THE MAN IN GREY
PROEM
It has been a difficult task to piece together the fragmentary documents which alone throw a light — dim and flickering at the best — upon that mysterious personality known to the historians of the Napoleonic era as the Man in Grey. So very little is known about him. Age, appearance, domestic circumstances, everything pertaining to him has remained a matter of conjecture — even his name! In the reports sent by the all-powerful Minister to the Emperor he is invariably spoken of as "The Man in Grey." Once only does Fouché refer to him as "Fernand."
Strange and mysterious creature! Nevertheless, he played an important part — the most important, perhaps — in bringing to justice some of those reckless criminals who, under the cloak of Royalist convictions and religious and political aims, spent their time in pillage, murder and arson.
Strange and mysterious creatures, too, these men so aptly named Chouans — that is, "chats-huants"; screech-owls — since they were a terror by night and
disappeared within their burrows by day. A world of
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