Napoleon alone was fresh as a rose, and the whole army saw him
drinking in pestilence without its doing him a bit of harm.
"Ha! my friends! will you tell me that _that's_ in the nature of a mere
man?
"The Mamelukes, knowing we were all in the ambulances, thought they
could stop the way; but that sort of joke wouldn't do with Napoleon. So
he said to his demons, his veterans, those that had the toughest hide,
'Go, clear me the way.' Junot, a sabre of the first cut, and his
particular friend, took a thousand men, no more, and ripped up the army
of the pacha who had had the presumption to put himself in the way.
After that, we came back to headquarters at Cairo. Now, here's another
side of the story. Napoleon absent, France was letting herself be ruined
by the rulers in Paris, who kept back the pay of the soldiers of the
other armies, and their clothing, and their rations; left them to die
of hunger, and expected them to lay down the law to the universe
without taking any trouble to help them. Idiots! who amused themselves
by chattering, instead of putting their own hands in the dough. Well,
that's how it happened that our armies were beaten, and the frontiers of
France were encroached upon: THE MAN was nor there. Now observe, I say
_man_ because that's what they called him; but 'twas nonsense, for he
had a star and all its belongings; it was we who were only men.
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