Except for a few quiet outings, including an Armistice Day pilgrimage to World War I battlefields, Charles de Gaulle has stayed close to his country place at Colombey-les-Deux-Églises since his retirement in April. The general, who turned 79 last month, has seen few visitors, but his most respected biographer, Raymond Tournoux of Paris-Match magazine, reports that he has by no means turned marmoreal. As Tournoux tells it, De Gaulle paces his garden, rails at events and "prepares for death like a man who has not stopped thinking of it for several years." He has rejected plans for a...
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