The young man moved hastily forward as if to press Bonaparte’s hand, but checked himself almost immediately. The light had fallen full on his face for an instant; that instant sufficed to make the general notice the face as he had the voice. Neither the one nor the other was unknown to him. He searched his memory for an instant, but finding it rebellious, said: “I know you!” “Possibly, general.” “I am certain; only I cannot recall your name.” “You managed that yours should not be forgotten, general.” “Who are you?” “Ask Valence, general.” Bonaparte gave a cry of joy. “Louis de Montrevel,” he exclaimed, opening wide his arms. This time the young lieutenant did not hesitate to fling himself into them. “Very good,” said Bonaparte; “you will serve eight days with the regiment in your new rank, that they may accustom themselves to your captain’s epaulets, and then you will take my poor Muiron’s place as aide-de-camp. Go!” “Once more!” cried the young man, opening his arms. “Faith, yes!” said Bonaparte, joyfully. Then holding him close after kissing him twice, “And so it was you who gave Valence that sword thrust?” “My word!” said the new captain and future aide-de-camp, “you were there when I promised it to him. A soldier keeps his word.” Eight days later Captain Montrevel was doing duty as staff-officer to the commander-in-chief, who changed his name of Louis, then in ill-repute, to that of Roland. And the young man consoled himself for ceasing to be a descendant of St. Louis by becoming the nephew of Charlemagne. Roland--no one would have dared to call Captain Montrevel Louis after Bonaparte had baptized him Roland--made the campaign of Italy with his general, and returned with him to Paris after the peace of Campo Formio. When the Egyptian expedition was decided upon, Roland, who had been summoned to his mother’s side by the death of the Brigadier-General de Montrevel, killed on the Rhine while his son was fighting on the Adige and the Mincio, was among the first appointed by the commander-in-chief to accompany him in the useless but poetical crusade which he was planning. He left his mother, his sister Amélie, and his young brother Edouard at Bourg, General de Montrevel’s native town. They resided some three-quarters of a mile out of the city, at Noires-Fontaines, a charming house, called a château, which, together with the farm and several hundred acres of land surrounding it, yielded an income of six or eight thousand livres a year, and constituted the general’s entire fortune. Roland’s departure on this adventurous expedition deeply afflicted the poor widow. The death of the father seemed to presage that of the son, and Madame de Montrevel, a sweet, gentle Creole, was far from possessing the stern virtues of a Spartan or Lacedemonian mother.