In a little wood stands a black marble pyramid with the following
inscription in worn-out gilt letters:
Here lieth Marceau, a soldier at sixteen, a general at twenty-two,
who died fighting for his country the last day of the year IV of
the Republic. Whoever you may be, friend or foe, respect the ashes
of this hero.
The French prisoners who died in 1870-71 at the camp of Petersberg have
been buried, on the same spot. Marceau was not older than these
soldiers, who died without fame or glory, when his brief and wonderful
career came to an end. Without knowing it, the Germans had completed the
hero's mausoleum by laying these remains around it; for it is proper
that beside the chief should be represented the anonymous multitude
without whom there would be no chiefs.
In 1889 the remains of Marceau were transferred to the Pantheon in
Paris, and the Coblenz monument now commemorates only his name. It will
be the same with Guynemer, whose remains will never be found, as if the
earth had refused to engulf them; they will never be brought back,
amidst the acclamations of the people, to the mount once dedicated to
Saint Genevieve.
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