Note 73 — IX

Comte Roger de Damas (born in 1765, died in 1823). At the age of fifteen he was already an officer in the French army; his bravery, his chivalrous character, his quick intellect, made him the observed of all. “François First, the great Condé, and the Marshal de Saxe, would have wished to have a son like him,” says the Prince de Ligne. “In the midst of the heaviest cannonade he is giddy as a cockchafer, noisy, the most relentless singer, shouting the finest opera airs, making the maddest quotations in the midst of the firing, and yet judging perfectly all that goes on. War does not intoxicate him, but he is full of a genial ardour, such as one feels after a supper ... amiable, beloved by all, what is called a nice Frenchman, good-looking, an excellent fellow, and a well-bred gentleman of the Court of France: such is Roger de Damas.”