Waterloo becomes a future celebration of peace

In my dream I am looking across the grasslands and cornfields of a countryside that seems half, but only half, familiar to me. By degrees I realise that I am looking at the actual fields of Waterloo. As I gaze at them I see a thin line of men hurrying over the crest of the low, grey hill in front of me. They are coming over at a running pace, and I can see the ancient red uniforms of the British soldiers. Waterloo is being fought and I am there watching it! And a guide standing by my side, like the chorus in a Greek play, is telling me what the distant scenes of the battle mean. From very, very far away the faint sound of cheering comes across the plain; the guide tells me to listen and to hear whether the sound has "the long-drawn-out note of the British hurrah," or if it is the sharp punctuated note of the Hochs, that would signify the coming of Blucher's army.

A few seconds later the scene of the dream and its century had changed, and it was carried forward into a future which, at the moment when this note was written, seemed infinitely far off; for it now took place in the public square of a strange foreign city, where under innumerable flags, and with triumphant music, and a procession of the soldiers of all nations, the Peace which was at last to end the Great War was being celebrated.

January, 1915