us with open arms; they sigh for our arrival as earnestly as the Jews for the coming of their Messiah, I will give freedom to the people civilized by Peter the Great; I will put the finishing hand to his great work, by providing the Russians with the Code Napoleon." The courtly Caulaincourt chimed in with emperor's opinion, and was in consequence much caressed. This incensed Ney, who ominously remarked: -- "Would to heaven the honied words of this diplomatic general may not prove more injurious to the army than the most bloody battle!"

At the battle of Borodino, or, as the French call it, of the Moskwa, the most sanguinary in modern times, the Bravest of the Brave surpassed himself, and nobly earned the princely title with which his imperial master rewarded him on the field. But the most valuable service he ever rendered France was in the deplorable retreat from Moscow. His station was in the rear -- the post of danger and of honour -- and he was the chief, if not (excepting Napoleon himself) the only hope of the troops. In the story of this flight, for such it was, every thing is so wonderful, that posterity would disbelieve the details, if one contemporary voice had been raised against them. That with a handful of worn-out followers, destitute of every necessary, he should repel the assaults and arrest the progress of untired, well-provided, and countless legions; that, while his heroic little band was daily diminished by hunger, cold, lassitude, he should yet bid defiance to the whole Russian host; in a word, that Ney's desperate valour should have secured the escape of any remnant of the Grand Army, must ever command the astonishment of the world. At one time, after leaving Krasnoi, the whole Russian army lay between him and Napoleon; but though he bad only three thousand men, he resolved to cut his way through the intervening legions. When summoned by Miloradovitch to capitulate, -- "A marshal of France never surrenders!" was his only reply, as he fearlessly led his devoted companions against the destructive batteries of the Losmina. He then made a circuit at midnight to the banks of the Dnieper, which he crossed on blocks of ice, in spite of all opposition, and finally, with fifteen hundred men, joined the emperor. Well might Napoleon be unable to find language sufficient to express his admiration of the hero: -- "What a man! what a soldier! what a vigorous chief!" While he still feared that the marshal had fallen into the hands of the Russians, he declared that he would willingly give three millions of francs for his ransom. His joy may well be conceived when Ney returned and received his embrace. The latter had soon afterwards the nearly undivided honour of saving the wreck of this once mighty host at the passage of the Berezina.

In the campaign of 1813, Ney faithfully adhered to the falling emperor. At Bautzen, Lutzen, Dresden, he contributed powerfully to the success; but he and Oudinot received a severe check at Dennewitz from the Crown Prince of Sweden. From that hour defeat succeeded defeat; the allies invaded France; -- and, in spite of the most desperate resistance, triumphantly entered Paris in March, 1814. Ney was one of the three marshals chosen by Napoleon to negociate with Alexander in behalf of the king of Rome, but the attempt was unsuccessful, and all he could do was to remain a passive spectator of the fall and exile of his chief. On the restoration of the Bourbons, Ney was more fortunate than many of his brethren: he was entrusted with a high military command, and created a knight of St. Louis, and a peer of France.

But France was now at peace with all the world; and no one of these great military chiefs could be more unprepared for the change than the Prince of Moskwa. He was too old to acquire new habits. For domestic comforts he was little adapted: during the many years of his marriage, he had been unable to pass more than a very few months with his family. Too illiterate to find any resource in books, too rude to be a favorite in society, and too proud to desire that sort of distinction, he was condemned to a solitary and an inactive life. The habit of braving death, and of commanding vast bodies of men, had impressed his character with a species of moral grandeur, which raised him far above the puerile observances of the fashionable world. Plain in his manners, and still plainer in his words, he neither knew nor wished to know, the art of pleasing courtiers. Of good nature he had indeed a considerable fund, but he showed it, not so much by the endless little attentions of a gentleman, as by scattered acts of princely beneficence. For dissipation he had no taste; his professional cares and duties, which, during twenty-five years, had left him no respite, had engrossed his attention too much to allow room for the passions, vices, or follies of society to obtain any empire over him. The sobriety of his manners was extreme, even to austerity.

