The Boy Life of Napoleon, Afterwards Emperor of the French Part 20

"But he disappeared--the emperor disappeared--he vanished," persisted the scholar.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "_Your Emperor was banished to a rock"--The Exiled Emperor (From the Painting by W Q Orchardson, ent.i.tled "Napoleon on board the Bellerophon_.")]

"Yes; he disappeared," the veteran admitted. "For after that came the Russian Campaign. Ah, but it was a cold one! Such snow, such ice; so cold, so cold! It was then I lost my eye. My leg I left at Austerlitz, my arm at Jena; my eye I dropped somewhere in the Beresina,--so much the better. I could not see that freeze-out. Then they sent me here. And since that I do not know what has happened. They tell me--you tell me--much. But to believe such foolish stories! Bah! I am not a baby.

They tell me that the emperor--my emperor--was exiled to Elba; that he returned again to France; that he reigned a hundred days; that a battle was fought at--where was it?"

"Waterloo," suggested the scholar.

"Eh, yes, you say, at Waterloo; and you say we lost it? As if we could lose a battle, and Napoleon there! Then you will say that the empire was no longer an empire, but a kingdom; and that he who governed was called Louis the Eighteenth, and others after him, but not my emperor. Bah!

foolish stories all!"

"But they are true, old Nonesuch," said the youngster sadly.

"Yes; they are true," echoed the other veterans. And the scholar added, "Yes; and your emperor was banished by those rascal English to a rock--the rock of St. Helena--a horrid rock, miles and miles out in the ocean. But he is here among us again." The Soldiers' Home, in the midst of his veterans, in the heart of his beautiful Paris.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Napoleon (1. The General 2. The Consul 3. The Conqueror 4. The Emperor.)]

Old soldiers are apt to be boastful when they tell, as did the Nonesuch, of the deeds of a leader whom they so often followed to victory. Madame Foa's pen has long since stopped its task of writing of French heroism for the boys and girls of France; but it never wrote anything more attractive or inspiring than the delicious bit of boasting that it put into the mouth of this dear and battered old veteran of Napoleon's wars,--Corporal Nonesuch of the Soldiers' Home.

For, if the American boys and girls who have followed this story will read, as I trust they will, the entire life-story of this marvellous man,--Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of the French,--they will learn that much of the boasting of old Nonesuch was true story, as he a.s.sured his comrades; while some of it, too, was,--let us say, the exaggeration of enthusiasm.

But there was much in the career of the great Napoleon to inspire enthusiasm. The determined and persistent way in which, while but a boy, he climbed steadily up, using the obstacles in his path but as the rounds of a ladder to lift him higher, affords a lesson of pluck and energy that every boy and girl can take to heart; while the story of his later career, through the rapid changes that made him general, consul, conqueror, emperor, is as full of interest, marvel, and romance as any of those wonder-stories of the "Arabian Nights" for which "the youngster" expressed so much admiration, but which old Nonesuch so contemptuously cast aside.

There were dark sides to his character; there were shadows on his career, there were blots on his name. Ambition, selfishness, and the love of success, were alike his inspiration and his ruin. But, with these, he possessed also the qualities that led men to follow him enthusiastically and love him devotedly.

But people do not all see things alike in this world; and since the downfall and death of Napoleon, those who recall his name have either enshrined him as a hero or vilified him as a monster. Whichever side in this controversy you make take as, when you grow older, you read and ponder over the story of Napoleon, you will, I am sure, be ready to admit his greatness as an historic character his ability as a soldier, his energy as a ruler, and his eminence as a man. And in these you will see but the logical outgrowth of his self-reliance, his determination, and his pluck as a boy, when on the rocky sh.o.r.e of Corsica, or in the schools of France, he was turned aside by no obstacle, and conquered neither by privation nor persecution, but pressed steadily forward to his great and matchless career as leader, soldier, and ruler--the most commanding figure of the nineteenth century. I did not like at all.

Napoleon was not there. Where he was not, the sun did not s.h.i.+ne. Then we returned to Paris. The emperor married a grand princess. He had a son--a baby son--the King of Rome! Then, too, what _fetes_! A fine child the King of Rome! I saw him often in his little goat-carriage at the Tuileries. I do not know what has become of him. They say he is dead; but I do not believe that, any more than I believe that my emperor is dead. Two deaths? Bah! old women's stories,--witch stories, good only to frighten children to sleep. When my emperor and his son come back, we shall be amazed that we ever believed them dead!"

"But he disappeared--the emperor disappeared--he vanished," persisted the scholar.

"Yes; he disappeared," the veteran admitted. "For after that came the Russian Campaign. Ah, but it was a cold one! Such snow, such ice; so cold, so cold! It was then I lost my eye. My leg I left at Austerlitz, my arm at Jena; my eye I dropped somewhere in the Beresina,--so much the better. I could not see that freeze-out.