"Ha! they think it is pretty well when they have given their blood to France for twenty years, when they have made ten, fifteen, and twenty campaigns, and wear three chevrons, and are riddled with wounds, to hear that their old chiefs are driven from their posts, their daughters turned out of the schools, and that the sons of those people are to be their officers forever--that delights them, Father Goulden!" and his face quivered even to his ears as he said this. "That is terrible, certainly," said Father Goulden, "but discipline is always discipline there. The marshals obey the ministers, and the officers the marshals, and the soldiers the officers." "You are right," said Zebede, "but there, they are beating the assembly." And he shook hands and hurried off to the barracks. The winter passed in this way, while the indignation increased every day. The city was full of officers on half-pay, who dared not remain in Paris,--lieutenants, captains, commandants, and colonels of infantry and cavalry,--men who lived on a crust of bread and a glass of wine a day, and who were the more miserable because they were forced to keep up an appearance--think of such men with their hollow cheeks and their hair closely cropped, with sparkling eyes and their big mustaches and their old uniform cloaks, of which they had been forced to change the buttons, see them promenading by threes and sixes and tens on the square, with their sword-canes at their button-holes, and their three-cornered hats so old and worn, though still well brushed; you could not help thinking that they had not one quarter enough to eat. And yet we were compelled to say to ourselves, these are the victors of Jemmapes, of Fleurus, of Zurich, of Hohenlinden, of Marengo, of Austerlitz, and of Friedland and Wagram. If we are proud of being Frenchmen, neither the Comte d'Artois nor the Duke de Berry can boast of being the cause; on the contrary, it is these men, and now they leave them to perish, they even refuse them bread and put the emigres in their place. It does not need any extraordinary amount of common-sense, or heart, or of justice to discover that this is contrary to nature. I never could look at these unhappy men; it made me miserable. If you have been a soldier for only six months, your respect for your old chiefs, for those whom you have seen in the very front under fire, always remains. I was ashamed of my country for permitting such indignities.