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21 - Folk Tales Every Child Should Know by Hamilton Wright Mabie · Folk Tales Every Child Should Know

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Speaker 1: Chapter twenty of Folk Tales Every Child Should Know. This
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Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Ellen Precle. Folk Tales Every
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Speaker 1: Child Should Know by Hamilton Wright maybe Chapter twenty, The
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Speaker 1: Peasant Story of Napoleon. Gogilet, an old soldier who fought
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Speaker 1: under Napoleon, tells the story of his wonderful general and
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Speaker 1: emperor to a group of eager listeners in the country
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Speaker 1: Doctor's barn. You see, my friends. Napoleon was born in Corsica,
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Speaker 1: a French island warmed by the sun of Italy, where
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Speaker 1: it is like a furnace, and where the people kill
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Speaker 1: each other from father to son, all about nothing. That's
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Speaker 1: a way they have to begin with the marvel of
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Speaker 1: the thing. His mother, who was the handsomest woman of
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Speaker 1: her time and a knowing one, bethought herself of dedicating
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Speaker 1: him to God so that he might escape the dangers
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Speaker 1: of his childhood and future life. For she had dreamed
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Speaker 1: that the world was set on fire the day he
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Speaker 1: was born, and indeed it was a prophecy. So she
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Speaker 1: asked God to protect him on condition that Napoleon should
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Speaker 1: restore his holy religion, which was then cast to the ground. Well,
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Speaker 1: that was agreed upon, and we shall see what came
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Speaker 1: of it. Follow me closely and tell me of what
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Speaker 1: you hear is in the nature of man. Sure and
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Speaker 1: certain it is that none but a man who conceived
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Speaker 1: the idea of making a compact with God could have
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Speaker 1: passed unheart through the enemy's lines, through cannonballs and discharges
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Speaker 1: of grape shot that swept the rest of us off
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Speaker 1: like flies, and always respected his head. I had proof
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Speaker 1: of that I myself at Elou. I see him now
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Speaker 1: as he rode up a height, took his field glass,
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Speaker 1: looked at the battle and said, all goes well. One
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Speaker 1: of those plumed, busy bodies who plagued him considerably and
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Speaker 1: followed him everywhere, even to his meals, so they said,
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Speaker 1: thought to play the wag and took the emperor's place.
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Speaker 1: As he rode away ho in a twinkling head and
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Speaker 1: plume were off. You must understand that Napoleon had promised
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Speaker 1: to keep the secrets of his compact all to himself.
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Speaker 1: That's why all those who followed him, even his nearest friends,
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Speaker 1: fell like nuts d roccveassier la nay, all strong as
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Speaker 1: steel bars, though he could bend them as he pleased.
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Speaker 1: Besides to prove he was the child of God and
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Speaker 1: made to be the father of soldiers. Was he ever
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Speaker 1: known to be lieutenant or captain, No, no commander in chief.
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Speaker 1: From the start he didn't look to be more than
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Speaker 1: twenty four years of age when he was an old
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Speaker 1: general at the taking of Toumont, where he first began
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Speaker 1: to show the others that they knew nothing about maneuvering cannon.
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Speaker 1: After that, down came our slip of a general to
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Speaker 1: command the Grand Army of Italy, which hadn't bred nor munitions,
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Speaker 1: nor shoes nor coats, a poor army as naked as
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Speaker 1: a worm. My friends said he here we are together.
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Speaker 1: Get it into your pates that fifteen days from now
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Speaker 1: you will be conquerors, new clothes, good gaiters, famous shoes,
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Speaker 1: and every man with a greatcoat. But my children, to
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Speaker 1: get these things, you must march to Milan, where they are.
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Speaker 1: And we marched. Franz, crushed as flat as a bed bug,
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Speaker 1: straightened up. We were thirty thousand bare feet against eighty
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Speaker 1: thousand Austrian bullies, all fine men, well set up. I
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Speaker 1: see him now. But Napoleon, he was then only Bonaparte.
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Speaker 1: He knew how to put the courage into us. We
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Speaker 1: marched by night, and we marched by day. We slapped
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Speaker 1: their faces at Montenon, We thrashed them at Rivoli, lodi
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Speaker 1: arcolle mellissimo. We never let em up. A soldier gets
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Speaker 1: the taste of conquest. So Napoleon whirled round those austring
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Speaker 1: generals who didn't know where to poke themselves to get
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Speaker 1: out of his way, and he pelted him well, nipped
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Speaker 1: off ten thousand men at a blow, sometimes by getting
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Speaker 1: round them with fifteen hundred frenchmen. Then he gleaned as
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Speaker 1: he pleased. He took their cannon, their supplies, their money,
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Speaker 1: their munitions, in short, all they had that was good
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Speaker 1: to take. He fought them and beat them on the mountains,
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Speaker 1: He drove them into the rivers and seas. He bit
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Speaker 1: him in the air, he devoured him on the ground,
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Speaker 1: and he lashed them everywhere. Hey, the grand are army
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Speaker 1: feathered itself well, For do you see the emperor, who
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Speaker 1: was a whit called up the inhabitants and told him
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Speaker 1: he was there to deliver them. So after that the
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Speaker 1: natives lodged and cherished us. The women do, and very
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Speaker 1: judicious they were. Now here's the end of it in
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Speaker 1: Vento's ninety six. In those times, that was the month
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Speaker 1: of March. Of to day we lay cuddled in a
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Speaker 1: corner of savoir with the Marmots. And yet before the
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Speaker 1: campaign was over we were masters of Italy, just as
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Speaker 1: Napoleon had predicted. And by the following March, in a
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Speaker 1: single year and two campaigns, he had brought us within
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Speaker 1: sight of Vienna twas a clean sweep. We devoured their
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Speaker 1: armies one after the other, and made an end of
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Speaker 1: four Austrian generals. One old fellow with white hair was
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Speaker 1: roasted like a rat in the straw at Nunthua. Kings
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Speaker 1: begged for mercy on their knees. Peace was one. Could
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Speaker 1: a man have done that? No God helped him to
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Speaker 1: a certainty. He divided himself up like the loaves in
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Speaker 1: the gospel, commanded the battle by day, planned it by night,
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Speaker 1: going and coming. For the sentinels saw him never eating,
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Speaker 1: never sleeping. So seeing these prodigies, the soldiers adopted him
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Speaker 1: for their father. Forward March and those others. The rulers
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Speaker 1: in Paris, seeing this, said to themselves, here's a bold
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Speaker 1: one that seems to get his orders from the skies.
