A CHAPTER ON PUNISHMENTS harm
239
to Little Jean's health and that he returned
home, having done his duty by the Foreign Legion, dapper and cheerful as he used to be. Even this supposition gives us a very pretty bit of arithmetic. Jean Dubois' original period of service
.
...
5 years
Extra service for time spent in . the penal battalion Ditto for regimental punish-
6 months
.
ments
.....
Ditto for imprisonment in
7
months
1
month
for-
2 years
tress
Total time Jean Dubois had to serve in place of his original five
years
...
.8 years
optimistic piece of arithmetic optimism even goes so far as to assume that Jean the Unlucky, during his two years of imprisonment
In
this
my
and during the rest of his period of service, did not incur any additional penalties. If I, however, compel myself to consider his career from a pessimistic point of view, the sum works out much more prettily. Dubois had not a very strong constitution and it is quite possible that the penal battalion, plus imprisonment, plus finished him starvation, quite despair, plus
In that case the loss of a blue scarf, a spiteful sergeant and the crass stupidity of a series of officers have been the death of him. But if Jean Dubois really got over his years of prison when he returns home (he is a Frenchman !) his strength will not be worth much in the worka-
off.
day world.