His wife had been reared in the court of Louis XVI., and had adorned that of the emperor. Cultivated in her mind, finished in her manners, and elegant in all she said or did, her society was courted on all sides. Her habits were expensive; -- luxury reigned throughout her apartments, and presided at her board; and to all this display of elegance and pomp of show, the military simplicity, not to say the coarseness, of the marshal, furnished a striking contrast. His good nature offered no other obstacle to the gratification of her wishes than the occasional expression of a fear that his circumstances might be deranged by them. But if he would not oppose, neither could he join in her extravagance. While she was presiding at a numerous and brilliant party of guests, he preferred to remain alone in a distant apartment, where the festive sounds could not reach him. On such occasions he almost always dined alone.

Ney seldom appeared at court. He could neither bow nor flatter, nor could he stoop to kiss even his sovereign's hand without something like self-humiliation. To his princess, on the other hand, the royal smile was necessary as the light of the sun; and unfortunately for her, she was sometimes disappointed in her efforts to attract it. Her wounded vanity often beheld an insult in what was probably no more than an inadvertence. In a word she ere long fervently regretted the court in which the great captains had occupied the first rank, and their families shared the almost exclusive favour of the sovereign. She complained to her husband; and he, with a calm smile, advised her never again to expose herself to such mortifications if she really sustained them. But thought he could thus rebuke a woman's vanity, the haughty soldier felt his own wounded through hers. To escape from these complaints, and from the monotony of his Parisian existence, he retired to his country-seat, in January (1815), -- the very season when people of consideration are most engrossed by the busy scenes of the metropolis. There he lead an unfettered life; and gave his mornings to field sports; and the guests he entertained in the evening were such as, from their humble condition, rendered formality useless, and placed him completely at his ease.

It was here that on the 6th of March he was surprised by the arrival of an aide-de-camp from the minister at war, who ordered him, with all possible despatch, to join the sixth division, of which he was the commander, and which was stationed at Besançon. In his anxiety to learn the extent of his instructions, Ney immediately rode to Paris; and there, for the first time, learned the disembarkation of Buonaparte from Elba.

Ney eagerly undertook the commission assigned him of hastening to oppose the invader. In his last interview with Louis, his protestations of devotedness to the Bourbons, and his denunciations against Napoleon, were ardent -- perhaps they were sincere. Whether he said that Buonaparte deserved to be confined in an iron cage, or that he would bring him to Paris in one, is not very clear, nor indeed very material. -- We reluctantly approach the darker shades in the life of this great officer.

On his arrival at Besançon, March 10th, he learned the disaffection of all the troops hitherto sent against the invader, and perceived that those by whom he was surrounded were not more to he trusted. He was surrounded with loud and incessant cries of Vive l'Empereur! Already, at Lyons, two members of the royal family had found all opposition vain; the march of Napoleon was equally peaceful and triumphant. During the night of the 13th Ney had a secret interview with a courier from his old master; and on the following morning he announced to his troops that the house of Bourbon had ceased to reign, -- that the emperor was the only ruler France would acknowledge! He then hastened to meet Napoleon, by whom he was received with open arms, and hailed by his indisputed title of Bravest of the Brave.

Ney was soon doomed to suffer the necessary consequence of his crime -- bitter and unceasing remorse. His inward reproaches became intolerable: he felt humbled, mortified, for he had lost that noble self-confidence, that inward sense of dignity, that unspeakable and exalted satisfaction, which integrity alone can bestow: the main who would have defied the world in arms, trembled before the new enemy within him; he saw that his virtue, his honour, his peace, and the esteem of the wise and the good, were lost to him for ever. In the bitterness of his heart, he demanded and obtained permission to retire for a short time into the country. But there he could not regain his self-respect. Of his distress, and we hope of his repentance, no better proof need be required, than the reply, which, on his return to Paris, he made to the emperor, who feigned to have believed that he had emigrated: "I ought to have done so long ago (said Ney); it is now too late!"

The prospect of approaching hostilities soon roused once more the enthusiasm of this gallant soldier, and made him for a while less sensible to the gloomy agitation within. From the day of his being ordered to join the army on the frontiers of Flanders (June 11), his temper was observed to be less unequal, and his eye to have regained its fiery glance.

