About the book: year / "We are in Holland. “The world met us,” and the hopes for which we were chasing here disappeared, like ghosts of the night with the rising of the sun. While still in Copenhagen, we learned that Napoleon had been defeated at Waterloo and that our troops were under the walls of Paris. The ardent feelings of youth, which made us want to continue the war, alarmed by the quick and unexpected revolution with which our plans were overturned, could not be consoled by prudence, which insisted that peace is better than war; and we, with sadness in our hearts, in the fight against storms, accompanied by four weeks of boredom, came on our frigates to the foggy shores of Holland…»