For the Honor of France

are taken away and shot, tell me what you were doing in that battery.'

"'Nothing, your Majesty.'

"'Nothing? I thought that I heard something about guns being spiked. Did not you spike a gun, Private Labonne?'

"'Yes, your Majesty.'

"'Did not you spike two guns--and both of them after the gunners and the officer in command of the battery had run away?'

"'Yes, your Majesty.'

"'And why did you not run away, too, Private Labonne?'

"'Because I wanted to spike the guns, your Majesty.'

"'You did not think, then, that it was your duty as one of my soldiers to save your life by running with the others?'

"This question puzzled me, for I certainly never had thought of the matter in that way at all. It occurred to me that perhaps I really had not done my duty. But what the Emperor said, for all that he was the Emperor, did not seem reasonable, and I made bold to answer him: 'If I had taken care of my own life, your Majesty, a great many of your soldiers would