the Army still cherished its memory of the Petit Caporal who had chatted with conscripts around a campfire, who had promoted them without class prejudice or bureaucratic delay, and who had made the Grande Armée the terror of kings and the pride of France. The peasants remembered that Napoleon had protected them against the demands of the nobility and the clergy; the proletariat had prospered under his rule; the middle classes had grown in wealth and social acceptance.
