3 1 4 Traveli and Adventures of the Brothers Bachevilk. [May 1 , 



guitied, will be a great advantage to the 

 connlry." 



I tiien joined my brother, who had 

 served in this short campaign with his 

 usual courage and ability ; and, content 

 to forget the sounding names of glory, 

 the trappings, the glittering grandeur 

 of militiiry costume, the ambition of 

 associating with the great, the mighty of 

 the earth, like self- governed men, we 

 retired to the peaceful slate of a cjuiet 

 life, in our own hearths or fire-sides, 

 which we re-entered Nov. 11, 1815. 



On the left bank of the Saone, a few 

 leagues before we arrive at Lyons, on 

 tlie back of a iiill covered with vine- 

 yards, a litllc town rises like an amphi- 

 theatre, commanding one of the finest 

 prospects tiiat Friuice exhibits. I know 

 persons who have daily enjoyed it for 

 twenty years, with ail the geiuiine emo- 

 tions of high curiosity, and yet their 

 iniiuitc criticism has certainly not re- 

 nounced this opinion, and I su])pose it 

 is what will not quickly be done. As 

 to the town, it is ill planned, very indif- 

 ferently built in general, and the pave- 

 ment consists of sliarp-pointed flints, 

 that cannot but be injurious to the feet. 

 Hence we survey the Saoiic, covered 

 with a crowd of boats ; some conveying 

 southward the wheats of Burgundy, and 

 the timber of La Bresse ; others taking 

 northward the olives, soaps, brandies, of 

 J^rovence, and the cottons of the Levant. 

 Its banks present to view one of the 

 most delightful and piclurescjue scenes. 

 In its course, it runs through a long 

 jange of vast meadows, enriched by a 

 tnultiplicity of diversified hills and 

 mountains of the fertile Eeaiijolaisj at a 

 certain distance. 



In this town, so agreeably situated, 

 Trevoux, the ancient capjial of Lcs 

 Dombes, 1 passed my early youth with 

 my brother, whom 1 am now doomed to 

 see no more. There, in 1815, after 

 de|)ositing our arms on the altar of our 

 country, we expected after our return to 

 enjoy some repose, till the public service 

 should again call us forth to duty. 



I never imagined that I had any 

 resentments to look for on the score of 

 politics. I had, indeed, accompanied 

 Napoleon to the Isle of Elba, and had 

 re-entered France with him ; but the 

 Generals Druot and Cambronne had 

 been tried and solemnly acquitted, and 

 T only executed their orders. The idea 

 of persecution never once suggested 

 itself; and, in retiring to my native 

 Country, I meant to settle or Cx my 

 abode ia it fur a long time. 



My brother felt himself in the same 

 rireumstances as when, previous to the 

 20th of iMarch, to be employed in time 

 of peace was not an object of desire. 

 Both of us had been so long employed 

 in distant warfare, acting oiu' parts in 

 the field or in high-raised battlements, 

 and the laboured mound, that a sort of 

 revolution had rendered our tempers 

 and pursuits dissimilar to what they 

 were. A change in our minds mado 

 us particularly to pant for rest, — ear- 

 nestly, enthusiastically, to desire a little 

 rest, — content with the modicum of our 

 half-pay. We had no other cause of 

 regret than what was common to every 

 true-hearted Frenchman, — the presence 

 of foreigners on our natal soil. 



Amidst the groupe of relations and 

 friends, to whom our rights and interests 

 were as dear as their own, our situation 

 was far from being disagreeable; when, 

 by an ill starred accident, though an 

 innocent victim, 1 fell a sacrifice to poli- 

 tical spleen of a most despicable kind, 

 and degrading, indeed, to human na- 

 ture ; such, however, as is evinced by 

 persons, who very often, under the pre- 

 tence of governing, unworthily direct 

 and administer |)ublic affairs so as to 

 prove ruinous to the best houses and 

 families, and a calamity to the Country 

 at large. 



A ministerial ordonnancc, connler- 

 sigued Fellre, de[)rived me, in the montti 

 of November, not only of my half-pay, 

 but of rights acquired by my preceding 

 services, for having taken part with Na- 

 poleon. How odious does such a mi- 

 nister n)ake his character appear on the 

 stage of public opinion ! When wiM 

 the time come when all the people, 

 colleclively, in the middle and lower 

 ranks of life, will rise up, as it were by 

 one general impulse, to correct the 

 faults, vices, and crimes, exhibited by 

 certain persons in high life? Is it rigl»t 

 for such degraded beings to derogate 

 from the merits of men, who, in an ho-^ 

 nourable profession, have so exettetf 

 themselves as to vindicate the reputation 

 and glory of their country ? That with 

 a single stroke of their pen, in a jocoso 

 way, they should direct the keenest 

 strokes of malignity against those who, 

 for twenty years successively, have been 

 bravely and fortunately acquiring cer- 

 tain privileges, in a manner, at the 

 sword's point. Is an officer, then, to bo 

 dismissed, like a valet dec/iainLte, undec 

 these circumstances, and from siiuations 

 which he has well deserved to till ? I 

 well know the censures which those 

 uuwiac 



