Tf.f PACIFIC COLLEGE OF Osrt 
 
 ^06 ANGELES, GAL 
 
 (7
 
 MEMOIES 
 
 OF 
 
 NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 
 
 LOUIS ANTOINEJFAUVELET DE BOURRIENNE 
 
 HIS PRIVATE SECRETARY 
 
 FO WHICH ABE ADDED AN ACCOUNT OF THE IMPORTANT EVENTS OP THE HUNDBBE 
 
 DAYS, OP NAPOLEON'S SUBBENDEB TO THE ENGLISH, AND OP HIS 
 
 RESIDENCE AND DEATH AT ST. HELENA, WITH ANECDOTES 
 
 AND ILLUSTRATIVE EXTRACTS FROM ALL THE 
 
 MOST AUTHENTIC SOURCES 
 
 EDITED BY K. W. PHIPPS 
 
 COLONEL, LATE ROYAL ARTILLERY 
 
 Veto and lUfctsct) 
 
 WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS 
 VOL. I 
 
 NEW YORK 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 1905
 
 PEEFAOE 
 
 BY THE EDITORS OF THE 1836 EDITION. 
 
 IN introducing the present edition of M. de Bourrienne's 
 Memoirs to the public we are bound, as Editors, to say a few 
 words on the subject. Agreeing, however, with Horace Wai- 
 pole, that an editor should not dwell for any length of time on 
 the merits of his author, we shall touch but lightly on this 
 part of the matter. We are the more ready to abstain since 
 the great success in England of the former editions of these 
 Memoirs, and the high reputation they have acquired on the 
 European Continent, and in every part of the civilised world 
 where the fame of Bonaparte has ever reached, sufficiently 
 establish the merits of M. de Bourrienne as a biographer. 
 These merits seem to us to consist chiefly in an anxious desire 
 to be impartial, to point out the defects as well as the merits 
 of a most wonderful man ; and in a peculiarly graphic power 
 of relating facts and anecdotes. With this happy faculty 
 Bourrienne would have made the life of almost any active 
 individual interesting ; but the subject of which the most fa- 
 vourable circumstances permitted him to treat was full ol 
 events and of the most extraordinary facts. The hero of his 
 history was such a being as the world has produced only on 
 the rarest occasions, and the complete counterpart to whom 
 has, probably, never existed ; for there are broad shades of 
 difference between Napoleon and Alexander, Caesar, and 
 Charlemagne ; neither will modern history furnish more exact 
 parallels, since Gustavus Adolphus, Frederick the Great, 
 Cromwell, Washington, or Bolivar bear but a small resem-
 
 PREFACE BY THE EDITORS. 
 
 blance to Bonaparte either in character, fortune, or extent of 
 enterprise. For fourteen years, to say nothing of his projects 
 in the East, the history of Bonaparte was the history of all 
 Europe ! 
 
 With the copious materials he possessed, M. de Bourrienne 
 has produced a work which, for deep interest, excitement, and 
 amusement, can scarcely be paralleled by any of the numer- 
 ous and excellent memoirs for which the literature of France 
 is so justly celebrated. 
 
 M. de Bourrienne shows us the hero of Marengo and Aus- 
 terlitz in his night-gown and slippers with a trait de plume 
 he, in a hundred instances, places the real man before us, with 
 all his personal habits and peculiarities of manner, temper, 
 and conversation. 
 
 The friendship between Bonaparte and Bourrienne began in 
 boyhood, at the school of Brienne, and their unreserved inti- 
 macy continued during the most brilliant part of Napoleon's 
 career. We have said enough, the motives for his writing 
 this work and his competency for the task will be best ex- 
 plained in M. de Bourrienne's own words, which the reader 
 will find in the Introductory Chapter. 
 
 M. de Bourrienne says little of Napoleon after his first abdi- 
 cation and retirement to Elba in 1814 : we have endeavoured 
 to fill up the chasm thus left by following his hero through 
 the remaining seven years of his life, to the " last scenes of 
 all " that ended his " strange, eventful history," to his death- 
 bed and alien grave at St. Helena. A completeness will thus 
 be given to the work which it did not before possess, and 
 which we hope will, with the other additions and improve- 
 ments already alluded to, tend to give it a place in every well- 
 selected library, as one of the most satisfactory of all the lives 
 of Napoleon. 
 LONDON, 1836.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 BY THE EDITOR OF THE 1885 EDITION. 
 
 THE Memoirs of the time of Napoleon may be divided into 
 two classes those by marshals and officers, of which Suchet's 
 is a good example, chiefly devoted to military movements, and 
 those by persons employed in the administration and in the 
 Court, giving us not only materials for history, but also valu- 
 able details of the personal and inner life of the great Em- 
 peror and of his immediate surroundings. Of this latter class 
 the Memoirs of Bourrienne are among the most important. 
 
 Long the intimate and personal friend of Napoleon both 
 at school and from the end of the Italian campaigns in 1797 
 till 1802 working in the same room with him, using the same 
 purse, the confidant of most of his schemes, and, as his sec- 
 retary, having the largest part of all the official and private 
 correspondence of the time passed through his hands, Bour- 
 rienne occupied an invaluable position for storing and record- 
 ing materials for history. The Memoirs of his successor, Me- 
 neval, are more those of an esteemed private secretary ; yet, 
 valuable and interesting as they are, they want the peculiarity 
 of position which marks those of Bourrienne, who was a com- 
 pound of secretary, minister, and friend. The accounts of 
 such men as Miot de Melito, Ecederer, etc., are most valuable, 
 but these writers were not in that close contact with Napoleon 
 enjoyed by Bourrienne. Bourrienne's position was simply 
 unique, and we can only regret that he did not occupy it till 
 the end of the Empire. Thus it is natural that his Memoirs 
 should have been largely used by historians, and to properly
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 understand the history of the time, they must be read by all 
 students. They are indeed full of interest for every one. 
 But they also require to be read with great caution. When 
 we meet with praise of Napoleon, we may generally believe 
 it, for, as Thiers (Consulat, ii. 279) says, Bourrienne need 
 be little suspected on this side, for although he owed every- 
 thing to Napoleon, he has not seemed to remember it. But 
 very often in passages in which blame is thrown on Napoleon, 
 Bourrienne speaks, partly with much of the natural bitterness 
 of a former and discarded friend, and partly with the curious 
 mixed feeling which even the brothers of Napoleon display in 
 their Memoirs, pride in the wonderful abilities evinced by the 
 man with whom he was allied, and jealousy at the way in 
 which he was outshone by the man he had in youth regarded 
 as inferior to himself. Sometimes also we may even suspect 
 the praise. Thus when Bourrienne defends Napoleon for giv- 
 ing,%s he alleges, poison to the sick at Jaffa, a doubt arises 
 whether his object was to really defend what to most Eng- 
 lishmen of this day, with remembrances of the deeds and reso- 
 lutions of the Indian Mutiny, will seem an act to be pardoned, 
 if not approved ; or whether he was more anxious to fix the 
 committal of the act on Napoleon at a time when public 
 opinion loudly blamed it. The same may be said of his de- 
 fence of the massacre of the prisoners of Jaffa. 
 
 Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne was born in 1769, 
 that is, in the same year as Napoleon Bonaparte, and he 
 was the friend and companion of the future Emperor at the 
 military school of Brienne-le-Chateau till 1784, when Napoleon, 
 one of the sixty pupils maintained at the expense of the State, 
 was passed on to the Military School of Paris. The friends 
 again met in 1792 and in 1795, when Napoleon was hanging 
 about Paris, and when Bourrienne looked on the vague dreams 
 of his old schoolmate as only so much folly. In 1796, as 
 soon as Napoleon had assured his position at the head of the 
 army of Italy, anxious as ever to surround himself with known
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 faces, he sent for Bourrienne to be his secretary. Bourrienne 
 had been appointed in 1792 as secretary of the Legation at 
 Stuttgart, and had, probably wisely, disobeyed the orders 
 given him to return, thus escaping the dangers of the Revo- 
 lution. He only came back to Paris in 1795, having thus 
 become an e*migre". He joined Napoleon in 1797, after the 
 Austrians had been beaten out of Italy, and at once assumed 
 the office of secretary which he held for so long. He had 
 sufficient tact to forbear treating the haughty young General 
 with any assumption of familiarity in public, and he was 
 indefatigable enough to please even the never-resting Napo- 
 leon. Talent Bourrienne had in abundance ; indeed he is 
 careful to hint that at school if any one had been asked to 
 predict greatness for any pupil, it was Bourrienne, not Napo- 
 leon, who would have been fixed on as the future star. He 
 went with his General to Egypt, and returned with him to 
 France. While Napoleon was making his formal entry into 
 the Tuileries, Bourrienne was preparing the cabinet he was 
 still to share with the Consul. In this cabinet our cabinet, as 
 he is careful to call it he worked with the First Consul till 
 1802. 
 
 During all this time the pair had lived on terms of equality 
 and friendship creditable to both. The secretary neither asked 
 for nor received any salary : when he required money, he sim- 
 ply dipped into the cash-box of the First Consul. As the 
 whole power of the State gradually passed into the hands of 
 the Consnl, the labours of the secretary became heavier. His 
 successor broke down under a lighter load, and had to receive 
 assistance ; but, perhaps borne np by the absorbing interest 
 of the work and the great influence given by his post, Bour- 
 rienne stuck to his place, and to all appearance might, except 
 for himself, have come down to us as the companion of Na- 
 poleon during his whole life. He had enemies, and one of 
 them ' has not shrunk from describing their gratification at 
 
 1 Bouhiy de la Meurthe.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 the disgrace of the trusted secretary. Any one in favour, or 
 indeed in office, under Napoleon was the sure mark of calumny 
 for all aspirants to place ; yet Bourrienne might have weathered 
 any temporary storm raised by unfounded reports as success- 
 fully as Meneval, who followed him. But Bourrienne's hands 
 were not clean in money matters, and that was an unpardon- 
 able sin in any one who desired to be in real intimacy with 
 Napoleon. He became involved in the affairs of the House of 
 Coulon, which failed, as will be seen in the notes, at the time 
 of his disgrace ; and in October 1802 he was called on to hand 
 over his office to Meneval, who retained it till invalided after 
 the Russian campaign. 
 
 As has been said, Bourrienne would naturally be the mark for 
 many accusations, but the conclusive proof of his misconduct 
 at least for any one acquainted with Napoleon's objection 
 and dislike to changes in office, whether from his strong belief 
 in the effects of training, or his equally strong dislike of new 
 faces round him is that he was never again employed near his 
 old comrade ; indeed he really never saw the Emperor again 
 at any private interview, except when granted the usual official 
 reception in 1805, before leaving to take up his post at Ham- 
 burg, which he held till 1810. We know that his re-employ- 
 ment was urged by Josephine and several of his former com- 
 panions. Savary himself says he tried his advocacy ; but 
 Napoleon was inexorable to those who, in his own phrase, 
 had sacrificed to the golden calf. 
 
 Sent, as we have said, to Hamburg in 1805, as Minister 
 Plenipotentiary to the Duke of Brunswick, the Duke of 
 Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and to the Hanse towns, Bourrienne 
 knew how to make his post an important one. He was at one 
 of the great seats of the commerce which suffered so fearfully 
 from the Continental system of the Emperor, and he was 
 charged to watch over the German press. How well he ful- 
 filled this duty we learn from Metternich, who writes in 1805 : 
 " I have sent an article to the newspaper editors in Berlin and
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 to M. de Hofer at Hamburg. I do not know whether it has 
 been accepted, for M. Bourrienne still exercises an authority 
 so severe over these journals that they are always submitted to 
 him before they appear, that he may erase or alter the articles 
 which do not please him." 
 
 His position at Hamburg gave him great opportunities for 
 both financial and political intrigues. In his Memoirs, as 
 Meneval remarks, he or his editor is not ashamed to boast of 
 being thanked by Louis XVIII. at St. Ouen for services ren- 
 dered while he was the minister of Napoleon at Hamburg. He 
 was recalled in 1810, when the Hanse towns were united, or, to 
 use the phrase of the day, re -united to the Empire. He then 
 hung about Paris, keeping on good terms with some of the 
 ministers Savary, not the most reputable of them, for ex- 
 ample. In 1814 he was to be found at the office of Lavallette, 
 the head of the posts, disguising, his enemies said, his delight 
 at the bad news which was pouring in, by exaggerated expres- 
 sions of devotion. He is accused of a close and suspicious 
 connection with Talleyrand, and it is odd that when Talleyrand 
 became head of the Provisional Government in 1814, Bour- 
 rienne of all persons should have been put at the head of the 
 posts. Received in the most flattering manner by Louis XVIII. , 
 he was as astonished as poor Beugnot was in 1815, to find him- 
 self on 13th May suddenly ejected from office, having, however, 
 had time to furnish post-horses to Maubreuil for the mysteri- 
 ous expedition, said to have been at least known to Talleyrand, 
 and intended certainly for the robbery of the Queen of West- 
 phalia, and probably for the murder of Napoleon. 
 
 In the extraordinary scurry before the Bourbons scuttled 
 out of Paris in 1814, Bourrienne was made Pre*fet of the Police 
 for a few days, his tenure of that post being signalised by the 
 abortive attempt to arrest Touche", the only effect of which 
 was to drive that wily minister into the arms of the Bonapart- 
 ists. 
 
 He fled with the King, and was exempted from the amnesty
 
 xli PREFACE. 
 
 proclaimed by Napoleon. On the return from Ghent he was 
 made a Minister of State without portfolio, and also became 
 one of the Council. The ruin of his finances drove him out of 
 France, but he eventually died in a madhouse at Caen. 
 
 When the Memoirs first appeared in 1829 they made a great 
 sensation. Till then in most writings Napoleon had been 
 treated as either a demon or as a demi-god. The real facts of 
 the case were not suited to the tastes of either his enemies or 
 his admirers. While the monarchs of Europe had been dis- 
 puting among themselves about the division of the spoils to 
 be obtained from France and from the unsettlement of the Con- 
 tinent, there had arisen an extraordinarily clever and unscru- 
 pulous man who, by alternately bribing and overthrowing the 
 great monarchies, had soon made himself master of the main- 
 land. His admirers were unwilling to admit the part played 
 in his success by the jealousy of his foes of each other's share 
 in the booty, and they delighted to invest him with every 
 great quality which man could possess. His enemies were 
 ready enough to allow his military talents, but they wished to 
 attribute the first success of his not very deep policy to a mar- 
 vellous duplicity, apparently considered by them the more 
 wicked as possessed by a parvenu emperor, and far removed, 
 in a moral point of view, from the statecraft so allowable in an 
 ancient monarchy. But for Napoleon himself and his family 
 and Court there was literally no limit to the really marvellous 
 inventions of his enemies. He might enter every capital on 
 the Continent, but there was some consolation in believing 
 that he himself was a monster of wickedness, and his Court 
 but the scene of one long protracted orgie. 
 
 There was enough against the Emperor in the Memoirs to 
 make them comfortable reading for his opponents, though 
 very many of the old calumnies were disposed of in them. 
 They contained indeed the nearest approximation to the 
 truth which had yet appeared. Metternich, who must have 
 been a good judge, as no man was better acquainted with what
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 he himself calls the " age of Napoleon," says of the Memoirs : 
 "If you want something to read, both interesting and amus- 
 ing, get the Mdmoires de Bourrienne. These are the only 
 authentic Memoirs of Napoleon which have yet appeared. 
 The style is not brilliant, but that only makes them the more 
 trustworthy." Indeed, Metternich himself in his own Me- 
 moirs often follows a good deal in the line of Bourrienne: 
 among many formal attacks, every now and then he lapses 
 into half involuntary and indirect praise of his great antag- 
 onist, especially where he compares the men he had to deal 
 with in aftertimes with his former rapid and talented inter- 
 locutor. To some even among the Bonapartists, Bourrienne 
 was not altogether distasteful. Lucien Bonaparte, remarking 
 that the time in which Bourrienne treated with Napoleon as 
 equal with equal did not last long enough for the secretary, 
 says he has taken a little revenge in his Memoirs, just as a 
 lover, after a break with his mistress, reveals all her defects. 
 But Lucien considers that Bourrienne gives us a good enough 
 idea of the young officer of the artillery, of the great General, 
 and of the First Consul. Of the Emperor, says Lucien, he 
 was too much in retirement to be able to judge equally well. 
 But Lucien was not a fair representative of the Bonapartists ; 
 indeed he had never really thought well of his brother or of 
 his actions since Lucien, the former " Brutus " Bonaparte, 
 had ceased to be the adviser of the Consul. It was well for 
 Lucien himself to amass a fortune from the presents of a cor- 
 rupt court, and to be made a Prince and Duke by the Pope, 
 but he was too sincere a republican not to disapprove of the 
 imperial system. The real Bonapartists were naturally and 
 inevitably furious with the Memoirs. They were not true, 
 they were not the work of Bourrienne, Bourrienne himself was 
 a traitor, a purloiner of manuscripts, his memory was as bad 
 as his principles, he was not even entitled to the de before his 
 name. If the Memoirs were at all to be pardoned, it was be- 
 cause his share was only really a few notes wrung from him by
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 large pecuniary offers at a time when he was pursued by hia 
 creditors, and when his brain was already affected. 
 
 The Bonapartist attack on the Memoirs was delivered in 
 full form, in two volumes, Bourrienne et ses Erreurs, Volon- 
 taires et Involontaires (Paris, Heideloff, 1830), edited by the 
 Comte d'Aure, the Ordonnateur en Chef of the Egyptian ex- 
 pedition, and containing communications from Joseph Bona- 
 parte, Gourgaud, Stein, etc. 1 
 
 Part of the system of attack was to call in question the 
 authenticity of the Memoirs, and this was the more easy as 
 Bourrienne, losing his fortune, died in 1834 in a state of 
 imbecility. But this plan is not systematically followed, and 
 the very reproaches addressed to the writer of the Memoirs 
 often show that it was believed they were really written by 
 Bourrienne. They undoubtedly contain plenty of faults. The 
 editor (Villemarest, it is said) probably had a large share in 
 the work, and Bourrienne must have forgotten or misplaced 
 many dates and occurrences. In such a work, undertaken so 
 many years after the events, it was inevitable that many errors 
 should be made, and that many statements should be at least 
 debatable. But on close investigation the work stands the 
 attack in a way that would be impossible unless it had really 
 been written by a person in the peculiar position occupied by 
 Bourrienne. He has assuredly not exaggerated that position : 
 he really, says Lucien Bonaparte, treated as equal with equal 
 with Napoleon during a part of his career, and he certainly 
 was the nearest friend and confidant that Napoleon ever had 
 in his life. 
 
 Where he fails, or where the Bonapartist fire is most tell- 
 ing, is in the account of the Egyptian expedition. It may 
 seem odd that he should have forgotten, even in some thirty 
 years, details such as the way in which the sick were removed ; 
 but such matters were not in his province ; and it would be 
 
 1 In the notes in this present edition these volumes are referred to in brief M 
 " Erreurt."
 
 PREFACE. xt 
 
 easy to match similar omissions in other works, such as the 
 accounts of the Crimea, and still more of the Peninsula. It 
 is with his personal relations with Napoleon that we are most 
 concerned, and it is in them that his account receives most 
 corroboration. 
 
 It may be interesting to see what has been said of the 
 Memoirs by other writers. We have quoted Metternich, and 
 Lucien Bonaparte ; let us hear Meneval, his successor, who 
 remained faithful to his master to the end : " Absolute confi- 
 dence cannot be given to statements contained in Memoirs 
 published under the name of a man who has not composed 
 them. It is known that the editor of these Memoirs offered to 
 M. de Bourrienne, who had then taken refuge in Holstein 
 from his creditors, a sum said to be thirty thousand francs to 
 obtain his signature to them, with some notes and addenda. 
 M. de Bourrienne was already attacked by the disease from 
 which he died a few years latter in a maison de sant6 at Caen. 
 Many literary men co-operated in the preparation of his 
 Memoirs. In 1825 I met M. de Bourrienne in Paris. He 
 told me it had been suggested to him to write against the 
 Emperor. 'Notwithstanding the harm he has done me,' said 
 he, ' I would never do so. Sooner may my hand be withered.' 
 If M. de Bourrienne had prepared his Memoirs himself, he 
 would not have stated that while he was the Emperor's minis- 
 ter at Hamburg he worked with the agents of the Comte de 
 Lille (Louis XVIII.) at the preparation of proclamations in 
 favour of that Prince, and that in 1814 he accepted the thanks 
 of the King, Louis XVIII., for doing so ; he would not have 
 said that Napoleon had confided to him in 1805 that he had 
 never conceived the idea of an expedition into England, and 
 that the plan of a landing, the preparations for which he gave 
 such publicity to, was only a snare to amuse fools. The Em- 
 peror well knew that never was there a plan more seriously 
 conceived or more positively settled. M. de Bourrienne would 
 not have spoken of his private interviews with Napoleon, nor
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 of the alleged confidences entrusted to him, while really 
 Napoleon had no longer received him after the 20th October 
 1802. When the Emperor, in 1805, forgetting his faults, 
 named him Minister Plenipotentiary at Hamburg, he granted 
 him the customary audience, but to this favour he did not 
 add the return of his former friendship. Both before and 
 afterwards he constantly refused to receive him, and he did 
 not correspond with him " (Meneval, ii. 378-79). And in 
 another passage Meneval says : " Besides, it would be wrong 
 to regard these Memoirs as the work of the man whose name 
 they bear. The bitter resentment M. de Bourrienne had 
 nourished for his disgrace, the enfeeblement of his faculties, 
 and the poverty he was reduced to, rendered him accessible 
 to the pecuniary offers made to him. He consented to give 
 the authority of his name to Memoirs in whose composition 
 he had only co-operated by incomplete, confused, and often 
 inexact notes, materials which an editor was employed to put 
 in order." And Meneval (iii. 29-30) goes on to quote what he 
 himself had written in the Spectateur Militaire, in which he 
 makes much the same assertions, and especially objects to the 
 account of conversations with the Emperor after 1802, except 
 always the one audience on taking leave for Hamburg. Mene- 
 val also says that Napoleon, when he wished to obtain intelli- 
 gence from Hamburg, did not correspond with Bourrienne, 
 but deputed him, Meneval, to ask Bourrienne for what was 
 wanted. But he corroborates Bourrienne on the subject of 
 the efforts made, among others by Josephine, for his reappoint- 
 ment. 
 
 Such are the statements of the Bonapartists pure ; and the 
 reader, as has been said, can judge for himself how far the 
 attack is good. Bourrienne, or his editor, may well have con- 
 fused the date of his interviews, but he will not be found 
 much astray on many points. His account of the conversation 
 of Josephine after the death of the Due d'Enghien may be 
 rompared with what we know from Madame de Bdmusat,
 
 PREFACE. xvii 
 
 who, by the way, would have been horrified if she had known 
 that he considered her to resemble the Empress Josephine in 
 character. 
 
 We now come to the views of Savary, the Due de Bovigo, 
 who avowedly remained on good terms with Bourrienne after 
 his disgrace, though the friendship of Savary was not exactly 
 a thing that most men would have much prided themselves 
 on. " Bourrienne had a prodigious memory ; he spoke and 
 wrote in several languages, and his pen ran as quickly as one 
 could speak. Nor were these the only advantages he pos- 
 sessed. He knew the routine of public business and public 
 law. His activity and devotion made him indispensable to 
 the First Consul. I knew the qualities which won for him 
 the unlimited confidence of his chief, but I cannot speak with 
 the same assurance of the faults which made him lose it. 
 Bourrienne had many enemies, both on account of his charac- 
 ter and of his place " (Savary, i. 418-19). 
 
 Marmont ought to be an impartial critic of the Memoirs. 
 He says, " Bourrienne . . . had a very great capacity, but 
 he is a striking example of the great truth that our passions 
 are always bad counsellors. By inspiring us with an immod- 
 erate ardour to reach a fixed end, they often make us miss it. 
 Bourrienne had an immoderate love of money. With his tal- 
 ents and his position near Bonaparte at the first dawn of 
 greatness, with the confidence and real good-will which Bona- 
 parte felt for him, in a few years he would have gained every- 
 thing in fortune and in social position. But his eager impa- 
 tience ruined his career at the moment when it might have 
 developed and increased " (Marmont, i. 64). The criticism 
 appears just. As to the Memoirs, Marmont says (ii. 224), "In 
 general, these Memoirs are of great veracity and powerful 
 interest so long as they treat of what the author has seen and 
 heard ; but when he speaks of others, his work is only an as- 
 semblage of gratuitous suppositions and of false facts put for- 
 ward for special purposes."
 
 xviU PREFACE. 
 
 The Comte Alexandra de Puymaigre, who arrived at Ham- 
 burgh soon after Bourrienne had left it in 1810, says (page 
 135) of the part of the Memoirs which relates to Hamburg, 
 "I must acknowledge that generally his assertions are well 
 founded. This former companion of Napoleon has only for- 
 gotten to speak of the opinion that they had of him in this 
 town. 
 
 "The truth is, that he was believed to have made much 
 money there." 
 
 Thus we may take Bourrienne as a clever, able man, who 
 would have risen to the highest honours under the Empire 
 had not his short-sighted grasping after lucre driven him from 
 office, and prevented him from ever regaining it under Napo- 
 leon. 
 
 In the present edition the translation has been carefully 
 compared with the original French text. Where in the orig- 
 inal text information is given which has now become mere 
 matter of history, and where Bourrienne merely quotes the 
 documents well enough known at this day, his possession of 
 which forms part of the charges of his opponents, advantage 
 has been taken to lighten the mass of the Memoirs. This has 
 been done especially where they deal with what the writer did 
 not himself see or hear, the part of the Memoirs which are 
 of least value and of which Marmont's opinion has just been 
 quoted. But in the personal and more valuable part of the 
 Memoirs, where we have the actual knowledge of the secretary 
 himself, the original text has been either fully retained, or 
 some few passages previously omitted restored. Illustrative 
 notes have been added from the Memoirs of the successor of 
 Bourrienne, Meneval, Madame de Bemusat, the works of 
 Colonel lung on Bonaparte et Son Temps, and on Lucien Bona- 
 parte, etc., and other books. Attention has also been paid to 
 the attacks of the Erreurs, and wherever these criticisms are 
 more than a mere expression of disagreement, their purport 
 has been recorded with, where possible, some judgment of the
 
 PREFACE. xlx 
 
 evidence. Thus the reader will have before him the materials 
 for deciding himself how far Bourrienne's statements are in 
 agreement with the facts and with the accounts of other 
 writers. 
 
 At the present time too much attention has been paid to 
 the Memoirs of Madame de Eemusat. She, as also Madame 
 Junot, was the wife of a man on whom the full shower of 
 imperial favours did not descend, and, womanlike, she saw 
 and thought only of the Court life of the great man who was 
 never less great than in his Court. She is equally astonished 
 and indignant that the Emperor, coming straight from long 
 hours of work with his ministers and with his secretary, could 
 not find soft words for the ladies of the Court, and that, a hor- 
 rible thing in the eyes of a Frenchwoman, when a mistress 
 threw herself into his arms, he first thought of what political 
 knowledge he could obtain from her. Bourrienne, on the 
 other hand, shows us the other and the really important side 
 of Napoleon's character. He tells us of the long hours in the 
 Cabinet, of the never -res ting activity of the Consul, of Napo- 
 leon's dreams, no ignoble dreams and often realised, of great 
 labours of peace as well as of war. He is a witness, and the 
 more valuable as a reluctant one, to the marvellous powers of 
 the man who, if not the greatest, was at least the one most 
 fully endowed with every great quality of mind and body the 
 world has ever seen. 
 
 B. W. P.
 
 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE desire of trading upon an illustrious name can alone 
 have given birth to the multitude of publications under 
 the titles of historical memoirs, secret memoirs, and other 
 rhapsodies which have appeared respecting Napoleon. On 
 looking into them it is difficult to determine whether the 
 impudence of the writers or the simplicity of certain 
 readers is most astonishing. Yet these rude and ill- 
 digested compilations, filled with absurd anecdotes, fabri- 
 cated speeches, fictitious crimes or virtues, and disfigured 
 by numerous anachronisms, instead of being consigned to 
 just contempt and speedy oblivion, have been pushed into 
 notice by speculators, and have found zealous partisans 
 and enthusiastic apologists. 1 
 
 For a time I entertained the idea of noticing, one by 
 one, the numerous errors which have been written re- 
 specting Napoleon ; but I have renounced a task which 
 would have been too laborious to myself, and very tedious 
 to the reader. I shall therefore only correct those which 
 come within the plan of my work, and which are con- 
 nected with those facts, to a more accurate knowledge of 
 which than any other person can possess I may lay claim. 
 There are men who imagine that nothing done by Napo- 
 leon will ever be forgotten ; but must not the slow but 
 inevitable influence of time be expected to operate with 
 respect to him ? The effect of that influence is, that the 
 most important event of an epoch soon sinks, almost im- 
 
 1 This Introduction has been reprinted as bearing upon the character of the work, 
 but refers very often to events of the day at the time of its first appearance.
 
 xxii AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. 
 
 perceptibly and almost disregarded, into the immense 
 mass of historical facts. Time, in its progress, diminishes 
 the probability as well as the interest of such an event, as 
 it gradually wears away the most durable monuments. 
 
 I attach only a relative importance to what I am about 
 to lay before the public. I shall give authentic docu- 
 ments. If all persons who have approached Napoleon, at 
 any time and in any place, would candidly record what 
 they saw and heard, without passion, the future historian 
 would be rich in materials. It is my wish that he who 
 may undertake the difficult task of writing the history of 
 Napoleon shall find in my notes information useful to the 
 perfection of his work. There he will at least find truth. 
 I have not the ambition to wish that what I state should 
 be taken as absolute authority ; but I hope that it will 
 always be consulted. 
 
 I have never before published anything respecting 
 Napoleon. That malevolence which fastens itself upon 
 men who have the misfortune to be somewhat separated 
 from the crowd has, because there is always more profit 
 in saying ill than good, attributed to me several works on 
 Bonaparte ; among others, Les Memoires secrets d'un 
 Homme qui ne l'a pas quitte, par M. B , and Me- 
 moires secrets sur Napoleon Bonaparte, par M. de B , 
 
 and Le Precis Historique sur Napoleon. The initial of my 
 name has served to propagate this error. The incredible 
 ignorance which runs through those memoirs, the ab- 
 surdities and inconceivable silliness with which they 
 abound, do not permit a man of honour and common 
 sense to allow such wretched rhapsodies to be imputed to 
 him. I declared in 1815, and at later periods, in the 
 French and foreign journals, that I had no hand in those 
 publications, and I here formally repeat this declaration. 
 
 But it may be said to me, Why should we place more 
 confidence in you than in those who have written before 
 you?
 
 A UTHOR '8 1NTROD UCTION. 
 
 My reply shall be plain. I enter the lists one of the 
 last. I have read all that my predecessors have published. 
 I am confident that all I state is true. I have no interest 
 in deceiving, no disgrace to fear, no reward to expect. I 
 neither wish to obscure nor embellish his glory. However 
 great Napoleon may have been, was he not also liable to 
 pay his tribute to the weakness of human nature ? I speak 
 of Napoleon such as I have seen him, known him, fre- 
 quently admired and sometimes blamed him. I state 
 what I saw, heard, wrote, and thought at the time, under 
 each circumstance that occurred. I have not allowed my- 
 self to be carried away by the illusions of the imagination, 
 nor to be influenced by friendship or hatred. I shall not 
 insert a single reflection which did not occur to me at the 
 very moment of the event which gave it birth. How 
 many transactions and documents were there over which 
 I could but lament ! how many measures, contrary to my 
 views, to my principles, and to my character ! while the 
 best intentions were incapable of overcoming difficulties 
 which a most powerful and decided will rendered almost 
 insurmountable. 
 
 I also wish the future historian to compare what I say 
 with what others have related or may relate. But it will 
 be necessary for him to attend to dates, circumstances, 
 difference of situation, change of temperament, and age, 
 for age has much influence over men. We do not think 
 and act at fifty as at twenty-five. By exercising this cau- 
 tion he will be able to discover the truth, and to establish 
 an opinion for posterity. 
 
 The reader must not expect to find in these Memoirs 
 an uninterrupted series of all the events which marked 
 the great career of Napoleon ; nor details of all those 
 battles, with the recital of which so many eminent men 
 have usefully and ably occupied themselves. I shall say 
 little about whatever I did not see or hear, and which is 
 not supported by official documents.
 
 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Perhaps I shall succeed in confirming truths which 
 have been doubted, and in correcting errors which have 
 been adopted. If I sometimes differ from the observations 
 and statements of Napoleon at St. Helena, I am far from 
 supposing that those who undertook to be the medium of 
 communication between him and the public have misrep- 
 resented what he said. I am welLconvinced that none of 
 the writers of St. Helena can be taxed with the slightest 
 deception ; disinterested zeal and nobleness of character 
 are undoubted pledges of their veracity. It appears to me 
 perfectly certain that Napoleon stated, dictated, or cor- 
 rected all they have published. Their honour is unques- 
 tionable ; no one can doubt it. That they wrote what he 
 communicated must therefore be believed ; but it cannot 
 with equal confidence be credited that what he communi- 
 cated was nothing but the truth. He seems often to have 
 related as a fact what was really only an idea, an idea, 
 too, brought forth at St. Helena, the child of misfortune, 
 and transported by his imagination to Europe in the time 
 of his prosperity. His favourite phrase, which was every 
 moment on his lips, must not be forgotten "What will 
 history say what will posterity think ? " This passion 
 for leaving behind him a celebrated name is one which 
 belongs to the constitution of the human mind ; and with 
 Napoleon its influence was excessive. In his first Italian 
 campaign he wrote thus to General Clarke : " That am- 
 bition and the occupation of high offices were not suffi- 
 cient for his satisfaction and happiness, which he had 
 early placed in the opinion of Europe and the esteem of 
 posterity." He often observed to me that with him the 
 opinion of posterity was the real immortality of the soul. 
 
 It may easily be conceived that Napoleon wished to give 
 to the documents which he knew historians would consult 
 a favourable colour, and to direct, according to his own 
 views, the judgment of posterity on his actions. But it 
 is only by the impartial comparison of periods, positions,
 
 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. 
 
 and age that a well-founded decision will be given. About 
 his fortieth year the physical constitution of Napoleon 
 sustained considerable change ; and it may be presumed 
 that his moral qualities were affected by that change. It is 
 particularly important not to lose sight of the premature 
 decay of his health, which, perhaps, did not permit him 
 always to possess the vigour of memory otherwise con- 
 sistent enough with his age. The state of our organisation 
 often modifies our recollections, our feelings, our manner 
 of viewing objects, and the impressions we receive. This 
 will be taken into consideration by judicious and thinking 
 men ; and for them I write. 
 
 What M. de Las Casas states Napoleon to have said in 
 May 1816 on the manner of writing his history corrob- 
 orates the opinion I have expressed. It proves that all 
 the facts and observations he communicated or dictated 
 were meant to serve as materials. We learn from the 
 Memorial that M. de Las Casas wrote daily, and that the 
 manuscript was read over by Napoleon, who often made 
 corrections with his own hand. The idea of a journal 
 pleased him greatly. He fancied it would be a work of 
 which the world could afford no other example. But there 
 are passages in which the order of events is deranged ; in 
 others facts are misrepresented and erroneous assertions 
 are made, I apprehend, not altogether involuntarily. 
 
 I have paid particular attention to all that has been pub- 
 lished by the noble participators of the imperial captivity. 
 Nothing, however, could induce me to change a word in 
 these Memoirs, because nothing could take from me my 
 conviction of the truth of what I personally heard and 
 saw. It will be found that Napoleon in his private con- 
 versations often confirms what I state ; but we sometimes 
 differ, and the public must judge between us. However, 
 I must here make one observation. 
 
 When Napoleon dictated or related to his friends in St. 
 Helena the facts which they have reported he was out of
 
 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the world, he had played his part. Fortune, which, ac- 
 cording to his notions, had conferred on him all his power 
 and greatness, had recalled all her gifts before he sank 
 into the tomb. His ruling passion would induce him to 
 think that it was due to his glory to clear up certain facts 
 which might prove an unfavourable escort if they accom- 
 panied him to posterity. This was his fixed idea. But is 
 there not some ground for suspecting the fidelity of him 
 who writes or dictates his own history ? Why might he 
 not impose on a few persons in St. Helena, when he was 
 able to impose on France and Europe, respecting many 
 acts which emanated from him during the long duration 
 of his power ? The life of Napoleon would be very un- 
 faithfully written were the author to adopt as true all his 
 bulletins and proclamations, and all the declarations he 
 made at St. Helena. Such a history would frequently be 
 in contradiction to facts ; and such only is that which 
 might be entitled, The History of Napoleon, written by 
 Himself. 
 
 I have said thus much because it is my wish that the 
 principles which have guided me in the composition of 
 these Memoirs may be understood. I am aware that they 
 will not please every reader ; that is a success to which I 
 cannot pretend. Some merit, however, may be allowed 
 me on account of the labour I have undergone. It has 
 neither been of a slight nor an agreeable kind. I made it 
 a rule to read everything that has been written respecting 
 Napoleon, and I have had to decipher many of his auto- 
 graph documents, though no longer so familiar with his 
 scrawl as formerly. I say decipher, because a real cipher 
 might often be much more readily understood than the 
 handwriting of Napoleon. My own notes, too, which 
 were often very hastily made, in the hand I wrote in my 
 youth, have sometimes also much embarrassed me. 
 
 My long and intimate connection with Bonaparte from 
 boyhood, my close relations with him when General, Con-
 
 AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. xxvii 
 
 sul, and Emperor, enabled me to see and appreciate all 
 that was projected and all that was done during that con- 
 siderable and momentous period of time. I not only had 
 the opportunity of being present at the conception and 
 the execution of the extraordinary deeds of one of the 
 ablest men mature ever formed, but, notwithstanding an 
 almost unceasing application to business, I found means 
 to employ the few moments of leisure which Bonaparte 
 left at my disposal in making notes, collecting documents, 
 and in recording for history facts respecting which the 
 truth could otherwise with difficulty be ascertained ; and 
 more particularly in collecting those ideas, often profound, 
 brilliant, and striking, but always remarkable, to which 
 Bonaparte gave expression in the overflowing frankness of 
 confidential intimacy. 
 
 The knowledge that I possessed much important infor- 
 mation has exposed me to many inquiries, and wherever I 
 have resided since my retirement from public affairs much 
 of my time has been spent in replying to questions. The 
 wish to be acquainted with the most minute details of the 
 life of a man formed on an unexampled m . del is very nat- 
 ural ; and the observation on my replies by those who heard 
 them always was, " You should publish your Memoirs ! " 
 
 I had certainly always in view the publication of my 
 Memoirs ; but, at the same time, I was firmly resolved not 
 to publish them until a period should arrive in which I 
 might tell the truth, and the whole truth. While Napo- 
 leon was in the possession of power I felt it right to resist 
 the urgent applications made to me on this subject by 
 some persons of the highest distinction. Truth would 
 then have sometimes appeared flattery, and sometimes, 
 also, it might not have been without danger. Afterwards, 
 when the progress of events removed Bonaparte to a far 
 distant island in the midst of the ocean, silence was im- 
 posed on me by other considerations, by considerations 
 of propriety and feeling.
 
 xxviii AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION. 
 
 After the death of Bonaparte, at St. Helena, reasons of 
 a different nature retarded the execution of my plan. The 
 tranquillity of a secluded retreat was indispensable for 
 preparing and putting in order the abundant materials in 
 my possession. I found it also necessary to read a great 
 number of works, in order to rectify important errors to 
 which the want of authentic documents had induced the 
 authors to give credit. This much-desired retreat was 
 found. I had the good fortune to be introduced, through 
 a friend, to the Duchesse de Brancas, and that lady in- 
 vited me to pass some time on one of her estates in Hai- 
 nault. Received with the most agreeable hospitality, I 
 have there enjoyed that tranquillity which could alone 
 have rendered the publication of these volumes practicable. 
 
 FAUVELET DE BOUKEIENNE.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHRONOLOGY OP BONAPARTE'S LIFE pages xliii-liii 
 
 CHAPTEK L 
 
 1769-1783. 
 
 Authentic date of Bonaparte's birth His family ruined by the Jesuits 
 His taste for military amusements Sham siege at the College of 
 Brienne The porter's wife and Napoleon My intimacy with Bona- 
 parte at college His love for the mathematics, and his dislike of 
 Latin He defends Paoli and blames his father He is ridiculed by 
 his comrades Ignorance of the monks Distribution of prizes at 
 Brienne Madame de Montesson and the Duke of Orleans Report of 
 M. Keralio on Bonaparte He leaves Brienne 1-12 
 
 CHAPTEE K 
 
 1784-1794. 
 
 Bonaparte enters the Military College of Paris He urges me to embrace 
 the military profession His report on the state of the Military 
 School of Paris He obtains a commission I set off for Vienna Re- 
 turn to Paris, where I again meet Bonaparte His singular plans for 
 raising money Louis XVI. with the red cap on his head The 10th 
 of August My departure for Stuttgart Bonaparte goes to Corsica 
 My name inscribed on the list of emigrants Bonaparte at the siege 
 of Toulon Le Souper de Beaucaire Napoleon's mission to Genoa 
 His arrest His autographical justification Duroc's first connection 
 with Bonaparte 13-27
 
 CONSENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 
 1794-1795. 
 
 Proposal to send Bonaparte to La Vendee He is struck off the list of 
 general officers Salicetti Joseph's marriage with Mademoiselle Clary 
 Bonaparte's wish to go to Turkey Note explaining the plan of his 
 proposed expedition Madame Bourrienne's character of Bonaparte, 
 and account of her husband's arrest Constitution of the year III. 
 The 13th Vendemiaire Bonaparte appointed second in command of 
 the army of the interior Eulogium of Bonaparte by Barras, and its 
 consequences St. Helena manuscript 38-44 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 1795-1797. 
 
 On my return to Paris I meet Bonaparte His interview with Josephine 
 Bonaparte's marriage, and departure from Paris ten days after 
 Portrait and character of Josephine Bonaparte's dislike of national 
 property Letter to Josephine Letter of General Colli, and Bona- 
 parte's reply Bonaparte refuses to serve with Kellerman Marmont's 
 letters Bonaparte's order to me to join the army My departure from 
 Sens for Italy Insurrection of the Venetian States 45-58 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Signature of the preliminaries of peace Pall of Venice My arrival and 
 reception at Leoben Bonaparte wishes to pursue his success The 
 Directory opposes him He wishes to advance on Vienna Movement 
 of the army of the Sainbre-et-Meuse Bonaparte's dissatisfaction 
 Arrival at Milan We take up our residence at Montebello Napo- 
 leon's j udgment respecting Dandolo and Melzi 59-64 
 
 CHAPTER VL 
 
 1797. 
 
 Napoleon's correspondence Release of French prisoners at Olmutz 
 Negotiations with Austria Bonaparte's dissatisfaction Letter of 
 complaint from Bonaparte to the Executive Directory Note respect-
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 ing the affairs of Venice and the Club of Clichy, written by Bonaparte 
 and circulated in the army Intercepted letter of the Emperor 
 Francis . . . . 65-72 
 
 CHAPTER VH. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Unfounded reports Carnot Capitulation of Mantua General Clarke 
 The Directory yields to Bonaparte Berthier Arrival of Eugene 
 Beauharnais at Milan Comte Delannay d'Entraigues His inter- 
 view with Bonaparte Seizure of his papers Copy of one describing a 
 conversation between him and Comte de Montgaillard The Em- 
 peror Francis The Prince de Conde and General Pichegru. . . 73-84 
 
 CHAPTER VUl 
 1797. 
 
 The royalists of the interior Bonaparte's intention of marching on Paris 
 with 25,000 men His animosity against the emigrants and the 
 Clichy Club His choice between the two parties of the Directory 
 Augereau's order of the day against the word Monsieur Bonaparte 
 wishes to be made one of the five Directors He supports the ma- 
 jority of the Directory La Vallette, Augereau, and Bernadotte 
 sent to Paris Interesting correspondence relative to the 18th Fruc- 
 tidor.. ,... 85-94 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Bonaparte's joy at the result of the 18th Fructidor. His letter to An- 
 gereau His correspondence with the Directory and proposed resigna- 
 tion Explanation of the Directory Bottot General Clarke Let- 
 ter from Madame Bacciocchi to Bonaparte Autograph letter of the 
 Emperor Francis to Bonaparte Arrival of Count Cobenteel Auto- 
 graph note of Bonaparte on the conditions of peace, ......... 95-103
 
 xxxii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Influence of the 18th Fructidor on the negotiations Bonaparte's sus- 
 picion of Bottot His complaints respecting the non-erasure of 
 Bourrienne Bourrienne's conversation with the Marquis of Gallo 
 Bottot writes from Paris to Bonaparte on the part of the Directory 
 Agents of the Directory employed to watch Bonaparte Influence of 
 the weather on the conclusion of peace Remarkable observation of 
 Bonaparte Conclusion of the treaty The Directory dissatisfied 
 with the terms of the peace Bonaparte's predilection for representa- 
 tive government Opinion on Bonaparte 103-112 
 
 CHAPTEE XI. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Effect of the 18th Fructidor on the peace The standard of the army of 
 Italy Honours rendered to the memory of General Hoche and of 
 Virgil at Mantua Remarkable letter In passing through Switzer- 
 land Bonaparte visits the field of Morat Arrival at RastadtLetter 
 from the Directory calling Bonaparte to Paris Intrigues against 
 Josephine Grand ceremony on the reception of Bonaparte by the 
 Directory The theatres Modesty of Bonaparte An assassination 
 Bonaparte's opinion of the Parisians His election to the National 
 Institute Letter to Camus Projects Reflections 113-126 
 
 CHAPTER XEL 
 
 1798. 
 
 Bonaparte's departure from Paris His return The Egyptian expedition 
 projected M. de Talleyrand General Desaix Expedition against 
 Malta Money taken at Berne Bonaparte's ideas respecting the 
 East Monge Non-influence of the Directory Marriages of Mar- 
 mont and La Valette Bonaparte's plan of colonising Egypt His 
 camp library Orthographical blunders Stock of wines Bona- 
 parte's arrival at Toulon Madame Bonaparte's fall from a balcony 
 Execution of an old man Simon < . 127-138
 
 CONTENTS. -cam 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 1798. 
 
 Departure of the squadron Arrival at Malta Dolomien General Bara- 
 guay d'Hilliers Attack on the western part of the island Caffarelli's 
 remark Deliverance of the Turkish prisoners Nelson's pursuit of 
 the French fleet Conversations on board How Bonaparte passed his 
 time Questions to the Captains Propositions discussed Morning 
 music Proclamation Admiral Brueys The English fleet avoided 
 Dangerous landing Bonaparte and his fortune Alexandria taken 
 Kleber wounded Bonaparte's entrance into Alexandria .... 139-151 
 
 CHAPTER XT7. 
 
 1798. 
 
 The mirage Skirmishes with the Arabs Mistake of General Desaix's 
 division Wretchedness of a rich sheik Combat beneath the 
 General's window The flotilla on the Nile Its distress and danger 
 The battle of Chebreisse Defeat of the Mamelukes Bonaparte's 
 reception of me Letter to Louis Bonaparte Success of the French 
 army Triumphal entrance into Cairo Civil and military organisa- 
 tion of Cairo Bonaparte's letter to his brother Joseph Plan of 
 colonisation . . , . 152-159 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 1798. 
 
 Establishment of a divan in each Egyptian province Desaix in Upper 
 Egypt Ibrahim Bey beaten by Bonaparte at Salehye'h Sulkowsky 
 wounded Disaster at Aboukir Dissatisfaction and murmurs of the 
 army Dejection of the General-in-Chief His plan respecting Egypt 
 Meditated descent upon England Bonaparte's censure of the Di- 
 rectory Intercepted correspondence 160-165
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XVL 
 
 1798. 
 
 The Egyptian Institute Festival of the birth of Mahomet Bonaparte'* 
 prudent respect for the Mahometan religion His Turkish dress 
 Djezzar, the Pasha of Acre Thoughts of a campaign in Germany 
 Want of news from France Bonaparte and Madame Foures The 
 Egyptian fortune-teller, M. Berthollet, and the Sheik El Bekri The 
 air " Marlbrook" Insurrection in Cairo Death of General Dupuis 
 Death of Sulkowsky The insurrection quelled Nocturnal execu- 
 tions Destruction of a tribe of Arabs Convoy of sick and 
 wounded Massacre of the French in Sicily Projected expedition 
 to Syria Letter to Tippoo Saib , 166-179 
 
 CHAPTER XVH. 
 
 1798-1799. 
 
 Bonaparte's departure for Suez Crossing the desert Passage of the Red 
 Sea The fountain of Moses The Cenobites of Mount Sinai Danger 
 in recrossing the Red Sea Napoleon's return to Cairo Money bor- 
 rowed at Genoa New designs upon Syria Dissatisfaction of the 
 Ottoman Porte Plan for invading Asia Gigantic schemes General 
 Berthier's permission to return to France His romantic love and the 
 adored portrait He gives up his permission to return home Louis 
 Bonaparte leaves Egypt The first Cashmere shawl in France Inter- 
 cepted correspondence Departure for Syria Fountains of Messou- 
 diah Bonaparte jealous Discontent of the troops El-Arish taken 
 Aspect of Syria Ramleh Jerusalem 180-193 
 
 CHAPTEE XVHL 
 
 1799. 
 
 Arrival at Jaffa The siege Beauharnais and Croisier Four thousand 
 prisoners Scarcity of provisions Councils of war Dreadful neces- 
 sity The massacre The plague Lannes and the mountaineers
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Barbarity of Djezzar Arrival at St. Jean d'Acre, and abortive 
 attacks Sir Sidney Smith Death of Caffarelli Duroo wounded 
 Bash bathing Insurrections in Egypt 193-205 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 1799. 
 
 The siege of Acre raised Attention to names in bulletins Gigantic pro- 
 ject The Druses Mount Carmel The wounded and infected 
 Order to march on foot Loss of our cannon A Nablousian fires at 
 Bonaparte Return to Jaffa Bonaparte visits the plague hospital A 
 potion given to the sick Bonaparte's statement at St. Helena. 206-320 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 1799. 
 
 Murat and Monrad Bey at the Natron Lakes Bonaparte's departure for 
 the Pyramids Sudden appearance of an Arab messenger News of 
 the landing of the Turks at Aboukir Bonaparte marches against 
 them They are immediately attacked and destroyed in the battle of 
 Aboukir Interchange of communication with the English Sudden 
 determination to return to Europe Outfit of two frigates Bona- 
 parte's dissimulation His pretended journey to the Delta Generous 
 behaviour of Lanusse Bonaparte's artifice Hia bad treatment of 
 General Kleber ... . . 221-230 
 
 CHAPTER XTT. 
 
 1799. 
 
 Our departure from Egypt Nocturnal embarkation M. Paraeval Grand- 
 maison Our course Adverse winds Fear of the English Favour- 
 able weather Vingt-et-un Chess We land at Ajaccio Bonaparte's 
 pretended relations Family domains Want of money Battle of Novi 
 Death of Joubert Visionary schemes Purchase of a boat Depart- 
 ure from Corsica The English squadron Our escape The roads of 
 Frejus Our landing in France The plague or the Austrians Joy of 
 the people The sanitary laws Bonaparte falsely accused . . 231-240
 
 xxxvi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXH. 
 1799. 
 
 Effect produced by Bonaparte's return His justification Melancholy 
 letter to my wife Bonaparte's intended dinner at Sens Louis Bona- 
 parte and Josephine He changes his intended route Melancholy 
 situation of the provinces Necessity of a change Bonaparte's am- 
 bitious views Influence of popular applause Arrival in Paris His 
 reception of Josephine Their reconciliation Bonaparte's visit to the 
 Directory His contemptuous treatment of Si6yes 241-348 
 
 CHAPTER XXHL 
 1799. 
 
 Moreau and Bernadotte Bonaparte's opinion of Bernadotte False re- 
 port The crown of Sweden and the Constitution of the year III. 
 Intrigues of Bonaparte's brothers Angry conversation between Bona- 
 parte and Bernadotte Bonaparte's version Josephine's version An 
 unexpected visit The Manege Club Salicetti and Joseph Bonaparte 
 Bonaparte invites himself to breakfast with Bernadotte Country 
 excursion Bernadotte dines with Bonaparte The plot and con- 
 spiracy Conduct of Lucien Dinner given to Bonaparte by the 
 Council of the Five Hundred Bonaparte's wiah to be chosen a mem- 
 ber of the Directory His reconciliation with Sieyes Offer made by 
 the Directory to Bonaparte He is falsely accused by Barras. 249-361 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 1799. 
 
 Cambac^res and Lebrun Gohier deceived My nocturnal visit to Barras 
 The command of the army given to Bonaparte The morning of the 
 18th Brumaire Meeting of the generals at Bonaparte's house Ber- 
 nadotte's firmness Josephine's interest for Madame Gohier Disap- 
 pointment of the Directors Review in the gardens of the Tuileries 
 Bonaparte's harangue Proclamation of the Ancients Moreau, 
 jailer of the Luxembourg My conversation with La Vallette Bon- 
 aparte at St. Cloud 363-273
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 1799. 
 
 The two Councils Ban-as 1 letter Bonaparte at the Council of the Five 
 Hundred False reports Tumultuous sitting Lucien's speech He 
 resigns the Presidency of the Council of the Five Hundred He is 
 carried out by grenadiers He harangues the troops A dramatic 
 scene Murat and his soldiers drive out the Five Hundred Council 
 of Thirty Consular commission Decree Return to Paris Conver- 
 sation with Bonaparte and Josephine respecting Gohier and Berna- 
 dotte The directors Gohier and Moulins imprisoned 274-285 
 
 CHAPTER XXVL 
 
 1799. 
 
 General approbation of the 18th Brnmaire Distress of the treasury M. 
 Collet's generosity Bonaparte's ingratitude Gohier set at liberty 
 Constitution of the year VIII. The Senate, Tribunate, and Council 
 of State Notes required on the character of candidates Bonaparte's 
 love of integrity and talent Influence of habit over him His hatred 
 of the Tribunate Provisional concessions The first Consular Min- 
 istry Mediocrity of La Place Proscription lists Cambaceres' 
 report M. Moreau de Worms Character of Sie'yes Bonaparte at the 
 Luxembourg Distribution of the day and visits Lebrun's opposi- 
 tion Bonaparte's singing His boyish tricks Resumption of the 
 titles " Madame " and " Monseigneur " The men of the Revolution 
 and the partisans of the Bourbons Bonaparte's fears Confidential 
 notes on candidates for office and the assemblies. .. . . 286-297 
 
 CHAPTER XXVH 
 
 1799-1800. 
 
 Difficulties of a new Government State of Europe Bonaparte's wish 
 for peace M. de Talleyrand Minister for Foreign Affairs Negotia- 
 tions with England and Austria Their failure Bonaparte's views on 
 the East His sacrifices to policy General Bonaparte denounced to 
 the First Consul KleTjer's letter to the Directory Accounts of the 
 Egyptian expedition published in the Mbniteur Proclamation to the 
 army of the East Favour and disgrace of certain individuals ac- 
 counted for. . , 298-306
 
 xxxvHi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVm. 
 
 1800. 
 
 Great and common men Portrait of Bonaparte The varied expression of 
 his countenance His convulsive shrug Presentiment of his cor- 
 pulency Partiality for bathing His temperance His alleged capa- 
 bility of dispensing with sleep Good and bad news Shaving, and 
 reading the journals Morning business Breakfast Coffee and snuff 
 Bonaparte's idea of his own situation His ill opinion of mankind 
 Hia dislike of a tete-d-tete His hatred of the Revolutionists Ladies 
 in white Anecdotes Bonaparte's tokens of kindness, and his droll 
 compliments His fits of ill humour Sound of bells Gardens of 
 Malmaison Hia opinion of medicine His memory His poetic in- 
 sensibility His want of gallantry Cards and conversation The 
 dress-coat and black cravat Bonaparte's payments His religious 
 ideas ilia obstinacy, 306-328 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 1800. 
 
 Bonaparte's laws Suppression of the festival of the 21st of January 
 Official visits The Temple Louis XVL and Sir Sidney Smith 
 Peculation during the Directory Loan raised Modest budget The 
 Consul and the Member of the Institute The figure of the Republic 
 Duroc's missions The King of Prussia The Emperor Alexander 
 General Latour-Foissac Arbitrary decree Company of players for 
 Egypt Singular ideas respecting literary property The preparatory 
 Consulate The journals Sabres and muskets of honour The First 
 Consul and his Comrade The bust of Brutus Statues in the gallery 
 of the Tuileries Sections of the Council of State Costumes of 
 public functionaries Masquerades The opera-balls Recall of the 
 oxilea 329-344 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 1800. 
 
 Bonaparte and Paul L Lord Whitworth Baron Sprengporten's arrival 
 at Paris Paul's admiration of Bonaparte Their close connection 
 and correspondence The royal challenge General Mack The road
 
 CONTENTS. xxxlx 
 
 to Malmaison Attempts at assassination Death of Washington 
 National mourning Ambitious calculation M. de Fontanes, the 
 skilful orator Fete at the Temple of Mars Murat's marriage with 
 Caroline Bonaparte Madame Bonaparte's pearls 845-360 
 
 CHAPTER XXXL 
 
 1800. 
 
 Police on police False information Dexterity of Fouch^ Police agents 
 deceived Money ill applied Inutility of political police Bonaparte's 
 opinion General considerations My appointment to the Prefecture 
 of police 861-367 
 
 CHAPTER XTKTT. 
 
 1800. 
 
 Successful management of parties Precautions Removal from the 
 Luxembourg to the Tuileries Hackney-coaches and the Consul's 
 white horses Royal custom and an inscription The review Bona- 
 parte's homage to the standards Talleyrand in Bonaparte's cabinet 
 Bonaparte's aversion to the cap of liberty even in painting The state 
 bed Our cabinet... .. S6&-377 
 
 CHAPTER XXXm. 
 1800. 
 
 The Tuileries Royalty in perspective Remarkable obierration Pres- 
 entations Assumption of the prerogative of mercy M. Defeu M. 
 de Frotte Georges Cadondal's audience of Bonaparte Rapp's pre- 
 caution and Bonaparte's confidence The dignity of France Napper 
 Tandy and Blackwell delivered up by the Senate of Hamburg Con- 
 tribution in the Egyptian style Valueless bill Fifteen thousand 
 francs in the drawer of a secretaire Josephine's debts Evening 
 walks with Bonaparte 378-391
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 1800. 
 
 War and monuments Influence of the recollections of Egypt First 
 improvements in Paris Malmaison too little St. Cloud taken The 
 Pont des Arts Business prescribed for me by Bonaparte Pecuniary 
 remuneration The First Consul's visit to the Pritanee His exami- 
 nation of the pupils Consular pensions Tragical death of Miack- 
 zinski Introduction of vaccination Recall of the members of the 
 Constituent Assembly The " canary " volunteers Tronchet and 
 Target Liberation of the Austrian prisoners Longchamps and 
 sacred music ANNEX.... , 395-411 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 1800. 
 
 The Memorial of St. Helena Louis XVllI.'s first letter to Bonaparte 
 Josephine, Hortense, and the Faubourg St. Germain Madame Bona- 
 parte and the fortune-teller Louis XVITL's second letter Bona- 
 parte's answer Conversation respecting the recall of Louis XVIII. 
 Peace and war A battle fought with pins Genoa and Melas Real- 
 isation of Bonaparte's military plans Ironical letter to Berthier De- 
 parture from Paris Instructions to Lucien and Cambaceres Joseph 
 Bonaparte appointed Councillor of State Travelling conversation 
 Alexander and Caesar judged by Bonaparte
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS 
 
 TO FAOB 
 
 I. NAPOLEON I. (First Portrait) .... Title 
 
 II. LETITIA BAMOLINO 2 
 
 HI. THE EMPKESS JOSEPHINE (First Portrait) . . 46 
 
 IV. EUGENE BEAUHARNAIS 76 
 
 V. GENERAL EL^EER ...... 150 
 
 VI. MABSHAL LANNES ...... 200 
 
 VII. TALLEYRAND 300 
 
 VILE. GENERAL DUROO 334 
 
 IX. MURAT, KING OF NAPLES 358
 
 CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. 
 
 AOB. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 ... 1769. Aug. 15. Napoleon Bonaparte born at Ajaccio, in Corsica. 
 Fourth child of Charles Bonaparte and of Letitia, ndt 
 Ramolino. 
 
 1. 1771. July 21. Napoleon Bonaparte baptized in the Cathedral of 
 Ajaccio. 
 
 9. 1778. Dec. 15. Napoleon embarks for France with his father, his 
 brother Joseph, and his uncle Fesch. 
 
 "9. 1779. Jan. 1. Napoleon enters the College of Autun with Joseph. 
 
 9. 1779. April 25. Napoleon enters the Royal Military School of 
 Brienne-le-Chateau. 
 
 15. 1784. Oct. 23. Napoleon enters the Royal Military School of 
 Paris. 
 
 15. 1785. Feb. 24. Charles Bonaparte, father of Napoleon, dies from 
 
 cancer in the stomach, aged thirty-eight years. 
 
 16. 1785. Sept. 1. Napoleon appointed Lieutenant en second in the 
 
 Compagnie d'Autume of Bombardiers of the 5th Bri- 
 gade of the 1st Battalion of the (Artillery) Regiment 
 de la Fere, then quartered at Valence. 
 
 16. 1785. Oct. 29. Napoleon leaves the Military School of Paris. 
 
 16. 1785. Nov. 5 to Aug. 11, 1786. Napoleon at Valence with hia 
 
 regiment. 
 
 17. 1786. Aug. 15 to Sept. 20, 1786. Napoleon at Lyons with regi- 
 
 ment. 
 
 17. 1786. Oct. 17 to Feb. 1, 1787. Napoleon at Douai with regiment 
 
 17. 1787. Feb. 1 to Oct. 14, 1787. Napoleon on leave to Corsica. 
 
 18. 1787. Oct. 15 to Deo. 24, 1787. Napoleon quits Corsica, arrives 
 
 in Paris, obtains fresh leave, and
 
 xliv CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. 
 
 AGE. 
 18. 
 
 18-19. 
 19. 
 
 19-20. 
 30-21. 
 
 21-23. 
 23. 
 
 DATB. EVENT. 
 
 1787. Dec. 25 to May 1788. Napoleon proceeds to Corsica and 
 
 returns early in May. 
 
 1788. May to April 4, 1789. Napoleon at Auxonnc with regi* 
 
 ment 
 
 1789. April 5 to April 30. Napoleon at Seurre in command of a 
 
 detachment. 
 
 1789. May 1 to Sept. 15, 1789. Napoleon at Auxonno with regi- 
 ment. 
 
 1789. Sept. 16 to June 1, 1791. Napoleon proceeds to Corsica; 
 engages in revolutionary movements ; returns on 13th 
 February 1791, having overstayed leave from 15th 
 October 1790 ; absence excused on account of contrary 
 winds. 
 
 1791. June 2 to Aug. 29, 1791. Napoleon joins the 4th Regiment 
 of Artillery at Valence as Lieutenant en premier. 
 
 1791. Aug. 30. Napoleon starts for Corsica on leave for three 
 months ; elected in April 1792 as second Lieutenant- 
 Colonel of 3d Battalion of Corsican Volunteers ; en- 
 gages in fresh revolutionary attempts ; quits Corsica, 
 3d May 1793, for France, where he has been dismissed 
 for absence without leave. 
 
 22. 1791. Dec. 12. Marie Louise, daughter of Emperor Francis, 
 born. 
 
 22. 1792. June 20. Attack of mob on Tuileries ; Kong wears cap of 
 liberty ; Napoleon looking on. 
 
 22. 1792. Aug. 10. Sack of Tuileries ; slaughter of Swiss Guard ; 
 
 King suspended from his functions. 
 
 23. 1793. Aug. 30. Napoleon reinstated ; explaining his absence as 
 
 serving with volunteers, and is promoted as Captain of 
 4th Class, with ante-date of 6th February 1792. 
 
 23. 1792. Sept. 14 to June 11, 1793. Napoleon in Corsica engaged in 
 revolutionary attempts, till, having declared against 
 Paoli, he and his family have to quit Corsica. Mean- 
 while France declared a Republic, 21st September 
 1792 ; Louis XVI. guillotined 21st January 1793. 
 
 23. 1793. June 13 to July 14, 1793. Napoleon with his company at 
 
 Nice. 
 
 38-24. 1793. July 14 to Oct. 9, 1793. Napoleon with army of Carteau* 
 in the south, acting against Marseilles and Toulon.
 
 CHRONOLOG Y OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. xlv 
 
 AGE. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 24. 1793. Oct. 9 to Dec. 19. Napoleon placed in command of part 
 of artillery of army of Carteaux before Toulon ; made 
 Chef deBataJllon (Major), 19th October ; Toulon taken, 
 19th December. 
 
 24, 1793. Dec. 22. Napoleon nominated provisionally General of 
 Brigade ; approved later ; receives commission, 16th 
 February 1794. 
 
 24. 1793. Dec. 36 to April 1, 1794. Napoleon appointed Inspector of 
 the coast from the Rhone to the Var, and on inspection 
 duty. 
 
 24. 1794. April 1 to Aug. 5, 1794. Napoleon with army of Italy 
 
 under Dumerbion ; preparing plans, etc. , with the 
 younger Robespierre, etc. ; at Genoa 15th-21st July. 
 
 34-25. 1794. Aug. 6 to Aug. 20, 1794. Napoleon in arrest after fall of 
 Robespierre on suspicion of treachery. 
 
 25. 1794. Sept. 14 to March 29, 1 795. Napoleon commanding artillery 
 
 of an intended maritime expedition to Corsica. 
 
 25. 1795. March 27 to May 10. Napoleon ordered from the sotfth to 
 
 join the army in La Vendee to command its artillery ; 
 arrives in Paris, 10th May. 
 
 25-26. 1795. June 13. Napoleon ordered to join Hoche's army at Brest, 
 to command a brigade of infantry ; remains in Paris ; 
 21st August, attached to Comite" de Salut Public as 
 one of four advisers ; 15th September, struck off list of 
 employed generals for disobedience of orders in not 
 proceeding to the west. 
 
 26. 1795. Oct. 5, 13th Vendemiaire (Jour des Sections). Napoleon 
 
 defends the Convention from the revolt of the Sections, 
 and fires on the people, as second in command under 
 Barras. 
 
 26. 1795. Oct. 16. Napoleon appointed provisionally General of Di- 
 vision. 
 
 26. 1795. Oct. 20. Napoleon appointed General of Division and 
 Commander of the Army of the Interior (i.e. of Paris). 
 
 96. 1796. March 2. Napoleon appointed Commander-in-Chief of the 
 Army of Italy ; 9th March, marries Josephine Tascher 
 de la Pagerie, Vicomtesse de Beauharnais, widow of 
 General Vicomte Alexandre de Beauharnais, and leaves 
 Paris for Italy on 11 th March.
 
 xlvi CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. 
 
 AQE. DATE. EVEHT. 
 
 26. 1796. First Italian campaign of Napoleon against Austrian* 
 
 under Beaulieu, and Sardinians under Colli. Battle of 
 Montenotte, 13th April ; Millesimo, 13th April ; Dego, 
 14th and 15th April ; Mondovi, 21st April ; Armistice 
 of Cherasco with Sardinians, 28th April ; Battle of 
 Lodi, 9th May ; Austrians beaten out of Lombardy 
 and Mantua besieged. 
 
 36. 1796. July and Aug. First attempt of Austrians to relieve Man- 
 tua ; battle of Lonato, 31st July ; Lonato and Casti- 
 glione, 3d August ; and, again, Castiglione, 5th and 6th 
 August ; Wurmser beaten off, and Mantua again in- 
 vested. 
 
 27. 1796. Sept. Second attempt of Austrians to relieve Mantua; 
 
 battles of Galliano, 4th September ; Primolano, 7th 
 September ; Bassano, 8th September ; St. Georges, 
 15th September ; Wurmser driven into Mantua and in- 
 vested there. Meanwhile Jourdan has been forced 
 back across the Rhine by the Archduke Charles on 
 21st September ; Moreau, after two celebrated re- 
 treats, recrosses the Rhine, 25th October. 
 
 27. 1796. Nov. Third attempt of Austrians to relieve Mantua ; 
 battles of Caldiero, llth November, and Arcola, 15th, 
 16th, and 17th November ; Alvinzi driven off. 
 
 27. 1797. Jan. Fourth attempt to relieve Mantua ; battles of Rivoli, 
 14th January, and Favorita, 16th January ; Alvinzi 
 again driven off. 
 
 27. 1797. Feb. 2. Wurmser surrenders Mantua with 18,000 men. 
 
 27. 1797. March 10. Napoleon commences his advance on the Arch- 
 
 duke Charles ; beats him at the Tagliamento, 16th 
 March ; 7th April, armistice of Judenbourg ; 18th 
 April, Provisional Treaty of Leoben with Austria, who 
 cedes the Netherlands, and is to get the Venetian ter- 
 ritory on the mainland ; Hoche advances, crosses the 
 Rhine same day, and Moreau on 20th April, till stopped 
 by news of peace. 
 
 28. 1797. Sept 4. Coup d'etat of 18th Fructidor ; majority of Di- 
 
 rectors, supported by the Jacobins and by Napoleon, 
 put down Royalist movement and banish many deputies 
 to Cayenne. 
 
 88. 1797. Oct. 17. Treaty of Campo-Formio between France and 
 Austria to replace that of Leoben ; Venice partitioned, 
 and itself now falls to Austria.
 
 CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. xlvii 
 
 AGE. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 28. 1798. Jan. 19. Congress of Rastadt formally opens, continues 
 till 28th April 1799. 
 
 28. 1798. Egyptian expedition. Napoleon sails from Toulon, 19th 
 
 May ; takes Malta, 12th June ; lands near Alexandria, 
 1st July ; Alexandria taken, 2d July ; battle of the 
 Chebreisse, 13th July ; battle of the Pyramids, 21st 
 July ; Cairo entered, 23d July. 
 
 2a 1798. Aug. 1. Battle of the Nile. 
 
 29. 1799. March 3. Napoleon starts for Syria ; 7th March, takes 
 
 Jaffa; 18th March, invests St. Jean d'Acre; 16th 
 April, Battle of Mount Tabor ; 22d May, siege of Acre 
 raised ; Napoleon reaches Cairo, 14th June. 
 
 29. 1799. July 25. Battle of Aboukir; Turks defeated. Mean- 
 
 while the Austrians and Russians have driven the 
 French out of Italy, Macdonald being beaten by Su- 
 warrow on the Trebbia, 18th to 20th June, and Hoche 
 being defeated and killed at Novi, 15th August; 
 French in same position as when Napoleon took com- 
 mand in 1796. 
 
 30. 1799. August (22d August, Thiers ; 24th August, Bourrienne ; 
 
 10th September, Marmont). Napoleon sails from 
 Egypt; lands at Frej us, 6th October. Meanwhile Mas- 
 se'na beats the Russians and Austrians, 25th and 26th 
 September, at Zurich ; Suwarrow forces his way over 
 the Alps, but withdraws his army in disgust with the 
 Austrians in October. 
 