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Speaker 1: He's likely to put his paw on France. We must
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Speaker 1: let him loose on Asia. We will send him to America.
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Speaker 1: Perhaps that will satisfy him. But twas written above for him,
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Speaker 1: as it was for Jesus Christ, the command went forth
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Speaker 1: that he should go to Egypt. See again his resemblance
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Speaker 1: to the Son of God. But that's not all. He
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Speaker 1: called together his best veterans, his fire eaters, the ones
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Speaker 1: he particularly put the devil into, and he said to
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Speaker 1: them like this, my friends. They have given us Egypt
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Speaker 1: to chew up, just to keep us busy, But we'll
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Speaker 1: swallow it hole in a couple of campaigns, as we
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Speaker 1: did Italy, the common soldiers shall be princes and have
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Speaker 1: the land for their own. Forward, March, forward, march, cried
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Speaker 1: the sergeants. And there we were at Toulont road to Egypt.
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Speaker 1: At that time the English had all their ships in
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Speaker 1: the sea. But when we embarked, Napoleon said, they won't
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Speaker 1: see us. It's just as well as you should know
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Speaker 1: from this time forth that your general has got his
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Speaker 1: star in the sky, which guides and protects us. What
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Speaker 1: was said was done. Passing over the sea. We took
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Speaker 1: Malta like an orange, just to quench his thirst for victory,
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Speaker 1: for he was a man who couldn't live and do nothing.
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Speaker 1: So here we are in Egypt. Good once here other orders.
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Speaker 1: The Egyptians, d'ye see, are men who ever since the
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Speaker 1: earth was, have had giants for sovereigns, and armies as
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Speaker 1: numerous as ants. For you must understand, that's the land
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Speaker 1: of genie and crocodiles, where they've built pyramids as big
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Speaker 1: as our mountains and buried their kings under them to
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Speaker 1: keep them fresh, an idea that pleased them mightily. So
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Speaker 1: then after we disembarked, the little corporal said to us,
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Speaker 1: my children, the country you are going to conquer has
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Speaker 1: a lot of gods that you must respect. Because Frenchmen
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Speaker 1: ought to be friends with everybody and fight the nations
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Speaker 1: without vexing the inhabitants. Get it into your skulls that
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Speaker 1: you are not to touch anything at first, for it
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Speaker 1: is all going to be yours soon forward. March. So far,
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Speaker 1: so good. But all those people of Africa, to whom
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Speaker 1: Nonapoleon was foretold under the name of Kabir Bonaberdes, a
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Speaker 1: word of their linguo that means the Sultan Fires were
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Speaker 1: afraid as the devil of him. So the Grand Turk
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Speaker 1: and Asia and Africa had recourse to magic. They sent
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Speaker 1: us a demon named the Mahdi, supposed to have descended
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Speaker 1: from heaven on a white horse, which, like its master,
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Speaker 1: was bullet proof, and both of them lived on air
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Speaker 1: without food to support them. There are some that say
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Speaker 1: they saw them, but I can't give you any reasons
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Speaker 1: to make you certain about that. The rulers of Arabia
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Speaker 1: and the Mamelukes tried to make their troopers believe that
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Speaker 1: the Mahdi could keep them from perishing in battle, and
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Speaker 1: they pretended he was an angel sent from heaven to
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Speaker 1: fight Napoleon and get back Solomon's seal. Solomon's seal was
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Speaker 1: part of their paraphernalia, which they vowed our general had stolen.
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Speaker 1: You must understand we'd given him a good many wry
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Speaker 1: faces in spite of what he'd said to us. Now
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Speaker 1: tell me how they knew that Napoleon had a pack
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Speaker 1: with God? Was that natural? Do you think they held
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Speaker 1: to it in their minds that Napoleon commanded the genie
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Speaker 1: and could pass hither and thither in the twinkling of
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Speaker 1: an eye like a bird. The fact is he was everywhere.
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Speaker 1: At last, it came to his carrying off a queen
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Speaker 1: beautiful as the dawn, for whom he had offered all
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Speaker 1: his treasure and diamonds as big as pigeons eggs, a
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Speaker 1: bargain which the Mameluke, to whom she particularly belonged, positively refused,
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Speaker 1: although he had several others. Such matters, when they come
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Speaker 1: to that pass, can be settled without great many battles,
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Speaker 1: And indeed there was no scarcity of battles. There was
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Speaker 1: fighting enough to please everybody. We were in line at Alexandria,
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Speaker 1: at Giza, and before the Pyramids. We marched in the
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Speaker 1: sun and through the sand, where some who had the
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Speaker 1: dazzles saw water that they couldn't drink, and shade where
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Speaker 1: their flesh was roasted. But we made short work of
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Speaker 1: the mamelukes, and everyone else yielded to the voice of Napoleon,
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Speaker 1: who took possession of upper and lower Egypt, Arabia, and
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Speaker 1: even the capitals of kingdoms that were no more where
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Speaker 1: there were thousands of statues, and all the plagues of Egypt,
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Speaker 1: more particularly lizards, a mammoth of a country were where
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Speaker 1: everybody could take. His acres of land were as little
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Speaker 1: as he pleased. While Napoleon was busy with his affairs inland,
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Speaker 1: where he had it in his head to do fine things.
