Lord Uxbridge himself went back there some years later, and insisted on dining at the table he had been carved on.

From Waterloo A Near Run Thing by David Howarth. Page 191.

Lord Uxbridge’s was the most celebrated of the thousands of legs sawn off at Waterloo, and his attitude to the loss of it was typical. ‘By God, sir, I’ve lost my leg’ was a figure of speech, if he said it at all: the leg was not shot off, but the knee was shattered. After he had been carried to Waterloo in a blanket, three miles from where he was wounded, he discussed the chances of saving it with the surgeons. All agreed it would have to come off. While they were making ready, he wrote a letter to his wife and chatted with his staff about the victory. During the operation, he never moved or complained: nobody held his hands, although that was a common practice. He said once perfectly calmly that he thought the instrument was not very sharp - and indeed, by that time of day the surgeons were in difficulties with knives and saws which were blunted by use. When it was over, his nerves did not seem shaken, and his pulse was unchanged. ‘I have had a pretty long run,’ he said. ‘I have been a beau these forty-seven years, and it would not be fair to cut the young men out any longer.’ Soon afterwards, another cavalry general came to see him. ‘Take a look at that leg,’ Lord Uxbridge said, ‘and tell me what you think of it. Some time hence, I may be inclined to imagine it might have been saved, and I should like your opinion.’ The visitor looked at the gruesome object, which was still in the same room, and confirmed that it was better off; and satisfied with that, Lord Uxbridge composed himself for sleep. Within a week, he was dressed and sitting up in a chair as if nothing had happened. Within three weeks, he was back in London, where a crowd took the horses from his carriage on Westminster Bridge and drew it through the streets, and the Prince Regent made him a marquess.

The owner of the house where the operation was performed, a M. Paris, shrewdly saw the value of the relic. He made a coffin for it, and with the permission of its owner he buried it in his garden. Above it he planted a weeping willow tree and put up a tombstone: 'Ici est enterré la jambe de I’illustre, brave et vaillant Comte Uxbridge . . .’ Generations of people went to see the grave, to the benefit of the Paris family, and Lord Uxbridge himself went back there some years later, and insisted on dining at the table he had been carved on.

The incident to which Howarth refers is the loss of Lord Uxbridge's leg. Wellington and Uxbridge were seated on their horses on a ridge, observing the battles when a cannonball took off Uxbridge's leg. Glancing down, the following exchange is supposed to have occurred.

Uxbridge: By God, sir, I've lost my leg!

Wellington: By God, sir, so you have!

The British stiff upper lip and sangfroid in the presence of catastrophe have stood them in good stead over the centuries.