 30. 1799. Oct. 9 and 10, 18th and 19th Brumaire. Napoleon seizes 
 power. Provisionary Consulate formed Napoleon, 
 Sieyes, and Roger Ducos. 
 
 30. 1799. Dec. 25. Napoleon, First Consul ; Cambaceres, Second 
 Consul ; Lebrun, Third Consul. 
 
 30. 1800. April 25. Moreau commences his advance into Germany, 
 and forces Austrians back on Ulm. 
 
 80. 1800. May and June. Marengo campaign. 14th May, Napoleon 
 commences passage of St. Bernard ; 2d June, enters 
 Milan ; 4th June, Massena surrenders Genoa to Aus- 
 trians ; 9th June, Lannes gains battle of Montebello ; 
 14th June, battle of Marengo ; Decaix killed (Kleber 
 assassinated in Egypt same day) ; armistice signed by 
 Napoleon with Melas, 15th June; Genoa and Italian 
 fortresses surrendered to French ; Moreau concludes 
 armistice, 15th July, having reached middle of Bavaria.
 
 xlviii CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. 
 
 AGE. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 31. 1800. Nov. 28. Rupture of armistice with Austria ; 3d Decenu 
 ber, Moreau gains battle of Hohenlinden. 
 
 81. 1800. Dec. 24. (3d Nivose). Affair of the Rue St. Nicaise ; 
 attempt to assassinate Napoleon by infernal machine. 
 
 81. 1801. Feb. 9. Treaty of Luneville between France and Ger- 
 many ; Venice partitioned ; left bank of Rhine and 
 the Austrian Netherlands secured to France. 
 
 31. 1801. July 15. Concordat with Rome ; Roman Catholic religion 
 
 restored in France. 
 
 32. 1801. Oct. 1. Preliminaries of peace between France and Eng- 
 
 land signed at London. 
 
 32. 1803. Jan. 26. Napoleon Vice-President of Italian Republic. 
 
 33. 1803. March 27. Treaty of Amiens ; England restores all con- 
 
 quests except Ceylon and Trinidad ; French to evacuate 
 Naples and Rome ; Malta to be restored to Knights. 
 
 32. 1803. May 19. Legion of Honour instituted ; carried out 14th 
 July 1814. 
 
 32. 1802. Aug. 4. Napoleon First Consul for life. 
 
 33. 1803. Feb. 25. Recess (or Reichs Deputation) of the German 
 
 Empire ; mediatisation of the smaller and of the eccle- 
 siastical States of Germany. 
 
 33. 1803. May. War between France and England. 
 
 83. 1803. March 5. Civil Code (later, Code Napoleon) decreed. 
 
 84. 1804. March 21. Due d'Enghien shot at Vincennea. 
 
 34. 1804. May 18. Napoleon, Empereur des Francais; crowned 2d 
 
 December. 
 
 86. 1805. Ulm campaign; 25th September, Napoleon crosses the 
 Rhine ; 14th October, battle of Elchingen ; 20th Oc- 
 tober, Mack surrenders Ulm. 
 
 86. 1805. Oct. 21. Battle of Trafalgar. 
 
 36. 1805. Dec. 3. Russians and Austrians defeated at Austerlitz. 
 
 86. 1805. Dec. 26. Treaty of Presburg ; Austria cedes her share of 
 Venetian lands to Kingdom of Italy, and the Tyrol to 
 Bavaria, which, with Wurtemberg, is recognised as a 
 Kingdom.
 
 CHRONOLOGY OP BONAPARTE'S LIFE. xlix 
 
 AOE. DATE. EVEHT. 
 
 36. 1806. Feb. 15. Joseph Bonaparte enters Naples as King. 
 
 36. 1806. Jane 5. Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland. 
 
 36. 1806. July 1. Confederation of the Rhine formed; Napoleon 
 
 protector ; German Empire dissolved 6th August ; 
 Francis I. takes title of Francis II. of Austria. 
 
 87. 1806. Jena campaign with Prussia. Battle of Saalfeld, 10th 
 October ; battles of Jena and of Auerstadt, 14th Oc- 
 tober ; Berlin occupied, 25th October. 
 
 37. 1806. Nov. 21. Berlin decrees issued. 
 
 37. 1807. Feb. 8. Battle of Eylau with Russians, indecirive ; 14th 
 June, battle of Friedland, decisive. 
 
 37. 1807. July 7. Treaty of Tilsit. Prussia partitioned; Polish 
 provinces forming Duchy of Warsaw under Saxony ; 
 provinces on left of Elbe, with Hesse Cassel, made 
 into Kingdom of Westphalia for Jerome Bonaparte. 
 
 37. 1807. Aug. and Sept. English expedition against Copenhagen. 
 
 38. 1807. Oct. 27. Secret treaty of Fontainebleau between France 
 
 and Spain for the partition of Portugal ; Jnnot enters 
 Lisbon, 30th November ; Royal Family withdraw to 
 Brazil. 
 
 38. 1808. March. French, under Murat, gradually occupy Spain 
 under pretence of march on Portugal ; 2d May, insur- 
 rection at Madrid ; 9th May, treaty of Bayonne ; 
 Charles IV. of Spain cedes throne ; Joseph Bonaparte 
 transferred from Naples to Spain ; replaced at Naples 
 by Murat. 
 
 38. 1808, July 22. Dupont surrenders to Spaniards at Baylen ; this 
 
 leads to evacuation of Madrid by French. 
 
 3ft 1808. Aug. 17. Wellesley defeats Laborde at Rolica, and Junot 
 on 21st at Vimiera ; 30th August, Convention of Cintra 
 for evacuation of Portugal by Junot. 
 
 39. 1808, Sept. 27 to Oct. 14. Conferences at Erfurt between Na- 
 
 poleon, Alexander, and German Sovereigns. 
 
 39. 1808. Nov. and Dec. Napoleon beats the Spanish armies ; enters 
 Madrid ; marches against Moore, but suddenly returns 
 to France to prepare for Austrian campaign.
 
 CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. 
 
 AGE. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 39. 1809. Jan. 16. Battle of Corunna. 
 
 39. 1809. Campaign of Wagram. Austrians advance, 10th April ; 
 
 battle of Abensberg, 20th April ; Eckmuhl, 22d April ; 
 Napoleon occupies Vienna, 13th May ; beaten back at 
 Eesling, 22d May ; finally crosses Danube, 4th July, 
 and defeats Austrians at Wagram, 6th July ; Armis- 
 tice of Znaim, 12th July. 
 
 40. 1809. Oct. 14. Treaty of Schoenbrunn or of Vienna ; Austria 
 
 cedes Istria, Carinthia, etc., to France, and Salzburg 
 to Bavaria. 
 
 40. 1809. Dec. 15-16. Josephine divorced. 
 
 40. 1810. April 1 and 2. Marriage of Napoleon, aged 40, with Marie 
 Louise, a 
 
 40. 1810. July 3. Louis Bonaparte abdicates crown of Holland, 
 
 which is annexed to French Empire on 9th July. 
 
 41. 1810. Dec. 13. Hanseatic towns and all northern coast of Ger- 
 
 many annexed to French Empire. 
 
 41. 1811. March 20. The King of Rome, son of Napoleon, born. 
 
 42-43. 1812. June 23. War with Russia; Napoleon crosses the Nie- 
 men ; 7th September, battle of Moskwa or Borodino ; 
 Napoleon enters Moscow, 14th September ; commences 
 his retreat, 19th October. 
 
 43. 1812. Oct. 22-23. Conspiration of General Malet at Paris. 
 
 48. 1813. Nov. 26-28. Passage of the Beresina ; 5th December, Na- 
 poleon leaves his army; arrives at Paris, 18th De- 
 cember. 
 
 48-44. 1818. Leipsic campaign. 2d May, Napoleon defeats Russians 
 and Prussians at Lutzen ; and again on 20-21st May 
 at Bautzen ; (21st June, battle of Vittoria, Joseph de- 
 cisively defeated by Wellington) ; 26th June, inter- 
 view of Napoleon and Metternich at Dresden; 10th 
 August, midnight, Austria joins the allies ; 26-27th 
 August, Napoleon defeats allies at Dresden, but Van- 
 damme is routed at Kulm on 30th August, and on 16th- 
 19th October, Napoleon is beaten at Leipsic ; 30th 
 October, Napoleon sweeps Bavarians from his path at 
 Hauau.
 
 CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE 1 8 LIFE. 
 
 AGE. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 44. 1814. Allies advance into France ; 29th January, battle of 
 Brienne ; 1st February, battle of La Rothiere. 
 
 44. 1814 Fab. 5 to March 18. Conferences of Chatillon (sur Seine). 
 
 44. 1814. Feb. 11. Battle of Montmirail ; 14th February, of Vau- 
 champs ; 18th February, of Montereau. 
 
 44. 1814. Feb. 23-24 Wellington crosses the Adour, and beats 
 Soult at Orthes on 27th February. 
 
 44. 1814. March 7. Battle of Craon; 9th-10th March, Laon; 20tfc 
 March, Arcis sur 1'Aube. 
 
 44. 1814. March 21. Napoleon commences his march to throw him- 
 self on the communicationa of the allies ; 25th March, 
 allies commence their march on Paris ; Battle of 
 La Fere Champenoise, Marmont and Mortier beat- 
 en ; 28th March, Napoleon turns back at St. Dizier 
 to follow allies ; 29th March, Empress and Court leave 
 Paris. 
 
 44. 1814. March 30. Paris capitulates ; Allied Sovereigns enter on 
 31st March. 
 
 44. 1814. April 2. Senate declare the dethronement of Napoleon, 
 who abdicates, conditionally, on 4th April ID favour of 
 his son, and unconditionally on 6th April ; Marmont's 
 corps marches into the enemy's lines on 5th April ; 
 on llth April Napoleon signs the treaty giving him 
 Elba for life ; 20th April, Napoleon takes leave of the 
 Guard at Fontainebleau ; 3d May, Louis XVIIL enters 
 Paris ; 4th May, Napoleon lands in Elba. 
 
 44. 1814. May 30. First Treaty of Paris ; France restricted to Units 
 
 of 1792, with some slight additions, part of Savoy, etc. 
 
 45. 1814. October 3. Congress of Vienna meets for settlement of 
 
 Europe ; actually opens 3d November. 
 
 45. 1815. Feb. 26. Napoleon quits Elba; lands near Cannes, 1st 
 March ; 19th March, Louis XVIII. leaves Paris about 
 midnight ; 20th March, Napoleon enters Paris. 
 
 45. 1815. 16th June. Battle of Ligny and Quatre Bras ; 18th June, 
 Battle of Waterloo. 
 
 45-46. 1815. June 29. Napoleon leaves Mabnaison for Rochefort ; sur- 
 renders to English, 15th July ; sails for St. Helena, 
 8th August ; arrives at St. Helena, 15th October.
 
 Hi CHRONOLOGY OF BONAPARTE'S LIFE. 
 
 AGE. DATE. EVENT. 
 
 46. 1815. Nov. 20. Second Treaty of Paris ; France restricted to 
 limits of 1790 ; losing Savoy, etc., pays an indemnity, 
 and receives an army of occupation. 
 
 51 yrs. Smths. 1821. May 5. Napoleon dies 5.4=5 P.M. ; buried 8th May. 
 
 1840. Oct. 15. Body of Napoleon disentombed ; embarked in 
 the Belle Poule, commanded by the Prince de Joinville, 
 son of Louis Philippe, on 16th October ; placed in the 
 Invalides 15th December 1840.
 
 NOTE. 
 
 THE Editor of the 1836 edition had added to the Memoirs, 
 several chapters taken from or founded on other works of the 
 time, so as to make a more complete history of the period. 
 These materials have been mostly retained, but with the cor- 
 rections which later publications have made necessary. A 
 chapter has now been added to give a brief account of the 
 part played by the chief historical personages during the Cent 
 Jours, and another at the end to include the removal of the 
 body of Napoleon from St. Helena to France. 
 
 Two special improvements have, it is hoped, been made in 
 this edition. Great care has been taken to get names, dates, 
 and figures rightly given, points much neglected in most 
 translations, though in some few cases, such as Davoust, the 
 ordinary but not strictly correct spelling has been followed to 
 suit the general reader. The number of references to other 
 works which are given in the notes will, it is believed, be of 
 use to any one wishing to continue the study of the history of 
 Napoleon, and may preserve them from many of the errors 
 too often committed. The present Editor has had the great 
 advantage of having his work shared by Mr. Eichard Bentley, 
 who has brought his knowledge of the period to bear, and 
 who has found, as only a busy man could do, the time to 
 minutely enter into every fresh detail, with the ardour which 
 soon seizes any one who long follows that enticing pursuit, 
 the special study of an historical period. 
 
 B. W.P. 
 
 January 188*.
 
 MEMOIRS 
 
 NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 1769-1783. 
 
 Authentic date of Bonaparte's birth His family ruined by the Jesuits 
 His taste for military amusements Sham siege at the College of 
 Brienne The porter's wife and Napoleon My intimacy with Bona- 
 parte at college His love for the mathematics, and his dislike of 
 Latin He defends Paoli and blames his father He is ridiculed by 
 his comrades Ignorance of the monks Distribution of prizes at 
 Brienne Madame de Montesson and the Duke of Orleans Report of 
 M. Keralio on Bonaparte He leaves Brienne. 
 
 NAPOLEON BONAPARTE was born at Ajaccio, in Corsica, 
 on the 15th of August 1769 ; 1 the original orthography 
 of his name was Buonaparte, but he suppressed the u 
 during his first campaign in Italy. His motives for so 
 
 1 The qnegtion as to the date of Napoleon's birth is fully gone into in Colonel lung's 
 work, Bonaparte et Son Tempt (tome i. pp. 39-52), from which the following sum- 
 mary is made. The first two children of Charles Bonaparte a son born in 1765, and 
 a daughter born 1767 both died young. A third child, a son, was born on 7th Jan- 
 uary 1768, at Corte ; and a fourth child, also a son, was born on 15th August 1769 
 at Ajaccio. There is no doubt as to these dates, or as to Joseph and Napoleon being 
 the two sons so born ; the question is, was Napoleon the second or first of these two ? 
 By the copy of an " Acte de Naissance" preserved in the French War Office, the child 
 born on 7th January 1768 was baptized " A r abulione." In the archives of Ajaccio, a 
 copy of a non-existing original record of baptism gives the name of the child then 
 born as " Joseph, A T abulion." By the official records of Corsica, Napoleone Bona- 
 parte, born 15th August 1769, was baptized 21st July 1771. Colonel lung inclines to 
 the belief that Napoleon was born on 7th January 1768 at Corte, and Joseph on 15th 
 August 1769. He suggests that when, in 1778, Charles Bonaparte obtained permis- 
 sion for one son to enter Brienne at the cost of the State, finding that the age of the 
 child must be under ten years, and Napoleon, the son chosen to tnter, being really
 
 2 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1769- 
 
 doing were merely to render the spelling conformable 
 with the pronunciation, and to abridge his signature. He 
 signed Buonaparte even after the famous 13th Vende- 
 miaire. 
 
 It has been affirmed that he was born in 1768, and that 
 he represented himself to be a year younger than he 
 really was. This is untrue. He always told me the 9th 
 of August was his birthday, and as I was born on the 9th 
 of July 1769, our proximity of age served to strengthen 
 our union and friendship when we were both at the Mili- 
 tary College of Brienne. 
 
 The false and absurd charge of Bonaparte having mis- 
 represented his age, is decidedly refuted by a note in the 
 register of M. Berton, sub-principal of the College of 
 Brienne, in which it is stated that M. Napoleon de Buona- 
 parte, ecuyer, born in the city of Ajaccio, in Corsica, on 
 the 15th of August 1.769, left the Koyal Military College 
 of Brienne on the 17th October 1784. 
 
 over the age, he used the baptismal record of the second son for the first Napoleon. 
 To support this theory, he throws doubt on the copy preserved in Ajaccio, saving 
 that the name Joseph is given in the French form at the time the French language 
 was not used In Corsica. In 1794, when Joseph married, the witnesses brought to 
 prove his age and place of birth, because the records could not be then got at, testi- 
 fied that Joseph, aged about 25, was born at Ajaccio, that is, at the place where the 
 son was born on 15th August 1769. But nothing seems really proved, except that, 
 whether by error or fraud, the Bonapartes were unfortunate in their dates, and were 
 fond of giving the same name to child after child. Thus there were several Marie- 
 Annes. In the marriage-contract of Napoleon with Josephine, his date of birth is 
 given as 5th February 1768, while she, really born on 23d July 1763, is stated to 
 have been born on 23d June 1767, the ages of the pair being thus made to approxi- 
 mate, Instead of a real difference of at least five years. Even in Napoleon's name the 
 greatest uncertainty appears to have prevailed. It figures in the different docu- 
 ments as Nabulione, Napoleone, Napoloeone, Napolione, and, on the Vendome col- 
 umn, as " Neapolio. im Aug." It will be noticed that the document given by Bour- 
 rienne and the statements of Napoleon to him really prove little or nothing, as if 
 once the date of his birth had been altered to a wrong date, it would have been 
 necessary to adhere to the alteration. But, on the whole, allowing for all the confu- 
 sion of the time and of his family affairs, it seems safest to adhere to the date of 15th 
 August 1769. 
 
 [Another reason for the change of date might be the wish to appear by birth a 
 French citizen, Corsica not having been annexed to France until June 1769. See 
 Notei and Queries, 1st Series, vol. vi. p. 265 ; also Quarterly Review, No. 23, an* 
 tome succeeding numbers.]
 
 tETTOZDA RAM OR! 
 
 MOTHER OF NAPOLEON
 
 1783. BONAPARTE'S BOYHOOD. 3 
 
 The stories about his low extraction are alike devoid of 
 foundation. His family was poor, and he was educated 
 at the public expense, an advantage of which many hon- 
 ourable families availed themselves. A memorial ad- 
 dressed by his father, Charles Buonaparte, to the Minister 
 of War states that his fortune had been reduced by the 
 failure of some enterprise in which he had engaged, and 
 by the injustice of the Jesuits, by whom he had been de- 
 prived of an inheritance. The object of this memorial 
 was to solicit a sub-lieutenant's commission for Napoleon, 
 who was then fourteen years of age, and to get Lucien 
 entered a pupil of the Military College. The Minister 
 wrote on the back of the memorial, " Give the usual 
 answer, if there be a vacancy ; " and on the margin are 
 these words " This gentleman has been informed that his 
 request is inadmissible as long as his second son remains 
 at the school of Brienne. Two brothers cannot be placed 
 at the same time in the military schools." When Napo- 
 leon was fifteen he was sent to Paris until he should attain 
 the requisite age for entering the army. Lucien was not 
 received into the College of Brienne, at least not until his 
 brother had quitted the Military School of Paris. 
 
 Bonaparte was undoubtedly a man of good family. I 
 have seen an authentic account of his genealogy, which he 
 obtained from Tuscany. A great deal has been said about 
 the civil dissensions which forced his family to quit Italy 
 and take refuge in Corsica. On this subject I shall say 
 nothing. 
 
 Many and various accounts have been given of Bona- 
 parte's youth. 1 He has been described in terms of en- 
 
 1 The following interesting trait of Napoleon's childhood is derived from the Mem- 
 oirs of the Duchess (TAbrantZs : " He was one day accused by one of his sisters of 
 having eaten a basketful of grapes, figs, and citrons, which had come from the garden 
 of hi uncle the Canon. None but those who were acquainted with the Bonaparte 
 family can form any idea of the enormity of this offence. To eat fruit belonging 
 to the uncle the Canon was infinitely more criminal than to eat grapes and figs which 
 might be claimed by anybody else. An inquiry took place. Napoleon denied the 
 fact, and was whipped. He was told that if he would beg pardon he should be for.
 
 4 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1769- 
 
 thusiastic praise and exaggerated condemnation. It is 
 ever thus with individuals who by talent or favourable 
 circumstances are raised above their fellow-creatures. 
 Bonaparte himself laughed at all the stories which were 
 got up for the purpose of embellishing or blackening his 
 character in early life. An anonymous publication, en- 
 titled the History of Napoleon Bonaparte, from his Birth to 
 his last Abdication, contains perhaps the greatest collection 
 of false and ridiculous details about his boyhood. Among 
 other things, it is stated that he fortified a garden to 
 protect himself from the attacks of his comrades, who, a 
 few lines lower down, are described as treating him with 
 esteem and respect. I remember the circumstances which, 
 probably, gave rise to the fabrication inserted in the work 
 just mentioned ; they were as follows. 
 
 During the winter of 1783-84, so memorable for heavy 
 falls of snow, Napoleon was greatly at a loss for those 
 retired walks and outdoor recreations in which he used to 
 take much delight. He had no alternative but to mingle 
 with his comrades, and, for exercise, to walk with them 
 up and down a spacious hall. Napoleon, weary of this 
 monotonous promenade, told his comrades that he thought 
 they might amuse themselves much better with the snow, 
 in the great courtyard, if they would get shovels and make 
 hornworks, dig trenches, raise parapets, cavaliers, etc. 
 " This being done," said he, " we may divide ourselves 
 into sections, form a siege, and I will undertake to direct 
 the attacks." The proposal, which was received with 
 
 given. He protested that he was innocent, but he was not believed. If I recollect 
 rightly, his mother was at the time on a visit to M. de Marbeuf , or some other friend. 
 The result of Napoleon's obstinacy was, that he was kept three whole days upon 
 bread and cheese, and that cheese was not broccio. However, he would not cry : he 
 was dull, but not sulky. At length, on the fourth day of his punishment, a little 
 friend of Marianne Bonaparte returned from the country, and on hearing of Na- 
 poleon's disgrace she confessed that she and Marianne had eaten the fruit. It was 
 now Marianne's turn to be punished. When Napoleon was asked why he had not 
 accused his sister, be replied that though he suspected that she was guilty, yet ont 
 of Consideration to her little friend, who had no share in the falsehood, he had said 
 nothing. He was then only seven years of age " (vol. i. p. 9, edit. 1888).
 
 178a BONAPARTE'S BOYHOOD. 3 
 
 enthusiasm, was immediately put into execution. This 
 little sham war was carried on for the space of a fortnight, 
 and did not cease until a quantity of gravel and small 
 stones having got mixed with the snow of which we made 
 our bullets, many of the combatants, besiegers as well as 
 besieged, were seriously wounded. I well remember that I 
 was one of the worst sufferers from this sort of grapeshot fire. 
 
 It is almost unnecessary to contradict the story about 
 the ascent in the balloon. It is now very well known that 
 the hero of that headlong adventure was not young Bona- 
 parte, as has been alleged, but one of his comrades, Dudont 
 de Chambon, who was somewhat eccentric. Of this his 
 subsequent conduct afforded sufficient proofs. 
 
 Bonaparte's mind was directed to objects of a totally 
 different kind. He turned his attention to political sci- 
 ence. During some of his vacations he enjoyed the society 
 of the Abbe Kaynal, who used to converse with him on 
 government, legislation, commercial relations, etc. 
 
 On festival days, when the inhabitants of Brienne were 
 admitted to our amusements, posts were established for 
 the maintenance of order. Nobody was permitted to enter 
 the interior of the building without a card signed by the 
 principal or vice-principal. The rank of officers or sub- 
 officers was conferred according to merit ; and Bonaparte 
 one day had the command of a post, when the following 
 little adventure occurred, which affords an instance of his 
 decision of character. 
 
 The wife of the porter of the school, 1 who was very well 
 known, because she used to sell milk, fruit, etc., to the 
 pupils, presented herself one Saint Louis day for admit- 
 tance to the representation of the Death of Csesar, corrected, 
 in which I was to perform the part of Brutus. As the 
 woman had no ticket, and insisted on being admitted 
 
 1 This woman, named Haut6, was afterwards placed at Malmaison, with her hus- 
 band. They both died as concierges of M almaison. This shows that Napoleon ha4 
 a memory. Bourrienne.
 
 6 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1769, 
 
 without one, some disturbance arose. The serjeant of the 
 post reported the matter to the officer, Napolaon Bona- 
 parte, who in an imperious tone of voice exclaimed : " Send 
 away that woman, who comes here with her camp impu- 
 dence." This was in 1782. 
 
 Bonaparte and I were eight years of age when our 
 friendship commenced. It speedily became very intimate, 
 for there was a certain sympathy of heart between us. I 
 enjoyed this friendship and intimacy until 1784, when he 
 was ti'ansf erred from the Military College of Brienne to 
 that of Paris. I was one among those of his youthful 
 comrades who could best accommodate themselves to his 
 stern character. His natural reserve, his disposition to 
 meditate on the conquest of Corsica, and the impressions 
 he had received in childhood respecting the misfortunes 
 of his country and his family, led him to seek retirement, 
 and rendered his general demeanour, though in appear- 
 ance only, somewhat unpleasing. Our equality of age 
 brought us together in the classes of the mathematics and 
 belles lettres. His ardent wish to acquire knowledge was 
 remarkable from the very commencement of his studies. 
 When he first came to the college he spoke only the Corsi- 
 can dialect, and the Sieur Dupuis, ' who was vice-principal 
 before Father Berton, gave him instructions in the French 
 language. In this he made such rapid progress that in a 
 short time he commenced the first rudiments of Latin. 
 But to this study he evinced such a repugnance that at 
 the age of fifteen he was not out of the fourth class. There 
 I left him very speedily ; but I could never get before 
 him in the mathematical class, in which he was undoubted- 
 ly the cleverest lad at the college. I used sometimes to 
 help him with his Latin themes and versions in return for 
 the aid he afforded me in the solution of problems, at 
 which he evinced a degree of readiness and facility which 
 perfectly astonished me. 
 
 * He afterwards filled the post of librarian to Napoleon at Malmaison.
 
 1783. BONAPARTE AT BRIENNE. J 
 
 When at Brienne, Bonaparte was remarkable for the 
 dark color of his complexion (which, subsequently, the 
 climate of France somewhat changed), for his piercing 
 and scrutinising glance, l and for the style of his conversa- 
 tion both with his masters and comrades. His conversation 
 almost always bore the appearance of ill-humour, and he 
 was certainly not very amiable. This I attribute to the 
 misfortunes his family had sustained and the impressions 
 made on his mind by the conquest of his country. 
 
 The pupils were invited by turns to dine with Father 
 Berton, the head of the school. One day, it being Bona- 
 parte's turn to enjoy this indulgence, some of the profes- 
 sors who were at table designedly made some disrespectful 
 remarks on Paoli, of whom they knew the young Corsican 
 was an enthusiastic admirer. "Paoli," observed Bona- 
 parte, " was a great man ; he loved his country ; and I 
 will never forgive my father, who was his adjutant, for 
 having concurred in the union of Corsica with France. 
 He ought to have followed Paoli's fortune, and have fallen 
 with him." " 
 
 Generally speaking, Bonaparte was not much liked by 
 his comrades at Brienne. He was not social with them, 
 and rarely took part in their amusements. His country's 
 recent submission to France always caused in his mind a 
 
 1 The Dnchesse d'Abrantcs, speaking of the personal characteristics of Bonaparte 
 in youth and manhood, says, " Saveria told me that Napoleon was never a pretty 
 boy, as Joseph was, for example : his head always appeared too large for his body, 
 a defect common to the Bonaparte family. When Napoleon grew up, the peculiar 
 charm of his countenance lay in his eye, especially in the mild expression it assumed 
 in his moments of kindness. His anger, to be sure, was frightful, and though I am 
 no coward, I never could look at him in his fits of rage without shuddering. 
 Though his smile was captivating, yet the expression of his mouth when disdainful 
 or angry could scarcely be seen without terror. But that forehead which seemed 
 formed to bear the crowns of a whole world ; those hands, of which the most 
 coquettish women might have been vain, and whose white skin covered muscles of 
 iron ; in short, of all that personal beauty which distinguished Napoleon as a young 
 man, no traces were discernible in the boy. Saveria spoke truly when she said, that 
 of all the children of Signora Loetitia, the Emperor was the one from whom future 
 greatness was least to be prognosticated " (voL i. p. 10, edit. 1883). 
 
 a Joseph Bonaparte, in hfe Notts on Bourrienne, asserts that their father re- 
 mained faithful to Paoli to the last (Erreurs, tome i. p. 238).
 
 8 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1769- 
 
 painful feeling, which estranged him from his schoolfel- 
 lows. I, however, was almost his constant companion. 
 During play-hours he used to withdraw to the library, 
 where he read with deep interest works of history, par- 
 ticularly Polybius and Plutarch. He was also fond of 
 Arrianus, but did not care much for Quintus Curtius. I 
 often went off to play with my comrades, and left him by 
 himself in the library. 
 
 The temper of the young Corsican was not improved by 
 the teasing he frequently experienced from his comrades, 
 who were fond of ridiculing him about his Christian name 
 Napoleon and his country. He often said to me, "I will 
 do these French all the mischief I can ; " and when I tried 
 to pacify him he would say, " But you do not ridicule me ; 
 you like me." 
 
 Father Patrauld, our mathematical professor, was much 
 attached to Bonaparte. He was justly proud of him as a 
 pupil. The other professors, in whose classes he was not 
 distinguished, took little notice of him. He had no taste 
 for the study of languages, polite literature, or the arts. 
 As there were , no indications of his ever becoming a 
 scholar, the pedants of the establishment were inclined to 
 think him stupid. His superior intelligence was, how- 
 ever, sufficiently perceptible, even through the reserve 
 under which it was veiled. If the monks to whom the 
 superintendence of the establishment was confided had 
 understood the organisation of his mind, if they had en- 
 gaged more able mathematical professors, or if we had 
 had any incitement to the study of chemistry, natural 
 philosophy, astronomy, etc., I am convinced that Bona- 
 parte would have pursued these sciences with all the 
 genius and spirit of investigation which he displayed in a 
 career, more brilliant it is true, but less useful to man- 
 kind. Unfortunately, the monks did not perceive this, 
 and were too poor to pay for good masters. However, 
 after Bonaparte left the college they found it necessary to
 
 1783. BONAPARTE'S EDUCATION. 9 
 
 engage two professors from Paris, otherwise the college 
 would have fallen to nothing. These two new professors, 
 MM. Durfort and Desponts, finished my education ; and I 
 regretted that they did not come sooner. The often-re- 
 peated assertion of Bonaparte having received a careful 
 education at Brienne is therefore untrue. The monks 
 were incapable of giving it him ; and, for my own part, I 
 must confess that the extended information of the present 
 day is to me a painful contrast with the limited course of 
 education I received at the Military College. It is only 
 surprising that the establishment should have produced a 
 single able man. 
 
 Though Bonaparte had no reason to be satisfied with 
 the treatment he received from his comrades, yet he was 
 above complaining of it ; and when he had the super- 
 vision of any duty which they infringed, he would rather 
 go to prison than denounce the criminals. 
 
 I was one day his accomplice in omitting to enforce a 
 duty which we were appointed to supervise. He prevailed 
 on me to accompany him to prison, where we remained 
 three days. We suffered this sort of punishment several 
 times, but with less severity. 
 
 In 1783 the Duke of Orleans and Madame de Montesson 
 visited Brienne ; and, for upwards of a month, the mag- 
 nificent chateau of the Comte de Brienne was a Versailles 
 in miniature. The series of brilliant entertainments which 
 were given to the august travellers made them almost for- 
 get the royal magnificence they had left behind them. 
 
 The Prince and Madame de Montesson expressed a wish 
 to preside at the distribution of the prizes of our college. 
 Bonaparte and I won the prizes in the class of mathe- 
 matics, which, as I have already observed, was the branch 
 of study to which he confined his attention, and in which 
 he excelled. When I was called up for the seventh time 
 Madame de Montesson said to my mother, who had come 
 from Sens to be present at the distribution, " Pray,
 
 10 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1769^ 
 
 madame, crown your son this time ; my hands are 
 a- weary." 
 
 There was an inspector of the military schools, whose 
 business it was to make an annual report on each pupil, 
 whether educated at the public expense or paid for by his 
 family. I copied from the report of 1784 a note which 
 was probably obtained surreptitiously from the War 
 Office. I wanted to purchase the manuscript, but Louis 
 Bonaparte bought it. I did not make a copy of the note 
 which related to myself, because I should naturally have 
 felt diffident in making any use of it. It would, however, 
 have served to show how time and circumstances fre- 
 quently reversed the distinctions which arise at school or 
 college. Judging from the reports of the inspector of 
 military schools, young Bonaparte was not, of all the 
 pupils at Brienne in 1784, the one most calculated to ex- 
 cite prognostics of future greatness and glory. 
 
 The note to which I have just alluded, and which was 
 written by M. de Keralio, then inspector of the military 
 schools, describes Bonaparte in the following terms : 
 
 Inapectton of JHUttarji Schools, 
 
 1784. 
 REPORT MADE FOR His MAJESTY BY M. DE K^RALIO. 
 
 M. tie Buonaparte (Napoleon], born 15th August 1769, height 4feet 
 10 inches 10 lines, is in the fourth doss, has a good constitution, 
 excellent health, cliaracter obedient, upright, grateful, conduct very 
 regular; has been always distinguished by his application to mathe- 
 matics. He knows history and geography very passably. He is not 
 well up in ornamental studies or in Latin, in which he is only in the 
 fourth class. He will be an excellent sailor. He deserves to be passed 
 on to tlie Military School of Paris. 
 
 Father Berton, however, opposed Bonaparte's removal 
 to Paris, because he had not passed through the fourth 
 Latin class, and the regulations required that he should
 
 1788. BONAPARTE LEAVES BRIENNE. 11 
 
 be in the third. I was informed by the vice-principal that 
 a report relative to Napoleon was sent from the College of 
 Brienne to that of Paris, in which he was described as 
 being domineering, imperious, and obstinate. 1 
 
 I knew Bonaparte well ; and I think M. de Ke'ralio's re- 
 port of him was exceedingly just, except, perhaps, that he 
 might have said he was very well as to his progress in his- 
 tory and geography, and very backward in Latin ; but cer- 
 tainly nothing indicated the probability of his being an 
 excellent seaman. He himself had no thought of the 
 navy. 3 
 
 In consequence of M. de Keralio's report, Bonaparte 
 was transferred to the Military College of Paris, along 
 with MM. Montarby de Dampierre, de Castres, de Com- 
 minges, and de Laugier de Bellecourt, who were all, like 
 him, educated at the public expense, and all, at least, as 
 favorably reported. 
 
 1 Napoleon remained upwards of five years at Brienne, -from April 1779 till the 
 latter end of 1784. In 1783 the Chevalier Keralio, sub-inspector of the military 
 schools, selected him to pass the year following to the military school at Paris, to 
 which three of the best scholars were annually sent from each of the twelve pr* 
 vincial military schools of France. It is curious as well as satisfactory to know the 
 opinion at this time entertained of him by those who were the best qualified to judge. 
 His old master, Leguille, professor of history at Paris, boasted that, in a list of the 
 different scholars, he had predicted his pupil's subsequent career. In fact, to the 
 name of Bonaparte the following note is added : " A Corslcan by birth and charao- 
 ter he will do something great, if circumstances favour him.' 1 ' 1 Monge was his in- 
 structor in geometry, who also entertained a high opinion of him. M. Bauer, his 
 German master, was the only one who saw nothing in him, and was surprised at 
 being told he was undergoing his examination for the artillery. Hdzlitt. 
 
 * Bourrienne is certainly wrong as to Bonaparte having no thought of the navy. 
 In a letter of 1784 to the Minister of War his father says of Napoleon that, " fol- 
 lowing the ad vice of the Comte de Marbeuf, he has turned his studies towards the 
 navy ; and so well has he succeeded that he was intended by M. de Keralio for the 
 school of Paris, and afterwards for the department of Toulon. The retirement of 
 the former professor (Keralio) has changed the fate of my son." It was only on the 
 failure of his intention to get into the navy that his father, on 15th July 1784, ap- 
 plied for permission for him to enter the artillery ; Napoleon having a horror of the 
 infantry, where he said they did nothing. It was on the success of this application 
 that he was allowed to enter the school of Paris (Tung, tome i. pp. 91-103). Oddly 
 enough, in later years, on 30th August 1792, having just succeeded in getting 
 himself reinstated as captain after his absence, overstaying leave, he applied to 
 pass into the Artillerie de la Marine. " The application was judged to be simply 
 absurd, and was filed with this note, ' S. B..' (sans reponse) " (lung, tome ii. p. 201).
 
 12 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1783 
 
 What could have induced Sir Walter Scott to say that 
 Bonaparte was the pride of the college, that our mathe- 
 matical master was exceedingly fond of him, and that the 
 other professors in the different sciences had equal reason 
 to be satisfied with him ? What I have above stated, to- 
 gether with the report of M. de Keralio, bear evidence of 
 his backwardness in almost every branch of education ex- 
 cept mathematics. Neither was it, as Sir Walter affirms, 
 his precocious progress in mathematics that occasioned 
 him to be removed to Paris. He had attained the proper 
 age, and the report of him was favourable, therefore he 
 was very naturally included among the number of the five 
 who were chosen in 1784. 
 
 In a biographical account of Bonaparte I have read the 
 following anecdote : When he was fourteen years of age 
 he happened to be at a party where some one pronounced 
 a high eulogium on Turenne ; and a lady in the company 
 observed that he certainly was a great man, but that she 
 should like him better if he had not burned the Palatinate. 
 " What signifies that," replied Bonaparte, " if it was neces- 
 sary to the object he had in view?" 
 
 This is either an anachronism or a mere fabrication. 
 Bonaparte was fourteen in the year 1783. He was then 
 at Brienne, where certainly he did not go into company, 
 and least of all the company of ladies.
 
 1784. IS 
 
 CHAPTEK H. 
 1784-1794 
 
 Bonaparte enters the Military College of Paris He urges me to embraco 
 the military profession His report on the state of the Military 
 School of Paris He obtains a commission I set off for Vienna Re- 
 turn to Paris, where I again meet Bonaparte His singular plans for 
 raising money Louis XVI. with the red cap on his head The 10th 
 of August My departure for Stuttgart Bonaparte goes to Corsica 
 My name inscribed on the list of emigrants Bonaparte at the siege 
 of Toulon Le Souper de Beaucaire Napoleon's mission to Genoa 
 His arrest His autographical justification Duroc's first connection 
 with Bonaparte. 
 
 BONAPARTE was fifteen years and two months old when he 
 went to the Military College of Paris. 1 I accompanied 
 him in a carriole as far as Nogent sur Seine, whence the 
 coach was to start. We parted with regret, and we did 
 
 1 Madame Junot relates some interesting particulars connected with Napoleon's 
 first residence in Paris. " My mother's first care," says she, "on arriving in Paris 
 was to inquire after Napoleon Bonaparte, He was at that time in the military school 
 at Paris, having quitted Brienne in the September of the preceding year. My 
 uncle Demetrius had met him just after he alighted from the coach which brought 
 him to town ; ' And trnly,' said my uncle, 'he had the appearance of a fresh impor- 
 tation. I met him in the Palais Royal, where he was gaping and staring with wonder 
 at everything he saw. He would have been an excellent subject for sharpers, if, in- 
 deed, he had had anything worth taking ! ' My uncle invited him to dine at his 
 house ; for though my uncle was a bachelor, he dirt not choose to dine at a traiteur 
 (the name restaurateur was not then introduced). He told my mother that Napo- 
 leon was very morose. ' I fear,' added he, ' that that young man has more self- 
 conceit than is suitable to his condil ion. When he dined with me he began to de- 
 claim violently against the luxury of the young men of the military school. After a 
 little he turned the conversation on Mania, and the present education of the young 
 Maniotes, drawing a comparison between it and the ancient Spartan nygtem of 
 education. His observations on this head he told me he intended to embody in a 
 memorial to be presented to the Minister of War. All this, depend upon it, will 
 bring him under the displeasure of his comrades, and it will be lucky if he escape 
 being run through.' A few days afterwards my mother saw Napoleon, and then his 
 irritability was at its height. He would scarcely bear any observations, even if
 
 14 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1784, 
 
 not meet again till the year 1792. During these eight 
 years we maintained an active correspondence ; but so 
 little did I anticipate the high destiny which, after his 
 elevation, it was affirmed the wonderful qualities of his 
 boyhood plainly denoted, that I did not preserve one of 
 the letters he wrote to me at that period, but tore them 
 up as soon as they were answered. 
 
 I remember, however, that in a letter which I received 
 from him about a year after his arrival in Paris he urged 
 me to keep my promise of entering the army with him. 
 Like him, I had passed through the studies necessary for 
 the artillery service ; and in 1787 I went for three months 
 to Metz, in order to unite practice with theory. A strange 
 Ordinance, which I believe was issued in 1778 by M. de 
 Segur, required that a man should possess four quarter- 
 ings of nobility before he could be qualified to serve his 
 king and country as a military officer. My mother went 
 to Paris, taking with her the letters patent of her hus- 
 band, who died six weeks after my birth. She proved 
 that in the year 1640 Louis XIII. had, by letters patent, 
 restored the titles of one Fauvelet de Villemont, who in 
 1586 had kept several provinces of Burgundy subject to 
 
 made in his favour, and I am convinced that it is to this uncontrollable irritability 
 that he owed the reputation of having been ill-tempered in his boyhood, and splen- 
 etic in his youth. My father, who was acquainted with almost all the heads of the 
 military school, obtained leave for him sometimes to come out for recreation. On 
 account of an accident (a sprain, if I recollect rightly) Napoleon once spent a whole 
 week at our house. To this day, whenever I pass the Qitai Conti, I cannot help 
 looking up at a mansarde at the left angle of the house on the third floor. That was 
 Napoleon's chamber when he paid us a visit, and a neat little room it was. My 
 brother used to occupy the one next to it. The two young men were nearly of the 
 same age : my brother perhaps had the advantage of a year or fifteen months. My 
 mother had recommended him to cultivate the friendship of young Bonaparte ; but 
 my brother complained how unpleasant it was to find only cold politeness where he 
 expected affection. This repulsiveness on the part of Napoleon was almost offen- 
 sive, and must have been sensibly felt by my brother, who was not only remarkable 
 for the mildness of his temper and the amenity and grace of his manner, but whose 
 society was courted in the most distinguished circles of Paris on account of nib ac- 
 complishments. He perceived in Bonaparte a kind of acerbity and bitter irony, of 
 which he long endeavoured to discover the cause. ' I believe,' said Albert one day 
 to my mother, ' that the poor young man feels keenly his dependent situation ' " 
 (.Memoirs of the Duc/iease <?Abrantes, vol. i. p. 18, edit. 1883). ,
 
 1794. EARLY LIFE IN PARIS. 15 
 
 the king's authority at the peril of his' life and the loss of 
 his property ; and that his family had occupied the first 
 places in the magistracy since the fourteenth century. All 
 was correct, but it was observed that the letters of nobil- 
 ity had not been registered by the Parliament, and to 
 repair this little omission, the sum of twelve thousand 
 francs was demanded. This my mother refused to pay, 
 and there the matter rested. 
 
 On his arrival at the Military School of Paris, Bona- 
 parte found the establishment on so brilliant and expen- 
 sive a footing that he immediately addressed a memorial 
 on the subject to the Vice-Principal Berton of Brienne. ' 
 He showed that the plan of education was really perni- 
 cious, and far from being calculated to fulfil the object 
 which every wise government must have in view. The 
 result of the system, he said, was to inspire the pupils, 
 who were all the sons of poor gentlemen, with a love of 
 ostentation, or rather, with sentiments of vanity and self- 
 sufficiency ; so that, instead of returning happy to the 
 bosom of their families, they were likely to be ashamed 
 of their parents, and to despise their humble homes. 
 Instead of the numerous attendants by whom they were 
 surrounded, their dinners of two courses, and their horses 
 and grooms, he suggested that they should perform little 
 necessary services for themselves, such as brushing their 
 clothes, and cleaning their boots and shoes ; that they 
 should eat the coarse bread made for soldiers, etc. 
 Temperance and activity, he added, would render them 
 robust, enable them to bear the severity of different 
 seasons and climates, to brave the fatigues of war, and to 
 inspire the respect and obedience of the soldiers under 
 
 1 A second memoir prepared by him to the same effect was intended for the Min- 
 ister of War, but Father Berton wisely advised silence to the young cadet (lung, 
 tome i. p. 122). Although believing in the necessity of show and of magnificence in 
 public life, Napoleon remained true to these principles. While lavishing wealth on 
 his ministers and marshals, "In your private life," said he, "be economical and 
 even parsimonious ; in public be magnificent " (Mtneval, tome i. p. 145).
 
 16 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 their command. Thus reasoned Napoleon at the age of 
 sixteen, and time showed that he never deviated from 
 these principles. The establishment of the military 
 school at Fontainebleau is a decided proof of this. 
 
 As Napoleon was an active observer of everything pass- 
 ing around him, and pronounced his opinion openly and 
 decidedly, he did not remain long at the Military School 
 of Paris. His superiors, who were anxious to get rid of 
 him, accelerated the period of his examination, and he 
 obtained the first vacant sub-lieutenancy in a regiment of 
 artillery. 
 
 I left Brienne in 1787, and as -I could not enter the 
 artillery, I proceeded in the following year to Vienna, 
 with a letter of recommendation to M. de Montmorin, 
 soliciting employment in the French Embassy at the 
 Court of Austria. 
 
 I remained two months at Vienna, where I had the 
 honour of twice seeing the Emperor Joseph. The im- 
 pression made upon me by his kind reception, his dignified 
 and elegant manners, and graceful conversation, will never 
 be obliterated from my recollection. After M. de Noailles 
 had initiated me in the first steps of diplomacy, he advised 
 me to go to one of the German universities to study the 
 law of nations and foreign languages. I accordingly 
 repaired to Leipsic, about the time when the French 
 Revolution broke out. 
 
 I spent some time at Leipsic, where I applied myself to 
 the study of the law of nations, and the German and 
 English languages. I afterwards travelled through Prussia 
 and Poland, and passed a part of the winter of 1791 and 
 1792 at Warsaw, where I was most graciously received 
 by Princess Tyszicwiez, niece of Stanislaus Augustus, the 
 last King of Poland, and the sister of Prince Poniatowski. 
 The Princess was very well informed, and was a great 
 admirer of French literature. At her invitation I passed 
 several evenings in company with the King in a circle
 
 1792. 80URX1ENNE AT VIENNA. 
 
 small enough to approach to something like intimacy. I 
 remember that his Majesty frequently asked me to read 
 the Moniteur / the speeches to which he listened with the 
 greatest pleasure were those of the Girondists. The 
 Princess Tyszicwiez wished to print at Warsaw, at her own 
 expense, a translation I had executed of Kotzebue's 
 Menschenhass und Eeue, to which I gave the title of 
 L'Inconnu." ' 
 
 I arrived at Vienna on the 26th of March 1792, when I 
 was informed of the serious illness of the Emperor, 
 Leopold II., who died on the following day. In private 
 companies, and at public places, I heard vague suspicions 
 expressed of his having been poisoned ; but the public, 
 who were admitted to the palace to see the body lie in state, 
 were soon convinced of the falsehood of these reports. I 
 went twice to see the mournful spectacle, and I never 
 heard a word which was calculated to confirm the odious 
 suspicion, though the spacious hall in which the remains 
 of the Emperor were exposed was constantly thronged 
 with people. 
 
 In the month of April 1792 I returned to Paris, where I 
 again met Bonaparte, 2 and our college intimacy was fully 
 renewed. I was not very well off, and adversity was hang- 
 ing heavily on him ; his resources frequently failed him. 
 We passed our time like two young fellows of twenty- 
 three who have little money and less occupation. Bona- 
 parte was always poorer than I. Every day we conceived 
 some new project or other. We were on the look-out 
 
 1 A play known on the English stage as The Stranger. 
 
 a Bonaparte is said, on very doubtful authority, to have spent five or six weeks 
 in London in 1791 or 1792, and to have "lodged in a house in George Street, Strand. 
 His chief occupation appeared to be taking pedestrian exercise in the streets of Lon- 
 donhence his marvellous knowledge of the great metropolis which used to aston- 
 ish any Englishmen of distinction who were not aware of this visit. He occasionally 
 took his cup of chocolate at the 'Northumberland, 1 occupying himself in reading, 
 and preserving a provoking taciturnity to the gentlemen in the room ; though his 
 manner was stern, his deportment was that of a gentleman." The story of his visit 
 is probably as apocryphal as that of his offering his services to the English Govern- 
 ment when the English forces were blockading the coast of Corsica. 
 
 VOL. I. 2
 
 18 MEMOIRS OP NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1792. 
 
 for some profitable speculation. At one time he wanted 
 me to join him in renting several houses, then building 
 in the Rue Montholon, to underlet them afterwards. We 
 found the demands of the landlords extravagant every- 
 thing failed. At the same time he was soliciting em- 
 ployment at the War Office, and I at the office of Foreign 
 Affairs. I was for the moment the luckier of the two. 
 
 While we were spending our time in a somewhat vaga- 
 bond way, 1 the 20th of June arrived. We met by ap- 
 pointment at a restaurateur's in the Hue St. Honore, near 
 the Palais Royal, to take one of our daily rambles. On 
 going out we saw approaching, in the direction of the 
 market, a mob, which Bonaparte calculated at five or six 
 thousand men. They were all in rags, ludicrously armed 
 with weapons of every description, and were proceeding 
 hastily towards the Tuileries, vociferating all kinds of 
 gross abuse. It was a collection of all that was most vile 
 and abject in the purlieus of Paris. " Let us follow the 
 mob," said Bonaparte. We got the start of them, and 
 took up our station on the terrace of the banks of the 
 river. It was there that he witnessed the scandalous 
 scenes which took place ; and it would be difficult to 
 describe the surprise and indignation which they excited 
 in him. When the King showed himself at the windows 
 overlooking the garden, with the red cap, which one of 
 the mob had put on his head, he could no longer repress 
 his indignation. " Che coglione ! " he loudly exclaimed. 
 "Why have they let in all that rabble ! They should 
 sweep off four or five hundred of them with the cannon ; 
 the rest would then set off fast enough." 
 
 When we sat down to dinner, which I paid for, as I 
 generally did, for I was the richer of the two, he spoke of 
 nothing but the scene we had witnessed. He discussed 
 
 1 It wag before the 20th of June that in our frequent excursions around Paris we 
 went to St. Cyr to see his sister Marianne (Elisa). We returned to dine alone at 
 Trianon. Bourrienne.
 
 1792. BONAPARTE AT THE TUILER1ES. 10 
 
 with great good sense the causes and consequences of 
 this unrepressed insurrection. He foresaw and developed 
 with sagacity all that would ensue. He was not mistaken. 
 The 10th of August soon arrived. I was then at Stutt- 
 gart, where I was appointed Secretary of Legation. 
 
 At St. Helena Bonaparte said, " On the news of the at- 
 tack of the Tuileries, on the 10th of August, I hurried to 
 Fauvelet, Bourrienne's brother, who then kept a furniture 
 warehouse at the Carrousel." This is partly correct. My 
 brother was connected with what was termed an entre- 
 prise d'encan national, where persons intending to quit 
 France received an advance of money, on depositing any 
 effects which they wished to dispose of, and which were 
 sold for them immediately. Bonaparte had some time 
 previously pledged his watch in this way. 
 
 After the fatal 10th of August Bonaparte went to Corsica, 
 and did not return till 1793. Sir Walter Scott says that af- 
 ter that time he never saw Corsica again. This is a mistake, 
 as will be shown when I speak of his return from Egypt. 1 
 
 Having been appointed Secretary of Legation to Stutt- 
 gart, I set off for that place on the 2d of August, and I 
 did not again see my ardent young friend until 1795. He 
 told me that my departure accelerated his for Corsica. 
 We separated, as may be supposed, with but faint hopes 
 of ever meeting again. 
 
 By a decree of the 28th of March of 1793, all French 
 agents abroad were ordered to return to France, within 
 three months, under pain of being regarded as emigrants. 
 What I had witnessed before my departure for Stuttgart, 
 
 > Sir Walter appears to have collected his information for the Life of Napoleon 
 only from those libels and vulgar stories which gratified his calumnious spirit and 
 national hatred. His work is written with excessive negligence, which, added to 
 its numerous errors, shows how much respect he must have entertained for his read- 
 ers. It would appear that his object was to make it the inverse of his novels, where 
 everything is borrowed from history. I have been assured that Marshal Macdonald 
 having offered to introduce Scott to some generals who could have furnished him 
 with the most accurate information respecting military events, the glory of which 
 they had shared, Sir Walter replied, " I thank you, butl shall collect my information 
 from unprofessioual reports." Bourrienne.
 
 20 MEMOIRS Off NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794. 
 
 the excitement in which I had left the public mind, and 
 the well-known consequences of events of this kind, made 
 me fear that I should be compelled to be either an accom- 
 plice or a victim in the disastrous scenes which were pass- 
 ing at home. My disobebience of the law placed my 
 name on the list of emigrants. 
 
 It has been said of me, in a biographical publication, 
 that " it was as remarkable as it was fortunate for Bour- 
 rienne that, on his return, he got his name erased from 
 the list of emigrants of the department of the Yonne, 
 on which it had been inscribed during his first journey to 
 Germany. This circumstance has been interpreted in 
 several different ways, which are not all equally favourable 
 to M. de Bourrienne." 
 
 I do not understand what favourable interpretations can 
 be put upon a statement entirely false. General Bona- 
 parte repeatedly applied for the erasure of my name, from 
 the month of April 1797, when I rejoined him at Leoben, 
 to the period of the signature of the treaty of Campo- 
 Formio ; but without success. He desired his brother 
 Louis, Berthier, Bernadotte, and others, when he sent 
 them to the Directory, to urge my erasure ; but in vain. 
 He complained of this inattention to his wishes to Bottot, 
 when he came to Passeriano, after the 18th Fructidor. 
 Bottot, who was secretary to Barras, was astonished that 
 I was not erased, and he made fine promises of what he 
 would do. On his return to France he wrote to Bona- 
 parte: "Bourrienne is erased." But this was untrue. I 
 was not erased until November 1797, upon the reiterated 
 solicitations of General Bonaparte. 
 
 It was during my absence from France that Bonaparte, 
 in the rank of chefde bataillon, performed his first campaign, 
 and contributed so materially to the recapture of Toulon. 
 Of this period of his life I have no personal knowledge, 
 and therefore I shall not speak of it as an eye-witness. I 
 shall merely relate some facts which fill up the interval be'
 
 1794. BONAPARTE'S FIRST CAMPAIGN. 21 
 
 tween 1793 and 1795, and which I have collected from pa- 
 pers which he himself delivered to me. Among these papers 
 is a little production, entitled Le Souper de Beaucaire, the 
 copies of which he bought up at considerable expense, and 
 destroyed upon his attaining the Consulate. This little 
 pamphlet contains principles very opposite to those he 
 wished to see established in 1800, a period when extrava- 
 gant ideas of liberty were no longer the fashion, and when 
 Bonaparte entered upon a system totally the reverse of 
 those republican principles professed in Le Souper de 
 Beaucaire. 1 It may be remarked, that in all that has come 
 to us from St. Helena, not a word is said of this youthful 
 production. Its character sufficiently explains this silence. 
 In all Bonaparte's writings posterity will probably trace 
 the profound politician rather than the enthusiastic revo- 
 lutionist. 
 
 Some documents relative to Bonaparte's suspension and 
 arrest, by order of the representatives Albitte and Salicetti, 
 
 1 This is not, as Sir Walter says, a dialogue between Marat and a Federalist, bnt a 
 conversation between a military officer, a native of Nismes, a native of Marseilles, 
 and a manufacturer from Montpellier. The latter, though he takes a share in the 
 conversation, does not say much. Le Souper de Beaucaire is given at full length in 
 the French edition of these Memoirs, tome i. pp. 319-347 ; and by lung, tome ii. p. 
 854, with the following remarks : " The first edition of Le Souper de Beaucaire was 
 issued at the cost of the Public Treasury, in August 1793. Sabin Tournal, its 
 editor, also then edited the Courrier cT Avignon. The second edition only appeared 
 twenty-eight years afterwards, in 1821, preceded by an introduction by Frederick 
 Royou (Paris : Brasseur Aine, printer, Terrey, publisher, in octavo). This pamphlet 
 did not make any sensation at the time it appeared. It was only when Napoleon 
 became Commandant of the Army of Italy that M. Loubet, secretary and corrector 
 of the press for M. Tournal, attached some value to the manuscript, and showed it to 
 several persons. Louis Bonaparte, later, ordered several copies from M. Aurel." 
 The pamphlet, dated 29th July 1793, is in the form of a dialogue between an officer 
 of the army, a citizen of Nismes, a manufacturer of Montpellier, and a citizen of 
 Marseilles. Marseilles was then in a state of insurrection against the Convention. 
 Its forces had seized Avignon, but had oeen driven out by the army of Carteaux, 
 Which was about to attack Marseilles itself. In the dialogue the officer gives moBt 
 excellent military advice to the representative of Marseilles on the impossibility of 
 their resisting the old soldiers of Carteaux. The Marseilles citizen argues but 
 feebly, and is alarmed at the officer's representations ; while his threat to call in the 
 Spaniards turns the other speakers against him. Even Colonel lung says, tome ii. 
 p. 372, " In these concise judgments is felt the decinion of the master and of the man 
 of war. . . . These marvellous qualities eonsequently struck the members of 
 the Convention, who made much of Bonaparte, authorised him to have it published
 
 22 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794. 
 
 serve to place in their true light circumstances which have 
 hitherto been misrepresented. I shall enter into some 
 details of this event, because I have seen it stated that this 
 circumstance of Bonaparte's life has been perverted and 
 misrepresented by every person who has hitherto written 
 about him ; and the writer who makes this remark, himself 
 describes the affair incorrectly and vaguely. Others have 
 attributed Bonaparte's misfortune to a military discussion 
 on war, and his connection with Robespierre the younger. 1 
 
 It has, moreover, been said that Albitte and Salicetti 
 explained to the Committee of Public Safety the impossi- 
 bility of their resuming the military operations unaided by 
 the talents of General Bonaparte. This is mere flattery. 
 The facts are these : 
 
 On the 13th of July 1794 (25th Messidor, year tt), the 
 representatives of the people with the army of Italy ordered 
 that General Bonaparte should proceed to Genoa, there, 
 conjointly with the French charge d'affaires, to confer on 
 certain subjects with the Genoese Government. This 
 mission, together with a list of secret instructions, direct- 
 ing him to examine the fortresses of Genoa and the neigh- 
 bouring country, show the confidence which Bonaparte, 
 who was then only twenty-five, inspired in men who were 
 deeply interested in making a prudent choice of their 
 agents. 
 
 Bonaparte set off for Genoa, and fulfilled his mission. 
 The 9th Thermidor arrived, and the deputies, called Terror- 
 ists, were superseded by Albitte and Salicetti. In the 
 disorder which then prevailed they were either ignorant of 
 
 at the public expense, and made him many promises." Lanfrey, vol. i. pp. 30-31, 
 says of this pamphlet, " Common enough ideas, expressed in a style only remarkable 
 for its ' Italianisms,' but becoming singularly firm and precise every time the author 
 expresses his military views. Under an apparent roughness, we find in it a rare 
 circumspection, leaving no hold on the writer, even if events change." 
 
 1 It will presently be seen that all this is erroneous, and that Sir Walter commits 
 another mistake when he says that Bonaparte's connection with Robespierre was 
 attended with fatal consequences to him, and that his justification consisted in 
 acknowledging that his friends were very different from what he had supposed them 
 to be. Bourrienne.
 
 1794. ARREST OF BONAPARTE. 23 
 
 the orders given to General Bonaparte, or persons envious 
 of the rising glory of the young general of artillery inspired 
 Albitte and Salicetti with suspicions prejudicial to him. Be 
 this as it may, the two representatives drew up a resolution, 
 ordering that General Bonaparte should be arrested, sus- 
 pended from his rank, and arraigned before the Committee 
 of Public Safety; and, extraordinary as it may appear, this 
 resolution was founded on that very journey to Genoa 
 which Bonaparte executed by the direction of the repre- 
 sentatives of the people. 1 
 Bonaparte said at St. Helena that he was a short time 
 
 1 Madame Junot throws some light on this persecution of Bonaparte by Salicetti. 
 " One motive (I do not mean to say the only one)," remarks this lady, "of the 
 animosity shown by Salicetti to Bonaparte, in the affair of Loano, was that they 
 were at one time suitors to the same lady. I am not sure whether it was in Corsica 
 or in Paris, but I know for a fact that Bonaparte, in spite of his youth, or perhaps 
 I should rather say on account of his youth, was the favoured lover. It was the 
 opinion of my brother, who was secretary to Salicetti, that Bonaparte owed his 
 life to a circumstance which is not very well known. The fact is, that Salicetti 
 received a letter from Bonaparte, the contents of which appeared to make a deep 
 impression on him. Bonaparte's papers had been delivered into Salicetti's hands, 
 who, after an attentive perusal of them, laid them aside with evident dissatisfac- 
 tion. He then took them up again, and read them a second time. Salicetti 
 declined my brother's assistance in the examination of the papers, and after a 
 second examination, which was probably as unsatisfactory as the first, he seated 
 himself with a very abstracted air. It would appear that he had seen among the 
 paperi some document which concerned himself. Another curious fact is, that tha 
 man who had the care of the papers after they were sealed up was an inferior clerk 
 entirely under the control of Salicetti ; and my brother, whose business it was to 
 have charge of the papers, was directed not to touch them. He has often spoken 
 to me of this circumstance, and I mention it here as one of importance to the history 
 of the time. Nothing that relates to a man like Napoleon can be considered useless 
 or trival. 
 
 " What, after all, was the result of this itrange business which might have cost 
 Bonaparte his head ? for, had he been taken to Paris and tried by the Committee 
 of Public Safety, there is little doubt that the friend of Robespierre the younger 
 would have been condemned by Billaud-Varennes and Collot d'Herbois. The result 
 was the acquittal of the accused. This result is the more extraordinary, since it 
 would appear that at that time Salicetti stood in fear of the young general. A 
 compliment is even paid to Bonaparte in the decree, by which he wa provisionally 
 restored to liberty. That liberation was said to be granted on the consideratiom that 
 General Bonaparte might be useful to the Republic. This was foresight ; but subse- 
 quently when measures were taken which rendered Bonaparte no longer an object 
 of fear, his name was erased from the list of general officers., and it is a curious fact 
 that Cambaceres, who was destined to be his colleague in the Consulate, was 
 one of the persons who signed ths act of erasure " (Memoirs of the Dttc/tesae 
 (fAbrantis, yol. i. p. 69, edjt. 1883).
 
 24 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794 
 
 imprisoned by order of the representative Laporte ; but 
 the order for his arrest was signed by Albitte, Salicetti, 
 and Laporte. 1 Laporte was not probably the most influ- 
 ential of the three, for Bonaparte did not address his re- 
 monstrance to him. He was a fortnight under arrest. 
 
 Had the circumstance occurred three weeks earlier, and 
 had Bonaparte been arraigned before the Committee of 
 Public Safety previous to the 9th Thermidor, there is 
 every probability that his career would have been at an 
 end ; and we should have seen perish on the scaffold, at 
 the age of twenty-five, the man who, during the twenty- 
 five succeeding years, was destined to astonish the world 
 by his vast conceptions, his gigantic projects, his great 
 military genius, his extraordinary good fortune, his faults, 
 reverses, and final misfortunes. 
 
 It is worth while to remark that in the post-Thermidor- 
 ian resolution just alluded to no mention is made of Bo- 
 naparte's association with Robespierre the younger. The 
 severity with which he was treated is the more astonishing, 
 since his mission to Genoa was the alleged cause of it. 
 Was there any other charge against him, or had calumny 
 triumphed over the services he had rendered to his country? 
 I have frequently conversed with him on the subject of 
 this adventure, and he invariably assured me that he had 
 nothing to reproach himself with, and that his defence, 
 which I shall subjoin, contained the pure expression of 
 his sentiments, and the exact truth. 
 
 In the following note, which he addressed to Albitte 
 and Salicetti, he makes no mention of Laporte. The copy 
 which I possess is in the handwriting of Junot, with cor- 
 rections in the General's hand. It exhibits all the charac- 
 teristics of Napoleon's writing : his short sentences, his 
 abrupt rather than concise style, sometimes his elevated 
 ideas, and always his plain good sense. 
 
 1 Albitte and Laporte were the representatives sent from the Convention to th* 
 army of the Alps, and Salicetti to the army of Italy.
 
 1794. BONAPARTE'S DEFENCE. 25 
 
 To THE REPRESENTATIVES ALBITTE AND SALICETTI. 
 
 You have suspended me from my duties, put me under arrest, 
 and declared me to be suspected. 
 
 Thus I am disgraced before being judged, or indeed judged be- 
 fore being heard. 
 
 In a revolutionary state there are two classes, the suspected and 
 the patriots. 
 
 When the first are accused, general measures are adopted towards 
 them for the sake of security. 
 
 The oppression of the second class is a blow to public liberty. 
 The magistrate cannot condemn until after the fullest evidence 
 and a succession of facts. This leaves nothing to arbitrary deci- 
 sion. 
 
 To declare a patriot suspected is to deprive him of all that he 
 most highly values confidence and esteem. 
 
 In what class am I placed ? 
 
 Since the commencement of the Revolution, have I not always 
 been attached to its principles ? 
 
 Have I not always been contending either with domestic enemies 
 or foreign foes ? 
 
 I sacrificed my home, abandoned my property, and lost every- 
 thing for the Republic ? 
 
 I have since served with some distinction at Toulon, and earned 
 a part of the laurels of the army of Italy at the taking of Saorgio, 
 Oneille, and Tanaro. 
 
 On the discovery of Robespierre's conspiracy, my conduct was 
 that of a man accustomed to look only to principles. 
 
 My claim to the title of patriot, therefore cannot be disputed. 
 
 Why, then, am I declared suspected without being heard, and 
 arrested eight days after I heard the news of the tyrant's death ? 
 
 I am declared suspected, and my papers are placed under seal. 
 
 The reverse of this course ought to have been adopted. My papers 
 should first have been sealed ; then I should have been called on 
 for my explanation ; and, lastly, declared suspected, if there was 
 reason for coming to such a decision. 
 
 . It is wished that I should go to Paris with an order which declares 
 me suspected. It will naturally be presumed that the representa- 
 tives did not draw up this decree without accurate information, and 
 I shall be judged with the bias which a man of that class merits. 
 
 Though a patriot and an innocent and calumniated man, yet 
 whatever measures may be adopted by the Committee I cannot com- 
 plain.
 
 26 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794- 
 
 If three men declare that I have committed a crime, I cannot 
 complain of the jury who condemns me. 
 
 Salicetti, you know me ; and I ask whether you hav observed 
 anything in my conduct for the last five years which can afford 
 ground of suspicion ? 
 
 Albitte, you do not know me ; but you have received proof of 
 no fact against me ; you have not heard me, and you know how 
 artfully the tongue of calumny sometimes works. 
 
 Must I then be confounded with the enemies of my country ? 
 and ought the patriots inconsiderately to sacrifice a general who 
 has not been useless to the Republic ? Ought the representatives 
 to reduce the Government to the necessity of being unjust and im- 
 politic ? 
 
 Hear me ; destroy the oppression that overwhelms me, and re- 
 store me to the esteem of the patriots. 
 
 An hour after, if my enemies wish for my life, let them take it. 
 I have often given proofs how little I value it. Nothing but the 
 thought that I may yet be useful to my country makes me bear the 
 burden of existence with courage. 
 
 It appears that this defence, which is remarkable for its 
 energetic simplicity, produced an effect on Albitte and 
 Salicetti. Inquiries more accurate, and probably more 
 favourable to the General, were instituted ; and on the 3d 
 Fructidor (20th August 1794) the representatives of the 
 people drew up a decree stating that, after a careful ex- 
 amination of General Bonaparte's papers, and of the 
 orders he had received relative to his mission to Genoa, 
 they saw nothing to justify any suspicion of his conduct ; 
 and that, moreover, taking into consideration the advan- 
 tage that might accrue to the Republic from the military 
 talents of the said General Bonaparte, it was resolved that 
 he should be provisionally set at liberty. 1 
 
 i With reference to the arrest of Bonaparte (which lasted thirteen days) see Bour- 
 rienne et ses Erreurs, tome i. pp. 16-28, and lung, tome ii. pp. 443-457. Both, in 
 opposition to Bourrienne, attribute the arrest to his connection with the younger 
 Kobeapierre. Apparently Albitte and Salicetti were not acquainted with the secret 
 plan of campaign prepared by the younger Robespierre and by Bonaparte, or with 
 the real instructions given for the mission to Genoa. Jealousy between the repre- 
 sentatives in the staff of the army of the Alps and those with the army of Italy, 
 with which Napoleon was, also played a part in the affair. lung looks on Salicetti 
 as acting as the protector of the Bonapartes ; but Napoleon does not seem to hare
 
 1795. BONAPARTE AND DUROC. 27 
 
 Salicetti afterwards became the friend and confidant of 
 young Bonaparte ; but their intimacy did not continue 
 after his elevation. 
 
 What is to be thought of the motives for Bonaparte's 
 arrest and provisional liberation, when his innocence and 
 the error that had been committed were acknowledged ? 
 The importance of the General's military talents, though 
 no mention is made about the impossibility of dispensing 
 with them, is a pretence for restoring him to that liberty 
 of which he had been unjustly deprived. 
 
 It was not at Toulon, as has been stated, that Bonaparte 
 took Duroc ' into the artillery, and made him his aide de 
 camp. The acquaintance was formed at a subsequent 
 period, in Italy. Duroc's cold character and unexcursive 
 mind suited Napoleon, whose confidence he enjoyed until 
 his death, and who entrusted him with missions perhaps 
 above his abili ties. At St. Helena Bonaparte often declared 
 that he was much attached to Duroc. I believe this to be 
 true ; but I know that the attachment was not returned. 
 The ingratitude of princes is proverbial. May it not 
 happen that courtiers are also sometimes ungrateful ? " 
 
 regarded him in that light ; see the letter given in Junot, vol. i. p. 106, where in 
 1795 he takes credit for not returning the ill done to him ; see also the same volume, 
 p. 89. Salicetti eventually became Minister of Police to Joseph, when King of 
 Naples, in 1806 ; but when he applied to return to France, Napoleon said to Mathieu 
 Dumas, " Let him know that I am not powerful enough to protect the wretches who 
 voted for the death of Louis XVI. from the contempt and indignation of the public" 
 (Dumas, tome iii. p. 316). At the same time Napoleon described Salicetti as worse 
 than the lazzaroni. 
 
 1 Michel Duroc (1773-1813), at first only aide de camp to Napoleon, was several 
 times entrusted with special diplomatic missions (for example, to Berlin, etc.). On 
 the formation of the Empire he became Grand Marechal dn Palais, and Due de 
 Frioul. He always remained in close connection with Napoleon until he was killed 
 in 1813. As he is often mentioned in contemporary memoirs under his abbreviated 
 title of Marshal, he has sometimes been erroneously included in the number of the 
 Vtarshals of the Empire a military rank he never attained to. 
 
 2 It is only just to Duroc to add that this charge does not seem borne out by the 
 impressions of those more capable than Bourrienne of judging in the matter.
 
 1794* 
 
 CHAPTER in. 
 
