The Abbé Leprince wanted them to give me a horse; but according to my father's notions, the only thing a naval officer need know how to steer was his ship. I was reduced, therefore, to riding two fat coach-horses or a big piebald by stealth. The latter was not, like Turenne's _Pie_, one of those steeds which the Romans called _desultorii equi_[114] and trained to aid their masters; it was a moon-eyed Pegasus, which overreached in trotting, and bit my legs when I set it at a ditch. I never cared much about horses, although I have led the life of a Tartar; and, contrary to the effect which my early training should have produced, I ride with an elegant rather than a firm seat. A tertiary fever, the germs of which I had brought with me from the marshes of Dol, rid me of M. Leprince. A quack passed through the village; my father, who did not believe in doctors, believed in charlatans: he sent for the empiric, who undertook to cure me in twenty-four hours. He returned the next day, in a green, gold-laced coat, a huge, powdered wig, wide ruffles of dirty muslin, false diamonds on his fingers, worn black satin breeches, bluey-white silk stockings, and shoes with enormous buckles. He pulled back my curtains, felt my pulse, made me put out my tongue, jabbered a few words with an Italian accent on the necessity for purging me, and gave me a little piece of burnt sugar to eat. My father approved of the treatment, for he maintained that all sickness came from indigestion, and that for every kind of ill you should purge your man till the blood came. Half-an-hour after swallowing the caramel, I was seized with a terrible vomiting; they sent to tell M. de Chateaubriand, who wanted to throw the poor wretch from the window of the tower. The latter, terrified, took off his coat, tucked back his shirt-sleeves, and made the most grotesque gestures. At each movement, his wig turned in every direction; he repeated my cries, adding after each: "_Che, Monsou Lavandier?_" This Monsieur Lavandier was the village druggist, who had been called in to lend his aid. I did not know, in the midst of my pain, whether I should die from taking the man's nostrums or from bursting with laughter at his behavior. The effects of this overdose of emetic were stopped in time, and I was set on my legs again. The whole of our life is spent in wandering round our tomb: our illnesses are so many puffs of wind that send us more or less near to the haven. The first corpse I saw was that of a canon of Saint-Malo: he lay dead upon his bed, his features distorted with the final convulsions. Death is beautiful, he is our friend: and yet we do not recognize him, because he comes to us masked, and his mask frightens us. I was sent back to school at the end of autumn. *