natural colour. The doctor knew not to what he could
ascribe my inability to rise, till, hearing me complaining of my leg, he
examined it, and found that my foot was gangrened. An accident of my
early days was the cause of this new trouble. At Soreze I had my right
foot wounded by the unbuttoned foil of a schoolfellow with whom I was
fencing. It seemed that the muscles of the part had become sensitive,
and had suffered much from cold while I was lying unconscious on the
field of Eylau; thence had resulted a swelling which explained the
difficulty experienced by the soldier in dragging off my right boot. The
foot was frost-bitten, and as it had not been treated in time, gangrene
had appeared in the site of the old wound from the foil. The place was
covered with an eschar as large as a five-franc piece. The doctor
turned pale when he saw the foot: then, making four servants hold me,
and taking his knife, he lifted the eschar, and dug the mortified flesh
from my foot just as one cuts the damaged part out of an apple. The pain
was great, but I did not complain. It was otherwise, however, when the
knife reached the living flesh, and laid bare the muscles and bones till
one could see them moving. Then the doctor, standing on a chair, soaked
a sponge in hot sweetened wine, and let it fall drop by drop into the
hole which he had just dug in my foot. The pain became unbearable.
Still, for eight days I had to undergo this torture morning and evening,
but my leg was saved.

'Nowadays, when promotions and decorations are bestowed so lavishly,
some reward would certainly be given to an officer who had braved danger
as I had done in reaching the 14th regiment; but under the Empire a
devoted act of that kind was thought so natural that I did not receive
the cross, nor did it ever occur to me to ask for it. A long rest having
been ordered for the cure of Marshal Augereau's wound, the Emperor wrote
to bid him return for treatment to France, and sent to Italy for
Massena, to whom my brother, Bro, and several of my comrades were
attached. Augereau took me with him, as well as Dr. Raymond and his
secretary. I had to be lifted in and out of the carriage; otherwise I
found my health coming back as I got away from those icy regions towards
a milder climate. My mare passed the winter in the stables of M. de
Launay, head of the forage department. Our road lay through Silesia. So
long as we were in that horrible Poland, it required twelve, somet