ancient piece of tapestry, representing the heroes of the Iliad. The
infant was christened by the name of Napoleon, an obscure saint, who had
dropped to leeward, and fallen altogether out of the calendar, so that
his namesake never knew which day he was to celebrate as the festival of
his patron. When questioned, on this subject by the bishop who
confirmed him, he answered smartly, that there were a great many saints,
and only three hundred and sixty-five days to divide amongst them. The
politeness of the pope promoted the patron in order to compliment the
god-child, and Saint Napoleon des Ursins was accommodated with a
festival. To render this compliment, which no one but a pope could have
paid, still more flattering, the feast of Saint Napoleon was fixed for
the fifteenth August, the birthday of the emperor, and the day on which
he signed the Concordat. So that Napoleon had the rare honour of
promoting his patron saint.

[3] Benson's "Sketches of Corsica," p. 4.


NAPOLEON'S EARLY LIFE.

The young Napoleon had, of course, the simple and hardy education proper
to the natives of the mountainous island of his birth, and in his
infancy was not remarkable for more than that animation of temper, and
wilfulness and impatience of inactivity, by which children of quick
parts and lively sensibility are usually distinguished. The winter of
the year was generally passed by the family of his father at Ajaccio,
where they still preserve and exhibit, as the ominous play-thing of
Napoleon's boyhood, the model of a brass cannon, weighing about thirty
pounds.[4] We leave it to philosophers to inquire, whether the future
love of war was suggested by the accidental possession of such a toy; or