"No, _mon Général_," I replied. He glared up at me with an angry stare, and his face took a dull-red colour. I thought he was going to burst. "Oh, indeed!" he blurted out at last. "You _must_ put in an application to become a French citizen, or go back to your battalion. I will have no foreigners in a post of confidence on _my_ staff. _Grand Dieu!_ what have they been doing to allow such a thing? It is shameful! _Nom de nom!_" He almost shouted the last words, so great was his indignation, and from the expression he put into them one might have been justified in imagining that the Republic was in danger owing to my presence there. I did not become naturalised, and I heard nothing more about the question; and in justice to this cantankerous officer, I must acknowledge that, during the fifteen months he commanded the Brigade, he treated me with consideration on the rare occasions that I had any direct business to transact with him. He had risen from the ranks--indeed, I was told that he began his career as a sailor on a man-of-war--and it is therefore probable that his modest origin and the hard times he experienced at his _début_ accounted for his rough and rude manners. Our new Brigade Major, Captain Bataille, was a quiet and reserved gentleman, who studied hard at his profession and was a most capable officer, having already brilliantly distinguished himself in the field, for which he had been decorated with the cross of the Legion of Honour. We had now no Intelligence Department; and all questions formerly dealt with by this branch, together with those relating to active operations by the troops, were treated by the Headquarters Staff at Hanoï. The Governor had not succeeded in doing away with the Brigade, but he had taken his revenge by reducing its importance to a minimum, and the _rôle_ of its chief now consisted almost entirely in looking after the details of administration and discipline of the regiments under his orders, and in conducting the annual inspection of the troops in French Indo-China. In January, 1893, we received orders to transfer our offices to Hanoï, and we had rather a lively time of it for several days packing up the records and stowing them away, together with all the portable furniture, into a long string of commissariat mule-carts. Our march to Hanoï was not a fatiguing one, for the distance is not great--about 20 miles--and the road is probably the best in Tonquin.