chief-of-staff and his assistants, together with those for the wagons
and so on, made up a fairly large group of which R*** was the leader.

They left a month before we did.

My father took in his coach the fatal M. Lachèze, Captain Gault and
me. Colonel Ménard, the chief-of- staff, followed, with one of his
assistants, in a post-chaise. A big rascal, my father's valet, went
ahead as a courier. We travelled in uniform. I had a fine forage
cap which pleased me so much that I wore it all the time, but, as I
put my head out of the coach window frequently, because the coach
made me travel-sick, it so happened that during the night, when my
companions were asleep, the cap fell into the road. The coach, drawn
by six vigourous horses, was going at top speed. I did not dare have
it stopped and so I lost my cap. A bad omen! But I was to suffer far
worse things in the terrible campaign which we were about to
undertake. This incident upset me a good deal, but I said nothing
about it for fear of being chaffed about the way the new soldier was
looking after his kit.

My father stopped at Mâcon, at the house of an old friend. We
spent twenty-four hours there and then continued our journey to
Lyons. We were not more than a few leagues from there, and were
changing horses at the post-house of Limonest, when we noticed that
all the postilions had decorated their hats with tricolour ribbons,
and that there were flags of the same colours hanging from all the
windows. We asked the reason for this demonstration, and were told
that General Bonaparte had just arrived in Lyons...!

My father, who was certain that Bonaparte was still in the depths