 1794-1795. 
 
 i 
 
 Proposal to send Bonaparte to La Vende'e He is struck off the list of 
 general officers Salicetti Joseph's marriage with Mademoiselle Clary 
 Bonaparte's wish to go to Turkey Note explaining the plan of his 
 proposed expedition Madame Bourrienne's character of Bonaparte, 
 and account of her husband's arrest Constitution of the year III. 
 The 13th Vendemiaire Bonaparte appointed second in command of 
 the army of the interior Eulogium of Bonaparte by Barras, and its 
 consequences St. . Helena manuscript. 
 
 GENERAL BONAPAKTE returned to Paris, where I also arrived 
 from Germany shortly after him. Our intimacy was re- 
 sumed, and he gave me an account of all that had passed 
 in the campaign of the south. He frequently alluded to 
 the persecutions he had suffered, and he delivered to me 
 the packet of papers noticed in the last chapter, desiring 
 me to communicate their contents to my friends. He was 
 very anxious, he said, to do away with the supposition 
 that he was capable of betraying his country, and, under 
 the pretence of a mission to Genoa, becoming a spy on the 
 interests of France. He loved to talk over his military 
 achievements at Toulon and in Italy. He spoke of his 
 first successes with that feeling of pleasure and gratifica- 
 tion which they were naturally calculated to excite in him. 
 The Government wished to send him to La Vendee, with 
 the rank of brigadier-general of infantry. Bonaparte re- 
 jected this proposition on two grounds. He thought the 
 scene of action unworthy of his talents, and he regarded 
 his projected removal from the artillery to the infantry as 
 a sort of insult. This last was his most powerful objection,
 
 1795. BONAPARTE UNEMPLOYED. 29 
 
 and was the only one he urged officially. In consequence 
 of his refusal to accept the appointment offered him, the 
 Committee of Public Safety decreed that he should be 
 struck off the list of general officers. 1 
 
 1 This statement as to the proposed transfer of Bonaparte to the infantry, his dis- 
 obedience to the order, and hia consequent dismissal, is fiercely attacked in the Er- 
 reurs, tome i. chap. iv. It is, however, correct in some points ; but the real truths 
 about Bonaparte's life at this time seem so little known that it may be well to ex- 
 plain the whole matter. On the 27th of March 1795 Bonaparte, already removed 
 from his employment in the south, was ordered to proceed to the army of the west, 
 to command its artillery as brigadier-general. He went as far as Paris, and then lin- 
 gered there, partly on medical certificate. While in Paris he applied, as Bourrienne 
 says, to go to Turkey to organise its artillery. His application, instead of being 
 neglected, as Bourrienne says, was favourably received, two members of the Comit6 
 de Salut Public putting on its margin most favourable reports of him ; one, Jean 
 Debry, even saying that ho was too distinguished an officer to be sent to a distance 
 at such a time. Par from being looked on as the half-crazy fellow Bourrienne con- 
 eulered him at that time, Bonaparte was appointed, on the 21st of August 1795, one 
 of four generals attached as military advisers to the Committee for the preparation 
 of warlike operations, his own department being a most important one. He him- 
 self at the time tells Joseph that he is attached to the topographical bureau of the 
 Comite de Salut Public, for the direction of the armies in the place of Carnot. It is 
 apparently this significant appointment to which Madame Junot, wrongly dating 
 it, alludes as " no great thing " (Junot, vol. i. p. 143). Another officer was there- 
 fore substituted for him as commander of Hoche's artillery, a fact made use of in 
 the Erreurs (p. 81) to deny his having been dismissed. But a general re-classifica- 
 tion of the generals was being made. The artillery generals were in excess of their 
 establishment, and Bonaparte, as junior in age, was ordered on 13th June to join 
 Hoche's army at Brest to command a brigade of infantry. All his efforts to get the 
 order cancelled failed, and as he did not obey it he was struck off the list of em- 
 ployed general officers on the 15th of September 17%, the order of the Comit6 de Sa- 
 lut Public being signed by Cambaceres, Berlier, Merlin, and Boissy. His application 
 to go to Turkey still, however, remained ; and it is a curious thing that, on the very 
 day he was struck off the list, the commission which had replaced the Minister of 
 War recommended to the Comite de Salut Public that he and his two aides de 
 camp, Junot and Livrat, with other officers, under him, should be sent to Constan- 
 tinople. So late as the 29th of September, twelve days later, this matter was being 
 considered, the only question being as to any departmental objections to the other 
 officers selected by him, a point which waa just being settled. But on the 13th Ven- 
 demiaire (5th October 1795), or rather on the night before, only nineteen days after 
 his removal, he was appointed second in command to Barras, a career in France was 
 opened to him, and Turkey was no longer thought of. 
 
 Thiers (vol. Iv. p. 326) and most writers, contemporary and otherwise, say that 
 Aubry gave the order for his removal from the list. Aubry, himself a brigadier- 
 general of artillery, did not belong to the Gomit6 de Salut Public at the time Bona- 
 parte was removed from the south ; and he had left the Comite early in August, that 
 is, before the order striking Bonaparte off was given. Aubry was, however, on the 
 Comito in June 1795, and signed the order, which probably may have originated from 
 him, for the transfer of Bonaparte to the infantry. It will be seen that, in the or- 
 dinary military sense of the term, Napoleon was only in Paris without employment
 
 30 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794. 
 
 Deeply mortified at this unexpected stroke, Bonaparte 
 retired into private life, and found himself doomed to an 
 inactivity very uncongenial with his ardent character. He 
 lodged in the Kue du Mail, in an hotel near the Place des 
 Victoires, and we recommenced the sort of life we had 
 led in 1792, before his departure for Corsica. It was not 
 without a struggle that he determined to await patiently 
 the removal of the prejudices which were cherished against 
 him by men in power ; and he hoped that, in the perpet- 
 ual changes which were taking place, those men might 
 be superseded by others more favourable to him. He fre- 
 quently dined and spent the evening with me and my 
 elder brother ; and his pleasant conversation and manners 
 made the hours pass away very agreeably. I called on 
 him almost every morning, and I met at his lodgings sev- 
 eral persons who were distinguished at the time ; among 
 others Salicetti, with whom he used to maintain very ani- 
 mated conversations, and who would often solicit a private 
 interview with him. On one occasion Salicetti paid him 
 three thousand francs, in assignats, as the price of his car- 
 riage, which his straitened circumstances obliged him to 
 dispose of. 1 I could easily perceive that our young friend 
 
 from the 15th of September to the 4th or 5th of October 1795 ; all the rest of the 
 time in Paris he had a command which he did not choose to take up. The distress 
 under which Napoleon is said to have laboured in pecuniary matters was probably 
 shared by most officers at that time ; see Erreurs, tome i. p. 82. This period is fully 
 described in lung, tome ii. p. 475, and tome iii. pp. 1-93. 
 
 1 Of Napoleon's poverty at this time Madame Junot says, " On Bonaparte's return 
 to Paris, after the misfortunee of which he accused Salicetti of being the cause, he 
 was in very destitute circumstances. His family, who were banished from Corsica, 
 found an asylum at Marseilles ; and they could not now do for him what they 
 would have done had they been in the country whence they derived their pecuniary 
 resources. From time to time he received remittances of money, and I suspect they 
 came from his excellent brother Joseph, who had then recently married Mademoi- 
 selle Clary ; but with all his economy these supplies were insufficient. Bonaparte 
 was therefore in absolute distress. Junot often used to speak of the six months 
 they passed together in Paris at this time. When they took an evening stroll on 
 the Boulevard, which used to be the resort of young men, mounted on fine horses, 
 and displaying all the luxury which they were permitted to show at that time, Bona- 
 parte would declaim against fate, and express his contempt for the dandies with 
 their whickers and their oreillea de chien, who, as they rode past, were eulogising
 
 1795. PROPOSES TO JOIN THE GRAND S&1GNIOR. 3t 
 
 either was or wished to be initiated in some political in- 
 trigue ; and I moreover suspected that Salicetti had bound 
 him by an oath not to disclose the plans that were hatching. 
 He became pensive, melancholy, and anxious ; and he al- 
 ways looked with impatience for Salicetti 's daily visit. 1 
 Sometimes, withdrawing his mind from political affairs, 
 he would envy the happiness of his brother Joseph, who 
 had just then married Mademoiselle Clary, the daughter 
 of a rich and respectable merchant of Marseilles. He 
 would often say, " That Joseph is a lucky rogue." 
 
 Meanwhile time passed away, and none of his projects 
 succeeded none of his applications were listened to. He 
 was vexed by the injustice with which he was treated, and 
 tormented by the desire of entering upon some active 
 pursuit. He could not endure the thought of remaining 
 buried in the crowd. He determined to quit France ; and 
 the favourite idea, which he never afterwards relinquished, 
 that the East is a fine field for glory, inspired him with 
 the wish to proceed to Constantinople, and to enter the 
 service of the Grand Seignior. What romantic plans, 
 what stupendous projects he conceived ! He asked me 
 whether I would go with him? I replied in the negative. 
 I looked upon him as a half-crazy young fellow, who was 
 driven to extravagant enterprises and desperate resolu- 
 tions by his restless activity of mind, joined to the irritat- 
 ing treatment he had experienced, and, perhaps, it may 
 be added, his want of money. He did not blame me for 
 my refusal to accompany him ; and he told me that Juuot, 
 Marmont, and some other young officers whom he had 
 known at Toulon, would be willing to follow his fortunes. 
 
 He drew up a note, which commenced with the words 
 
 in ecstasy the manner in which Madame Scio sang paole pafumee, paole panactite. 
 ' And it is on such beings as these,' he would say, ' that Fortune confers her favours. 
 Grand Dieu I how contemptible is human nature ! ' " (Memoirs of the Duchesse 
 cTAbrantes, vol. i. p. SO, edit. 1888). 
 
 1 Salicetti was implicated in the insurrection of the 20th May 1795, 1st Prairial, 
 year III., and was obliged to fly to Venice.
 
 32 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794, 
 
 Note for .... It was addressed to no one, and was 
 merely a plan. Some days after he wrote out another, 
 which, however, did not differ very materially from the 
 first, and which he addressed to Aubert and Coni. I 
 made him a fair copy of it, and it was regularly for- 
 warded. It was as follows : 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 At a moment when the Empress of Russia has strengthened her 
 union with the Emperor of Germany (Austria), it is the interest of 
 France to do everything in her power to increase the military 
 power of Turkey. 
 
 That power possesses a numerous and brave militia, but is very 
 backward in the scientific part of the art of war. 
 
 The organisation and the service of the artillery, which, in our 
 modern tactics, so powerfully facilitate the gaining of battles, and 
 on which, almost exclusively, depend the attack and defence of 
 fortresses, are especially the points in which France excels, and in 
 which the Turks are most deficient. 
 
 They have several times applied to us for artillery officers, and 
 we have sent them some ; but the officers thus sent have not been 
 sufficiently powerful, either in numbers or talent, to produce any 
 important result. 
 
 General Bonaparte, who, from his youth, has served in the 
 artillery, of which he was entrusted with the command at the siege 
 of Toulon, and in the two campaigns of Italy, offers his services to 
 proceed to Turkey, with a mission from the (French) Government. 
 
 He proposes to take along with him six or seven officers, of dif- 
 ferent kinds, and who may be, altogether, perfect masters of the 
 military art. 
 
 He will have the satisfaction of being useful to his country in this 
 new career, if he succeed in rendering the Turkish power more 
 formidable, by completing the defence of their principal fortresses, 
 and constructing new ones. 
 
 This note shows the error of the often-repeated assertion, 
 that he proposed entering the service of the Turks against 
 Austria. He makes no mention of such a thing ; and the 
 two countries were not at war. 1 
 
 1 The Scottish biographer makes Bonaparte say that it would be strange if a little 
 Corsican should become King of Jerusalem. I never hoard anything drop from him
 
 1795. MADAME DE BOURRIENNE ON BONAPARTE. 38 
 
 No answer was returned to this note. Turkey remained 
 unaided, and Bonaparte unoccupied. I must confess that 
 for the failure of this project, at least I was not sorry. I 
 should have regretted to see a young man of great prom- 
 ise, and one for whom I cherished a sincere friendship, 
 devote himself to so uncertain a fate. Napoleon has less 
 than any man provoked the events which have favoured 
 him ; no one has more yielded to circumstances from 
 which he was so skilful to derive advantages. If, however, 
 a clerk of the War Office had but written on the note, 
 " Granted, " that little word would probably have changed 
 the fate of Europe. 
 
 Bonaparte remained in Paris, forming schemes for the 
 gratification of his ambition, and his desire of making a fig- 
 ure in the world ; but obstacles opposed all he attempted. 
 
 Women are better judges of character than men. 
 Madame de Bourrienne, knowing the intimacy which sub- 
 sisted between us, preserved some notes which she made 
 upon Bonaparte, and the circumstances which struck her 
 as most remarkable, during her early connection with 
 him. My wife did not entertain so favourable an opinion 
 of him as I did ; the warm friendship I cherished for him 
 probably blinded me to his faults. I subjoin Madame de 
 Bourrienne's notes, word for word. 
 
 On the day after our second return from Germany, which was in 
 May 1795, we met Bonaparte in the Palais Royal, near a shop kept 
 by a man named Girardin. Bonaparte embraced Bourrienne as a 
 friend whom he loved and was glad to see. We went that evening 
 to the Theatre Frangais. The performance consisted of a tragedy, 
 and Le Sourd, ou I'Auberge pleine. During the latter piece the au- 
 dience was convulsed with laughter. The part of Dasnieres was rep- 
 resented by Batiste the younger, and it was never played better. 
 The bursts of laughter were so loud and frequent that the actor was 
 several times obliged to stop in the midst of his part. Bonaparte 
 alone (and it struck me as being very extraordinary) was silent, and 
 
 which supports the probability of such a remark, and certainly there is nothing ill 
 his note to warrant the inference of his having made it. Sourrlenne, 
 
 VOL. I. 3
 
 84 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794* 
 
 coldly insensible to the humour which was so irresistibly diverting to 
 every one else. I remarked at this period that his character was re- 
 served, and frequently gloomy. His smile was hypocritical, and 
 often misplaced ; and I recollect that a few days after our return 
 he gave us one of those specimens of savage hilarity which I greatly 
 disliked, and which prepossessed me against him. He was telling 
 us that, being before Toulon, where he commanded the artillery, 
 one of his officers was visited by his wife, to whom he had been but 
 * short time married, and whom he tenderly loved. A few days 
 after, orders were given for another attack upon the town, in which 
 this officer was to be engaged. His wife came to General Bonaparte, 
 and with tears entreated him to dispense with her husband's ser- 
 vices that day. The General was inexorable, as he himself told us, 
 with a sort of savage exultation. The moment for the attack ar- 
 rived, and the officer, though a very brave man, as Bonaparte him- 
 self assured us, felt a presentiment of his approaching death. He 
 turned pale and trembled. He was stationed beside the General, 
 and during an interval when the firing from the town was very 
 heavy, Bonaparte called out to him, "Take care, there is a shell 
 coming ! " The officer, instead of moving to one side, stooped down, 
 and was literally severed in two. Bonaparte laughed loudly while 
 he described the event with horrible minuteness. 
 
 At this time we saw him almost every day. He frequently came 
 to dine with us. As there was a scarcity of bread, and sometimes 
 only two ounces per head daily were distributed in the section, it 
 was customary to request one's guests to bring their own bread, as 
 it could not be procured for money. Bonaparte and his brother 
 Louis (a mild, agreeable young man, who was the General's aide de 
 camp) used to bring with them their ration bread, which was black, 
 and mixed with bran. I was sorry to observe that all this bad bread 
 fell to the share of the poor aide de camp, for we provided the Gen- 
 eral with a finer kind, which was made clandestinely by a pastry- 
 cook, from flour which we contrived to smuggle from Sens, where 
 my husband had some farms. Had we been denounced, the affair 
 might have cost us our heads. 
 
 We spent six weeks in Paris, and we went frequently with Bona- 
 parte to the theatres, and to the fine concerts given by Garat in the 
 Rue St. Marc. These were the first brilliant entertainments that 
 took place after the death of Robespierre. There was always some- 
 thing original in Bonaparte's behaviour, for he often slipped away 
 from us without saying a word ; and when we were supposing ha 
 had left the theatre, we would suddenly discover him in the second 
 or third tier, sitting alone in a box, and looking rather sulky.
 
 1795. INDIFFERENCE OF BONAPARTE. 35 
 
 Before our departure for Sens, where my husband's family reside, 
 and which was fixed upon for the place of my first accouchement, we 
 looked out for more agreeable apartments than we had in the Rue 
 Grenier St. Lazare, which we only had temporarily. Bonaparte used 
 to assist us in our researches. At last we took the first floor of a 
 handsome new house, No. 19 Rue des Marais. Bonaparte, who 
 wished to stop in Paris, went to look at a house opposite to ours. 
 He had thoughts of taking it for himself, his uncle Fesch (after- 
 wards Cardinal Fesch), and a gentleman named Patrauld, formerly 
 one of his masters at the Military School. One day he said, " With 
 that house over there, my friends in it, and a cabriolet, I shall be 
 the happiest fellow in the world." 
 
 We soon after left town for Sens. The house was not taken by 
 him, for other and great affairs were preparing. During the interval 
 between our departure and the fatal day of Vendemiaire several 
 letters passed between him and his school companion. These let- 
 ters were of the most amiable and affectionate description. They 
 have been stolen. On our return, in November of the same year, 
 everything was changed. The college friend was now a great per- 
 sonage. He had got the command of Paris in return for his share 
 in the events of Vend6miaire. Instead of a small house in the Rue 
 des Marais, he occupied a splendid hotel in the Rue des Capucines ; 
 the modest cabriolet was converted into a superb equipage, and the 
 man himself was no longer the same. But the friends of his youth 
 were still received when they made their morning calls. They were 
 invited to grand dejeuners, which were sometimes attended by ladies ; 
 and, among others, by the beautiful Madame Tallien and her friend 
 the amiable Madame de Beauharnais, to whom Bonaparte had be- 
 gun to pay attention. He cared little for his friends, and ceased to 
 address them in the style of familiar equality. 
 
 After the 13th of Vendemiaire M. de Bourrienne saw Bonaparte 
 only at distant periods. In the month of February 1796 my hus- 
 band was arrested, at seven in the morning, by a party of men, 
 armed with muskets, on the charge of being a returned emigrant. 
 He was torn from his wife and his child, only six months old, being 
 barely allowed time to dress himself. I followed him. They con- 
 veyed him to the guard-house of the Section, and thence I know not 
 whither ; and, finally, in the evening, they placed him in the lock- 
 up-house of the prefecture of police, which, I believe, is now called 
 the central bureau. There he passed two nights and a day, among 
 men of the lowest description, some of whom were even malefactors. 
 I and his friends ran about everywhere, trying to find somebody to 
 rescue him, and, among the rest, Bonaparte was applied to. It wa
 
 36 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1704, 
 
 with great difficulty he could be seen. Accompanied by one of my 
 husband's friends, I waited for the Commandant of Paris until 
 midnight, but he did not come home. Next morning I returned at 
 an early hour, and found him. I stated what had happened to my 
 husband, whose life was then at stake. He appeared to feel very 
 little for the situation of his friend, but, however, determined to 
 write to Merlin, the Minister of Justice. I carried the letter accord- 
 ing to its address, and met the Minister as he was coming downstairs, 
 on his way to the Directory. Being in grand costume, he wore a 
 Henri IV. hat, surmounted with a multitude of plumes, a dress 
 which formed a singular contrast with his person. He opened the 
 letter ; and whether it was that he cared as little for the General as 
 for the cause of M. de Bourrienne's arrest, he replied that the mat- 
 ter was no longer in his hands, and that it was now under the cog- 
 nisance of the public administrators of the laws. The Minister then 
 stepped into his carriage, and the writer was conducted to several 
 offices in his hotel. She passed through them with a broken heart, 
 for she met with none but harsh men, who told her that the pris- 
 oner deserved death. From them she learned that on the follow- 
 ing day he would be brought before the judge of the peace for his 
 Section, who would decide whether there was ground for putting 
 him on his trial. In fact, this proceeding took place next day. He 
 was conveyed to the house of the judge of the peace for the Section 
 of Bondy, Rue Grange-aux-Belles, whose name was Lemaire. His 
 countenance was mild ; and though his manner was cold, he had 
 none of the harshness and ferocity common to the Government 
 agents of that time. His examination of the charge was long, and 
 he several times shook his head. The moment of decision had ar- 
 rived, and everything seemed to indicate that the termination would 
 be to place the prisoner under accusation. At seven o'clock he de- 
 sired me to be called. I hastened to him, and beheld a most heart- 
 rending scene. BourrSenne was suffering under a haemorrhage, 
 which had continued since two o'clock, and had interrupted the ex- 
 amination. The judge of the peace, who looked sad, sat with his 
 head resting on his hand. I threw myself at his feet, and implored 
 his clemency. The wife and the two daughters of the judge visited 
 this scene of sorrow, and assisted me in softening him. He was a 
 worthy and feeling man, a good husband and parent, and it was 
 evident that he struggled between compassion and duty. He kept 
 referring to the laws on the subject, and, after long researches said 
 to me, "To-morrow is Decadi, and no proceedings can take place 
 on that day. Find, madame, two responsible persons, who will an- 
 swer for the appearance of your husband, and I will permit him tA
 
 1785. THE NATIONAL CONVENTION. 87 
 
 go home with you, accompanied by the two guardians." Next day 
 two friends were found, one of whom was M. Desmaisons, counsel- 
 lor of the court, who became bail for M. de Bourrienne. He con- 
 tinued under these guardians six months, until a law compelled the 
 persons who were inscribed on the fatal list to remove to the dis- 
 tance of ten leagues from Paris. One of the guardians was a man 
 of straw ; the other was a knight of St. Louis. The former was 
 left in the antechamber ; the latter made, every evening, one of 
 our party at cards. The family of M. de Bourrienne have always 
 felt the warmest gratitude to the judge of the peace and his family. 
 That worthy man saved the life of M. de Bourrienne, who, when 
 he returned from Egypt, and had it in his power to do him some 
 service, hastened to his house ; but the good judge was no more ! 
 
 The letters mentioned in the narrative were at this time 
 stolen from me by the police officers. 
 
 Everyone was now eager to pay court to a man who had 
 risen from the crowd in consequence of the part he had 
 acted at an extraordinary crisis, and who was spoken of 
 as the future General of the Army of Italy. It was ex- 
 pected that he would be gratified, as he really was, by the 
 restoration of some letters which contained the expression 
 of his former very modest wishes, called to recollection his 
 unpleasant situation, his limited ambition, his pretended 
 aversion for public employment, and finally exhibited his 
 intimate relations with those who were, without hesitation, 
 characterised as emigrants, to be afterwards made the vic- 
 tims of confiscation and death. 
 
 The 13th of Vendemiaire (5th October 1795) was ap- 
 proaching. The National Convention had been painfully 
 delivered of a new constitution, called, from the epoch of 
 its birth, " the Constitution of Year IH." It was adopted 
 on the 22d of August 1795. The provident legislators did 
 not forget themselves. They stipulated that two-thirds 
 of their body should form part of the new legislature. 
 The party opposed to the Convention hoped, on the con- 
 trary, that, by a general election, a majority would be ob- 
 tained for its opinion. That opinion was against the con-
 
 38 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794- 
 
 tinuation of power in the hands of men who had already 
 so greatly abused it. The same opinion was also enter- 
 tained by a great part of the most influential Sections of 
 Paris, both as to the possession of property and talent. 
 These Sections declared that, in accepting the new con- 
 stitution, they rejected the decree of the 30th of August, 
 which required the re-election of two-thirds. The Conven- 
 tion, therefore, found itself menaced in what it held most 
 dear its power, and accordingly resorted to measures 
 of defence. A declaration was put forth, stating that the 
 Convention, if attacked, would remove to Chalons-sur- 
 Marne ; and the commanders of the armed force were 
 called upon to defend that body. 
 
 The 5th of October, the day on which the Sections of 
 Paris attacked the Convention, is certainly one which 
 ought to be marked in the wonderful destiny of Bonaparte. 
 "With the events of that day were linked, as cause and 
 effect, many great political convulsions of Europe. The 
 blood which flowed ripened the seeds of the youthful 
 General's ambition. It must be admitted that the history 
 of past ages presents few periods full of such extraordinary 
 events as the years included between 1795 and 1815. The 
 man whose name serves, in some measure, as a recapitu- 
 lation of all these great events was entitled to believe 
 himself immortal. 
 
 Living retired at Sens since the month of July, I only 
 learned what had occasioned the insurrection of the Sec- 
 tions from public report and the journals. I cannot, 
 therefore, say what part Bonaparte may have taken in the 
 intrigues which preceded that day. He was officially 
 characterised only as secondary actor in the scene. The 
 account of the affair which was published announces that 
 Barras was, on that very day, Commander-in-chief of the 
 Army of the Interior, and Bonaparte second in command. 
 Bonaparte drew up that account. The whole of the man- 
 uscript was in his handwriting, and it exhibits all the
 
 1795. BONAPARTE'S NARRATIVE OF THE DEFENCE. 39 
 
 peculiarity of his style and orthography. He sent me a 
 copy. 
 
 Those who read the bulletin of the 13th Vendemiaire, 
 cannot fail to observe the care which Bonaparte took to 
 cast the reproach of shedding the first blood on the men 
 he calls rebels. He made a great point of representing 
 his adversaries as the aggressors. It is certain he long 
 regretted that day. He often told me that he would give 
 years of his life to blot it out from the page of his history. 
 He was convinced that the people of Paris were dreadfully 
 irritated against him, and he would have been glad if 
 Barras had never made that speech in the Convention, with 
 the part of which, complimentary to himself, he was at 
 the time so well pleased. Barras said, " It is to his able 
 and prompt dispositions that we are indebted for the 
 defence of this assembly, around which he had posted the 
 troops with so much skill." This is perfectly true, but it 
 is not always agreeable that every truth should be told. 
 Being out of Paris, and a total stranger to this affair, I 
 know not how far he was indebted for his success to chance, 
 or to his own exertions, in the part assigned to him by 
 the miserable Government which then oppressed France. 
 He represented himself only as secondary actor in this 
 sanguinary scene in which Barras made him his associate. 
 He sent to me, as already mentioned, an account of the 
 transaction, written entirely in his own hand, and dis- 
 tinguished by all the peculiarities of his style and 
 orthography. 1 
 
 " On the 13th," says Bonaparte, " at five o'clock in the 
 morning, the representative of the people, Barras, was 
 appointed Commander-in-chief of the Army of the Inter- 
 ior, and General Bonaparte was nominated second in 
 command. 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte, in a note on this passage, insinuates that the account of the 
 13th Vendemiaire was never sent to Sens, but was abstracted by Bourrienne, with 
 other documents, from Napoleon's cabinet (Erreurt, tome i. p. 230).
 
 40 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794- 
 
 " The artillery for service on the frontier was still at the 
 camp of Sablons, guarded solely by 150 men ; the remain- 
 der was at Marly with 200 men. The depot of Meudon 
 was left unprotected. There were at the Feuillans only 
 a few four-pounders without artillerymen, and but 80,000 
 cartridges. The victualling depots were dispersed 
 throughout Paris. In many Sections the drums beat to 
 arms ; the Section of the Theatre Franyais had advanced 
 posts even as far as the Pont Neuf, which it had barricaded. 
 
 " General Barras ordered the artillery to move immedi- 
 ately from the camp of Sablons to the Tuileries, and 
 selected the artillerymen from the battalions of the 89th 
 regiment, and from the gendarmerie, and placed them at 
 the Palace ; sent to Meudon 200 men of the police legion 
 whom he brought from Versailles, 50 cavalry, and two 
 companies of veterans ; he ordered the property which 
 was at Marly to be conveyed to Meudon ; caused car- 
 tridges to be brought there, and established a workshop 
 at that place for the manufacture of more. He secured 
 means for the subsistence of the army and of the Conven- 
 tion for many days, independently of the depots which 
 were in the Sections. 
 
 " General Verdier, who commanded at the Palais Na- 
 tional, exhibited great coolness ; he was required not to 
 suffer a shot to be fired till the last extremity. In the 
 meantime reports reached him from all quarters acquaint- 
 ing him that the Sections were assembled in arms, and 
 had formed their columns. He accordingly arrayed his 
 troops so as to defend the Convention, and his artillery 
 was in readiness to repulse the rebels. His cannon was 
 planted at the Feuillans to fire down the Rue Honore. 
 Eight-pounders were pointed at every opening, and in the 
 event of any mishap, General Verdier had cannon in 
 reserve to fire in flank upon the column which should 
 have forced a passage. He left in the Carrousel three 
 howitzers (eight-pounders) to batter down the houses
 
 7 795. BONAPARTE'S NARRATIVE OF THE DEFENCE. 41 
 
 from which the Convention might be fired upon. At four 
 o'clock the rebel columns marched out from every street 
 to unite their forces. It was necessary to take advantage 
 of this critical moment to attack the insurgents, even had 
 they been regular troops. But the blood about to flow 
 was French ; it was therefore for these misguided people, 
 already guilty of rebellion, to embrue their hands in the 
 blood of their countrymen by striking the first blow. 
 
 "At a quarter before five o'clock the insurgents had 
 formed. The attack was commenced by them on all 
 sides. They were everywhere routed. French blood was 
 spilled : the crime, as well as the disgrace, fell this day 
 upon the Sections. 
 
 " Among the dead were everywhere to be recognized 
 emigrants, landowners, and nobles ; the prisoners con- 
 sisted for the most part of the chouans of Chare tte. 
 
 " Nevertheless the Sections did not consider themselves 
 beaten : they took refuge in the church of St. Roch, in 
 the theatre of the Republic, and in the Palais figalite; 
 and everywhere they were heard furiously exciting the 
 inhabitants to arms. To spare the blood which would 
 have been shed the next day it was necessary that no time 
 should be given them to rally, but to follow them with 
 vigour, though without incurring fresh hazards. The 
 General ordered Montchoisy, who commanded a reserve 
 at the Place de la Revolution, to form a column with two 
 twelve-pounders, to march by the Boulevard in order to 
 turn the Place Vendome, to form a junction with the 
 picket stationed at headquarters, and to return in the 
 same order of column. 
 
 "General Brune, with two howitzers, deployed in the 
 streets of St. Nicaise and St. Honore. General Cartaux 
 sent two hundred men and a four-pounder of his division 
 by the Rue St. Thomas-du-Louvre to debouch in the 
 square of the Palais figalite. General Bonaparte, who 
 had hig horse killed under him, repaired to the Feuillans.
 
 42 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794 
 
 "The columns began to move. St. Koch and the 
 theatre of the Republic were taken by assault, when the 
 rebels abandoned them, and retreated to the upper part 
 of the Rue de la Loi, and barricaded themselves on all 
 sides. Patrols were sent thither, and several cannon- 
 shots were fired during the night, in order to prevent 
 them from throwing up defences, which object was effec- 
 tually accomplished. 
 
 "At daybreak, the General having learned that some 
 students from the St. Genevieve side of the river were 
 marching with two pieces of cannon to succour the 
 rebels, sent a detachment of dragoons in pursuit of them, 
 who seized the cannon and conducted them to the Tuil- 
 eries. The enfeebled Sections, however, still showed a 
 front. They had barricaded the Section of Grenelle, and 
 placed their cannon in the principal streets. At nine 
 o'clock General Beruyer hastened to form his division in 
 battle array in the Place Vendome, marched with two 
 eight-pounders to the Rue des Vieux-Augustins, and 
 pointed them in the direction of the Section Le Pelletier. 
 General Vachet, with a corps of tirailleurs, marched on 
 his right, ready to advance to the Place Victoire. General 
 Brune marched to the Perron, and planted two howitzers 
 at the upper end of the Rue Vivienne. General Duvigier, 
 with his column of six hundred men, and two twelve- 
 pounders, advanced to the streets of St. Roch and Mont- 
 martre. The Sections lost courage with the apprehension 
 of seeing their retreat cut off, and evacuated the post at 
 the sight of our soldiers, forgetting the honour of the 
 French name which they had to support. The Section of 
 Brutus still caused some uneasiness. The wife of a 
 representative had been arrested there. General Duvigier 
 was ordered to proceed along the Boulevard as far as the 
 Rue Poissonniere. General Beruyer took up a position 
 at the Place Victoire, and General Bonaparte occupied 
 the Pont-au-Change.
 
 1793. MANUSGRIT DE SAINTE HELENE. 43 
 
 "The Section of Brutus "was surrounded, and the 
 troops advanced upon the Place de Greve, where the 
 crowd poured in from the Isle St. Louis, from the The- 
 atre Fran^ais, and from the Palace. Everywhere the pa- 
 triots had regained their courage, while the poniards of 
 the emigrants, arme 1 against us, had disappeared. The 
 people universally admitted their error. 
 
 " The next day the two Sections of Le Pelletier and the 
 Theatre Francais were disarmed." 
 
 The result of this petty civil war brought Bonaparte for- 
 ward ; but the party he defeated at that period never par- 
 doned him for the past, and that which he supported 
 dreaded him in the future. Five years after he will be 
 found reviving the principles which he combated on the 
 5th of October 1795. On being appointed, on the motion 
 of Barras, Lieutenant-General of the Army of the Interior, 
 he established his headquarters in the Rue Neuve des Ca- 
 pucines. The statement in the Manuscrit de Sainte Helene, 
 that after the 13th Brumaire he remained unemployed at 
 Paris, is therefore obviously erroneous. So far from this, 
 he was incessantly occupied with the policy of the nation, 
 and with his own fortunes. Bonaparte was in constant, 
 almost daily, communication with every one then in 
 power, and knew how to profit by all he saw or heard. 
 
 To avoid returning to this Manuscrit de Sainte Helbne, 
 which at the period of its appearance attracted more 
 attention than it deserved, and which was very generally 
 attributed to Bonaparte, I shall here say a few wordt 
 respecting it. I shall briefly repeat what I said in a note 
 when my opinion was asked, under high authority, by a 
 minister of Louis XYTTT. 
 
 No reader intimately acquainted with public affairs can 
 be deceived by the pretended authenticity of this pam- 
 phlet. What does it contain ? Facts perverted and 
 heaped together without method, and related in an ob- 
 scure, affected, and ridiculously sententious style. B-
 
 44 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1794-95. 
 
 sides what appears in it, but which is badly placed there, 
 it is impossible not to remark the omission of what should 
 necessarily be there, were Napoleon the author. It is full 
 of absurd and of insignificant gossip, of thoughts Napoleon 
 never had, expressions unknown to him, and affectations 
 far removed from his character. With some elevated 
 ideas, more than one style and an equivocal spirit can be 
 seen in it. Professed coincidences are put close to un- 
 pardonable anachronisms, and to the most absurd revela- 
 tions. It contains neither his thoughts, his style, his ac- 
 tions, nor his life. Some truths are mixed up with an 
 inconceivable mass of falsehoods. Some forms of expres- 
 sion used by Bonaparte are occasionally met with, but 
 they are awkwardly introduced, and often with bad taste. 1 
 It has been reported that the pamphlet was written by 
 M. Bertrand, formerly an officer of the army of the Vis- 
 tula, and a relation of the Comte de Simeon, peer of 
 France. 
 
 1 Manuscrit venu de Sainte H&lene cCune mantere inconnue, London, Murray ; 
 Bruxelles, De Mat, 20 Avril 1817. This work merits a note. Metternich (TO!, i. 
 pp. 312-13) says, " At the time when it appeared the manuscript of St. Helena made 
 a great impression upon Europe. This pamphlet was generally regarded as a pre- 
 cursor of the memoirs which Napoleon was thought to be writing in his place of 
 exile. The report soon spread that the work was conceived and executed by 
 Madame de Stael. Madame de Stae'l, for her part, attributed it to Benjamin Con- 
 stant, from whom she was at this time separated by some disagreement. Afterwards 
 it came to be known that the author was the Marquis Lullin de Chateauvieux, a 
 man in society, whom no one had suspected of being able to hold m pen." Jomini 
 (tome i. p. 6 note) says, " It will be remarked that in the course of this work [his 
 Life of Napoleon] the author has used some fifty pages of the pretended ManuscrU 
 de Sainte JJelene. Parfrom wishing to commit a plagiarism, he considers he onghtto 
 render this homage to a clever and original work, several false points of view in 
 which, however, he has combated. It would have been easy for him to rewrite these 
 pages in other terms, but they appeared to him to be so well suited to the character 
 of Napoleon that he has preferred to preserve them." In the will of Napoleon 
 occurs (see end of this work) : " I disavow the bfanuserit de Sainte Helene, and the 
 other works under the title of Jfaxtms, Sentences, etc., which they have been 
 pleased to publish during the last six years. Such rules are not thoee which have 
 guided my life." This manuscript must not be confused with the Manorial of 
 Saint Helena.
 
 1795-97. . 45 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 1795-1797. 
 
 On my return to Paris I meet Bonaparte His interview with Josephine 
 Bonaparte's marriage, and departure from Paris ten days after 
 Portrait and character of Josephine Bonaparte's dislike of national 
 property Letter to Josephine Letter of General Colli, and Bona- 
 parte's reply Bonaparte refuses to serve with Kellerman Marmont's 
 letters Bonaparte's order to me to join the army My departure from 
 Sens for Italy Insurrection of the Venetian States. 
 
 AFTER the 13th Vendemiaire I returned to Paris from 
 Sens. During the short time I stopped there I saw Bona- 
 parte less frequently than formerly. I had, however, no 
 reason to attribute this to anything but the pressure of 
 public business with which he was now occupied. When 
 I did meet him it was most commonly at breakfast or 
 dinner. One day he called my attention to a young lady 
 who sat opposite to him, and asked what I thought of her. 
 The way in which I answered his question appeared to give 
 him much pleasure. He then talked a great deal to me about 
 her, her family, and her amiable qualities ; he told me that 
 he should probably marry her, as he was convinced that 
 the union would make him happy. I also gathered from 
 his conversation that his marriage with the young widow 
 would probably assist him in gaining the objects of his 
 ambition. His constantly-increasing influence with her 
 had already brought him into contact with the most influen- 
 tial persons of that epoch. He remained in Paris only ten 
 days after his marriage, which took place on the 9th of 
 March 1796. 1 It was a union in which great harmony 
 
 1 Bonaparte's first interview with Josephine, and the circumstance which, gave 
 rise to it, are thus described in the Menioireg de Constant : 
 
 " Eugene was not more than fourteen or fifteen years of age when he ventured to
 
 40 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795- 
 
 prevailed, notwithstanding occasional slight disagreements. 
 Bonaparte never, to my knowledge, caused annoyance to 
 his wife. Madame Bonaparte possessed personal graces 
 and many good qualities. 1 I am convinced that all who 
 
 introduce himself to General Bonaparte, for the purpose of soliciting his father's 
 sword, of which he understood the General had become possessed. The countenance, 
 air, and frank manner of Eugene pleased Bonaparte, and he immediately granted 
 him the boon he sought. As soon as the sword was placed in the boy's hands he 
 burst into tears, and kissed it. This feeling of affection for his father's memory, and 
 the natural manner in which it was evinced, increased the interest of Bonaparte in 
 his young visitor. Madame de Beauharnais, on learning the kind reception which 
 the General had given her son, thought it her duty to call and thank him. Bona- 
 parte \vas much pleased with Josephine on this first interview, and he returned her 
 visit. The acquaintance thus commenced speedily led to their marriage." 
 
 This anecdote is related in nearly the same terms in A Voice from St. Helena. 
 The story seems unlikely, however, as there was no disarmament after the 13th 
 Vendtimiaire, and Josephine, as a friend of Barras, would have been safe from any 
 domiciliary visit ; moreover, Bonaparte himself, at St. Helena, says that he first met 
 Josephine at Barras' (see lung's BoiMparte, tome iii. p. 116). 
 
 1 " Neither of his wives had ever anything to complain of from Napoleon's per- 
 sonal manners" (Metternich, vol. i. p. 279). 
 
 Madame de Remusat, who, to paraphrase Thierg' Baying on Bourrienne himself, is 
 a trustworthy witness, for if she received benefits from Napoleon they did not weigh 
 on her, says, "However, Napoleon had some affection for his first wife; and, in 
 fact, if he has at any time been touched, no doubt it has been only for her and by 
 her" (tome i. p. 113). "Bonaparte was young when he first knew Madame de 
 Boauharnais. In the circle where he met her she had a great superiority by the 
 name she bore and by the extreme elegance of her manners. ... In marrying 
 Madame de Beauharnais.. Boi,aparte believed he was allying himself to a very grand 
 lady ; thus this was one more conquest" (p. 114). But in speaking of Josephine's 
 complaints to Napoleon of his love affairs, Mndame de Remusat says, " Her husband 
 sometimes answered by violences, the excess of which I do not dare to detail, until 
 the moment when, his new fancy having suddenly passed, he felt his tenderness for 
 his wife again renewed. Then he wns touched by her sufferings, replaced his insults 
 by caresses which were hardly more measured than his violences, and, as she was 
 gentle and untenacious, she fell back into her feeling of security " (p. 206). 
 
 Miot de Melito, who was a follower of Joseph Bonaparte, says, " No woman has 
 united ao much kindness to so much natural grace, or has done more good with more 
 pleasure than she did. She honoured me with her friendship, and the remembrance 
 of the benevolence she has shown me, to the last moment of her too short existence, 
 will never be effaced from my heart" (tome i. pp. 101-2). 
 
 Meneval, the successor of Bourrienne in his place of secretary to Napoleon, and 
 who remained attached to the Emperor until the end, says of Josephine (tome i. p 
 227), " Josephine was irresistibly attractive. Her beauty was not regular, but she 
 had La grAce, plus belle encore que la beaute, according to the good La Fontaine. 
 She had the soft abandonment, the supple and elegant movements, and the graceful 
 carelessness of the Creoles.* Her temper was always the same. She WBS gentle and 
 
 * The reader must remember that the term " Creole " does not imply any taint of 
 black blood, but only that the person, of European family, has been born in the 
 West Indies.
 
 EMPRESS OF FRANCE
 
 1797. CHARACTER OF JOSEPHINE. 47 
 
 were acquainted with her must have felt bound to speak 
 well of her; to few, indeed, did she ever give cause for 
 complaint. In the time of her power she did not lose any 
 of her friends, because she forgot none of them. Benevo- 
 lence was natural to her, but she was not always prudent 
 in its exercise. Hence her protection was often extended 
 to persons who did not deserve it. Her taste for splendour 
 and expense was excessive. This proneness to luxury 
 became a habit which seemed constantly indulged without 
 any motive. What scenes have I not witnessed when the 
 moment for paying the tradesmen's bills arrived ! She 
 always kept back one-half of their claims, and the discov- 
 ery of this exposed her to new reproaches. How many 
 tears did she shed which might have been easily spared ! 
 
 kind, affable and indulgent with every one, without difference of persons. She had 
 neither a superior mind nor much learning, but her exquisite politeness, her full 
 acquaintance with society, with the court, and with their innocent artifices, made 
 her always know at need the best thing to say or to do." 
 
 When Talleyranil was asked about her, "Avait-elle de 1'esprit?" he answered, 
 "Elle s'en passait supurieurement bien " (Diary of Henry Greville, p. 77). 
 
 Perhaps Napoleon's feeling for Josephine may be best judged by one little trait. 
 After the divorce, Josephine's affairs, as usual with her, became embarrassed. The 
 Comte Mollien, chosen for his conciliatory manners, was sent by the Emperor to see 
 Josephine, and regulate matters. On his return Napoleon learnt that Josephine had 
 shed tears. " Napoleon interrupted the Minister to say to him that he had specially 
 ordered him not to make her weep " (Meneval, tome iii. p. 237). 
 
 It may be well also to have an unfavourable portrait of her. "Josephine," says 
 Lucien Bonaparte, " was not ill-natured, or rather, it has been constantly said that 
 she was very kind ; but that was when her acts of kindness cost her nothing. She 
 had knowledge enough of the ' grand monde ' into which she had been introduced by 
 her first husband a short time before the Revolution of 1789. She had very little 
 mind, and could not be called beautiful, but there were some Creole reminiscences in 
 the supple undulations of her figure, which was rather below the ordinary height. 
 Her face had no natural freshness, but that was sufficiently remedied for candle-light 
 by the care of her toilette. Yet all her person was not devoid of some remains of 
 ' attracto-partage ' of her first youth, which the painter Gerard, that skilful restorer 
 of the damaged beauty of faded women, has agreeably reproduced in the portraits 
 which remain to us of the wife of the First Consul." Lucien goes on to say that he 
 hardly noticed her in 1796, so inferior was she to the other beauties of the Court of 
 Ban-as, of which the wife of Tallien was the real Calypso (Lucien Bonaparte, by 
 lung, tome i. pp. 135-36). 
 
 For a corroboration of this sneer at Josephine's kindness, see cFAbrantts, vol. ii. 
 pp. 59-60, where one of her proteges, finding that instead of a petition, he had given 
 her his tailor's bill to be presented to Napoleon, is amazed by receiving her assurances 
 that she and Napoleon have read the petition together, au4 that the success of this 
 affair had made her the happiest woman in the world !
 
 48 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795^ 
 
 When fortune placed a crown on her head she told me 
 that the event, extraordinary as it was, had been predicted. 
 It is certain that she put faith in fortune-tellers. I often 
 expressed to her my astonishment that she should cherish 
 such a belief, and she readily laughed at her own credulity ; 
 but notwithstanding never abandoned it. The event had 
 given importance to the prophecy ; but the foresight of the 
 prophetess, said to be an old negress, was not the less a 
 matter of doubt. 
 
 Not long before the 13th of Vendemiaire, that day which 
 opened for Bonaparte his immense career, he addressed 
 a letter to me at Sens, in which, after some of his usually 
 friendly expressions, he said, " Look out a small piece of 
 land in your beautiful valley of the Yonne. I will pur- 
 chase it as soon as I can scrape together the money. I 
 wish to retire there ; but recollect that I will have nothing 
 to do with national property." 
 
 Bonaparte left Paris on the 21st of March 1796, while I 
 was still with my guardians. He no sooner joined the 
 French army than General Colli, then in command of the 
 Piedmontese army, transmitted to him the following letter, 
 which, with its answer, I think sufficiently interesting to 
 deserve preservation : 
 
 GENERAL I suppose that you are ignorant of the arrest of one 
 of my officers, named Moulin, the bearer of a flag of truce, who has 
 been detained for some days past at Murseco, contrary to the laws 
 of war, and notwithstanding an immediate demand for his liberation 
 being made by General Count Vital. His being a French emigrant 
 cannot take from him the rights of a flag of truce, and I again claim 
 him in that character. The courtesy and generosity which I have 
 always experienced from the generals of your nation induces me to 
 hope that I shall not make this application in vain ; and it is with 
 regret that I mention that your chief of brigade, BarthSlemy, who 
 ordered the unjust arrest of my flag of truce, having yesterday by 
 the chance of war fallen into my hands, that officer will be dealt 
 with according to the treatment which M. Moulin may receive. 
 
 I most sincerely wish that nothing may occur to change the noble
 
 1797. BONAPARTE AND RELLERMAX. 49 
 
 and humane conduct which the two nations have hitherto been ac- 
 customed to observe towards each other. I have the honour, etc., 
 
 (Signed) COLLI. 
 CBVA, 17tA April 1796. 
 
 Bonaparte replied as follows : 
 
 GENERAL^. An emigrant is a parricide whom no character can 
 render sacred. The feelings of honour, and the respect due to the 
 French people, were forgotten when M. Moulin was sent with a flag 
 of truce. You know the laws of war, and I therefore do not give 
 credit to the reprisals with which you threaten the chief of brigade, 
 Barthelemy. If, contrary to the laws of war, you authorise such an 
 aot of barbarism, all the prisoners taken from you shall be imme- 
 diately made responsible for it with the most deplorable vengeance, 
 for I entertain for the officers of your nation that esteem which is 
 due to brave soldiers. 
 
 The Executive Directory, to whom these letters were 
 transmitted, approved of the arrest of M. Moulin ; but 
 ordered that he should be securely guarded, and not 
 brought to trial, in consequence of the character with 
 which he had been invested. 
 
 About the middle of the year 1796 the Directory pro- 
 posed to appoint General Kellerman, who commanded the 
 army of the Alps, second in command of the army of Italy. 
 
 On the 24th of May 1796 Bonaparte wrote to Carnot 
 respecting this plan, which was far from being agreeable 
 to him. He said, " Whether I shall be employed here or 
 anywhere else is indifferent to me : to serve the country, 
 and to merit from posterity a page in our history, is all 
 my ambition. If you join Kellerman and me in command 
 in Italy you will undo everything. General Kellerman 
 has more experience than I, and knows how to make war 
 better than I do ; but both together, we shall make it 
 badly. I will not willingly serve with a man who con- 
 siders himself the first general in Europe." 
 
 Numbers of letters from Bonaparte to his wife have ben 
 VOL. I. 4
 
 50 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795- 
 
 published. I cannot deny their authenticity, nor is it my 
 wish to do so. I will, however, subjoin one which appears 
 to me to differ a little from the rest. It is less remarkable 
 for exaggerated expressions of love, and a singularly am- 
 bitious and affected style, than most of the correspondence 
 here alluded to. Bonaparte is announcing the victory of 
 Arcola to Josephine. 
 
 VERONA, the 29<A, noon. 1 
 
 At length, my adored Josephine, I live again. Death is no longer 
 before me, and glory and honour are still in my breast. The enemy 
 is beaten at Arcola. To-morrow we will repair the blunder of Vau- 
 bois, who abandoned Rivoli. In eight days Mantua will be ours, 
 and then thy husband will fold thee in his arms, and give thee a 
 thousand proofs of his ardent affection. I shall proceed to Milan as 
 soon as I can : I am a little fatigued. I have received letters from 
 Eugene and Hortense. I am delighted with the children. I will 
 send you their letters as soon as I am joined by my household, which 
 is now somewhat dispersed. 
 
 We have made five thousand prisoners, and "killed at least six 
 thousand of the enemy. Adieu, my adorable Josephine. Think of 
 me often. When you cease to love your Achilles, when your heart 
 grows cool towards him. you will be very cruel, very unjust. But 
 I am sure you will always continue my faithful mistress, as I shall 
 ever remain your fond lover (tend/re amie). Death alone can break 
 the union which sympathy, love, and sentiment have formed. Let 
 me have news of your health. A thousand and a thousand kisses. 
 
 It is impossible for me to avoid occasionally placing 
 myself in the foreground in the course of these Memoirs. 
 I owe it to myself to answer, though indirectly, to certain 
 charges which, on various occasions, have been made 
 against me. Some of the documents which I am about to 
 insert belong, perhaps, less to the history of the General- 
 in-Chief of the army of Italy than to that of his secretary ; 
 but I must confess I wish to show that I was not an in- 
 truder, nor yet pursuing, as an obscure intriguer, the 
 path of fortune. I was influenced much more by friend- 
 ship than by ambition when I took a part on the scene 
 
 1 There is no other date ; but the name of Arcola is sufficient. Bourrienne.
 
 1797. LETTERS FROM MARMONT. 51 
 
 where the rising glory of the future Emperor already shed 
 a lustre on all who were attached to his destiny. It will 
 be seen by the following letters with what confidence I 
 was then honoured ; but these letters, dictated by friend- 
 ship, and not written for history, speak also of our military 
 achievements ; and whatever brings to recollection the 
 events of that heroic period must still be interesting to 
 many. 
 
 HEADQUAHTEB8 AT MlLAH, 
 
 20*A Prairial, year IV. (8<A June 1796). 
 
 The General-in-Chief has ordered me, my dear Bourrienne, to 
 make known to you the pleasure he experienced on hearing of you, 
 and his ardent desire that you should join us. Take your depar- 
 ture, then, my dear Bourrienne, and arrive quickly. You may be 
 certain of obtaining the testimonies of affection which are your due 
 from all who know you ; and we much regret that you were not 
 with us to have a share in our success. The campaign which we 
 have just concluded will be celebrated in the records of history. 
 With less than 30,000 men, in a state of almost complete destitu- 
 tion, it is a fine thing to have, in the course of less than two months, 
 beaten, eight different times, an army of from 65 to 70,000 men, 
 obliged the King of Sardinia to make a humiliating peace, and 
 driven the Austrians from Italy. The last victory, of which you 
 have doubtless had an account, the passage of the Mincio, has closed 
 our labours. There now remain for us the siege of Mantua and the 
 castle of Milan ; but these obstacles will not detain us long. Adieu, 
 my dear Bourrienne : I repeat General Bonaparte's request that yoq 
 should repair hither, and the testimony of his desire to see you. 
 Beceive, etc., (Signed) MARMONT. 
 
 Chief of Brigade (Artillery), and Aide de camp to the General-in-Chief 
 
 I was obliged to remain at Sens, soliciting my erasurw 
 from the emigrant list, which I did not obtain, however, 
 till 1797, and to put an end to a charge made against me 
 of having fabricated a certificate of residence. Meanwhile 
 I applied myself to study, and preferred repose to the 
 agitation of camps. For these reasons I did not then ac- 
 cept this friendly invitation, notwithstanding that I was 
 very desirous of seeing my young college friend in tho
 
 52 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795- 
 
 midst of his astonishing triumphs. Ten months after, I 
 received another letter from Marmont, in the following 
 terms : 
 
 llEADQTJAETEKS, GORIZIA, 
 
 SW Germinal, year V. (22d March 1797). 
 
 The General-in-Chief, my dear Bourrienne, has ordered me to ex- 
 press to you his wish for your prompt arrival here. We have all 
 along anxiously desired to see you, and look forward with great 
 pleasure to the moment when we shall meet. I join with the Gen- 
 eral, my dear Bourrienne, in urging you to join the army without 
 loss of time. You will increase a united family, happy to receive 
 you into its hosom. I enclose an order written by the General, 
 which will serve you as a passport. Take the post route and arrive as 
 soon as you can. We are on the point of penetrating into Germany. 
 The language is changing already, and in four days we shall hear 
 no more Italian. Prince Charles has been well beaten, and we are 
 pursuing him. If this campaign be fortunate, we may sign a peace, 
 which is so necessary for Europe, in Vienna. Adieu, my dear 
 Bourrienne : reckon for something the zeal of one who is much at- 
 tached to you. (Signed) MARMONT. 
 
 BONAPARTE, GENERAL-IN-CHIEF OF THE ARJfY OF ITALY. 
 
 Headquarters, Gorizia, 2rZ Germinal, year V. 
 The citizen Bourrie.nnc is to come to me on receipt of the pres- 
 ent order. (Signed) 
 
 BONAPARTE. 
 
 The odious manner in which I was then harassed, I 
 know not why, on the part of the Government respecting 
 my certificate of residence, rendered my stay in France 
 not very agreeable. I was even threatened with being 
 put on my trial for having produced a certificate of resi- 
 dence which was alleged to be signed by nine false wit- 
 nesses. This time, therefore, I resolved without hesita- 
 tion to set out for the army. General Bonaparte's order, 
 which I registered at the municipality of Sens, answered 
 for a passport, which otherwise would probably have been
 
 1797. MASSACRE IN VERONA. 53 
 
 refused me. I have always felt a strong sense of gratitude 
 for his conduct towards me on this occasion. 
 
 Notwithstanding the haste I made to leave Sens, the 
 necessary formalities and precautions detained me some 
 days, and at the moment I was about to depart I received 
 the following letter : 
 
 HEADQUABTEBS, JUDENBOTOG, 
 19#i Germinal, year V. (8th April 1797). 
 
 The General-in-Chief again orders me, my dear Bourrienne, to 
 urge you to come to him quickly. We are in the midst of success 
 and triumphs. The German campaign begins even more brilliantly 
 than did the Italian. You may judge, therefore, what a promise it 
 holds out to us. Come, my dear Bourrienne, immediately yield 
 to our solicitations share our pains and pleasures, and you will add 
 to our enjoyments. 
 
 I have directed the courier to pass through Sens, that he may de- 
 Uver this letter to yeu, and bring me back your answer. 
 
 (Signed) MARMONT. 
 
 To the above letter this order was subjoined : 
 
 The citizen Fauvelet de Bourrienne is ordered to leave Sens, and 
 repair immediately by post to the headquarters of the army of Italy. 
 
 (Signed) BONAPARTE. 
 
 I arrived at the Venetian territory at the moment when 
 the insurrection against the French was on the point of 
 breaking out Thousands of peasants were instigated to 
 rise under the pretext of appeasing the troubles of Ber- 
 gamo and Brescia. I passed through Verona on the 16th 
 of April, the eve of the signature of the preliminaries of 
 Leoben and of the revolt of Verona. Easter Sunday was 
 the day which the ministers of Jesus Christ selected for 
 preaching "that it was lawful, and even meritorious, to 
 kill Jacobins." Death to Frenchmen ! Death to Jacobins ! 
 as they called all the French, were their rallying cries. At 
 the time I had not the slightest idea of this state of 
 things, for I had left Sens only on the llth of April
 
 54 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795- 
 
 After stopping two hours at Verona, I proceeded on my 
 journey without being aware of the massacre which 
 threatened that city. When about a league from the 
 town I was, however, stopped by a party of insurgents on 
 their way thither, consisting, as I estimated, of about two 
 thousand men. They only desired me to cry El viva 
 Santo Marco, an order with which I speedily complied, 
 and passed on. What would have become of me had I 
 been in "Verona on the Monday ? On that day the bells 
 were rung, while the French were butchered in the hos- 
 pitals. Every one met in the streets was put to death. 
 The priests headed the assassins, and more than four hun- 
 dred Frenchmen were thus sacrificed. The forts held out 
 against the Venetians, though they attacked them with 
 fury ; but repossession of the town was not obtained until 
 after ten days. ,Ou the very day of the insurrection of 
 Verona some Frenchmen were assassinated between that 
 city and Vicenza, through which I passed on the day be- 
 fore without danger ; and scarcely had I passed through 
 Padua, when I learned that others had been massacred 
 there. Thus the assassinations travelled as rapidly as the 
 post. 
 
 I shall say a few words respecting the revolt of the 
 Venetian States, which, in consequence of the difference 
 of political opinions, has been viewed in very contradic- 
 tory lights. 
 
 The last days of Venice were approaching, and a storm 
 had been brewing for more than a year. About the be- 
 ginning of April 1797 the threatening symptoms of a 
 general insurrection appeared. The quarrel commenced 
 when the Austrians entered Peschiera, and some pretext 
 was also afforded by the reception given to Monsieur, 
 afterwards Louis XVlLL. It was certain that Venice had 
 made military preparations during the siege of Mantua 
 in 1796. The interests of the aristocracy outweighed the 
 political considerations in our favour. On the 7th of
 
 1797. RISING IN THE VENETIAN STATES. 55 
 
 June 1796 General Bonaparte wrote thus to the Execu- 
 tive Directory : 
 
 The Senate of Venice lately sent two judges of their Council her* 
 to ascertain definitively how things tand. I repeated my com- 
 plaints. I spoke to them about the reception given to Monsieur. 
 Should it be your plan to extract five or six millions from Venice, 
 I have expressly prepared this sort of rupture for you. If your in- 
 tentions be more decided, I think this ground of quarrel ought to be 
 kept up. Let me know what you mean to do, and wait till the 
 favourable moment, which I shall seize according to circumstances; 
 for we must not have to do with all the world at once. 
 
 The Directory answered that the moment was not 
 favourable ; that it was first necessary to take Mantua, 
 and give Wurmser a sound beating. However, towards 
 the end of the year 1796 the Directory began to give 
 more credit to the sincerity of the professions of neutral- 
 ity made on the part of Venice. It was resolved, there- 
 fore, to be content with obtaining money and supplies for 
 the army, and to refrain from violating the neutrality. 
 The Directory had not then in reserve, like Bonaparte, 
 the idea of making the dismemberment of Venice serve 
 as a compensation for such of the Austrian possessions as 
 the French Republic might retain. 
 
 In 1797 the expected favourable moment had arrived. 
 The knell of Venice was rung ; and Bonaparte thus 
 wrote to the Directory on the 30th of April : "I am con- 
 vinced that the only course to be now taken is to destroy 
 this ferocious and sanguinary Government." On the 3d 
 of May, writing from Palma Nuova, he says.- "I see 
 nothing that can be done but to obliterate the Venetian 
 name from the face of the globe." 
 
 Towards the end of March 1797 the Government of 
 Venice was in a desperate state. Ottolini, the Podesta of 
 Bergamo, an instrument of tyranny in the hands of the 
 State inquisitors, then harassed the people of Bergamo 
 and Brescia, who, after the reduction of Mantua, wished
 
 56 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795- 
 
 to be separated from Venice. He drew up, to be sent to 
 the Senate, a long report respecting the plans of separa- 
 tion, founded on information given him by a Roman ad- 
 vocate, named Marcelin Serpini, who pretended to have 
 gleaned the facts he communicated in conversation with 
 officers of the French army. The plan of the patriotic 
 party was, to unite the Venetian territories on the main- 
 land with Lombardy, and to form of the whole one re- 
 public. The conduct of Ottolini exasperated the party 
 inimical to Venice, and augmented the prevailing discon- 
 tent. Having disguised his valet as a peasant, he sent 
 him off to Venice with the report he had drawn up on 
 Serpini's communications, and other information; but 
 this report never reached the inquisitors. The valet was 
 arrested, his despatches taken, and Ottolini fled from 
 Bergamo. This gave a beginning to the general rising of 
 the Venetian States. In fact, the force of circumstances 
 alone brought on the insurrection of those territories 
 against their old insular government. General La Hoz, 
 who commanded the Lombard Legion, was the active 
 protector of the revolution, which certainly had its origin 
 more in the progress of the prevailing principles of lib- 
 erty than in the crooked policy of the Senate of Venice. 
 Bonaparte, indeed, in his despatches to the Directory, 
 stated that the Senate had instigated the insurrection ; 
 but that was not quite correct, and he could not wholly 
 believe his own assertion. 
 
 Pending the vacillation of the Venetian Senate, Vienna 
 was exciting the population of its States on the mainland 
 to rise against the French. The Venetian Government had 
 always exhibited an extreme aversion to the French Revo- 
 lution, which had been violently condemned at Venice. 
 Hatred of the French had been constantly excited and en- 
 couraged, and religious fanaticism had inflamed many 
 persons of consequence in the country. From the end of 
 1796 the Venetian Senate secretly continued its arma-
 
 1797. RISING IN THE VENETIAN STATES. 5T 
 
 ments, and the whole conduct of that Government an- 
 nounced intentions which have been called perfidious, but 
 the only object of which was to defeat intentions still 
 more perfidious. The Senate was the irreconcilable enemy 
 of the French Republic. Excitement was carried to such 
 a point that in many places the people complained that 
 they were not permitted to arm against the French. The 
 Austrian generals industriously circulated the most sinis- 
 ter reports respecting the armies of the Sambre-et-Meuse 
 and the Rhine, and the position of the French troops in 
 the Tyrol These impostures, printed in bulletins, were 
 well calculated to instigate the Italians, and especially the 
 Venetians, to rise in mass to exterminate the French, when 
 the victorious army should penetrate into the Hereditary 
 States. 
 
 The pursuit of the Archduke Charles into the heart of 
 Austria encouraged the hopes which the Venetian Senate 
 had conceived, that it would be easy to annihilate the feeble 
 remnant of the French army, as the troops were scattered 
 through the States of Venice on the mainland. Wherever 
 the Senate had the ascendency, insurrection was secretly 
 fomented ; wherever the influence of the patriots prevailed, 
 ardent efforts were made to unite the Venetian terra firma 
 to the Lombard Republic. 
 
 Bonaparte skilfully took advantage of the disturbances, 
 and the massacres consequent on them, to adopt towards 
 the Senate the tone of an offended conqueror. He pub- 
 lished a declaration that the Venetian Government was the 
 most treacherous imaginable. The weakness and cruel 
 hypocrisy of the Senate facilitated the plan he had con- 
 ceived of making a peace for France at the expense of the 
 Venetian Republic. On returning from Leoben, a con- 
 queror and pacificator, he, without ceremony, took posses- 
 sion of Venice, changed the established government, and, 
 master of all the Venetian territory, found himself, in the 
 negotiations of Campo Formio, able to dispose of it as he
 
 58 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1795^ 
 
 pleased, as a compensation for the cessions which had 
 been exacted from Austria. After the 19th of May he 
 wrote to the Directory that one of the objects of his treaty 
 with Venice was to avoid bringing upon us the odium of 
 violating the preliminaries relative to the Venetian terri- 
 tory, and, at the same time, to afford pretexts and to facili- 
 tate their execution. 
 
 At Campo Formio the fate of this republic was decided. 
 It disappeared from the number of States without effort or 
 noise. The silence of its fall astonished imaginations 
 warmed by historical recollections from the brilliant pages 
 of its maritime glory. Its power, however, which had been 
 silently undermined, existed no longer except in the pres- 
 tige of those recollections. What resistance could it have 
 opposed to the man destined to change the face of all Eu- 
 rope?
 
 1797. 59 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 1797. 
 
 Signature of the preliminaries of peace Fall of Venice My arrival and 
 reception at Leoben Bonaparte wishes to pursue his success The 
 Directory opposes him He wishes to advance on Vienna Movement 
 of the army of the Sambre-et-Meuse Bonaparte's dissatisfaction 
 Arrival at Milan We take up our residence at Montebello Napo- 
 leon's judgment respecting Dandolo and Melzi. 
 
 I JOINED Bonaparte at Leoben on the 19th of April, the 
 day after the signature of the preliminaries of peace. 
 These preliminaries resembled in no respect the definitive 
 treaty of Campo Formio. The still incomplete fall of the 
 State of Venice did not at that time present an available 
 prey for partition. All was arranged afterwards. Woe 
 to the small States that come in immediate contact with 
 two colossal empires waging war ! 
 
 Here terminated my connection with Bonaparte as a 
 comrade and equal, and those relations with him com- 
 menced in which I saw him suddenly great, powerful, 
 and surrounded with homage and glory. I no longer 
 addressed him as I had been accustomed to do. I appre- 
 ciated too well his personal importance. His position 
 placed too great a social distance between him and me not 
 to make me feel the necessity of fashioning my demeanour 
 accordingly. I made with pleasure, and without regret, 
 the easy sacrifice of the style of familiar companionship 
 and other little privileges. He said, in a loud voice, when 
 I entered the salon where he was surrounded by the 
 officers who formed his brilliant staff, " I am glad to see 
 you, at last " " Te voila done, enfin ; " but as soon as we
 
 60 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797- 
 
 were alone he made me understand that he was pleased 
 with my reserve, and thanked me for it. I was immedi- 
 ately placed at the head of his Cabinet. I spoke to him 
 the same evening respecting the insurrection of the Vene- 
 tian territories, of the dangers which menaced the French, 
 and of those which I had escaped, etc. " Care thou 1 
 nothing about it," said he ; " those rascals shall pay for it. 
 Their republic has had its day, and is done." This repub- 
 lic was, however, still existing, wealthy and powerful. 
 These words brought to my recollection what I had read 
 in a work by one Gabriel Naude, who wrote during the 
 reign of Louis XHL for Cardinal de Bagin : " Do you see 
 Constantinople, which flatters itself with being the seat 
 of a double empire ; and Venice, which glories in her 
 stability of a thousand years ? Their day will come." 
 
 In the first conversation which Bonaparte had with me, 
 I thought I could perceive that he was not very well satisfied 
 with the preliminaries. He would have liked to advance 
 with his army to Vienna. He did not conceal this from 
 me. Before he offered peace to Prince Charles, he wrote 
 to the Directory that he intended to pursue his success, 
 but that for this purpose he reckoned on the co-operation 
 of the armies of the Sambre-et-Meuse and the Rhine. 
 The Directory replied that he must not reckon on a diver- 
 sion in Germany, and that the armies of the Sambre-et- 
 Meuse and the Rhine were not to pass that river. A 
 resolution so unexpected a declaration so contrary to 
 what he had constantly solicited, compelled him to termi- 
 nate his triumphs, and renounce his favourite project of 
 planting the standard of the republic on the ramparts of 
 Vienna, or at least of levying contributions on the suburbs 
 of that capital. 
 
 A law of the 23d of August 1794 forbade the use of any 
 other names than those in the register of births. I wished 
 to conform to this law, which very foolishly interfered with 
 
 1 He used to tutoyer me in this familiar manner until his return to Milan.
 
 1797. MOREAU CROSSES THE RHINE. <J1 
 
 old habits. My eldest brother was living, and I therefore 
 designated myself Fauvelet the younger. This annoyed 
 General Bonaparte. " Such change of name is absolute 
 nonsense," said he. " I have known you for twenty years 
 by the name of Bourrienne. Sign as you still are named, 
 and see what the advocates with their laws will do." 
 
 On the 20th of April, as Bonaparte was returning to 
 Italy, he was obliged to stop on an island of the Taglia- 
 mento, while a torrent passed by, which had been occasioned 
 by a violent storm. A courier appeared on the right bank 
 of the river. He reached the island. Bonaparte read in 
 the despatches of the Directory that the armies of the 
 Sambre-et-Meuse and the Rhine were in motion ; that they 
 were preparing to cross the Rhine, and had commenced 
 hostilities on the very day of the signing of the preliminaries. 
 This information arrived seven days after the Directory had 
 written that " he must not reckon on the co-operation of 
 the armies of Germany." It is impossible to describe the 
 General's vexation on reading these despatches. He had 
 signed the preliminaries only because the Government 
 had represented the co-operation of the armies of the 
 Rhine as impracticable at that moment, and shortly after- 
 wards he was informed that the co-operation was about to 
 take place ! The agitation of his mind was so great that 
 he for a moment conceived the idea of crossing to the left 
 bank of the Tagliamento, and breaking off the negotiations 
 under some pretext or other. He persisted for some time 
 in this resolution, which, however, Berthier and some 
 other generals successfully opposed. He exclaimed, 
 " What a difference would there have been in the pre- 
 liminaries, if, indeed, there had been any !" 
 
 His chagrin, I might almost say his despair, increased 
 when, some days after his entry into the Venetian States, 
 he received a letter from Moreau, dated the 23d of 
 April, in which that general informed him that, having 
 passed the Rhine on the 20th with brilliant success, and
 
 62 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 taken four thousand prisoners, it would not be long before 
 he joined him. Who, in fact, can say what would have 
 happened but for the vacillating and distrustful policy of 
 the Directory, which always encouraged low intrigues, and 
 participated in the jealousy excited by the renown of 
 the young conqueror? Because the Directory dreaded 
 his ambition they sacrificed the glory of our arms and the 
 honour of the nation ; for it cannot be doubted that, had 
 the passage of the Rhine, so urgently demanded by Bona- 
 parte, taken place some days sooner, he would have been 
 able, without incurring any risk, to dictate imperiously 
 the conditions of peace on the spot ; or, if Austria were 
 obstinate, to have gone on to Vienna and signed it there. 
 Still occupied with this idea, he wrote to the Directory on 
 the 8th of May : " Since I have received intelligence of 
 the passage of the Rhine by Hoche and Moreau, I much 
 regret that it did not take place fifteen days sooner ; or, at 
 least, that Moreau did not say that he was in a situation 
 to effect it." (He had been informed to the contrary.) 
 What, after this, becomes of the unjust reproach against 
 Bonaparte of having, through jealousy of Moreau, deprived 
 France of the advantages which a prolonged campaign 
 would have procured her ? Bonaparte was too devoted to 
 the glory of France to sacrifice it to jealousy of the glory 
 of any individual. 
 
