Letter 028 — XXVIII
Original French
Ancône, le 10 février 1797.
Nous sommes à Ancône depuis deux jours. Nous avons pris la citadelle après une petite fusillade, et par un coup de main. Nous avons fait douze cents prisonniers; j’ai renvoyé les cinquante officiers chez eux. Je suis toujours à Ancône. Je ne te fais pas venir, parce que tout n’est pas encore terminé; mais sous peu de jours j’espère que cela sera terminé. D’ailleurs, ce pays-ci est très maussade, et tout le monde a peur. Je pars demain pour les montagnes. Tu ne m’écris point; tu devais cependant me donner de tes nouvelles tous les jours. Je te prie d’aller te promener tous les jours; cela te fera du bien. Je te donne un million de baisers. Je ne me suis jamais autant ennuyé qu’à cette vilaine guerre-ci. Adieu, ma douce amie, pense à moi.
Musean translation
Machine-assisted Musean English translated from the French of the 172 Napoleon letters selected from Tancrède Martel, ed., Œuvres littéraires de Napoléon Bonaparte, tome 1 (Albert Savine, Paris, 1888). French Wikisource contributors supplied the scan-backed transcription: https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Livre:Bonaparte_-_Œuvres_littéraires,_tome_1,_1888.djvu (page histories credit contributors). The transcription is CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/; this adapted text and translations are shared under the same license. Extraction removes markup and editorial notes; selected transcription repairs were checked against print images.
Ancona, February 10, 1797.
We have been in Ancona for two days. We took the citadel after a little exchange of fire, in a surprise attack. We took twelve hundred prisoners; I sent the fifty officers home. I am still in Ancona. I am not calling you here because everything is not yet settled, but I hope it will be in a few days. Besides, this country is very dreary, and everyone is afraid. Tomorrow I leave for the mountains. You do not write to me; yet you were supposed to send me news every day. Please go out for a walk every day; it will do you good. I give you a million kisses. I have never been so bored as in this wretched war. Farewell, my sweet friend, think of me.
Plain English translation
Independent machine-assisted Plain English translation from the 1888 Martel French edition, not a historical English translation. French Wikisource contributors supplied the scan-backed transcription: https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Livre:Bonaparte_-_Œuvres_littéraires,_tome_1,_1888.djvu (page histories credit contributors). The adapted transcription and translation are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. Extraction removes markup and editorial notes and makes documented transcription repairs. French-source model review is not human specialist certification or a complete scan collation.
Ancona, February 10, 1797.
We have been at Ancona for two days. After a brief exchange of gunfire, we seized the citadel in a surprise attack. We captured twelve hundred men; the fifty officers I sent back to their homes. I am still at Ancona. I am not asking you to come because things are not yet settled, though I hope they will be within a few days. Besides, the country here is very gloomy, and fear has seized everyone. I set off for the mountains tomorrow. You have not written, though you were meant to let me hear from you daily. Please go out for a walk daily; it will do you good. A million kisses. This nasty war has bored me more than anything ever has. Goodbye, my sweet friend; think of me.
About this section
Letter 028 — XXVIII is part of Letters to Josephine by Napoléon Bonaparte. This page sets the French original beside 2 direct-source translations, so any line can be checked against the source. It is part 28 of 172 in the work, which is kept in the European tradition.
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