A FIRST LIEUTENANT ON SERVICE. 9 



gineers. There, under the auspices of Monge, he doubt- 

 less cultivated* descriptive geometry and the physical 

 sciences with his habitual success ; but on this point it 

 must be owned, we are reduced to mere conjecture ; for 

 in carrying to an extreme the natural desire to conceal 

 from strangers the knowledge, then but little spread, 

 of the art of making and destroying fortifications, the 

 celebrated school of Mezieres had been made a sort of 

 conclave of which the secrets were never penetrated by 

 the profane. 



CARNOT A FIRST LIEUTENANT ON SERVICE IN FOR- 

 TRESSES. 



On the 12th of January, 1773, Carnot, having become 

 a first lieutenant, was sent to Calais. The works of a 

 place where the periodical oscillations of the ocean add 

 a new and important condition to the already very com- 

 plicated data of the problem of fortification, were very 

 interesting to the young officer. He thus overleaped 

 without hindrance, the passage, generally so troublesome, 

 from learned theories to tiresome practice ; from the 

 brilliant illusions which amuse us in schools, to the sad 

 realities of life. 



The Memorial de Saint Helene says that in his youth 

 " Carnot was looked on by his comrades as an original." 

 This title Napoleon had borrowed from Carnot himself. 

 I find it in the answer to Bailleul, but explained and 

 commented on, and deprived of that vagueness which 

 leaves* it to be taken either as a compliment or a reproach. 

 Carnot, at twenty years of age, was, to the officers of the 

 garrison of Calais, an " original," or a " philosopher," 

 (these words were equivalent,) because he did not join 



them either in their turbulence or in any of their wild 



1* 



