came to the birth, while others, again, miscarried. Alibaud, as my
readers are aware, fired point-blank at the King with a walking-stick
gun, which he steadied on the door of the carriage, as it passed slowly
through the Tuileries archway, and missed him, except that his whiskers
were singed by the wad. Neither my father's courage nor that of my
mother and aunt, who were with him, failed them for a moment. I saw them
get out of the carriage at Neuilly, without for an instant suspecting
the risk they had run.

But the time soon came for me to go to sea again, and I was ordered to
join the frigate Iphigenie, of which my old captain, M. de Parseval, had
taken command, as full lieutenant, and we started for the Levant
station. The recollection of a very extraordinary accident which
occurred during this cruise remains with me. We were in the Archipelago,
off the Island of Andros. I had just come off the first night watch, at
midnight, and had got into bed, when I heard somebody say our consort, a
twenty-gun brig, the Ducouedic, Commander Bruat, was making signals of
distress, I got back on deck without delay. The brig's lights had
disappeared. Nothing could be seen of her. It was blowing great guns,
with a heavy sea. We continued in a state of great anxiety till morning.
At last, by the first rays of daylight, we saw our consort dismasted.
She signalled to us for a tow, which was quite impracticable in the
state of the sea. All we could do was to stand by her, while she tried
to get to Syra. with her foresail, the only one left her. This she
succeeded in doing. But the extraordinary thing is that what dismasted
her was the contrary action of a tremendous roll, and a heavy squall,
which came just at midnight, when the whole crew was mustered on deck,
to change the watch, and that the mainmast with all its spars and gear
and the maintopmast as well, fell on to the deck without hurting
anybody.