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Speaker 1: The English burned his fleet at Babukir, for they were
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Speaker 1: always looking about them to annoy us. But Napoleon, who
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Speaker 1: had the respect of the East and of the West,
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Speaker 1: whom the Pope called his son and the cousin of
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Speaker 1: Mohammed called his dear father, resolved to punish England and
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Speaker 1: get hold of India in exchange for his fleet. He
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Speaker 1: was just about to take us across the Red Sea
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Speaker 1: into Asia, a country where there are diamonds and gold
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Speaker 1: to pay the soldiers and palaces for bivouax, when the
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Speaker 1: Mahdi made a treaty with the plague and sent it
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Speaker 1: down to hinder our victories. Halt the army to a
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Speaker 1: man defiled at that parade, and few they were who
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Speaker 1: came back on their feet. Dying soldiers couldn't take Saint Jandar,
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Speaker 1: though they rushed at it three times with generous and
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Speaker 1: martial obstinacy. The plague was the strongest, no, saying to
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Speaker 1: that enemy, my good friend, every soldier lay ill. Napoleon
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Speaker 1: alone was fresh as a rose, and the whole army
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Speaker 1: saw drinking in pestilence without its doing him a bit
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Speaker 1: of harm. Ha, my friends, will you tell me that's
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Speaker 1: in the nature of a mere man. The Mamelukes, knowing
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Speaker 1: we were all in the ambulances, thought that they could
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Speaker 1: stop the way. But that sort of joke wouldn't do
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Speaker 1: with Napoleon. So he said to his demons, his veterans,
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Speaker 1: those that had the toughest hide, go clear me the way. Juno,
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Speaker 1: a saber of the first cut, and his particular friend,
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Speaker 1: took a thousand men no more, and ripped up the
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Speaker 1: army of the Pacha, who had had the presumption to
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Speaker 1: put himself in the way. After that we came back
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Speaker 1: to headquarters at Cairo. Now here's another side of the story. Napoleon,
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Speaker 1: absent Franz was letting herself be ruined by the rulers
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Speaker 1: in Paris, who kept back the pay of the soldiers
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Speaker 1: of the other armies and their clothing and their rations,
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Speaker 1: left them to die of hunger, and expected them to
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Speaker 1: lay down the law to the universe without taking any
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Speaker 1: trouble to help them, idiots who amused themselves by chattering
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Speaker 1: instead of putting their own hands in the dough. Well,
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Speaker 1: that's how it happened that our armies were beaten and
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Speaker 1: the friend tears of France were encroached upon. The man
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Speaker 1: was not there now. Observe I say man, because that's
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Speaker 1: what they called him. But twas nonsense, for he had
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Speaker 1: a star and all its belongings, and it was we
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Speaker 1: who were only men. He taught history to France after
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Speaker 1: his famous Battle of Abukir, where without losing more than
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Speaker 1: three hundred men and with a single division, he vanquished
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Speaker 1: the Grand Army of the Dirk seventy five thousand strong
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Speaker 1: and hustled more than half of it into the sea. Rah.
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Speaker 1: That was his last thunderclap in Egypt. He said to himself,
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Speaker 1: seeing the way things were going in Paris, I am
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Speaker 1: the Savior of France. I know it, and I must go.
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Speaker 1: But understand me, the army didn't know he was going
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Speaker 1: where they'd have kept him by force and made him
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Speaker 1: Emperor of the East. So now we were sad, for
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Speaker 1: he was gone. Who was all our joy. He left
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Speaker 1: the command to clab Big Mastif, who came off duty
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Speaker 1: at Cairo, assassinated by an Egyptian, whom they put to
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Speaker 1: death by impaling him on a bayonet. That's the way
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Speaker 1: they guillotined people down there. But it makes him suffer
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Speaker 1: so much that a soldier had pity on the criminal
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Speaker 1: and gave him his canteen. And then as soon as
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Speaker 1: the Egyptian had drunk his fill, he gave up the
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Speaker 1: ghost with all the pleasure in his life. But that's
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Speaker 1: a trifle we couldn't laugh at. Then Napoleon embarked in
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Speaker 1: a cockle shell, a little skiff that was nothing at all,
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Speaker 1: though twas called fortune, And in a twinkling under the
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Speaker 1: nose of Egypt, who was blockading him with ships of
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Speaker 1: the wine, frigates and anything else that could hoist a sail,
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Speaker 1: he crossed over, and there he was in France, For
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Speaker 1: he always had the power, mind you, of crossing the
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Speaker 1: seas at one straddle. Was that a human man? Bah,
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Speaker 1: So one minute he is at Frazue, the next in Paris.
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Speaker 1: There they all adore him, but he summons the government,
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Speaker 1: what have you done with my children? The soldiers He
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Speaker 1: says to the lawyers, you're a mob of rascally scribblers.
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Speaker 1: You're making France a mess of cottage and snapping your
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Speaker 1: fingers at what people think of you. It won't do,
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Speaker 1: and I speak the opinion of everybody so on that
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Speaker 1: they wanted to battle with him and kill him. Click,
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Speaker 1: he had him locked up in barracks, or flying out
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Speaker 1: of him windows, or drafted among his followers, where they
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Speaker 1: were as mute as fishes and as pliable as a
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Speaker 1: quin of tobacco. After that stroke, Consul and then, as
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Speaker 1: it was not for him to doubt the Supreme Being,
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Speaker 1: he fulfilled his promise to the Good God, whom you
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Speaker 1: see had kept his word to him. He gave him
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Speaker 1: back his churches and re established his religion. The bells
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Speaker 1: rang for God and for him, and lo everybody was pleased.
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Speaker 1: Primo the priests, whom he saved from being harassed, Segundo
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Speaker 1: the bourgeois, who thought only of their trade and no
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Speaker 1: longer had to fear the repiaments of the law, which
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Speaker 1: had got to be unjust. Tertio the nobles, for he
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Speaker 1: forbade they should be killed, as unfortunately the people had
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Speaker 1: got the habit of doing. But he still had the
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Speaker 1: enemy to wipe out, and he wasn't the man to
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Speaker 1: go to sleep at a mess table, because do you
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Speaker 1: see his eye looked over the whole earth as if
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Speaker 1: it were no bigger than a man's head. So he
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Speaker 1: then appeared in Italy like as though he had stuck
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Speaker 1: his head through the window. One glance was enough. The
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Speaker 1: Austrians were swallowed up at Marengo like so many Gudjuns
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Speaker 1: by a whale. Uf the French eagles sang their peons
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Speaker 1: so loud that the world heard them, and it sufficed.
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Speaker 1: We won't play that game any more, said the German.
