“The bootprints of history tramp through my children's veins. I hear my father telling me about the great road that ran above his village right along the Adriatic. Napoleonova Cesta he called it proudly. Napoleon's road. It was built by Marshal Marmont when Napoleon made him governor of the Dalmatia that the Emperor renamed Illyria, giving it back its ancient name. Was Marshal Marmont the Duc de Dalmatie who signed with a flourish the document giving the Nanto-Bordelaise Company the charter for French settlement in Akaroa ? I like to think he was.””