hort, he looked almost like
an ordinary man; but I who am telling you all these things have seen him
myself with the grape-shot whizzing about his ears, no more put out by
it than you are at this moment; never moving a limb, watching through
his field-glass, always looking after his business; so we stood our
ground likewise, as cool and calm as John the Baptist. I do not know
how he did it; but whenever he spoke, a something in his words made
our hearts burn within us; and just to let him see that we were his
children, and that it was not in us to shirk or flinch, we used to walk
just as usual right up to the sluts of cannon that were belching smoke
and vomiting battalions of balls, and never a man would so much as say,
"Look out!" It was a something that made dying men raise their heads to
salute him and cry, "Long live the Emperor!"

Was that natural? Would you have done this for a mere man?

Thereupon, having fitted up all his family, and things having so turned
out that the Empress Josephine (a good woman for all that) had no
children, he was obliged to part company with her, although he loved her
not a little. But he must have children, for reasons of State. All the
crowned heads of Europe, when they heard of his difficulty, squabbled
among themselves as to who should find him a wife. He married an
Austrian princess, so they say, who was the daughter of the Caesars, a
man of antiquity whom everybody talks about, not only in our country,
where it is said that most things were his doing, but also all over
Europe. And so certain sure is that, that I who am talking to you have
been myself across the Danube, where I saw the ruins of a bridge built
by that man; and it appeared that he was some connection of Napoleon's
at Rome, for the Emperor claimed succession there for his son.

So, after his wedding, which was a holiday for the whole world, and when
they let the people off their taxes for ten years to come (though they
had to pay them just the same after all, because the excisemen took no
notice of the proclamation)--after his wedding, I say, his wife had a
child who was King of Rome; a child was born a King while his father was
alive, a thing that had never been seen in the world before! That day a
balloon set out from Paris to carry the news to Rome, and went all the
way in one day. There, now! Is there one of you who will stand me out
that there was nothing supernatural in that? No, it was decreed on high.
And th