The march past was to take place in the Place Vendome, and the chancellor’s offices were full of ladies of the official world, gathered round my mother.  We dismounted for a moment to go and speak to them, and here again a moving scene took place.  We had been able to send on an aide-de-camp to assure my mother and aunt and my sisters that we were safe and sound, but our messenger had not had time to learn the names of all the victims.  So when we mounted the stairs of the chancellor’s offices, some of us all bespattered with blood, all these women, their brilliant dresses contrasting sadly with their terrified eyes, rushed upon us to see whether those they loved were amongst us.  Some of them were never to see their dear ones again!

Shortly after this bloody episode in our national history I joined the Didon frigate, Captain de Parseval, as enseigne de vaisseau.  My new commanding officer, who had joined the navy at a very early age, had served as a midshipman on board Villeneuve’s vessel, the Bucentaure, at Trafalgar.  He was in command of the mizzentop, and saw Nelson’s ship, the Victory, pass slowly astern of the Bucentaure—­so close that her yards caught the other’s ensign—­while the fifty guns of the British ship poured their fire one after the other into the stern of the French one, sweeping her gun-deck from end to end, and laying low four hundred of her crew.  After this commencement of his career, Commander de Parseval had spent his whole life in fighting and adventure.  He had been in three shipwrecks, one specially terrible one on the Isle de Sable, near the coast of Nova Scotia, in which (he was a lieutenant at the time) he swam ashore to get help and save the crew of his frigate.  He died with the rank of admiral, after having had the chief command of the Baltic Fleet during the Crimean War.  He was a charming fellow, slight and smart-looking, very carefully dressed, as resolute in command as he was formal as to politeness, a consummate seaman, managing his ship in first-rate style.  I sailed a great deal with him, and learned much from him, and from the very first I felt a personal affection for him, which was never belied, and which he reciprocated.  An extra bond of sympathy existed between us—­when I was just becoming deaf, he was deaf already.

We made a cruise for drill, on the Didon, doing a deal of navigation in all sorts of weathers, and I performed the duties of captain of the watch—­my first attempt at command, my first trial in a responsible position.

The winter season of 1836 found me back in Paris, where I began my classes again, and gave myself up in particular to my passion for the fine arts.  This taste of mine was the cause of a terrible blowing up I got from my father.  The jury of the Salon of 1836 refused a picture of Marilhat’s—­I think it was his first.  Some of the artists who had seen the young painter’s work thought this decision unjust.  They grumbled, and their grumbling