{ Story of Bougainville and his friend the curé of Boulogne
On 14 November of the year 1766, an open carriage, drawn by
post-horses, containing three naval officers, one seated on the front
seat and the other two on the back one,--which signified a decided
difference in their rank,--was driving along the _Bois de Boulogne_,
coming from the _barrière de l'Étoile>_ and going towards the _Avenue
de Saint-Cloud._ By the _Château de la Muette_ it passed a priest who
was walking slowly along in one of the side-walks reading his breviary.
"Hi! postillion!" shouted the officer sitting at the back of the
carriage; "stop a moment, please."
The postillion stopped. This request, given in a loud voice, and the
noise the postillion made pulling up his horses, naturally led to the
priest raising his head and fixing his eyes on the carriage and its
three occupants.
"Pardieu! I am not mistaken," said the officer sitting behind; "it is
really you, my dear Rémy!"
The priest gazed in astonishment. However, his face gradually cleared
as light dawned on him, and his lips turned from amazement to smiles.
"Ah!" he said at length, "it is you!"
"Why _you_ (_vous_)?"
"It is thou (_toi_) then, Antoine."
"Yes, it is I, Antoine de Bougainville."
"Mon Dieu! What have you been doing with yourself during the
twenty-five years since we parted?"
"What have I been doing with myself, dear friend?" repeated
Bougainville. "Come and sit down by me a few minutes and I will tell
you."
"But ..." The priest looked round him uneasily, as though he were
afraid to go far away from his home, Bougainville understood his fear.
"Do not be anxious; we will go at a walking pace," he replied.
A valet got down from the seat behind and lowered the step.
"It is a quarter past eleven," said the priest, "and Marianne expects
me for dinner at twelve."
"In the first place--where do you live? But sit down, though!"
He lightly drew the priest by his gown, and the priest sat down.
"Where do I live?" asked the latter.
"Yes."
"At Boulogne.... I am curé of Boulogne, friend."
"Ah! ah! I offer you my congratulations; you always had the vocation."
"So, you see, I entered Orders."
"Are you satisfied?"
"Enchanted, my friend! The curé of Boulogne is not one of the best: it
only has an income of eight hundred livres; but my tastes are modest,
and there still remain four hundred livres over to give away to the
poor."
"Good Rémy!... You can go at a slow trot, so that we lose as little
time as possible."
The postillion set the horses to the required pace, which, moderate
though it was, none the less brought a cloud of distress on the curé's
countenance.
"Set your mind at rest," said Bougainville, "seeing we are going in the
direction of Boulogne."
"Friend," the Abbé Rémy said, laughing, "I have been curé of Boulogne
for twenty years; Marianne has been fifteen years with me, and never,
except when detained by the side of a dying parishioner, have I been
five minutes later than twelve; punctually at twelve the soup is on the
table, and ... you understand?"
"Yes; don't be afraid, I do not want to upset Marianne.... You shall be
home exactly by twelve."
"Now my mind is easy.... But talk about yourself a little: are you not
wearing the uniform of the Navy?"
"Yes; I am captain of a ship."
"How comes that about? I thought you were a barrister--Really?--when
you left college did you not begin to study law?"
"What is to be done, my dear Rémy? You, God's anointed, ought to know
better than anyone the proverb:
"'Man proposes and God disposes.' It is true I was entered as a
barrister in 1752 at the High Judicial Court of Paris."
"Ah! I knew it!" said the good priest, withdrawing the finger from his
breviary, which marked the place where he had left off reading. "So you
did become a barrister?"
"Yes; but at the same time that I was called to the Bar," continued
Bougainville, "I enlisted in the Musketeers."
"Oh, indeed! You always had a taste for arms and a special talent for
mathematics."
"You remember that?"
"Why, of course! Was I not your best friend at College?" "Ah, that is
very true!"
"Is it you or your brother Louis who belongs to the Academy?"
Bougainville smiled.
"It is my brother," he said; "or rather, it was, for you must know that
I had the misfortune to lose him three years ago."
"Ah! poor Louis.... But what can you expect. We are all mortal, and it
is well to look upon this life as a voyage which leads us to port....
Pardon, friend, it seems to me we are passing Boulogne."
Bougainville looked at his watch.
"Bah!" said he, "what does it matter! It is only half-past eleven, and
consequently you have still a good twenty minutes before you.--Faster,
postillion!"
"Why faster?"
"Because you are in a hurry, my friend."
