Chapter 1

How Brigadier Gerard Lost His Ear

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It was the old Brigadier who was talking in the cafe.

I have seen a great many cities, my friends. I would not dare to
tell you how many I have entered as a conqueror with eight
hundred of my little fighting devils clanking and jingling behind
me. The cavalry were in front of the Grande Armee, and the
Hussars of Conflans were in front of the cavalry, and I was in
front of the Hussars. But of all the cities which we visited
Venice is the most ill-built and ridiculous. I cannot imagine
how the people who laid it out thought that the cavalry could
manoeuvre. It would puzzle Murat or Lassalle to bring a squadron
into that square of theirs. For this reason we left Kellermann's
heavy brigade and also my own Hussars at Padua on the mainland.
But Suchet with the infantry held the town, and he had chosen me
as his aide- de-camp for that winter, because he was pleased
about the affair of the Italian fencing-master at Milan. The
fellow was a good swordsman, and it was fortunate for the credit
of French arms that it was I who was opposed to him. Besides, he
deserved a lesson, for if one does not like a prima donna's
singing one can always be silent, but it is intolerable that a
public affront should be put upon a pretty woman. So the
sympathy was all with me, and after the affair had blown over and
the man's widow had been pensioned Suchet chose me as his own
galloper, and I followed him to Venice, where I had the strange
adventure which I am about to tell you.

You have not been to Venice? No, for it is seldom that the
French travel. We were great travellers in those days. From
Moscow to Cairo we had travelled everywhere, but we went in
larger parties than were convenient to those whom we visited, and
we carried our passports in our limbers. It will be a bad day
for Europe when the French start travelling again, for they are
slow to leave their homes, but when they have done so no one can
say how far they will go if they have a guide like our little man
to point out the way. But the great days are gone and the great
men are dead, and here am I, the last of them, drinking wine of
Suresnes and telling old tales in a cafe.

But it is of Venice that I would speak. The folk there live like
water-rats upon a mud-bank, but the houses are very fine, and the
churches, especially that of St. Mark, are as great as any I have
seen. But above all they are proud of their statues and their
pictures, which are the most famous in Europe. There are many
soldiers who think that because one's trade is to make war one
should never have a thought above fighting and plunder. There
was old Bouvet, for example--the one who was killed by the
Prussians on the