to us, just as it might be by way of conversation, in the order of the
day:

"'Children, is it fitting that your Emperor's relations should beg their
bread? No; I want them all to be luminaries, like me in fact! Therefore,
it is urgently necessary to conquer a kingdom for each one of them, so
that the French nation may be masters everywhere, so that the Guard may
make the whole earth tremble, and France may spit wherever she likes,
and every nation shall say to her, as it is written on my coins, "God
protects you."'

"'All right!' answers the army, 'we will fish up kingdoms for you with
the bayonet.'

"Ah! there was no backing out of it, look you! If he had taken it into
his head to conquer the moon, we should have had to put everything in
train, pack our knapsacks, and scramble up; luckily, he had no wish for
that excursion. The kings who were used to the comforts of a throne, of
course, objected to be lugged off, so we had marching orders. We march,
we get there, and the earth begins to shake to its centre again. What
times they were for wearing out men and shoe-leather! And the hard
knocks that they gave us! Only Frenchmen could have stood it. But you
are not ignorant that a Frenchman is a born philosopher; he knows that
he must die a little sooner or a litter later. So we used to die without
a word, because we had the pleasure of watching the Emperor do _this_ on
the maps."

Here the soldier swung quickly round on one foot, so as to trace a
circle on the barn floor with the other.

"'There, that shall be a kingdom,' he used to say, and it was a kingdom.
What fine times they were! Colonels became generals whilst you were
looking at them, generals became marshals of France, and marshals became
kings. There is one of them still left on his feet to keep Europe in
mind of those days, Gascon though he may be, and a traitor to France
that he might keep his crown; and he did not blush for his shame, for,
after all, a crown, look you, is made of gold. The very sappers and
miners who knew how to read became great nobles in the same way. And I
who am telling you all this have seen in Paris eleven kings and a crowd
of princes all round about Napoleon, like rays about the sun! Keep this
well in your minds, that as every soldier stood a chance of having a
throne of his own (provided he showed himself worthy of it), a corporal
of the Guard was by way of being a sight to see, and they gaped at him
as he went by; for every on