"Bougainville!..."
"What! does not the wish to know what I have been doing outweigh your
fear of upsetting Marianne by being five minutes late?... That is a
queer sort of friendship, to be sure!"
"You are right, upon my word; five minutes more or less.... Tell me
about yourself, my dear Antoine. Besides, when I tell Marianne that it
was for you and through you I am late, she will stop scolding."
"Marianne knows me, then?"
"Knows you? Of course she does! I have spoken to her of you a score of
times.... But be quick and finish telling me how it is that, having
been called to the Bar, and after enlisting in the Musketeers, I find
you a naval officer."
"It is very simple, and I can explain it all to you in a word. In 1753
I became assistant-major in the provincial battalion of Picardie; the
following year I was appointed aide-de-camp to Chevert, whom I left
to become Secretary to the Embassy in London, and to be made a member
of the Royal Society; in 1756 I went as captain of dragoons with the
Marquis of Montcalm, charged with the defence of Canada..
"Capital! capital!" interrupted the Abbé Rémy. "I can see you doing it!
Go on, my friend, I am listening."
The abbé, completely fascinated by Bougainville's narrative, had not
noticed that the horses had quietly passed from a slow to a quick trot.
Bougainville continued his story.
"When in Canada, I was pretty much master of my future; I had but to
conduct myself well to attain to anything. I was put in charge of
several expeditions by the Marquis de Montcalm, which I brought to a
successful issue. Thus, for instance, after a march of sixty leagues
through forests which were believed to be impenetrable, sometimes over
tracks of country covered with snow, sometimes on the ice of the river
Richelieu, I advanced as far as the end of the lake of Saint-Sacrement,
where I burned an English flotilla under the very fort which protected
it."
"What!" said the abbé, "was it you who did that? Why, I read the
account of that event; but I did not know you were the hero...."
"Did you not recognise my name?"
"I knew the name but not the man.... How could you expect I should
recognise in a member of the Basoche, whom I left studying law, and
aspiring to become a barrister, a dashing fellow who burns fleets in
the far-away depths of Canada? ... You can surely see that it was
impossible!"
At this moment the carriage stopped before a posting-house.
"Oh!" said the Abbé Rémy, "where are we, Antoine?"
"We are at Sèvres, my friend."
"At Sèvres! What time is it?"
Bougainville looked at his watch.
"It is ten minutes to twelve."
"Oh! Mon Dieu!" exclaimed the abbé, "but I shall never be at Boulogne
by noon."
"That is more than probable."
"A league to go!"
"A league and a half."
"If only I could find a posting-carriage...."
He rose to his feet in the carriage and cast a look round him as far as
his sight could reach, but there was no sign of even the smallest sort
of vehicle.
"Never mind," he said, "I will walk."
"You shall not walk!" said Bougainville.
"What! you will not let me walk?"
"No, it shall not be said that you caught pleurisy because you took a
drive with a friend."
"I will go quietly."
"Oh, I know you! You would be afraid of being scolded by Mademoiselle
Marianne, you would hurry your pace, arrive in a state of perspiration,
drink cold water and give yourself inflammation of the lungs.... Some
idiot of a doctor would purge you instead of bleeding, or bleed you
instead of purging; and, three days later, Good-bye, there would be the
end to the Abbé Rémy!"
"All the same I must return to Boulogne.... Hi! postillion! postillion!
Stop!..."
The carriage, with its fresh horses, set off at a quick trot.
"Listen," says Bougainville, "this is the best thing to do."
"The best thing to do, my good friend, my dear Antoine, is to stop the
horses, so that I can get down and make my way back to Boulogne."
"No," says Bougainville; "the best thing to be done is for you to come
with me as far as Versailles."
"As far as Versailles?..."
"Yes; as you have missed Mademoiselle Marianne's dinner you must dine
with me at Versailles. Whilst I am receiving final commands from His
Majesty, one of these gentlemen will undertake to find a travelling
carriage to convey you back to Boulogne."
"Of course that would be a great pleasure, my friend, but...."
"But what?"
The Abbé Rémy felt about in his waistcoat pockets, plunging both hands
in up to his armpits.
"But," he Continued, "Marianne has not put any money in my pockets."
"Never mind about that, my dear Rémy! At Versailles I will ask the king
for a hundred crowns for the poor of Boulogne; the king will grant them
me, and I will give them to you. You can borrow a few crowns from them
until you return in the travelling carriage to Boulogne, and the thing
is settled."