 In traversing the Venetian States to return to Milan, he 
 often spoke to me of Venice. He always assured me that 
 he was originally entirely unconnected with the insurrec- 
 tions which had agitated that country ; that common 
 sense would show, as his project was to advance into the 
 basin of the Danube, he had no interest in having his 
 rear disturbed by revolts, and his communications inter- 
 rupted or cut off. " Such an idea," said he, " would 
 be absurd, and could never enter into the mind of a 
 man to whom even his enemies cannot deny a certain 
 degree of tact." He acknowledged that he was not
 
 1797. ONLY TWO MEN IN ITALY. 03 
 
 vexed that matters bad turned out as they had done, 
 because he had already taken advantage of these cir- 
 cumstances in the preliminaries and hoped to profit still 
 more from them in the definitive peace. " When I arrive 
 at Milan," said he, " I will occupy myself with Venice." 
 It is therefore quite evident to me that in reality the 
 General-in-Chief had nothing to do with the Venetian 
 insurrections ; that subsequently he was not displeased 
 with them ; and that, later still, he derived great ad- 
 vantage from them. 
 
 We arrived at Milan on the 5th of May, by way of 
 Leybach, Trieste, Palma-Nuova, Padua, Verona, and 
 Mantua. Bonaparte soon took up his residence at 
 Montebello, a very fine chateau, three leagues from 
 Milan, with a view over the rich and magnificent plains 
 of Lombardy. At Montebello commenced the negotia- 
 tions for the definitive peace which were terminated at 
 Passeriano. The Marquis de Gallo, the Austrian pleni- 
 potentiary, resided half a league from Montebello. 
 
 During his residence at Montebello the General-in Chief 
 made an excursion to the Lake of Como and to the Lago 
 Maggiore. He visited the Borromean Islands in succession, 
 and occupied himself on his return with the organisation 
 of the towns of Venice, Genoa, and Milan. He sought for 
 men and found none. " Good God," said he, " how rare 
 men are ! There are eighteen millions in Italy, and I have 
 with difficulty found two, Dandolo and Melzi." 
 
 He appreciated them properly. Dandolo was one of 
 the men who, in those revolutionary times, reflected the 
 greatest honour upon Italy. After being a member of the 
 great council of the Cisalpine Republic, he exercised the 
 functions of Proveditore-General in Dalmatia. It is only 
 necessary to mention the name of Dandolo to the Dalma- 
 tians to learn from the grateful inhabitants how just and 
 vigorous his administration was. The services of Melzi 
 are known. He was Chancellor and Keeper of the
 
 64 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 Seals of the Italian monarchy, and was created Duke of 
 Lodi. 1 
 
 In those who have seen the world the truth of Napoleon's 
 reproach excites little astonishment. In a country which, 
 according to biographies and newspapers, abounds with 
 extraordinary men, a woman of much talent 2 said, "What 
 has most surprised me, since the elevation of my husband 
 has afforded me the opportunity of knowing many persons, 
 and particularly those employed in important affairs, is 
 the universal mediocrity which exists. It surpasses all 
 that the imagination can conceive, and it is observable 
 in all ranks, from the clerk to the minister. Without this 
 experience I never could have believed my species to be so 
 contemptible." 
 
 Who does not remember Oxenstiern's remark to his son, 
 who trembled at going so young to the congress of Mun- 
 ster: "Go, my son. You will see by what sort of men 
 the world is governed." 
 
 ' Francesco, Comte de Melzi d'Eryl (1753-1816), Vice-President of the Italian 
 Republic, 1802 ; Chancellor of the Kingdom of Italy, 1805 ; Due de Lodi, 1807. 
 * Madame Roland.
 
 1797. 66 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 1797. 
 
 Napoleon's correspondence Release of French prisoners at Olmutz 
 Negotiations with Austria Bonaparte's dissatisfaction Letter of 
 complaint from Bonaparte to the Executive Directory Note respect- 
 ing the affairs of Venice and the Club of Clichy, written by Bonaparte 
 and circulated in the army Intercepted letter of the Emperor Francis. 
 
 DURING the time when the preliminaries of Leoben sus- 
 pended military operations, Napoleon was not anxious to 
 reply immediately to all letters. He took a fancy to do, 
 not exactly as Cardinal Dubois did, when he threw into 
 the fire the letters he had received, saying, " There ! my 
 correspondents are answered," but something of the same 
 kind. To satisfy himself that people wrote too much, 
 and lost, in trifling and useless answers, valuable time, he 
 told me to open only the letters which came by extraordi- 
 nary couriers, and to leave all the rest for three weeks in 
 the basket. At the end of that time it was unnecessary 
 to reply to four-fifths of these communications. Some 
 were themselves answers ; some were acknowledgments 
 of letters received ; others contained requests for favours 
 already granted, but of which intelligence had not been 
 received. Many were filled with complaints respecting 
 provisions, pay, or clothing, and orders had been issued 
 upon all these points before the letters were written. 
 Some generals demanded reinforcements, money, pro- 
 motion, etc. By not opening their letters Bonaparte was 
 spared the unpleasing office of refusing. "When the General- 
 in-Chief compared the very small number of letters which 
 it was necessary to answer with the large number which 
 VOL. I. 6
 
 (56 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 time alone had answered, he laughed heartily at his whimsi- 
 cal idea. Would not this mode of proceeding be prefer- 
 able to that of causing letters to be opened by any one 
 who may be employed, and replying to them by a circular 
 to which it is only necessary to attach a date ? 
 
 During the negotiations which followed the treaty of 
 Leoben, the Directory ordered General Bonaparte to de- 
 mand the liberty of MM. de La Fayette, Latour-Maubourg, 
 and Bureau de Puzy, detained at Olmutz since 1792 as 
 prisoners of state. The General-in-Chief executed this 
 commission with as much pleasure as zeal, but he often 
 met with difficulties which appeared to be insurmount- 
 able. It has been very incorrectly stated that these pris- 
 oners obtained their liberty by one of the articles of 
 the preliminaries of Leoben. I wrote a great deal on 
 this subject to the dictation of General Bonaparte, and I 
 joined him only on the day after the signature of these 
 preliminaries. It was not till the end of May of the year 
 1797 that the liberation of these captives was demanded, 
 and they did not obtain their freedom till the end of 
 August. There was no article in the treaty, public or 
 secret, which had reference to them. Neither was it at 
 his own suggestion that Bonaparte demanded the en- 
 largement of the prisoners, but by order of the Directory. 
 To explain why they did not go to France immediately 
 after their liberation from Olmutz, it is necessary to rec- 
 ollect that the events of the 18th Fructidor occurred be- 
 tween the period when the first steps were taken to pro- 
 cure their liberty and the date of their deliverance. It 
 required all Bonaparte's ascendency and vigour of char- 
 acter to enable him to succeed in his object at the end of 
 three months. 
 
 We had arrived at the month of July, and the negotia* 
 tions were tediously protracted. It was impossible to 
 attribute the embarrassment which was constantly occur- 
 ring to anything but the artful policy of Austria. Other
 
 1797. CRITICISMS ON BONAPARTE. 67 
 
 affairs occupied Bonaparte. The news from Paris en- 
 grossed all his attention. He saw with extreme displeas- 
 ure the manner in which the influential orators of the 
 councils, and pamphlets written in the same spirit as they 
 spoke, criticised him, his army, his victories, the affairs of 
 Venice, and the national glory. He was quite indignant 
 at the suspicions which it was sought to create respecting 
 his conduct and ulterior views. 
 
 The following excerpts, attributed to the pens of Du- 
 mouriez or Rivarol, are specimens of some of the com- 
 ments of the time : 
 
 EXTRACTS OF LETTERS IN " LE SPECTATUER DU NORD" OP 1797. 
 
 General Bonaparte is, without contradiction, the most brilliant 
 warrior who has appeared at the head of the armies of the French 
 Republic. His glory is incompatible with democratic equality, and 
 the services he has rendered are too great to be recompensed ex- 
 cept by hatred and ingratitude. He is very young, and consequently 
 has to pursue a long career of accusations and of persecutions. 
 
 . . . Whatever may be the crowning event of his military 
 career, Bonaparte is still a great man. All his glory is due to him- 
 self alone, because he alone has developed a character and a genius 
 of which no one else has furnished an example. 
 
 EXTRACT OP LETTER OP 18TH APRIL 1797 m 
 
 "LE SPECTATEUR DU NORD." 
 
 Regard, for instance, this wretched war. Uncertain in Cham- 
 pagne, it becomes daring under Dumouriez, unbridled under the 
 brigands who fought the Vendeeans, methodic under Pichegru, 
 vulgar under Jourdan, skilled under Moreau, rash under Bona- 
 parte. Each general has put the seal of his genius on his career, 
 and has given life or death to his army. From the commencement 
 of his career Bonaparte has developed an ardent character which is 
 irritated by obstacles, and a quickness which forestalls every de- 
 termination of the enemy. It is with heavier and heavier blows 
 that he strikes. He throws his army on the enemy like an un- 
 loosed torrent. He is all action, and he is so in everything. See 
 him fight, negotiate, decree, punish, all is the matter of a moment. 
 He compromises with Turin as with Rome. He invades Modena as 
 he burns Binasco. He never hesitates : to cut the Gordian knot ia 
 always his method.
 
 68 MEMOIRS 0V NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797, 
 
 Bonaparte could not endure to have his conduct predi- 
 cated ; and enraged at seeing his campaigns depreciated, 
 his glory and that of his army disparaged, 1 and intrigues 
 formed against him in the Club of Clichy, he wrote the 
 following letter to the Directory : 
 
 To THE PRESIDENT OF THE EXECUTIVE DIBECTORY. 
 
 I have just received, Citizens-Directors, a copy of the motion of 
 Dumolard (23d June 1797). 
 
 This motion, printed by order of the Assembly, it is evident, ia 
 directed against me. I was entitled, after having five times con- 
 cluded peace, and given a death-blow to the coalition, if not to civic 
 triumphs, at least to live tranquilly under the protection of the first 
 magistrates of the Republic. At present I find myself ill-treated, 
 persecuted, and disparaged, by every shameful means which their 
 policy brings to the aid of persecution. I would have been indif- 
 ferent to all except that species of opprobrium with which the first 
 magistrates of the Republic endeavour to overwhelm me. After 
 having deserved well of my country by my last act, I am not bound 
 10 hear myself accused in a manner as absurd as atrocious. I have 
 not expected that a manifesto, signed by emigrants, paid by Eng- 
 land, should obtain more credit with the Council of Five Hundred 
 than the evidence of eighty thousand men than mine 1 What 1 
 we were assassinated by traitors upwards of four hundred men 
 perished ; and the first magistrates of the Republic make it a crime 
 to have believed the statement for a moment. Upwards of four 
 hundred Frenchmen were dragged through the streets. They 
 were assassinated before the eyes of the governor of the fort. They 
 were pierced with a thousand blows of stilettos, such as I sent you- 
 and the representatives of the French people cause it to be printed, 
 that if they believed this fact for an instant, they were excusable. 
 I know well there are societies where it is said, "Is this blood, then, 
 so pure ? " 
 
 If only base men, who are dead to the feeling of patriotism and 
 national glory, had spoken of me thus, I would not have com- 
 plained. I would have disregarded it ; but I have a right to com- 
 
 1 The extraordinary folly of the opposition to the Directory in throwing Bona 
 parte on to the side of the Directory, will be seen by reading the speech of Dnmo- 
 lard, BO often referred to by Bourrienne (Thiers, vol. v. pp. 110-111), and by the 
 attempts of Mathieu Dumas to remove the impression that the opposition slighted 
 the fortunate General. (See Dttmas, tome iii. p. 90 ; see also Lanfrey, tome i. pp. 
 287-299).
 
 1797. BONAPARTE'S PROTEST TO THE DIRECTORY. 69 
 
 plain of the degradation to which the first magistrates of the Re 
 public reduce those who have aggrandised, and carried the French 
 name to so high a pitch of glory. Citizens-Directors, I reiterate the 
 demand I made for my dismissal ; I wish to live in tranquillity, if 
 the poniards of Clichy will allow me to live. You have employed 
 me in negotiations. I am not very fit to conduct them. 
 
 About the same time he drew up the following note 
 respecting the affairs of Venice, which was printed with- 
 out the author's name, and circulated through the whole 
 
 army : 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 Bonaparte, pausing before the gates of Turin, Parma, Rome, and 
 Vienna, offering peace when he was sure of obtaining nothing but 
 fresh triumphs Bonaparte, whose every operation exhibits respect 
 for religion, morality, and old age ; who, instead of heaping, as he 
 might have done, dishonour upon the Venetians, and humbling their 
 republic to the earth, loaded her with acts of kindness, and took 
 such great interest in her glory is this the same Bonaparte who is 
 accused of destroying the ancient Government of Venice, and de- 
 mocratising Genoa, and even of interfering in the affairs of the 
 prudent and worthy people of the Swiss Cantons ? Bonaparte had 
 passed the Tagliamento, and entered Germany, when insurrections 
 broke out in the Venetian States ; these insurrections were, there- 
 fore, opposed to Bonaparte's project; surely, then, he could not 
 favour them. When he was in the heart of Germany the Venetians 
 massacred more than four hundred French troops, drove their 
 quarters out of Verona, assassinated the unfortunate Laugier, and 
 presented the spectacle of a fanatical party in arms. He returned 
 to Italy ; and on his arrival, as the winds cease their agitation at 
 the presence of Neptune, the whole of Italy, which was in com- 
 motion, which was in arms, was restored to order. 
 
 However, the deputies from Bonaparte drew up different articles 
 conformable to the situation of the country, and in order to pre- 
 vent, not a revolution in the Government, for the Government was 
 defunct, and had died a natural death, but a crisis, and to save the 
 city from convulsion, anarchy, and pillage. Bonaparte spared a 
 division of his army to save Venice from pillage and massacre. All 
 the battalions were in the streets of Venice, the disturbers were put 
 down, and the pillage discontinued. Property and trade were pre- 
 served, when General Baraguey d'Hilliers entered Venice with his 
 division. Bonaparte, as usual, spared blood, and was the protector
 
 70 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 of Venice. Whilst the French troops remained they conducted 
 themselves peaceably, and only interfered to support the provisional 
 Government. 
 
 Bonaparte could not say to the deputies of Venice, who came to 
 ask his protection and assistance against the populace, who wished 
 to plunder them, ' ' I cannot meddle with your affairs. " He could 
 not say this, for Venice, and all its territories, had really formed 
 the theatre of war ; and, being in the rear of the army of Italy, the 
 Republic of Venice was really under the jurisdiction of that army. 
 The rights of war confer upon a general the powers of supreme 
 police over the countries which are the seat of war. As the great 
 Frederick said, " There are no neutrals where there is war." 
 Ignorant advocates and babblers have asked, in the Club of Clichy, 
 why we occupy the territory of Venice. These declaimers should 
 learn war, and they would know that the Adige, the Brenta, and 
 the Tagliamento, where we have been fighting for two years, are 
 within the Venetian States. But, gentlemen of Clichy, we are at 
 no loss to perceive your meaning. You reproach the army of Italy 
 for having surmounted all difficulties for subduing all Italy for 
 having twice passed the Alps for having marched on Vienna, and 
 obliged Austria to acknowledge the Republic that you, men of 
 Clichy, would destroy. You accuse Bonaparte, I see clearly, for 
 having brought about peace. But I know you, and I speak in the 
 name of eighty thousand soldiers. The time is gone when base 
 advocates and wretched declaimers could induce soldiers to revolt. 
 If, however, you compel them, the soldiers of the army of Italy 
 will soon appear at the Barrier of Clichy, with their General. But 
 woe unto you if they do 1 
 
 Bonaparte having arrived at Palma-Nuova, issued a manifesto on 
 the 3d of May 1797. Arrived at Mestre, where he posted his troops, 
 the Government sent three deputies to him, with a decree of the 
 Great Council, without Bonaparte having solicited it and without 
 his having thought of making any change in the Government of 
 that country. The governor of Venice was an old man, ninety -nine 
 years of age, confined by illness to his apartment. Everyone felt 
 the necessity of renovating this Government of twelve hundred 
 years' existence, and to simplify its machinery, in order to preserve 
 its independence, honour, and glory. It was necessary to deliberate, 
 first, on the manner of renovating the Government ; secondly, on 
 the means of atoning for the massacre of the French, the iniquity 
 of which every one was sensible. 
 
 Bonaparte, after having received the deputation at Mestre, told 
 them that in order to obtain satisfaction for the assassination of his
 
 1707. LETTER FROM THE EMPEROR FRANCIS. 71 
 
 brethren in arms, he wished the Great Council to arrest the inquis- 
 itors. He afterwards granted them an armistice, and appointed 
 Milan as the place of conference. The deputies arrived at Milan 
 on the ... A negotiation commenced to re-establish harmony be- 
 tween the Governments. However, anarchy, with all its horrors, 
 afflicted the city of Venice. Ten thousand Sclavonians threatened 
 to pillage the shops. Bonaparte acquiesced in the proposition sub- 
 mitted by the deputies, who promised to verify the loss which had 
 been sustained by pillage. 
 
 Bonaparte also addressed a manifesto to the Doge, 
 which appeared in all the public papers. It contained 
 fifteen articles of complaint, and was followed by a decree 
 ordering the French Minister to leave Venice, the Venetian 
 agents to leave Lombardy, and the Lion of St. Mark to be 
 pulled down in all the Continental territories of Venice. 
 
 The General-in-Chief now openly manifested his resolu- 
 tion of marching on Paiis ; and this disposition, which 
 was well known in the army, was soon communicated to 
 Vienna. At this period a letter from the Emperor Francis 
 II. to his brother, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, was inter- 
 cepted by Bonaparte. I translated the letter, which proved 
 to him that Francis IE. was acquainted with his project. 
 He likewise saw with pleasure the assurances which the 
 Emperor gave his brother of his love of peace, as well as 
 the wavering of the imperial resolves, and the incertitude 
 respecting the fate of the Italian princes, which the Em- 
 peror easily perceived to depend on Bonaparte. The 
 Emperor's letter was as follows : 
 
 MY DEAR BROTHER I punctually received your third letter, con- 
 taining a description of your unhappy and delicate situation. You 
 may be assured that I perceive it as clearly as you do yourself ; and 
 I pity you the more because, in truth, I do not know what advice to 
 give you. You are. like me, the victim of the former inactivity of 
 the princes of Italy, who ought, at once, to have acted with all their 
 united forces, while I still possessed Mantua. If Bonaparte's pro- 
 ject be, as I learn, to establish republics in Italy, this is likely to 
 nd in spreading republicanism over the whole country. I have
 
 72 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 already commenced negotiations for peace, and the preliminaries 
 are ratified. If the French observe them as strictly as I do, and 
 will do, then your situation will be improved ; but already the 
 French are beginning to disregard them. The principal problem 
 which remains to be solved is, whether the French Directory ap- 
 prove of Bonaparte's proceedings, and whether the latter, as appears 
 by some papers distributed through his army, is not disposed to 
 revolt against his country, which also seems to be probable, from 
 his severe conduct towards Switzerland, notwithstanding the assur- 
 ances of the Directory, that he had been ordered to leave the country 
 untouched. If this should be the case, new and innumerable dif- 
 ficulties may arise. Under these circumstances I can, at present, 
 advise nothing ; for, as to myself, it is only time and the circum- 
 stances of the moment which can point out how I am to act. 
 
 There is nothing new here. We are all well ; but the heat is 
 extraordinary. Always retain your friendship and love for me. 
 Make my compliments to your wife, and believe me ever 
 
 Your best Friend and Brother, 
 FRANCIS. 
 
 HITZEHDOKF, July 80, 1707.
 
 1797. 73 
 
 CHAPTER VH 
 1797. 
 
 Unfounded reports Carnot Capitulation of Mantua General Clarke 
 The Directory yields to Bonaparte Berthier Arrival of Eugene 
 Beauhamais at Milan Comte Delaunay d'Entraigues Hi a inter- 
 view with Bonaparte Seizure of his papers Copy of one describing a 
 conversation between him and Comte de Montgaillard The Em- 
 peror Francis The Prince de Conde and General Pichegru. 
 
 WHILE Bonaparte was expressing his opinion on his cam- 
 paigns and the injustice with which they had been criti- 
 cised, it was generally believed that Carnot dictated to 
 him from a closet in the Luxembourg all the plans of his 
 operations, and that Berthier was at his right hand, with- 
 out whom, notwithstanding Carnot's plans, which were 
 often mere romances, he would have been greatly em- 
 barrassed. This twofold misrepresentation was very cur- 
 rent for some time ; and, notwithstanding it was contrary 
 to the evidence of facts, it met with much credence, par- 
 ticularly abroad. There was, however, no foundation for 
 the opinion. Let us render to Caesar that which is 
 Caesar's due. Bonaparte was a creator in the art of war, 
 and no imitator. That no man was superior to him in 
 that art is incontestable. At the commencement of the 
 glorious campaign in Italy the Directory certainly sent 
 out instructions to him ; but he always followed his own 
 plans, and continually wrote back that all would be lost if 
 movements conceived at a distance from the scene of 
 action were to be blindly executed. He also offered to 
 resign. At length the Directory perceived the impossi- 
 bility of prescribing operations of war according to the
 
 74 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 view of persons in Paris ; and when I became the secretary 
 of the General-in-Chief I saw a despatch of the Directory, 
 dated May, 1796, committing the whole plan of the cam- 
 paign to his judgment ; and assuredly there was not a sin- 
 gle operation or movement which did not originate with 
 him. Carnot was obliged to yield to his firmness. When 
 the Directory, towards the end of 1796, felt disposed to 
 treat for peace, General Clarke, appointed to conclude the 
 armistice, was authorised, in case Mantua should not be 
 taken before the negotiation was brought to a close, to 
 propose leaving the blockade in statu quo. Had such a 
 condition been adopted it would doubtless have been stip- 
 ulated that the Emperor of Austria should be allowed to 
 provision the garrison and inhabitants of the city day by 
 day. Bonaparte, convinced that an armistice without 
 Mantua would by no means conduce to peace, earnestly 
 opposed such a conditon. He carried his point ; Mantua 
 capitulated, and the result is well known. Yet he was 
 not blind to the hazards of war ; while preparing, during 
 the blockade, an assault on Mantua, he wrote thus to the 
 Directory : "A bold stroke of this nature depends abso- 
 lutely for success on a dog or a goose." This was about 
 a question of surprise. 
 
 Bonaparte was exceedingly sensitive to the rumours 
 which reached him respecting Carnot and Berthier. He 
 one day said to me : " What gross stupidity is this? It 
 is very well to say to a general, ' Depart for Italy, gain 
 battles, and sign a peace at Vienna ; ' but the execution 
 that is not so easy. I never attached any value to the 
 plans which the Directory sent me. Too many circum- 
 stances occur on the spot to modify them. The move- 
 ment of a single corps of the enemy's army may confound 
 a whole plan arranged by the fireside. Only fools can 
 believe such stuff. As for Berthier, since you have been 
 with me, you see what he is he is a blockhead. Yet it 
 is he who does it all ; it is he who gathers a great part of
 
 1797. CHARACTER OF BERTHIER. 75 
 
 the glory of the army of Italy." I told him that this 
 erroneous opinion could not last long ; that each person 
 would be allowed his merit, and that at least posterity 
 would judge rightly. This observation seemed to pleas* 
 him. 
 
 Berthier was a man full of honour, courage, and pro- 
 bity, and exceedingly regular in the performance of his 
 duties. Bonaparte's attachment to him arose more from 
 habit than liking. Berthier did not concede with affa- 
 bility, and refused with harshness. His abrupt, egotistic, 
 and careless manners did not, however, create him many 
 enemies, but, at the same time, did not make him many 
 friends. In consequence of our frequent intercourse he 
 had contracted the friendly practice of speaking to me in 
 the second person singular ; but he never wrote to me in 
 that style. He was perfectly acquainted with the disposi- 
 tion of all the corps, and could name their commanders 
 and their respective forces. Day or night he was always 
 at hand and made out with clearness all the secondary 
 orders which resulted from the dispositions of the Gen- 
 eral-in-Chief. In fact, he was an excellent head of the 
 staff of an army ; but that is all the praise that can be 
 given, and indeed he wished for no greater. He had such 
 entire confidence in Bonaparte, and looked up to him 
 with so much admiration, that he never would have pre- 
 sumed to oppose his plans or give any advice. Berthier's 
 talent was very limited, and of a special nature ; his char- 
 acter was one of extreme weakness. Bonaparte's friend- 
 ship for him and the frequency of his name in the bulle- 
 tins and official despatches have unduly elevated his repu- 
 tation. Bonaparte, giving his opinion to the Directory 
 respecting the generals employed in his army, said, " Ber- 
 thier has talents, activity, courage, character all in his 
 favour." This was in 1796. He then made an eagle of 
 him ; at St. Helena he called him a goose. He should 
 neither have raised him so high nor sunk him so low.
 
 76 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 Berthier neither merited the one nor the other. Bona- 
 parte was a man of habit ; he was much attached to all 
 the people about him, and did not like new faces. Ber- 
 thier loved him. He carried out his orders well, and that 
 enabled him to pass off with his small portion of talent. 
 
 It was about this time that young Beauharnais came to 
 Milan. He was seventeen years old. He had lived in 
 Paris with his mother since the departure of Bonaparte. 
 On his arrival he immediately entered the service as aide 
 de camp to the General-in-Chief, who felt for him an affec- 
 tion which was justified by his good qualities. 
 
 Comte Delaunay d'Entraigues, well known in the French 
 Revolution, 1 held a diplomatic post at Venice when that 
 city was threatened by the French. Aware of his being 
 considered the agent of all the machinations then existing 
 against France, and especially against the army of Italy, 
 he endeavoured to escape ; but the city being surrounded, 
 he was seized, together with all his papers. The ap- 
 parently frank manners of the Count pleased Bonaparte, 
 who treated him with indulgence. His papers were 
 restored, with the exception of three relating to political 
 subjects. He afterwards fled to Switzerland, and ungrate- 
 fully represented himself as having been oppressed by 
 Bonaparte. His false statements have induced many 
 writers to make of him an heroic victim. He was assas- 
 sinated by his own servant in 1802. 
 
 I kept a copy of one of his most interesting papers. It 
 has been much spoken of, and Fauche-Borel has, I believe, 
 denied its authenticity and the truth of its contents. The 
 manner in which it fell into the hands of the General-in- 
 Chief, the importance attached to it by d'Entraigues, the 
 differences I have observed between the manuscript I 
 copied and versions which I have since read, and the 
 knowledge of its authenticity, having myself transcribed 
 it from the handwriting of the Count, who in my presence 
 
 i Thiers' French Revolution, v. 113 ; lung, iii. 195 ; Miot de Melito, i. 170.
 
 VICEROY OF ITALY
 
 1797. PICHEGRU AND THE PRINCE DE CONDE. 77 
 
 vouched for the truth of the facts it details all these cir- 
 cumstances induce me to insert it here, and compel me to 
 doubt that it was, as Fauche-Borel asserted, a fabrication. 
 
 This manuscript is en titled, My Conversation urith Comte 
 de Montgaillard, on the th of December 1796, from Six in 
 the Afternoon till Midnight, in the presence of the Abbe 
 Dumontel. 
 
 [On my copy are written the words, " Extracts from 
 this conversation, made by me, from the original." I 
 omitted what I thought unimportant, and transcribed only 
 the most interesting passages. Montgaillard spoke of his 
 escape, of his flight to England, of his return to France, 
 of his second departure, and finally of his arrival at Bale 
 in August 1796.] 
 
 The Prince de Conde soon afterwards, he said, called me to 
 Miilheim, and knowing the connections I had had in France, pro- 
 posed that I should sound General Pichegru, whose headquarters 
 were at Altkirch, where he then was, surrounded by four represen- 
 tatives of the Convention. 
 
 I immediately went to Neufchatel, taking with me four or five 
 hundred louis. I cast my eyes on Fauche-Borel, the King's printer 
 at Neufchatel, and also yours and mine, as the instrument by which 
 to make the first overture, and I selected as his colleague M. Cour- 
 ant, a native of Neufchatel. I persuaded them to undertake the 
 business : I supplied them with instructions and passports. They 
 were foreigners : so I furnished them with all the necessary docu- 
 ments to enable them to travel in France as foreign merchants and 
 purchasers of national property. I went to Bale to wait for news 
 from them. 
 
 On the 13th of August Fauche and Courant set out for the head- 
 quarters at Altkirch. They remained there eight days without find- 
 ing an opportunity to speak to Pichegru, who was surrounded by 
 epresentatives and generals. Pichegru observed them, and seeing 
 them continually wheresoever he went, he conjectured that they 
 had something to say to him, and he called out in a loud voice, 
 while passing them, " lam going to Huningen." Fauche contrived 
 to throw himself in his way at the end of a corridor. Pichegru ob- 
 served him, and fixed his eyes upon him, and although it rained in 
 torrents, he said aloud, ' ' / am going to dine at the ch&teau qf Ma-
 
 78 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 dame Salomon." This chateau was three leagues from Huningen, 
 and Madame Salomon was Pichegru's mistress. 
 
 Fauche set off directly to the chateau, and begged to speak with 
 General Pichegru. He told the general that, being in the posses- 
 sion of some of J. J. Rousseau's manuscripts, he wished to publish 
 them and dedicate them to him. "Very good," said Pichegru ; "but 
 I should like to read them first ; for Ronsseau professed principles 
 of liberty in which I do not concur, and with which I should not 
 like to have my name connected." "But," said Fauche, " I have 
 something else to speak to you about." " What is it, and on whose 
 behalf?" " On behalf of the Prince de Conde." "Be silent, then, 
 and follow me. " 
 
 He conducted Fauche alone into a retired cabinet, and said to 
 him, "Explain yourself; what does Monseigneur le Prince de 
 Conde wish to communicate to me ? " Fauche was embarrassed, 
 and stammered out something unintelligible. " Compose yourself," 
 said Pichegru ; " my sentiments are the same as the Prince de 
 Conde's. What does he desire of me ? " Fauche, encouraged by 
 these words, replied, " The Prince wishes to join you. He counts 
 on you, and wishes to connect himself with you." 
 
 "These are rague and unmeaning words," observed Pichegru. 
 "All this amounts to nothing. Go back, and ask for written in- 
 structions, and return in three days to my headquarters at Altkirch. 
 You will find me alone precisely at six o'clock in the evening." 
 
 Fauche immediately departed, arrived at Bule, and informed me 
 of all that had passed. I spent the night in writing a letter to Gen- 
 eral Pichegru. (The Prince de Conde, who was invested with all 
 the powers of Louis XVIII. , except that of granting the cordon-lieu, 
 had, by a note in his own handwriting, deputed to me all his pow- 
 ers, to enable me to maintain a negotiation with General Piche- 
 gru). 
 
 I therefore wrote to the general, stating, in the outset, every- 
 thing that was calculated to awaken in him that noble sentiment 
 of pride which is the instinct of great minds ; and after pointing 
 out to him the vast good it was in his power to effect, I spoke of the 
 gratitude of the King, and the benefit he would confer on his coun- 
 try by restoring royalty. I told him that his Majesty would make 
 him a marshal of France, and governor of Alsace, as no one could 
 better govern the province than he who had so valiantly defended 
 it. I added that he would have the cordon-rouge, the Chateau de 
 Chambord, with its park, and twelve pieces of cannon taken from 
 the Austrians, a million of ready money, 200,000 livres per annum, 
 and an hotel in Paris ; that the town of Arbois, Pichegru's native
 
 1797. PICHEORU AND THE PRINCE DE CONDE. 79 
 
 place, should bear his name, and be exempt from all taxation for 
 twenty-five years; that a pension of 200,000 livres would be 
 granted to him, with half reversion to his wife, and 50,000 livres to 
 his heirs for ever, until the extinction of his family. Such were 
 the offers, made in the name of the King, to General Pichegru. 
 (Then followed the boons to be granted to the officers and soldiers, 
 an amnesty to the people, etc). I added that the Prince de Conde" 
 desired that he would proclaim the King in the camps, surrender 
 the city of Huniugen to him, and join him for the purpose of march- 
 ing on Parie. 
 
 Pichegru, having read my letter with graat attention, said to 
 Fauche, " This is all very well ; but who is this M. de Montgail- 
 lard who talks of being thus authorised ? I neither know him nor 
 his signature. Is he the author?" "Yes," replied Fauche. 
 " But," said Pichegru, " I must, before making any negotiation on 
 my part, be assured that the Prince de Conde, with whose hand- 
 writing I am well acquainted, approves of all that has been written 
 in his name by M. de Montgaillard. Return directly to M. de 
 Montgaillard, and tell him to communicate my answer to the 
 Prince. 
 
 Fauche immediately departed, leaving M. Courant with Pichegru. 
 He arrived at Bale at nine o'clock in the evening. I set off di- 
 rectly for Miilheim, the Prince de Conde' s headquarters, and ar- 
 rived there at half -past twelve. The Prince was in bed, but I awoke 
 him. He made me sit down by his bedside, and our conference then 
 commenced. 
 
 After having informed the Prince of the state of affairs, all that 
 remained was to prevail on him to write to General Pichegru to con- 
 firm the truth of what had been stated in his name. This matter, 
 which appeared so simple, and so little liable to objection, occupied 
 the whole night. The Prince, as brave a man as can possibly be, 
 inherited nothing from the great Conde but his undaunted courage. 
 In other respects he is the most insignificant of men ; without re- 
 sources of mind, or decision of character ; surrounded by men of me- 
 diocrity, and even baseness ; and though he knows them well, he 
 suffers himself to be governed by them. 
 
 It required nine hours of hard exertion on my part to get him to 
 write to General Pichegru a letter of eight lines. 1st. He did not 
 wish it to be in his handwriting. 2d. He objected to dating it, 3d. 
 He was unwilling to call him General, lest he should recognise the 
 republic by giving that title. 4th. He did not like to address it, or 
 affix his seal to it. 
 
 At length he consented to all, and wrote to Pichegru that he night
 
 80 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 place full confidence in the letters of the Comte de Montgaillard. 
 When all this was settled, after great difficulty, the Prince next 
 hesitated about sending the letter ; but at length he yielded. I 
 set off for Bale, and despatched Fauche to Altkirch, to General 
 Pichegru. 
 
 The general, after reading the letter of eight lines, and recognising 
 the handwriting and signature, immediately returned it to Fauche, 
 saying, ' ' I have seen the signature : that is enough for me. The 
 word of the Prince is a pledge with which every Frenchman ought 
 to be satisfied. Take back his letter." He then inquired what 
 was the Prince's wish. Fauche explained that he wished 1st. 
 That Pichegru should proclaim the King to his troops, and hoist 
 the white flag. 2d. That he should deliver up Huningen to the 
 Prince. Pichegru objected to this. " I will never take part in 
 such a plot," said he ; "I have no wish to make the third volume 
 of La Fayette and Dumouriez. I know my resources ; they are as 
 certain as they are vast. Their roots are not only in my army, but 
 in Paris, in the Convention, in the departments, and in the armies 
 of those generals, my colleagues, who think as I do. I wish to do 
 nothing by halves. There must be a complete end of the present 
 state of things. France cannot continue a Republic. She must 
 have a king, and that king must be Louis XVIIL But we must 
 not commence the counter-revolution until we are certain of effect- 
 ing it. ' Surely and rightly ' is my motto. The Prince's plan leads 
 to nothing. He would be driven from Huningen in four days, and 
 in fifteen I should be lost. My army is composed both of good men 
 and bad. We must distinguish between them, and, by a bold stroke, 
 assure the former of the impossibility of drawing back, and that 
 their only safety lies in success. For this purpose I propose to pass 
 the Rhine, at any place and any time that may be thought neces- 
 sary. In the advance I will place those officers on whom I can de- 
 pend, and who are of my way of thinking. I will separate the bad, 
 and place them in situations where they can do no harm, and their 
 position shall be such as to prevent them from uniting. That done, 
 as soon as I shall be on the other side of the Rhine, I will proclaim 
 the King, and hoist the white flag. Conde's corps and the Emperor's 
 army will then join us. I will immediately repass the Rhine, and 
 re-enter France. The fortresses will be surrendered, and will be 
 held in the King's name by the Imperial troops. Having joined 
 Condi's army, I immediately advance. All my means now develop 
 themselves on every side. We march upon Paris, and in a fort- 
 night will be there. But it is necessary that you should know that 
 you must give the French soldier wine and a crown in his hand if
 
 1797. "FRANCE MUST HAVE A KINO." 81 
 
 you would have him cry Vive le Roi! Nothing must be wanting at 
 the first moment. My army must be well paid as far as the fourth 
 or fifth march in the French territory. There, go and tell all this 
 to the Prince, show my handwriting, and bring me back his 
 answer." 
 
 During these conferences Pichegru was surrounded by four repre- 
 sentatives of the people, at the head of whom was Merlin de Thion- 
 ville, the most insolent and the most ferocious of inquisitors. These 
 men, having the orders of the Committee, pressed Pichegru to pass 
 the Rhine and go and besiege Manheim, where Merlin had an 
 understanding with the inhabitants. Thus, if on the one hand the 
 Committee by its orders made Pichegru wish to hasten the execution 
 of his plan, on the other he had not a moment to lose ; for to delay 
 obeying the orders of the four representatives was to render himself 
 suspected. Every consideration, therefore, called upon the Prince to 
 decide, and decide promptly. Good sense required him also to do 
 another thing, namely, to examine without prejudice what sort of 
 man Pichegru was, to consider the nature of the sacrifice he made, and 
 what were his propositions. Europe acknowledged his talents, and 
 he had placed the Prince in a condition to judge of his good faith. 
 Besides, his conduct and his plan afforded fresh proofs of his 
 sincerity. By passing the Rhine and placing himself between the 
 armies of Conde and Wurmser, he rendered desertion impossible ; 
 and, if success did not attend his attempt, his own acts forced him 
 to become an emigrant. He left in the power of his fierce enemies 
 his wife, his father, his children. Everything bore testimony to 
 his honesty ; the talents he had shown were a pledge for his genius, 
 his genius for his resources ; and the sacrifices he would have to 
 make in case of failure proved that he was confident of success. 
 
 What stupid conceit was it for any one to suppose himself better 
 able to command Pichegru's army than Pichegru himself ! to pre- 
 tend to be better acquainted with the frontier provinces than 
 Pichegru, who commanded them, and had placed his friends in 
 them as commanders of the towns ! This self-conceit, however, 
 ruined the monarchy at this time, as well as at so many others. The 
 Prince de Conde, after reading the plan, rejected it in toto. To 
 render it successful it was necessary to make the Austrians parties 
 to it. This Pichegru exacted, but the Prince of Cond would not 
 hear a word of it, wishing to have confined to himself the glory of 
 effecting the counter-revolution. He replied to Pichegru by a few 
 observations, and concluded his answer by returning to his first 
 plan that Pichegru should proclaim the King without passing the 
 Rhine, and should give up Huningen ; that then the army of Conde 
 VOL. I. 6
 
 82 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 by itself, and without the aid of the Austrians, would join him. In 
 that case he could promise 100,000 crowns in louia, which he had at 
 Bale, and 1,400,000 livres, which he had in good bills payable at 
 sight. 
 
 No argument or entreaty had any effect on the Prince de Conde. 
 The idea of communicating his plan to Wurmser and sharing his 
 glory with him rendered him blind and deaf to every consideration. 
 However, it was necessary to report to Pichegru the observations of 
 the Prince de Conde, and Courant was commissioned to do so. 
 
 Tins document appeared so interesting to me that 
 while Bonaparte was sleeping I was employed in copying 
 it. Notwithstanding posterior and reiterated denials of 
 its truth, I believe it to be perfectly correct. 
 
 Napoleon had ordered plans of his most famous battles 
 to be engraved, and had paid in advance for them. The 
 work was not done quickly enough for him. He got 
 angry, and one day said to his geographer, Bacler d'Albe, 
 whom he liked well enough, " Ah ! do hurry yourself, and 
 think all this is only the business of a moment. If you 
 make further delay you will sell nothing ; everything ia 
 soon forgotten ! " 
 
 We were now in July, and the negotiations were carried 
 on with a tardiness which showed that something was kept 
 in reserve on both sides. Bonaparte at this time was 
 anything but disposed to sign a peace, which he always 
 hoped to be able to make at Vienna, after a campaign in 
 Germany, seconded by the armies of the Rhine and the 
 Sambre-et-Meuse. The minority of the Directory re- 
 commended peace on the basis of the preliminaries, but 
 the majority wished for more honourable and advantage- 
 ous terms ; while Austria, relying on troubles breaking 
 out in France, was in no haste to conclude a treaty. In 
 these circumstances Bonaparte drew up a letter to be sent 
 to the Emperor of Austria, in which he set forth the 
 moderation of France ; but stated that, in consequence of 
 the many delays, nearly all hope of peace had vanished. 
 He advised the Emperor not to rely on difficulties arising
 
 1797. BONAPARTE AND DESAIX. 88 
 
 in France, and doubted, if war should continue and the 
 Emperor be successful in the next campaign, that he 
 would obtain a more advantageous peace than was now at 
 his option. This letter was never sent to the Emperor, 
 but was communicated as the draft of a proposed de- 
 spatch to the Directory. The Emperor Francis, however, 
 wrote an autograph letter to the General-in-Chief of the 
 army of Italy, which will be noticed when I come to the 
 period of its reception. It is certain that Bonaparte at 
 this time wished for war. He was aware that the Cabinet 
 of Vienna was playing with him, and that the Austrian 
 Ministers expected some political convulsion in Paris, 
 which they hoped would be favourable to the Bourbons. 
 He therefore asked for reinforcements. His army consisted 
 of 35,900 men, and he desired it to be raised to 60,000 
 infantry and 10,000 cavalry ready for the field. 
 
 General Desaix, profiting by the preliminaries of Leo- 
 ben, came in the end of July to visit the scene of the army 
 of Italy's triumphs. His conversations with Bonaparte 
 respecting the army of the Rhine were far from giving 
 him confidence in his military situation in Italy, or as- 
 surance of support from that army in the event of hos- 
 tilities commencing beyond the mountains. It was at 
 this period that their intimacy began. Bonaparte con- 
 ceived for Desaix the greatest esteem and the sincerest 
 friendship. 1 When Desaix was named temporary com- 
 mander of the force called the army of England, during 
 the absence of General Bonaparte, the latter wrote to the 
 Directory that they could not have chosen a more dis- 
 tinguished officer than Desaix ; these sentiments he never 
 belied. The early death of Desaix alone could break their 
 union, which, I doubt not, would eventually have had 
 
 1 Desaix, discontented with the conduct of affairs in Germany, seceded from the 
 army of the Rhine, to which he belonged, to join that of Napoleon. Ho was sent to 
 Italy to organise the part of the Egyptian expedition starting from Civita Vecchia. 
 He took with him his two aides de camp, Bapp and Savary (later Due de Bovigo), 
 both of whom, on his death, were given the same post with Bonaparte.
 
 84 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 great influence on the political and military career of 
 General Bonaparte. 
 
 All the world knows the part which the General-in-Chief 
 of the army of Italy took at the famous crisis of the 18th 
 Fructidor ; his proclamation, his addresses to the army, 
 and his celebrated order of the day. Bonaparte went 
 much into detail on this subject at St. Helena ; and I shall 
 now proceed to state what I knew at the time respecting 
 that memorable event, which was in preparation in the 
 month of June.
 
 1797. 85 
 
 CHAPTER 
 1797. 
 
 The royalists of the interior Bonaparte's intention of marching on Paris 
 with 25,000 men His animosity against the emigrants and the 
 Clichy Club His choice between the two parties of the Directory 
 Augereau's order of the day against the word Monsieur Bonaparte 
 wishes to be made one of the five Directors He supports the major- 
 ity of the Directory La Vallette, Augereau, and Bernadotte sent to 
 Paris Interesting correspondence relative to the 18th Fructidor. 
 
 BONAPAETE had long observed the struggle which was go- 
 ing on between the partisans of royalty and the Republic. 
 He was told that royalism was everywhere on the increase. 
 All the generals who returned from Paris to the army 
 complained of the spirit of reaction they had noticed. 
 Bonaparte was constantly urged by his private correspon- 
 dents to take one side or the other, or to act for himself. 
 He was irritated by the audacity of the enemies of the 
 Republic, and he saw plainly that the majority of the 
 councils had an evident ill-will towards him. The orators 
 of the Club of Clichy missed no opportunity of wound- 
 ing his self-love in speeches and pamphlets. They spared 
 no insults, disparaged his success, and bitterly censured 
 his conduct in Italy, particularly with respect to Venice. 
 Thus his services were recompensed by hatred or ingrati- 
 tude. About this time he received a pamphlet, which 
 referred to the judgments pronounced upon him by the 
 German journals, and more particularly by the Spectator 
 of the North, which he always made me translate. 
 
 Bonaparte was touched to the quick by the comparison 
 make between him and Moreau, and by the wish to repre- 
 sent him as foolhardy (" savante sous Moreau, fougueuse
 
 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 sous Buojmparte "). In the term of " brigands," applied 
 to the generals who fought in La Vendee, he thought ha 
 recognized the hand of the party he was about to attack 
 and overthrow. He was tired of the way in which 
 Moreau's system of war was called " savante." But what 
 grieved him still more was to see sitting in the councils 
 of the nation Frenchmen who were detractors and enemies 
 of the national glory. 
 
 He urged the Directory to arrest the emigrants, to 
 destroy the influence of foreigners, to recall the armies, 
 to suppress the journals sold to England, such as the 
 Quotidienne, the Memorial, and the The, which he accused 
 of being more sanguinary than Marat ever was. In case 
 of there being no means of putting a stop to assassinations 
 and the influence of Louis XVHI., he offered to resign. 
 
 His resolution of passing the Alps with 25,000 men and 
 marching by Lyons and Paris was known in the capital, 
 and discussions arose respecting the consequences of this 
 passage of another Rubicon. On the 17th of August 
 1797 Camot wrote to him : " People attribute to you a 
 thousand absurd projects. They cannot believe that a 
 man who has performed so many great exploits can be 
 content to live as a private citizen." This observation 
 applied to Bonaparte's reiterated request to be permitted 
 to retire from the service on account of the state of his 
 health, which, he said, disabled him from mounting his 
 horse, and to the need which he constantly urged of 
 having two years' rest. 
 
 The General-in-Chief was justly of opinion that the 
 tardiness of the negotiations and the difficulties which 
 incessantly arose were founded on the expectation of an 
 event which would change the government of France, 
 and render the chances of peace more favourable to Aus- 
 tria. He still urgently recommended the arrest of the 
 emigrants, the stopping of the presses of the royalist 
 journals, which he said were sold to England and Aus-
 
 1797. BONAPARTE AND TEE DIRECTORY. 87 
 
 tria, and the suppression of the Clichy Club. This club 
 was held at the residence of Gerard Desoddieres, in the 
 Rue de Clichy. Aubry was one of its warmest partisans, 
 and he was the avowed enemy of the revolutionary cause 
 which Bonaparte advocated at this period. Aubry's con- 
 duct at this time, together with the part he had taken in 
 provoking Bonaparte's dismissal in 1795, inspired the 
 General with an implacable hatred of him. 
 
 Bonaparte despised the Directory, which he accused of 
 weakness, indecision, pusillanimity, wasteful expendi- 
 ture, of many errors, and perseverance in a system de- 
 grading to the national glory. 1 He knew that the Clichy 
 
 1 The Directory merited these accusations. The following sketches of two of 
 their official sittings present a singular contrast : 
 
 ' At the time that the Directory were first installed in the Luxembourg (27th 
 October 1795)," says M. Bailleul, ' there was hardly a single article of furniture in it. 
 In a small room, round a little broken table, one of the legs of which had given way 
 from age, on which table they had deposited a quire of letter-paper, and a writing- 
 desk A calamet, which luckily they had had the precaution to bring with them from 
 the Committee of Public Safety, seated on four rush-bottomed chairs, in front of 
 some logs of wood ill-lighted, the whole borrowed from the porter Dupont; who 
 would believe that it was in this deplorable condition that the members of the new 
 Government, after having examined all the difficulties, nay, let me add, all the 
 horrors of their sitnation,resolved to confront all obstacles, and that they would either 
 deliver France from the abyss in which she was plunged or perish in the attempt ? 
 They drew up on a sheet of letter-paper the act by which they declared themselves 
 constituted, and immediately forwarded it to the Legislative Bodies." 
 
 And the Oomte de La Vallette, writing to M. Cuvillier Fleury, says: "I saw our 
 five kings, dressed in the robes of Francis I., his hat, his pantaloons, and his lace : 
 the face of La Reveillere looked like a cork upon two pins, with the black and 
 greasy hair of Clodion. M. de Talleyrand, in pantaloons of the colour of wine dregs, 
 sat in folding chair at the feet of the Director Barras, in the Court of the Petit 
 Luxembourg, and gravely presented to his sovereigns an ambassador from the 
 Grand Duke of Tuscany, while the French were eating his master's dinner, from 
 the soup to the cheese. At the right hand there were fifty musicians and singers 
 of the Opera, Laine, Lays, Begnault, and the actresses, now all dead of old age, 
 roaring a patriotic cantata to the music of Mehul. Facing them, on another 
 elevation, there were two hundred young and beautiful women, with their arms 
 and bosoms bare, all in ecstasy at the majesty of our Pentarchy and the happiness 
 of the Republic. They also wore tight flesh-coloured pantaloons, with rings on 
 their toes. That was a sight that never will be seen again. A fortnight after this 
 magnificent fSte, thousands of families wept over their banished fathers, forty-eight 
 departments were deprived of their representatives, and forty editors of newspapers 
 were forced to go and drink the waters of the Elbe, the Synamary, or the Ohio ! 
 It would be a curious disquisition to. seek to discover what really were at that time 
 the Republic and Liberty."
 
 88 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 party demanded his dismissal and arrest. He was given 
 to understand that Dumolard was one of the most de- 
 cided against him, and that, finally, the royalist party was 
 on the point of triumphing. 
 
 Before deciding for one party or the other Bonaparte 
 first thought of himself. He did not imagine that he had 
 yet achieved enough to venture on possessing himself of 
 that power which certainly he might easily have obtained. 
 He therefore contented himself with joining the party 
 which was, for the moment, supported by public opinion. 
 I know he was determined to march upon Paris with 
 25,000 men had affairs taken a turn unfavourable to the 
 Republic, which he preferred to royalty. He cautiously 
 formed his plan. To defend the Directory was, he con- 
 ceived, to defend his own future fortune ; that is to say, 
 it was protecting a power which appeared to have no 
 other object than to keep a place for him until his re- 
 turn. 
 
 The parties which rose up in Paris produced a reaction 
 in the army. The employment of the word Monsieur had 
 occasioned quarrels, and even bloodshed. General Au- 
 gereau, in whose division these contests had taken place, 
 published an order of the day, setting forth that every 
 individual in his division who should use the word Mon- 
 sieur, either verbally or in writing, under any pretence 
 whatever, should be deprived of his rank, and declared in- 
 capable of serving in the Republican armies. This order 
 was read at the head of each company. 
 
 Bonaparte viewed the establishment of peace as the 
 close of his military career. Repose and inactivity were 
 to him unbearable. He sought to take part in the civil 
 affairs of the Republic, and was desirous of becoming one 
 of the five Directors, convinced that, if he obtained that 
 object, he would speedily stand single and alone. The 
 fulfilment of this wish would have prevented the Egyptian 
 expedition, and placed the imperial crown much sooner
 
 1797. ASPIRES TO THE DIRECTORY. 
 
 upon his head. Intrigues were carried on in Paris in his 
 name, with the view of securing to him a legal dispensation 
 on the score of age. He hoped, though he was but eight- 
 and-twenty, to supersede one of the two Directors who 
 were to go out of office. ' His brothers and their friends 
 made great exertions for the success of the project, which, 
 however, was not officially proposed, because it was too 
 adverse to the prevailing notions of the day, and seemed 
 too early a violation of the constitution of the year III., 
 which, nevertheless, was violated in another way a few 
 months after. 
 
 The members of the Directory were by no means 
 anxious to have Bonaparte for their colleague. They 
 dissembled, and so did he. Both parties were lavish of 
 their mutual assurances of friendship, while they cordially 
 hated each other. The Directory, however, appealed for 
 the support of Bonaparte, which he granted ; but his sub- 
 sequent conduct clearly proves that the maintenance of 
 the constitution of the year HI. was a mere pretext. He 
 indeed defended it meanwhile, because, by aiding the 
 triumph of the opposite party, he could not hope to pre- 
 serve the influence which he exercised over the Directory. 
 I know well that, in case of the Clichy party gaining the 
 ascendency, he was determined to cross the Alps with his 
 army, and to assemble all the friends of the Kepublic at 
 Lyons, thence to march upon Paris. 
 
 In the Memorial of St. Helena it is stated, in reference 
 to the 18th Fructidor, " that the triumph of the majority 
 of the councils was his desire and hope, we are inclined 
 to believe from the following fact, viz., that at the crisis of 
 the contest between the two factions a secret resolution 
 was drawn up by three of the members of the Directory, 
 asking him for three millions to support the attack on the 
 councils, and that Napoleon, under various pretences, did 
 not send the money, though he might easily have done so." 
 
 1 The Directors had to be forty years of age before they could be appointed.
 
 90 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 This is not very comprehensible. There was no secret 
 resolution of the members who applied for the three mill- 
 ions. It was Bonaparte who offered the money, which, 
 however, he did not send ; it was he who despatched 
 Augereau ; and he who wished for the triumph of the 
 Directorial majority. His memory served him badly at 
 St. Helena, as will be seen from some correspondence 
 which I shall presently submit to the reader. It is very 
 certain that he did offer the money to the Directory ; that 
 is to say, to three of its members. 1 Bonaparte had so de- 
 cidedly formed his resolution that on the 17th of July, 
 wishing to make Augereau his confidant, he sent to Vicenr 
 za for him by an extraordinary courier. 
 
 Bonaparte adds that when Bottot, the confidential 
 agent of Barras, came to Passeriano, after the 18th Fruc- 
 tidor, he declared to him that as soon as La Vallette 
 should make him acquainted with the real state of things 
 the money should be transmitted. The inaccuracy of 
 these statements will be seen in the correspondence 
 relative to the event. In thus distorting the truth 
 Napoleon's only object could have been to proclaim his 
 inclination for the principles he adopted and energetically 
 supported from the year 1800, but which, previously to 
 that period, he had with no less energy opposed. 
 
 He decidedly resolved to support the majority of the 
 Directory, and to oppose the royalist faction ; the latter, 
 which was beginning to be important, would have been 
 listened to had it offered power to him. About the end 
 of July he sent his aide de camp La Vallette to Paris. La 
 Vallette was a man of good sense and education, pleasing 
 manners, pliant temper, and moderate opinions. He was 
 decidedly devoted to Bonaparte. With his instructions 
 he received a private cipher to enable him to correspond 
 with the General-in-Chief. 
 
 1 Barras, La R6veill6re-Lcpaux, and Eewbell, the three Directors who carried 
 out the coup d?eiat of the 18th Fructidor against their colleagues Carnot and 
 Barth61emy. (See Thiers' French Revolution, voL v. pp. 114, 139, and 163.)
 
 1797. CORRESPONDENCE WITH AUGEREAU. 91 
 
 Augereau went, after La Vallette, on the 27th of July. 
 Bonaparte officially wrote to the Directory that Augereau 
 " had solicited leave to go to Paris on his own private 
 business." 
 
 But the truth is, Augereau was sent expressly to second 
 the revolution which was preparing against the Clichy par- 
 ty and the minority of the Directory. 
 
 Bonapaiie made choice of Augereau because he knew 
 his staunch republican principles, his boldness, and his 
 deficiency in political talent. He thought him well calcu- 
 lated to aid a commotion, which his own presence with 
 the army of Italy prevented him from directing in person ; 
 and besides, Augereau was not an ambitious rival who 
 might turn events to his own advantage. Napoleon said, 
 at St. Helena, that he sent the addresses of the army of 
 Italy by Augereau because he was a decided supporter of 
 the opinions of the day. That was the true reason for 
 choosing him. 
 
 Bemadotte was subsequently despatched on the same 
 errand. Bonaparte's pretence for sending him was, that 
 he wished to transmit to the Directory four flags, which, 
 out of the twenty-one taken at the battle of Bivoli, had 
 been left, by mistake, at Peschiera. Bernadotte, how- 
 ever, did not take any great part in the affair. He was 
 always prudent. 
 
 The crisis of the 18th Fructidor, which retarded for 
 three years the extinction of the pentarchy, presents one 
 of the most remarkable events of its short existence. It 
 will be seen how the Directors extricated themselves from 
 this difficulty. I subjoin the correspondence relating to 
 this remarkable episode of our Revolution, cancelling only 
 such portions of it as are irrelevant to the subject. It ex- 
 hibits several variations from the accounts given by Napo- 
 leon at St. Helena to his noble companions in misfortune. 
 
 Augereau thus expressed himself on the 18th Fructidor 
 (4th September 1797) :
 
 92 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 At length, General, my mission is accomplished, and the prom* 
 ises of the army of Italy are fulfilled. The fear of being anticipated 
 has caused measures to be hurried. 
 
 At midnight I despatched orders to all the troops to march tow- 
 ards the points specified. Before day all the bridges and principal 
 places were planted with cannon. At daybreak the halls of the 
 councils were surrounded, the guards of the councils were amicably 
 mingled with our troops, and the members, of whom I send you 
 a list, were arrested and conveyed to the Temple. The greater 
 number have escaped, and are being pursued. Carnot has disap- 
 peared. 1 
 
 Paris is tranquil, and every one is astounded at an event which 
 promised to be awful, but which has passed over like a fete. 
 
 The stout patriots of the faubourgs proclaim the safety of the Re- 
 public, and the black collars are put down. It now remains for the 
 wise energy of the Directory and the patriots of the two councils to 
 do the rest. The place of sitting is changed, and the first opera- 
 tions promise well. This event is a great step towards peace ; which 
 it is your task finally to secure to us. 
 
 On the 24th Fructidor (10th September 1797) Auge- 
 reau writes : 
 
 My aide de camp, de Verine, will acquaint you with the events of 
 the 18th. He is also to deliver to you some despatches from the 
 Directory, where much uneasiness is felt at not hearing from you. 
 No less uneasiness is experienced on seeing in Paris one of your 
 aides de camp^ whose conduct excites the dissatisfaction and dis- 
 trust of the patriots, towards whom he has behaved very ill. 
 
 The news of General Clarke's recall will have reached you by this 
 time, and I suspect has surprised you. Amongst the thousand and 
 one motives which have determined the Government to take this 
 step may be reckoned his correspondence with Carnot, which has 
 been communicated to me, and in which he treated the generals of 
 the army of Italy as brigands. 
 
 Moreau has sent the Directory a letter which throws a new light 
 on Pichegru's treason. Such baseness is hardly to be conceived. 
 
 The Government perseveres in maintaining the salutary meas- 
 ures which it has adopted. I hope it will be in vain for the rem- 
 
 1 In 1824 Louis XVIII. sent letters of nobility to those members of the two coun- 
 cils who were, as it was termed, fruclidorised. Bourrienne. 
 * La Vallette.
 
 1797. CORRESPONDENCE WITH BERNADOTTE. 93 
 
 nant of the factions to renew their plots. The patriots will continue 
 united. 
 
 Fresh troops having been summoned to Paris, and my presence 
 at their head being considered indispensable by the Government, I 
 Bhall not have the satisfaction of seeing you so soon as I hoped. 
 This has determined me to send for my horses and carriages, which 
 I left at Milan. 
 
 Bernadotte wrote to Bonaparte on the 24th Fructidor as 
 follows : 
 
 The arrested deputies are removed to Rochefort, where they will 
 be embarked for the island of Madagascar. Paris is tranquil. The 
 people at first heard of the arrest of the deputies with indifference. 
 A feeling of curiosity soon drew them into the streets ; enthusiasm 
 followed, and cries of Vive la Republique, which had not been heard 
 for a long time, now resounded in every street. The neighbouring 
 departments have expressed their discontent. That of Allier has, 
 it is said, protested ; but it will cut a fine figure. Eight thousand 
 men are marching to the environs of Paris. Part is already within 
 the precincts, under the orders of General Lemoine. The Govern- 
 ment has it at present in its power to elevate public spirit ; but 
 everybody feels that it is necessary the Directory should be sur- 
 rounded by tried and energetic Republicans. Unfortunately a host 
 of men, without talent and resources, already suppose that what 
 has taken place has been done only in order to advance their inter- 
 ests. Time is necessary to set all to rights. The armies have re- 
 gained consistency. The soldiers of the interior are esteemed, or 
 at least feared. The emigrants fly, and the non-juring priests con- 
 ceal themselves. Nothing could have happened more fortunately 
 to consolidate the Republic. 
 
 Bonaparte wrote as follows, to the Directory on the 
 26th Fructidor : - 
 
 Herewith you will receive a proclamation to the army, relative to 
 the events of the 18th. I have despatched the 45th demi-brigade, 
 eommanded by General Bon, to Lyons, together with fifty cavalry ; 
 also General Lannes, with the 20th light infantry and the 9th regi- 
 ment of the line, to Marseilles. I have issued the enclosed procla- 
 mation in the southern departments. I am about to prepare a 
 proclamation for the inhabitants of Lyons, as soon as I obtain some 
 information of what may have passed there.
 
 94 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 If I find there is the least disturbance, I will march there with 
 the utmost rapidity. Believe that there are here a hundred thous- 
 and men, who are alone sufficient to make the measures you have 
 taken to place liberty on a solid basis be respected. What avails it 
 that we gain victories if we are not respected in our country. In 
 speaking of Paris, one may parody what Cassius said of Rome : "Of 
 what use to call her queen on the banks of the Seine, when she is 
 the slave of Pitt's gold ?" 
 
 After the 18th Fructidor Augereau wished to have his 
 reward for his share in the victory, and for the service 
 which he had rendered. He wished to be a Director. 
 He got, however, only the length of being a candidate ; 
 honour enough for one who had merely been an instru- 
 ment on that day.
 
 1797. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Bonaparte's joy at the result of the 18th Fructidor. His letter to Au- 
 gereau His correspondence with the Directory and proposed resigna- 
 tionExplanation of the Directory Bottot General Clarke Let- 
 ter from Madame Bacciocchi to Bonaparte Autograph letter of the 
 Emperor Francis to Bonaparte Arrival of Count Cobentzel Auto- 
 graph note of Bonaparte on the conditions of peace. 
 
 BONAPARTE was delighted when he heard of the happy 
 issue of the 18th Fructidor. Its result was the dissolu- 
 tion of the Legislative Body and the fall of the Clichyan 
 party, which for some months had disturbed his tranquil- 
 lity. The Clichyans had objected to Joseph Bonaparte's 
 right to sit as deputy for Liamone in the Council of Five 
 Hundred. 1 His brother's victory removed the difficulty ; 
 but the General-in-Chief soon perceived that the ascend- 
 ant party abused its power, and again compromised the 
 safety of the Republic, by recommencing the Revolution- 
 ary Government. The Directors were alarmed at his dis- 
 content and offended by his censure. They conceived the 
 singular idea of opposing to Bonaparte, Augereau, of 
 whose blind zeal they had received many proofs. The 
 Directory appointed Augereau commander of the army 
 of Germany. Augereau, whose extreme vanity was 
 notorious, believed himself in a situation to compete with 
 Bonaparte. What he built his arrogance on was, that, 
 with a numerous troop, he had arrested some unarmed 
 
 1 He was ambassador to Rome, and not a deputy at this time. When he became a 
 member of the council, after his return from Rome, he experienced no oppoaitio* 
 (JBovrrienne et set Erreurs, tome i. p, 240).
 
 96 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 representatives, and torn the epaulettes from the shoul- 
 ders of the commandant of the guard of the councils. 
 The Directory and he filled the headquarters at Passeriano 
 with spies and intriguers. 
 
 Bonaparte, who was informed of everything that was 
 going on, laughed at the Directory, and tendered his resig- 
 nation, in order that he might be supplicated to continue 
 in command. 
 
 The following post-Thermidorian letters will prove that 
 the General's judgment on this point was correct. 
 
 On the 2d Vendemiaire, year VI. (23d September 1797), 
 he wrote to Augereau, after having announced the arrival 
 of his aide de camp as follows : 
 
 The whole army applauds the wisdom and vigour which you have 
 displayed upon this important occasion, and participates in the suc- 
 cess of the country with the enthusiasm and energy which charac- 
 terise our soldiers. It is only to be hoped, however, that the Gov- 
 ernment will not be playing at see-saw, and thus throw itself into 
 the opposite party. Wisdom and moderate views alone can establish 
 the happiness of the country on a sure foundation. As for myself, 
 this is the most ardent wish of my heart. I beg that you will some- 
 times let me know what you are doing in Paris. 
 
 On the 4th Vendemiaire Bonaparte wrote a letter to the 
 Directory in the following terms : 
 
 The day before yesterday an officer arrived at the army from 
 Paris. He reported that he left Paris on the 25th, when anxiety 
 prevailed there as to the feelings with which I viewed the events of 
 the 18th. He was the bearer of a sort of circular from General 
 Augereau to all the generals of division ; and he brought a letter of 
 credit from the Minister of War to the commissary -general, author- 
 ising him to draw as much money as he might require for his 
 journey. 
 
 It is evident from these circumstances that the Government is 
 acting towards me in somewhat the same way in which Pichegru 
 was dealt with after Vendemiaire (year IV.). 
 
 I beg of you to receive my resignation, and appoint another to 
 my place. No power on earth shall make me continue in the ser-
 
 1797. BONAPARTE PROFFERS HIS RESIGNATION. 97 
 
 vice after this shocking mark of ingratitude on the part of the Gov- 
 ernment, which I was very far from expecting. My health, which 
 is considerably impaired, imperiously demands repose and tran- 
 quillity. 
 
 The state of my mind, likewise, requires me to mingle again in 
 the mass of citizens. Great power has for a longtime been confided 
 to my hands. I have employed it on all occasions for the advantage 
 of my country ; so much the worse for those who put no faith in vir- 
 tue, and may have suspected mine. My recompense is in my own 
 conscience, and in the opinion of posterity. 
 
 Now that the country is tranquil and free from the dangers which 
 have menaced it, I can, without inconvenience, quit the post in 
 which I have been placed. 
 
 Be sure that if there were a moment of danger, I would be found 
 in the foremost rank of the defenders of liberty and of the constitu- 
 tion of the year IIL 
 
 The Directory, judging from the account which Bottot J 
 gave of his mission that he had not succeeded in entirely 
 removing the suspicions of Bonaparte, wrote the following 
 letter on the 30th Vendemiaire : 
 
 The Directory has itself been troubled about the impression made 
 on you by the letter to the paymaster-general, of which an aide de 
 camp was the bearer. The composition of this letter has very much 
 astonished the Government, which never appointed nor recognised 
 such an agent : it is at least an error of office. But it should not 
 alter the opinion you ought otherwise to entertain of the manner in 
 which the Directory thinks of and esteems you. It appears that the 
 18th Fructidor was misrepresented in the letters which were sent to 
 the army of Italy. You did well to intercept them, and it may be 
 right to transmit the most remarkable to the Minister of Police. 2 
 
 In your observations on the too strong tendency of opinion towards 
 military government, the Directory recognises an equally enlight- 
 ened and ardent friend of the Republic. 
 
 Nothing is wiser than the maxim, cedant arma toga, for the main- 
 tenance of republics. To show so much anxiety on so important a 
 point is not one of the least glorious features in the life of a general 
 placed at the head of a triumphant army. 
 
 See p. 79. 
 
 * What an ignoble task to propose to the conqueror of Italy 1 
 
 VOL. I. 7
 
 98 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 The Directory had sent General Clarke l to treat for 
 peace, as second plenipotentiary. Bonaparte has often 
 told me he had no doubt from the time of his arrival that 
 General Clarke was charged with a secret mission to act 
 as a spy upon him, and even to arrest him if an oppor- 
 tunity offered for so doing without danger. That he had 
 a suspicion of this kind is certain ; but I must own that I 
 was never by any means able to discover its grounds ; for 
 in all my intercourse since with Clarke he never put a 
 single question to me, nor did I ever hear a word drop 
 from his mouth, which savoured of such a character. If 
 the fact be that he was a spy, he certainly played his part 
 well. In all the parts of his correspondence which were 
 intercepted there never was found the least confirmation 
 of this suspicion. Be this as it may, Bonaparte could not 
 endure him ; he did not make him acquainted with what 
 was going on, and his influence rendered this mission a 
 mere nullity. The General-in-Chief concentrated all the 
 business of the negotiation in his own closet ; and, as to 
 what was going on, Clarke continued a mere cipher until 
 the 18th Fructidor, when he was recalled. Bonaparte 
 made but little count of Clarke's talents. It is but justice, 
 however, to say that he bore him no grudge for the con- 
 duct of which he suspected he was guilty in Italy. "I 
 pardon him because I alone have the right to be offended.* 
 
 He even had the generosity to make interest for an of- 
 ficial situation for him. These amiable traits were not 
 uncommon with Bonaparte. 
 
 Bonaparte had to encounter so many disagreeable con- 
 trarieties, both in the negotiators for peace and the events 
 at Paris, that he often displayed a good deal of irritation 
 and disgust. This state of mind was increased by the 
 recollection of the vexation his sister's marriage had 
 
 1 H. J. G. Clarke, afterwards Minister of War under Napoleon, 1807-1814, and 
 under tlie Bourbons in 1816, when he was made a Marshal of France. He was 
 created Due de Feltre in 1809.
 
 1797. LETTER FROM MADAME BACCIOCCHI. 99 
 
 caused him, and which was unfortunately revived by a 
 letter he received from her at this juncture. His excite- 
 .vuent was such that he threw it down with an expression 
 of anger. It has been erroneously reported in several 
 publications that " Bacciocchi espoused Marie-Anne-Eliza 
 Bonaparte on the 5th of May 1797. The brother of the 
 bride was at the time negotiating the preliminaries of 
 peace with Austria." 
 
 In fact, the preliminaries were signed in the month of 
 April, and it was for the definitive peace we were negotiat- 
 ing in May. But the reader will find by the subjoined 
 letter that Christine applied to her brother to stand god- 
 father to her third child. Three children in three months 
 would be rather quick work. 
 
 AJACCIO, 14tft Thermidor^ year V. (1st August 1797). 
 
 GENERAL Suffer me to write to you and call you by the name of 
 brother. My first child was born at a time when you were much 
 incensed against us. I trust she may soon caress you, and so make 
 you forget the pain my marriage has occasioned you. My second 
 child was still-born. Obliged to quit Paris by your order, 1 I mis- 
 carried in Germany. In a month's time I hope to present you with 
 a nephew. A favourable time, and other circumstances, incline me 
 to hope my next will be a boy, and I promise you 1 will make a 
 soldier of him ; but I wish him to bear your name, aud that you 
 should be his godfather. I trust you will not refuse youi sister's 
 request. 
 