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Speaker 1: Enough enough, said all the rest to sum up. Europe
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Speaker 1: backed down, England knocked under general peace, and the kings
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Speaker 1: and the peoples made believe kiss each other. That's the
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Speaker 1: time when the Emperor invented the legion of honor, and
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Speaker 1: a fine thing too in France. This is what he said.
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Speaker 1: It bolone before the whole army. Every man is brave.
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Speaker 1: So the citizen who does a fine action shall be
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Speaker 1: sister to the soldier, and the soldier shall be his brother,
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Speaker 1: and the two shall be one under the flag of honor.
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Speaker 1: We who were down in Egypt now came home. All
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Speaker 1: was changed. He left us General, and hey, in a
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Speaker 1: twinkling we found him Emperor France. Gave herself to him
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Speaker 1: like a fine girl to a lancer. When it was done,
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Speaker 1: to the satisfaction of all, as you may say, a
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Speaker 1: sacred ceremony took place like of which had never been seen.
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Speaker 1: Under the ca a canopy of the skies. The Pope
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Speaker 1: and the cardinals, in their red and gold vestments, crossed
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Speaker 1: the Alps expressly to crown him before the army and
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Speaker 1: the people, who clapped their hands. There is one thing
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Speaker 1: I should do very wrong not to tell you. In Egypt,
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Speaker 1: in the desert close to Syria, the red Man came
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Speaker 1: to him on the Mount of Moses and said, all
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Speaker 1: is well. Then at Marengo, the night before the victory,
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Speaker 1: the same red Man appeared before him for the second time,
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Speaker 1: standing erect and saying, thou shalt see the world at
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Speaker 1: thy feet. Thou shalt be Emperor of France, King of Italy,
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Speaker 1: Master of Holland, Sovereign of Spain, Portugal and the Illyrian Provinces,
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Speaker 1: Protector of Germany, Savior of Poland, First Eagle of the
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Speaker 1: Legion of Honor. All this Red Man, you understand, was
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Speaker 1: his genius, his spirit, a sort of satellite who served him,
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Speaker 1: as some say, to communicate with his star. I never
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Speaker 1: really believed that. But the Red Man himself is a
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Speaker 1: true fact. Napoleon spoke of him and said he came
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Speaker 1: to him in troubled moments and lived in the Palace
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Speaker 1: of the Willies under the roof. So on the day
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Speaker 1: of the coronation Napoleon saw him for the third time,
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Speaker 1: and they were in consultation over many things. After that
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Speaker 1: Napoleon went to Milan to be crowned King of Italy,
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Speaker 1: and there the grand triumph of the soldier began. Every
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Speaker 1: man who could write was made an officer. Down came pensions,
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Speaker 1: It rained duchies, treasures poured in for the staff, which
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Speaker 1: didn't cost France a penny, and the legion of Honor
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Speaker 1: provided incomes for the private soldiers, of which I received
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Speaker 1: mine to this day. So here were the armies maintained
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Speaker 1: as never before on this earth. But besides that, the Emperor,
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Speaker 1: knowing that he was to be the emperor of the
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Speaker 1: whole world, bethought him of the bourgeois, and to please
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Speaker 1: them he built fery monuments after their own ideas in
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Speaker 1: places where you'd never think to find any. For instance,
16:48
Speaker 1: suppose you were coming back from Spain and going to Berlin. Well,
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Speaker 1: you'd find triumphal arches along the way, with common soldiers
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Speaker 1: sculptured on the stone, every bit the same as generals.
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Speaker 1: In two or three year years, and without imposing taxes
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Speaker 1: on any of you. Napoleon filled his vaults with gold,
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Speaker 1: built palaces, made bridges, roads, scholars, fetes, laws, vessels, harbors,
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Speaker 1: and spent millions upon millions, such enormous sums that he could, so,
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Speaker 1: they tell me, have paved France from end to end
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Speaker 1: with five franc pieces. If he had had a mind
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Speaker 1: to now, when he sat at ease on his throne
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Speaker 1: and was master of all so that Egypt waited his
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Speaker 1: permission to do his bidding, he remembered his four brothers
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Speaker 1: and his three sisters, and he said to us, as
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Speaker 1: it might be in conversation in an order of the day,
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Speaker 1: my children, is it right that the blood relations of
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Speaker 1: your emperor should be begging their bread? No, I wish
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Speaker 1: to see them in splendor like myself. It becomes therefore
17:42
Speaker 1: absolutely necessary to conquer a kingdom for each of them
17:46
Speaker 1: to the end, that Frenchmen may be masters over all lands,
17:50
Speaker 1: that the soldiers of the Guard shall make the whole
17:52
Speaker 1: earth tremble, that France may spitbirstly likes, and that all
17:56
Speaker 1: the nations shall say to her, as it is written
17:58
Speaker 1: on my copper coins. God protects you, agreed, cried the army.
18:02
Speaker 1: We'll go fish for thy kingdoms with our bayonets ha.
18:06
Speaker 1: There was no backing down. Don't you see? If he
18:08
Speaker 1: had taken it into his head to conquer the moon,
18:10
Speaker 1: we should have made ready, packed knapsacks and clambered up. Happily,
18:14
Speaker 1: he didn't think of it. The kings of the countries,
18:17
Speaker 1: who liked their comfortable thrones, were naturally loath to budge
18:20
Speaker 1: and had to have their ears pulled. So then forward
18:23
Speaker 1: march we did. March we got there, and the earth
18:26
Speaker 1: once more trembled to its center. Hey, the men in
18:29
Speaker 1: the shoes he used up in those days. The enemy
18:32
Speaker 1: dealt us such blows that none but the Grand Army
18:34
Speaker 1: could have borne the fatigue of it. But you are
18:36
Speaker 1: not ignorant that a Frenchman is born a philosopher and
18:39
Speaker 1: knows that a little sooner or a little later he
18:41
Speaker 1: has got to die so we were ready to die
18:44
Speaker 1: without a word, for we liked to see the emperor
18:46
Speaker 1: doing that. On the geographies. Here the narrator nimbly described
18:50
Speaker 1: a circle with his foot on the floor of the barn,
18:53
Speaker 1: and Napoleon said, there, that's to be a kingdom and
18:56
Speaker 1: a kingdom. It was ha the good times. The colonels
18:59
Speaker 1: were general, the general's marshals, the marshals kings. There's one
19:03
Speaker 1: of them still on his throne to prove it to Europe.
