"If he had flunked and come back to Corsica to live," said Joseph, "I
think I should have emigrated. I love him dearly, but I'm fonder of
myself, and Corsica, large as it is, is too small to contain Napoleon
Bonaparte and his brother Joseph simultaneously, particularly as
Joseph is distinctly weary of being used as an understudy for a gory
battle-field."



CHAPTER III: PARIS--VALENCE--LYONS--CORSICA
1785-1793



The feeling among the larger boys at Brienne at Napoleon's departure
was much the same as that experienced by Joseph when his soon to-be-
famous brother departed from Corsica. The smaller boys regretted his
departure, since it had been one of their greatest pleasures to watch
Napoleon disciplining the upper classmen, but Bonaparte was as glad
to go as the elders were to have him.

"Brienne is good enough in its way," said he; "but what's the use of
fighting children? It's merely a waste of time cracking a
youngster's skull with a snowball when you can go out into the real
world and let daylight into a man's whole system with a few ounces of
grape-shot."

He had watched developments at Paris, too, with the keenest interest,
and was sufficiently far-seeing to know that the troubles of the King
and Queen and their aristocratic friends boded well for a man fond of