cle of light.

"So you are the man who wished to cross the bridge before me?" continued
Bonaparte.

"It was done on a wager, general," gayly answered the young lieutenant,
whose voice made the general start.

"Did I make you lose it?"

"Maybe, yes; maybe, no."

"What was the wager?"

"That I should be promoted captain to-day."

"You have won it."

"Thank you, general."

The young man moved hastily forward as if to press Bonaparte's hand,
but checked himself almost immediately. The light had fallen full on his
face for an instant; that instant sufficed to make the general notice
the face as he had the voice. Neither the one nor the other was
unknown to him. He searched his memory for an instant, but finding it
rebellious, said: "I know you!"

"Possibly, general."

"I am certain; only I cannot recall your name."

"You managed that yours should not be forgotten, general."

"Who are you?"

"Ask Valence, general."

Bonaparte gave a cry of joy.

"Louis de Montrevel," he exclaimed, opening wide his arms. This time the
young lieutenant did not hesitate to fling himself into them.

"Very good," said Bonaparte; "you will serve eight days with the
regiment in your new rank, that they may accustom themselves to your
captain's epaulets, and then you will take my poor Muiron's place as
aide-de-camp. Go!"

"Once more!" cried the young man, opening his arms.

"Faith, yes!" said Bonaparte, joyfully. Then holding him close after
kissing him twice, "And so it was you who gave Valence that sword
thrust?"

"My word!" said the new captain and future aide-de-camp, "you were there
when I promised it to him. A soldier keeps his word."

Eight days later Captain Montrevel was doing duty as staff-officer
to the commander-in-chief, who changed his name of Louis, then in
ill-repute, to that of Roland. And the young man consoled himself
for ceasing to be a descendant of St. Louis by becoming the nephew of
Charlemagne.

Roland--no one would have dared to call Captain Montrevel Louis after
Bonaparte had baptized him Roland--made the campaign of Italy with his
general, and returned with him to Paris after the peace of Campo Formio.

When the Egyptian expedition was decided upon, Roland, who had been
summoned to his mother's side by the death of the Brigadier-General de
Montrevel, killed on the Rhine while his son was fighting on the Adige
and the Mincio, was among the first appointed by the commander-in-chief
to accompan