19:05
Speaker 1: But he's a gascon and a traitor to France for
19:07
Speaker 1: keeping that ground. And he doesn't blush for shame as
19:10
Speaker 1: he ought to, because crowns, don't you see, are made
19:12
Speaker 1: of gold. I who am speaking to you? I have
19:15
Speaker 1: seen in Paris eleven kings and a mob of princes
19:18
Speaker 1: surrounding Napoleon like the rays of the sun. You understand,
19:22
Speaker 1: of course, that every soldier had the chance to mount
19:24
Speaker 1: a throne, provided he always had the merit. So a
19:27
Speaker 1: corporal of the guard was a sight to be looked
19:29
Speaker 1: at as he walked along, for each man had his
19:32
Speaker 1: share in the victory, and was plainly set forth in
19:35
Speaker 1: the bulletin What victories there were Austerlitz, where the army maneuvered,
19:39
Speaker 1: as if on parade Elao, where we drowned the Russians
19:42
Speaker 1: in a lake, as though Napoleon had blown them into
19:45
Speaker 1: it with the breath of his mouth. Wagram, where the
19:47
Speaker 1: army fought for three days without grumbling. We won as
19:50
Speaker 1: many battles as there are saints in the calendar. It
19:53
Speaker 1: was proved, then, beyond a doubt, that Napoleon had the
19:55
Speaker 1: sword of God in his scabbard. The soldiers were his friends.
19:59
Speaker 1: He made them his children. He looked after us and
20:01
Speaker 1: saw that we had shoes and shirts, and greatcoats, and
20:04
Speaker 1: bread and cartridges. But he always kept up his majesty,
20:08
Speaker 1: for don't you see twas his business to rain? No
20:11
Speaker 1: matter for that, however, a sergeant and even a common
20:13
Speaker 1: soldier could say to him, my Emperor, just as you
20:16
Speaker 1: say to me sometimes, my good friend. He gave us
20:19
Speaker 1: an answer if we appealed to him. He slept in
20:21
Speaker 1: the snow like the rest of us, And indeed he
20:24
Speaker 1: had almost the air of a human man. I who
20:27
Speaker 1: speak to you, I have seen him with his feet
20:29
Speaker 1: among the grape shot, and no more uneasy than you
20:31
Speaker 1: are now standing steady looking through his field glass and
20:35
Speaker 1: minding his business, twas that kept the rest of us quiet.
20:39
Speaker 1: I don't see how he did it, but when he spake,
20:41
Speaker 1: he made our hearts burn within us. And to show
20:43
Speaker 1: him we were his children incapable of balking, didn't we
20:47
Speaker 1: rush at the mouths of the rascally cannon that belched
20:49
Speaker 1: and vomited shot and shell, without so much as saying,
20:52
Speaker 1: look out, why the dying must needs raise their heads
20:55
Speaker 1: to salute him and cry long live the Emperor? I
20:59
Speaker 1: ask you, was that natural? Who they have done that
21:02
Speaker 1: for a human man? Well after he had settled the world,
21:05
Speaker 1: the Empress Josephine, his wife, a good woman all the same,
21:09
Speaker 1: managed matters so that she did not bear him any children,
21:12
Speaker 1: and he was obliged to give her up, though he
21:14
Speaker 1: loved her considerably. But you see, he had to have
21:17
Speaker 1: little ones for reasons of state. Hearing of this, all
21:20
Speaker 1: the sovereigns of Europe quarreled as to which of them
21:22
Speaker 1: should give him a wife. And he married. So they
21:25
Speaker 1: told us an Austrian archduke's daughter of Caesar, an ancient
21:29
Speaker 1: man about whom people talk a good deal, and not
21:32
Speaker 1: in France, only where any one will tell you what
21:35
Speaker 1: he did but in Europe it is all true. For
21:38
Speaker 1: I myself, who addressed you at this moment, I have
21:40
Speaker 1: been on the Danube and have seen the remains of
21:43
Speaker 1: a bridge built by that man, who it seems was
21:45
Speaker 1: a relation of Napoleon in Rome. And that's how the
21:48
Speaker 1: Emperor got the inheritance of that city for his son. So,
21:52
Speaker 1: after the marriage, which was a fit for the whole world,
21:54
Speaker 1: and an honor of which he released the people of
21:56
Speaker 1: ten years taxes which they had to pay all the same. However,
22:00
Speaker 1: because the assessors didn't take account of what he said,
22:03
Speaker 1: his wife had a little one who was king of Rome.
22:06
Speaker 1: Now there's a thing that had never been seen on
22:07
Speaker 1: this earth. Never before was a child born a king
22:10
Speaker 1: with his father living. On that day a balloon went
22:13
Speaker 1: up in Paris to tell the news to Rome, and
22:15
Speaker 1: that balloon made the journey in one day. Now, is
22:19
Speaker 1: there any man among you who will stand up here
22:21
Speaker 1: and declare to me that all that was human? No,
22:23
Speaker 1: it was written above. And may the scurvy season who
22:27
Speaker 1: deny that he was sent by God himself for the
22:29
Speaker 1: triumph of France. Well, here's the Emperor of Russia that
22:33
Speaker 1: used to be his friend. He gets angry because Napoleon
22:35
Speaker 1: didn't marry a Russian. So he joins with the English,
22:38
Speaker 1: our enemies, to whom our Emperor always wanted to say
22:41
Speaker 1: a couple of words in their boroughs. Only he was prevented.
22:45
Speaker 1: Napoleon gets angry too, and end had to be put
22:48
Speaker 1: to such things. So he says, to us soldiers, you
22:51
Speaker 1: have been masters of every capital in Europe except Moscow,
22:54
Speaker 1: which is now the ally of England. To conquer England
22:57
Speaker 1: and India, which belongs to the English. It becomes our
23:00
Speaker 1: peremptory duty to go to Moscow. Then he assembled the
23:04
Speaker 1: greatest army that ever trailed its gaters over the globe,
23:07
Speaker 1: and so marvelously in hand it was that he reviewed
23:10
Speaker 1: a million men in one day, who rah cried the Russians.