 Will you send, for this purpose, your power of attorney to Blic- 
 ciocchi, or to whomsoever you think fit ? I shall expect with im- 
 patience your assent. Because we are poor let not that cause you to 
 despise us ; for, after all, you are our brother, mine are the only 
 children that call you uncle, and we all love you more than we do 
 the favours of fortune. Perhaps I may one day succeed in con- 
 vincing you of the love I bear you. Your affectionate sister, 
 
 CHRISTINE BONAPARTE.* 
 
 P.S. Do not fail to remember me to your wife, whom I strongly 
 
 1 Napoleon had written in August 1796 to Carnot, to request that Lucien might be 
 rdered to quit Paris ; see rung, tome iii. p. 222. 
 
 a Madame Bacciocehi went by the name of Marianne at St. Cyr, of Christine whiia 
 on her travels, and of Eliza under the Consulate. Bourrienne.
 
 100 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797 
 
 desire to be acquainted with. They told me at Paris I was very like 
 her. If you recollect my features you can judge. C. B. 
 
 This letter is in the handwriting of Lucien Bonaparte.' 
 General Bonaparte had been near a month at Passeriano 
 
 when he received the following autograph letter from the 
 
 Emperor of Austria : 
 
 To MONSIEUR LE GENERAL BONAPARTE, GENERAL-IN-CHIEF 
 OF THE ARMY OF ITALY. 
 
 MONSIEUR LE G&N&RAL BONAPARTE When I thought I had 
 given my plenipotentiaries full powers to terminate the important 
 negotiation with which they were charged, I learn, with as much 
 pain as surprise, that in consequence of swerving continually from 
 the stipulations of the preliminaries, the restoration of tranquillity, 
 with the tidings of which I desire to gladden the hearts of my sub- 
 jects, and which the half of Europe devoutly prays for, becomes 
 day after day more uncertain. 
 
 Faithful to the performance of my engagements, I am ready to 
 execute what was agreed to at Leoben, and require from you but the 
 reciprocal performance of so sacred a duty. This is what has already 
 been declared in my name, and what I do not now hesitate myself 
 to declare. If, perhaps, the execution of some of the preliminary 
 articles be now impossible, in consequence of the events which have 
 since occurred, and in which I had no part, it may be necessary to 
 substitute others in their stead equally adapted to the interests and 
 equally conformable to the dignity of the two nations. To such 
 alone will I put my hand. A frank and sincere explanation, dic- 
 tated by the same feelings which govern me, is the only way to lead 
 to so salutary a result. In order to accelerate this result as far as in 
 me lies, and to put an end at once to the state of uncertainty we re- 
 main in, and which has already lasted too long, I have determined 
 to despatch to the place of the present negotiations Comte de Co- 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte in his Notes says, " It is false that Madame Bonaparte ever 
 called herself Christine ; it is false that she ever wrote the letter of which M. d 
 Bourrienne here gives a copy." It will be observed that Bourrienne says it was 
 written by her brother Lucien. This is an error. The letter is obviously from 
 Christine Boyer, the wife of Lucien Bonaparte, whose marriage had given such dis- 
 pleasure to Napoleon. (See Erreurs, tome i. p. 240, and lung's Lucien, tome i. 
 P. 151). j
 
 1797. THE AUSTRIAN PROPOSALS, 101 
 
 bentzel, a man who possesses my most unlimited confidence, and 
 who is instructed as to my intentions and furnished with my most 
 ample powers. I have authorised him to receive and accept every 
 proposition tending to the reconciliation of the two parties which 
 may be in conformity with the principles of equity and reciprocal 
 fitness, and to conclude accordingly. 
 
 After this fresh assurance of the spirit of conciliation which ani- 
 mates me, I doubt not you will perceive that peace lies in your own 
 hands, and that on your determination will depend the happiness 
 or misery of many thousand men. If I mistake as to the means I 
 think best adapted to terminate the calamities which for along time 
 have desolated Europe, I shall at least have the consolation of re- 
 flecting that I have done all that depended on me. With the con- 
 sequences which may result I can never be reproached. 
 
 I have been particularly determined to the course I now take by 
 the opinion I entertain of your upright character, and by the per- 
 sonal esteem I have conceived towards you, of which I am very 
 happy, M. le General Bonaparte, to give you here an assurance. 
 
 (Signed) FRANCIS. 
 VIENNA, 20i September 1797. 
 
 In fact, it was only on the arrival of the Comte de 
 Cobentzel that the negotiations were seriously set on foot. 
 Bonaparte had all along clearly perceived that Gallo and 
 Meerweldt were not furnished with adequate powers. He 
 saw also clearly enough that if the month of September 
 were to be trifled away in unsatisfactory negotiations, as the 
 month which preceded it had been, it would be difficult 
 in October to strike a blow at the house of Austria on the 
 side of Carinthia. The Austrian Cabinet perceived with 
 satisfaction the approach of the bad weather, and insisted 
 more strongly on its ultimatum, which was the Adige, 
 with Venice. 
 
 Before the 18th Fructidor the Emperor of Austria hoped 
 that the movement which was preparing in Paris would 
 operate badly for France and favourably to the European 
 cause. The Austrian plenipotentiaries, in consequence, 
 raised their pretensions, and sent notes and an ultimatum 
 which gave the proceedings more an air of trifling than of
 
 102 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 serious negotiation. Bonaparte's original ideas, which I 
 have under his hand, were as follows : 
 
 1. The Emperor to have Italy as far as the Adda. 
 
 2. The King of Sardinia as far as the Adda. 
 
 3. The Genoese Republic to have the boundary of Tor- 
 tona as far as the Po (Tortona to be demolished), as also 
 the imperial fiefs. (Coni to be ceded to France, or to be 
 demolished.) 
 
 4. The Grand Duke of Tuscany to be restored. 
 
 5. The Duke of Parma to be restored.
 
 1797. 103 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 1797. 
 
 Influence of the 18th Frnctidor on the negotiations Bonaparte's sus- 
 picion of Bottot His complaints respecting the non-erasure oi 
 Bourrienne Bourrienne's conversation with the Marquis of Gallo 
 Bottot writes from Paris to Bonaparte on the part of the Directory 
 Agents of the Directory employed to watch Bonaparte Influence of 
 the weather on the conclusion of peace Remarkable observation of 
 Bonaparte Conclusion of the treaty The Directory dissatisfied 
 with the terms of the peace Bonaparte's predilection for representa- 
 tive government Opinion on Bonaparte. 
 
 AFTER the 18th Fructidor Bonaparte was more powerful, 
 Austria less haughty and confident. Venice was the only 
 point of real difficulty. Austria wanted the line of the 
 Adige, with Venice, in exchange for Mayence, and the 
 boundary of the Rhine until that river enters Holland. 
 The Directory wished to have the latter boundary, and to 
 add Mantua to the Italian Republic, without giving up all 
 the line of the Adige and Venice. The difficulties were 
 felt to be so irreconcilable that within about a month of 
 the conclusion of peace the Directory wrote to General 
 Bonaparte that a resumption of hostilities was preferable 
 to the state of uncertainty which was agitating and ruin- 
 ing France. The Directory, therefore, declared that both 
 the armies of the Rhine should take the field. It appears 
 from the Fructidorian correspondence, which has been 
 already given, that the majority of the Directory then 
 looked upon a peace such as Bonaparte afterwards made 
 as infamous. 
 
 But Bonaparte, from the moment the Venetian insur- 
 rection broke out, perceived that Venice might be used
 
 104 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 for the pacification. Bonaparte, who was convinced that, 
 in order to bring matters to an issue, Venice and the 
 territory beyond the Adige must fall beneath the Haps- 
 burg sceptre, wrote to the Directory that he could not 
 commence operations, advantageously, before the end of 
 March, 1798 ; but that if the objections to giving Venice 
 to the Emperor of Austria were persisted in, hostilities 
 would certainly be resumed in the month of October, for 
 the Emperor would not renounce Venice. In that case it 
 would be necessary to be ready on the Rhine for an ad- 
 vance in Germany, as the army of Italy, if it could make 
 head against the Archduke Charles, was not sufficiently 
 strong for any operations on a grand scale. At this period 
 the conclusion of peace was certainly very doubtful ; it 
 was even seriously considered in what form the rupture 
 should be notified. 
 
 Towards the end of September Bottot, Barras' secretary, 
 arrived at Passeriano. He was despatched by the Direc- 
 tory. Bonaparte immediately suspected he was a new spy, 
 come on a secret mission, to watch him. He was there- 
 fore received and treated with coolness ; but Bonaparte 
 never had, as Sir Walter Scott asserts, the idea of order- 
 ing him to be shot. That writer is also in error when he 
 says that Bottot was sent to Passeriano to reproach Bona- 
 parte for failing to fulfil his promise of sending money to 
 the Directory. 
 
 Bonaparte soon gave Bottot an opportunity of judging 
 of the kind of spirit which prevailed at headquarters. He 
 suddenly tendered his resignation, which he had already 
 several times called upon the Directory to accept. He 
 accused the Government, at table, in Bottot's presence, of 
 horrible ingratitude. He recounted all his subjects of 
 complaint, in loud and impassioned language, without any 
 restraint, and before twenty or thirty persons. 
 
 Indignant at finding that his reiterated demands for the 
 erasure of my name from the list of emigrants had been
 
 1797. THE MARQUIS DE GALLO. 105 
 
 slighted, and that, in spite of his representations, con- 
 veyed to Paris by General Bernadotte, Louis Bonaparte, 
 and others, I was still included in that fatal list, he apos- 
 trophised M. Bottot at dinner one day, before forty indi- 
 viduals, among whom were the diplomatists Gallo, Co- 
 bentzel, and Meerweldt. The conversation turned upon 
 the Directory. " Yes, truly," cried Bonaparte, in a loud 
 voice, "I have good reason to complain; and, to pass 
 from great to little things, look, I pray you, at Bourri- 
 enne's case. He possesses my most unbounded confidence. 
 He alone is entrusted, under my orders, with all the de- 
 tails of the negotiation. This you well know ; and yet 
 your Directory will not strike him off the list. In a word, 
 it is not only an inconceivable, but an extremely stupid 
 piece of business ; for he has all my secrets ; he knows 
 my ultimatum, and could by a single word realize a hand- 
 some fortune, and laugh at your obstinacy. Ask M. de 
 Gallo if this be not true." 
 
 Bottot wished to offer some excuse ; but the general 
 murmur which followed this singular outburst reduced 
 him to silence. 
 
 The Marquis de Gallo had conversed with me but 
 three days before, in the park of Passeriano, on the sub- 
 ject of my position with regard to France, of the de- 
 termination expressed by the Directory not to erase my 
 name, and of the risk I thereby ran. " We have no 
 desire," continued he, " to renew the war ; we wish sin- 
 cerely for peace ; but it must be an honourable one. The 
 Republic of Venice presents a large territory for partition, 
 which would be sufficient for both parties. The cessions 
 at present proposed are not, however, satisfactory. We 
 want to know Bonaparte's ultimatum ; and I am author- 
 ised to offer an estate in Bohemia, with a title and 
 residence, and an annual revenue of 90,000 florins." 
 
 I quickly interrupted M. de Gallo, and assured him 
 that both my conscience and my duty obliged me to
 
 106 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 reject his proposal ; and so put at once an end to the 
 conversation. 
 
 I took care to let the General-in-Chief know this story, 
 and he was not surprised at my reply. His conviction, 
 however, was strong, from all that M. de Gallo had said, 
 and more particularly from the offer he had made, that 
 Austria was resolved to avoid war, and was anxious for 
 peace. 
 
 After I had retired to rest M. Bottot came to my bed- 
 room and asked me, with a feigned surprise, if it was true 
 that my name was still on the list of emigrants. On my 
 replying in the affirmative, he requested me to draw up a 
 note on the subject. This I declined doing, telling him 
 that twenty notes of the kind he required already ex- 
 isted ; that I would take no further steps ; and that I 
 would henceforth await the decision in a state of perfect 
 inaction. 
 
 General Bonaparte thought it quite inexplicable that 
 the Directory should express dissatisfaction at the view 
 he took of the events of the 18th Fructidor, as, with- 
 out his aid, they would doubtless have been overcome. 
 He wrote a despatch, in which he repeated that his health 
 and his spirits were affected that he had need of some 
 years' repose that he could no longer endure the fatigue 
 of riding ; but that the prosperity and liberty of his 
 country would always command his warmest interests. In 
 all this there was not a single word of truth. The Direc- 
 tory thought as much, and declined to accept his resig- 
 nation in the most flattering terms. 
 
 Bottot proposed to him, on the part of the Directory, to 
 revolutionise Italy. The General inquired whether the 
 whole of Italy would be included in the plan. The revolu- 
 tionary commission had, however, been entrusted to 
 Bottot in so indefinite a way that he could only hesitate, 
 and give a vague reply. Bonaparte wished for more pre- 
 cise orders. In the interval peace was concluded, and the
 
 1797. BONAPARTE DISTRUSTS IHK DIRECTORY. 107 
 
 idea of that perilous and extravagant undertaking was no 
 longer agitated. Bottot, soon after his return to Paris, 
 wrote a letter to General Bonaparte, in which he com- 
 plained that the last moments he had passed at Passeriano 
 had deeply afflicted his heart He said that cruel sus- 
 picions had followed him even to the gates of the Directory. 
 These cruel suspicions had, however, been dissipated by the 
 sentiments of admiration and affection which he had found 
 the Directory entertained for the person of Bonaparte. 
 
 These assurances, which were precisely what Bonaparte 
 had expected, did not avail to lessen the contempt he 
 entertained for the heads of the Government, nor to 
 change his conviction of their envy and mistrust of him- 
 self. To their alleged affection he made no return. 
 Bottot assured the hero of Italy of " the Republican 
 docility" of the Directory, and touched upon the re- 
 proaches Bonaparte had thrown out against them, and 
 upon his demands which had not been granted. He 
 said: 
 
 " The three armies, of the North, of the Rhine, and of 
 the Sambre-et-Meuse, are to form only one, the army of 
 Germany. Augereau ? But you yourself sent him. The 
 fault committed by the Directory is owing to yourself ! 
 Bernadotte ? he is gone to join you. Cacault ? he is 
 recalled. Twelve thousand men for your army? they 
 are on their march. The treaty with Sardinia? it is 
 ratified. Bourrienne? he is erased. The revolution of 
 Italy ? it is adjourned. Advise the Directory, then : I 
 repeat it, they have need of information, and it is to you 
 they look for it." 
 
 The assertion regarding me was false. For six months 
 Bonaparte demanded my erasure without being able to 
 obtain it. I was not struck off the list until the llth of 
 November 1797. 
 
 Just before the close of the negotiation Bonaparte, dis- 
 gusted at the opposition and difficulties with which he was
 
 108 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 surrounded, reiterated again and again the offer of his 
 resignation, and his wish to have a successor appointed. 
 What augmented his uneasiness was an idea he enter- 
 tained that the Directory had penetrated his secret, and 
 attributed his powerful concurrence on the 18th Fructi- 
 dor to the true cause his personal views of ambition. In 
 spite of the hypocritical assurances of gratitude made to 
 him in writing, and though the Directory knew that his 
 services were indispensable, spies were employed to watch 
 his movements, and to endeavour by means of the persons 
 about him to discover his views. Some of the General's 
 friends wrote to him from Paris, and for my part I never 
 ceased repeating to him that the peace, the power of mak- 
 ing which he had in his own hands, would render him far 
 more popular than the renewal of hostilities undertaken 
 with all the chances of success and reverse. The signing 
 of the peace, according to his own ideas, and in opposi- 
 tion to those of the Directory, the way in which he just 
 halted at Rastadt, and avoided returning to the Congress, 
 and, finally, his resolution to expatriate himself with an 
 army in order to attempt new enterprises, sprung more than 
 is generally believed from the ruling idea that he was dis- 
 trusted, and that his ruin was meditated. He often re- 
 called to mind what La Vallette had written to him about 
 his conversation with Lacuee ; and all he saw and heard 
 confirmed the impression he had received on this subject 
 The early appearance of bad weather precipitated his 
 determination. On the 13th of October, at daybreak, on 
 opening my window, I perceived the mountains covered 
 with snow. The previous night had been superb, and the 
 autumn till then promised to be fine and late. I pro- 
 ceeded, as I always did, at seven o'clock in the morning, 
 to the General's chamber. I woke him, and told him 
 what I had seen. He feigned at first to disbelieve me, 
 then leaped from his bed, ran to the window, and, con- 
 vinced of the sudden change, he calmly said, " What ! be-
 
 1797. RESULTS OF THE CAMPAIGN. 109 
 
 fore the middle of October ! What a country is this ! 
 Well, we must make peace ! " While he hastily put on 
 his clothes I read the journals to him, as was my daily 
 custom. He paid but little attention to them. 
 
 Shutting himself up with me in his closet, he reviewed 
 with the greatest care all the returns from the different 
 corps of his army. "Here are," said he, "nearly 80,000 
 effective men. I feed, I pay them : but I can bring but 
 60,000 into the field on the day of battle. I shall gain it, 
 but afterwards my force will be reduced 20,000 men 
 by killed, wounded, and prisoners. Then how oppose all 
 the Austrian forces that will march to the protection of 
 Vienna ? It would be a month before the armies of the 
 Rhine could support me, if they should be able ; and in a 
 fortnight all the roads and passages will be covered deep 
 with snow. It is settled I will make peace. Venice 
 shall pay for the expense of the war and the boundary of 
 the Rhine : let the Directory and the lawyers say what 
 they like." 
 
 He wrote to the Directory in the following words : "The 
 summits of the hills are covered with snow ; I cannot, on 
 account of the stipulations agreed to for the recommence- 
 ment of hostilities, begin before five-and-twenty days, and 
 by that time we shall be overwhelmed with snow." 
 
 Fourteen years after, another early winter, in a more 
 severe climate, was destined to have a fatal influence on 
 his fortunes. Had he but then exercised equal foresight ! 
 
 It is well known that, by the treaty of Campo-Formio, 
 the two belligerent powers made peace at the expense of 
 the Republic of Venice, which had nothing to do with the 
 quarrel in the first instance, and which only interfered at 
 a late period, probably against her own inclination, and 
 impelled by the force of inevitable circumstances. But 
 what has been the result of this great political spoliation ? 
 A portion of the Venetian territory was adjudged to the 
 Cisalpine Republic ; it is now in the possession of Austria.
 
 110 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 Another considerable portion, and the capital itself, fell 
 to the lot of Austria in compensation for the Belgic prov- 
 inces and Lombardy, which she ceded to France. Austria 
 has now retaken Lombardy, and the additions then made 
 to it, and Belgium is in the possession of the House of 
 Orange. France obtained Corfu and some of the Ionian 
 isles ; these now belong to England. 1 Romulus never 
 thought he was founding Rome for Goths and priests. 
 Alexander did not foresee that his Egyptian city would 
 belong to the Turks ; nor did Constantine strip Rome for 
 the benefit of Mahomet IE. Why then fight for a few pal- 
 try villages ? 
 
 Thus have we been gloriously conquering for Austria 
 and England. An ancient State is overturned without 
 noise, and its provinces, after being divided among different 
 bordering States, are now all under the dominion of 
 Austria. We do not possess a foot of ground in all the 
 fine countries we conquered, and which served as compen- 
 sations for the immense acquisitions of the House of 
 Hapsburgh in Italy. Thus that house was aggrandised 
 by a war which was to itself most disastrous. But Austria 
 has often found other means of extending her dominion 
 than military triumphs, as is recorded in the celebrated 
 distich of Mathias Corvinus : 
 
 " Bella gerunt alii, tu felix Austria nube ; 
 Nam quae Mars aliis, dat tibi regna Venus." * 
 
 The Directory was far from being satisfied with the 
 treaty of Campo-Formio, and with difficulty resisted the 
 temptation of not ratifying it. A fortnight before the 
 signature the Directors wrote to General Bonaparte that 
 they would not consent to give to the Emperor Venice, 
 Frioul, Padua, and the terra firma. with the boundary of 
 
 1 Afterwards to be ceded by her to Greece. Belgium is fre. 
 a " Glad Austria wins by Hymen's silken chain 
 What other States by doubtful battle gain, 
 And while fierce Mars enriches meaner lands, 
 Receives possession from fair Venus' hands."
 
 1797. THE DIRECTORY DISSATISFIED. Ill 
 
 the Adige. *' That," said they, " would not be to make 
 peace, but to adjourn the war. We shall be regarded as 
 the beaten party, independently of the disgrace of aban- 
 doning Venice, \vhich Bonaparte himself thought so worthy 
 of freedom. France ought not, and never will wish, to see 
 Italy delivered up to Austria. The Directory would 
 prefer the chances of a war to changing a single word of 
 its ultimatum, wiiich is already too favourable to Austria." 
 
 All this was said in vain. Bonaparte made no scruple 
 of disregarding his instructions. It has been said that 
 the Emperor of Austria made an offer of a very consider- 
 able sum of money, and even of a principality, to obtain 
 favourable terms. 1 was never able to find the slightest 
 ground for this report, which refers to a time when 
 the smallest circumstance could not escape my notice. 
 The character of Bonaparte stood too high for him to 
 sacrifice his glory as a conqueror and peacemaker for even 
 the greatest private advantage. This was so thoroughly 
 known, and he was so profoundly esteemed by the Austrian 
 plenipotentiaries, that I will venture to say none of them 
 would have been capable of making the slightest overture 
 to him of so debasing a proposition. Besides, it would 
 have induced him to put an end to all intercourse with 
 the plenipotentiaries. Perhaps what I have just stated of 
 M. de Gallo will throw some light upon this odious accu- 
 sation. But let us dismiss this story with the rest, and 
 among them that of the porcelain tray, which was said to 
 have been smashed and thrown at the head of M. de 
 Cobentzel. 1 I certainly know nothing of any such scene ; 
 our manners at Passeriano were not quite so bad ! 
 
 The presents customary on such occasions were given, 
 and the Emperor of Austria also took that opportunity to 
 present to General Bonaparte six magnificent white horses. 
 
 Bonaparte returned to Milan by way of Gratz, Laybach, 
 Trieste, Mestre, Verona, and Mantua. 
 
 ' Belated in the Memoir* of Segur, vol. i. p. 376.
 
 112 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 At this period Napoleon was still swayed by the im- 
 pulse of the age. He thought of nothing but representa- 
 tive governments. Often has he said to me, " I should 
 like the era of representative governments to be dated 
 from my time." His conduct in Italy and his proclama- 
 tions ought to give, and in fact do give, weight to this 
 account of his opinion. But there is no doubt that this 
 idea was more connected with lofty views of ambition 
 than a sincere desire for the benefit of the human race ; 
 for, at a later period, he adopted this phrase : 1 should 
 like to be the head of the most ancient of the dynasties of 
 Europe." What a difference between Bonaparte, the 
 author of the Souper de Beaucaire, the subduer of royal- 
 ism at Toulon, the author of the remonstrance to Albitte 
 and Salicetti, the fortunate conqueror of the 13th Ven- 
 de"miaire, the instigator and supporter of the revolution 
 of Fructidor, and the founder of the Republics of Italy, 
 the fruits of his immortal victories, and Bonaparte, First 
 Consul in 1800, Consul for life in 1802, and, above all, 
 Napoleon, Emperor of the French in 1804, and King of 
 Italy in 1805 1
 
 1797. 118 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 1797. 
 
 Effect of the 18th Fructidor on the peace The standard of the army of 
 Italy Honours rendered to the memory of General Hoche and of 
 Virgil at Mantua Remarkable letter In passing through Switzer- 
 land Bonaparte visits the field of Morat Arrival at Rastadt -Letter 
 from the Directory calling Bonaparte to ParisIntrigues against 
 Josephine Grand ceremony on the reception of Bonaparte by the 
 Directory The theatres Modesty of Bonaparte An assassination 
 Bonaparte's opinion of the Parisians His election to the National 
 Institute Letter to Camus Projects Reflections. 
 
 THE day of the 18th Fructidor had, without any doubt, 
 mainly contributed to the conclusion of peace at Campo- 
 Formio. On the one hand, the Directory, hitherto not 
 very pacifically inclined, after having effected a coup 
 d'etat, at length saw the necessity of appeasing the dis- 
 contented by giving peace to France. On the other hand, 
 the Cabinet of Vienna, observing the complete failure of 
 all the royalist plots in the interior, thought it high time 
 to conclude with the French Republic a treaty which, not- 
 withstanding all the defeats Austria had sustained, still 
 left her a preponderating influence over Italy. 
 
 Besides, the campaign of Italy, so fertile in glorious 
 achievements of arms, had not been productive of glory 
 alone. Something of greater importance followed these 
 conquests. Public affairs had assumed a somewhat un- 
 usual aspect, and a grand moral influence, the effect of 
 victories and of peace, had begun to extend all over 
 France. Republicanism was no longer so sanguinary and 
 fierce as it had been some years before. Bonaparte, ne- 
 gotiating with princes and their ministers on a footing 
 of equality, but still with all that superiority to which 
 victory and his genius entitled him, gradually taught 
 VOL. I. 8
 
 114 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 foreign courts to be familiar with Republican France, and 
 the Republic to cease regarding all States governed by 
 Kings as of necessity enemies. 
 
 In these circumstances the General-in-Chief 's departure 
 and his expected visit to Paris excited general attention. 
 The feeble Directory was prepared to submit to the pres- 
 ence of the conqueror of Italy in the capital. 
 
 It was for the purpose of acting as head of the French 
 legation at the Congress of Rastadt that Bonaparte quitted 
 Milan on the 17th of November. But before his departure 
 he sent to the Directory one of those monuments, the in- 
 scriptions on which may generally be considered as fabu- 
 lous, but whioh, in this case, were nothing but the truth. 
 This monument was the "flag of the Army of Italy," and 
 to General Joubert was assigned the honourable duty of 
 presenting it to the members of the Executive Government. 
 
 On one side of the flag were the words "To the Army 
 of Italy, the grateful country." The other contained an 
 enumeration of the battles fought and places taken, and 
 presented, in the following inscriptions, a simple but strik- 
 ing abridgment of the history of the Italian campaign. 
 
 150,000 PRISONERS ; 170 STANDARDS ; 550 PIECES OF SIEGE 
 ARTILLERY ; 600 PIECES OF FIELD ARTILLERY ; FIVE PON- 
 TOON EQUIPAGES ; NINE 64-GUN SHIPS ; TWELVE 82-GUN 
 FRIGATES ; 12 CORVETTES ; 18 GALLEYS ; ARMISTICE WITH 
 THE KING OF SARDINIA ; CONVENTION WITH GENOA ; AR- 
 MISTICE WITH THE DUKE OF PARMA ; ARMISTICE WITH THE 
 KING OF NAPLES ; ARMISTICE WITH THE POPE ; PRELIMIN- 
 ARIES OF LEOBEN ; CONVENTION OF MONTEBELLO WITH THE 
 REPUBLIC OF GENOA ; TREATY OF PEACE WITH THE EM- 
 PEROR OF GERMANY AT CAMPO-FORMIO. 
 
 LIBERTY GIVEN TO THE PEOPLE OF BOLOGNA, FERRARA, 
 MODENA, MASSA-CARRARA, LA ROMAGNA, LOMBARDY, BRES- 
 CIA, BERGAMO, MANTUA, CREMONA, PART OF THE VERO- 
 NESE, CHIAVENA, BORMIO, THE VALTELINE, THE GENOESE, 
 THE IMPERIAL FIEFS, THE PEOPLE OF THE DEPARTMENTS 
 OF CORQYRA, OF THE AEGEAN SEA, AND OF ITHACA. 
 
 SENT TO PARIS ALL THE MASTERPIECES OF MICHAEL AN- 
 GELO, OF GUERCINO, OF TITIAN, OF PAUL VERONESE, OF 
 CORREGGIO, OF ALBANA, OF THE CARRACCI, OF RAPHAEL, 
 AND OF LEONARDO DA VINCI.
 
 1797. STANDARD OF THE ARMY OF ITALY. 115 
 
 Thus were recapitulated on a flag, destined to decorate 
 the Hall of the Public Sittings of the Directory, the mili- 
 tary deeds of the campaign in Italy, its political results, 
 and the conquest of the monuments of art. 
 
 Most of the Italian cities looked upon their conqueror 
 as a liberator such was the magic of the word liberty, 
 which resounded from the Alps to the Apennines. On his 
 way to Mantua the General took up his residence in the 
 palace of the ancient dukes. Bonaparte promised the 
 authorities of Mantua that their department should be one 
 of the most extensive ; impressed on them the necessity 
 of promptly organising a local militia, and of putting in 
 execution the plans of Mari, the mathematician, for the 
 navigation of the Mincio from Mantua to Peschiera. 
 
 He stopped two days at Mantua, and the morrow of his 
 arrival was devoted to the celebration of a military funeral 
 solemnity, in honour of General Hoche, who had just died. 
 His next object was to hasten the execution of the monu- 
 ment which was erecting to the memory of Virgil. Thus, 
 in one day, he paid honour to France and Italy, to modern 
 and to ancient glory, to the laurels of war and to the 
 laurels of poetry. 
 
 A person who saw Bonaparte on this occasion for the 
 first time thus described him in a letter he wrote to 
 Paris : " With lively interest and extreme attention I 
 have observed this extraordinary man, who has performed 
 such great deeds, and about whom there is something 
 which seems to indicate that his career is not yet termi- 
 nated. I found him very like his portraits little, thin, 
 pale, with an air of fatigue, but not of ill-health, as has 
 been reported of him. He appears to me to listen with 
 more abstraction than interest, and that he was more 
 occupied with what he was thinking of than with what was 
 said to him. There is great intelligence in his countenance, 
 along with which may be marked an air of habitual med- 
 itation, which reveals nothing of what is passing within,
 
 116 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 In that thinking head, in that bold mind, it is impossible 
 not to believe that some daring designs are engendering 
 which will have their influence on the destinies of Europe." 
 
 From the last phrase, in particular, of this letter, one 
 might suspect that it was written after Bonaparte had 
 made his name feared throughout Europe ; but it really 
 appeared in a journal in the month of December 1797, a 
 little before his arrival in Paris. 
 
 There exists a sort of analogy between celebrated men 
 and celebrated places ; it was not, therefore, an uninter- 
 esting spectacle to see Bonaparte surveying the field of 
 Morat, where, in 1476, Charles the Bold, Duke of Bur- 
 gundy, daring like himself, fell with his powerful army un- 
 der the effects of Helvetian valour. Bonaparte slept during 
 the night at Moudon, where, as in every place through 
 which he passed, the greatest honours were paid him. In 
 the morning, his carriage having broken down, we con- 
 tinued our journey on foot, accompanied only by some 
 officers and an escort of dragoons of the country. Bona- 
 parte stopped near the Ossuary, and desired to be shown 
 the spot where the battle of Morat was fought. A plain 
 in front of the chapel was pointed out to him. An officer 
 who had served in France was present, and explained to 
 him how the Swiss, descending from the neighbouring 
 mountains, were enabled, under cover of a wood, to turn 
 the Burgundian army and put it to the rout. "What was 
 the force of that army?" asked Bonaparte. "Sixty thou- 
 sand men." " Sixty thousand men ! " he exclaimed : "they 
 ought to have completely covered these mountains ! " 
 " The French fight better now," said Lannes, who was one 
 of the officers of his suite. " At that time," observed Bo- 
 naparte, interrupting him, "the Burgundians were not 
 Frenchmen." 
 
 Bonaparte's journey through Switzerland was not with- 
 out utility ; and his presence served to calm more than one 
 inquietude. He proceeded on his journey to Rastadt by
 
 1797. " BONAPARTE THE PACIFICATOR!" 117 
 
 Aix in Savoy, Berne, and Bale. On arriving at Berne dur- 
 ing night we passed through a double file of well-lighted 
 equipages, filled with beautiful women, all of whom raised 
 the cry of "Long live Bonaparte! long live the Pacifica- 
 tor ! " To have a proper idea of this genuine enthusiasm 
 it is necessary to have seen it. 
 
 The position in society to which his services had raised 
 him rendered it unfit to address him in the second per- 
 son singular and the familiar manner sometimes used 
 by his old schoolfellows of Brienne. I thought this very 
 natural. 
 
 M. de Cominges, one of those who went with him to the 
 military school at Paris, and who had emigrated, was at Bale. 
 Having learned our arrival, he presented himself without 
 ceremony, with great indecorum, and with a complete 
 disregard of the respect due to a man who had rendered 
 himself so illustrious. General Bonaparte, offended at this 
 behaviour, refused to receive him again, and expressed him- 
 self to me with much warmth on the occasion of this visit. 
 All my efforts to remove his displeasure were unavailing : 
 this impression always continued, and he never did for M. 
 de Cominges what his means and the old ties of boyhood 
 might well have warranted. 
 
 On arriving at Kastadt * Bonaparte found a letter from 
 the Directory summoning him to Paris. He eagerly obeyed 
 this invitation, which drew him from a place where he could 
 act only an insignificant part, and which he had determined 
 to leave soon, never again to return. Some time after his 
 arrival in Paris, on the ground that his presence was neces- 
 sary for the execution of different orders, and the general 
 despatch of business, he required that authority should 
 be given to a part of his household, which he had left at 
 Rastadt, to return. 
 
 How could it ever be said that the Directory " kept 
 
 1 The conference for the formal peace with the Empire of Germany was held there. 
 The peace of Leoben was only one made with Austria.
 
 118 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 General Bonaparte away from the great interests which 
 were under discussion at Rastadt " ? Quite the contrary 1 
 The Directory would have been delighted to see him re- 
 turn there, as they would then have been relieved from his 
 presence in Paris ; but nothing was so disagreeable to 
 Bonaparte as long and seemingly interminable negotia- 
 tions. Such tedious work did not suit his character, and 
 he had been sufficiently disgusted with similar proceedings 
 at Campo-Formio. 
 
 On our arrival at Rastadt I soon found that General 
 Bonaparte was determined to stay there only a short time. 
 I therefore expressed to him my decided desire to remain 
 in Germany. I was then ignorant that my erasure from 
 the emigrant list had been ordered on the llth of Novem- 
 ber, as the decree did not reach the commissary of the 
 Executive Directory at Auxerre until the 17th of Novem- 
 ber, the day of our departure from Milan. 
 
 The silly pretext of difficulties by which my erasure, 
 notwithstanding the reiterated solicitations of the vic- 
 torious General, was so long delayed made me appre- 
 hensive of a renewal, under a weak and jealous pentarchy, 
 of the horrible scenes of 1796. Bonaparte said to me, in 
 a tone of indignation, " Come, pass the Rhine ; they will 
 not dare to seize you while near me. I answer for your 
 safety." On reaching Paris I found that my erasure had 
 taken place. It was at this period only that General Bo- 
 naparte's applications in my favour were tardily crowned 
 with success. Sotin, the Minister of General Police, noti- 
 fied the fact to Bonaparte ; but his letter gave a reason for 
 my erasure very different from that stated in the decree. 
 The Minister said that the Government did not wish to 
 leave among the names of traitors to their country the 
 name of a citizen who was attached to the person of the 
 conqueror of Italy ; while the decree itself stated as the 
 motive for removing my name from the list that I never 
 had emigrated.
 
 1797. BONAPARTE'S FORTUNE. 119 
 
 At St. Helena it seems Bonaparte said that lie did not 
 return from Italy with more than 300,000 francs; but I 
 assert that he had at that time in his possession some- 
 thing more than 3,000,000. l How could he with 300,000 
 francs have been able to provide for the extensive repairs, 
 the embellishment, and the furnishing of his house in the 
 Eue Chantereine? How could he have supported the 
 establishment he did with only 15,000 francs of income 
 and the emoluments of his rank ? The excursion which 
 he made along the coast, of which I have yet to speak, of 
 itself cost near 12,000 francs in gold, which he trans- 
 ferred to me to defray the expense of the journey ; and I 
 do not think that this sum was ever repaid him. Besides, 
 what did it signify, for any object he might have in dis- 
 guising his fortune, whether he brought 3,000,000 or 
 300,000 francs with him from Italy? No one will accuse 
 him of peculation. He was an inflexible administrator. 
 He was always irritated at the discovery of fraud, and 
 pursued those guilty of it with all the vigour of his char- 
 acter. He wished to be independent, which he well knew 
 that no one could be without fortune. He has often said 
 to me, "I am no Capuchin, not I." But after having been 
 allowed only 300,000 francs on his arrival from the rich 
 Italy, where fortune never abandoned him, it has been 
 printed that he had 20,000,000 (some have even doubled 
 the amount) on his return from Egypt, which is a very 
 poor country, where money is scarce, and where reverses 
 followed close upon his victories. All these reports are 
 false. What he brought from Italy has just been stated, 
 and it will be seen when we come to Egypt what treasure 
 he carried away from the country of the Pharaohs. 
 
 Bonaparte's brothers, desirous of obtaining complete 
 dominion over his mind, strenuously endeavoured to lessen 
 
 1 Joseph says that Napoleon, when he sailed for Egypt, left with him all his for- 
 tune, and that it was much nearer 300,000 francs than 3,000,000. (See Errewrt, 
 tome L pp. 243, 259.)
 
 120 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 the influence which Josephine possessed from the love of 
 her husband. They tried to excite his jealousy, and took 
 advantage of her stay at Milan after our departure, which 
 had been authorised by Bonaparte himself. My intimacy 
 with both the husband and the wife fortunately afforded 
 me an opportunity of averting or lessening a good deal of 
 mischief. If Josephine still lived she would allow me this 
 merit. I never took part against her but once, and that 
 unwillingly. It was on the subject of the marriage of her 
 daughter Hortense. Josephine had never as yet spoken 
 to me on the subject. Bonaparte wished to give his step- 
 daughter to Duroc, and his brothers were eager to pro- 
 mote the marriage, because they wished to separate Jo- 
 sephine from Hortense, for whom Bonaparte felt the ten- 
 derest affection. Josephine, on the other hand, wished 
 Hortense to marry Louis Bonaparte. Her motives, as 
 may easily be divined, were to gain support in a family 
 where she experienced nothing but enmity, and she car- 
 ried her point. 1 
 
 On his arrival from Rastadt the most magnificent prep- 
 arations were made at the Luxembourg for the reception 
 of Bonaparte. The grand court of the Palace was ele- 
 
 ' Previous to her marriage with Louis, Hortense cherished an attachment for 
 Duroc, who was at that time a handsome man about thirty, and a great favourite of 
 Bonaparte. However, the indifference with which Duroc regarded the marriage of 
 Louis Bonaparte sufficiently proves that the regard with which he had inspired Hor- 
 tense was not very ardently returned. It is certain that Duroc might have become 
 the husband of Mademoiselle de Beauharnais had he been willing to accede to the 
 conditions on which the First Consul offered him his step-daughter's hand. But 
 Dnroc looked forward to something better, and his ordinary prudence forsook him at 
 a moment when he might easily have beheld a perspective calculated to gratify even 
 a more towering ambition than his. He declined the proposed marriage ; and the 
 union of Hortense and Louis, which Madame Bonaparte, to conciliate the favour of 
 her brothers-in-law, had endeavoured to bring about, was immediately determined 
 on (Menwires de Constant). 
 
 In allusion to the alleged unfriendly feeling of Napoleon's brothers towards Jo. 
 eephine, the following observation occurs in Joseph Bonaparte's Notes on Bow- 
 rienne : 
 
 " None of Napoleon's brothers," he says, " were near him from the time of his de- 
 parture for Italy except Louis, who cannot be suspected of having intrigued against 
 Josephine, whose daughter he married. These calumnies are without found? lion" 
 iErreurs, tome i. p. 244).
 
 1797. GRAND RECEPTION IN PARIS. 121 
 
 gantly ornamented ; and at its farther end, close to the 
 Palace, a large amphitheatre was erected for the accommo- 
 dation of official persons. Curiosity, as on all like occa- 
 sions, attracted multitudes, and the court was filled. 
 Opposite to the principal vestibule stood the altar of the 
 country, surrounded by the statues of Liberty, Equality, 
 and Peace. When Bonaparte entered every head was 
 uncovered. The windows were full of young and beauti- 
 ful females. But notwithstanding this great preparation 
 an icy coldness characterized the ceremony. Every one 
 seemed to be present only for the purpose of beholding a 
 sight, and curiosity was the prevailing expression rather 
 than joy or gratitude. It is but right to say, however, 
 that an unfortunate event contributed to the general in- 
 difference. The right wing of the Palace was not occu- 
 pied, but great preparations had been making there, and 
 an officer had been directed to prevent anyone from 
 ascending. One of the clerks of the Directory, however, 
 contrived to get upon the scaffolding, but had scarcely 
 placed his foot on the first plank when it tilted up, and 
 the imprudent man fell the whole height into the court. 
 This accident created a general stupor. Ladies fainted, 
 and the windows were nearly deserted. 
 
 However, the Directory displayed all the Republican 
 splendour of which they were so prodigal on similar occa- 
 sions. Speeches were far from being scarce. Talleyrand, 
 who was then Minister for Foreign Affairs, on introducing 
 Bonaparte to the Directory, made a long oration, in the 
 course of which he hinted that the personal greatness of 
 the General ought not to excite uneasiness, even in a 
 rising Republic. "Far from apprehending anything from 
 his ambition, I believe that we shall one day be obliged to 
 solicit him to tear himself from the pleasures of studious 
 retirement. All France will be free, but perhaps he never 
 will ; such is his destiny." 
 
 Talleyrand was listened to with impatience, so anxious
 
 122 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 was every one to hear Bonaparte. The conqueror of Italy 
 then rose, and pronounced with a modest air, but in a firm 
 voice, a short address of congratulation on the improved 
 position of the nation. 
 
 Barras, at that time President of the Directory, replied 
 to Bonaparte with so much prolixity as to weary everyone ; 
 and as soon as he had finished speaking he threw himself 
 into the arms of the General, who was not much pleased 
 with such affected displays, and gave him what was then 
 called the fraternal embrace. The other members of the 
 Directory, following the example of the President, sur- 
 rounded Bonaparte and pressed him in their arms ; each 
 acted, to the best of his ability, his part in the senti- 
 mental comedy. 
 
 Chenier composed for this occasion a hymn, which 
 Mehul set to music. A few days after an opera was pro- 
 duced, bearing the title of the Fall of Carthage, which was 
 meant as an allusion to the anticipated exploits of the 
 conqueror of Italy, recently appointed to the command of 
 the "army of England." The poets were all employed 
 in praising him ; and Lebrun, with but little of the Pin- 
 daric fire in his soul, composed the following distich, which 
 certainly is not worth much : 
 
 "Heros, cher a la paix, aux arts, a la victoire 
 II conquit en deux ans mille siecles de gloire." 
 
 The two councils were not disposed to be behind the 
 Directory in the manifestation of joy. A few days after 
 they gave a banquet to the General in the gallery of the 
 Louvre, which had recently been enriched by the master- 
 pieces of painting conquered in Italy. 
 
 At this time Bonaparte displayed great modesty in all 
 his transactions in Paris. The administrators of the 
 department of the Seine having sent a deputation to him 
 to inquire what hour and day he would allow them to wait 
 on him, he carried himself his answer to the department,
 
 1797. BONAPARTE AT THE THEATRES. 123 
 
 accompanied by General Berthier. It was also remarked 
 that the judge of the peace of the arrondissement where 
 the General lived having called on him on the 6th of 
 December, the evening of his arrival, he returned the 
 visit next morning. These attentions, trifling as they may 
 appear, were not without their effect on the minds of the 
 Parisian a 
 
 In consequence of General Bonaparte's victories, the 
 peace he had effected, and the brilliant reception of which 
 he had been the object, the business of Vendemiaire was 
 in some measure forgotten. Every one was eager to get 
 a sight of the young hero whose career had commenced 
 with so much eclat. He lived very retiredly, yet went 
 often to the theatre. He desired me, one day, to go and 
 request the representation of two of the best pieces of the 
 time, in which Elleviou, Mesdames St. Aubin, Phillis, and 
 other distinguished performers played. His message was, 
 that he only wished these two pieces on the same night, 
 if that were possible. The manager told me that nothing 
 that the conqueror of Italy wished for was impossible, for 
 he had long ago erased that word from the dictionary. 
 Bonaparte laughed heartily at the manager's answer. 
 When we went to the theatre he seated himself, as usual, 
 in the back of the box, behind Madame Bonaparte, making 
 me sit by her side. The pit and boxes, however, soon 
 found out that he was in the house, and loudly called for 
 him. Several times an earnest desire to see him was mani- 
 fested, but all in vain, for he never showed himself. 
 
 Some days after, being at the Theatre des Arts, at the 
 second representation of Iloratius Coctis, although he was 
 sitting at the back of a box in the second tier, the audi- 
 ence discovered that he was in the house. Immediately ac- 
 clamations arose from all quarters ; but he kept himself 
 concealed as much as possible, and said to a person in the 
 next box, "Had I known that the boxes were so exposed, 
 I should not have come."
 
 124 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 During Bonaparte's stay at Paris a woman sent a mes- 
 senger to warn him that his life would be attempted, and 
 that poison was to be employed for that purpose. Bona- 
 parte had the bearer of this information arrested, who 
 went, accompanied by the judge of the peace, to the 
 woman's house, where she was found extended on the floor, 
 and bathed in her blood. The men whose plot she had 
 overheard, having discovered that she had revealed their 
 secret, murdered her. The poor woman was dreadfully 
 mangled : her throat was cut ; and, not satisfied with that, 
 the assassins had also hacked her body with sharp instru- 
 ments. 
 
 On the night of the 10th of Nivose the Hue Chantereine, 
 in which Bonaparte had a small house (No. 6), received, 
 in pursuance of a decree of the department, the name of 
 Rue de la Victoire. The cries of " Vive Bonaparte ! " and 
 the incense prodigally offered up to him, did not however 
 seduce him from his retired habits. Lately the conqueror 
 and ruler of Italy, and now under men for whom he had 
 no respect, and who saw in him a formidable rival, he said 
 to me one day, " The people of Paris do not remember 
 anything. Were I to remain here long, doing nothing, I 
 should be lost. In this great Babylon one reputation 
 displaces another. Let me be seen but three times at the 
 theatre and I shall no longer excite attention ; so I shall 
 go there but seldom." When he went he occupied a box 
 shaded with curtains. The manager of the opera wished 
 to get up a special performance in his honour ; but he 
 declined the offer. When I observed that it must be 
 agreeable to him to see his fellow-citizens so eagerly run- 
 ning after him, he replied, "Bah ! the people would 
 crowd as fast to see me if I were going to the scaffold." * 
 
 On the 28th of December Bonaparte was named a 
 member of the Institute, in the class of the Sciences and 
 
 1 A similar remark made to William III. on his landing at Brixham elicited tha 
 comment, " Like the Jews, who cried one day ' Hosanna I ' and the next " Crucify 
 Him ! crucify Him 1 "
 
 3797. EUROPE NOT ENOUGH FOR BONAPARTE. 125 
 
 Arts. 1 He showed a deep sense of this honour, and wrote 
 the following letter to Camus, the president of the class : 
 
 CITIZEN PRESIDENT The suffrage of the distinguished men who 
 compose the Institute confers a high honour on me. I feel well 
 assured that, before I can be their equal, I must long be their 
 scholar. If there were any way more expressive than another of 
 making known my esteem for you, I should be glad to employ it. 
 True conquests the only ones which leave no regret behind them 
 are those which are made over ignorance. The most honourable, 
 as well as the most useful, occupation for nations is the contributing 
 to the extension of human knowledge. The true power of the 
 French Kepublic should henceforth be made to consist in not allow- 
 ing a single new idea to exist without making it part of its property. 
 
 BONAPARTE. 
 
 The General now renewed, though unsuccessfully, the 
 attempt he had made before the 18th Fructidor to obtain 
 a dispensation of the age necessary for becoming a Di- 
 rector. Perceiving that the time was not yet favourable 
 for such a purpose, he said to me, on the 29th of January 
 1798, " Bourrienne, I do not wish to remain here ; there 
 is nothing to do. They are unwilling to listen to any- 
 thing. I see that if I linger here, I shall soon lose myself. 
 Everything wears out here ; my glory has already disap- 
 peared. This little Europe does not supply enough of it 
 for me. I must seek it in the East, the fountain of glory. 
 However, I wish first to make a tour along the coast, to 
 ascertain by my own observation what may be attempted. 
 I will take you, Lannes, and Sulkowsky, with me. If 
 the success of a descent ou England appear doubtful, as 
 I suspect it will, the army of England shall become the 
 army of the East, and I will go to Egypt." 
 
 This and other conversations give a correct insight into 
 his character. He always considered war and conquest as 
 
 1 Napoleon seems to have really considered this nomination as a great honour. 
 He was fond of using the title in his proclamations ; and to the last the allowance 
 attached to the appointment figured in the Imperial accounts. He replaced Carnot, 
 the exiled Director.
 
 136 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1797. 
 
 the most noble and inexhaustible source of that glory 
 which was the constant object of his desire. He revolted 
 at the idea of languishing in idleness at Paris, while fresh 
 laurels were growing for him in distant climes. His im- 
 agination inscribed, in anticipation, his name on those 
 gigantic monuments which alone, perhaps, of all the crea- 
 tions of man, have the character of eternity. Already 
 proclaimed the most illustrious of living generals, he 
 sought to efface the rival names of antiquity by his own. 
 If Csesar fought fifty battles, he longed to fight a hundred : 
 if Alexander left Macedon to penetrate to the Temple of 
 Ammon, he wished to leave Paris to travel to the Cataracts 
 of the Nile. ' While he was thus to run a race with fame, 
 events would, in his opinion, so proceed in France as to 
 render his return necessary and opportune. His place 
 would be ready for him, and he should not come to claim 
 it a forgotten or unknown man.
 
 im is? 
 
 CHAPTEK XH 
 
 1798. 
 
 Bonaparte's departure from Paris His return The Egyptian expedition 
 projected M. de Talleyrand General Desaix Expedition against 
 Malta Money taken at Berne Bonaparte's ideas respecting the 
 East Monge Non-influence of the Directory Marriages of Mar- 
 mont and La Valette Bonaparte's plan of colonising Egypt His 
 camp library Orthographical blunders Stock of wines Bona- 
 parte's arrival at Toulon Madame Bonaparte's fall from a balcony 
 Execution of an old man Simon. 
 
 BONAPARTE left Paris for the north on the 10th of Febru- 
 ary 1798 but he received no order, though I have seen 
 it everywhere so stated, to go there " for the purpose of 
 preparing the operations connected with the intended in- 
 vasion of England." He occupied himself with no such 
 business, for which a few days certainly would not have 
 been sufficient. His journey to the coast was nothing but 
 a rapid excursion, and its sole object was to enable him 
 to form an opinion on the main point of the question. 
 Neither did he remain absent several weeks, for the jour- 
 ney occupied only one. There were four of us in his 
 carriage himself, Lannes, Sulkowsky, and L Moustache 
 was our courier. Bonaparte was not a little surprised 
 on reading, in the Moniteur of the 10th February, an arti- 
 cle giving greater importance to his little excursion than 
 it deserved. 
 
 "General Bonaparte," said the Moniteur, "has departed for 
 Dunkirk with some naval and engineer officers. They have gone 
 to visit the coasts and prepare the preliminary operations for the 
 descent [upon England]. It may be stated that he will not return 
 to Rastadt, and that the close of the session of the Congress there 
 is approaching."
 
 128 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 Now for the facts. Bonaparte visited Etaples, Amble- 
 teuse, Boulogne, Calais, Dunkirk, Fumes, Niewport, 
 Ostend, and the Isle of Walcheren. He collected at the 
 different ports all the necessary information with that in- 
 telligence and tact for which he was so eminently dis- 
 tinguished. He questioned the sailors, smugglers, and 
 fishermen, and listened attentively to the answers he 
 received. 
 
 We returned to Paris by Antwerp, Brussels, Lille, and 
 St. Quentin. The object of our journey was accomplished 
 when we reached the first of these towns. " Well, General," 
 said I, " what think you of our journey ? Are you satis- 
 fied ? For my part, I confess I entertain no great hopes 
 from anything I have seen and heard." Bonaparte im- 
 mediately answered, "It is too great a chance. I will 
 not hazard it. I would not thus sport with the fate of 
 my beloved France." On hearing this I already fancied 
 myself in Cairo ! 
 
 On his return to Paris Bonaparte lost no time in set- 
 ting on foot the military and scientific preparations for 
 the projected expedition to the banks of the Nile, re- 
 specting which such incorrect statements have appeared. 
 It had long occupied his thoughts, as the following facts 
 will prove. 
 
 In the month of August 1797 he wrote " that the time 
 was not far distant when we should see that, to destroy 
 the power of England effectually, it would be necessary 
 to attack Egypt." In the same month he wrote to Talley- 
 rand, who had just succeeded Charles de Lacroix as 
 Minister of Foreign Affairs, " that it would be necessary 
 to attack Egypt, which did not belong to the Grand Sig- 
 nior." Talleyrand replied, "that his ideas respecting 
 Egypt were certainly grand, and that their utility could 
 not fail to be fully appreciated." He concluded by 
 saying he would write to him at length on the subject. 
 
 History will speak as favourably of M. de Talleyrand as
 
 1798. EXPEDITION AGAINST MALTA. 129 
 
 his contemporaries have spoken ill of him. When a 
 statesman, throughout a great, long, and difficult career, 
 makes and preserves a number of faithful friends, and 
 provokes but few enemies, it must be acknowledged that 
 his character is honourable and his talent profound, and 
 that his political conduct has been wise and moderate. It 
 is impossible to know M. de Talleyrand without admiring 
 him. All who have that advantage, no doubt, judge him 
 as I do. 
 
 In the month of November of the same year Bonaparte 
 sent Poussielgue, under the pretence of inspecting the 
 ports of the Levant, to give the finishing stroke to the 
 meditated expedition against Malta. 
 
 General Desaix, whom Bonaparte had made the confi- 
 dant of all his plans at their interview in Italy after the 
 preliminaries of Leoben, wrote to him from Affenbourg, 
 on his return to Germany, that he regarded the fleet of 
 Corfu with great interest. " If ever," said he, " it should 
 be engaged in the grand enterprises of which I have 
 heard you speak, do not, I beseech you, forget me." Bona- 
 parte was far from forgetting him. 
 
 The Directory at first disapproved of the expedition 
 against Malta, which Bonaparte had proposed long before 
 the treaty of Campo-Formio was signed. The expedition 
 was decided to be impossible, for Malta had observed 
 strict neutrality, and had on several occasions even 
 assisted our ships and seamen. Thus vre had no pretext 
 for going to war with her. It was said, too, that the 
 legislative body would certainly not look with a favourable 
 eye on such a measure. This opinion, which, however, 
 did not last long, vexed Bonaparte. It was one of the 
 disappointments which made him give a rough welcome 
 to Bottot, Barras' agent, at the commencement of Octo- 
 ber 1797. 
 
 In the course of an animated conversation he said to 
 Bottot, shrugging his shoulders, " Mon Dieu ! Malta is 
 VOL. I. 9
 
 130 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 for sale ! " Sometime after he himself was told that 
 " great importance was attached to the acquisition of 
 Malta, and that he must not suffer ifc to escape." At the 
 latter end of September 1797 Talleyrand, then Minister 
 of Foreign Affairs, wrote to him that the Directory 
 authorized him to give the necessary orders to Admiral 
 Brueys for taking Malta. He sent Bonaparte some 
 letters for the island, because Bonaparte had said it was 
 necessary to prepare the public mind for the event. 
 
 Bonaparte exerted himself night and day in the execu- 
 tion of his projects. I never saw him so active. He 
 made himself acquainted with the abilities of the respec- 
 tive generals, and the force of all the army corps. Orders 
 and instructions succeeded each other with extraordinary 
 rapidity. If he wanted an order of the Directory he ran 
 to the Luxembourg to get it signed by one of the Direct- 
 ors. Merlin de Douai was generally the person who did 
 him this service, for he was the most constant at his post. 
 Lagarde, the Secretary-General, did not countersign any 
 document relative to this expedition, Bonaparte not wish- 
 ing him to be informed of the business. He transmitted 
 to Toulon the money taken at Berne, which the Directory 
 had placed at his disposal. It amounted to something 
 above 3,000,000 francs. In those times of disorder and 
 negligence the finances were very badly managed. The 
 revenues were anticipated and squandered away, so that 
 the treasury never possessed so large a sum as that just 
 mentioned. 
 
 It was determined that Bonaparte should undertake an 
 expedition of an unusual character to the East. I must 
 confess that two things cheered me in this very painful 
 interval ; my friendship and admiration for the talents 
 of the conqueror of Italy, and the pleasing hope of 
 traversing those ancient regions, the historical and relig- 
 ious accounts of which had engaged the attention of my 
 youth.
 
 1798. THE ARMY OF THE EAST. 131 
 
 It was at Passeriano that, seeing the approaching termi- 
 nation of his labours in Europe, he first began to turn 
 serious attention to the East. During his long strolls in 
 the evening in the magnificent park there he delighted to 
 converse about the celebrated events of that part of the 
 world, and the many famous empires it once possessed. 
 He used to say, " Europe is a mole-hill. There have never 
 been great empires and revolutions except in the East, 
 where there are 600,000,000 men." He considered that 
 part of the world as the cradle of all religions, of 'all 
 metaphysical extravagances. This subject was no less 
 interesting than inexhaustible, and he daily introduced it 
 when conversing with the generals with whom he was 
 intimate, with Monge, and with me. 
 
 Monge entirely concurred in the General-in-Chief's opin- 
 ions on this point ; and his scientific ardour was increased 
 by Bonaparte's enthusiasm. In short, all were unani- 
 mously of one opinion. The Directory had no share in 
 renewing the project of this memorable expedition, the 
 result of which did not correspond with the grand views 
 in which it had been conceived. Neither had the Direc- 
 tory any positive control over Bonaparte's departure or 
 return. It was merely the passive instrument of the 
 General's wishes, which it converted into decrees, as the 
 law required. He was no more ordered to undertake the 
 conquest of Egypt than he was instructed as to the plan of 
 its execution. Bonaparte organised the army of the East, 
 raised money, and collected ships ; and it was he who 
 conceived the happy idea of joining to the expedition men 
 distinguished in science and art, and whose labours have 
 made known, in its present and past state, a country, the 
 very name of which is never pronounced without exciting 
 grand recollections. 
 
 Bonaparte's orders flew like lightning from Toulon to 
 Civita Vecchia. With admirable precision he appointed 
 some forces to assemble before Malta, and others before
 
 132 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 Alexandria. He dictated all these orders to me in his 
 Cabinet. 
 
 In the position in which France stood with respect to 
 Europe, after the treaty of Campo-Formio, the Directory, 
 far from pressing or even facilitating this expedition, 
 ought to have opposed it. A victory on the Adige would 
 have been far better for France than one on the Nile. 
 From all I saw, I am of opinion that the wish to get rid 
 of an ambitious and rising man, whose popularity excited 
 envy, triumphed over the evident danger of removing, for 
 an indefinite period, an excellent army, and the possible 
 loss of the French fleet. As to Bonaparte, he was well 
 assured that nothing remained for him but to choose 
 between that hazardous enterprise and his certain ruin. 
 Egypt was, he thought, the right place to maintain his 
 reputation, and to add fresh glory to his name. 
 
 On the 12th of April 1798 he was appointed General- 
 in-Chief of the army of the East. 
 
 It was about this time that Marmont was married to 
 Mademoiselle Perregaux ; and Bonaparte's aide de camp, 
 La Vallette, to Mademoiselle Beauharnais. l 
 
 Shortly before our departure I asked Bonaparte how 
 long he intended to remain in Egypt. He replied, "A 
 few months, or six years : all depends on circumstances. 
 I will colonise the country. I will bring them artists and 
 artisans of every description ; women, actors, etc. We are 
 but nine-and-twenty now, and we shall then be five-and- 
 thirty. That is not an old age. Those six years will en- 
 able me, if all goes well, to get to India. Give out that 
 you are going to Brest. Say so even to your family." I 
 obeyed, to prove my discretion and real attachment to 
 him. 
 
 Bonaparte wished to form a camp library of cabinet 
 
 1 Sir Walter Scott informs us that Josephine, when she became Empress, brought 
 about the marriage between her niece and La Vallette. This is another fictitious 
 incident of his historical romance. Sourrienne.
 
 1798. PROVISION OF BOOKS AND WINE. 138 
 
 editions, and lie gave me a list of the books which I was 
 to purchase. This list is in his own writing, and is as 
 follows : 
 
 CAMP LIBRARY. 
 
 1. ARTS AND SCIENCE. FonteneUe's Worlds, 1 voL Letters to a 
 German Princess, 2 wls. Courses of the Normal School, 6 wls. The 
 Artillery Assistant, 1 wl. Treatise on Fortifications, 3 vols. Treatise 
 on Fireworks, 1 vol. 
 
 2. GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVELS. Barclay's Geography, 12 wls. 
 Cook's Voyages, 3 wls. La Harpe's Travels, 24 vols. 
 
 3. HISTORY. Plutarch, 12 vols. Turenne, 2 wls. Conde, 4 vols. 
 Villars, 4 wls. Luxembourg, 2 vols. Duguesclin, 2 wls. Saxe, 3 
 wls. Memoirs of the Marshals of France, 20 wls. President 
 Hainault, 4 wls. Chronology, 2 wls. Marlborough, 4 wls. Prince 
 Eugene, 6 wls. Philosophical History of India, 12 vols. Germany, 
 2 wls. Charles XII., 1 wl. Essay on the Manners of Nations, 6 
 wls. Peter the Great, 1 vol. Polybius, 6 wls. Justin, 2 vols. 
 Arrian, 3 wls. Tacitus, 2 vols. Titus Livy. Tfiucydides, 2 vols. 
 Vertot, 4 wls. Denina, 8 wls. Frederick II., 8 wls. 
 
 4. POETRY. Ossian, 1 wl. Tasso, 6 wls. Ariosto, 6 wls. 
 Homer, 6 wls. Virgil, 4 wls. The Henriade, 1 wl. Telemachus, 2 
 vols. Les Jardins, 1 wl. The Chefs-d'QSuvre of the French TJieatre, 
 20 wls. Select Light Poetry, 10 -cols. La Fontaine. 
 
 5. ROMANCE. Voltaire, 4 wls. Helolse, 4 vols. Werther, 1 wl. 
 Marmontel, 4 to&. English Novels, 40 w&. Z Sage, 10 wZs. 
 Precost, 10 r0&. 
 
 6. POLITICS AND MORALS. The Old Testament. The New Testa- 
 ment. The Koran. The Vedan. Mythology. Montesquieu. The 
 Esprit des Lois. 
 
 It will be observed that he classed the books of the 
 religious creeds of nations under the head of " politics." 
 
 The autograph copy of the above list contains some of 
 those orthographical blunders which Bonaparte so fre- 
 quently committed. Whether these blunders are attrib- 
 utable to the limited course of instruction he received at 
 Brienne, to his hasty writing, the rapid flow of his ideas, 
 or the little importance he attached to that indispensable
 
 134 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 condition of polite education, I know not. Knowing so 
 well as he did the authors and generals whose names ap- 
 pear in the above list, it is curious that he should have 
 written Ducecling for Duguesclin, and Ocean for Ossian. 
 The latter mistake would have puzzled me not a little had 
 I not known his predilection for the Caledonian bard. 
 
 Before his departure Bonaparte laid in a considerable 
 stock of Burgundy. It was supplied by a man named 
 James, of Dijon. I may observe that on this occasion we 
 had an opportunity of ascertaining that good Burgundy, 
 well racked off, and in casks hermetically sealed, does not 
 lose its quality on a sea voyage. Several cases of this 
 Burgundy twice crossed the desert of the Isthmus of Suez 
 on camels' backs. We brought some of it back with us 
 to Frejus, and it was as good as when we departed. 
 James went with us to Egypt. 
 
 During the remainder of our stay in Paris nothing oc- 
 curred worthy of mention, with the exception of a conver- 
 sation between Bonaparte and me some days before our 
 departure for Toulon. He went with me to the Luxem- 
 bourg to get signatures to the official papers connected 
 with his expedition. He was very silent. As we passed 
 through the Kue Sainte Anne I asked him, with no other 
 object than merely to break a long pause, whether he was 
 still determined to quit France. He replied, " Yes : I 
 have tried everything. They do not want me (probably 
 alluding to the office of Director). I ought to overthrow 
 them, and make myself King ; but it will not do yet. 
 The nobles will never consent to it. I have tried my 
 ground. The time is not yet come. I should be alone. 
 But I will dazzle them again." I replied, "Well, we will 
 go to Egypt ; " and changed the conversation. ' 
 
 1 Lucien and the Bonaparttsts of course deny that Napoleon wished to become 
 Director, or to seize on power ut this time ; see Lucien, tome 1. p. 154. Thiers (vol. 
 v. p. 257) takes the same view. Lanf rey (tome i. p. 63) believes Napoleon was at 
 last compelled by the Directory to start, and he credits the story told by Desaix to 
 Mathieu Dumas, or rather to the wife of that officer, that there was a plot to npeet
 
 1798. DEPARTURE FOR TOULON. 135 
 
 The squabble with Bernadotte at Vienna delayed our 
 departure for a fortnight, and might have had the most 
 disastrous influence on the fate of the squadron, as Nelson 
 would most assuredly have waited between Malta and 
 Sicily if he had arrived there before us. 1 
 
 It is untrue that he ever entertained the idea of 
 abandoning the expedition in consequence of Bernadotte's 
 affair. The following letter to Brueys, dated the 28th 
 of April 1798, proves the contrary : 
 
 Some disturbances which have arisen at Vienna render my pres- 
 ence in Paris necessary for a few days. This will not change any 
 of the arrangements for the expedition. I have sent orders by this 
 courier for the troops at Marseilles to embark and proceed to Toulon. 
 On the evening of the 30th I will send you a courier with orders for 
 you to embark and proceed with the squadron and convoy to Genoa, 
 where I will join you. 
 
 The delay which this fresh event has occasioned will, I imagine, 
 have enabled you to complete every preparation. 
 
 We left Paris on the 3d of May 1798. Ten days be- 
 fore Bonaparte's departure for Egypt a prisoner (Sir Sid- 
 ney Smith) escaped from the Temple who was destined to 
 contribute materially to his reverses. An escape so un- 
 important in itself afterwards caused the failure of the 
 most gigantic projects and daring conceptions. This 
 escape was pregnant with future events ; a false order of 
 the Minister of Police prevented the revolution of the 
 East! 
 
 the Directory, but that when all was ready Napoleon judged that the time was not 
 ripe. Lanfrey, however, rather enlarges what Dumas says ; see Dumas, tome iii. 
 p. 157. See also the very remarkable conversation of Napoleon with Miot de Melito 
 just before leaving Italy for Rastadt : '' I cannot obey any longer. I have tasted 
 the pleasures of command, and I cannot renounce it. My decision is taken. If I 
 cannot be master, I shall quit France " (Miot, tome i. p. 184). 
 
 1 Sir Walter Soott, -without any authority, states that, at the moment of his de- 
 parture, Bonaparte seemed disposed to abandon the command of an expedition so 
 doubtful and hazardous, and that for this purpose he endeavoured to take advantage 
 of what had occurred at Vienna. This must be ranked in the class of inventions, to- 
 gether with Barras' mysterious visit to communicate the change of destination, and 
 also the ostracism and honourable exile which the Directory wished to impose on 
 Bonaparte. Bourrienne.
 
 136 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 We were at Toulon on the 8th. Bonaparte knew by 
 the movements of the English that not a moment was to 
 be lost ; but adverse winds detained us ten days, which 
 he occupied in attending to the most minute details con- 
 nected with the fleet. 
 
 Bonaparte, whose attention was constantly occupied 
 with his army, made a speech to the soldiers, which I 
 wrote to his dictation, and which appeared in the public 
 papers at the time. This address was followed by cries 
 of " The Immortal Republic for ever ! " and the singing 
 of national hymns. 
 
 Those who knew Madame Bonaparte are aware that few 
 women were more amiable and fascinating. Bonaparte 
 was passionately fond of her, and to enjoy the pleasure of 
 her society as long as possible he brought her with him 
 to Toulon. Nothing could be more affecting than their 
 parting. On leaving Toulon Josephine went to the waters 
 of Plombieres. I recollect that during her stay at Ploin- 
 bieres she incurred great danger from a serious accident. 
 Whilst she was one day sitting at the balcony of the hotel, 
 with her suite, the balcony suddenly gave way, and all 
 the persons in it fell into the street. Madame Bonaparte 
 was much hurt, but no serious consequences ensued. 1 
 
 Bonaparte had scarcely arrived at Toulon when lie 
 heard that the law for the death of emigrants was en- 
 forced with frightful rigour ; and that but recently an old 
 
 1 " Madame Bonaparte had been but a short time at Plombi^res, when one morning, 
 as she was sitting in her drawing-room engaged at needlework and conversing with 
 some ladies, Madame de Cambis, who was in the balcony, called her to look at a beau- 
 tiful little dog that was passing through the street. All the ladies who were in the 
 room immediately rose, and, following Madame Bonaparte, rushed to the balcony, 
 which instantly gave way, and fell with a tremendous crash. It fortunately hap- 
 pened that nobody was killed ; but Madame de Cnmbis had her leg broken, and 
 Madame Bonaparte was dreadfully hurt, though she escaped without broken bones. 
 M. Charvet, who was in an adjoining room, being alarmed by the noise, ran out, 
 and, on learning what had happened, he ordered a sheep to be immediately killed ; 
 and the skin of the animal being taken off, Madame Bonaparte was wrapped in it. 
 She suffered from the effects of this accident for a considerable time. Her hands and 
 arms were so severely bruised that she was long unable to use them " (Memoires de 
 Constant).
 
 1798. HUMANITY OF BONAPARTE. 137 
 
 man, upwards of eighty, had been shot. Indignant at 
 this barbarity, he dictated to me, in a tone of anger, the 
 following letter : 
 
 HEADQUABTEBS, TOULON, 
 27A Floreal, year TV. (IGtft May 1798). 
 
 BONAPARTE, MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE, TO THE 
 MILITARY COMMISSIONERS OF THE NINTH DIVISION, ESTAB- 
 LISHED BY THE LAW OF THE 19TH FRUCTIDOR. 
 
 I have learned, citizens, with deep regret, that an old man, be- 
 tween seventy and eighty years of age, and some unfortunate wom- 
 en, in a state of pregnancy, or surrounded with children of tender 
 age, have been shot on the charge of emigration. 
 
 Have the soldiers of liberty become executioners ? Can the 
 mercy which they have exercised even in the fury of battle be ex- 
 tinct in their hearts ? 
 
 The law of the 19th Fructidor was a measure of public safety. 
 Its object was to reach conspirators, not women and aged men. 
 
 I therefore exhort you, citizens, whenever the law brings to your 
 tribunals women or old men, to declare that in the field of battle you 
 have respected the women and old men of your enemies. 
 
 The officer who signs a sentence against a person incapable of 
 bearing arms is a coward. (Signed) BONAPARTE. 
 
 This letter saved the life of an unfortunate man who 
 came under the description of persons to whom Bona- 
 parte referred. The tone of this note shows what an idea 
 he already entertained of his power. He took upon him, 
 doubtless from the noblest motives, to step out of his way 
 to interpret and interdict the execution of a law, atro- 
 cious, it is true, but which even in those times of weak- 
 ness, disorder, and anarchy was still a law. In this 
 instance, at least, the power of his name was nobly em- 
 ployed. The letter gave great satisfaction to the army 
 destined for the expedition. 
 
