The first circumstance is connected with the battle of Waterloo.
History read backwards.
No one remembers that catastrophe better than I do. Well, my old comrade, in taking part in this battle again, I found it quite different from what it was in the past, as you may judge from what I will relate to you. When I had recognised the field of Waterloo, to the south of Brussels, I distinguished first a considerable number of dead bodies lying on the ground indiscriminately. The officers who accompanied him were marching backwards also. The cannon began to boom, and from time to time I saw the lurid gleam of their flashes.