"What! You think the king would give you a hundred crowns for my poor?"
"I am sure of it."
"On your word of honour?"
"On my faith as a gentleman!"
"My friend, that decides me then."
"Thanks! You would not come for my sake, but you will for your poor. It
seems to be better worth being one of your poor parishioners than your
friend!"
"I do not say so, my dear Antoine; but you know a curé who deserts his
post must have a good excuse."
"An excuse?... Oh! if you slept away, I do not say...."
"What! if I slept away!" exclaims the Abbé Rémy, terrified. "Do you
mean, then, to make me stop away the night? ... Postillion! hi!
postillion!"
"No, do not be afraid.... At the rate we are going we shall reach
Versailles in an hour; we shall dine by two, and you can leave at
three."
"Why at three, and not at two?"
"Because I must have time to see the king and ask him for the hundred
crowns."
"Ah! that is true."
"Three hours for you to return by carriage from Versailles to Boulogne;
you will be home at six o'clock."
"What will Marianne say?"
"Bah! when she sees you return with a hundred crowns direct from the
king, Marianne will be happy and proud of your influence,"
"Upon my faith you are right.... You must tell me all the king says to
you; this adventure will give her enough to talk of to her neighbours
for a week to come."
"So it is settled, we are to dine at Versailles?"
"Agreed as to Versailles! But now tell me the end of your story."
"Ah! true.... We had got to my expedition on the Saint-Sacrement. It
earned me the rank of quarter-master of one of the Army Corps, and the
commission to go to Versailles to explain the precarious situation of
the Governor of Canada, to ask for reinforcements for him. I stayed
two years and a half in France without obtaining anything that I
asked. True, I got what I did not ask for, that is to say, the Cross
of Saint-Louis and the rank of colonel in the staff of the regiment
of Rovergne. I arrived in Canada just in time to receive from the
Marquis of Montcalm the command of the Grenadiers and Volunteers, at
the famous retreat from Quebec, which I was ordered to effect. When
Montcalm arrived beneath the walls of the town, he thought he might
risk a battle. The two generals were killed: Montcalm in our ranks;
Wolfe in those of the English. Montcalm dead, our army defeated, there
were no means of defending Canada. I returned to France, and went
through the campaign of 1761 in England, as aide-de-camp to M. de
Choiseul-Stainville."
"Then it was you to whom the king made the present of two guns?"
interrupted the curé de Boulogne.
"Who told you that?"
"I read about it, my friend, in the _Gazette de la Cour...._ How could
I have dreamt this Bougainville was my friend Antoine?"
"What did you think of the present?"
"Bah! I thought it well deserved ... but, all the same, I thought the
king ought to have given this M. Bougainville, whom I was far from
suspecting to be you, something more easily carried about than two
cannons; for, of course, though a great honour, one cannot carry them
about wherever one goes."
"There is truth in what you say," Bougainville resumed, laughing; "but,
as at the same time the king made me captain of a ship, and entrusted
me with the founding of a settlement for myself and the inhabitants of
St. Malo, in the isles of Malouines, I thought my two cannon might be
of use there."
"Ah! quite right," said the Abbé Rémy; "but, excuse my ignorance of
geography, my dear Antoine, where are the Malouines Isles?"
"I beg your pardon, my friend," said Bougainville, "I should have
called them the Falkland Isles, for it was I who gave them their name
of Malouines Isles in honour of the town of St. Malo."
"Very good!" said the Abbé Rémy, smiling; "I recognise them under that
name! The Falkland Isles belong to the archipelago of the Atlantic
Ocean; I know where they are, near the southern extremity of South
America, to the east of Magellan Straits."
"Upon my word," said Bougainville, "Strong, who christened them, could
not have determined their bearing more accurately himself. You study
geography, then, in your curé of Boulogne?"
"Oh, my friend, when I was young I always longed to be a missionary to
the Indies.... I was born with the love of travel, and I would have
given anything to go round the world ... in those days, but not now."
"Yes, I understand," says Bougainville, exchanging a glance with his
two companions, "to-day it would put you out of your regular habits....
So you have travelled?"
"My friend, I have never been further than Versailles."
"Then you have not been to the sea."
"No."
"You have never seen a ship?"
"I have seen sails at Auxerre."
"That is something, but it can only give you a very imperfect idea of a
frigate of sixty guns."
"I should think so," added the Abbé Rémy innocently. "So you say you
went to the Malouines Isles, where the Government had authorised you to
found a settlement. I have no doubt that you did so?"
"Unluckily the Spaniards, after the peace of Paris, laid claim to these
islands; their claim was considered just by the Court of France, which
gave them up on condition they indemnified me for the money I had laid
out."
"But did they do so?"
"Yes, my dear friend, they gave me a million francs!"
"A million francs? _Peste!_ what a pretty sum."
It will be observed that the good abbé nearly swore.
"Now," continued he, "where are you going?..."
"I am going to Havre."
"What to do? Forgive me, friend, perhaps I am inquisitive."
"Inquisitive? Oh, certainly not!... I am going to Havre to see a
frigate of which the king has made me captain."
"What is its name?..."
"_La Boudeuse._"
"Is it a very fine ship?"
"Superb!"
The Abbé Rémy heaved a sigh. It was evident the poor priest thought
what pleasure it would have given him in times past, when he had been
free, to have seen the sea and to go over a frigate.
This sigh led to a fresh interchange of looks and smiles between
Bougainville and the two officers. Both smiles and glances passed
unnoticed by the worthy Abbé Rémy, who had fallen into so profound a
reverie that he did not return to himself until the carriage stopped
before a large hotel.
"Ah I so we have arrived," he says. "I am very hungry!"
"Very well. We will not wait as the dinner was ordered beforehand."
"What a delightful life a sea captain's must be!" says the abbé. "He
gets millions from the Spaniards; he travels post in a good carriage;
and, when he arrives, he finds a dinner all ready for him! Poor
Marianne! she has dined without me!"
"Bah!" says Bougainville, "once does not mean always. ... We will dine
without her, and I hope her absence will not take away your appetite."
"Oh, don't be anxious ... I am really very hungry."
"Well then, to table! to table!"
"To table!" merrily repeated the Abbé Rémy.
It was a good dinner; Bougainville was a gourmet; he drank no other
wine than champagne; the fashion of icing it had just been invented.
All priests, whether they be curés of a small town or hamlet, or
officiating priests of a chapel without a congregation, are inclined
to be a little greedy; the Abbé Remy, modest though he was, had
the sensual side with which nature has endowed the palate of the
ecclesiastic. At first he would not drink more than a few drops of
wine in his water; then he mixed wine and water in equal parts; then,
finally, he decided to drink his wine pure. When Bougainville saw he
had arrived at this point, he rose, and announced that it was time for
him to present himself before the king, to whom he was going to address
the request relative to the poor of Boulogne. In the meantime the two
officers were to keep the Abbé Remy company. As Bougainville had said,
he was absent an hour. In spite of the efforts of the officers the
worthy priest's hopes see-sawed up and down in a way which did credit
to his kindliness of heart.
"Well!" he said, when he caught sight of Bougainville, "what about my
poor people?"
"It is not three hundred livres that the king has given me for them,"
said Bougainville, drawing a roll from his pocket, "but fifty louis!"
"What! Fifty louis?" exclaimed the Abbé Rémy, quite overcome by this
regal bounty; "twelve hundred livres!"
"Twelve hundred livres."
"Impossible!"
"Here they are."
The Abbé Rémy held out his hand.
"But the king has given them to me on one condition."
"What?"
"That you drink to his health."
"Oh, if that is all!"
He held out his glass, into which Bougainville tipped the neck of the
bottle.
"Stop! stop!" said the abbé.
"Come, now!" Bougainville insisted, "half a glass? Well! the king would
not be pleased to see only half a glass drunk to his health."
"Really," the Abbé Rémy said jovially, "twelve hundred livres deserve
a whole glass. Fill it quite full, Antoine; and here's to the king's
health!"
"To the king!" repeated Bougainville.
"Ah!" said the Abbé Rémy, putting his glass on the table, "that is what
one might call a real orgy!... True, it is the first I have taken part
in, and I shall not have the opportunity of a second for a very long
time."
"I tell you what it is...." said Bougainville, resting his elbows on
the table.
"Well?" replied the Abbé Rémy, whose eyes were shining like carbuncles.
"Something you ought to do."
"What is it?"
"You tell me you have never seen the sea."
"Never."
"Well! you ought to come to Havre with me."
"I ... come to Havre with you?... But you are not dreaming of such a
thing as that, Antoine?"
"On the contrary, it is just what I am doing. Have a glass of
champagne?"
"Thanks, I have already drunk too much!"
"Ah! to the health of your poor people ... that is a toast you cannot
resist."
"Yes, but only a drop."
"A drop! When you drank the glass full to the king? Ah! that is not
scriptural, my dear Remy. Our Saviour said: 'The first shall be last
...' A full glass for the poor of Boulogne or none at all."
"Here goes, then, for a full glass; but it is the last."
The abbé, good Catholic as he was, emptied his toast to the poor as
gaily as that to the king.
"There!" said Bougainville. "Now it is agreed we set off for Havre."
"Antoine, you must be mad!"
"You shall see the sea, my friend ... and such a sea! Not a lake like
the poor Mediterranean; but the ocean, which rolls round the world!"
"Do not tempt me, you wretched fellow!"
"The ocean, which you yourself admit it has been the desire of your
life to see!"
"_Vade retro, Satanas!_"
"It is only a matter of a week."
"But do you not know, then, that if I absent myself for a week without
leave I shall lose my curé?"
"I have foreseen that, and as monseigneur, the Bishop of Versailles,
was with the king, I made him sign you a permit, telling him you were
coming with me."
"You told him that?"
"Yes."
"And he signed me a permit?"
"Here it is."
"Dear me, it is indeed his signature! Good! I would swear to it!"
"My friend, you are a sailor at heart."
"Give me my fifty louis and let me go."
"Here they are, but you shall not go."
"Why not?"
"Because I am authorised by the king to hand you fifty more at Havre,
and you will not be so mean a Christian as to deprive your poor
people--your children, the flock over which the Saviour has given you
charge--of fifty beautiful golden louis!"
"Very well!" cried the Abbé Rémy, "then I will go to Havre! But it is
only for their sakes I consent."
Then, stopping suddenly--
"No," he said violently, "it is impossible!"
"Why impossible?"
"Marianne!..."
"You shall write to her to relieve her anxiety."
"What shall I tell her, my friend?"
"Tell her that you have met the Bishop of Versailles, and that he has
given you leave to go to Havre."
"That would be lying!"
"To lie for a good motive is not a sin, but a virtue."
"She will not believe me."
"You can show her the permit signed by the bishop."
"Stay, that is true.... Ah! you barristers, you soldiers and sailors,
you do not stick at anything."
"See, you want pen and ink and paper?"
The Abbé Rémy reflected for a minute, and no doubt he said to himself
that a written lie was a bigger sin than a spoken one, for suddenly he
said--
"No, I would rather tell her on my return.... But she will think me
dead."
"She will be all the more pleased when she sees you back alive!"
"Then, my friend, do not leave me time to reflect, but carry me off
now!"
"Nothing easier."
So, turning to the two officers--
"The horses are in, are they not?"
"Yes, captain."
"Well then, let us go!"
"_En voiture!_" repeated the Abbé Rémy in the tones of a man who flings
himself head-first into some unknown peril.
"_En voiture!_" repeated the two officers gaily.
They got into the carriage, travelled very fast all night, and by five
next morning they were at Havre. Bougainville himself chose the room
to be occupied by his friend, who, tired with the journey, and still
a little heavy from the previous day's dinner, slept and did not wake
till noon. Just as he was waking, Bougainville came into his room and
opened the windows. The abbé uttered a cry of surprise and admiration:
the windows looked out on the sea. A quarter of a league away _la
Boudeuse_ was riding gracefully in the roadstead, moored with two
anchors down.
"Oh!" asked the Abbé Rémy, "what is that magnificent vessel?"
"My friend," said Bougainville, "that is _la Boudeuse_, where we are
expected to dinner."
"What! Do you mean me to go on board?"
"Surely! You would not come all the way to Havre and return without
having seen over a ship! Why, my dear friend, it is just as though you
went to Rome without seeing the pope."
"True enough," said the Abbé Remy; "but when shall we return?"
"When you like.... after dinner--it is for you to decide.... You shall
give your orders and be captain on my vessel."
"Very good! Let us go soon rather than late.... We have taken fourteen
hours to come, but I shall take quite five or six days to return."
"What does it matter, as you have leave for a week?"
"I know that quite well, but, you see, there is Marianne...."
"You are picturing to yourself the cries of joy she will utter when she
sees you again?"
"Do you think they will be cries of joy?"
"Zounds! I hope so indeed!"
"I, too, hope so," said the Abbé in tones expressive of more doubt than
hope.
Then, like a man who has flung his cap over the windmill--"Come, come,"
he said, "to the frigate!"
Bougainville appeared to be waited on by genii, who also did the
bidding of the Abbé Rémy, and to such good purpose that, when the
latter exclaimed "To Havre!" he found the carriage all ready; and
in the same way, when he exclaimed, "To the frigate!" he found the
captain's gig in waiting. He got into the boat and sat down by
Bougainville, who took the helm. A dozen sailors waited with raised
oars.
Bougainville made a sign; the twelve oars fell and hit the water with
so regular a movement that they seemed to strike it as one man. The gig
flew over the sea like those long-legged water-spiders which glide over
water. In less than ten minutes they were alongside. It hardly need he
said that the maritime wonder called a frigate roused the enthusiasm
of the good Abbé Rémy to the highest pitch; he asked Bougainville the
name of each mast, of each yard and of each rope. No sails were set,
but they were hanging in brails. In the middle of the naming of the
different parts of the ship, a messenger came to tell the captain that
dinner was served. The abbé and he went down into the captain's cabin.
This cabin might have vied with any drawing-room belonging to one of
the richest châteaux round Paris in comfort and elegance. The abbé's
surprise increased more and more. Fortunately, although it was 15
November, the sea was all ablaze; it was one of those beautiful autumn
days, which seem like a farewell sent to the earth by the summer sun
before its disappearance for six months.
The Abbé Rémy was not in the least seasick, upon which fact the
superior officers admitted to the captain's table, and the captain
himself, offered their congratulations. However, towards the middle
of dinner it seemed to him as though the motion of the frigate
was increasing; Bougainville replied that it was the ebb tide, and
delivered a learned lecture on tides. The Abbé Rémy listened to his
friend's scientific dissertation with the greatest animation and
attention; and, as he was not unacquainted with physical science, he
made observations in his turn which seemed to call forth the delighted
admiration of the officers.
The dinner was protracted longer than the diners themselves realised;
nothing is so deceptive as to the passing of time as interesting
conversation, enlivened with good wine. Then came coffee, that sweet
nectar for which the abbé confessed a weakness. Captain Bougainville's
coffee was such a cunning and happy mixture of Mocha and Martinique,
that, when he was imbibing it, in small sips, the abbé declared he had
never tasted its equal. Then, after the coffee, came liqueurs, those
famous liqueurs de Madame Anfoux which were the delight of the gourmets
of the latter part of the last century. Finally, when the liqueurs
had been enjoyed, and the Abbé Rémy proposed to go back to the deck,
Bougainville raised no opposition to this desire; but he was obliged
to give his arm to his friend up the companion, the abbé naïvely
attributing his instability of balance to the champagne, Mocha coffee
and liqueurs de Madame Anfoux which he had drunk.
The frigate was on the larboard tack, with her head to the north-east,
and the wind blowing free; all sail was set, including lower and
top-gallant studding sails. Only the stay-sails were stowed. They must
have been going at eleven knots an hour!
The good abbé's first feeling was that of whole-hearted admiration for
this masterpiece of naval architecture in full sail. Then he noticed
that the frigate was moving. Next he looked around him,--and, finally,
he uttered a cry of terror. The land of France looked no more than a
cloud upon the horizon.... He regarded Bougainville with an expression
in which was concentrated all the reproaches of a betrayed confidence.
"My dear fellow," said Bougainville, "it gave me so much pleasure to
see you, my oldest and dearest comrade, that I resolved we would
remain together as long as possible. ... I wanted a chaplain on board
my frigate; I asked His Majesty to let you fill this post, and he
graciously granted it, together with a stipend of a thousand crowns....
Here is your commission."
The Abbé Rémy flung a frightened glance at his appointment.
"But," he said, "where are we going?"
"Round the world, my dear man!"
"How long does it take to go round the world?"
"Oh, from three to three years and a half, more or less.... But reckon
three and a half years rather than three."
The abbé fell back, overcome, against the raised stand of the officers'
watch.
"Oh!" he murmured, "I shall never dare to appear before Marianne
again!..."
"I promise to take you to the presbytery and to make your peace with
her," said Bougainville.
On 15 May 1770, the frigate _Boudeuse_ re-entered the port of
Saint-Malo. It was exactly three years and a half since she had left
Havre; Bougainville was not a day out in his calculation. In that time
she had been all round the world.
Heaven alone knows what passed at the first interview which took place
between the Abbé Rémy and Marianne.