e back here, sorely disheartened
but resigned to his fate. This hero unknown to fame does draining work
on the land, for which he is paid ten sous the fathom. He is accustomed
to working in a marshy soil, and so, as he says, he gets jobs which no
one else cares to take. He can make about three francs a day by clearing
out ponds, or draining meadows that lie under water. His deafness makes
him seem surly, and he is not naturally inclined to say very much, but
there is a good deal in him.

"We are very good friends. He dines with me on the day of Austerlitz,
on the Emperor's birthday, and on the anniversary of the disaster at
Waterloo, and during the dessert he always receives a napoleon to pay
for his wine very quarter. Every one in the Commune shares in my feeling
of respect for him; if he would allow them to support him, nothing would
please them better. At every house to which he goes the people follow my
example, and show their esteem by asking him to dine with them. It is a
feeling of pride that leads him to work, and it is only as a portrait of
the Emperor that he can be induced to take my twenty-franc piece. He has
been deeply wounded by the injustice that has been done to him; but I
think regret for the Cross is greater than the desire for his pension.

"He has one great consolation. After the bridges had been constructed
across the Beresina, General Eble presented such of the pontooners
as were not disabled to the Emperor, and Napoleon embraced poor
Gondrin--perhaps but for that accolade he would have died ere now. This
memory and the hope that some day Napoleon will return are all that
Gondrin lives by. Nothing will ever persuade him that Napoleon is dead,
and so convinced is he that the Emperor's captivity is wholly and solely
due to the English, that I believe he would be ready on the slightest
pretext to take the life of the best-natured alderman that ever traveled
for pleasure in foreign parts."

"Let us go on as fast as possible!" cried Genestas. He had listened
to the doctor's story with rapt attention, and now seemed to recover
consciousness of his surroundings. "Let us hurry! I long to see that
man!"

Both of them put their horses to a gallop.

"The other soldier that I spoke of," Benassis went on, "is another of
those men of iron who have knocked about everywhere with our armies.
His life, like that of all French soldiers, has been made up of bullets,
sabre strokes, and victories; he has had a ver