23:14
Speaker 1: Down came all Russia and those animals of Cossacks, and
23:17
Speaker 1: a flock twas nation against nation, a general hurly burly,
23:21
Speaker 1: and beware, who could Asia against Europe? As the Red
23:24
Speaker 1: Men had foretold to Napoleon, Enough, cried the Emperor, I'll
23:28
Speaker 1: be ready. So now sure enough came all the kings,
23:31
Speaker 1: as the Red Man had said, to lift Napoleon's hand. Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Poland, Italy.
23:38
Speaker 1: Every one of em were with us, flattering us. Ah,
23:40
Speaker 1: it was fine. The eagles never called so loudly as
23:44
Speaker 1: those parades perched high above the banners of all Europe.
23:48
Speaker 1: The Poles were bursting with joy because Napoleon was going
23:50
Speaker 1: to release them. And that's why France and Poland are
23:53
Speaker 1: brothers to this day. Russia is ours, cried the army.
23:57
Speaker 1: We plunged into it, well supplied. We marched and marched
24:01
Speaker 1: no Russians. At last we found the brutes entrenched on
24:04
Speaker 1: the banks of the Moskva. That's where I won my cross.
24:07
Speaker 1: And I've got the right to say it was a
24:09
Speaker 1: damnable battle. This was how it came about. The Emperor
24:13
Speaker 1: was anxious. He had seen the red man, who said
24:15
Speaker 1: to him, my son, you are going too fast for
24:18
Speaker 1: your feet. You will lack men, friends will betray you.
24:21
Speaker 1: So the Emperor offered peace, but before signing, let us
24:25
Speaker 1: drub those Russians. He said to us, done, cried the
24:28
Speaker 1: army forward, march, said the sergeants. My clothes were in rags,
24:33
Speaker 1: my shoes worn out from trudging along those roads which
24:35
Speaker 1: are very uncomfortable ones. But no matter. I said to myself,
24:39
Speaker 1: as it's the last of our earthquakings, I'll go into
24:42
Speaker 1: it tooth and nail. We were drawn up in line
24:45
Speaker 1: before the great Ravine. Front seat says to her, signal given,
24:48
Speaker 1: and seven hundred pieces of artillery began a conversation that
24:52
Speaker 1: would bring the blood from your ears. Then must do
24:55
Speaker 1: justice to one's enemies. The Russians let themselves be killed
24:58
Speaker 1: like Frenchmen. They wouldn't give way. We couldn't advance forward.
25:02
Speaker 1: Some one cried, here comes the Emperor. True enough, he
25:05
Speaker 1: passed at a gallop, waving his hand to let us know.
25:07
Speaker 1: We must take the redoubt. He inspired us on We ran.
25:11
Speaker 1: I was the first in the ravine. Ha, my god,
25:14
Speaker 1: how the lieutenants fell, and the colonels and the soldiers,
25:17
Speaker 1: no matter, all the moor shoes for those that had none,
25:20
Speaker 1: and epaulets for the clever ones who knew how to read. Victory,
25:23
Speaker 1: cried the whole line. Victory, And would you believe it
25:26
Speaker 1: a thing never seen before? There lay twenty five thousand
25:29
Speaker 1: frenchmen on the ground, twas like mowing down a wheatfield.
25:33
Speaker 1: Only in place of the ears of wheat put the
25:35
Speaker 1: heads of men. We were sobered by this time. Those
25:38
Speaker 1: who were left alive. The man rode up. We made
25:41
Speaker 1: the circle around him. Ha. He knew how to cajole
25:44
Speaker 1: his children. He could be amiable when he liked, and
25:47
Speaker 1: feed him with words when their stomachs were ravenous with
25:49
Speaker 1: the hunger of wolves. Flatterer, he distributed the crosses himself.
25:54
Speaker 1: He uncovered to the dead, and then cried to us,
25:56
Speaker 1: on to Moscow, till Moscow answered the army. We took Moscow.
26:01
Speaker 1: Would you believe it? The Russians burned their own city
26:05
Speaker 1: twas a hay stack six miles square, and it blazed
26:07
Speaker 1: for two days. The buildings crashed like slates, and showers
26:11
Speaker 1: of melted iron and lead rained down upon us, which
26:14
Speaker 1: was naturally horrible, I may say to you plainly. It
26:17
Speaker 1: was like a flash of lightning on our disasters. The
26:19
Speaker 1: Emperor said, we've done enough. My soldiers shall rest here.
26:23
Speaker 1: So we rested awhile, just to get breath into our
26:25
Speaker 1: bodies and the flesh on our bones, for we were
26:28
Speaker 1: really tired. We took possession of the golden cross that
26:31
Speaker 1: was on the Kremlin, and every soldier brought away with
26:33
Speaker 1: him a small fortune. But out there the winter sets
26:36
Speaker 1: in a month earlier, a thing those fools of science
26:38
Speaker 1: didn't properly explain. So coming back, the cold nipped us.
26:42
Speaker 1: No longer an army, do you hear me, No longer
26:45
Speaker 1: any generals, no longer any sergeants. Even twas the rain
26:48
Speaker 1: of wretchedness and hunger, a rain of equality. At last,
26:52
Speaker 1: no one thought of anything but to see France once more.
26:54
Speaker 1: No one stooped to pick up his gun or his
26:56
Speaker 1: money if he dropped them. Each man followed his nose
26:59
Speaker 1: and went as he pleas, without caring for glory. The
27:01
Speaker 1: weather was so bad the emperor couldn't see the star.
