tion. His nature revolted at the religious
formalism of priestcraft; his mind turned in disgust from the
scholastic husks of its superficial knowledge. What he had learned
came from inborn capacity, from desultory reading, and from the
untutored imaginings of his garden at Brienne, his cave at Ajaccio, or
his barrack chambers. What more plausible than that he should first
turn to the land of his birth with some hope of happiness, usefulness,
or even glory! What more mortifying than the revelation that in
manhood he was too French for Corsica, as in boyhood he had been too
Corsican for France!

The story of his sojourns and adventures in Corsica has no
fascination; it is neither heroic nor satanic, but belongs to the dull
and mediocre realism which makes up so much of commonplace life. It is
difficult to find even a thread of continuity in it: there may be one
as to purpose; there is none as to either conduct or theory. There is
the passionate admiration of a southern nature for a hero as
represented by the ideal Paoli. There is the equally southern quality
of quick but transient hatred. The love of dramatic effect is shown at
every turn, in the perfervid style of his writings, in the mock
dignity of an edict issued from the grotto at Milleli, in the empty
honors of a lieutenant-colonel without a real command, in the paltry
style of an artillery inspector with no artillery but a few dismantled
guns.

But the most prominent characteristic of the young man was his
shiftiness, in both the good and bad senses of the word. He would
perish with mortification rather than fail in devising some expedient
to meet every emergency; he felt no hesitation in changing his point
of view as experience destroyed an ideal or an unforeseen chance was
to be seized and improved. Moreover, repeated failure did not
dishearten him. Detesting garrison life, he neglected its duties, and
endured punishment, but he secured regular promotion; defeated again
and again before the citadel of Ajaccio, each time he returned
undismayed to make a fresh trial under new auspices or in a new way.

He was no spendthrift, but he had no scruples about money. He was
proud in the headship of his family, and reckless as to how he should
support them, or should secure their promotion. Solitary in his
boyhood, he had become in his youth a companion and leader; but his
true friendships were not with his social equals, whom he despised,
but with the lowly, whom he u