 A man named Simon, who had followed his master in 
 emigration, and dreaded the application of the law, heard 
 that I wanted a servant. He came to me and acknowl- 
 edged his situation. He suited me, and I hired him. 
 He then told me he feared he should be arrested whilst
 
 138 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 going to the port to embark. Bonaparte, to whom I 
 mentioned the circumstance, and who had just given a 
 striking proof of his aversion to these acts of barbarity, 
 said to me in a tone of kindness, " Give him my portfolio 
 to carry, and let him remain with you." The words 
 " Bonaparte, General-in-Chief of the Army of the East," 
 were inscribed in large gold letters on the green morocco. 
 Whether it was the portfolio or his connection with us 
 that prevented Simon from being arrested I know not ; 
 but he passed on without interruption. I reprimanded 
 him for having smiled derisively at the ill humour of the 
 persons appointed to arrest him. He served me faith- 
 fully, and was even sometimes useful to Bonaparte.
 
 1798. 139 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 1798. 
 
 Departure of the squadron Arrival at Malta Dolomien General Bara- 
 guay d'Hilliers Attack on the western part of the island Caffarelli's 
 remark Deliverance of the Turkish prisoners Nelson's pursuit of 
 the French fleet Conversations on board How Bonaparte passed his 
 time Questions to the Captains Propositions discussed Morning 
 music Proclamation Admiral Brueys The English fleet avoided 
 Dangerous landing Bonaparte and his fortune Alexandria taken 
 Kleber wounded Bonaparte's entrance into Alexandria. 
 
 THE squadron sailed on the 19th of May. The Orient, 
 which, owing to her heavy lading, drew too much water, 
 touched the ground ; but she was got off without much 
 difficulty. 
 
 We arrived off Malta on the 10th of June. We had lost 
 two days in waiting for some convoys which joined us at 
 Malta. 
 
 The intrigues throughout Europe had not succeeded in 
 causing the ports of that island to be opened to us imme- 
 diately on our arrival. Bonaparte expressed much dis- 
 pleasure against the persons sent from Europe to arrange 
 measures for that purpose. One of them, however, M. 
 Dolomieu, had cause to repent his mission, which occa- 
 sioned him to be badly treated by the Sicilians. M. 
 Poussielgue had done all he could in the way of seduction, 
 but he had not completely succeeded. There was some 
 misunderstanding, and, in consequence, some shots were 
 interchanged. Bonaparte was very much pleased with 
 General Baraguay d'Hilliers' services in Italy. He could 
 not but praise his military and political conduct at Venice
 
 140 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 when, scarcely a year before, he had taken possession of 
 that city by his orders. General Baraguay d'Hilliers 
 joined us with his division, which had embarked in the 
 convoy that sailed from Genoa. The General-in Chief 
 ordered him to land and attack the western part of the 
 island. He executed this order with equal prudence and 
 ability, and highly to the satisfaction of the General-in- 
 Chief. As every person in the secret knew that all this 
 was a mere form, these hostile demonstrations produced 
 no unpleasant consequences. We wished to save the 
 honour of the knights that was all ; for no one who has 
 seen Malta can imagine that an island surrounded with 
 such formidable and perfect fortifications would have sur- 
 rendered in two days to a fleet which was pursued by an 
 enemy. The impregnable fortress of Malta is so secure 
 against a coup de main that General Caffarelli, after 
 examining its fortifications, said to the General-in-Chief, 
 in my presence, "Upon nay word, General, it is lucky 
 there is some one in the town to open the gates for us." 
 
 By comparing the observation of General Caffarelli 
 with what has been previously stated respecting the pro- 
 ject of the expedition to Egypt and Malta, an idea may be 
 formed of the value of Bonaparte's assertion at St. Helena : 
 " The capture of Malta was not owing to private intrigues, 
 but to the sagacity of the Commander-in-chief. I took 
 Malta when I was in Mantua ! " It is not the less true, 
 however, that I wrote, by his dictation, a mass of instruc- 
 tions for private intrigues. Napoleon also said to another 
 noble companion of his exile at St Helena, " Malta cer- 
 tainly possessed vast physical means of resistance ; but 
 no moral means. The knights did nothing dishonourable : 
 nobody is obliged to do impossibilities. No ; but they 
 were sold ; the capture of Malta was assured before we 
 left Toulon." 
 
 The General-in-Chief proceeded to that part of the port 
 where the Turks made prisoners by the knights were kept
 
 1798. NELSON'S PURSUIT OF THE FRENCH. 141 
 
 The disgusting galleys were emptied of their occupants. 
 The same principles which, a few days after, formed the 
 basis of Bonaparte's proclamation to the Egyptians, 
 guided him in this act of reason and humanity. 
 
 He walked several times in the gardens of the grand- 
 master. They were in beautiful order, and filled with 
 magnificent orange-trees. We regaled ourselves with 
 their fruit, which the great heat rendered most delici- 
 ous. 
 
 On the 19th of June, after having settled the govern- 
 ment and defence of the island, the General left Malta, 
 which he little dreamed he had taken for the English, 
 who have very badly requited the obligation. Many of 
 the knights followed Bonaparte and took civil and mili- 
 tary appointments. 
 
 During the night of the 22d of June the English squad- 
 ron was almost close upon us. It passed at about six 
 leagues from the French fleet. Nelson, who learned the 
 capture of Malta at Messina on the day we left the island, 
 sailed direct for Alexandria, without proceeding into the 
 north. He considered that city to be the place of our 
 destination. By taking the shortest course, with every 
 sail set, and unembarrassed by any convoy, he arrived 
 before Alexandria on the 28th of June, three days before 
 the French fleet, which, nevertheless, had sailed before 
 him from the shores of Malta. The French squadron 
 took the direction of Candia, which we perceived on the 
 25th of June, and afterwards stood to the south, favoured 
 by the Etesian winds, which regularly prevail at that sea- 
 son. The French fleet did not reach Alexandria till the 
 30th of June. 
 
 When on board the Orient he took pleasure in convers- 
 ing frequently with Monge and Berthollet. The subjects 
 on which they usually talked were chemistry, mathemat- 
 ics, and religion. General Caffarelli, whose conversation, 
 supplied by knowledge, was at once energetic, witty, and
 
 142 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 lively, was one of those with whom he most willingly dis- 
 coursed. Whatever friendship he might entertain for 
 Berthollet, it was easy to perceive that he preferred 
 Monge, and that he was led to that preference because 
 Monge, endowed with an ardent imagination, without ex- 
 actly possessing religious principles, had a kind of pre- 
 disposition for religious ideas which harmonised with the 
 notions of Bonaparte. On this subject Berthollet some- 
 times rallied his inseparable friend Monge. Besides, 
 Berthollet was, with his cold imagination, constantly de- 
 voted to analysis and abstractions, inclined towards ma- 
 terialism, an opinion with which the General was always 
 much dissatisfied. 
 
 Bonaparte sometimes conversed with Admiral Brueys. 
 His object was always to gain information respecting the 
 different manoeuvres, and nothing astonished the Admiral 
 more than the sagacity of his questions. I recollect that 
 one day, Bonaparte having asked Brueys in what manner 
 the hammocks were disposed of when dealing for action, 
 he declared, after he had received an answer, that if the 
 case should occur he would order every one to throw his 
 baggage overboard. 
 
 He passed a great part of his time in his cabin, lying on 
 a bed, which, swinging on a kind of castors, alleviated the 
 severity of the sea-sickness from which he frequently suf- 
 fered much when the ship rolled. 
 
 I was almost always with him in his cabin, where I read 
 to him some of the favourite works which he had selected 
 for his camp library. He also frequently conversed, for 
 hours together, with the captains of the vessels which he 
 hailed. He never failed to ask whence they came ? what 
 was their destination ? what ships they had met ? what 
 course they had sailed ? His curiosity being thus satis- 
 fied, he allowed them to continue their voyage, after mak- 
 ing them promise to say nothing of having seen the French 
 squadron.
 
 1798. LIFE ON BOARD THE " ORIENT.'' 143 
 
 Whilst we were at sea he seldom rose before ten o'clock 
 in the morning. The Orient had the appearance of a popu- 
 lous town, from which women had been excluded ; and 
 this floating city was inhabited by 2000 individuals, 
 amongst whom were a great number of distinguished men. 
 Bonaparte every day invited several persons to dine with 
 him, besides Brueys, Berthier, the colonels, and his ordi- 
 nary household, who were always present at the table of 
 the General-in-Chief. When the weather was fine he went 
 up to the quarter-deck, which, from its extent, formed a 
 grand promenade. 
 
 I recollect once that when walking the quarter-deck with 
 him whilst we were in Sicilian waters I thought I could see 
 the summits of the Alps, beautifully lighted by the rays of 
 the setting sun. Bonaparte laughed much, and joked 
 me about it. He called Admiral Brueys, who took his 
 telescope and soon confirmed my conjecture. The Alps ! 
 At the mention of that word by the Admiral I think I can 
 see Bonaparte still. He stood for a long time motionless ; 
 then, suddenly bursting from his trance, exclaimed, " No ! 
 I cannot behold the land of Italy without emotion ! There 
 is the East : and there I go ; a perilous enterprise invites 
 me. Those mountains command the plains where I so 
 often had the good fortune to lead the French to victory. 
 With them we will conquer again." 
 
 One of Bonaparte's greatest pleasures during the voyage 
 was, after dinner, to fix upon three or four persons to 
 support a proposition and as many to oppose it. He had 
 an object in view by this. These discussions afforded him 
 an opportunity of studying the minds of those whom he 
 had an interest in knowing well, in order that he might 
 afterwards confide to each the functions for which he 
 possessed the greatest aptitude. It will not appear singu- 
 lar to those who have been intimate with Bonaparte, that 
 in these intellectual contests he gave the preference to 
 those who had supported an absurd proposition with ability
 
 144 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 over those who had maintained the cause of reason ; and 
 it was not superiority of mind which determined his judg- 
 ment, for he really preferred the man who argued well 
 in favour of an absurdity to the man who argued equally well 
 in support of a reasonable proposition. He always gave 
 out the subjects which were to be discussed ; and they 
 most frequently turned upon questions of religion, the dif- 
 ferent kinds of government, and the art of war. One day 
 he asked whether the planets were inhabited ; on another, 
 what was the age of the world ; then he proposed to con- 
 sider the probability of the destruction of our globe, either 
 by water or fire ; at another time, the truth or fallacy of 
 presentiments, and the interpretation of dreams. I re- 
 member the circumstance which gave rise to the last pro- 
 position was an allusion to Joseph, of whom he happened 
 to speak, as he did of almost everything connected with 
 the country to which we were bound, and which that able 
 administrator had governed. No country came under 
 Bonaparte's observation without recalling historical re- 
 collections to his mind. On passing the island of Candia 
 his imagination was excited, and he spoke with enthusiasm 
 of ancient Crete and the Colossus, whose fabulous renown 
 has surpassed all human glories. He spoke much of the 
 fall of the empire of the East, which bore so little resem- 
 blance to what history has preserved of those fine countries, 
 so often moistened with the blood of man. The ingen- 
 ious fables of mythology likewise occurred to his mind, 
 and imparted to his language something of a poetical, and, 
 I may say, of an inspired character. The sight of the 
 kingdom of Minos led him to reason on the laws best cal- 
 culated for the government of nations ; and the birthplace 
 of Jupiter suggested to him the necessity of a religion for 
 the mass of mankind. This animated conversation lasted 
 until the favourable north winds, which drove the clouds 
 into the valley of the Nile, caused us to lose sight of the 
 island of Candia.
 
 1798. BONAPARTE'S RESPECT FOR LIFE. 145 
 
 The musicians on board the Orient sometimes played 
 serenades ; but only between decks, for Bonaparte was 
 not yet sufficiently fond of music to wish to hear it in his 
 cabin. It may be said that his taste for this art increased 
 in the direct ratio of his power ; and so it was with his 
 taste for hunting, of which he gave no indication until 
 after his elevation to the empire ; as though he had 
 wished to prove that he possessed within himself not only 
 the genius of sovereignty for commanding men, but also 
 the instinct for those aristocratical pleasures, the enjoy- 
 ment of which is considered by mankind to be amongst the 
 attributes of kings. 
 
 It is scarcely possible that some accidents should not 
 occur during a long voyage in a crowded vessel that some 
 persons should not fall overboard. Accidents of this kind 
 frequently happened on board the Orient. On those occa- 
 sions nothing was more remarkable than the great human- 
 ity of the man who has since been so prodigal of the blood 
 of his fellow-creatures on the field of battle, and who was 
 about to shed rivers of it even in Egypt, whither we were 
 bound. When a man fell into the sea the General-in-Chief 
 was in a state of agitation till he was saved. He instantly 
 had the ship hove-to, and exhibited the greatest uneasiness 
 until the unfortunate individual was recovered. He ordered 
 me to reward those who ventured their lives in this service. 
 Amongst these was a sailor who had incurred punishment 
 for some fault. He not only exempted him from the punish- 
 ment, but also gave him some money. I recollect that one 
 dark night we heard a noise like that occasioned by a man 
 falling into the sea. Bonaparte instantly caused the ship to 
 be hove-to until the supposed victim was rescued from cer- 
 tain death. The men hastened from all sides, and at length 
 they picked up what? the quarter of a bullock, which 
 had fallen from the hook to which it was hung. What was 
 Bonaparte's conduct ? He ordered me to reward the sail- 
 ors who had exerted themselves on this occasion even more 
 VOL. I. 10
 
 14G MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 generously than usual, saying, "It might have been a sailor, 
 and these brave fellows have shown as much activity and 
 courage as if it had." 
 
 After the lapse of thirty years all these things are as 
 fresh in my recollection as if they were passing at the 
 present moment. In this manner Bonaparte employed 
 his time on board the Orient during the voyage, and it was 
 also at this time that he dictated to me the following pro- 
 clamation : 
 
 HEADQUARTERS ON BOASD THE " ORIENT," 
 the 4ith. Messidor, year VI. 
 
 BONAPARTE, MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE, 
 GENERAL-IN-CHIEF. 
 
 SOLDIERS You are about to undertake a conquest the effects of 
 which on civilization and commerce are incalculable. The blow you 
 are about to give to England will be the best aimed, and the most sen- 
 sibly felt, she can receive until the time arrive when you can give 
 her her deathblow. 
 
 We must make some fatiguing marches ; we must fight several 
 battles ; we shall succeed in all we undertake. The destinies are 
 with us. The Mameluke Beys who favour exclusively English com- 
 merce, whose extortions oppress our merchants, and who tyrannise 
 over the unfortunate inhabitants of the Nile, a few days after our 
 arrival will no longer exist. 
 
 The people amongst whom we are going to live are Mahometans. 
 The first article of their faith is this : " There is no God but God, 
 and Mahomet is his prophet." Do not contradict them. Behave 
 to them as you have behaved to the Jews to the Italians. Pay 
 respect to their muftis, and their Imaums, as you did to the rabbis 
 and the bishops. Extend to the ceremonies prescribed by the Ko- 
 ran and to the mosques the same toleration which you showed to 
 the synagogues, to the religion of Moses and of Jesus Christ. 
 
 The Roman legions protected all religions. You will find here 
 customs different from those of Europe. You must accommodate 
 yourselves to them. The people amongst whom we are to mix differ 
 from us in the treatment of women ; but in all countries he who 
 violates is a monster. Pillage enriches only a small number of 
 men; it dishonours us ; it destroys our resources ; it converts into 
 enemies the people whom it is our interest to have for friends.
 
 1798. FOREBODINGS OF ADMIRAL BRUET8. 141 
 
 The first town we shall come to was built by Alexander. At every 
 step we shall meet with grand recollections, worthy of exciting the 
 emulation of Frenchmen. BONAPARTE. 
 
 During the voyage, and particularly between Malta and 
 Alexandria, I often conversed with the brave and unfortu- 
 nate Admiral Brueys. The intelligence we heard from 
 time to time augmented his uneasiness. I had the good 
 fortune to obtain the confidence of this worthy man. He 
 complained bitterly of the imperfect manner in which the 
 fleet had been prepared for sea ; of the encumbered state 
 of the ships of the line and frigates, and especially of the 
 Orient ; of the great number of transports ; of the bad 
 outfit of all the ships and the weakness of their crews. 
 He assured me that it required no little courage to under- 
 take the command of a fleet so badly equipped ; and he 
 often declared, that in the event of our falling in with the 
 enemy, he could not answer for the consequences. The 
 encumbered state of the vessels, the immense quantity of 
 civil and military baggage which each person had brought, 
 and would wish to save, would render proper manoeuvres 
 impracticable. In case of an attack, added Brueys, even 
 by an inferior squadron, the confusion and disorder 
 amongst so great a number of persons would produce an 
 inevitable catastrophe. Finally, if the English had ap- 
 peared with ten vessels only, the Admiral could not have 
 guaranteed a fortunate result. He considered victory to 
 be a thing that was impossible, and even with a victory, 
 what would have become of the expedition? " God send," 
 he said, with a sigh, " that we may pass the English without 
 meeting them ! " He appeared to foresee what did after- 
 wards happen to him, not in the open sea, but in a situa- 
 tion which he considered much more favourable to his 
 defence. 
 
 On the morning of the 1st of July the expedition arrived 
 off the coast of Africa, and the column of Septimus Severus 
 pointed out to us the city of Alexandria. Our situation
 
 148 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 and frame of mind hardly permitted us to reflect that in 
 the distant point we beheld the city of the Ptolemies and 
 Csesars, with its double port, its pharos, and the gigantic 
 monuments of its ancient grandeur. Our imaginations 
 did not rise to this pitch. 
 
 Admiral Brueys had sent on before the frigate Juno to 
 fetch M. Magallon, the French Consul. It was near four 
 o'clock when he arrived, and the sea was very rough. 
 He informed the General-in-Cbief that Nelson had been 
 off Alexandria on the 28th that he immediately dis- 
 patched a brig to obtain intelligence from the English 
 agent. On the return of the brig Nelson instantly stood 
 away with his squadron towards the north-east. But for a 
 delay which our convoy from Civita Vecchia occasioned, we 
 should have been on this coast at the same time as Nel- 
 son. 
 
 It appeared that Nelson supposed us to be already at 
 Alexandria when he arrived there. He had reason to 
 suppose so, seeing that we left Malta on the 19th of June, 
 whilst he did not sail from Messina till the 21st. Not 
 finding us where he expected, and being persuaded we 
 ought to have arrived there had Alexandria been the place 
 of our destination, he sailed for Alexandretta in Syria, 
 whither he imagined we had gone to effect a landing. This 
 error saved the expedition a second time. 
 
 Bonaparte, on hearing the details which the French 
 Consul communicated, resolved to disembark immedi- 
 ately. Admiral Brueys represented the difficulties and 
 dangers of a disembarkation the violence of the surge, 
 the distance from the coast, a coast, too, lined with reefs 
 of rocks, the approaching night, and our perfect ignorance 
 of the points suitable for landing. The Admiral, there- 
 fore, urged the necessity of waiting till next morning ; that 
 is to say, to delay the landing twelve hours. He observed 
 that Nelson could not return from Syria for several days. 
 Bonaparte listened to these representations with impa-
 
 1798. CAPTURE OF ALEXANDRIA. 149 
 
 tience and ill-humour. He replied peremptorily, "Admi- 
 ral, we have no time to lose. Fortune gives me but three 
 days ; if I do not profit by them we are lost." He relied 
 much on fortune ; this chimerical idea constantly influ- 
 enced his resolutions. 
 
 Bonaparte having the command of the naval as well as 
 the military force, the Admiral was obliged to yield to his 
 wishes. 
 
 I attest these facts, which passed in my presence, and 
 no part of which could escape my observation. It is quite 
 false that it was owing to the appearance of a sail which, it 
 is pretended, was descried, but of which, for my part, I 
 saw nothing, that Bonaparte exclaimed, " Fortune, have 
 you abandoned me ? I ask only five days 1 " No such 
 thing occurred. 
 
 It was one o'clock in the morning of the 2d of July 
 when we landed on the soil of Egypt, at Marabou, three 
 leagues to the west of Alexandria. We had to regret the 
 loss of some lives ; but we had every reason to expect that 
 our losses would have been greater. 
 
 At three o'clock the same morning the General-in-Chief 
 marched on Alexandria with the divisions of Kleber, Bon, 
 and Menou. The Bedouin Arabs, who kept hovering 
 about our right flank and our rear, picked up the strag- 
 glers. 
 
 Having arrived within gunshot of Alexandria, we scaled 
 the ramparts, and French valour soon triumphed over all 
 obstacles. 
 
 The first blood I saw shed in war was General Kleber's. 
 He was struck in the head by a ball, not in storming the 
 walls, but whilst heading the attack. He came to Pompey's 
 Pillar, where many members of the staff were assembled, 
 and where the General-in-Chief was watching the attack. 
 I then spoke to Kleber for the first time, and from that day 
 our. friendship commenced. I had the good fortune to 
 contribute somewhat towards the assistance of which he
 
 150 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 stood in need, and which, as we were situated, could not 
 be procured very easily. 
 
 It has been endeavoured to represent the capture of 
 Alexandria, which surrendered after a few hours, as a brill- 
 iant exploit. The General-iu-Chief himself wrote that the 
 city had been taken after a few discharges of cannon ; the 
 walls, badly fortified, were soon scaled. Alexandria was 
 not delivered up to pillage, as has been asserted, and 
 often repeated. This would have been a ' most impolitic 
 mode of commencing the conquest of Egypt, which had 
 no strong places requiring to be intimidated by a great 
 example. 
 
 Bonaparte, with some others, entered the city by a nar- 
 row street which scarcely allowed two persons to walk 
 abreast ; I was with him. We were stopped by some 
 musket-shots fired from a low window by a man and a 
 woman. They repeated their fire several times. The 
 guides who preceded their General kept up a heavy fire on 
 the window. The man and woman fell dead, and we passed 
 on in safety, for the place had surrendered. 
 
 Bonaparte employed the six days during which he re- 
 mained in Alexandria in establishing order in the city and 
 province, with that activity and superior talent which I 
 could never sufficiently admire, and in directing the march 
 of the army across the province of Bohahire'h. He sent 
 Desaix with 4500 infantry and 60 cavalry to Beda, on the 
 road to Damanhour. This general was the first to expe- 
 rience the privations and sufferings which the whole army 
 had soon to endure. His great mind, his attachment to 
 Bonaparte, seemed for a moment about to yield to the ob- 
 stacles which presented themselves. On the 15th of July 
 he wrote from Bohahire'h as follows : "I beseech you do 
 not let us stop longer in this position. My men are dis- 
 couraged and murmur. Make us advance or fall back 
 without delay. The villages consist merely of huts, ab- 
 solutely without resources."
 
 1798. COMPLAINTS OF THE FRENCH TROOPS. 151 
 
 In these immense plains, scorched by the vertical rays 
 of a burning sun, water, everywhere else so common, be- 
 comes an object of contest. The wells and springs, those 
 secret treasures of the desert, are carefully concealed from 
 the travellers ; and frequently, after our most oppressive 
 marches, nothing could be found to allay the urgent crav- 
 ings of thirst but a little brackish water of the most dis- 
 gusting description. 1 
 
 ' Some idea of the misery endured by the French troops on this occasion may be 
 gathered from the following description in Napoleon's Memoirs, dictated at St. 
 Helena : 
 
 "As the Hebrews wandering in the wilderness complained, and angrily asked 
 Moses for the onions and flesh-pots of Egypt, the French soldiers constantly re- 
 gretted the luxuries of Italy. In vain were they assured that the country was the 
 most fertile in the world, that it was even superior to Lombardy ; how were they 
 to be persuaded of this when they could get neither bread nor wine ? We en- 
 camped on immense quantities of wheat, but there was neither mill nor oven in 
 the country. The biscuit brought from Alexandria had long been exhausted ; the 
 soldiers were even reduced to bruise the wheat between two stones and to make 
 cakes, which they baked under the ashes. Many parched the wheat in a pan, 
 after which they boiled it. This was the best way to use the grain ; but, after 
 all, it was not bread. The apprehensions of the soldiers increased daily, and rose 
 to such a pitch that a great number of them said there was no great city of Cairo ; 
 and that the place bearing that name was, like Damanhour, a vast assemblage of mere 
 huts, destitute of everything that could render life comfortable or agreeable. To 
 such a melancholy state of mind had they brought themselves that two dragoons 
 threw themselves, completely clothed, into the Nile, where they were drowned. It 
 is nevertheless true that, though there was neither bread nor wine, the reiources 
 which were procured with wheat, lentils, meat, and sometimes pigeons, furnished 
 the army with food of some kind. But the evil was in the ferment of the mind. 
 The officers complained more loudly than the soldiers, because the comparison was 
 proportionately more disadvantageous to them. In Egypt they found neither the 
 quarters, the good table, nor the luxury of Italy. The General-in-Chief, wishing to set 
 an example, used to bivouac in the midst of the army, and in the least commodious 
 spots. No one had either tent or provisions ; the dinner of Napoleon and his staff 
 consisted of a dish of lentils. The soldiers passed the evenings in political conver- 
 sations, arguments, and complaints. ' For what purpose are we come here t ' said 
 some of them ; ' the Directory has transported usS ' CajffarelU,' 1 said others, ' is 
 the agent that has been made use of to deceive the General-in-Chief.^ Many of 
 them, having observed that wherever there were vestiges of antiquity they were 
 carefully searched, vented their spite in invective against the savants, or scientific 
 men, who, they said, had started the idea of the expedition in order to make these 
 searches. Jests were showered upon them, even in their presence. The men called 
 an ass a savant ; and said of Caffarelli Dufalga, alluding to his wooden leg, 'ffe 
 laughs at all these troubles ; he has one foot in France. 1 "
 
 152 1798. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 1798. 
 
 Th mirage Skirmishes with the Arabs Mistake of General Desaix's 
 division Wretchedness of a rich sheik Combat beneath the 
 General's window The flotilla on the Nile Its distress and danger 
 The battle of Chebreisse Defeat of the Mamelukes Bonaparte's 
 reception of me Letter to Louis Bonaparte Success of the French 
 army Triumphal entrance into Cairo Civil and military organisa- 
 tion of Cairo Bonaparte's letter to hia brother Joseph Plan of 
 colonisation. 
 
 ON the 7th of July General Bonaparte left Alexandria for 
 Damanhour. In the vast plains of Bohahire'h the mirage 
 every moment presented to the eye wide sheets of water, 
 while, as we advanced, we found nothing but barren 
 ground full of deep cracks. Villages, which at a distance 
 appear to be surrounded with water, are, on a nearer ap- 
 proach, discovered to be situated on heights, mostly ar- 
 tificial, by which they are raised above the inundations 
 of the Nile. This illusion continually recurs ; and it is 
 the more treacherous, inasmuch as it presents to the eye 
 the perfect representation of water, at the time when the 
 want of that article is most felt. This mirage is so con- 
 siderable in the plain of Pelusium that shortly after sunrise 
 no object is recognisable. The same phenomenon has been 
 observed in other countries. Quintus Curtius says that 
 in the deserts of Sogdiana, a fog rising from the earth 
 obscures the light, and the surrounding country seems 
 like a vast sea. The cause of this singular illusion is now 
 fully explained ; and, from the observations of the learned 
 Monge, it appears that the mirage will be found in al-
 
 1798. ENCOUNTER WITH DE8AIX. 153 
 
 most every country situated between the tropics where the 
 local circumstances are similar. 
 
 The Arabs harassed the army without intermission. 
 The few wells met with in the desert were either filled up 
 or the water was rendered unfit for use. The intolerable 
 thirst with which the troops were tormented, even on this 
 first march, was but ill allayed by brackish and unwhole- 
 some water. The army crossed the desert with the 
 rapidity of lightning, scarcely tasting a drop of water. 
 The sufferings of the troops were frequently expressed by 
 discouraging murmurs. 
 
 On the first night a mistake occurred which might have 
 proved fatal. We were advancing in the dark, under feeble 
 escort, almost sleeping on our horses, when suddenly we 
 were assailed by two successive discharges of musketry. 
 We aroused ourselves and reconnoitred, and to our great 
 satisfaction discovered that the only mischief was a slight 
 wound received by one of our guides. Our assailants were 
 the division of General Desaix, who, forming the advanced 
 guard of the army, mistook us for a party of the enemy, 
 and fired upon us. It was speedily ascertained that the 
 little advanced guard of the headquarters had not heard 
 the "Qui vive?" of Desaix's advanced posts. 
 
 On reaching Damanhour our headquarters were estab- 
 lished at the residence of a sheik. The house had been 
 new whitened, and looked well enough outside, but the 
 interior was inconceivably wretched. Every domestic 
 utensil was broken, and the only seats were a few dirty 
 tattered mats. Bonaparte knew that the sheik was rich ; 
 and having somewhat won his confidence, he asked him, 
 through the medium of the interpreter, why, being in easy 
 circumstances, he thus deprived himself of all comfort. 
 " Some years ago," replied the sheik, " I repaired and 
 furnished my house. When this became known at Cairo 
 a demand was made upon me for money, because it was 
 said my expenses proved me to be rich. I refused to pay
 
 154 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 the money, and in consequence I was ill-treated, and at 
 length forced to pay it. From that time I have allowed 
 myself only the bare necessaries of life, and I shall buy no 
 furniture for my house." The old man was lame in con- 
 sequence of the treatment he had suffered. Woe to him 
 who in this country is suspected of having a competency 
 a hundred spies are always ready to denounce him. 
 The appearance of poverty is the only security against the 
 rapine of power and the cupidity of barbarism. 
 
 A little troop of Arabs on horseback assailed our head- 
 quarters. Bonaparte, who was at the window of the 
 sheik's house, indignant at this insolence, turned to one of 
 his aides de camp, who happened to be on duty, and said, 
 " Croisier, take a few guides and drive those fellows away !" 
 In an instant Croisier was in the plain with fifteen guides. 
 A little skirmish ensued, and we looked on from the win- 
 dow. In the movement and in the attack of Croisier and 
 his party there was a sort of hesitation which the General- 
 in-Chief could not comprehend. "Forward, I say! 
 Charge ! " he exclaimed from the window, as if he could 
 have been heard. Our horsemen seemed to fall back as 
 the Arabs returned to the attack ; and after a little con- 
 test, maintained with tolerable spirit, the Arabs retired 
 without loss, and without being molested in their retreat. 
 Bonaparte could no longer repress his rage ; and when 
 Croisier returned he experienced such a harsh reception 
 that the poor fellow withdrew deeply mortified and dis- 
 tressed. Bonaparte desired me to follow him and say 
 something to console him : but all was in vain. "I can- 
 not survive this," he said. "I will sacrifice my life on the 
 first occasion that offers itself. I will not live dishonoured." 
 The word coward had escaped the General's lips. Poor 
 Croisier died at Saint Jean d'Acre. 
 
 On the 10th of July our headquarters were established at 
 Rahmahanie'h, where they remained during the llth and 
 12th. At this place commences the canal which was
 
 1798. ESCAPE OF THE TURKISH FLOTILLA. 155 
 
 cut by Alexander to convey water to his new city, and to 
 facilitate commercial intercourse between Europe and the 
 East. 
 
 The flotilla, commanded by the brave chief of division 
 Perree, had just arrived from Kosetta. Perree was on 
 board the xebec Cerf.~ Bonaparte placed on board the 
 Cfer/and the other vessels of the flotilla those individuals 
 who, not being military, could not be serviceable in 
 engagements, and whose horses served to mount a few of 
 the troops. 
 
 On the night of the 14th of July the General-in-Chief 
 directed his march towards the south, along the left bank 
 of the Nile. The flotilla sailed up the river parallel with 
 the left wing of the army. But the force of the wind, 
 which at this season blows regularly from the Mediter- 
 ranean into the valley of the Nile, carried the flotilla far 
 in advance of the army, and frustrated the plan of their 
 mutually defending and supporting each other. The 
 flotilla thus unprotected fell in with seven Turkish gun- 
 boats coming from Cairo, and was exposed simultaneously 
 to their fire and to that of the Mamelukes, fellahs, and 
 Arabs who lined both banks of the river. They had 
 small guns mounted on camels. 
 
 Perree cast anchor, and an engagement commenced at 
 nine o'clock on the 14th of July, and continued till half 
 past twelve. 
 
 At the same time the General-in-Chief met and at- 
 tacked a corps of about 4000 Mamelukes. His object, as 
 he afterwards said, was to turn the corps by the left of 
 the village of Chebreisse, and to drive it upon the Nile. 
 
 About eleven in the morning Perree told me that the 
 Turks were doing us more harm than we were doing 
 them ; that our ammunition would soon be exhausted ; 
 that the army was far inland, and that if it did not make a 
 
 1 Bonaparte had great confidence in him. He had commanded, under the Gen- 
 eral's orders, the uaval forces in the Adriatic in 1797. Bourrienne.
 
 156 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 move to the left there would be no hope for us. Several 
 vessels had already been boarded and taken by the 
 Turks, who massacred the crews before our eyes, and with 
 barbarous ferocity showed us the heads of the slaugh- 
 tered men. 
 
 Perree, at considerable risk, despatched several persons 
 to inform the General-in-Chief of the desperate situa- 
 tion of the flotilla. The cannonade which Bonaparte had 
 heard since the morning, and the explosion of a Turkish 
 gunboat, which was blown up by the artillery of the 
 xebec, led him to fear that our situation was really peril- 
 ous. He therefore made a movement to the left, in the 
 direction of the Nile and Chebreisse, beat the Mamelukes, 
 and forced them to retire on Cairo. At sight of the 
 French troops the commander of the Turkish flotilla 
 weighed anchor and sailed up the Nile. The two banks 
 of the river were evacuated, and the flotilla escaped the 
 destruction which a short time before had appeared in- 
 evitable. Some writers have alleged that the Turkish 
 flotilla was destroyed in this engagement. The truth is, 
 the Turks did us considerable injury, while on their part 
 they suffered but little. We had twenty men killed and 
 several wounded. Upwards of 1500 cannon-shots were 
 fired during the action. 
 
 General Berthier, in his narrative of the Egyptian 
 expedition, enumerates the individuals who, though not 
 in the military service, assisted Perree in this unequal and 
 dangerous engagement. He mentions Monge, Berthollet, 
 Andreossy, the paymaster, Junot, and Bourrienne, secre- 
 tary to the General-in-Chief. It has also been stated that 
 Sucy, the commissary-general, was seriously wounded 
 while bravely defending a gunboat laden with provisions ; 
 but this is incorrect. 
 
 We had no communication with the army until the 
 23d of July. On the 22d we came in sight of the 
 Pyramids, and were informed that we were only about
 
 1798. BON APARTE'S RECEPTION OF BOURRIENNE. 151 
 
 ten leagues from Gizeh, where they are situated. The 
 cannonade which we heard, and which augmented in pro- 
 portion as the north wind diminished, announced a seri- 
 ous engagement ; and that same day we saw the banks of 
 the Nile strewed with heaps of bodies, which the waves 
 were every moment washing into the sea. This horrible 
 spectacle, the silence of the surrounding villages, which 
 had hitherto been armed against us, and the cessation of 
 the firing from the banks of the river, led us to infer, 
 with tolerable certainty, that a battle fatal to the Mame- 
 lukes had been fought. The misery we suffered on our 
 passage from Rahmahanie'h to Gizeh is indescribable. We 
 lived for eleven days on melons and water, besides be- 
 ing momentarily exposed to the musketry of the Arabs 
 and the f ellahs. We luckily escaped with but a few killed 
 and wounded. The rising of the Nile was only begin- 
 ning. The shallowness of the river near Cairo obliged us 
 to leave the xebec and get on board a djerm. We 
 reached Gizeh at three in the afternoon of the 23d of 
 July. 
 
 When I saluted the General, whom I had not seen 
 for twelve days, he thus addressed me : "So you are 
 here, are you ? Do you know that you have all of you 
 been the cause of my not following up the battle of Che- 
 breisse ? It was to save you, Monge, Berthollet, and the 
 others on board the flotilla that I hurried the movement 
 of my left upon the Nile before my right had turned Che- 
 breisse. But for that, not a single Mameluke would have 
 eseaped." 
 
 "I thank you for my own part," replied I; "but in 
 conscience could you have abandoned us, after taking 
 away our horses, and making us go on board the xebec, 
 whether we would or not ? " He laughed, and then told 
 me how sorry he was for the wound of Sucy, and the death 
 of many useful men, whose places could not possibly be 
 filled up.
 
 158 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 He made me write a letter to his brother Louis, inform- 
 ing him that he had gained a complete victory over the 
 Mamelukes at Einbabeh, opposite Boulac, and that the 
 enemy's loss was 2000 men killed and wounded, 40 guns, 
 and a great number of horses. 
 
 The occupation of Cairo was the immediate consequence 
 of the victory of Embabeh. Bonaparte established his 
 head-quarters in the house of Elfy Bey, in the great 
 square of Ezbekye'h. 
 
 The march of the French army to Cairo was attended 
 by an uninterrupted succession of combats and victories. 
 We had won the battles of Kahmahanie'h, Chebreisse, and 
 the Pyramids. The Mamelukes were defeated, and their 
 chief, Mourad Bey, was obliged to fly into Upper Egypt. 
 Bonaparte found no obstacle to oppose his entrance into 
 Uie capital of Egypt, after a campaign of only twenty days. 
 
 No conqueror, perhaps, ever enjoyed a victory so much 
 as Bonaparte, and yet no one was ever less inclined to 
 abuse his triumphs. 
 
 We entered Cairo on the 24th of July, and the General- 
 in-Chief immediately directed his attention to the civil and 
 military organisation of the country. Only those who 
 saw him in the vigour of his youth can form an idea of his 
 extraordinary intelligence and activity. Nothing escaped 
 his observation. Egypt had long been the object of his 
 study ; and in a few weeks he was as well acquainted with 
 the country as if he had lived in it ten years. He issued 
 orders for observing the strictest discipline, and these 
 orders were punctually obeyed. 
 
 The mosques, the civil and religious institutions, the 
 harems, the women, the customs of the country all were 
 scrupulously respected. A few days after they entered 
 Cairo the French were freely admitted into the shops, and 
 were seen sociably smoking their pipes with the inhabi- 
 tants, assisting them in their occupations, and playing 
 with their children.
 
 1798. HO W TO MAKE EG TPT A FRENCH COLONY. 159 
 
 The day after his arrival in Cairo Bonaparte addressed 
 to his brother Joseph the following letter, which was in- 
 tercepted and printed. Its authenticity has been doubted, 
 but I saw Napoleon write it, and he read it to me before 
 
 he sent it off. 
 
 CAIRO, 
 
 Ittt Thermidor (25<A July 1798). 
 
 You will see in the public papers the bulletins of the battles and 
 conquest of Egypt, which were sufficiently contested to add another 
 wreath to the laurels of this army. Egypt is richer than any country 
 in the world in corn, rice, vegetables, and cattle. But the people 
 are in a state of utter barbarism. We cannot procure money, even 
 to pay the troops. I may be in France in two months. 
 
 Engage a country-house, to be ready for me on my arrival, either 
 near Paris or in Burgundy, where I mean to pass the winter. ' 
 
 (Signed) BONAPARTE. 
 
 This announcement of his departure to his brother is 
 corroborated by a note which he despatched some days 
 after, enumerating the supplies and individuals which he 
 wished to have sent to Egypt. His note proves, more con- 
 vincingly than any arguments, that Bonaparte earnestly 
 wished to preserve his conquest, and to make it a French 
 colony. It must be borne in mind that the note here 
 alluded to, as well as the letter above quoted, was written 
 long before the destruction of the fleet. 
 
 1 Bonaparte's autograph note, after enumerating the troops and warlike stores he 
 wished to be sent, concluded with the following list : 
 
 1st, a company of actors ; 2d, a company of dancers ; 3d, some dealers in mario- 
 nettes, at least three or four ; 4th, a hundred French women ; 5th, the wives of all 
 the men employed in the corps ; 6th, twenty surgeons, thirty apothecaries, and ten 
 physicians ; 7th, some founders ; 8th, some distillers and dealers in liquor ; 9th, 
 fifty gardeners with their families, and the seeds of every kind of vegetable ; 10th, 
 each party to bring with them 200,000 pints of brandy ; llth, 30,000 ells of blue and 
 scarlet cloth ; 12th, a supply of fwap and oil. Sourrienne.
 
 180 1798. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 1798. 
 
 Establishment of a divan in each Egyptian province Deaaix in Upper 
 Egypt Ibrahim Bey beaten by Bonaparte at Salehye'h Sulkowsky 
 wounded Disaster at Aboukir Dissatisfaction and murmurs of the 
 army Dejection of the General-in-Chief His plan respecting Egypt 
 Meditated descent upon England Bonaparte's censure of the Di- 
 rectory Intercepted correspondence. 
 
 FROM the details I have already given respecting Bona- 
 parte's plans for colonising Egypt, it will be seen that his 
 energy of mind urged him to adopt anticipatory measures 
 for the accomplishment of objects which were never real- 
 ised. During the short interval in which he sheathed his 
 sword he planned provisional governments for the towns 
 and provinces occupied by the French troops, and he 
 adroitly contrived to serve the interests of his army with- 
 out appearing to violate those of the country. After he 
 had been four days at Cairo, during which time he em- 
 ployed himself in examining everything, and consulting 
 every individual from whom he could obtain useful in- 
 formation, he published the following order : 
 
 HEADQUARTERS, CAIBO, 
 
 9<A Thermidor, year VI. 
 
 BONAPARTE, MEMBER OP THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE, AND 
 GENERAL-IN-CHIEF, ORDERS : 
 
 Art. 1. There shall be in each province of Egypt a divan, com- 
 posed of seven individuals, whose duty will be to superintend the 
 interests of the province ; to communicate to me any complaints 
 that may be made ; to prevent warfare among the different vil- 
 lages ; to apprehend and punish criminals (for whieh purpose they
 
 1798. GENERAL DE8AIX IN UPPER EGYPT. 161 
 
 may demand assistance from the French commandant) ; and to take 
 every opportunity of enlightening the people. 
 
 Art. 2. There shall be in each province an aga of the Janizaries, 
 maintaining constant communication with the French commandant. 
 He shall have with him a company of sixty armed natives, whom 
 he may take wherever he pleases, for the maintenance of good 
 order, subordination, and tranquillity. 
 
 Art. 3. There shall be in each province an intendant, whose busi- 
 ness will be to levy the miri, the feddam, and the other contribu- 
 tions which formerly belonged to the Mamelukes, but which now 
 belong to the French Republic. The intendants shall have as many 
 agents as may be necessary. 
 
 Art. 4. The said intendant shall have a French agent to correspond 
 with the Finance Department, and to execute all the orders he may 
 receive. (Signed) BONAPARTE. 
 
 While Bonaparte was thus actively taking measures for 
 the organisation of the country, 1 General Desaix had 
 marched into Upper Egypt in pursuit of Mourad Bey. We 
 learned that Ibrahim, who, next to Mourad, was the most 
 influential of the beys, had proceeded towards Syria, by 
 the way of Belbeis and Salehye'h. The General-in-Chief 
 immediately determined to march in person against that 
 formidable enemy, and he left Cairo about fifteen days 
 after he had entered it. It is unnecessary to describe the 
 well-known engagement in which Bonaparte drove Ibra- 
 him back upon El-Arish ; besides, I do not enter minutely 
 into the details of battles, my chief object being to record 
 events which I personally witnessed. 
 
 At the battle of Salehye'h Bonaparte thought he had 
 lost one of his aides de camp, Sulkowsky, to whom he was 
 much attached, and who had been with us during the 
 whole of the campaign of Italy. On the field of battle one 
 object of regret cannot long engross the mind ; yet, on his 
 return to Cairo, Bonaparte frequently spoke to me of Sul- 
 kowsky in terms of unfeigned sorrow. 
 
 "I cannot," said he one day, " sufficiently admire the 
 
 1 Far more thoroughly and actively than those taken by the English Government 
 in 18S2-3-4 ! 
 
 VOL. I. 11
 
 162 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 noble spirit and determined courage of poor Sulkowsky." 
 He often said that Sulkowsky would have been a valuable 
 aid to whoever might undertake the resuscitation of Po- 
 land. Fortunately that brave officer was not killed on that 
 occasion, though seriously wounded. He was, however, 
 killed shortly after. 
 
 The destruction of the French squadron in the roads of 
 Aboukir occurred during the absence of the General-in- 
 Chief. This event happened on the 1st of August. The 
 details are generally known ; but there is one circumstance 
 to which I cannot refrain from alluding, and which excited 
 deep interest at the time. This was the heroic courage of 
 the son of Casabianca, the captain of the Orient. Casa- 
 bianca was among the wounded, and when the vessel was 
 blown up his son, a lad of ten years of age, preferred 
 perishing with him rather than saving himself, when one 
 of the seamen had secured him the means of escape. I 
 told the aide de camp, sent by General Kleber, who had 
 the command of Alexandria, that the General-in-Chief was 
 near Salehye'h. He proceeded thither immediately, and 
 Bonaparte hastened :back to Cairo, a distance of about 
 thirty-three leagues. 
 
 In spite of any assertions that may have been made to 
 the contrary, the fact is, that as soon as the French troops 
 set foot in Egypt, they were filled with dissatisfaction, and 
 ardently longed to return home. 1 The illusion of the 
 
 1 Etveurs objects to this description of the complaints of the army, but Savary 
 (tome i. pp. 56, B7, and tome i. p. 89) fully confirms it, giving the reason that the 
 army was not a homogeneous body, but a mixed force taken from Rome, Florence, 
 Milan, Venice, Genoa, and Marseilles ; see also Thiers, tome v. p. 283. But the fact 
 is not singular. For a striking instance, in the days of the Empire, of the soldiers in 
 1809, in Spain, actually threatening Napoleon in his own hearing, see De Gonneville 
 (tome i. pp. 100-193) : " The soldiers of Lapisse's division gave loud expression to the 
 most sinister designs against the Emperor's person, stirring up each other to fire a 
 shot at him, and bandying accusations of cowardice for not doing it. He heard it 
 all as plainly as we did, and seemed as if he did not care a bit for it, but " sent the 
 division into good quarters, when the men were as enthusiastic as they were formerly 
 mutinous. In 17% d'Entraigues, the Bourbon ppy, reports, " As a general rule, the 
 French soldier grumbles and is discontented. He accuses Bonaparte of being a 
 thiii and u rascal. But to-morrow the very same soldier will obey him blindly* 
 (luiig'b Bonaparte, tome iii. p. 152).
 
 1798. NELSOJVS VICTORY AT ABOUKIR. 163 
 
 expedition had disappeared, and only its reality remained. 
 What bitter murmuring have I not heard from Murat, 
 Lannes, Berthier, Bessieres, and others ! Their complaints 
 were, indeed, often so unmeasured as almost to amount to 
 sedition. This greatly vexed Bonaparte, and drew from 
 him severe reproaches and violent language. 1 When the 
 news arrived of the loss of the fleet, discontent increased. 
 All who had acquired fortunes under Napoleon now began 
 to fear that they would never enjoy them. All turned 
 their thoughts to Paris, and its amusements, and were 
 utterly disheartened at the idea of being separated from 
 their homes and their friends for a period, the termination 
 of which it was impossible to foresee. 
 
 The catastrophe of Aboukir came like a thunderbolt 
 upon the General-in-Chief. In spite of all his energy and 
 fortitude, he was deeply distressed by the disasters which 
 now assailed him. To the painful feelings excited by the 
 complaints and dejection of his companions in arms was 
 now added the irreparable misfortune of the burning of 
 oar fleet. He measured the fatal consequences of this 
 event at a single glance. We were now cut off from all 
 communication with France, and all hope of returning 
 thither, except by a degrading capitulation with an impla- 
 cable and hated enemy. Bonaparte had lost all chance of 
 preserving his conquest, and to him this was indeed a 
 bitter reflection. And at what a time did this disaster 
 befall him ? At the very moment when he was about to 
 apply for the aid of the mother- country. 
 
 From what General Bonaparte communicated to me 
 previously to the 1st of August, his object was, having once 
 secured the possession of Egypt, to return to Toulon with 
 the fleet ; then to send troops and provisions of every 
 
 1 Napoleon related at St. Helena that in a fit of irritation he rushed among a 
 group of dissatisfied generals, and said to one of them, who was remarkable for hie 
 stature, " You have held seditious language ; but take care I do not perform my 
 duty. Though you are five feet ten inches high, that shall not save you from being 
 shot. " Bourrienne,
 
 164 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 kind to Egypt ; and next to combine with the fleet all the 
 forces that could be supplied, not only by France, but by 
 her allies, for the purpose of attacking England. It is 
 certain that previously to his departure for Egypt he had 
 laid before the Directory a note relative to his plans. He 
 always regarded a descent upon England as possible, 
 though in its result fatal, so long as we should be inferior 
 in naval strength ; but he hoped by various manoeuvres to 
 secure a superiority on one point. 
 
 His intention was to return to France. Availing him- 
 self of the departure of the English fleet for the Mediter- 
 ranean, the alarm excited by his Egyptian expedition, the 
 panic that would be inspired by his sudden appearance at 
 Boulogne, and his preparations against England, he hoped 
 to oblige that power to withdraw her naval force from the 
 Mediterranean, and to prevent her sending out troops to 
 Egypt. This project was often in his head. He would 
 have thought it sublime to date an order of the day from 
 the ruins of Memphis, and three months later, one from 
 London. The loss of the fleet converted all these bold 
 conceptions into mere romantic visions. 
 
 When alone with me he gave free vent to his emotion. 
 I observed to him that the disaster was doubtless great, 
 but that it would have been infinitely more irreparable 
 had Nelson fallen in with us at Malta, or had he waited 
 for us four-and-twenty hours before Alexandria, or in the 
 open sea. "Any one of these events," said I, "which 
 were not only possible but probable, would have deprived 
 us of every resource. We are blockaded here, but we 
 have provisions and money. Let us then wait patiently 
 to see what the Directory will do for us." " The Direc- 
 tory ! " exclaimed he angrily, " the Directory is composed 
 of a set of scoundrels ! they envy and hate me, and would 
 gladly let me perish here. Besides, you see how dissatis- 
 fied the whole army is : not a man is willing to stay." 
 
 The pleasing illusions which were cherished at the out-
 
 1798. FRENCHMEN IN CAIRO. 165 
 
 set of the expedition vanished long before our arrival in 
 Cairo. Egypt was no longer the empire of the Ptolemies, 
 covered with populous and wealthy cities ; it now pre- 
 sented one unvaried scene of devastation and misery. 
 Instead of being aided by the inhabitants, whom we had 
 ruined, for the sake of delivering them from the yoke of 
 the beys, we found all against us : Mamelukes, Arabs, and 
 fellahs. No Frenchman was secure of his life who hap- 
 pened to stray half a mile from any inhabited place, or 
 the corps to which he belonged. The hostility which 
 prevailed against us and the discontent of the army were 
 clearly developed in the numerous letters which were 
 written to France at the time, and intercepted. 
 
 The gloomy reflections which at first assailed Bona- 
 parte, were speedily banished ; and he soon recovered the 
 fortitude and presence of mind which had been for a 
 moment shaken by the overwhelming news from Aboukir. 
 He, however, sometimes repeated, in a tone which it would 
 be difficult to describe, " Unfortunate Brueys, what have 
 you done ! " 
 
 I have remarked that in some chance observations which 
 escaped Napoleon at St. Helena he endeavoured to throw 
 all the blame of the affair on Admiral Brueys. Persons 
 who are determined to make Bonaparte an exception to 
 human nature have unjustly reproached the Admiral for 
 the loss of the fleet.
 
 IG6 179a 
 
 CHAPTEE XVI. 
 
 1798. 
 
 The Egyptian Institute Festival of the birth of Mahomet Bonaparte's 
 prudent respect for the Mahometan religion His Turkish dress 
 Djezzar, the Pasha of Acre Thoughts of a campaign in Germany 
 Want of news from France Bonaparte and Madame Foures The 
 Egyptian fortune-teller, M. Berthollet, and the Sheik El Bekri The 
 air " Marlbrook " Insurrection in Cairo Death of General Dapuis 
 Death of Sulkowsky The insurrection quelled Nocturnal execu- 
 tions Destruction of a tribe of Arabs Convoy of sick and 
 wounded Massacre of the French in Sicily Projected expedition 
 to Syria Letter to Tippoo Saib. 
 
 THE loss of the fleet convinced General Bonaparte of the 
 necessity of speedily and effectively organising Egypt, 
 where everything denoted that we should stay for a con- 
 siderable time, except in the event of a forced evacuation, 
 which the General was far from foreseeing or fearing. 
 The distance of Ibrahim Bey and Mourad Bey now left 
 him a little at rest. War, fortifications, taxation, govern- 
 ment, the organisation of the divans, trade, art, and 
 science, all occupied his attention. Orders and instruc- 
 tions were immediately despatched, if not to repair the 
 defeat, at least to avert the first danger that might ensue 
 from it. On the 21st of August Bonaparte established at 
 Cairo an institute of the arts and sciences, of which he 
 subsequently appointed me a member in the room of M. 
 de Sucy, who was obliged to return to France, in conse- 
 quence of the wound he received on board the flotilla in 
 the Nile. 1 
 
 1 The Institute of Egypt was composed of members of the French Institute, and 
 of the men of science and artists of the commission who did not belong to that
 
 1793. THE EGYPTIAN INSTITUTE. 167 
 
 In founding this Institute, Bonaparte wished to afford an 
 example of his ideas of civilisation. The minutes of the 
 sittings of that learned body, which have been printed, 
 bear evidence of its utility, and of Napoleon's extended 
 views. The objects of the Institute were the advancement 
 and propagation of information in Egypt, and the study 
 and publication of all facts relating to the natural history, 
 trade, and antiquities of that ancient country. 
 
 On the 18th Bonaparte was present at the ceremony of 
 opening the dyke of the canal of Cairo, which receives the 
 water of the Nile when it reaches the height fixed by the 
 Mequyas. 
 
 Two days after came the anniversary festival of the 
 birth of Mahomet. At this Napoleon was also pres- 
 ent, in company with the sheik El Bekri, 1 who at his 
 
 body. They assembled and added to their number several officers of the artillery 
 and staff, and others who had cultivated the sciences and literature. 
 
 The Institute was established in one of the palaces of the beys. A great number 
 of machines, and physical, chemical, and astronomical instruments had been 
 brought from France. They were distributed in the different rooms, which were also 
 successively filled with all the curiosities of the country, whether of the animal, 
 vegetable, or mineral kingdom. 
 
 The garden of the palace became a botanical garden. A chemical laboratory was 
 formed at headquarters ; Berthollet performed experiments there several times 
 every week, at which Napoleon and a great number of officers attended (Memoirs 
 of Napoleon}. 
 
 1 The General-in-Chief went to celebrate the feast of the Prophet at the house of 
 the sheik El Bekri. The ceremony was begun by the recital of a kind of litany, 
 containing the life of Mahomet from his birth to his death. About a hundred 
 sheiks, sitting in a circle, on carpets, with their legs crossed, recited all the verses, 
 swinging their bodies violently backwards and forwards, and altogether. 
 
 A grand dinner was afterwards served up, at which the guests sat on carpets, with 
 their legs across. There were twenty tables, and five or six people at each table. 
 That of the General-in-Chief and the sheik El Bekri was in the middle ; a little 
 slab of a precious kind of wood ornamented with mosaic work was placed eighteen 
 inches above the floor and covered with a great number of dishes in succession. 
 They were pillaws of rice, a particular kind of roast, entrees, and pastry, all very 
 highly spiced. The sheiks picked everything with their fingers. Accordingly 
 water was brought to wash the hands three times during dinner. Gooseberry- water, 
 lemonade, and other sorts of sherbets were served to drink, and abundance of pre- 
 serves and confectionery with the dessert. On the whole, the dinner was not dis- 
 agreeable ; it was only the manner of eating it that seemed strange to us. 
 
 In the evening the whole city was illuminated. After dinner the party went into 
 the square of El Bekri, the illumination of which, in coloured lamps, was very beau- 
 tiful. An immense concourse of people attended.. Thej were all placed in order,
 
 168 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 request gave him two young Mamelukes, Ibrahim, and 
 Roustan. l 
 
 It has been alleged that Bonaparte, when in Egypt, 
 took part in the religious ceremonies and worship of the 
 Mussulmans ; but it cannot be said that he celebrated the 
 festivals of the overflowing of the Nile and the anniversary 
 of the Prophet. The Turks invited him to these merely 
 as a spectator ; and the presence of their new master was 
 gratifying to the people. But he never committed the 
 folly of ordering any solemnity. He neither learned nor 
 repeated any prayer of the Koran, as many persons have 
 asserted ; neither did he advocate fatalism, polygamy, or 
 any other doctrine of the Koran. Bonaparte employed 
 himself better than in discussing with the Imaums the 
 theology of the children of Ismael. The ceremonies, at 
 which policy induced him to be present, were to him, and 
 to all who accompanied him, mere matters of curiosity. 
 He never set foot in a mosque ; and only on one oc- 
 casion, which I shall hereafter mention, dressed himself in 
 the Mahometan costume. He attended the festivals to 
 which the green turbans invited him. 2 His religious 
 tolerance was the natural consequence of his philosophic 
 spirit. 
 
 in ranks of from twenty to a hundred persons, who, standing close together, recited 
 the prayers and litanies of the Prophet with movements which kept increasing, 
 until at length they seemed to be convulsive, and some of the most zealous fainted 
 away (Memoirs of Napoleon). 
 
 1 Roustan or Rustan, a Mameluke, was always with Napoleon from the time 
 of the return from Egypt till 1814, when he abandoned his master. He slept at or 
 near the door of Napoleon. See Remusat, tome i. p. 209, for an amusing descrip- 
 tion of the alarm of Josephine, and the precipitate flight of Madame de R6musat, 
 at the idea of being met and killed by this man in one of Josephine's nocturnal 
 attacks on the privacy of her husband when closeted with his mistress. 
 
 2 From this Sir Walter Scott infers that he did not scruple to join the Mussul- 
 mans in the external ceremonies of their religion. He embellishes hta romance 
 with the ridiculous farce of the sepulchral chamber of the grand pyramid, and the 
 speeches which were addressed to the General as well as to the muftis and Imanms ; 
 and he adds that Bonaparte was on the point of embracing Islamism. All that 
 Sir Walter says on this subject is the height of absurdity, and does not even deserve 
 to be seriously refuted. Bonaparte never entered a mosque except from motives of 
 curiosity, and he never for one moment afforded any ground for supposing that he 
 btlieved in the mission of Mahomet.Bourrienne,
 
 1798. BONAPARTE ACTS THE MUSSULMAN. 16 
 
 Doubtless Bonaparte did, as he was bound to do, show 
 respect for the religion of the country ; and he found it 
 necessary to act more like a Mussulman than a Catholic. 
 A wise conqueror supports his triumphs by protecting 
 and even elevating the religion of the conquered people. 
 Bonaparte's principle was, as he himself has often told 
 me, to look upon religions as the work of men, but to re- 
 spect them everywhere as a powerful engine of govern- 
 ment. However, I will not go so far as to say that he 
 would not have changed his religion had the conquest of 
 the East been the price of that change. All that he said 
 about Mahomet, Islamism, and the Koran to the great 
 men of the country he laughed at himself. He enjoyed 
 the gratification of having all his fine sayings on the 
 subject of religion translated into Arabic poetry, and re- 
 peated from mouth to mouth. This of course tended to 
 conciliate the people. 
 
 I confess that Bonaparte frequently conversed with the 
 chiefs of the Mussulman religion on the subject of his 
 conversion ; but only for the sake of amusement. The 
 priests of the Koran, who would probably have been de- 
 lighted to convert us, offered us the most ample conces- 
 sions. But these conversations were merely started by 
 way of entertainment, and never could have warranted a 
 supposition of their leading to any serious result. If 
 Bonaparte spoke as a Mussulman, it was merely in his 
 character of a military and political chief in a Mussulman 
 country. To do so was essential to his success, to the 
 safety of his army, and, consequently, to his glory. In 
 every country he would have drawn up proclamations and 
 delivered addresses on the same principle. In India he 
 would have been for Ali, at Thibet for the Dalai-lama, and 
 in China for Confucius. 1 
 
 1 On the snbject of his alleged conversion to Mahometanism Bonaparte expressed 
 himself at St. Helena as follows : 
 
 " I never followed any of the tenets of that religion. I never prayed in tha 
 mosques. I never abstained from wine, or was circumcised, neither did I ever
 
 170 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 179a 
 
 The General-in-Chief had a Turkish dress made, which 
 he once put on, merely in joke. One day he desired me 
 to go to breakfast without waiting for him, and that he 
 would follow me. In about a quarter of an hour he made 
 his appearance in his new costume. As soon as he was 
 recognised he was received with a loud burst of laughter. 
 He sat down very coolly ; but he found himself so en- 
 cumbered and ill at ease in his turban and Oriental robe 
 that he speedily threw them off, and was never tempted to 
 a second performance of the masquerade. 
 
 About the end of August Bonaparte wished to open ne- 
 gotiations with the Pasha of Acre, nicknamed the Butcher. 
 He offered Djezzar his friendship, sought his in return, 
 and gave him the most consolatory assurances of the safety 
 of his dominions. He promised to support him against 
 the Grand Seignior, at the very moment when he was as- 
 suring the Egyptians that he would support the Grand 
 Seignior against the beys. But Djezzar, confiding in his 
 
 profess it. I said merely that we were the friends of the Mussulmans, and that I 
 respected Mahomet their prophet, which was true ; I respect him now. I wanted 
 to make the Imaums cause prayers to be offered up in the mosques for me, in order 
 to make the people respect me still more than they actually did, and obey me more 
 readily. The Imaums replied that there was a great obstacle, because their Prophet 
 in the Koran had inculcated to them that they were not to obey, respect, or hold 
 faith with infidels, and that I came under that denomination. I then desired them 
 to hold a consultation, and see what was necessary to be done in order to become a 
 Mussulman, as some of their tenets could not be practised by us. That, as to cir- 
 cumcision, God had made us unfit for that. That, with respect to drinking wine, 
 we were poor cold people, inhabitants of the north, who could not exist without it. 
 They consulted together accordingly, and in about three weeks issued a fetham, de- 
 claring that circumcision might be omitted, because it was merely a profession ; that 
 as to drinking wine, it might be drunk by Mussulmans, but that those who drank it 
 would not go to paradise, but to hell. I replied that this would not do ; that we 
 had no occasion to make ourselves Mussulmans in order to go to hell, that there 
 were many ways of getting there without coming to, Egypt, and desired them to 
 hold another consultation. After deliberating and battling together for I believe 
 three months, they finally decided that a man might become a Mussulman, and 
 neither circumcise nor abstain from wine ; but that, in proportion to the wine drunk, 
 some good works must be done. I then told them that we were all Mussulmans and 
 friends of the Prophet, which they really believed, as the French soldiers neve* 
 went to church, and had no priests with them. For you must know that during th 
 EevolutiOD there was no religion whatever in the French army. Menou," continued 
 Napoleon, " really turned Mahometan, which was the reason 1 left him behind."-* 
 Voice from St. Helena.
 
 1798. NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE PASHA OF ACRE. 171 
 
 own strength and in the protection of the English, who 
 had anticipated Bonaparte, was deaf to every overture, 
 and would not even receive Beauvoisin, who was sent to 
 him on the 22d of August. A second envoy was beheaded 
 at Acre. The occupations of Bonaparte and the necessity 
 of obtaining a more solid footing in Egypt retarded for 
 the moment the invasion of that pashalic, which provoked 
 vengeance by its barbarities, besides being a dangerous 
 neighbour. 
 
 From the time he received the accounts of the disaster 
 of Aboukir until the revolt of Cairo on the 22d of Octo- 
 ber, Bonaparte sometimes found the time hang heavily on 
 his hands. Though he devoted attention to everything, 
 yet there was not sufficient occupation for his singularly 
 active mind. When the heat was not too great he rode on 
 horseback ; and on his return, if he found no despatches 
 to read (which often happened), no orders to send off, or 
 no letters to answer, he was immediately absorbed in 
 reverie, and would sometimes converse very strangely. 
 One day, after a long pause, he said to me 
 
 "Do you know what I am thinking of? " " Upon my 
 word, that would be very difficult ; you think of such ex- 
 traordinary things." " I don't know," continued he, "that 
 I shall ever see France again ; but if I do, my only ambi- 
 tion is to make a glorious campaign in Germany in the 
 plains of Bavaria ; there to gain a great battle, and to 
 avenge France for the defeat of Hochstadt. After that I 
 would retire into the country, and live quietly." 
 
 He then entered upon a long dissertation on the prefer- 
 ence he would give to Germany as the theatre of war ; l 
 
 1 So early as 1794 Napoleon had suggested that Austria should always be attacked 
 in Germany, not in Italy. ' It is Germany that should be overwhelmed ; that done, 
 Italy and Spain fall of themselves. . . . Germany should be attacked, not Spain 
 or Italy. If we obtain great success, advantage should never be taken of it to pene- 
 trate into Italy while Germany, unweakened, offers a formidable front" (lung's 
 Bonaparte, tome ii. p. 430). He was always opposed to the wild plans which had 
 ruined so many French armies in Italy, and which the Directory tried to force on 
 him, of marching on Borne and Naples after every success in the north.
 
 172 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 the fine character of the people, and the prosperity and 
 wealth of the country, and its power of supporting an 
 army. His conversations were sometimes very long ; but 
 always replete with interest. 
 
 In these intervals of leisure Bonaparte was accustomed 
 to retire to bed early. I used to read to him every even- 
 ing. When I read poetry he would fall asleep ; but when 
 he asked for the Life of Cromwell I counted on sitting up 
 pretty late. In the course of the day he used to read and 
 make notes. He often expressed regret at not receiving 
 news from France ; for correspondence was rendered im- 
 practicable by the numerous English and Turkish cruisers. 
 Many letters were intercepted and scandalously published. 
 Not even family secrets and communications of the most 
 confidential nature were respected. 
 
 About the middle of September in this year (1798), 
 Bonaparte ordered to be brought to the house of Elfy Bey 
 half a dozen Asiatic women whose beauty he had heard 
 highly extolled. But their ungraceful obesity displeased 
 him, and they were immediately dismissed. A few days 
 after he fell violently in love with Madame FourSs, the 
 wife of a lieutenant of infantry. 1 She was very pretty, and 
 her charms were enhanced by the rarity of seeing a wom- 
 an in Egypt who was calculated to please the eye of a 
 European. Bonaparte engaged for her a house adjoining 
 the palace of Elfy Bey, which we occupied. He fre- 
 quently ordered dinner to be prepared there, and I used 
 to go there with him at seven o'clock, and leave him at 
 nine. 
 
 This connection soon became the general subject of gos- 
 sip at headquarters. Through a feeling of delicacy to M. 
 Four6s, the General-in-Chief gave him a mission to the 
 Directory. He embarked at Alexandria, and the ship waa 
 captured by the English, who, being informed of the cause 
 
 1 See Memoirs of the Ducfiesse cTAbrantte (Madame Juno^, English edition <4 
 1883, vol. i. p. 458.
 
 1798. AN EGYPTIAN SOOTHSAYER. 173 
 
 of his mission, were malicious enough to send him back 
 to Egypt, instead of keeping him prisoner. Bonaparte 
 wished to have a child by Madame Foures, but this wish 
 was not realised. 
 
 A celebrated soothsayer was recommended to Bonaparte 
 by the inhabitants of Cairo, who confidentially vouched 
 for the accuracy with which he could foretell future events. 
 He was sent for, and when he arrived, I, Venture, and a 
 sheik were with the General The prophet wished first to 
 exercise his skill upon Bonaparte, who, however, proposed 
 that I should have my fortune told first, to which I ac- 
 ceded without hesitation. To afford an idea of his pro- 
 phetic skill I must mention that since my arrival in Cairo 
 I had been in a very weak state. The passage of the Nile 
 and the bad food we had had for twelve days had greatly 
 reduced me, so that I was miserably pale and thin. 
 
 After examining my hands, feeling my pulse, my fore- 
 head, and the nape of my neck, the fortune-teller shrugged 
 his shoulders, and, in a melancholy tone, told Venture that 
 he did not think it right to inform me of my fate. I gave 
 him to understand that he might say what he pleased, as 
 it was a matter of indifference to me. After considerable 
 hesitation on his part and pressing on mine, he announced 
 to me that the earth of Egypt would receive me in two 
 months. 
 
 I thanked him, and he was dismissed. "When we were 
 alone the General said to me, " Well, what do you think 
 of that ? " I observed that the fortune-teller did not run 
 any great risk in foretelling my death, which was a very 
 probable circumstance in the state in which I was ; " but," 
 added I, " if I procure the wines which I have ordered 
 from France, you will soon see me get round again." 
 
 The art of imposing on mankind has at all times been 
 an important part of the art of governing ; and it was not 
 that portion of the science of government which Bona- 
 parte was the least acquainted with. He neglected no
 
 174 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 opportunity of showing off to the Egyptians the superiority 
 of France in arts and sciences ; but it happened, oftener 
 than once, that the simple instinct of the Egyptians 
 thwarted his endeavours in this way. Some days after the 
 visit of the pretended fortune-teller he wished, if I may so 
 express myself, to oppose conjurer to conjurer. For this 
 purpose he invited the principal sheiks to be present at 
 some chemical experiments performed by M. Berthollet. 
 The General expected to be much amused at their as- 
 tonishment ; but the miracles of the transformation of liq- 
 uids, electrical commotions and galvanism, did not elicit 
 from them any symptom of surprise. They witnessed the 
 operations of our able chemist with the most imperturb- 
 able indifference. When they were ended, the sheik El 
 Bekri desired the interpreter to tell M. Berthollet that it 
 was all very fine ; " but," said he, " ask him whether he 
 can make me be in Morocco and here at one and the 
 same moment?" M. Berthollet replied in the negative, 
 with a shrug of his shoulders. " Oh ! then," said the 
 sheik, "he is not half a sorcerer." 
 
 Our music produced no greater effect upon them. They 
 listened with insensibility to all the airs that were played 
 to them, with the exception of " Marlbrook." When that 
 was played they became animated, and were all in motion, 
 as if ready to dance. 
 
 An order which had been issued on our arrival in Cairo 
 for watching the criers of the mosques had for some weeks 
 been neglected. At certain hours of the night these criers 
 address prayers to the Prophet. As it was merely a repeti- 
 tion of the same ceremony over and over again, in a short 
 time no notice was taken of it. The Turks, perceiving 
 this negligence, substituted for their prayers and hymns 
 cries of revolt, and by this sort of verbal telegraph, insur- 
 rectionary excitement was transmitted to the northern 
 and southern extremities of Egypt. By this means, and 
 by the aid of secret emissaries, who eluded our feeble
 
 1798. INSURRECTION IN CAIRO. 175 
 
 police, and circulated real or forged firmans of the Sultan 
 disavowing the concord between France and the Porte, 
 and provoking war, the plan of a revolution was organised 
 throughout the country. 
 
 The signal for the execution of this plan was given from 
 the minarets on the night of the 20th of October, and on 
 the morning of the 21st it was announced at headquarters 
 that the city of Cairo was in open insurrection. The 
 General-in-Chief was not, as has been stated, in the isle of 
 Raouddah : he did not hear the firing of the alarm-guns. 
 He rose when the news arrived ; it was then five o'clock. 
 He was informed that all the shops were closed, and that 
 the French were attacked. A moment after he heard of 
 the death of General Dupuis, commandant of the garrison, 
 who was killed by a lance in the street. Bonaparte im- 
 mediately mounted his horse, and, accompanied by only 
 thirty guides, visited all the threatened points, restored 
 confidence, and, with great presence of mind adopted 
 measures of defence. 
 
