Mr. Bryan, in a speech in Congress, made good use of an incident recorded by Muelbach, who narrated that at Marengo, when Napoleon gave up the battle as lost, and ordered a drummer-boy to beat a retreat, the lad's face saddened as he said: "Sire, I do not know how. Dessaix has never taught me retreat, but I can beat a charge. Oh, I can beat a charge that would make the dead fall into line! I beat it at Mount Tabor; I beat it at the Pyramids. Oh, may I beat it here?" The charge was ordered, and victory plucked from the jaws of defeat by the little hands of that heroic lad. The incident is fanciful, but it is illustrative. There is a stone wall in a cemetery at Paris where many Communists were executed. When I saw it the wall still bore marks of shot, and fragments of the skin and hair of the victims were matted to the masonry. A lad who had been among the fiercest of the fighters was one of the condemned. While marching near his home and to the place of execution, he told the officer in command that he had a locket which he had just taken from the body of his dead father, and begged that he might bear it to his mother, promising to return and resume his place in the fated line. The officer, touched by his tender age, gave the permission, hoping and believing he would not return, thus sparing him the necessity of executing a mere child. Before the line reached its destination, however, the lad came up with hasty steps, stood against the wall, and faced the soldiers. The first volley tore out his brave little heart. The cradles of France furnished the troops who fought and won the desperate battle of Wagram. "In my young soldiers," said Napoleon, "I have found all the valor of my old companions in arms."