27:05
Speaker 1: There was something between him and the skies. Poor man,
27:08
Speaker 1: it made him ill to see his eagles flying away
27:10
Speaker 1: from victory. Ah twas a mortal blow, you may believe me, Well,
27:15
Speaker 1: we got to the barrescene of my friends. I can
27:18
Speaker 1: affirm you by all that is most sacred, by my honor,
27:21
Speaker 1: that since mankind came into the world, never never was
27:24
Speaker 1: there seen such a frick a sea of any army, guns, carriages,
27:28
Speaker 1: artillery wagons, in the midst of such snows, under such
27:31
Speaker 1: relentless skies. The muzzles of the muskets burned our hands
27:35
Speaker 1: if we touched them. The iron was so cold. It
27:38
Speaker 1: was there that the army was saved by the Pontoniers,
27:40
Speaker 1: who were affirm at their post. And there that Gondran,
27:44
Speaker 1: sole survivor of the men who were bold enough to
27:46
Speaker 1: go into the water and build the bridges by which
27:48
Speaker 1: the army crossed. That Gondran here present, admirably conducted himself
27:53
Speaker 1: and saved us from the Russians, who, I must tell
27:55
Speaker 1: you still respected the Grand Army, remembering its victories. And
28:00
Speaker 1: he added, pointing to Gndran, who was gazing at him
28:02
Speaker 1: with the peculiar attention of a deaf man. Gondran is
28:05
Speaker 1: a finished soldier, a soldier who is honor itself, and
28:09
Speaker 1: he merits your highest esteem. I saw the emperor. He resumed,
28:13
Speaker 1: standing by the bridge, motionless, not feeling the cold. Was
28:17
Speaker 1: that human He looked at the destruction of his treasure,
28:20
Speaker 1: his friends, his old Egyptians, bah all that passed him, women, army, wagons, artillery,
28:25
Speaker 1: all were shattered, destroyed, ruined. The bravest carried the eagles.
28:30
Speaker 1: For the eagles ye see, were France, the nation. All
28:32
Speaker 1: of you. They were the civil and the military honor
28:35
Speaker 1: that must be kept pure. Could their heads be lowered
28:38
Speaker 1: because of the cold. It was only near the Emperor
28:41
Speaker 1: that we were warmed ourselves, because when he was in danger,
28:44
Speaker 1: we ran frozen as we were. We who wouldn't have
28:47
Speaker 1: stretched a hand to save a friend. They told us
28:50
Speaker 1: he wept at night over his poor family of soldiers. Ah,
28:53
Speaker 1: None but he and the Frenchmen could have got themselves
28:55
Speaker 1: out of that business. We did get out, but with
28:58
Speaker 1: losses great life. As I tell you, the Allies captured
29:02
Speaker 1: our provisions. Men began to betray him, as the Red
29:05
Speaker 1: Man predicted. Those chatterers in Paris who had held their
29:08
Speaker 1: tongues after the Imperial Guard was formed, now thought he
29:12
Speaker 1: was dead. So they hoodwinked the Prefect of Police and
29:15
Speaker 1: hatched a conspiracy to overthrow the Empire. He heard of it.
29:18
Speaker 1: It worried him. He left us, saying adieu, my children,
29:22
Speaker 1: guard the outposts. I shall return to you fat. Without him,
29:26
Speaker 1: nothing went right. The generals lost their heads. The marshals
29:29
Speaker 1: talked nonsense and committed follies, but that was not surprising
29:33
Speaker 1: for Napoleon, who was kind, had fed them on gold.
29:36
Speaker 1: They had got as fat as large and wooden stir
29:38
Speaker 1: some stayed in camp when they ought to have been
29:40
Speaker 1: warming the backs of the enemy loose between us and France.
29:44
Speaker 1: But the Emperor came back, and he brought recruits, famous recruits.
29:47
Speaker 1: He changed their backbone and made them dogs of war,
29:50
Speaker 1: fit to set their teeth into anything. And he brought
29:53
Speaker 1: a guard of honor, a fine body, indeed, all bourgeois
29:56
Speaker 1: who melted away like butter on a gridiron. Well, in
30:00
Speaker 1: spite of our stern bearing, here's everything going against us,
30:03
Speaker 1: And yet the armies did prodigies of valor. Then came
30:06
Speaker 1: battles on the mountains, Nations against nations, Dresden, Lutzen, Bautzen.
30:11
Speaker 1: Remember these days, all of you. Wi. Twas then that
30:14
Speaker 1: the Frenchmen were so particularly heroic that a good grenadier
30:17
Speaker 1: only lasted six months. We triumphed always, Yet there were
30:22
Speaker 1: those English in our rear rousing revolts against us with
30:25
Speaker 1: their lies. No matter, we cut our way home through
30:28
Speaker 1: the whole pack of the nations. Wherever the Emperor showed himself,
30:31
Speaker 1: we followed him. For if by sea or land he
30:34
Speaker 1: gave us the word go, we went. At last we
30:37
Speaker 1: were in France, and many a poor foot soldier felt
30:40
Speaker 1: the air of his own country restore his soul to satisfaction.
30:42
Speaker 1: Spite the wintry weather. I can say for myself that
30:45
Speaker 1: it refreshed my life well. Next our business was to
30:48
Speaker 1: defend France, our country, our beautiful France, against all Europe
30:53
Speaker 1: which resented our having laid down the law to the
30:55
Speaker 1: Russians and pushed them back into their dens so that
30:58
Speaker 1: they couldn't eat us up a lot as northern nations,
31:01
Speaker 1: who are dainty and like southern flesh, have a habit
31:04
Speaker 1: of doing. At least so I have heard some generals say.
31:08
Speaker 1: Then the Emperor saw his own father in law, his
31:10
Speaker 1: friends whom he had made kings, and the scoundrels to
31:13
Speaker 1: whom he had given back their thrones all against him.
31:16
Speaker 1: Even Frenchmen and allies in our own ranks turned against
31:19
Speaker 1: us under their secret orders. As at the Battle of Leipsic.
31:23
Speaker 1: Would common soldiers have been capable of such wickedness? Three
31:27
Speaker 1: times a day men were false to their word, and
31:29
Speaker 1: they called themselves princes. So then France was invaded. Wherever
31:34
Speaker 1: the Emperor showed his lie in face, the enemy retreated,
31:36
Speaker 1: and he did more prodigies in defending France than ever
31:39
Speaker 1: he had done in conquering Italy, the East, Spain, Europe
31:43
Speaker 1: and Russia. He meant to bury every invader under the
31:46
Speaker 1: sod and teach him to respect the soil of France.
31:49
Speaker 1: So he let them get to Paris, that he might
31:51
Speaker 1: swallow them at a mouthful and rise to the height
31:54
Speaker 1: of his genius in a battle greater than all the rest,
31:56
Speaker 1: a mother battle, as it were. But there the Parisians
32:01
Speaker 1: were afraid for their two penny skins and their trumpery shops.
