"I had also thought, Madame, that one might summon to this council a few men of great talent and of an opinion contrary to ours; but perhaps it would be to place them in a false position, to oblige them to make a sacrifice of honour and principle to which lofty minds and upright consciences do not readily lend themselves. "CHATEAUBRIAND." An old disciplined soldier, I was therefore hastening up to take my place in the ranks and to march under my captains: reduced by the will of the authorities to a duel, I accepted it I had scarcely expected to come, from the tomb of the husband, to fight by the tomb of the widow. Supposing that I were bound to remain alone, that I had misunderstood what suits France, I was none the less in the path of honour. Nor is it of little use for men that a man should immolate himself to his conscience; it is good that some one should consent to ruin himself to remain steadfast to principles of which he is convinced and which have to do with what is noble in our nature: those dupes are the necessary contestants of the brutal fact, the victims charged to utter the veto of the oppressed against the triumph of might. We praise the Poles: is their devotion other than a sacrifice? It has saved nothing; it could save nothing: even in the minds of my opponents, will that devotion be barren of results for the human race? I prefer a family before my country, they say: no, I prefer fidelity to my oaths before perjury, the moral world before material society; that is all: in so far as the family is concerned, I devote myself to it because it was essentially beneficial to France; I confound its posterity with that of the country and, when I deplore the misfortunes of the one, I deplore the disasters of the other: beaten, I have prescribed duties to myself, even as the victors have laid interests upon themselves. I am trying to withdraw from the world with my self-respect; in solitude we have to be careful whom we choose for our companion. [Sidenote: On the arrest of Madame.] In France, the land of vanity, so soon as an occasion offers for making a fuss, a crowd of people seize it: some act from good-heartedness, others from their consciousness of their own merits. I therefore had many competitors; they begged, as I had done, of Madame la Duchesse de Berry, the honour to defend her. At least, my presumption in offering myself to the Princess as a champion was a little justified by former services; though I did not fling the sword of Brennus[484] into the scale, at least I put my name there: however unimportant that may be, it had already gained some victories for the Monarchy. I opened my _Mémoire sur la captivité de Madame la duchesse de Berry_[485] with a consideration by which I am forcibly struck; I have often reprinted it, and it is probable that I shall reprint it again: