A Tale of Brittany (Mon frère Yves)

Here is a little tale which I wish to dedicate to you. Accept it, I pray, with my affection.
It has been urged against my books that there is always in them too much of the trouble of love. This time there is only a little love and that an honest love and it comes only towards the end.
It was you who gave me the idea of writing the life story of a sailor and of putting into it the immense monotony of the sea.
It may be that this book will make me enemies, although I have touched as lightly as possible on the regulations of the service. But you who love everything connected with the sea, even the wind and the fog and the great waves—yes, and the brave and simple sailors—you, assuredly, will understand me. And in that I shall find my recompense.
PIERRE LOTI.
The pay-book of my brother Yves differs in no wise from the pay-book of all other sailors.
It is covered with a yellow-coloured parchment paper and, as it has travelled much about the sea, in many a ship's locker, it is absolutely wanting in freshness.
In large letters on the cover appears:
KERMADEC, 2091. P.
Kermadec is his family name; 2091, his number in the army of the sea; and P., the initial letter of Paimpol, the port at which he was enrolled.
Opening the book, one finds, on the first page, the following description:
Kermadec (Yves-Marie), son of Yves-Marie and Jeanne Danveoch. Born 28 August, 1851, at Saint Pol-de-Léon (Finistère). Height 5 ft. 11 inches. Hair brown, eyebrows brown, eyes brown, nose ordinary, chin ordinary, forehead ordinary, face oval. Distinctive marks: tattooed on the left breast with an anchor and, on the right wrist, with a bracelet in the form of a fish.