lood and tears. One thing alone could cheer her.
I could do it, and I did. I applied for Letters of Naturalisation.
Some weeks later I became a French citizen, and received a letter from
M. ADOLPH CREMIEUX, then Minister of Justice, and never suspected
of being a wag. He wrote: "Your application for Naturalisation in
the midst of our great disasters, is for me the signal of a new life
for us. A country which in the midst of such catastrophes recruits
citizens like you, is not to be despaired of."

Years after, THIERS, then President of the Republic, said, "I
never will forget that you became a Frenchman in the time of our
misfortunes." EDMUND ABOUT picturesquely said, "_Il s'est fait
naturaliser vaincu._" BISMARCK has told me that the Emperor WILLIAM,
then at Versailles, in the first flush of triumph at touch on his brow
of the Imperial diadem, hearing of the event through the capturing
of a balloon despatched with the news to dolorous Paris, passed a
sleepless night.

"I fear me" he said, "all will now be lost."

"Not at all, your Majesty," said BISMARCK, affecting an indifference
he assures me he did not feel. "There is not even a Frenchman the
more. They have lost an Emperor and gained VAN DE BLOWITZOWN TROMP.
_Ce met egal._"

"Not quite," said the Emperor, with subtle flattery. The Emperor
WILLIAM, though he had his failings, was a keen judge of the
comparative value of men.

The limits of this article compel me to glance hastily over succeeding
epochs in a career with the main drift of which the civilised world
is already familiar. After saving Marseilles to the Republic, by a
series of actions alternating between desperate valour and brilliant
strategy, I went to Paris to report on the great event. Calling on the
official entrusted with the duty of considering claims to decorations,
I began at once by saying that my own name must not be taken into
consideration.

"Let my name," I said, gently but firmly, "be scored out in the
proposed list of decorations."

"_Mais, Monsieur_" he said, "there is no such list."

I, however, was not to be put off with excuse of that kind. I
insisted, both to the Secretary of the Minister of War, to M. THIERS,
that I should not be decorated. I was only too successful. When the
list came out, all my associates at Marseilles were decorated. I was
not included. This was all right. It was what I had requested. I could
say nothing. All the same, I could not help thinking that my