Page 730 - the-idiot

depth of humiliation as I, can ever have been the actual eye-
witness of great events. Go on, I don’t mind! Has he found
time to tell you scandal about me?’
‘No, I’ve heard nothing of this from Lebedeff, if you mean
Lebedeff.’
‘H’m; I thought differently. You see, we were talking over
this period of history. I was criticizing a current report of
something which then happened, and having been myself
an eyewitness of the occurrence—you are smiling, prince—
you are looking at my face as if—‘
‘Oh no! not at all—I—‘
‘I am rather young-looking, I know; but I am actually
older than I appear to be. I was ten or eleven in the year
1812. I don’t know my age exactly, but it has always been a
weakness of mine to make it out less than it really is.
‘I assure you, general, I do not in the least doubt your
statement. One of our living autobiographers states that
when he was a small baby in Moscow in 1812 the French
soldiers fed him with bread.’
‘Well, there you see!’ said the general, condescendingly.
‘There is nothing whatever unusual about my tale. Truth
very often appears to be impossible. I was a page—it sounds
strange, I dare say. Had I been fifteen years old I should
probably have been terribly frightened when the French
arrived, as my mother was (who had been too slow about
clearing out of Moscow); but as I was only just ten I was not
in the least alarmed, and rushed through the crowd to the
very door of the palace when Napoleon alighted from his
horse.’