Well, it finally ended in this way:  in Ventose, 1796,—­which was the same time of year that our March is now,—­we were penned up in one corner of the marmot country:  but at the end of the first campaign, lo and behold! we were masters of Italy, just as Napoleon had predicted.  And in the month of March following—­that is, in two campaigns, which we fought in a single year—­he brought us in sight of Vienna.  It was just a clean sweep.  We had eaten up three different armies in succession, and had wiped out four Austrian generals; one of them—­a white-haired old chap—­was burned alive at Mantua like a rat in a straw mattress.  We had conquered peace, and kings were begging, on their knees, for mercy.  Could a man have done all that alone?  Never!  He had the help of God; that’s certain!  He divided himself up like the five loaves of bread in the Gospel; he planned battles at night and directed them in the daytime:  he was seen by the sentries going here and there at all hours, and he never ate or slept.  When the soldiers saw all these wonderful things, they adopted him as their father.

But the people at the head of the government over there in Paris, who were looking on, said to themselves:  “This schemer, who seems to have the watchword of Heaven, is quite capable of laying his hands on France.  We’d better turn him loose in Asia or America.  Then maybe he’ll be satisfied for a while.”  So it was written that he should do just what Jesus Christ did—­go to Egypt.  You see how in this he resembled the Son of God.  But there’s more to come.

He gathered together all his old fire-eaters—­the fellows that he had put the spirit of the Devil into—­and said to them:  “Boys!  They’ve given us Egypt to chew on—­to keep us quiet for a while; but we’ll swallow Egypt in one time and two movements—­just as we did Italy; All you private soldiers shall be princes, with lands of your own.  Forward!”

“Forward, boys!” shouted the sergeants.

So we marched to Toulon, on our way to Egypt.  As soon as the English heard of it, they sent out all their ships of war to catch us; but when we embarked, Napoleon said to us:  “The English will never see us; and it is only proper for you to know now that your general has a star in the sky which will henceforth guide and protect us.”

As ’t was said, so ’t was done.  On our way across the sea we took Malta (just as one would pick an orange in passing) to quench Napoleon’s thirst for victory; because he was a man who wanted to be doing something all the time.

And so at last we came to Egypt; and then the orders were different.  The Egyptians, you know, are people who, from the beginning of the world, have had giants to rule over them, and armies like innumerable ants.  Their country is a land of genii and crocodiles, and of pyramids as big as our mountains, where they put the bodies of their dead kings to keep them fresh—­a thing that seems to please them all around.  Of