All these were statues of warriors from Ney to
Charlemagne, modelled in clay for the nonce, and placed here to meet the
corpse of the greatest warrior of all. Passing these, we had to walk to
a little door at the back of the Invalides, where was a crowd of persons
plunged in the deepest mourning, and pushing for places in the chapel
within.
The chapel is spacious and of no great architectural pretensions, but
was on this occasion gorgeously decorated in honor of the great person
to whose body it was about to give shelter.
We had arrived at nine; the ceremony was not to begin, they said, till
two: we had five hours before us to see all that from our places could
be seen.
We saw that the roof, up to the first lines of architecture, was hung
with violet; beyond this with black. We saw N's, eagles, bees, laurel
wreaths, and other such imperial emblems, adorning every nook and corner
of the edifice. Between the arches, on each side of the aisle, were
painted trophies, on which were written the names of some of Napoleon's
Generals and of their principal deeds of arms--and not their deeds of
arms alone, pardi, but their coats of arms too.
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