Part 12 (1/2)

Bouquet should see that he knew how gentlemen should act. He would not fall upon him, and beat him as he deserved. He would conduct himself as all gentlemen did. He would challenge to a duel the insulter of his father.

This was the custom. The refuge of all gentlemen who felt themselves insulted, disgraced, or persecuted in those days, was to seek vengeance in a personal encounter with deadly weapons, called a duel. It is a foolish and savage way of seeking redress; but even today it is resorted to by those who feel themselves ill treated by their ”equals.” So Napoleon felt that he was doing the only wise and gentlemanly thing possible.

But, even then duelling was against the law. It was punished when men were caught at it; for schoolboys, it was considered an unheard-of crime.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Napoleon sends his Challenge_.]

Still, though against the law, all men felt that it was the only way to salve their wounded honor. Napoleon felt it would be the only manly course open to him; so, early next morning, he despatched his friend Bourrienne with a note to Bouquet. That note was a ”cartel,” or challenge. It demanded that Mr. Bouquet should meet Mr. Bonaparte at such time and place as their seconds might select, there to fight with swords until the insult that Mr. Bouquet had put upon Mr. Bonaparte should be wiped out in blood.

There was ferocity for you! But it was the fas.h.i.+on.

”Mr. Bouquet,” however, had no desire to meet the fiery young Corsican at swords' points. So, instead of meeting his adversary, he sneaked off to one of the teachers, who, as we know, most disliked Napoleon, and complained that the Corsican, Bonaparte, was seeking his life, and meant to kill him.

At once Napoleon was summoned before the indignant instructor.

”So, sir!” cried the teacher, ”is this the way you seek to become a gentleman and officer of your king? You would murder a schoolmate; you would force him to a duel! No denial, sir; no explanation. Is this so, or not so?”

Once more Napoleon saw that words or remonstrances would be in vain.

”It is so,” he replied. ”Can we, then, never work out your Corsican brutality?” said the teacher. ”Go, sir! you are to be imprisoned until fitting sentence for your crime can be considered.”

And once again poor Napoleon went into the school lock-up, while Bouquet, who was the most at fault, went free.

There was almost a rebellion in school over the imprisonment of the successful general who had so bravely fought the battles of the snow-fort.

Napoleon pa.s.sed a day in the lock-up; then he was again summoned before the teacher who had thus punished him.

”You are an incorrigible, young Bonaparte,” said the teacher.

”Imprisonment can never cure you. Through it, too, you go free from your studies and tasks. I have considered the proper punishment. It is this: you are to put on to-day the penitent's woollen gown; you are to kneel during dinner-time at the door of the dining-room, where all may see your disgrace and take warning therefrom; you are to eat your dinner on your knees. Thereafter, in presence of your schoolmates a.s.sembled in the dining-room, you are to apologize to Mr. Bouquet, and ask pardon from me, as representing the school, for thus breaking the laws and acting as a bully and a murderer. Go, sir, to your room, and a.s.sume the penitent's gown.”

Napoleon, as I have told you, was a high-spirited boy, and keenly felt disgrace. This sentence was as humiliating and mortifying as anything that could be put upon him. Rebel at it as he might, he knew that he would be forced to do it; and, distressed beyond measure at thought of what he must go through, he sought his room, and flung himself on his bed in an agony of tears. He actually had what in these days we call a fit of hysterics.

While thus ”broken up,” his room door opened. Supposing that the teacher, or one of the monitors, had come to prepare him for the dreadful sentence, he refused to move.

Then a voice, that certainly was not the one he expected, called to him.

He raised a flushed and tearful face from the bed, and met the inquiring eyes of his father's old friend, and the ”protector” of the Bonaparte family, General Marbeuf, formerly the French commander in Corsica.

”Why, Napoleon, boy! what does all this mean?” inquired the general.

”Have you been in mischief? What is the trouble?”

The visit came as a climax to a most exciting event. In it Napoleon saw escape from the disgrace he so feared, and the injustice against which he so rebelled. With a joyful shout he flung himself impulsively at his friend's feet, clasped his knees, and begged for his protection. The boy, you see, was still unnerved and over-wrought, and was not as cool or self-possessed as usual.

Gradually, however, he calmed down, and told General Marbeuf the whole story.

The general was indignant at the sentence. But he laughed heartily at the idea of this fourteen-year-old boy challenging another to a duel.

”Why, what a fire-eater it is!” he cried. ”But you had provocation, boy. This Bouquet is a sneak, and your teacher is a tyrant. But we will change it all; see, now! I will seek out the princ.i.p.al. I will explain it all. He shall see it rightly, and you shall not be thus disgraced.

No, sir! not if I, General Marbeuf, intrench myself alone with you behind what is left of your slushy snow-fort yonder, and fight all Brienne school in your behalf--teachers and all. So cheer up, lad! we will make it right.”