 He left me at headquarters with only one sentinel ; but 
 he had been accurately informed of the situation of the 
 insurgents ; and such was my confidence in his activity 
 and foresight that I had no apprehension, and awaited his 
 return with perfect composure. This composure was not 
 disturbed even when I saw a party of insurgents attack 
 the house of M. Esteve, our paymaster-general, which was 
 situated on the opposite side of Ezbekye'h Place. M. 
 Esteve was, fortunately, able to resist the attack until 
 troops from Boulac came up to his assistance. 
 
 After visiting all the posts, and adopting every precau- 
 tionary measure, Bonaparte returned to headquarters. 
 Finding me still alone with the sentinel, he asked me, 
 smiling, " whether I had not been frightened ? " " Not at 
 all, General, I assure you," replied I. 
 
 It was about half-past eight in the morning when Bona- 
 parte returned to headquarters, and while at breakfast he
 
 176 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 was informed that some Bedouin Arabs, on horseback, 
 were trying to force their entrance into Cairo. He 
 ordered his aide de camp, Sulkowsky, to mount his horse, 
 to take with him fifteen guides, and proceed to the point 
 where the assailants were most numerous. This was the 
 Bab-el-Nasser, or the gate of victory. Croisier observed 
 to the General-in-Chief that Sulkowsky had scarcely re- 
 covered from the wounds at Salehye'h, and he offered to 
 take his place. He had his motives for this. Bonaparte 
 consented ; but Sulkowsky had already set out. Within 
 an hour after, one of the fifteen guides returned, covered 
 with blood, to announce that Sulkowsky and the remainder 
 of his party had been cut to pieces. This was speedy 
 work, for we were still at table when the sad newa 
 arrived. 
 
 Mortars were planted on Mount Mokatam, which com- 
 mands Cairo. The populace, expelled from all the princi- 
 pal streets by the troops, assembled in the square of the 
 Great Mosque, and in the little streets running into it, 
 which they barricaded. The firing of the artillery on the 
 heights was kept up with vigour for two days. 
 
 About twelve of the principal chiefs of Cairo were 
 arrested and confined in an apartment at headquarters. 
 They awaited with the calmest resignation the death they 
 knew they merited ; but Bonaparte merely detained them 
 as hostages. The aga in the service of Bonaparte was 
 astonished that sentence of death was not pronounced 
 upon them ; and he said, shrugging his shoulders, and 
 with a gesture apparently intended to provoke severity, 
 " You see they expect it." 
 
 On the third the insurrection was at an end, and tran- 
 quillity restored. Numerous prisoners were conducted to 
 the citadel. In obedience to an order which I wrote every 
 evening, twelve were put to death nightly. The bodies 
 were then put into sacks and thrown into the Nile. There 
 were many women included in these nocturnal executions.
 
 1798. MASSACRES Of FRENCH AND ARABS. 177 
 
 I am not aware that the number of victims amounted to 
 thirty per day, as Bonaparte assured General Reynier in a 
 letter which he wrote to him six days after the restoration 
 of tranquillity. " Every night," said he, " we cut off thirty 
 heads. This, I hope, will be an effectual example." I am 
 of opinion that in this instance he exaggerated the extent 
 of his just revenge. 
 
 Some time after the revolt of Cairo the necessity of 
 ensuring our own safety forced the commission of a terrible 
 act of cruelty. A tribe of Arabs in the neighbourhood of 
 Cairo had surprised and massacred a party of French. 
 The General-in-Chief ordered his aide de camp Croisier to 
 proceed to the spot, surround the tribe, destroy the huts, 
 kill all the men, and conduct the rest of the population to 
 Cairo. The order was to decapitate the victims, and bring 
 their heads in sacks to Cairo to be exhibited to the people. 
 Eugene Beauharnais accompanied Croisier, who joyfully 
 set out on this horrible expedition, in hope of obliterating 
 all recollection of the affair of Damanhour. 
 
 On the following day the party returned. Many of the 
 poor Arab women had been delivered on the road, and the 
 children had perished of hunger, heat, and fatigue. About 
 four o'clock a troop of asses arrived in Ezbekye'h Place, 
 laden with sacks. The sacks were opened and the heads 
 rolled out before the assembled populace. I cannot de- 
 scribe the horror I experienced ; but I must nevertheless 
 acknowledge that this butchery ensured for a considerable 
 time the tranquillity and even the existence of the little 
 caravans which were obliged to travel in all directions for 
 the service of the army. 
 
 Shortly before the loss of the fleet the General-in-Chief 
 had formed the design of visiting Suez, to examine the 
 traces of the ancient canal which united the Nile to the 
 Gulf of Arabia, and also to cross the latter. The revolt 
 at Cairo caused this project to be adjourned until the 
 month of December. 
 VOL. L 12
 
 178 MEMOIRS OP NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798. 
 
 Before his departure for Suez Bonaparte granted the 
 commissary Sucy leave to return to France. 1 He had 
 received a wound in the right hand when on board the 
 xebec Cerf. I was conversing with him on deck when he 
 received this wound. At first it had no appearance of 
 being serious ; but some time after he could not use his 
 hand. General Bonaparte despatched a vessel with sick 
 and wounded, who were supposed to be incurable, to the 
 number of about eighty. All envied their fate, and were 
 anxious to depart with them, but the privilege was con- 
 ceded to very few. However, those who were disappointed 
 had no cause for regret. We never know what we wish 
 for. Captain Marengo, who landed at Augusta in Sicily, 
 supposing it to be a friendly land, was required to observe 
 quarantine for twenty-two days, and information was given 
 of the arrival of the vessel to the court, which was at 
 Palermo. On the 25th of January 1799 all on board the 
 French vessel were massacred, with the exception of 
 twenty-one who were saved by a Neapolitan frigate, and 
 conducted to Messina, where they were detained. 
 
 Before he conceived the resolution of attacking the 
 Turkish advanced guard in the valleys of Syria, Bonaparte 
 had formed a plan of invading British India from Persia. 
 He had ascertained, through the medium of agents, that 
 the Shah of Persia would, for a sum of money paid in 
 advance, consent to the establishment of military maga- 
 zines on certain points of his territory. Bonaparte fre- 
 quently told me that if, after the subjugation of Egypt, he 
 could have left 15,000 men in that country, and have had 
 30,000 disposable troops, he would have marched on the 
 Euphrates. He was frequently speaking about the deserts 
 which were to be crossed to reach Persia. 
 
 How many times have I seen him extended on the 
 ground, examining the beautiful maps which he had 
 
 1 Erreurs (tome i. p. 67) says that the expedition to Suez started in Niv6se 
 (December uiul January), and that Sucy had gone home three months before.
 
 1798. LETTER TO TIPPOO SAIB. 179 
 
 brought with him, and he would sometimes make me lie 
 down in the same position to trace to me his projected 
 march. This reminded him of the triumphs of his favourite 
 hero, Alexander, with whom he so much desired to asso- 
 ciate his name ; but, at the same time, he felt that these 
 projects were incompatible with our resources, the weak- 
 ness of the Government, and the dissatisfaction which the 
 army already evinced. Privation and misery are insepar- 
 able from all these remote operations. 
 
 This favourite idea still occupied his mind a fortnight 
 before his departure for Syria was determined on, and on 
 the 25th of January 1799 he wrote to Tippoo Saib as 
 follows : 
 
 You are of course already informed of my arrival on the banks 
 of the Red Sea, with a numerous and invincible army. Eager to 
 deliver you from the iron yoke of England, I hasten to request that 
 you will send me, by the way of Mascate or Mocha, an account of 
 the political situation in which you are. I also wish that you could 
 send to Suez, or Grand Cairo, some able man, in your confidence, 
 with whom I may confer. 1 
 
 1 It is not true, as has often been stated, that Tippoo Saib wrote to General 
 Bonaparte. He could not reply to a letter written on the 25th of January, owing to 
 the great difficulty of communication, the considerable distance, and the short inter- 
 val which elapsed between the 25th of January and the fall of the empire of Mysore, 
 which happened on the 20th of April following. The letter addressed to Tippoo 
 Saib commenced " Citizen-Sultan | " Sourrienne,
 
 180 1798, 
 
 CHAPTER XVH. 
 1798-1799. 
 
 Bonaparte's departure for Suez Crossing the desert Passage of the Red 
 Sea The fountain of Moses The Cenobites of Mount Sinai Danger 
 in recrosfiing the Red Sea Napoleon's return to Cairo Money bor- 
 rowed at Genoa New designs upon Syria Dissatisfaction of the 
 Ottoman Porte Plan for invading Asia Gigantic schemes General 
 Berthier's permission to return to France His romantic love and the 
 adored portrait He gives up his permission to return home Louis 
 Bonaparte leaves Egypt The first Cashmere shawl in France Inter- 
 cepted correspondence Departure for Syria Fountains of Messou- 
 diah Bonaparte jealous Discontent of the troops El- Arish taken 
 Aspect of Syria Ramleh Jerusalem. 
 
 ON the 24th of December we set out for Suez, where 
 we arrived on the 26th. On the 25th we encamped in the 
 desert some leagues before Ad-Greroth. The heat had been 
 very great during the day ; but about eleven at night the 
 cold became so severe as to be precisely in an inverse ratio 
 to the temperature of the day. This desert, which is the 
 route of the caravans from Suez, from Tor and the coun- 
 tries situated on the north of Arabia, is strewed with the 
 bones of the men and animals who, for ages past, have 
 perished in crossing it. As there was no wood to be got, 
 we collected a quantity of these bones for fuel. Monge 
 himself was induced to sacrifice some of the curious skulls 
 of animals which he had picked up on the way and de- 
 posited in the berlin of the General-in-Chief. But no soon- 
 er had we kindled our fires than an intolerable effluvium 
 obliged us to raise our camp and advance farther on, for 
 we could procure no water to extinguish the fires. 
 
 On the 27th Bonaparte employed himself in inspecting
 
 1799. BONAPARTE CROSSES THE RED SEA. 181 
 
 the town and port of Suez, and in giving orders for some 
 naval and military works. He feared what indeed really 
 occurred after his departure from Egypt the arrival of 
 some English troops from the East Indies, which he had 
 intended to invade. These regiments contributed to the 
 loss of his conquest. 1 
 
 On the morning of the 28th we crossed the Bed Sea 
 dry-shod, 3 to go to the Wells of Moses, which are nearly a 
 myriametre from the eastern coast, and a little southeast 
 of Suez. The Gulf of Arabia terminates at about 5,000 
 metres north of that city. Near the port the Red Sea is 
 not above 1,500 metres wide, and is always fordable at 
 low water. The caravans from Tor and Mount Sinai* 
 always pass at that part, either in going to or returning 
 from Egypt. This shortens their journey nearly a myria- 
 metre. At high tide the water rises five or six feet at 
 Suez, and when the wind blows fresh it often rises to nine 
 or ten feet. 
 
 We spent a few hours seated by the largest of the 
 springs called the Wells of Moses, situated on the eastern 
 shore of the Gulf of Arabia. We made coffee with the 
 water from these springs, which, however, gave it such a 
 brackish taste that it was scarcely drinkable. 
 
 Though the water of the eight little springs which form 
 the Wells of Moses is not so salt as that of many wells 
 
 1 Sir David Baird, with a force of about 7000 men sent from India, landed at Cos- 
 neir in July 1801. 
 
 s From time immemorial this ford has been called by the people of the country 
 El-Mahadyeh, the passage. Bourrienne. 
 
 8 I shall say nothing of the Cenobites of Mount Sinai, as I had not the honour of 
 seeing them. Neither did I see the register containing the names of AH, Salah- 
 Etldin, Ibrahim or Abraham, on which Bonaparte is said to have inscribed his 
 name. I perceived at a distance some high hills which were said to be Mount Sinai. 
 I conversed, through the medium of an interpreter, with some Arabian chiefs of 
 Tor and its neighbourhood. They had been informed of our excursion to the Wells, 
 and that they might there thank the French General for the protection granted to 
 their caravans and their trade with Egypt. On the 19th of December, before his 
 departure from Suez, Bonaparte signed a sort of safeguard, or exemption from 
 duties, for the convent of Mount Sinai. This had been granted out of respect to 
 Moses and the Jawish nation, and alas because the convent of Mount Sinai is a seat 
 of learning and civilisation amidst the barbarism of the deserts. Bourrienne
 
 182 MEMOIRS 0V NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798, 
 
 dug in other parts of the deserts, it is, nevertheless, 
 exceedingly brackish, and does not allay thirst so well as 
 fresh water. 
 
 Bonaparte returned to Suez that same night. It was 
 very dark when we reached the sea-shore. The tide was 
 coming up, and the water was pretty high. We deviated 
 a little from the way we had taken in the morning ; we 
 crossed a little too low down ; we were thrown into dis- 
 order, but we did not lose ourselves in the marshes as has 
 been stated. There were none. 
 
 I have read somewhere, though I did not see the fact, 
 nor did 1 hear it mentioned at the time, that the tide, 
 which was coming up, would have been the grave of the 
 General-in-Chief had not one of the guides saved him by 
 carrying him on his shoulders. If any such danger had 
 existed all who had not a similar means of escape must 
 have perished. 
 
 This is a fabrication. General Caffarelli was the only 
 person who was really in danger, for his wooden leg pre- 
 vented his sitting firmly on his horse in the water ; but 
 some persons came to his assistance and supported him. 1 
 
 On his return to Cairo the General-in-Chief wished to 
 discover the site of the canal which in ancient times 
 formed a junction between the Red Sea and the Nile by 
 Belbeis. M. Lepere, who was a member of the Egyptian 
 Institute, and is now inspector-general of bridges and 
 highways, executed on the spot a beautiful plan, which 
 may confidently be consulted by those who wish to form 
 an accurate idea of that ancient communication, and the 
 level of the two seas." 
 
 1 Bonaparte extricated himself as the others did from the real danger he and his 
 escort had run. At St. Helena he said, "Profiting by the low tide, I crossed the 
 Hed Sea dry-shod. On my return I was overtaken by the night, and went astray in 
 the middle of the rising tide. I ran the greatest danger. I nearly perished in the 
 same manner as Pharaoh did. This would certainly have furnished all the Christian 
 preachers with a magnificent text against me." Bourrtenne. 
 
 2 Since accurately ascertained during the progress of the works for the Sue 
 Canal.
 
 1799. "PARTANT POUR LA SYRIE." 183 
 
 On his arrival at the capital Bonaparte again devoted 
 all his thoughts to the affairs of the army, which he had 
 not attended to during his short absence. The revenues 
 of Egypt were far from being sufficient to meet the mili- 
 tary expenditure. To defray his own expenses Bonaparte 
 raised several considerable loans in Genoa through the 
 medium of M. James. The connection of James with the 
 Bonaparte family takes its date from this period. 1 
 
 Since the month of August the attention of General 
 Bonaparte had been constantly fixed on Syria. The period 
 of the possible landing of an enemy in Egypt had now 
 passed away, and could not return until the month of 
 July in the following year. Bonaparte was fully convinced 
 that that landing would take place, and he was not de- 
 ceived. The Ottoman Porte had, indeed, been persuaded 
 that the conquest of Egypt was not in her interest. She 
 preferred enduring a rebel whom she hoped one day to 
 subdue to supporting a power which, under the specious 
 pretext of reducing her insurgent beys to obedience, de- 
 prived her of one of her finest provinces, and threatened 
 the rest of the empire. 
 
 On his return to Cairo the General-in-Chief had no 
 longer any doubt as to the course which the Porte in- 
 tended to adopt. The numerous class of persons who be- 
 lieved that the Ottoman Porte had consented to our oc- 
 cupation of Egypt were suddenly undeceived. It was 
 then asked how we could, without that consent, have at- 
 tempted such an enterprise ? Nothing, it was said, could 
 justify the temerity of such an expedition, if it should 
 produce a rupture between France, the Ottoman empire, 
 and its allies. However, for the remainder of the year 
 Bonaparte dreaded nothing except an expedition from 
 Gaza and El-Arish, of which the troops of Djezzar had al- 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte says that the fathers of Napoleon and of M. James had long 
 known one another, and that Napoleon had met James at Autuu (Erreurs, tome i. 
 p. 245).
 
 184 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 179&. 
 
 ready taken possession. This occupation was justly re- 
 garded as a decided act of hostility ; war was thus prac- 
 tically declared. "We must adopt anticipatory meas- 
 ures," thought Napoleon ; " we must destroy this advanced 
 guard of the Ottoman empire, overthrow the ramparts of 
 Jaffa and Acre, ravage the country, destroy all her re- 
 sources, so as to render the passage of an army across the 
 desert impracticable." Thus was planned the expedition 
 against Syria. 
 
 General Berthier, after repeated entreaties, had ob- 
 tained permission to return to France. The Courageuse 
 frigate, which was to convey him home, was fitting out at 
 Alexandria ; he had received his instructions, and was to 
 leave Cairo on the 29th of January, ten days before Bona- 
 parte's departure for Syria. Bonaparte was sorry to part 
 with him ; but he could not endure to see an old friend, 
 and one who had served him well in all his campaigns, 
 dying before his eyes, the victim of nostalgia and roman- 
 tic love. Besides, Berthier had been for some time past, 
 anything but active in the discharge of his duties. Hia 
 passion, which amounted almost to madness, impaired the 
 feeble faculties with which nature had endowed him. 
 Some writers have ranked him in the class of sentimental 
 lovers : be this as it may, the homage which Berthier ren- 
 dered to the portrait of the object of his adoration more 
 frequently excited our merriment than our sensibility. 
 
 One day I went with an order from Bonaparte to the 
 chief of his staff, whom I found on his knees before the 
 portrait of Madame Visconti, which was hanging opposite 
 the door. I touched him, to let him know I was there. 
 He grumbled a little, but did not get angry. 
 
 The moment was approaching when the two friends 
 were to part, perhaps forever. Bonaparte was sincerely 
 distressed at this separation, and the chief of his staff was 
 informed of the fact. At a moment when it was supposed 
 Berthier was on his way to Alexandria, he presented him-
 
 1799. FIRST CASHMERE SHA WL IN FRANCE. 185 
 
 self to the General-in-Chief. "You are, then, decidedly 
 going to Asia? " said he. "You know," replied the Gen- 
 eral, " that all is ready, and I shall set out in a few days." 
 " Well, I will not leave you. I voluntarily renounce all 
 idea of returning to France. I could not endure to for- 
 sake you at a moment when you are going to encounter 
 new dangers. Here are my instructions and my pass- 
 port." Bonaparte, highly pleased with this resolution, 
 embraced Berthier ; and the coolness which had been ex- 
 cited by his request to return home was succeeded by a 
 sincere reconciliation. 
 
 Louis Bonaparte, who was suffering from the effects of 
 the voyage, was still at Alexandria. The General-in-Chief, 
 yielding to the pacific views of his younger brother, who 
 was also beginning to evince some symptoms of nostalgia, 
 consented to his return home. He could not, however, 
 depart until the llth of March 1799. I felt the absence 
 of Louis very much. 
 
 On his return to France Louis passed through Sens, 
 where he dined with Madame de Bourrienne, to whom he 
 presented a beautiful shawl, which General Berthier had 
 given me. This, I believe, was the first Cashmere that 
 had ever been seen in France. Louis was much sui*prised 
 when Madame de Bourrienne showed him the Egyptian 
 correspondence, which had been seized by the English 
 and printed in London. He found in the collection some 
 letters addressed to himself, and there were others, he 
 said, which were likely to disturb the peace of more than 
 one family on the return of the army. 
 
 On the llth of Febuary 1799 we began our march for 
 Syria, with about 12,000 men. 1 It has been erroneously 
 stated that the army amounted to only 6000 : nearly that 
 number was lost in the course of the campaign. How- 
 ever, at the very moment we were on our way to Syria, 
 
 1 Erreurs (tome I. p. 69) points out that all good historians have put the strength 
 of the army of Syria at from 10,000 to 12,000 men. Thiers (tome v. p. 446) saya 
 about 13,000.
 
 186 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798, 
 
 with 12,000 men, scarcely as many being left in Egypt, 
 the Directory published that, " according to the informa- 
 tion which had been received," we had 60,000 infantry 
 and 10,000 cavalry ; that the army had doubled its num- 
 bers by battles ; and that since our arrival in Egypt, we 
 had lost only 300 men. Is history to be written from 
 such documents ? 
 
 We arrived, about four o'clock in the afternoon, at Mes- 
 soudiah, or, " the Fortunate Spot." Here we witnessed 
 a kind of phenomenon, which was not a little agreeable 
 to us. Messoudiah is a place situated on the coast of the 
 Mediterranean, surrounded with little dunes of very fine 
 sand, which the copious rains of winter readily penetrate. 
 The rain remains in the sand, so that on making with the 
 fingers holes of four or five inches in depth at the bottom 
 of these little hills, the water immediately flows out. 
 This water was, indeed, rather thick, but its flavour was 
 agreeable ; and it would have become clear if we could 
 have spared time to allow it to rest and deposit the par- 
 ticles of sand it contained. 
 
 It was a curious spectacle to behold us all lying pros- 
 trate, digging wells in miniature, and displaying a laugh- 
 able selfishness in our endeavours to obtain the most 
 abundant source. This was a very important discovery 
 to us. We found these sand-wells at the extremity of the 
 desert, and it contributed, in no small degree, to revive 
 the courage of our soldiers ; besides, when men are, as 
 was the case with us, subject to privations of every kind, 
 the least benefit which accrues inspires the hope of a new 
 advantage. We were approaching the confines of Syria, 
 and we enjoyed by anticipation, the pleasure we were 
 about to experience, on treading a soil which, by its va- 
 riety of verdure and vegetation, would remind us of our 
 native land. At Messoudiah we likewise possessed the 
 advantage of bathing in the sea, which was not more than 
 fifty paces from our unexpected water-supply.
 
 1799. BONAPARTE 1 8 JEALOUSY. 187 
 
 Whilst near the wells of Messoudiah, on our way to 
 El-Arish, I one day saw Bonaparte walking alone with 
 Junot, as he was often in the habit of doing. I stood at 
 a little distance, and my eyes, I know not why, were fixed 
 on him during their conversation. The General's coun- 
 tenance, which was always pale, had, without my being 
 able to divine the cause, become paler than usual. There 
 was something convulsive in his features a wildness in 
 his look, and he several times struck his head with his 
 hand. After conversing with Junot about a quarter of an 
 hour he quitted him and came towards me. I never saw 
 him exhibit such an air of dissatisfaction, or appear so 
 much under the influence of some prepossession. I ad- 
 vanced towards him, and as soon as we met, he exclaimed 
 in an abrupt and angry tone, " So ! I find I cannot depend 
 upon you. These women ! Josephine ! If you had loved 
 me, you would before now have told me all I have heard 
 from Junot he is a real friend Josephine ! and I 600 
 leagues from her you ought to have told me. That she 
 should thus have deceived me ! Woe to them ! I will 
 exterminate the whole race of fops and puppies ! As to 
 her divorce ! yes, divorce ! a public and open divorce ! 
 I must write ! I know all ! It is your fault you 
 ought to have told me ! " 
 
 These energetic and broken exclamations, his disturbed 
 countenance and altered voice, informed me but too well 
 of the subject of his conversation with Junot. I saw that 
 Junot had been drawn into a culpable indiscretion, and 
 that, if Josephine had committed any faults, he had cruelly 
 exaggerated them. My situation was one of extreme 
 delicacy. However, I had the good fortune to retain my 
 self-possession, and as soon as some degree of calmness 
 succeeded to this first burst, I replied that I knew noth- 
 ing of the reports which Junot might have communicated 
 to him ; that even if such reports, often the offspring of 
 calumny, had reached my ear, and if I had considered it
 
 188 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798^ 
 
 my duty to inform him of them, I certainly would not 
 have selected for that purpose the moment when he was 
 600 leagues from France. I also did not conceal how 
 blamable Junot's conduct appeared to me, and how un- 
 generous I considered it thus rashly to accuse a woman 
 who was not present to justify or defend herself ; that it 
 was no great proof of attachment to add domestic uneasi- 
 ness to the anxiety, already sufficiently great, which the 
 situation of his brothers in arms, at the commencement 
 of a hazardous enterprise, occasioned him. 
 
 Notwithstanding these observations, which, however, he 
 listened to with some calmness, the word " divorce " still 
 escaped his lips ; and it is necessary to be aware of the 
 degree of irritation to which he was liable when anything 
 seriously vexed him, to be able to form an idea of what 
 Bonaparte was during this painful scene. However, I kept 
 my ground. I repeated what I had said. I begged of 
 him to consider with what facility tales were fabricated 
 and circulated, and that gossip such as that which had 
 been repeated to him was only the amusement of idle 
 persons, and deserved the contempt of strong minds. I 
 spoke of his glory. " My glory ! " cried he. " I know not 
 what I would not give if that which Junot has told me 
 should be untrue ; so much do I love Josephine ! If she 
 be really guilty a divorce must seperate us for ever. I 
 will not submit to be a laughing-stock for all the imbe- 
 ciles in Paris. . I will write to Joseph ; he will get the 
 divorce declared." 
 
 Although his agitation continued long, intervals oc- 
 curred in which he was less excited. I seized one of these 
 moments of comparative calm to combat this idea of 
 divorce which seemed to possess his mind. I represented 
 to him especially that it would be imprudent to write to 
 his brother with reference to a communication which was 
 probably false. " The letter might be intercepted ; it 
 would betray the feelings of irritation which dictated it.
 
 1799. BONAPARTE AND JUNOT. 189 
 
 As to a divorce, it would be time to think of that hereaf- 
 ter, but advisedly." 
 
 These last words produced an effect on him which I 
 could not have ventured to hope for so speedily. He 
 became tranquil, listened to me as if he had suddenly felt 
 the justice of my observations, dropped the subject, and 
 never returned to it ; except that about a fortnight after, 
 when we were before St. Jean d'Acre, he expressed himself 
 greatly dissatisfied with Junot, and complained of the 
 injury he had done him by his indiscreet disclosures, 
 which he began to regard as the inventions of malignity. 
 I perceived afterwards that he never pardoned Junot for 
 this indiscretion ; and I can state, almost with certainty, 
 that this was one of the reasons why Junot was not 
 created a marshal of France, like many of his comrades 
 whom Bonaparte had loved less. It may be supposed 
 that Josephine, who was afterwards informed by Bona- 
 parte of Junot's conversation, did not feel particularly 
 interested in his favour. 1 He died insane on the 27th of 
 July 1813. 
 
 1 However indiscreet Junot might on this occasion have shown himself in inter- 
 fering in so delicate a matter, it is pretty certain that his suspicions were breathed 
 to no other ear than that of Bonaparte himself. Madame Junot, in speaking of the 
 ill-suppressed enmity between her husband and Madame Bonaparte, says that he 
 never uttered a word even to her of the subject of his conversation with the General 
 in-Chief in Egypt. That Junot's testimony, however, notwithstanding the counte- 
 nance it obtained from Bonaparte's relations, ought to be cautiously received, the 
 following passage from the Memoirs of the Duchesse tfAbrantli, vol. i. p. 260, 
 demonstrative of the feelings of irritation between the parties, will show : 
 
 " Jnnot escorted Madame Bonaparte when she went to join the General-in-Chief 
 in Italy. I am surprised that M. de Bonrrienne has omitted mentioning this circum- 
 stance in his Memoirs. He must have known it, since he was well acquainted with 
 everything relating to Josephine, and knew many facts of high interest in her life 
 as this period and subsequently. How happens it too that he makes no mention of 
 Mademoiselle Louise, who might be called her demoiselle de compagnte rather than 
 her femme de chambre t At the outset of the journey to Italy she was such a 
 favourite with Josephine that she dressed like her mistress, sat at table with her, and 
 was in all respects her friend and confidante. 
 
 "The journey was long, much too long for Junot, though he was very much 
 in love with Mademoiselle Louise. But he was anxious to join the army, for to him 
 hit General was always the dearest of mistresses. Junot has often spoken to me, 
 and to me alone, of the vexations he experienced on this journey, ffe might have 
 added to hit circumstantial details relative to Josephine the conversation be is
 
 190 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1798-* 
 
 Our little army continued its march on El-Arish, where 
 we arrived on the 17th of February. The fatigues experi- 
 enced in the desert and the scarcity of water excited violent 
 murmurs amongst the soldiers during their march across 
 the isthmus. "When any person on horseback passed them 
 they studiously expressed their discontent. The advan- 
 tage possessed by the horsemen provoked their sarcasms. 
 I never heard the verses which they are said to have 
 repeated, but they indulged in the most violent language 
 against the Republic, the men of science, and those whom 
 they regarded as the authors of the expedition. Never- 
 theless these brave fellows, from whom it was not aston- 
 ishing that such great privations should extort complaints, 
 often compensated by their pleasantries for the bitterness 
 o.f their reproaches. 
 
 Many times during the crossing of the isthmus I have 
 seen soldiers, parched with thirst, and unable to wait till 
 the hour for distribution of water, pierce the leathern 
 bottles which contained it ; and this conduct, so injurious 
 to all, occasioned numerous quarrels. 
 
 El-Arish surrendered on the 17th of February. It has 
 been erroneously stated that the garrison of this insignifi- 
 cant place, which was set at liberty on condition of not 
 again serving against us, was afterwards found amongst 
 the besieged at Jaffa. It has also been stated that it was 
 because the men composing the El-Arish garrison did not 
 proceed to Bagdad, according to the capitulation, that we 
 
 reported to have had with Bonaparte in Egypt ; but fit never breathed a word on 
 the subject, for his character was always noble and generous. The journey to 
 Italy did not produce the effect which usually arises from such incidents in common 
 life ; namely, a closer friendship and intimacy between the parties. On the con- 
 trary, Madame Bonaparte from that moment evinced some degree of ill-humour 
 towards Junot, and complained with singular warmth of the want of respect which 
 he had shown her, in making love to her/mme de chambre before her face." 
 
 According to Erreurs (tome i. pp. 4, 50) Junot was not then in Syria. On 16th 
 February Napoleon was at Messoudiah. Junot only arrived from Egypt at Gaza 
 on the 25th February. Madame d'Abrantes (ii. 32) treats this conversation aa 
 apocryphal, " This [an anecdote of her own] is not an imaginary episode, like that, 
 for example, of making a person speak at Messoudiah who never was there. "
 
 1799. CHRISTIANS AT RAMLEH. 161 
 
 shot them at Jaffa. We shall presently see the falsehood 
 of these assertions. 
 
 On the 28th of February we obtained the first glimpse 
 of the green and fertile plains of Syria, which, in many 
 respects, reminded us of the climate and soil of Europe. 
 We now had rain, and sometimes rather too much. The 
 feelings which the sight of the valleys and mountains called 
 forth made us, in some degree, forget the hardships and 
 vexatious of an expedition of which few persons could fore- 
 see the object or end. There are situations in life when 
 the slightest agreeable sensation alleviates all our ills. 
 
 On the 1st of March we slept at Rarnleh, 1 in a small 
 convent occupied by two monks, who paid us the greatest 
 attention. They gave us the church for a hospital. These 
 good fathers did not fail to tell us that it was through 
 this place the family of Jesus Christ passed into Egypt, and 
 showed us the wells at which they quenched their thirst. 
 The pure and cool water of these wells delighted us. 
 
 We were not more than about six leagues from Jerusalem. 
 I asked the General whether he did not intend to direct 
 his march by the way of that city, so celebrated in many 
 respects. He replied, " Oh no ! Jerusalem is not in my line 
 of operations. I do not wish to be annoyed by moun- 
 taineers in difficult roads. And, besides, on the other 
 side of the mountain I should be assailed by swarms of 
 cavalry. I am not ambitious of the fate of Cassius." 
 
 We therefore did not enter Jerusalem, which was not 
 disturbed by the war. All we did was to send a written 
 declaration to the persons in power at Jerusalem, assuring 
 them that we had no design against that country, and 
 only wished them to remain at peace. To this communi- 
 cation no answer was returned, and nothing more passed 
 on the subject." 
 
 1 Ramleh, the ancient Arimathea, is situated at the base of a chain of mountains, 
 the eastern extremity of which is washed by the Persian Gulf, and the western 
 by the Mediterranean. Boiirrienne. 
 
 a Sir Walter Scott says, speaking of Bonaparte, that he believes that little officer
 
 192 MEMOIRS Of NAPOLEOtf BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 We found at Ramleh between two and three hundred 
 Christians in a pitiable state of servitude, misery, and 
 dejection. On conversing with them I could not help 
 admiring how much the hope of future rewards may 
 console men under present ills. But I learned from 
 many of them that they did not live in harmony together. 
 The feelings of hatred and jealousy are not less common 
 amongst these people than amongst the better-instructed 
 inhabitants of rich and populous cities. 
 
 of artillery dreamed of being King of Jerusalem. What I have just stated proves 
 that he never thought of such a thing. The "little officer of artDlery" had a 
 far more splendid dream in his bead, Bourrienne,
 
 1799. 193 
 
 CHAPTER XVm. 
 1799. 
 
 Arrival at Jaffa The siege Beauharnais and Croisier Four thousand 
 prisoners Scarcity of provisions Councils of war Dreadful neces- 
 sity The massacre The plague Lannes and the mountaineers 
 Barbarity of Djezzar Arrival at St. Jean d'Acre, and abortive 
 attacks Sir Sidney Smith Death of Caffarelli Duroc wounded 
 Rash bathing Insurrections in Egypt. 
 
 ON arriving before Jaffa, where there were already some 
 troops, the first person I met was Adjutant-Genera] 
 Gre"sieux, with whom I was well acquainted. I wished 
 him good-day, and offered him my hand. " Good God ! 
 what are you about ? " said he, repulsing me with a very 
 abrupt gesture ; " you may have the plague. People do not 
 touch each other here ! " I mentioned the circumstance 
 to Bonaparte, who said, " If he be afraid of the plague, he 
 will die of it." Shortly after, at St. Jean d'Acre, he was 
 attacked by that malady, and soon sank under it. 
 
 On the 4th of March we commenced the siege of Jaffa. 
 That paltry place, which, to round a sentence, was pom- 
 pously styled the ancient Joppa, held out only to the 6th 
 of March, when it was taken by storm, and given up to 
 pillage. The massacre was horrible. General Bonaparte 
 Bent his aides de camp Beauharnais and Croisier to ap- 
 pease the fury of the soldiers as much as possible, and 
 to report to him what was passing. They learned that a 
 considerable part of the garrison had retired into some 
 vast buildings, a sort of caravanserai, which formed a 
 large enclosed court. Beauharnais and Croisier, who 
 were distinguished by wearing the aide de camp scarf on 
 VOL. I. 13
 
 194 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 their arms, proceeded to that place. The Arnauts and 
 Albanians, of whom these refugees were almost entirely 
 composed, cried from the windows that they were will- 
 ing to surrender upon an assurance that they would 
 be exempted from the massacre to which the town was 
 doomed ; if not, they threatened to fire on the aides de 
 camp, and to defend themselves to the last extremity. 
 The two officers thought that they ought to accede to the 
 proposition, notwithstanding the decree of death which 
 had been pronounced against the whole garrison, in 
 consequence of the town being taken by storm. They 
 brought them to our camp in two divisions, one consisting 
 of about 2500 men, the other of about 1500. 
 
 I was walking with General Bonaparte, in front of his 
 tent, when he beheld this mass of men approaching, and 
 before he even saw his aides de camp he said to me, in a 
 tone of profound sorrow, " What do they wish me to do 
 with these men ? Have I food for them ? ships to convey 
 them to Egypt or France? Why, in the devil's name, have 
 they served me thus ? " After their arrival, and the ex- 
 planations which the General-in-Chief demanded and lis- 
 tened to with anger, Eugene and Croisier received the 
 most severe reprimand for their conduct. But the deed 
 was done. Four thousand men were there. It was neces- 
 sary to decide upon their fate. The two aides de camp 
 observed that they had found themselves alone in the 
 midst of numerous enemies, and that he had directed them 
 to restrain the carnage. "Yes, doubtless," replied the 
 General-in-Chief, with great warmth, " as to women, chil- 
 dren, and old men all the peaceable inhabitants ; but not 
 with respect to armed soldiers. It was your duty to die 
 rather than bring these unfortunate creatures to me. 
 What do you want me to do with them?" These words 
 were pronounced in the most angry tone. 
 
 The prisoners were then ordered to sit down, and were 
 placed, without any order, in front of the tents, their
 
 1799. FOUR THOUSAND PRISONERS. 195 
 
 hands tied behind their backs. A sombre determination 
 was depicted in their countenances. We gave them a 
 little biscuit and bread, squeezed out of the already scanty 
 supply for the army. 
 
 On the first day of their arrival a council of war was 
 held in the tent of the General-in-Chief, to determine what 
 course should be pursued with respect to them. The 
 council deliberated a long time without coming to any 
 decision. 
 
 On the evening of the following day the daily reports 
 of the generals of division came in. They spoke of noth- 
 ing but the insufficiency of the rations, the complaints of 
 the soldiers of their murmurs and discontent at seeing 
 their bread given to enemies who had been withdrawn 
 from their vengeance, inasmuch as a decree of death, in 
 conformity with the laAvs of war, had been passed on Jaffa. 
 All these reports were alarming, and especially that of 
 General Bon, in which no reserve was made. He spoke 
 of nothing less than the fear of a revolt, which would be 
 justified by the serious nature of the case. 
 
 The council assembled again. All the generals of divis- 
 ion were summoned to attend, and for several hours to- 
 gether they discussed, under separate questions, what 
 measures might be adopted, with the most sincere desire 
 to discover and execute one which would save the lives of 
 these unfortunate prisoners. 
 
 (1.) Should they be sent into Egypt? Could it be done? 
 
 To do so, it would be necessary to send with them a 
 numerous escort, which would too much weaken our little 
 army in the enemy's country. How, besides, could they 
 and the escort be supported till they reached Cairo, hav- 
 ing no provisions to give them on setting out, and their 
 route being through a hostile territory, which we had ex- 
 hausted, which presented no fresh resources, and through 
 which we, perhaps, might have to return. 
 
 (2.) Should they be embarked?
 
 196 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Where were the ships ? Where could they be found ? 
 All our telescopes, directed over the sea, could not descry 
 a single friendly sail. Bonaparte, I affirm, would have re- 
 garded such an event as a real favour of fortune. It was, 
 and I am glad to have to say it, this sole idea, this sole 
 hope, which made him brave, for three days, the murmurs 
 of his army. But in vain was help looked for seaward. 
 It did not come. 
 
 (3.) Should the prisoners be set at liberty ? 
 
 They would then instantly proceed to St. Jean d'Acre 
 to reinforce the pasha, or else, throwing themselves into 
 the mountains of Nablous, would greatly annoy our rear 
 and right flank, and deal out death to us, as a recompense 
 for the life we had given them. There could be no doubt 
 of this. What is a Christian dog to a Turk ? It would 
 even have been a religious and meritorious act in the eye 
 of the Prophet. 
 
 (4.) Could they be incorporated, disarmed, with our 
 soldiers in tha ranks ? 
 
 Here again the question of food presented itself in all 
 its force. Next came to be considered the danger of 
 having such comrades while marching through an enemy's 
 country. What might happen in the event of a battle 
 before St. Jean d'Acre ? Could we even tell what might 
 occur during the march ? And, finally, what must be done 
 with them when under the ramparts of that town, if we 
 should be able to take them there ? The same embarrass- 
 ments with respect to the questions of provisions and 
 security would then recur with increased force. 
 
 The third day arrived without its being possible, anx- 
 iously as it was desired, to come to any conclusion fa- 
 vourable to the preservation of these unfortunate men. 
 The murmurs in the camp grew louder the evil went on 
 increasing remedy appeared impossible the danger was 
 real and imminent. 
 
 The order for shooting the prisoners was given and
 
 1799. SLAUGHTER OF THE PRISONERS. 197 
 
 executed on the 10th of March. We did not, as has been 
 stated, separate the Egyptians from the other prisoners. 
 There were no Egyptians. 
 
 Many of the unfortunate creatures composing the 
 smaller division, which was fired on close to the sea- 
 coast, at some distance from the other column, succeeded 
 in swimming to some reefs of rocks out of the reach of 
 musket-shot. The soldiers rested their muskets on the 
 sand, and, to induce the prisoners to return, employed 
 the Egyptian signs of reconciliation in use in the country. 
 They came back ; but as they advanced they were killed, 
 and disappeared among the waves. 
 
 I confine myself to these details of this act of dreadful 
 necessity, of which I was an eye-witness. Others, who, 
 like myself, saw it, have fortunately spared me the recital 
 of the sanguinary result. This atrocious scene, when I 
 think of it, still makes me shudder, as it did on the day I 
 beheld it ; and I would wish it were possible for me to for- 
 get it, rather than be compelled to describe it. All the 
 horrors imagination can conceive, relative to that day of 
 blood, would fall short of the reality. 
 
 I have related the truth, the whole truth. I was present 
 at all the discussions, all the conferences, all the delibera- 
 tions. I had not, as may be supposed, a deliberative 
 voice ; but I am bound to declare that the situation of the 
 army, the scarcity of food, our small numerical strength, 
 in the midst of a country where every individual was an 
 enemy, would have induced me to vote in the affirmative 
 of the proposition which was carried into effect, if I had a 
 vote to give. It was necessary to be on the spot in order 
 to understand the horrible necessity which existed. 
 
 War, unfortunately, presents too many occasions on 
 which a law, immutable in all ages, and common to all 
 nations, requires that private interests should be sacrificed 
 to a gi'eat general interest, and that even humanity should 
 be forgotten. It is for posterity to judge whether this ter-
 
 198 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 rible situation was that in which Bonaparte was placed. 
 For my own part, I have a perfect conviction that he 
 could not do otherwise than yield to the dire necessity of 
 the case. It was the advice of the council, whose opinion 
 was unanimous in favour of the execution, that governed 
 him. Indeed I ought in truth to say, that he yielded only 
 in the last extremity, and was one of those, perhaps, who 
 beheld the massacre with the deepest pain. 1 
 
 1 The following is Napoleon's own account of this dreadful affair : I asked the 
 Emperor then if he had ever read Miot's history of the expedition to Egypt. 
 " What, the commissary ? " replied he. " I believe Las Cases gave me a copy ; 
 moreover, it was published in my time." He then desired me to bring the one 
 which I had, that he might compare them. He observed, "Miot was a polisson, 
 whom, together with his brother, I raised from the dirt. He says that I threatened 
 him for writing the book, which is a falsehood. I said to his brother once that he 
 might as well not have published untruths. He was a man who had always fear 
 oefore his eyes. What does he say about the poisoning affair and the shooting at 
 Jaffa ? " I replied, that as to the poisoning, Miot declared he could say no more 
 than that such had been the current report : but he positively as.serted that he 
 (Napoleon) had caused between three and four thousand Turks to bo shot some days 
 after the capture of Jaffa. Napoleon answered, "It is not true that there were so 
 many. I ordered about a thousand or twelve hundred to be shot, which was done. 
 The reason was, that amongst the garrison of Jaffa, a number of Turkish troops 
 were discovered whom I had taken a short time before at El-Arish, and sent to Bag- 
 dad upon their parole not to serve again, or to be found in arms against me for a 
 year. I had caused them to be escorted twelve leagues on their way to Bagdad by a 
 division of my army. But those Turks, instead of proceeding to Bagdad, threw 
 themselves into Jaffa, defended it to the last, and cost me a number of brave men to 
 take it, whose lives would have been spared if the others had not reinforced the gar- 
 rison of Jaffa. Moreover, before I attacked the town I sent them a flag of truce. 
 Immediately afterwards we saw the head of the bearer hoisted on a pole over the 
 wall. Now, if I had spared them again, and sent them away upon their parole, they 
 would have directly gone to St. Jean d'Acre, where they would have played over 
 again the same scene that they had done at Jaffa. In justice to the lives of 
 my soldiers, as every general ought to consider himself as their father, and them as 
 his children, I could not allow this. To leave as a guard a portion of my army, 
 already small and reduced in number, in consequence of the breach of faith of those 
 wretches, was impossible. Indeed, to have acted otherwise than as I did would prob- 
 ably have caused the destruction of my whole army. I therefore, availing myself of 
 the rights of war, which authorise the putting to death prisoners taken under such 
 circumstances, independently of the right given to me by taking the city by assault, 
 and that of retaliation on the Turks, ordered that the prisoners taken at El-Arish 
 who, in defiance of their capitulation, had been found bearing arms against me, 
 should be selected out and shot. The rest, amounting to a considerable number, 
 were spared. " I would," continued he, " do the same thing again to-morrow, and 
 so would Wellington or any general commanding an army under similar circum- 
 stances " (.4 Voice from St. Helena). 
 
 Savary (tome i. p. 154) gives a similar account, but he was not present. Thiers
 
 1799. LANNES' SKIRMISH WITH MOUNTAINEERS. 199 
 
 After the siege of Jaffa the plague began to exhibit 
 itself with a little more virulence. We lost between seven 
 and eight hundred men by the contagion during the cam- 
 paign of Syria.' 
 
 During our march on St. Jean d'Acre, which was com- 
 menced on the 14th of March, the army neither obtained 
 the brilliant triumphs nor encountered the numerous ob- 
 stacles spoken of in certain works. Nothing of impor- 
 tance occurred but a rash skirmish of General Lannes, 
 who, in spite of contrary orders from Bonaparte, obsti- 
 nately pursued a troop of mountaineers into the passes of 
 Nablous. On returning, he found the mountaineers placed 
 in ambush in great numbers amongst rocks, the windings 
 of which they were well acquainted with, whence they 
 fired close upon our troops, whose situation rendered 
 them unable to defend themselves. Daring the time of 
 this foolish and useless enterprise, especially while the 
 firing was brisk, Bonaparte exhibited much impatience, 
 and, it must be confessed, his anger was but natural 
 The Nablousians halted at the openings of the moun- 
 tain defiles. Bonaparte reproached Lannes bitterly for 
 having uselessly exposed himself, and " sacrificed, with- 
 out any object, a number of brave men." Lannes ex- 
 cused himself by saying that the mountaineers had de- 
 fied him, and he wished to chastise the rabble. "We 
 are not in a condition to play the swaggerer," replied 
 Napoleon. 
 
 (tome v. p. 447) accepts this account. Jomini (tome i. pp. 292-293), a good judge, 
 treats the act as unjustifiable by public law, but justifiable by reciprocity, i.e. con- 
 sidering the treatment the French would certainly have met with from the Turks. 
 Lanfrey (tome i. pp. 393-390) of course throws the whole weight of blame on 
 Napoleon, denying there was any difficulty in feeding the prisoners. It will be 
 noticed that Bourrienne denies one of the reasons given at St. Helena, that it was 
 known the men formed part of the garrison of El-Arish. Some protestations were 
 made among the officers. 
 
 1 Sir Walter Scott Rays, that Heaven sent this pestilence amongst us to avenge 
 the massacre of Jaffa. The pestilence had its origin, however, before the massacre, 
 for KltSber's division caught the seeds of the dreadful malady at Damietta. It wag 
 developed and propagated on our march ; and was carried into Syria with u, 
 Bourrienne.
 
 200 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 In four days we arrived before St. Jean d'Acre, where 
 we learned that Djezzar had cut off the head of our envoy, 
 Mailly-de-Chateau-Renaud, and thrown his body into the 
 sea in a sack. This cruel pasha was guilty of a great 
 number of similar executions. The waves frequently 
 drove dead bodies towards the coast, and we came upon 
 them whilst bathing. 
 
 The details of the siege of Acre are well known. Al- 
 though surrounded by a wall, flanked "sith strong towers, 
 and having, besides, a broad and deep ditch defended by 
 works, this little fortress did not appear likely to hold out 
 against French valour and the skill of our corps of engin- 
 eers and artillery : but the ease and rapidity with which 
 Jaffa had been taken occasioned us to overlook in some 
 degree the comparative strength of the two places, and 
 the difference of their respective situations. At Jaffa 
 we had sufficient artillery : at St. Jean d'Acre we had not. 
 At Jaffa we had to deal only with a garrison left to 
 itself : at St. Jean d'Acre we were opposed by a garrison 
 strengthened by reinforcements of men and supplies of 
 provisions, supported by the English fleet, and assisted by 
 European science. 
 
 Sir Sidney Smith was, beyond doubt, the man who did 
 us the greatest injury. 1 Much has been said respecting his 
 communications with the General-in-Chief. The reproaches 
 which the latter cast upon him for endeavouring to seduce 
 the soldiers and officers of the army by tempting offers 
 were the more singular, even if they were well founded, 
 inasmuch as these means are frequently employed by 
 leaders in war. 8 As to the embarking of French prisoners 
 
 1 Sir Sidney Smith was the only Englishman besides the Duke of Wellington who 
 defeated Napoleon in military operations. The third Englishman opposed to him. 
 Sir John Moore, was compelled to make a precipitate retreat through the weakness 
 of his force. 
 
 4 At one tune the French General was so disturbed by them ns to endeavour to put 
 a stop to them, which object he effected by interdicting all communication with the 
 English, and signifying, in an order of the day, that their Commodore was a mad- 
 man. This, being believed in the army, so enraged Sir Sidney Smith, that in his
 
 TDUCDEMONTEBELLO
 
 1799. BONAPARTE AND SIR SIDNEY SMITH. 201 
 
 on board a vessel in which the plague existed, the im- 
 probability of the circumstance alone, but especially the 
 notorious facts of the case, repell this odious accusation. 
 I observed the conduct of Sir Sidney Smith closely at 
 the time, and I remarked in him a chivalric spirit, which 
 sometimes hurried him into trifling eccentricities ; but I 
 affirm that his behaviour towards the French was that of 
 a gallant enemy. I have seen many letters, in which the 
 writers informed him that they " were very sensible of 
 the good treatment which the French experienced when 
 they fell into his hands." Let any one examine Sir Sid- 
 ney's conduct before the capitulation of El-Arish, and 
 after its rupture, and then they can judge of his char- 
 acter. 1 
 
 wrath he sent a challenge to Napoleon. The latter replied, that he had too many 
 weighty affairs on his hands to trouble himself in so trifling a matter. Had it, In- 
 deed, been the great Marl borough, it might have been worthy his attention. Still, 
 if the English sailor was absolutely bent upon fighting, he would send him a bravo 
 from the army, and allow them a small portion of neutral ground, where the mad 
 Commodore might land, and satisfy his humour to the full. Editor c/1836 Edition. 
 
 1 Napoleon, when at St. Helena, in speaking of the siege of Acre, said, "Sidney 
 Smith is a brave officer. He displayed considerable ability in the treaty for the 
 evacuation of Egypt by the French. He took advantage of the discontent which 
 ne found to prevail amongst the French troops at being so long away from France, 
 and other circumstances. He manifested great honour in sending immediately to 
 Kleber the refusal of Lord Keith to ratify the treaty, which saved the French 
 army ; if he had kept it a secret seven or eight days longer, Cairo would have been 
 given up to the Turks, and the French army necessarily obliged to surrender to the 
 English. He also showed great humanity and honour in all his proceedings towards 
 the French who fell into his hands. He landed at Havre, for some sottise of a bet 
 he had made, according to some, to go to the theatre ; others said it was for espion- 
 age ; however th it may be, he was arrested and confined in the Temple as n spy ; 
 and at one time it was intended to try and execute him. Shortly after I returned 
 from Italy he wrote to me from his prison, to request that I would intercede for 
 him; but, under the circumstances in which he was taken, I could do nothing for 
 him. He is active, intelligent, intriguing, and indefatigable ; but I believe that ha 
 is mei&o pazo. 
 
 "The chief cause of the failure at Acre was, that he took all my battering train, 
 which was on board of several small vessels. Had it not been for that. I would 
 have taken Acre in spite of him. He behaved very bravely, and was well seconded 
 by Phillipeaux, a Frenchman of talent, who had studied with me as an engineer. 
 There was a Major Douglas also, who behaved very gallantly. The acquisition of 
 five or six hundred seamen as gunners was a great advantage to the Turks, whose 
 spirits they revived, and whom they showed how to defend the fortress. But he 
 committed a great fault in making sorties, which cost the lives of two or three hun- 
 dred brave fellows without the possibility of success. For it was impossible hs
 
 202 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799 
 
 All our manoeuvres, our works, and attacks were made 
 with that levity and carelessness which over-confidence 
 inspires. Kleber, whilst walking with me one day in the 
 lines of our camp, frequently expressed his surprise and 
 discontent. "The trenches," said he, "do not come up 
 to my knees." Besieging artillery was, of necessity, re- 
 quired : we commenced with field artillery. This encour- 
 aged the besieged, who perceived the weakness of our re- 
 sources. The besieging artillery, consisting only of three 
 twenty-four pounders and six eighteen pounders, was not 
 brought up until the end of April, and before that period 
 three assaults had taken place with very serious loss. On 
 the 4th of May our powder began to fail us. This cruel 
 event obliged us to slacken our fire. We also wanted 
 shot ; and an order of the day fixed a price to be given 
 for all balls, according to their calibre, which might be 
 picked up after being fired from the fortress or the two 
 ships of the line, the Tiger and Theseus, which were sta- 
 tioned on each side of the harbour. These two vessels 
 embarrassed the communication between the camp and 
 the trenches ; but though they made much noise, they 
 did little harm. A ball from one of them killed an officer 
 on the evening the siege was raised. 
 
 The enemy had within the walls some excellent rifle- 
 men, chiefly Albanians. They placed stones, one over the 
 other, on the walls, put their firearms through the inter- 
 stices, and thus, completely sheltered, fired with destructive 
 precision. 
 
 On the 9th of April General Caffarelli, so well known for 
 
 could succeed against the number of the French who were before Acre. I would 
 lay a wager that he lost half of bis crew in them. He dispersed proclamations 
 amongst my troops, which certainly shook some of them, and I in consequence pub- 
 lished an order, stating that he was mad, and forbidding all communication with 
 him. Some days after he sent, by means of a flag of truce, a lieutenant or a mid- 
 shipman with a letter containing a challenge to me to meet him at some place he 
 pointed out in order to fight a duel. I laughed at this, and sent him back an in- 
 timation that when he brought Marlborough to fight me I would meet him. Not- 
 withstanding this, I like the character of the man " ( Voice from St. Helena, vol. i. 
 p. 208).
 
 1799. DEATH OF GENERAL CAFFARELLL 208 
 
 his courage and talents, was passing through the trench, 
 his hand resting as he stooped on his hip, to preserve the 
 equilibrium which his wooden leg impaired ; his elbow 
 only was raised above the trench. He was warned that 
 the enemy's shot, fired close upon us, did not miss the 
 smallest object. He paid no attention to any observation 
 of this kind, and in a few instants his elbow-joint was 
 fractured. Amputation of the arm was judged indispens- 
 able. The General survived the operation eighteen days. 
 Bonaparte went regularly twice a day to his tent. By his 
 order, added to my friendship for Caffarelli, I scarcely ever 
 quitted him. Shortly before he expired he said to me, 
 "My dear Bourrienne, be so good as to read to me 
 Voltaire's preface to the Esprit des Lois." When I returned 
 to the tent of the General-in-Chief he asked, "How is 
 Caffarelli ? " I replied, " He is near his end ; but he asked 
 me to read him Voltaire's preface to the Esprit des Lois. 
 He has just fallen asleep." Bonaparte said, "Bah! to 
 wish to hear that preface ? how singular ! " He went 
 to see Caffarelli, but he was still asleep. I returned 
 to him that evening, and received his last breath. He 
 died with the utmost composure. His death was equally 
 regretted by the soldiers and the men of science who ac- 
 companied us. It was a just regret, fully due to that dis- 
 tinguished man, in whom very extensive information was 
 united with great courage and an amiable disposition. 
 
 On the 10th of May, when an assault took place, Bona- 
 parte proceeded at an early hour to the trenches. 1 Croisier, 
 who was mentioned on our arrival at Damanhour, and on 
 the capture of Jaffa, had in vain courted death since the 
 commencement of the siege. Life had become insup- 
 portable to him since the 'unfortunate affair at Jaffa. He 
 as usual accompanied his General to the trenches. Be- 
 lieving that the termination of the siege, which was 
 
 1 Sir Sidney Smith, in his official report of the assault of the 8th of May, says that 
 Napoleon was distinctly seen directing the operation.
 
 204 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 supposed to be near, would postpone indefinitely the death 
 which he sought, he mounted a battery. In this situation 
 his tall figure uselessly provoked all the enemy's shots. 
 " Croisier, come down, I command you ; you have no 
 business there," cried Bonaparte, in a loud and imperative 
 tone. Croisier remained without making any reply. A 
 moment after a ball passed through his right leg. Ampu- 
 tation was not considered indispensable. On the day of 
 our departure he was placed on a litter, which was borne 
 by sixteen men alternately, eight at a time. I received 
 his last farewell between Gaza and El-Arish, where he died 
 of tetanus. His modest tomb will not be often visited. 
 
 The siege of St. Jean d'Acre lasted sixty days. During 
 that time eight assaults and twelve sorties took place. In 
 the assault of the 8th of May more than 200 men penetrated 
 into the town. Victory was already shouted ; but the 
 breach having been taken in reverse by the Turks, it was 
 not approached without some degree of hesitation, and the 
 200 men who had entered were not supported. The 
 streets were barricaded. The cries, the howlings of the 
 women, who ran through the streets throwing, according 
 to the custom of the country, dust in the air, excited the 
 male inhabitants to a desperate resistance, which rendered 
 unavailing this short occupation of the town by a handful 
 of men, who, finding themselves left without assistance, 
 retreated towards the breach. Many who could not reach 
 it perished in the town. 
 
 During this assault Duroc, who was in the trench, was 
 wounded in the right thigh by the splinter from a shell 
 fired against the fortifications. Fortunately this accident 
 only carried away the flesh from the bone, which remained 
 untouched. He had a tent in common with several other 
 aides de camp ; but for his better accommodation I gave 
 him mine, and I scarcely ever quitted him. Entering his 
 tent one day about noon, I found him in a profound sleep. 
 The excessive heat had compelled him to throw off all
 
 1799. APPEARANCE OF A MAHDI. 205 
 
 covering, and part of his wound was exposed. I perceived 
 a scorpion which had crawled up the leg of the camp-bed 
 and approached very near to the wound. I was just in 
 time to hurl it to the ground. The sudden motion of my 
 hand awoke Duroc. 
 
 We often bathed in the sea. Sometimes the English, 
 perhaps after taking a double allowance of grog, would 
 fire at our heads, which appeared above water. I am not 
 aware that any accident was occasioned by their cannon- 
 ade ; but as we were beyond reach of their guns, we 
 paid scarcely any attention to the firing. It was even a 
 subject of amusement to us. 
 
 Had our attack on St. Jean d'Acre been less precipitate, 
 and had the siege been undertaken according to the rules 
 of war, the place would not have held out three days ; one 
 assault, like that of the 8th of May, would have been suffi- 
 cient. If, in the situation in which we were on the day 
 when we first came in sight of the ramparts of Acre, we 
 had made a less inconsiderate estimate of the strength of 
 the place ; if we had likewise taken into consideration the 
 active co-operation of the English and the Ottoman Porte, 
 our absolute want of artillery of sufficient calibre, our 
 scarcity of gunpowder and the difficulty of procuring food, 
 we certainly should not have undertaken the siege ; and 
 that would have been by far the wisest course. 
 
 Towards the end of the siege the General-in-Chief 
 received intelligence of some trifling insurrections in 
 northern Egypt. An angel had excited them, and the 
 heavenly messenger, who had condescended to assume a 
 name, was called the Mahdi, or El Mohdy. This religious 
 extravagance, however, did not last long, and tranquillity 
 was soon restored. All that the fanatic Mahdi, who 
 shrouded himself in mystery, succeeded in doing was to 
 attack our rear by some vagabonds, whose illusions were 
 dissipated by a few musket- shots.
 
 30f> 179ft 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 1799. 
 
 The siege of Acre raised Attention to names in bulletins Gigantic pro- 
 ject The Druses Mount Carmel The wounded and infected 
 Order to march on foot Loss of our cannon A Nablousian fires at 
 Bonaparte Return to Jaffa Bonaparte visits the plague hospital 
 A potion given to the sick Bonaparte's statement at St. Helena. 
 
 THE siege of St. Jean d'Acre was raised on the 20th of 
 May. It cost us a loss of nearly 3000 men, in killed, 
 deaths by the plague, or wounds. A great number were 
 wounded mortally. In those veracious documents, the 
 bulletins, the French loss was made 500 killed, and 1000 
 wounded, and the enemy's more than 15,000.' 
 
 Our bulletins may form curious materials for history ; 
 but their value certainly will not depend on the credit 
 due to their details. Bonaparte attached the greatest 
 importance to those documents, generally drawing them 
 up himself, or correcting them, when written by another 
 hand, if the composition did not please him. 
 
 It must be confessed that at that time nothing so much 
 flattered self-love as being mentioned in a bulletin. Bona- 
 parte was well aware of this ; he knew that to insert a 
 name in a bulletin was conferring a great honour, and 
 that its exclusion was a severe disappointment. General 
 Berthier, to whom I had expressed a strong desire to ex- 
 amine the works of the siege, took me over them ; but, 
 notwithstanding his promise of secrecy, he mentioned the 
 circumstance to the General-in-Chief, who had desired me 
 
 1 M. Aure, the ordonnateur-en-chef of the army, computes the whole number ol 
 deaths during the Syrian campaign at 2000 (Erreurs, tome i. p. 75>
 
 1799. MISTAKEN CALCULATIONS. 207 
 
 not to approach the works. " What did you go there 
 for?" said Bonaparte to me, with some severity; "that 
 is not your place." I replied that Berthier told me that 
 no assault would take place that day ; and he believed 
 there would be no sortie, as the garrison had made one 
 the preceding evening. "What matters that? There 
 might have been another. Those who have nothing to do 
 in such places are always the first victims. * Let every 
 man mind his own business. Wounded or killed, I would 
 not even have noticed you in the bulletin. You would 
 have been laughed at, and that justly." 
 
 Bonaparte, not having at this time experienced reverses, 
 having continually proceeded from triumph to triumph, 
 confidently anticipated the taking of St. Jean d'Acre. In 
 his letters to the generals in Egypt he fixed the 25th of 
 April for the accomplishment of that event. He reckoned 
 that the grand assault against the tower could not be made 
 before that day ; it took place, however, twenty-four hours 
 sooner. He wrote to Desaix on the 19th of April, " I 
 count on being master of Acre in six days." On the 2d of 
 May he told Junot, " Our 18 and 24 pounders have arrived. 
 We hope to enter Acre in a few days. The fire of their 
 artillery is completely extinguished." Letters have been 
 printed, dated 30th Floreal a (19th May), in which he an- 
 nounces to Dugua and to Poussielgue that they can rely 
 on his being in Acre on 6th Floreal (25th April). Some 
 mistake has evidently been made. " The slightest cir- 
 cumstances produce the greatest events," said Napoleon, 
 according to the Memorial of St. Helena; "had St. Jean 
 d'Acre fallen, I should have changed the face of the world." 
 And again, " The fate of the East lay in that small town." 
 
 1 It may be noted that this has always been a common belief among soldiers, an 
 idea supported by the frequent wounds and death of persons voluntarily engaged in 
 operations. 
 
 * If in these latter letters for 30th Flor&al we read 30th Germinal (19th April), the 
 letters to Caff arelli, Dugua, and to Poussielgne will agree in their dates with thoso 
 to Desaix.
 
 208 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 This idea is not one which he first began to entertain at 
 St. Helena ; he often repeated the very same words at St. 
 Jean d'Acre. On the shore of Ptolemais gigantic projects 
 agitated him, as, doubtless, regret for not having carried 
 them into execution tormented him at St. Helena. 
 
 Almost every evening Bonaparte and myself used to 
 walk together, at a little distance from the sea-shore. The 
 day after the unfortunate assault of the 8th of May Bona- 
 parte, afflicted at seeing the blood of so many brave men 
 uselessly shed, said to me, "Bourrienne, I see that this 
 wretched place has cost me a number of men, and wasted 
 much time. But things are too far advanced not to attempt 
 a last effort If I succeed, as I expect, I shall find in the 
 town the pasha's treasures, and arms for 300,000 men. 
 I will stir up and arm the people of Syria, who are dis- 
 gusted at the ferocity of Djezzar, and who, as you know, 
 pray for his destruction at every assault. I shall then 
 march upon Damascus and Aleppo. On advancing into 
 the country, the discontented will flock round my stand- 
 ard, and swell my army. I will announce to the people 
 the abolition of servitude and of the tyrannical governments 
 of the pashas. I shall arrive at Constantinople with large 
 masses of soldiery. I shall overturn the Turkish empire, 
 and found in the East a new and grand empire, which 
 will fix my place in the records of posterity. Perhaps I 
 shall return to Paris by Adrianople, or by Vienna, after 
 having annihilated the house of Austria." After I had 
 made some observations which these grand projects natu- 
 rally suggested, he replied, "What! do you not see that 
 the Druses only wait for the fall of Acre to rise in re- 
 bellion? Have not the keys of Damascus already been 
 offered me? I only stay till these walls fall because until 
 then I can derive no advantage from this large town. By 
 the operation which I meditate I cut off all kind of succour 
 from the beys, and secure the conquest of Egypt. I will 
 have Desaix nominated commander-in-chief ; but if I do
 
 1799. PROCLAMATIONS OF BONAPARTE. 209 
 
 not succeed in the last assault I am about to attempt, I 
 set off directly. Time presses. I shall not be at Cairo 
 before the middle of June. The winds will then be 
 favourable for ships bound to Egypt from the north. 
 Constantinople will send troops to Alexandria and Ro- 
 setta. I must be there. As for the army which will 
 arrive afterwards by land, I do not fear it this year. I 
 will cause everything to be destroyed, all the way to the 
 entrance of the desert. I will render the passage of an 
 army impossible for two years. Troops cannot exist 
 amidst ruins." 
 
 As soon as I returned to my tent I committed to paper 
 this conversation, which was then quite fresh in my mem- 
 ory ; and I may venture to say that every word I put down 
 is correct. I may add, that during the siege our camp was 
 constantly filled with the inhabitants, who invoked Heaven 
 to favour our arms, and prayed fervently at every assault 
 for our success, many of them on their knees, with their 
 faces to the city. The people of Damascus, too, had 
 offered the keys to Bonaparte. Thus everything contrib- 
 uted to make him confident in his favourite plan. 
 
 The troops left St. Jean d'Acre on the 20th of May, tak- 
 ing advantage of the night to avoid a sortie from the be- 
 sieged, and to conceal the retreat of the army, which had 
 to march three leagues along the shore, exposed to the fire 
 of the English vessels lying in the roads of Mount Carmel. 
 The removal of the wounded and sick commenced on the 
 18th and 19th of May. 
 
 Bonaparte then made a proclamation, which from one 
 end to the other offends against truth. It has been pub- 
 lished in many works. The season of the year for hostile 
 landing is there very dexterously placed in the foreground ; 
 all the rest is a deceitful exaggeration. It must be ob- 
 served that the proclamations which Bonaparte regarded 
 as calculated to dazzle an ever too credulous public were 
 amplifications often ridiculous and incomprehensible upon 
 VOL. L 14
 
 210 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 the spot, and which only excited the laughter of men of 
 common sense. In all Bonaparte's correspondence there 
 is an endeavour to disguise his reverses, and impose on the 
 public, and even on his own generals. For example, he 
 wrote to General Dugua, commandant of Cairo, on the 
 15th of February, " I will bring you plenty of prisoners 
 and flags ! " One would almost be inclined to say that he 
 had resolved, during his stay in the East, thus to pay a 
 tribute to the country of fables. l 
 
 Thus terminated this disastrous expedition. I have read 
 somewhere that during this immortal campaign the two 
 heroes Murat and Mourad had often been in face of one 
 another. There is only a little difficulty; Mourad Bey 
 never put his foot in Syria. 
 
 We proceeded along the coast, and passed Mount Car- 
 mel. Some of the wounded were carried on litters, the re- 
 mainder on horses, mules, and camels. At a short distance 
 from Mount Carmel we were informed that three soldiers, 
 ill of the plague, who were left in a convent (which served 
 for a hospital), and abandoned too confidently to the gen- 
 erosity of the Turks, had been barbarously put to death. 
 
 A most intolerable thirst, the total want of water, an 
 excessive heat, and a fatiguing march over burning sand- 
 hills, quite disheartened the men, and made every generous 
 sentiment give way to feelings of the grossest selfishness 
 and most shocking indifference. I saw officers, with their 
 limbs amputated, thrown off the litters, whose removal in 
 that way had been ordered, and who had themselves given 
 money to recompense the bearers. I saw the amputated, 
 the wounded, the infected, or those only suspected of in- 
 fection, deserted and left to themselves. The march was 
 
 1 .The prisoners and flags were sent The Turkish flags were entrusted by Berthier 
 to the Adjutant-Commandant Boycr, who conducted a convoy of sick and wounded 
 to Egypt. Sidney Smith acknowledges the loss of some flags by the Turks. The 
 Turkish prisoners were used as carriers of the litters for the wounded, and were, for 
 the most part, brought into Egypt (Erreurs, tome i. pp. 47 and 160). See also La*- 
 Jrey (tome i. p. 403) as to prisoners and flags.
 
 1799. THE WOUNDED AND INFECTED. 211 
 
 illumined by torches, lighted for the purpose of setting 
 fire to the little towns, villages, and hamlets which lay in 
 the route, and the rich crops with which the land was then 
 covered. The whole country was in a blaze. Those who 
 were ordered to preside at this work of destruction seemed 
 eager to spread desolation on every side, as if they could 
 thereby avenge themselves for their reverses, and find in 
 such dreadful havoc an alleviation of their sufferings. We 
 were constantly surrounded by plunderers, incendiaries, 
 and the dying, who, stretched on the sides of the road, 
 implored assistance in a feeble voice, saying, " I am not 
 infected I am only wounded;" and to convince those 
 whom they addressed, they reopened their old wounds, or 
 inflicted on themselves fresh ones. Still nobody attended 
 to them. "It is all over with him," was the observation 
 applied to the unfortunate beings in succession, while 
 every one pressed onward. The sun, which shone in an 
 unclouded sky in all its brightness, was often darkened by 
 our conflagrations. On our right lay the sea ; on our left, 
 and behind us, the desert made by ourselves ; before were 
 the privations and sufferings which awaited us. Such was 
 our true situation. 
 
