And that duel,—that fierce duel of which she has ever been ignorant?[5]
If, led astray by an attack of incurable frenzy, I outrageously insulted Falmouth, had I not saved his life at the risk of mine?
The good I have done certainly does not acquit me of the evil imputed to me, but is it not dreadful to think that all that was worthy and noble in my conduct will ever vanish under the flood of bitterness and hate to which my distrust gave birth?
But after all, what matter is the past now to me! These lines are written that I may once more see the events of my life roll by before my eyes; that they may shorten the long and weary hours of solitude in which I live at present at Serval, in the old and gloomy ancestral castle so long abandoned by me.
We therefore left the island of Khios in perfect ignorance as to the fate of Du Pluvier.
Although we entered the equinox, the crossing was fine, though frequently delayed by contrary winds.
The Russian sailors appeared to me quite different from the English. These are submissive to the hardships of the most despotic military discipline; they are, by nature and custom, full of deference for the officers belonging to the highest aristocracy, officers of whom they are above all proud, just as negroes pride themselves in belonging to a white master rather than to a mulatto. Everything in them, however, reveals that unconquerable national pride, that insolent British arrogance, which renders the English sailor one of the best sailors in the world, because he is always driven or sustained by an exaggerated sentiment of his own value, and by his profound faith in the superiority of his own country over all other maritime nations.
Now, however deluded they may be, fanaticism and faith always work prodigies.
The Russian sailors, on the contrary, displayed a passive, almost religious, obedience, a blind resignation, a mechanical submission to the will of their superiors, in whom they almost appeared to acknowledge a nature superior to their own. One felt, indeed, that a word, a sign, from these officers might elevate the resignation and intrepid devotion of the Russian sailors, even to the heroism of personal self-sacrifice.
Strange difference between the character of these two people and that of the French,—of the French, sometimes strictly obedient, but never respectful, gaily obeying superiors, of whom they make fun, or bravely dying for causes which they revile!