At the Battle of Castiglione in 1796, French general Napoleon Bonaparte was driving his vanquished enemy from the field when he came across a little dog standing with his forepaws on the chest of his dead master, an Austrian officer. The sight arrested him at once, so poet Helen Williams tells us, and he called his lieutenants to witness it.

The dog threw but a brief glance at the great general, but Napoleon felt more bitterness of reproach in it than any speech could have expressed. He immediately halted his pursuit, and Williams wished the image of that little dog could rise before all the warring parties, to remind them of the true cost of war.

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