The story of Waterloo need not be repeated here. We shall only observe, that on no occasion did the Bravest of the Brave exhibit more impetuous though hopeless valour. Five horses were shot under him; his garments were pierced with balls; his whole person was disfigured with blood and mud, yet he would have continued the contest on foot while life remained, had he not been forced from the field, by the dense and resistless columns of the fugitives. He returned to the capital, and there witnessed the second imperial abdication, and the capitulation of Paris, before he thought of consulting his safety by flight. Perhaps he hoped that by virtue of the twelfth article of that convention, he should not be disquieted; if so, however, the royal ordinance of July 24th terribly undeceived him. He secreted himself with one of his relatives, at the chateau of Bessaris, department of Lot, in the expectation that he should soon have an opportunity of escaping to the United States. But he was discovered, and in a very singular manner.

In former days Ney had received a rich Egyptian sabre from the hands of the First Consul. There was but another like it known to exist, and that was possessed by Murat. The marshal was carefully secluded both from visitors and domestics, but unluckily this splendid weapon was left on a sofa in the drawing-room. It was perceived, and not a little admired by a visitor, who afterwards described it to a party of friends at Aurillac. One present immediately observed, that, from the description, it must belong to either Ney or Murat. This came to the ears of the prefect, who instantly despatched fourteen gensdarmes, and some police agents, to arrest the owner. They surrounded the chateau; and Ney at once surrendered himself. Perhaps he did not foresee the fatal issue of his trial; some of his friends say that he even wished it to take place immediately, that he might have an opportunity to contradict a report that Louis had presented him with half a million of francs, on his departure for Besançon.

A council of war, composed of French marshals, was appointed to try him; but they had little inclination to pass sentence on an old companion in arms; and declared their incompetency to try one, who, when he consummated his treason, was a peer of France. Accordingly, by a royal ordinance of November 12th, the Chamber of Peers were directed to take congizance of the affair. His defence was made to rest by his advocates -- first, on the twelfth article of the capitulation, and when this was over-ruled, on the ground of his no longer being amenable to French laws, since Sarre-Louis, his native town, had recently been dissevered from France. This the prisoner himself over-ruled; "I am a Frenchman, (cried Ney), and I will die a Frenchman!" The result was that he was found guilty and condemned to death by an immense majority, one hundred and sixty-nine to seventeen. On hearing the sentence read according to usage, he interrupted the enumeration of his titles, by saying: "Why cannot you simply call me Michael Ney -- now a French soldier, and soon a heap of dust?" His last interview with his lady, who was sincerely, attached to him, and with his children, whom he passionately loved, was far more bitter than the punishment he was about to undergo. This heavy trial being over, he was perfectly calm, and spoke of his approaching fate with the utmost unconcern. "Marshal," said one of his sentinels, a poor grenadier, "you should now think of God: I never faced danger without such preparation." "Do you suppose (answered Ney) that any one need teach me to die?" But he immediately gave way to better thoughts, and added, "Comrade, you are right. I will die as becomes a man of honour and a Christian. Send for the curate of St. Sulpice!"

A little after eight o'clock on the morning of December 7th, the marshal, with a firm step and an air of perfect indifference, descended the steps leading to the court of the Luxembourg, and entered a carriage which conveyed him to the place of execution, outside the garden gates. He alighted, and advanced towards the file of soldiers drawn up to despatch him. To an officer, who proposed to blindfold him, he replied -- "Are you ignorant that, for twenty-five years, I have been accustomed to face both ball and bullet?" He took off his hat, raised it above his head, and cried aloud -- "I declare before God and man that I have never betrayed my country: may my death render her happy! Vive la France!" He then turned to the men, and, striking his other hand on his heart, gave the word, "Soldiers -- fire!"

Thus, in his forty-seventh year, did the "Bravest of the Brave" expiate one great error, alien from his natural character, and unworthy of the general course of his life. If he was sometimes a stern, he was never an implacable, enemy. Ney was sincere, honest, blunt even: so far from flattering, he often contradicted him on whose nod his fortunes depended. He was, with rare exceptions, merciful to the vanquished; and while so many of his brother marshals dishonoured themselves by the most barefaced rapine and extortion, he lived and died poor.

Ney left four sons, two of whom are in the service of his old friend, Bernadotte.