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Rh peration and fury in his bloodshot eyes; and then later on Scobeleff washed, scented, dressed like a dandy; and then a third picture—Scobeleff waking up in his sleep to weep bitter tears over the deaths of the brave fellows he had led in thousands to destruction. There was a picture that stands out in the memory for ever, and that reveals war in a flash, as a black sky shows its battlements and turrets, its banks and seas of cloud when lightning bursts forth and opens up its darkness. There is no such passage in all Marbot. There are scenes, some of them very vividly described; and there are plenty of good stories; but somehow or other inspiration is wanting, and you do not feel that you have got inside Napoleon one bit more than you have done before. And yet I can understand the extraordinary popularity which the book has attained. If Marbot fails with Napoleon, he is more successful with his marshals, and you get some very clear and correct notions of what some of them were like.

The book, too, is wonderfully effective as a description of what war is like in the details as distinguished from general results and plans. The author is so candid and so simple that you are able to live his life with him from day to day. He is distinctly egotistic, though there is an utter absence of braggadocio; and he is utterly frank in taking more interest in his own affairs and adventures than in anything or anybody else. The