comrades to drink milk at Mother Marguerite's. He was not Emperor then;
but that was nothing, he made the others step around! Indeed, you should
have seen him! The milk, the eggs, the brown bread, the broken dishes
though he took care to have me paid for everything, and began by paying
his own bill."--"What! Mother Marguerite," replied his Majesty, smiling,
"you have not forgotten Bonaparte!"--"Forgotten! my good sir; you think
that any one would forget such a young man as he, who was wise, serious,
and sometimes even sad, but always good to poor people? I am only a poor
peasant woman, but I could have predicted that this young man would make
his way. He has not done it very badly, has he? Ah, no, indeed!"

During this short dialogue, the Emperor had at first turned his back to
the door, and consequently to the light, which entered the cottage only
by that means. But, by degrees; the Emperor approached the good woman;
and when he was quite near her, with the light shining full on his face
from the door, he began to rub his hands and say, trying to recall the
tone and manner of the days of his early youth, when he came to the
peasant's house, "Come, Mother Marguerite, some milk and fresh eggs; we
are famishing." The good old woman seemed trying to revive her memories,
and began to observe the Emperor with the closest attention. "Oh, yes,
Mother, you were so sure a while ago of knowing Bonaparte again. Are we
not old acquaintances, we two?" The peasant, while the Emperor was
addressing these last words to her, had fallen at his feet; but he raised
her with the most touching kindness, and said to her, "The truth is,
Mother Marguerite, I have still a schoolboy's appetite. Have you nothing
to give me?" The good woman, almost beside herself with happiness,
served his Majesty with eggs and milk; and when this simple repast was
ended, his Majesty gave his aged hostess a purse full of gold, saying to
her, "You know, Mother Marguerite, that I believe in paying my bills.
Adieu, I shall not forget you." And while the Emperor remounted his