32:04
Speaker 1: They opened the gates. Then the ragusades began, and happiness ended.
32:10
Speaker 1: The Empress was fooled, and the white banner flaunted from
32:12
Speaker 1: the windows. The generals whom he had made his nearest
32:15
Speaker 1: friends abandoned him for the Bourbons. A set of people
32:18
Speaker 1: no one had heard tell of. The Emperor bade us
32:21
Speaker 1: farewell at Fontainbleau, soldiers, I can hear him now. We
32:24
Speaker 1: wept like children. The flags and the eagles were lowered,
32:27
Speaker 1: as if for a funeral. It was, I may well
32:29
Speaker 1: say to you, the funeral of the Empire. Her dapper
32:34
Speaker 1: armies were nothing now but skeletons, so he said to us,
32:37
Speaker 1: standing there on the portico, of his palace. My soldiers,
32:40
Speaker 1: we are vanquished by treachery, but we shall meet in heaven,
32:43
Speaker 1: the country of the brave. Defend my child, whom I
32:46
Speaker 1: commit to you. Long live Napoleon the second. He meant
32:50
Speaker 1: to die, that no man should look upon Napoleon vanquished.
32:53
Speaker 1: He took poison enough to have killed a great regiment, because,
32:56
Speaker 1: like Jesus Christ before his passion, he thought himself abandoned
32:59
Speaker 1: to God and his talisman. But the potion did not
33:02
Speaker 1: hurt him. See again, he found he was immortal, sure
33:06
Speaker 1: of himself, knowing he must ever be the Emperor. He
33:09
Speaker 1: went for a while to an island to study out
33:11
Speaker 1: the nature of these others, whom you may be sure,
33:14
Speaker 1: committed folly's without end. Whilst he bided his time down there,
33:17
Speaker 1: the Chinese and the wild men on the coast of Africa,
33:20
Speaker 1: and the Barbary states, and others who are not at
33:23
Speaker 1: all accommodating, knows so well he was more than man
33:26
Speaker 1: that they respected his tent, saying to touch it would
33:29
Speaker 1: be to offend God. Thus do you see, when these
33:31
Speaker 1: others turned him from the doors of his own France,
33:34
Speaker 1: he still reigned over the whole world. Before long he
33:37
Speaker 1: embarked in the same little coppleshell of a boat he
33:39
Speaker 1: had had in Egypt, sailed round the beard of the English,
33:42
Speaker 1: set foot in France, and France acclaimed him. The sacred
33:45
Speaker 1: cuckoo flew from spire to spire. All France cried out
33:49
Speaker 1: with one voice, long live the Emperor in this region.
33:52
Speaker 1: Here the enthusiasm for that wonder of the ages was,
33:55
Speaker 1: I may say solid. Dauphine behaved well, and I am
33:58
Speaker 1: particularly pleased to know that her people wept when they
34:01
Speaker 1: saw once more the gray top coat march. First, it
34:04
Speaker 1: was when Napoleon landed with two hundred men to conquer
34:07
Speaker 1: the Kingdom of France and of Navarre, which on the
34:10
Speaker 1: twelfth of the same month was again the French Empire.
34:13
Speaker 1: On that day our man was in Paris. He had
34:15
Speaker 1: made a clean sweep, recovered his dear friends, and gathered
34:18
Speaker 1: his veterans together by saying no more than three words,
34:22
Speaker 1: I am here, twas the greatest miracle God had done.
34:25
Speaker 1: Yet before him did ever man recover an empire by
34:29
Speaker 1: showing his hat. And these others who thought they had
34:31
Speaker 1: subdued France, not they at sight of the eagles. A
34:35
Speaker 1: national army sprang up, and we marched to Waterloo. There
34:38
Speaker 1: the guard died at one blow. Napoleon, in despair, threw
34:42
Speaker 1: himself three times before the cannon of the enemy, without
34:45
Speaker 1: obtaining death. We saw that the battle was lost. That night,
34:48
Speaker 1: the Emperor called his old soldiers to him on the field,
34:51
Speaker 1: soaked with our blood. He burned his banners and his eagles,
34:54
Speaker 1: His poor eagles, ever victorious, who cried forward in the battles,
34:58
Speaker 1: and had flown the length and breadth Europe, They were
35:01
Speaker 1: saved the infamy of belonging to the enemy. All the
35:04
Speaker 1: treasures of England couldn't get her a tail feather of them,
35:07
Speaker 1: No more eagles. The rest is well known. The Red
35:10
Speaker 1: Man went over to the Bourbons, like the scoundrel that
35:12
Speaker 1: he is. France is crushed. The soldier is nothing. They
35:16
Speaker 1: deprive him of his dues. They discharge him to make
35:18
Speaker 1: room for broken down nobles. Ah tis pitiable. They seize
35:21
Speaker 1: Napoleon by treachery. The English nailed him on a desert
35:24
Speaker 1: island in mid ocean, on a rock raised ten thousand
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Speaker 1: feet above the earth. And there he is and will
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Speaker 1: be till the Red Man gives him back his power.
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Speaker 1: For the happiness of France. These others say he's dead. Ah, dead,
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Speaker 1: tis easy to see. They don't know him. They tell
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Speaker 1: that fib to catch the people and feel safe in
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Speaker 1: their hovel of a government. Listen, the truth at the
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Speaker 1: bottom of it all is that his friends have left
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Speaker 1: him alone on the desert isle to fulfill a prophecy.
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Speaker 1: For I forgot to say that his name Napoleon means
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Speaker 1: lion of the desert. Now this that I tell you
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Speaker 1: is true as the Gospel. All other tales that you
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Speaker 1: hear of the Emperor our follies without common sense, because
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Speaker 1: do you see, God never gave to child of woman
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Speaker 1: born the right to stamp his name and read as
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Speaker 1: he did on the earth which forever shall remember him.
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Speaker 1: Long live Napoleon, the father of his people and of
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Speaker 1: the soldier. The end end of Chapter twenty. End of
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Speaker 1: folk Tales Every Child Should Know by Hamilton Wright. Maybe