The boy life of Napoleon, afterwards emperor of the French . eing dead, eh ? Will you insist on thattoo ? And why not? replied the Corsican, still harpingon his personal knowledge of things in Ajaccio. Iknew the Bonapartes well, I tell you. There was thefather, Papa Charles, a fine, noble-looking man ; andtheir uncle, the canon — ah! he was a good man. Hewas short and fat and bald, with little eyes, but witha look like an eagle. And the children ! how oftenI have seen them, though they were older than I —Joseph and Lucien, and little Louis, and Eliza andPauline and Caroline. Yes; I saw them of
The boy life of Napoleon, afterwards emperor of the French . eing dead, eh ? Will you insist on thattoo ? And why not? replied the Corsican, still harpingon his personal knowledge of things in Ajaccio. Iknew the Bonapartes well, I tell you. There was thefather, Papa Charles, a fine, noble-looking man ; andtheir uncle, the canon — ah! he was a good man. Hewas short and fat and bald, with little eyes, but witha look like an eagle. And the children ! how oftenI have seen them, though they were older than I —Joseph and Lucien, and little Louis, and Eliza andPauline and Caroline. Yes; I saw them often. AndNapoleon too. They say he never played you knew him at Brienne school, old Nonesucho* Yes, nodded the old veteran ; for there my fatherwas the porter. He was ever grave and stern, was Napoleon;— not wicked, thouo^h — BY THE WALL OF THE SOLDIERS HOME. 219 No, no; never wicked, broke in old Nonesuch. I remember his snow-ball fight. A fio-ht with snow-balls ! exclaimed the young-ster. Yes; with snow-balls, youngster, replied old None-. The Emperor was—the Emperor! cried old Nonesuch. such. Did you never hear of it? But you are tooyoung. Only the Corsican and I can rememberthat; and the old man nodded to the Corsican withthe superiority of old age over these babies, as hecalled the younger veterans. 220 THE BOY LIFE OF NAPOLEON. Let me see, said Nonesuch, crossing his woodenleg over his leg of flesh ; I was the porters boy atBrienne school. I was there to blacken my shoes —not mine, you understand, but those of the was much snow that winter. The scholarscould not play in the courts nor out-of-doors. Theywere forced to walk in the halls. ^ That wearied them,but it rejoiced me. Why ? Because I had but fewshoes to blacken. They could not get them dirtywhile they remained indoors. But, look you ! oneday at recess I saw the scholars all out-of-doors, —all out in the snow. Alas ! alas ! my poor shoes,said I. It made me sad. I hid behind the o
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