 We reached Tentoura on the 20th of May, when a most 
 oppressive heat prevailed, and produced general dejection. 
 We had nothing to sleep on but the parched and burning 
 sand ; on our right lay a hostile sea ; our losses in 
 wounded and sick were already considerable since leaving 
 Acre ; and there was nothing consolatory in the future. The 
 truly afflicting condition in which the remains of an army 
 called triumphant were plunged, produced, as might well 
 be expected, a corresponding impression on the mind of 
 the General-in-Chief. Scarcely had he arrived at Ten- 
 toura when he ordered his tent to be pitched. He then 
 called me, and with a mind occupied by the calamities of 
 our situation, dictated an order that every one should 
 march on foot ; and that all the horses, mules, and camels
 
 212 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 should be given up to the wounded, the sick, and infected 
 who had been removed, and who still showed signs of life. 
 " Carry that to Berthier," said he ; and the order was in- 
 stantly despatched. Scarcely had I returned to the tent 
 when the elder Vigogne, the General-in-Chief's groom, 
 entered, and raising his hand to his cap, said, " General, 
 what horse do you reserve for yourself ? " In the state 
 of excitement in which Bonaparte was this question irri- 
 tated him so violently that, raising his whip, he gave the 
 man a severe blow on the head, saying in a terrible voice, 
 " Every one must go on foot, you rascal I the first ! Do 
 you not know the order ? Be off ! " 
 
 Every one in parting with his horse was now anxious 
 to avoid giving it to any unfortunate individual supposed 
 to be suffering from plague. Much pains were taken to 
 ascertain the nature of the diseases of the sick ; and no diffi- 
 culty was made in accommodating the wounded or ampu- 
 tated. For my part I had an excellent horse, a mule, and 
 two camels, all which I gave up with the greatest pleas- 
 ure ; but I confess that I directed my servant to do all he 
 could to prevent an infected person from getting my 
 horse. It was returned to me in a very short time. The 
 same thing happened to many others. The cause may be 
 easily conjectured. 
 
 The remains of our heavy artillery were lost in the mov- 
 ing sands of Tentoura, from the want of horses, the small 
 number that remained being employed in more indispen- 
 sable services. The soldiers seemed to forget their own 
 sufferings, plunged in grief at the loss of their bronze 
 guns, often the instruments of their triumphs, ajnd which 
 had made Europe tremble. 
 
 We halted at Caesarea on the 22d of May, and we 
 marched all the following night. Towards daybreak a 
 man, concealed in a bush upon the left of the road (the 
 sea was two paces from us on the right), fired a musket 
 almost close to the head of the General-in-Chief, who was
 
 1799. A NADLOUSIAN FIRES AT BONAPARTE. 213 
 
 sleeping on his horse. I was beside him. The wood be- 
 ing searched, the Nablousian was taken without difficulty, 
 and ordered to be shot on the spot. Four guides pushed 
 him towards the sea by thrusting their carbines against 
 his back ; when close to the water's edge they drew the 
 triggers, but all the four muskets hung fire : a circum- 
 stance which was accounted for by the great humidity of 
 the night. The Nablousian threw himself into the water, 
 and, swimming with great agility and rapidity, gained a 
 ridge of rocks so far off that not a shot from the whole 
 troop, which fired as it passed, reached him. Bonaparte, 
 who continued his march, desired me to wait for K16- 
 ber, whose division formed the rear-guard, and to tell 
 him not to forget the Nablousian. He was, I believe, shot 
 at last. 
 
 We returned to Jaffa on the 24th of May, and stopped 
 there during the 25th, 26th, 27th, and 28th. This town 
 had lately been the scene of a horrible transaction, dic- 
 tated by necessity, and it was again destined to witness 
 the exercise of the same dire law. Here I have a painful 
 duty to perform I will perform it. I will state what I 
 know, what I saw. 
 
 I have seen the following passage in a certain work : 
 "Bonaparte, having arrived at Jaffa, ordered three re- 
 movals of the infected : one by sea to Damietta, and 
 also by land ; the second to Gaza ; and the third to El- 
 Arish ! " So many words, so many errors ! 
 
 Some tents were pitched on an eminence near the gar- 
 dens east of Jaffa. Orders were given directly to under- 
 mine the fortifications and blow them up ; and on the 27th 
 of May, upon the signal being given, the town was in a 
 moment laid bare. An hour afterwards the General-in- 
 Chief left his tent and repaired to the town, accompanied 
 by Berthier, some physicians and surgeons, and his usual 
 staff. I was also one of the party. A long and sad de- 
 liberation took place on the question which now arose
 
 214 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 relative to the men who were incurably ill of the plague, 
 or who were at the point of death. After a discussion of 
 the most serious and conscientious kind it was decided to 
 accelerate a few moments, by a potion, a death which was 
 inevitable, and which would otherwise be painful and 
 cruel. 
 
 Bonaparte took a rapid view of the destroyed ramparts 
 of the town and returned to the hospital, where there were 
 men whose limbs had been amputated, many wounded, 
 many afflicted with ophthalmia, whose lamentations were 
 distressing, and some infected with the plague. The beds 
 of the last description of patients were to the right on 
 entering the first ward. I walked by the General's side, 
 and I assert that I never saw him touch any one of the 
 infected. And why should he have done so? They were 
 in the last stage of the disease. Not one of them spoke a 
 word to him, and Bonaparte well knew that he possessed 
 no protection against the plague. Is Fortune to be again 
 brought forward here? She had, in truth, little favoured 
 him during the last few months, when he had trusted to 
 her favours. I ask, why should he have exposed himself to 
 certain death, and have left his army in the midst of a 
 desert created by our ravages, in a desolate town, without 
 succour, and without the hope of ever receiving any ? 
 Would he have acted rightly in doing so he who was 
 evidently so necessary, so indispensable to his army ; he 
 on whom depended at that moment the lives of all who 
 had survived the last disaster, and who had proved their 
 attachment to him by their sufferings, their privations, 
 and their unshaken courage, and who had done all that 
 he could have required of men, and whose only trust was 
 in him? 
 
 Bonaparte walked quickly through the rooms, tapping 
 the yellow top of his boot with a whip he held in his 
 hand. As he passed along with hasty steps he repeated 
 these words: " The fortifications are destroyed. Fortune
 
 1799. VISIT OF BONAPARTE TO THE HOSPITAL. 215 
 
 was against me at St. Jean d'Acre. I must return to 
 Egypt to preserve it from the enemy, who will soon be 
 there. In a few hours the Turks will be here. Let all 
 those who have strength enough rise and come along with 
 us. They shall be carried on litters and horses." There 
 were scarcely sixty cases of plague in the hospital ; and 
 all accounts stating a greater number are exaggerated. 
 The perfect silence, complete dejection, and general 
 stupor of the patients announced their approaching end. 
 To carry them away in the state in which they were would 
 evidently have been doing nothing else than inoculating 
 the rest of the army with the plague. I have, it is true, 
 learned, since my return to Europe, that some persons 
 touched the infected with impunity ; nay, that others went 
 so far as to inoculate themselves with the plague in order 
 to learn how to cure those whom it might attack. It cer- 
 tainly was a special protection from Heaven to be pre- 
 served from it ; but, to cover in some degree the absurdity 
 of such a story, it is added that they knew how to elude 
 the danger, and that any one else who braved it without 
 using precautions met with death for their temerity. 
 This is, in fact, the whole point of the question. Either 
 those privileged persons took indispensable precautions, 
 and in that case their boasted heroism is a mere juggler's 
 trick ; or they touched the infected without using precau- 
 tions, and inoculated themselves with the plague,. thus 
 voluntarily encountering death, and then the story is really 
 a good one. 
 
 The infected were confided, it has been stated, to the 
 head apothecary of the army, Boyer, who, dying in Egypt 
 three years after, carried the secret with him to the grave. 
 But on a moment's reflection it will be evident that the 
 leaving of Royer alone in Jaffa would have been to devote 
 to certain death, and that a prompt and cruel one, a man 
 who was extremely useful to the army, and who was 
 at the time in perfect health. It must be remembered
 
 216 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 that no guard could be left with him, and that the Turks 
 were close at our heels. Bonaparte truly said, while 
 walking through the rooms of the hospital, that the Turks 
 would be at Jaffa in a few hours. With this conviction, 
 would he have left the head apothecary in that town ? 
 
 Recourse has been had to suppositions to support the 
 contrary belief to what I state. For example, it is said 
 that the infected patients were embarked in ships of war. 
 There were no such ships. Where had they disem- 
 barked, who had received them, what had been done with 
 them? No one speaks of them. 1 Others, not doubting 
 that the infected men died at Jaffa, say that the rear- 
 guard under Kleber, by order of Bonaparte, delayed its 
 departure for three days, and only began its march when 
 death had put an end to the sufferings of these unfortunate 
 beings, unshortened by any sacrifice. All this is incorrect. 
 No rear-guard was left it could not be done. Pretence 
 is made of forgetting that the ramparts were destroyed, 
 that the town was as open and as defenceless as any vil- 
 lage, so this small rear-guard would have been left for 
 certain destruction. The dates themselves tell against 
 these suppositions. It is certain, as can be seen by the 
 official account, that we arrived at Jaffa on 24th May, and 
 stayed there the 25th, 26th, and 27th. We left it on the 
 28th. Thus the rear-guard, which, according to these 
 writers, left on the 29th, did not remain, even according 
 to their own hypothesis, three days after the army to see 
 the sick die. In reality it left on the 29th of May, the 
 day after we did. Here are the very words of the Major- 
 General (Berthier) in his official account, written under 
 the eye and under the dictation of the Commander- 
 in-Chief : 
 
 i Erreun (tome i. pp. 36, 37, 87, and 163, etc.) fully proves that many sick were 
 sent by sea as well as by land, and gives the names of the vessels employed, the officers 
 in charge, the ports of landing, etc. Sir Sidney Smith reports that he captured, but 
 released and sent to Damietta, some if not all those sent by sea. Bourrienne himself 
 seems to have afterwards practically admitted he was wrong about the difficulty of 
 removing the sick (Erreun, tome i. p. 41).
 
 1799. VISIT OF BONAPARTE TO THE HOSPITAL. 217 
 
 The army arrived at Jaffa 5th Prairial (24th May), and remained 
 there the 6th, 7th, and 8th (25th-27th May). This time was em- 
 ployed in punishing the village, which had behaved badly. The 
 fortifications of Jaffa were blown up. All the iron guns of the 
 place were thrown into the sea. The wounded were removed by 
 sea and by land. There were only a few ships, and to give time to 
 complete the evacuation by land, the departure of the army had to 
 be deferred until the 9th (28th May). K16ber's division formed 
 the rear-guard, and only left Jaffa on the 10th (29th May). 
 
 The official report of what passed at Jaffa was drawn 
 up by Berthier, under the eye of Bonaparte. It has been 
 published ; but it may be remarked that not a word about 
 the infected, not a word of the visit to the hospital, or 
 the touching of the plague-patients with impunity, ia 
 there mentioned. In no official report is anything said 
 about the matter. Why this silence ? Bonaparte was not 
 the man to conceal a fact which would have afforded him 
 so excellent and so allowable a text for talking about his 
 fortune. If the infected were removed, why not mention 
 it ? Why be silent on so important an event ? But it 
 would have been necessary to confess that being obliged 
 to have recourse to so painful a measure was the unavoid- 
 able consequence of this unfortunate expedition. Very 
 disagreeable details must have been entered into ; and it 
 was thought more advisable to be silent on the subject. 
 
 But what did Napoleon himself say on the subject at 
 St. Helena ? His statement there was to the following 
 effect : " I ordered a consultation as to what was best to 
 be done. The report which was made stated that there 
 were seven or eight men (the question is not about the 
 number) so dangerously ill that they could not live beyond 
 twenty-four hours, and would besides infect the rest of 
 the army with the plague. It was thought it would be 
 an act of charity to anticipate their death a few hours." 
 [Then comes the fable of the 500 men of the rear-guard, 
 who, it is pretended, saw them die.] " I make no doubt 
 that the story of the poisoning was the invention of
 
 218 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Den . He was a babbler, who understood a story 
 
 badly, and repeated it worse. I do not think it would 
 have been a crime to have given opium to the infected. 
 On the contrary, it would have been obedience to the 
 dictates of reason. Where is the man who would not, in 
 such a situation, have preferred a prompt death, to being 
 exposed to the lingering tortures inflicted by barbarians ? 
 If my child, and I believe I love him as much as any father 
 does his, had been in such a state, my advice would have 
 been the same ; if I had been among the infected myself, 
 I should have demanded to be so treated." 
 
 Such was the reasoning at St. Helena, and such was 
 the view which he and every one else took of the case 
 twenty years ago at Jaffa. 1 
 
 1 M. de Bonrrienne's description of the extraordinary scene in the hospital of 
 Jaffa does not precisely correspond with that given by some other writers. The 
 reader may feel interested in comparing it with the account given by the Due de 
 Bovigo in his Memoirs, tome i. p. 161. It is as follows: 
 
 "The hospital contained many soldiers who were in a state bordering upon mad- 
 ness, much more owing to the terror which the malady inspired than to the intensity 
 of the pain. General Bonaparte determined to restore them to their wonted energy. 
 He paid them a visit, reproached them for giving way to dejection and yielding to 
 chimerical fears ; and in order to convince them, by the most obvious proof, that 
 their apprehensions were groundless, he desired that the .bleeding tumour of one of 
 the soldiers should be uncovered before him, and pressed it with his own hand. 
 This act of heroism restored confidence to the sick, who no longer thought their case 
 desperate. Each one recruited his remaining strength, and prepared to quit a place 
 which but a moment before he had expected never to leave. A grenadier, upon 
 whom the plague had made greater ravages, could hardly raise himself from his bed. 
 The General perceiving this addressed to him a few encouraging words. ' You are 
 right, General,' replied the warrior; 'your grenadiers are not made to die in a 
 hospital.' Affected at the courage displayed by these unfortunate men, who were 
 exhausted by uneasiness of mind no less than by the complaint, General Bonaparte 
 would not quit them until he saw them all placed upon camels and the other means 
 of transport at the disposal of the army. These, however, being found inadequate, 
 he made a requisition for the officers' horses, delivered up his own, and, finding one 
 of them missing, he sent for the groom, who was keeping it for his master, and hes- 
 itated to give it up. The General, growing impatient at this excess of zeal, darted a 
 threatening look ; the whole stud was placed at the disposal of the sick ; and yet it 
 is this very act of magnanimity which the perverseness of human nature has de- 
 lighted in distorting. I feel ashamed to advert to so atrocious a calumny ; but the 
 man whose simple assertion was found sufficient to give it currency has not been 
 able to stifle it by his subsequent disavowal. I must, therefore, descend to the task 
 of proving the absurdity of the charge. I do not wish to urge, as an argument, the 
 absolute want of medicines to which the army was reduced by the rapacity of an 
 apothecary ; nor the indignation felt by General Bonaparte .when he learned that 
 this wretch, instead of employing his camels to transport pharmaceutic preparations,
 
 1799. RETURN TO EGYPT. 219 
 
 Our little army arrived at Cairo on the 14th of June, 
 after a painful and harassing march of twenty-five days. 
 The heat, during the passage of the desert between El- 
 Arish and Belbeis exceeded thirty- three degrees. On 
 placing the bulb of the thermometer in the sand the 
 mercury rose to forty-five degrees. ' The deceitful mirage 
 was even more vexatious than in the plains of Bohahire'h. 
 In spite of our experience an excessive thirst, added to a 
 perfect illusion, made us goad on our wearied horses 
 towards lakes which vanished at our approach, and left 
 behind nothing but salt and arid sand. In two days my 
 cloak was completely covered with salt, left on it after 
 the evaporation of the moisture which held it in solution. 
 Our horses, who ran eagerly to the brackish springs of 
 the desert, perished in numbers, after travelling about a 
 quarter of a league from the spot where they drank the 
 deleterious fluid. 
 
 had loaded them with provisions, upon which he expected to derive a profit. The 
 necessity to which we were driven of using roots as a substitute for opium is a fact 
 known to the whole army. Supposing, however, that opium had been as plentiful 
 as it was scarce, and that General Bonaparte could have contemplated the expedi- 
 ent attributed to him, where co:ild there be found a man sufficiently determined in 
 mind, or so lost to the feelings of human nature, as to force open the jaws of fifty 
 wretched men on the point of death, and thrust a deadly preparation down their 
 throats? The most intrepid soldier turned pale at the Right of an infected person ; 
 the warmest heart dared not relieve a friend afflicted with the plague ; and is it to 
 be credited, that brutal ferocity could execute what the noblest feelings recoiled at ? 
 or that there should have been a creature savage or mad enough to sacrifice his own 
 life in order to enjoy the satisfaction of hastening the death of fifty dying men, 
 wholly unknown to him, and against whom he had no complaint to make ? The 
 supposition is truly absurd, and only worthy of those who bring it forward in spite 
 of the disavowal of its author." 
 
 The above account is confirmed by the statements of M. Desgenettes, the physi- 
 cian, General Andreossy, and M. d'Aure, who, as well as M. de Bourrienne, were 
 present on the occasion referred to. It is to be remarked, however, that Savary, 
 then with Desaix in Upper Egypt, was not an eye-witness. Lanfrey (tome i. pp. 
 404-407), with unusual fairness, points out that Sir Sidney Smith, who found some of 
 the infected still alive at Jaffa after the departure of the French and who reports 
 the murmurs of the soldiers against their General, says nothing of the poisoning.' 
 Lanfrey himself believes the most probable account to be that opium was put within 
 the reach of the men left behind. It seems safest to believe that the proposal to 
 give the opium was discussed, but never carried out. Few soldiers would not, in the 
 circumstances, prefer the views of Napoleon on the point to the false humanity of 
 handing dying men to the certain cruelty of Asiatics. 
 
 1 Beamur?
 
 220 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Bonaparte preceded his entry into the capital of Egypt 
 by one of those lying bulletins which only imposed on 
 fools. "I will bring with me," said he, "many prisoners 
 and flags. I have razed the palace of the Djezzar and 
 the ramparts of Acre not a stone remains upon another. 
 All the inhabitants have left the city by sea. Djezzar is 
 severely wounded." 
 
 I confess that I experienced a painful sensation in writ- 
 ing, by his dictation, these official words, everyone of 
 which was an imposition. Excited by all I had just wit- 
 nessed, it was difficult for me to refrain from making 
 some observation ; but his constant reply was, " My dear 
 fellow, you are a simpleton : you do not understand this 
 business." And he observed, when signing the bulletin, 
 that he would yet fill the world with admiration, and in- 
 spire historians and poets. 
 
 Our return to Cairo has been attributed to the insur- 
 rections which broke out during the unfortunate expedi- 
 tion into Syria. Nothing is more incorrect. The term 
 insurrection cannot be properly applied to the foolish en- 
 terprises of the angel El-Mahdi in the Bohahire'h, or to 
 the less important disturbances in the Charkyeh. The 
 reverses experienced before St. Jean d'Acre, the fear, or 
 rather the prudent anticipation of a hostile landing, were 
 sufficient motives, and the only ones, for our return to 
 Egypt. What more could we do in Syria but lose men 
 and time, neither of which the General had to spare ?
 
 1799. 391 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 1799. 
 
 Marat and Mourad Bey at the Natron Lakes Bonaparte's departure for 
 the Pyramids Sudden appearance of an Arab messenger News of 
 the landing of the Turks at Aboukir Bonaparte marches against 
 them They are immediately attacked and destroyed in the battle of 
 Aboukir Interchange of communication with the English Sudden 
 determination to return to Europe Outfit of two frigates Bona- 
 parte's dissimulation His pretended journey to the Delta Generous 
 behaviour of Lanusse Bonaparte's artifice His bad treatment of 
 General Kleber. 
 
 BONAPAETK had hardly set foot in Cairo when he was in- 
 formed that the brave and indefatigable Mourad Bey was 
 descending by the Fayoum, in order to form a junction 
 with reinforcements which had been for some time past 
 collected in the Bohahire'h. In all probability this move- 
 ment of Mourad Bey was the result of news he had re- 
 ceived respecting plans formed at Constantinople, and the 
 landing which took place a short time after in the roads of 
 Aboukir. Mourad had selected the Natron Lakes for his 
 place of rendezvous. To these lakes Murat was despatched. 
 The Bey no sooner got notice of Murat's presence than he 
 determined to retreat and to proceed by the desert to 
 Gizeh and the great Pyramids. I certainly never heard, 
 until I returned to France, that Mourad had ascended to 
 the summit of the great Pyramid for the purpose of pass- 
 ing his time in contemplating Cairo ! 
 
 Napoleon said at St. Helena that Murat might have 
 taken Mourad Bey had the latter remained four-and-twenty 
 hours longer in the Natron Lakes. Now the fact is, that
 
 222 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 as soon as the Bey heard of Murat's arrival he was off. The 
 Arabian spies were far more serviceable to our enemies 
 than to us ; we had not, indeed, a single friend in Egypt. 
 Mourad Bey, on being informed by the Arabs, who acted 
 as couriers for him, that General Desaix was despatching 
 a column from the south of Egypt against him, that the 
 General-in-Chief was also about to follow his footsteps 
 along the frontier of Gizeh, and that the Natron Lakes 
 and the Bohahire'h were occupied by forces superior to 
 his own, retired into Fayoum. 
 
 Bonaparte attached great importance to the destruction 
 of Mourad, whom he looked upon as the bravest, the most 
 active, and most dangerous of his enemies in Egypt. As 
 all accounts concurred in stating that Mourad, supported 
 by the Arabs, was hovering about the skirts of the desert 
 of the province of Gizeh, Bonaparte proceeded to the 
 Pyramids, there to direct different corps against that able 
 and dangerous partisan. He, indeed, reckoned him so 
 redoubtable that he wrote to Murat, saying he wished 
 fortune might reserve for him the honour of putting the 
 seal on the conquest of Egypt by the destruction of this 
 opponent. 
 
 On the 14th of July Bonaparte left Cairo for the Pyra- 
 mids. He intended spending three or four days in ex- 
 amining the ruins of the ancient necropolis of Memphis ; 
 but he was suddenly obliged to alter his plan. This jour- 
 ney to the Pyramids, occasioned by the course of war, has 
 given an opportunity for the invention of a little piece of 
 romance. Some ingenious people have related that Bona- 
 parte gave audiences to the mufti and ulemas, and that on 
 entering one of the great Pyramids he cried out, "Glory 
 to Allah ! God only is God, and Mahomet is his prophet ! " 
 Now the fact is, that Bonaparte never even entered the 
 great Pyramid. He never had any thought of entering 
 it. I certainly should have accompanied him had he done 
 so, for I never quitted his side a single moment in the
 
 1799. BONAPARTE AT THE PYRAMIDS. 223 
 
 desert. He caused some persons to enter into one of the 
 great Pyramids while he remained outside, and received 
 from them, on their return, an account of what they had 
 seen. In other words, they informed him there was 
 nothing to be seen ! 
 
 On the evening of the 15th of July, while we were tak- 
 ing a walk, we perceived, on the road leading from 
 Alexandria, an Arab riding up to us in all haste. He 
 brought to the General-in-Chief a despatch from General 
 Marmont, who was entrusted with the command of Alex- 
 andria, and who had conducted himself so well, especially 
 during the dreadful ravages of the plague, that he had 
 gained the unqualified approbation of Bonaparte. The 
 Turks had landed on the llth of July at Aboukir under 
 the escort and protection of English ships of war. The 
 news of the landing of from fifteen to sixteen thousand 
 men did not surprise Bonaparte, who had for some time 
 expected it. It was not so, however, with the generals 
 most in his favour, whose apprehensions, for reasons which 
 may be conjectured, he had endeavoured to calm. He 
 had even written to Marmont, who, being in the most ex- 
 posed situation, had the more reason to be vigilant, in 
 these terms : 
 
 The army which was to have appeared before Alexandria, and 
 which left Constantinople on the 1st of the Kamadhan, has been 
 destroyed under the walls of Acre. If, however, that mad English- 
 man (Smith) has embarked the remains of that army in order to 
 convey them to Aboukir, I do not believe there can be more than 
 2000 men. 
 
 He wrote in the following strain to General Dugua, who 
 had the command of Cairo : 
 
 The English Commander, who has summoned Damietta, is a mad- 
 man. The combined army they speak of has been destroyed bef or 
 Acre, where it arrived a fortnight before we left that place .
 
 224 MEMOIRS Off NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 As soon as lie arrived at Cairo, in a letter lie despatched 
 to Desaix, he said : 
 
 The time has now arrived when disembarkations have become 
 practicable. I shall lose no time in getting ready. The probabili- 
 ties, however, are, that none will take place this year. 
 
 What other language could he hold, when he had pro- 
 claimed, immediately after the raising of the siege of Acre, 
 that he had destroyed those 15,000 men who two months 
 after landed at Aboukir ? 
 
 No sooner had Bonaparte perused the contents of Mar- 
 mont's letter than he retired into his tent and dictated to 
 me, until three in the morning, his orders for the depart- 
 ure of the troops, and for the routes he wished to be 
 pursued during his absence by the troops who should re- 
 main in the interior. At this moment I observed in him 
 the development of that vigorous character of mind which 
 was excited by obstacles until it overcame them, that 
 celerity of thought which foresaw everything. He was all 
 action, and never for a moment hesitated. On the 16th 
 of July, at four in the morning, he was on horseback and 
 the army in full march. I cannot help doing justice to 
 the presence of mind, promptitude of decision, and rapid- 
 ity of execution which at this period of his life never de- 
 serted him on great occasions. 
 
 We reached Ouardan, to the north of Gizeh, on the 
 evening of the 16th ; on the 19th we arrived at Rahma- 
 hanie'h, and on the 23d at Alexandria, where every prep- 
 aration was made for that memorable battle which, though 
 it did not repair the immense losses and fatal consequences 
 of the naval conflict of the same name, will always recall 
 to the memory of Frenchmen one of the most brilliant 
 achievements of their arms. 1 
 
 1 As M. de Bourrienne gives no details of the battle, the following extract from 
 the Duo de Rovigo's Memoirs, tome i. p. 167, will supply the deficiency : 
 
 " General Bonaparte left Cairo in the utmost haste to place himself at the head of
 
 1799. BATTLE OF ABOUKIR. 225 
 
 After the battle, which took place on the 25th of July, 
 Bonaparte sent a flag of truce on board the English 
 Admiral's ship. Our intercourse was full of politeness, 
 such as might be expected in the communications of the 
 people of two civilised nations. The English Admiral 
 gave the flag of truce some presents in exchange for some 
 we sent, and likewise a copy of the French Gazette of Frank- 
 fort, dated 10th of June 1799. For ten months we had re- 
 ceived no news from France. Bonaparte glanced over this 
 journal with an eagerness which may easily be conceived. 1 
 
 the troops which he had ordered to quit their cantonments and march down to the 
 coast 
 
 " Whilst the General was making these arrangements and coming in person from 
 Cairo, the troops on board the Turkish fleet had effected a landing and taken posses- 
 sion of the fort of Aboukir, and of a redoubt placed behind the village of that name 
 which ought to have been put into a state ot defence six months before, but had been 
 completely neglected. 
 
 "The Turks had nearly destroyed the weak garrisons that occupied those two mil- 
 itary points when General Marmont (who commanded at Alexandria) came to their 
 relief. This general, seeing the two posts in the power of the Turks, returned to 
 shut himself up in Alexandria, where he would probably have been blockaded by the 
 Turkish army had it not been for the arrival of General Bonaparte with his forces, 
 who was very angry when he saw that the fort and redoubt had been taken ; but he 
 did not blame Marmont for retreating to Alexandria with the forces at his disposal. 
 
 " General Bonaparte arrived at midnight with his guides and the remaining part 
 of his army, and ordered the Turks to be attacked the nextmorning. In this battle, 
 as in the preceding ones, the attack, the encounter, and the rout were occurrences of a 
 moment, and the result of a single movement on the part of our troops. The whole 
 Turkish army plunged into the sea to regain its ships, leaving behind them every- 
 thing they had brought on shore. 
 
 " Whilst this event was occurring on the seashore a pasha had left the field of 
 battle with a corps of about 3000 men in order to throw himself into the fort of 
 Abonkir. They soon felt the extremities of thirst, which compelled them, after the 
 lapse of a few days, to surrender unconditionally to General Menou, who was left to 
 close the operations connected with the recently defeated Turkish army." 
 
 1 The French, on their return from St. Jean d'Acre were totally ignorant of all that 
 had taken place in Europe for several months. Napoleon, eager to obtain intelligence, 
 Bent a flag of truce on board the Turkish admiral's ship, under the pretence of treat- 
 ing for the ransom of the prisoners taken at Aboukir, not doubting but the envoy 
 would be stopped by Sir Sidney Smith, who carefully prevented all direct communi- 
 cation between the French and the Turks. Accordingly the French flag of truce 
 received directions from Sir Sidney to go on board his ship. He experienced the 
 handsomest treatment ; and the English commander having, among other things, 
 ascertained that the disasters of Italy were quite unknown to Napoleon, indulged in 
 the malicious pleasure of sending him a file of newspapers. Napoleon spent the 
 whole night in his tent perusing the papers ; and he came to the determination of 
 immediately proceeding to Europe to repair the disasters of France ; and if possible, 
 to save her from destruction (Memorial de Sainte Hilene). 
 
 VOL. I. 15
 
 226 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 " Heavens ! " said he to me, " my presentiment is veri- 
 fied : the fools have lost Italy. All the fruits of our vic- 
 tories are gone ! I must leave Egypt ! " 
 
 He sent for Berthier, to whom he communicated the 
 news, adding that things were going on very badly in 
 France that he wished to return home that he (Berthier) 
 should go along with him, and that, for the present, only 
 he, Gantheaume, and I were in the secret. He recom- 
 mended Berthier to be prudent, not to betray any symp- 
 toms of joy, nor to purchase or sell anything, and concluded 
 by assuring him that he depended on him. " I can answer," 
 said he, "for myself and for Bourrienne." Berthier 
 promised to be secret, and he kept his word. He had 
 had enough of Egypt, and he so ardently longed to return to 
 France, that there was little reason to fear he would dis- 
 appoint himself by any indiscretion. 
 
 Gantheaume arrived, and Bonaparte gave him orders to 
 fit out the two frigates, the Muiron and the Carr&re, and 
 the two small vessels, the Revanche and the Fortune, with 
 a two months' supply of provisions for from four to five 
 hundred men. He enjoined his secrecy as to the object 
 of these preparations, and desired him to act with such 
 circumspection that the English cruisers might have no 
 knowledge of what was going on. He afterwards arranged 
 with Gantheaume the course he wished to take. No 
 details escaped his attention. 
 
 Bonaparte concealed his preparations with much care, 
 but still some vague rumours crept abroad. General 
 Dugua, the commandant of Cairo, whom he had just left 
 for the purpose of embarking, wrote to him on the 18th 
 of August to the following effect : 
 
 I have this moment heard that it is reported at the Institute you 
 are about to return to France, taking with you Monge, Berthollet, 
 Berthier, Lannes, and Murat. This news has spread like lightning 
 through the city, and I should not be at all surprised if it produce 
 an unfavourable effect, which, however, I hope you will obviate.
 
 1799. HOMEWARD BOUND. 227 
 
 Bonaparte embarked five days after the receipt of 
 Dugua's letter, and, as may be supposed, without replying 
 to it 
 
 On the 18th of August he wrote to the divan of Cairo as 
 follows : 
 
 I set out to-morrow for Menouf , whence I intend to make various 
 excursions in the Delta, in order that I may myself witness the acts 
 of oppression which are committed there, and acquire some know- 
 ledge of the people. 
 
 He told the army but half the truth : 
 
 The news from Europe (said he) has determined me to proceed 
 to France. I leave the command of the army to General Kleber. 
 The army shall hear from me forthwith. At present I can say no 
 more. It costs me much pain to quit troops to whom I am so 
 strongly attached. But my absence will be but temporary, and the 
 general I leave in command has the confidence of the Government 
 as well as mine. 
 
 I have now shown the true cause of General Bonaparte's 
 departure for Europe. This circumstance, in itself per- 
 fectly natural, has been the subject of the most ridiculous 
 conjectures to those who always wish to assign extra- 
 ordinary causes for simple events. There is no truth 
 whatever in the assertion of his having planned his de- 
 parture before the battle of Aboukir. Such an idea never 
 crossed his mind. He had no thought whatever of his de- 
 parture for France when he made the journey to the 
 Pyramids, nor even when he received the news of the 
 landing of the Anglo-Turkish force. 
 
 At the end of December 1798 Bonaparte thus wrote to 
 the Directory : " We are without any news from France. 
 No courier has arrived since the month of June." 
 
 Some writers have stated that we received news by the 
 way of Tunis, Algiers, or Morocco ; but there is no contra- 
 dicting a positive fact. At that period I had been with 
 Bonaparte more than two years, and during that time not
 
 228 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 a single despatch on any occasion arrived of the contents 
 of which I was ignorant. How then should the news 
 alluded to have escaped me ? 1 
 
 Almost all those who endeavour to avert from Bonaparte 
 the reproach of desertion quote a letter from the Directory, 
 dated the 26th of May 1799. This letter may certainly 
 have been written, but it never reached its destination. 
 Why then should it be put upon record ? 
 
 The circumstance I have stated above determined the 
 resolution of Bonaparte, and made him look upon Egypt 
 as an exhausted field of glory, which it was high time he 
 had quitted, to play another part in France. On his de- 
 parture from Europe Bonaparte felt that his reputation 
 was tottering. He wished to do something to raise up his 
 glory, and to fix upon him the attention of the world. 
 This object he had in great part accomplished ; for, in 
 spite of serious disasters, the French flag waved over the 
 cataracts of the Nile and the ruins of Memphis, and the 
 
 1 Details on the question of the correspondence of Napoleon with France while he 
 was in Egypt will be found in Colonel lung's work, Lucten Bonaparte (Paris, Char- 
 pentier, 1882), tome i. pp. 251-274. It seems most probable that Napoleon was in 
 occasional communication with his family and with some of the Directors by way of 
 Tunis and Tripoli. It would not be his interest to let his army or perhaps even 
 Bourrienne know of the disasters in Italy till he found that they were sure to hear 
 of them through the English. This would explain his affected ignorance till such a 
 late date. On the llth of April Barras received a despatch by which Napoleon stated 
 his intention of returning to France if the news brought by Hamelin was confirmed. 
 On the 26th of May 1799 three of the Directors, Barras, Rewbell, and La Rev6illere- 
 Lepeaux, wrote to Napoleon that Admiral Bruix had been ordered to attempt every 
 means of bringing back his army. On the 15th of July Napoleon seems to have 
 received this and other letters. On the 20th of July he warns Admiral Gantheaume 
 to be ready to start. On the llth of September the Directors formally approved the 
 recall of the army from Egypt. Thus at the title Napoleon landed in France (on the 
 8th October), his intended return had been long known to and approved by the 
 majority of the Directors, and had at last been formally ordered by the Directory. At 
 the most he anticipated the order. He cannot be said to have deserted his post. 
 Lanfrey (tome i. p. 411) remarks that the existence and receipt of the letter from 
 Joseph denied by Bourrienne is proved by Miot (the commissary, the brother of 
 Miot de Melito) and by Joseph himself. Talleyrand thanks the French Consul at 
 Tripoli for sending news from Egypt, and for letting Bonaparte know what passed in 
 Europe. See also Baguse (Mannont), tome i. p. 441, writing on 24th December 
 1798 : " I have found an Arab of whom I am sure, and who shall start to-morrow 
 for Dane. . . . This means can be used to send a letter to Tripoli, for boats 
 often go there."
 
 1799. DISSIMULATION OP BONAPARTE. 229 
 
 battles of the Pyramids and Aboukir were calculated in 
 no small degree to dazzle the imagination. Cairo and 
 Alexandria too were ours. Finding that the glory of his 
 arms no longer supported the feeble power of the Directory, 
 he was anxious to see whether he could not share it, or 
 appropriate it to himself. 
 
 A great deal has been said about letters and secret com- 
 munications from the Directory, but Bonaparte needed no 
 such thing. He could do what he pleased : there was no 
 power to check him ; such had been the nature of his 
 arrangements on leaving France. He followed only the 
 dictates of his own will, and probably, had not the fleet 
 been destroyed, he would have departed from Egypt much 
 sooner. To will and to do were with him one and the same 
 thing. The latitude he enjoyed was the result of his ver- 
 bal agreement with the Directory, whose instructions and 
 plans he did not wish should impede his operations. 
 
 Bonaparte left Alexandria on the 5th of August, and on 
 the 10th arrived at Cairo. He at first circulated the re- 
 port of a journey to Upper Egypt. This seemed so much 
 the more reasonable, as he had really entertained that de- 
 sign before he went to the Pyramids, and the fact was 
 known to the army and the inhabitants of Cairo. Up to 
 this time our secret had been studiously kept. However, 
 General Lanusse, the commandant at Menouf, where we 
 arrived on the 20th of August, suspected it. "You are 
 going to France," said he to me. My negative reply con- 
 firmed his suspicion. This almost induced me to believe 
 the General-in-Chief had been the first to make the dis- 
 closure. General Lanusse, though he envied our good 
 fortune, made no complaints. He expressed his sincere 
 wishes for our prosperous voyage, but never opened his 
 mouth on the subject to any one. 
 
 On the 21st of August we reached the wells of Birkett. 
 The Arabs had rendered the water unfit for use, but the 
 General-in-Chief was resolved to quench his thirst, and for
 
 230 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 this purpose squeezed the juice of several lemons into a 
 glass of the water ; but he could not swallow it without 
 holding his nose and exhibiting strong feelings of disgust. 
 
 The next day we reached Alexandria, where the General 
 informed all those, who had accompanied him from Cairo 
 that France was their destination. At this announcement 
 joy was pictured in every countenance. 
 
 General Kleber, to whose command Bonaparte had re- 
 signed the army, was invited to come from Damietta to 
 Rosetta to confer with the General-in-Chief on affairs of 
 extreme importance. Bonaparte, in making an appoint- 
 ment which he never intended to keep, hoped to escape 
 the unwelcome freedom of Kleber's reproaches. He after- 
 wards wrote to him all he had to say ; and the cause he 
 assigned for not keeping his appointment was, that his 
 fear of being observed by the English cruisers had forced 
 him to depart three days earlier than he intended. But 
 when he wrote Bonaparte well knew that he would be at 
 sea before Kleber could receive his letter. Kleber, in his 
 letter to the Directory, complained bitterly of this decep- 
 tion. The singular fate that befell this letter will be 
 seen by and by.
 
 1790. 331 
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 1799. 
 
 Our departure from "Egypt Nocturnal embarkation M. Parseval Grand- 
 maison Our course Adverse winds Fear of the English Favour- 
 able weather Vingt-et-un Chess We land at Ajaccio Bonaparte's 
 pretended relations Family domains Want of money Battle of Novi 
 Death of Joubert Visionary schemes Purchase of a boat Depart- 
 ure from Corsica The English squadron Our escape The roads of 
 Frejus Our landing in France The plague or the Austrians Joy of 
 the people The sanitary laws Bonaparte falsely accused. 
 
 WE were now to return to our country again to cross 
 the sea, to us so pregnant with danger Caesar and his for- 
 tune were once more to embark. But Csesar was not now 
 advancing to the East to add Egypt to the conquests of 
 the Republic. He was revolving in his mind vast schemes, 
 unawed by the idea of venturing everything to change in 
 his own favour the Government for which he had fought. 
 The hope of conquering the most celebrated country of the 
 East no longer excited the imagination, as on our depart- 
 ure from France. Our last visionary dream had vanished 
 before the walls of St. Jean d'Acre, and we were leaving 
 on the burning sands of Egypt most of our companions in 
 arms. An inconceivable destiny seemed to urge us on, 
 and we were obliged to obey its decrees. 
 
 On the 23d of August 1 we embarked on board two 
 frigates, the Muiron* and Carrdre. Our number was 
 between four and five hundred. Such was our squadron, 
 and such the formidable army with which Bonaparte had 
 resolved, as he wrote to the divan of Cairo, " to annihilate 
 
 1 It was neither in June nor July, as stated by the Due de Rovigo. Bourrienne, 
 9 Named after Bonaparte's aide de camp killed ia the Italian campaign.
 
 232 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 all his enemies." This boasting might impose on those 
 who did not see the real state of things ; but what were 
 we to think of it ? What Bonaparte himself thought the 
 day after. 
 
 The night was dark when we embarked in the frigates 
 which lay at a considerable distance from the port of 
 Alexandria ; but by the faint light of the stars we per- 
 ceived a corvette, which appeared to be observing our 
 silent nocturnal embarkation. 1 
 
 Next morning, just as we were on the point of setting 
 sail, we saw coming from the port of Alexandria a boat, 
 on board of which was M. Parseval Grandmaison. This 
 excellent man, who was beloved by all of us, was not in- 
 cluded among the persons whose return to France had 
 been determined by the General-in-Chief. In his anxiety 
 to get off Bonaparte would not hear of taking him on 
 board. It will readily be conceived how urgent were the 
 entreaties of Parseval ; but he would have sued in vain 
 had not Gantheaume, Monge, Berthollet, and I interceded 
 for him. With some difficulty we overcame Bonaparte's 
 resistance, and our colleague of the Egyptian Institute got 
 on board after the wind had filled our sails. 
 
 It has been erroneously said that Admiral Gantheaume 
 had full control of the frigates, as if any one could com- 
 mand when Bonaparte was present. On the contrary, 
 Bonaparte declared to the admiral, in my hearing, that he 
 would not take the ordinary course and get into the open 
 
 1 The horses of the escort had been left to run loose on the beach, and all was 
 perfect stillness in Alexandria, when the advanced posts of the town were alarmed 
 by the wild galloping of horses, which from a natural instinct, were returning to 
 Alexandria through the desert. The picket ran to arms on seeing horses ready 
 saddled and bridled, which were soon discovered to belong to the regiment of guides. 
 They at first thought that a misfortune had happened to some detachment in its 
 pursuit of the Arabs. With these horses came also those of the generals who had 
 embarked with General Bonaparte ; so that Alexandria was for a time In con- 
 siderable alarm. The cavalry was ordered to proceed in all haste in the direction 
 whence the horses came, and every one was giving himself up to the most gloomy con- 
 jectures, when the cavalry returned to the city with the Turkish groom, who was 
 bringing back General Bonaparte's horse to Alexandria (Memoirs of the Due dt 
 Rovigo, tome i. p. 182).
 
 1799. BONAPARTE 1 8 DREAD OF THE ENGLISH. 233 
 
 sea. " Keep close along the coast of the Mediterranean," 
 said he, " on the African side, until you get south of Sar- 
 dinia. I have here a handful of brave fellows and a few 
 pieces of artillery ; if the English should appear I will run 
 ashore, and with my party make my way by land to Oran, 
 Tunis, or some other port, whence we may find an oppor- 
 tunity of getting home." This was his irrevocable de- 
 termination. 
 
 For twenty-one days adverse winds, blowing from west 
 or north-west, drove us continually on the coast of Syria, 
 or in the direction of Alexandria. At one time it was 
 even proposed that we should again put into the port ; 
 but Bonaparte declared he would rather brave every dan- 
 ger than do so. During the day we tacked to a certain 
 distance northward, and in the evening we stood towards 
 Africa until we came within sight of the coast. Finally, 
 after no less than twenty-one days of impatience and dis- 
 appointment, a favourable east wind carried us past that 
 point of Africa on which Carthage formerly stood, and 
 we soon doubled Sardinia. We kept very near the west- 
 ern coast of that island, where Bonaparte had determined 
 to land in case of our falling in with the English squadron. 
 From thence his plan was to reach Corsica, and there to 
 await a favourable opportunity of returning to France. 
 
 Everything had contributed to render our voyage dull 
 and monotonous ; and, besides, we were not entirely with- 
 out uneasiness as to the steps which might be taken by 
 the Directory, for it was certain that the publication of 
 the intercepted correspondence must have occasioned 
 many unpleasant disclosures. Bonaparte used often to 
 walk on deck to superintend the execution of his orders. 
 The smallest sail that appeared in view excited his alarm. 
 The fear of falling into the hands of the English never for- 
 sook him. That was what he dreaded most of all, and 
 yet, at a subsequent period, he trusted to the generosity 
 of his enemies.
 
 234 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 
 
 However, in spite of our well-founded alarm, there were 
 some moments in which we sought to amuse ourselves, or, 
 to use a common expression, to kill time. Cards afforded 
 us a source of recreation, and even this frivolous amuse- 
 ment served to develop the character of Bonaparte. In 
 general he was not fond of cards ; but if he did play, 
 vingt-et-un was his favourite game, because it is more 
 rapid than many others, and because, in short, it afforded 
 him an opportunity of cheating. For example, he would 
 ask for a card ; if it proved a bad one he would say noth- 
 ing, but lay it down on the table and wait till the dealer 
 had drawn his. If the dealer produced a good card, then 
 Bonaparte would throw aside his hand, without showing it, 
 and give up his stake. If, on the contrary, the dealer's 
 card made him exceed twenty-one, Bonaparte also threw 
 his cards aside without showing them, and asked for the 
 payment of his stake. He was much diverted by these 
 little tricks, especially when they were played off unde- 
 tected; and I confess that even then we were courtiers 
 enough to humour him, and wink at his cheating. I 
 must, however, mention that he never appropriated to 
 himself the fruit of these little dishonesties, for at the 
 end of the game he gave up all his winnings, and they 
 were equally divided. Gain, as may readily be supposed, 
 was not his object ; but he always expected that fortune 
 would grant him an ace or a ten at the right moment 
 with the same confidence with which he looked for fine 
 weather on the day of battle. If he were disappointed he 
 wished nobody to know it. 
 
 Bonaparte also played at chess, but very seldom, because 
 he was only a third-rate player, and he did not like to be 
 beaten at that game, which, I know not why, is said to 
 bear a resemblance to the grand game of war. At this 
 latter game Bonaparte certainly feared no adversary. 
 This reminds me that when we were leaving Passeriano 
 he announced his intention of passing through Mantua.
 
 1799. RECEPTION AT A JAG CIO. 885 
 
 He was told that the commandant of that town, I believe 
 General Beauvoir, was a great chess-player, and he ex- 
 pressed a wish to play a game with him. General Beau- 
 voir asked him to point out any particular pawn with 
 which he would be checkmated ; adding, that if the pawn 
 were taken, he, Bonaparte, should be declared the winner. 
 Bonaparte pointed out the last pawn on the left of his 
 adversary. A mark was put upon it, and it turned out 
 that he actually was checkmated with that very pawn. 
 Bonaparte was not very well pleased at this. He liked to 
 play with me because, though rather a better player than 
 himself, I was not always able to beat him. As soon as a 
 game was decided in his favour he declined playing any 
 longer, preferring to rest on his laurels. 
 
 The favourable wind which had constantly prevailed 
 after the first twenty days of our voyage still continued 
 while we kept along the coast of Sardinia ; but after we 
 had passed that island the wind again blew violently from 
 the west, and on the 1st of October we were forced to 
 enter the Gulf of Ajaccio. We sailed again next day ; 
 but we found it impossible to work our way out of the 
 gulf. We were therefore obliged to put into the port and 
 land at Ajaccio. Adverse winds obliged us to remain 
 there until the 7th of October. It may readily be 
 imagined how much this delay annoyed Bonaparte. He 
 sometimes expressed his impatience, as if he could en- 
 force the obedience of the elements as well as of men. 
 He was losing time, and time was everything to him. 
 
 There was one circumstance which seemed to annoy him 
 as much as any of his more serious vexations. " What 
 will become of me," said he, "if the English, who are 
 cruising hereabout, should learn that I have landed in 
 Corsica ? I shall be forced to stay here. That I could 
 never endure. I have a torrent of relations pouring upon 
 me." His great reputation had certainly prodigiously 
 augmented the number of his family. He \vas over-
 
 236 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 whelmed with visits, congratulations, and requests. The 
 whole town was in a commotion. Every one of its in- 
 habitants wished to claim him as their cousin ; and from 
 the prodigious number of his pretended godsons and god- 
 daughters, it might have been supposed that he had held 
 one-fourth of the children of Ajaccio at the baptismal font. 
 
 Bonaparte frequently walked with us in the neighbour- 
 hood of Ajaccio ; and when in all the plenitude of his 
 power he did not count his crowns with greater pleasure 
 than he evinced in pointing out to us the little domains of 
 his ancestors. 
 
 While we were at Ajaccio M. Fesch * gave Bonaparte 
 French money in exchange for a number of Turkish 
 sequins, amounting in value to 17,000 francs. This sum 
 was all that the General brought with him from Egypt. I 
 mention this fact because he was unjustly calumniated in 
 letters written after his departure, and which were inter- 
 cepted and published by the English. I ought also to add, 
 that as he would never for his own private use resort to 
 the money-chest of the army, the contents of which were, 
 indeed, never half sufficient to defray the necessary ex- 
 penses, he several times drew on Genoa, through M. 
 James, and on the funds he possessed in the house of 
 Clary, 15,000, 25,000, and up to 33,000 francs. 2 I can 
 bear witness that in Egypt I never saw him touch any 
 money beyond his pay ; and that he left the country 
 poorer than he had entered it is a fact that cannot be 
 denied. In his notes on Egypt it appears that in one year 
 12,600,000 francs were received. In this sum were in- 
 
 1 Joseph Fesch (1763-1839), son of Napoleon's maternal grandmother by her 
 second marriage with Captain Francis Fesch, Archdeacon, 1792, Commissary in War 
 Department, 1793 ; re-entered clerical orders, 1799 ; Bishop, 1802 ; Archbishop of 
 Lyons, 1802 ; Cardinal, 1803 ; Grand Almoner under the Empire ; nominated Arch- 
 bishop of Paris, but never held that see ; Coadjutor to Archbishop of Ratisbon 
 (Prince Primate), 1806 ; retired to Rome, 1816. 
 
 a Joseph Bonaparte says that his brother had no funds with the house of Clary 
 (Erreurx, tome i. p. 248). It will be remembered that Joseph had married a 
 daughter of M. Clary.
 
 1799. VISIONARY SCHEMES. 237 
 
 eluded at least 2,000,000 of contributions, which wer 
 levied at the expense of many decapitations. Bonaparte 
 was fourteen months in Egypt, and he is said to have 
 brought away with him 20,000,000. Calumny may be 
 very gratifying to certain persons, but they should at least 
 give it a colouring of probability. The fact is, that Bona- 
 parte had scarcely enough to maintain himself at Ajaccio 
 and to defray our posting expenses to Paris. 
 
 On our arrival at Ajaccio we learnt the death of Joubert, 
 and the loss of the battle of Novi, which was fought on 
 the 15th of August. Bonaparte was tormented by 
 anxiety ; he was in a state of utter uncertainty as to the 
 future. From the time we left Alexandria till our arrival 
 in Corsica he had frequently talked of what he should do 
 during the quarantine, which he supposed he would be 
 required to observe on reaching Toulon, the port at which 
 he had determined to land. 
 
 Even then he cherished some illusions respecting the 
 state of affairs ; and he often said to me, " But for that 
 confounded quarantine, I would hasten ashore, and place 
 myself at the head of the army of Italy. All is not over ; 
 and I am sure that there is not a general who would re- 
 fuse me the command. The news of a victory gained by 
 me would reach Paris as soon as the battle of Aboukir ; 
 that, indeed, would be excellent." 
 
 In Corsica his language was very different. When he 
 was informed of our reverses, and saw the full extent of 
 the evil, he was for a moment overwhelmed. His grand 
 projects then gave way to the consideration of matters of 
 minor import, and he thought about his detention in the 
 Lazaretto of Toulon. He spoke of the Directory, of in- 
 trigues, and of what would be said of him. He accounted 
 his enemies those who envied him, and those who could 
 not be reconciled to his glory and the influence of his 
 name. Amidst all these anxieties Bonaparte was out- 
 wardly calm, though he was moody and rflctirt .
 
 238 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Providing against every chance of danger, he had pur- 
 chased at Ajaccio a large launch which was intended to 
 be towed by the Muiron, and it was manned by twelve of 
 the best sailors the island could furnish. His resolution 
 was, in case of inevitable danger, to jump into this boat 
 and get ashore. This precaution had well-nigh proved 
 useful. ' 
 
 After leaving the Gulf of Ajaccio the voyage was pros- 
 perous and undisturbed for one day ; but on the second 
 day, just at sunset, an English squadron of fourteen sail 
 hove in sight. The English, having advantage of the 
 light, which we had in our faces, saw us better than we 
 could see them. They recognised our two frigates as 
 Venetian built ; but, luckily for us, night came on, for we 
 were not far apart. We saw the signals of the English 
 for a long time, and heard the report of the guns more 
 and more to our left, and we thought it was the intention 
 of the cruisers to intercept us on the south-east. Under 
 these circumstances Bonaparte had reason to thank for- 
 tune ; for it is very evident that had the English suspected 
 our two frigates of coming from the East and going to 
 France, they would have shut us out from land by running 
 between us and it, which to them was very easy. Prob- 
 ably they took us for a convoy of provisions going from 
 Toulon to Genoa ; and it was to this error and the dark- 
 ness that we were indebted for escaping with no worse 
 consequence than a fright. 2 
 
 1 Sir Walter Scott, at the commencement of his Life of Napoleon, says that 
 Bonaparte did not see his native city after 1793. Probably to avoid contradicting 
 himself, the Scottish historian observes that Bonaparte was near Ajaccio on his 
 return from Egypt. He spent eight days there. Bourrienne. 
 
 4 Here Bourrienne says in a note, " Where did Sir Walter Scott learn that we 
 were neither seen nor recognised ? We were not recognised, but certainly seen." 
 This IB corroborated by the testimony of the Due de Eovigo, who, in his Memoirs, 
 says, " I have met officers of the English navy who assured me that the two frigates 
 had been seen, but were considered by the Admiral to belong to his squadron, aa 
 they steered their course towards him ; and as he knew we had only one frigate in the 
 Mediterranean, and one in Toulon harbour, he was far from supposing that the 
 frigates which he had descried could have General Bonaparte on board " (Savary, 
 tome i. p. 226).
 
 1799. THE ENGLISH SQUADRON. 233 
 
 During the remainder of the night the utmost agitation 
 prevailed on board the Muiron. Gantheaume especially 
 was in a state of anxiety which it is impossible to de- 
 scribe, and which it was painful to witness : he was quite 
 beside himself, for a disaster appeared inevitable. He 
 proposed to return to Corsica. " No, no ! " replied Bona- 
 parte imperiously. " No ! Spread all sail ! Every man 
 at his post ! To the north-west ! To the north-west ! " 
 This order saved us ; and I am enabled to affirm that in 
 the midst of almost general alarm Bonaparte was solely 
 occupied in giving orders. The rapidity of his judgment 
 seemed to grow in the face of danger. The remembrance 
 of that night will never be effaced from my mind. The 
 hours lingered on ; and none of us could guess upon 
 what new dangers the morrow's sun would shine. 
 
 However, Bonaparte's resolution was taken : his orders 
 were given, his arrangements made. During the evening 
 he had resolved upon throwing himself into the long- 
 boat ; he had already fixed on the persons who were to 
 share his fate, and had already named to me the papers 
 which he thought it most important to save. Happily 
 our terrors were vain and our arrangements useless. By 
 the first rays of the sun we discovered the English fleet 
 sailing to the north-east, and we stood for the wished-for 
 coast of France. 
 
 The 8th of October, at eight in the morning, we entered 
 the roads of Frejus. The sailors not having recognised 
 the coast during the night, we did not know where we 
 were. There was, at first, some hesitation whether we 
 should advance. We were by no means expected, and did 
 not know how to answer the signals, which had been 
 changed during our absence. Some guns were even fired 
 upon us by the batteries on the coast ; but our bold entry 
 into the roads, the crowd upon the decks of the two 
 frigates, and our signs of joy, speedily banished all doubt 
 of our being friends. We were in the port, and approach-
 
 240 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 ing the landing-place, when the rumour spread that 
 Bonaparte was on board one of the frigates. In an 
 instant the sea was covered with boats. In vain we begged 
 them to keep at a distance ; we were carried ashore, and 
 when we told the crowd, both of men and women who 
 were pressing about us, the risk they ran, they all ex- 
 claimed, " We prefer the plague to the Austrians I " 
 
 What were our feelings when we again set foot on the 
 soil of France I will not attempt to describe. Our escape 
 from the dangers that threatened us seemed almost 
 miraculous. We had lost twenty days at the beginning of 
 our voyage, and at its close we had been almost taken by 
 au English squadron. Under these circumstances, how 
 rapturously we inhaled the balmy air of Provence ! 
 Such was our joy, that we were scarcely sensible of the 
 disheartening news which arrived from all quarters. At 
 the first moment of our arrival, by a spontaneous impulse, 
 we all repeated, with tears in our eyes, the beautiful lines 
 which Voltaire has put into the mouth of the exile of 
 Sicily. 
 
 Bonaparte has been reproached with having violated the 
 sanitary laws ; but, after what I have already stated re- 
 specting his intentions, I presume there can remain no 
 doubt of the falsehood of this accusation. All the blame 
 must rest with the inhabitants of Frejus, who on this oc- 
 casion found the law of necessity more imperious than the 
 sanitary laws. Yet when it is considered that four or five 
 hundred persons, and a quantity of effects, were landed 
 from Alexandria, where the plague had been raging during 
 the summer, it is almost a miracle that France, and indeed 
 Europe, escaped the scourge,
 
 1799. 241 
 
 CH1PTEB Y1TT. 
 1799. 
 
 Effect produced by Bonaparte's return His justification Melancholy 
 letter to my wife Bonaparte's intended dinner at Sens Louis Bona- 
 parte and Josephine He changes his intended route Melancholy 
 situation of the provinces Necessity of a change Bonaparte's am- 
 bitious views Influence of popular applause Arrival in Paris His 
 reception of Josephine Their reconciliation Bonaparte's visit to the 
 Directory His contemptuous treatment of Sieyes. 
 
 THE effect produced in France and throughout Europe by 
 the mere intelligence of Bonaparte's return is well known. 
 I shall not yet speak of the vast train of consequences 
 which that event entailed. I must, however, notice some 
 accusations which were brought against him from the 
 time of our landing to the 9th of November. He was re- 
 proached for having left Egypt, and it was alleged that 
 his departure was the result of long premeditation. But 
 I, who was constantly with him, am enabled positively to 
 affirm that his return to France was merely the effect of a 
 sudden resolution. Of this the following fact is in itself 
 sufficient evidence. 
 
 While we were at Cairo, a few days before we heard of 
 the landing of the Anglo-Turkish fleet, and at the moment 
 when we were on the point of setting off to encamp at the 
 Pyramids, Bonaparte despatched a courier to France. I 
 took advantage of this opportunity to write to my wife. I 
 almost bade her an eternal adieu. My letter breathed ex- 
 pressions of grief such as I had not before evinced. I said, 
 among other things, that we knew not when or how it 
 would be possible for us to return to Franc*. If Bona- 
 VOL. I. II
 
 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 parte had then entertained any thought of a speedy return 
 I must have known it, and in that case I should not cer- 
 tainly have distressed my family by a desponding letter, 
 when I had not had an opportunity of writing for seven 
 months before. 
 
 Two days after the receipt of my letter my wife was 
 awoke very early in the morning to be informed of our 
 arrival in France. The courier who brought this intelli- 
 gence was the bearer of a second letter from me, which I 
 had written on board ship, and dated from Frejus. In this 
 letter I mentioned that Bonaparte would pass through 
 Sens and dine with my mother. 
 
 In fulfilment of my directions Madame de Bourrienne 
 set off for Paris at five in the morning. Having passed 
 the first post-house she met a berlin containing four trav- 
 ellers, among whom she recognised Louis Bonaparte go- 
 ing to meet the General on the Lyons road. On seeing 
 Madame de Bourrienne Louis desired the postillion to 
 stop, and asked her whether she had heard from me. She 
 informed him that we should pass through Sens, where the 
 General wished to dine with my mother, who had made 
 every preparation for receiving him. Louis then contin- 
 ued his journey. About nine o'clock my wife met another 
 berlin, in which were Madame Bonaparte and her daugh- 
 ter. As they were asleep, and both carriages were driv- 
 ing at a very rapid rate, Madame de Bourrienne did not 
 stop them. Josephine followed the route taken by Louis. 
 Both missed the General, who changed his mind at Lyons, 
 and proceeded by way of Bourbonnais. He arrived fifteen 
 hours after my wife ; and those who had taken the Bur- 
 gundy road proceeded to Lyons uselessly. 
 
 Determined to repair in all haste to Paris, Bonaparte 
 had left Frejus on the afternoon of the day of our landing. 
 He himself had despatched the courier to Sens to inform 
 my mother of his intended visit to her ; and it was not 
 until he got to Lyons that he determined to take the
 
 1799. CONDITION OF THE PROVINCES. 243 
 
 Bourbonnais road. His reason for doing so will presently 
 be seen. All along the road, at Aix, at Lyons, in every 
 town and village, he was received, as at Frejus, with the 
 most rapturous demonstrations of joy. 1 Only those who 
 witnessed his triumphal journey can form any notion of 
 it ; and it required no great discernment to foresee some- 
 thing like the 18th Brumaire. 
 
 The provinces, a prey to anarchy and civil war, were con- 
 tinually threatened with foreign invasion. Almost all the 
 south presented the melancholy spectacle of one vast arena 
 of conflicting factions. The nation groaned beneath the 
 yoke of tyrannical laws ; despotism was systematically es- 
 tablished ; the law of hostages struck a blow at personal 
 liberty, and forced loans menaced every man's property. 
 The generality of the citizens had declared themselves 
 against apentarchy devoid of power, justice, and morality, 
 and which had become the sport of faction and intrigue. 
 Disorder was general ; but in the provinces abuses were 
 felt more sensibly than elsewhere. In great cities it was 
 found more easy to elude the hand of despotism and op- 
 pression. 
 
 A change so earnestly wished for could not fail to be 
 realised, and to be received with transport. The majority 
 of the French people longed to be relieved from the situa- 
 tion in which they then stood. There were two dangers 
 to cope with anarchy and the Bourbons. Every one felt 
 the urgent and indispensable necessity of concentrating 
 the power of the Government in a single hand ; at the 
 same time maintaining those institutions which the spirit 
 of the age demanded, and which France, after having so 
 dearly purchased, was now about to lose. The country 
 looked for a man who was capable of restoring her to 
 
 1 From Frejus to Aix a crowd of men kindly escorted us, carrying torches along- 
 side the carriage of the General, not so much to show their enthusiasm as to ensure 
 our safety (Bourrienne). These brigands became so bad in France that at one time 
 soldiers were placed in the imperials of all the diligences, receiving from the wiU 
 the curiously anticipative name of " imperial armies."
 
 244 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 tranquillity ; but as yet no such man had appeared. A 
 soldier of fortune presented himself, covered with glory ; 
 he had planted the standard of France on the Capitol and 
 on the Pyramids. The whole world acknowledged his su- 
 perior talent ; his character, his courage, and his victories 
 had raised him to the very highest rank. His great works, 
 his gallant actions, his speeches, and his proclamations 
 ever since he had risen to eminence left no doubt of his 
 wish to secure happiness and freedom to France, his 
 adopted country. At that critical moment the necessity 
 of a temporary dictatorship, which sometimes secures the 
 safety of a state, banished all reflections on the conse- 
 quences of such a power, and nobody seemed to think 
 glory incompatible with personal liberty. All eyes were 
 therefore directed on the General, whose past conduct 
 guaranteed his capability of defending the Kepublic 
 abroad, and liberty at home, on the General whom his 
 flatterers, and indeed some of his sincere friends, styled, 
 " the hero of liberal ideas," the title to which he aspired. 
 
 Under every point of view, therefore, he was naturally 
 chosen as the chief of a generous nation, confiding to him 
 her destiny, in preference to a troop of mean and fanatical 
 hypocrites, who, under the names of republicanism and 
 liberty, had reduced France to the most abject slavery. 
 
 Among the schemes which Bonaparte was incessantly 
 revolving in his mind may undoubtedly be ranked the 
 project of attaining the head of the French Government ; 
 but it would be a mistake to suppose that on his return 
 from Egypt he had formed any fixed plan. There was 
 something vague in his ambitious aspirations ; and he was, 
 if I may so express myself, fond of building those im- 
 aginary edifices called castles in the air. The current of 
 events was in accordance with his wishes ; and it may 
 truly be said that the whole French nation smoothed for 
 Bonaparte the road which led to power. Certainly th 
 unanimous plaudits and universal joy which accompanied
 
 179. ARRIVAL IN PARIS. 245 
 
 him along a journey of more than 200 leagues must have 
 induced him to regard as a national mission that step 
 which was at first prompted merely by his wish of med- 
 dling with the affairs of the Republic. 
 
 This spontaneous burst of popular feeling, unordered 
 and unpaid for, loudly proclaimed the grievances of the 
 people, and their hope that the man of victory would be- 
 come their deliverer. The general enthusiasm excited by 
 the return of the conqueror of Egypt delighted him to a 
 degree which I cannot express, and was, as he has often 
 assured me, a powerful stimulus in urging him to the 
 object to which the wishes of France seemed to direct 
 him. 
 
 Among people of all classes and opinions an 18th 
 Brumaire was desired and expected. Many royalists even 
 believed that a change would prove favourable to the King. 
 So ready are we to persuade ourselves of the reality of 
 what we wish. 
 
 As soon as it was suspected that Bonaparte would accept 
 the power offered him, an outcry was raised about a con- 
 spiracy against the Republic, and measures were sought 
 for preserving it. But necessity, and indeed, it must be 
 confessed, the general feeling of the people, consigned the 
 execution of those measures to him who was to subvert 
 the Republic. On his return to Paris Bonaparte spoke 
 and acted like a man who felt his own power ; he cared 
 neither for flattery, dinners, nor balls, his mind took a 
 higher flight. 
 
 We arrived in Paris on the 24th Vendemiaire (the 16th 
 of October). As yet he knew nothing of what was going 
 on ; for he had seen neither his wife nor his brothers, 
 who were looking for him on the Burgundy road. The 
 news of our landing at Frejus had reached Paris by a 
 telegraphic despatch. Madame Bonaparte, who was din- 
 ing with M Gohier when that despatch was communicated 
 to him, as president of the Directory, immediately set off
 
 246 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 to meet her husband, well knowing how important it was 
 that her first interview with him should not be anticipated 
 by his brothers. 
 
 The imprudent communications of Junot at the foun- 
 tains of Messoudiah will be remembered ; but, after the 
 first ebullition of jealous rage, all traces of that feeling 
 had apparently disappeared. Bonaparte, however, was 
 still harassed by secret suspicion, and the painful impres- 
 sions produced by Junot were either not entirely effaced 
 or were revived after our arrival in Paris. We reached 
 the capital before Josephine returned. The recollection 
 of the past, the ill-natured reports of his brothers, 1 and 
 the exaggeration of facts had irritated Napoleon to the 
 very highest pitch, and he received Josephine with studied 
 coldness, and with an air of the most cruel indifference. 
 He had no communication with her for three days, during 
 which time he frequently spoke to me of suspicions which 
 his imagination converted into certainty ; and threats of 
 divorce escaped his lips with no less vehemence than when 
 we were on the confines of Syria. I took upon me the 
 office of conciliator, which I had before discharged with 
 success. I represented to him the dangers to be appre- 
 hended from the publicity and scandal of such an affair ; 
 and that the moment when his grand views might possibly 
 be realized was not the fit time to entertain France and 
 Europe with the details of a charge of adultery. I spoke 
 to him of Hortense and Eugene, to whom he was much 
 attached. Reflection, seconded by his ardent affection for 
 Josephine, brought about a complete reconciliation. 
 After these three days of conjugal misunderstanding 
 their happiness was never afterwards disturbed by a 
 similar cause. 8 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte remarks on this that Napoleon met Josephine at Paris 
 before his brothers arrived there. (Compare <?Abrant&s, vol. i. pp. 260-262, and 
 Jiemusat, tome i. pp. 147, 148.) 
 
 3 In speaking of the unexpected arrival of Bonaparte from Egypt, and of the 
 meeting between him and Josephine, Madame Junot says : 
 
 " On the 10th October Josephine set off to meet her husband, but without know-
 
 1799. VISIT TO THE DIRECTORY. 247 
 
 On the day after his arrival Bonaparte visited the Di- 
 rectors. 1 The interview was cold. On the 24th of Octo- 
 ber he said to me, " I dined yesterday at Gohier's ; Sieyes 
 was present, and I pretended not to see him. I observed 
 how much he was enraged at this mark of disrespect." 
 
 ing exactly what road he would take. She thought it likely he would come by way 
 of Burgundy, and therefore Louis and she set off for Lyons. 
 
 " Madame Bonaparte was a prey to great and well-founded uneasiness. Whether 
 she was guilty or only imprudent, ehe was strongly accused by the Bonapnrte family, 
 who were desirous that Napoleon should obtain a divorce. The elder M. de Cau- 
 laincourt stated to us his apprehensions on this point ; but whenever the subject 
 was introduced my mother changed the conversation, because, knowing as she did 
 the sentiments of the Bonaparte family, she could not reply without either commit- 
 ting them or having recourse to falsehood. She knew, moreover, the truth of many 
 circumstances which M. de Oaulaincourt seemed to doubt, and which her situation 
 with respect to Bonaparte prevented her from communicating to him. 
 
 " Madame Bonaparte committed a great fault in neglecting at this juncture to con- 
 ciliate her mother-in-law, who might have protected her against those who sought 
 her ruin, and effected it nine years later ; for the divorce in 1809 was brought about 
 by the joint efforts of all the members of the Bonaparte family, aided by some of 
 Napoleon's most confidential servants, whom Josephine, either as Madame Bona- 
 parte or as Empress, had done nothing to make her friends. 
 
 " Bonaparte, on his arrival in Paris, found his house deserted ; but his mother, 
 sisters, and sisters-in-law, and, in short, every member of his family, except Louie, 
 who had attended Madame Bonaparte to Lyons, came to him immediately. The im- 
 pression made upon him by the solitude of his home and its desertion by its mistress 
 was profound and terrible, and nine years afterwards, when the ties between him and 
 Josephine were severed for ever, he showed that it was not effaced. Prom not find- 
 ing her with his family he inferred that she felt herself unworthy of their presence, 
 and feared to meet the man she had wronged. He considered her journey to Lyons 
 as a mere pretence. 
 
 " M. de Bourrienne says that for some days after Josephine's return Bonaparte 
 treated her with extreme coldness. As he was an eye-witness, why does he not state 
 the whole truth, and say that on her return Bonaparte refused to see her and did not 
 tee her f It was to the earnest entreaties of her children that she owed the recovery, 
 not of her husband's love, for that had long ceased, but of that tenderness acquired 
 by habit, and that intimate intercourse which made her still retain the rank of con- 
 sort to the greatest man of his age. Bonaparte was at this period much attached to 
 Eugene Beauharnais, who, to do him justice, was a charming youth. He knew less 
 of Hortense ; but her youth and sweetness of temper, and the protection of which, 
 as his adopted daughter, she besought him not to deprive her, proved powerful ad- 
 vocates, and overcame his resistance. 
 
 " In this delicate negotiation it was good policy not to bring any other person into 
 play, whatever might be their influence with Bonaparte, and Madame Bonaparte did 
 not, therefore, have recourse either to Barras, Bourrienne, or Berthier. It was ex- 
 pedient that they who interceded for her should be able to say something without 
 the possibility of a reply. Now Bonaparte could not with any degree of propriety 
 
 1 The Directors at this time were Barras, Sieyes, Mouline, Gohier, and Roger 
 Ducos.
 
 248 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 "But are you sure he is against you ?" inquired I. "I 
 know nothing yet ; but he is a scheming man, and I don't 
 like him." Even at that time Bonaparte had thoughts of 
 getting himself elected a member of the Directory in the 
 room of Sieyes. 
 
 explain to such children as Engine or Hortense the particulars of their mother's con- 
 duct. He was therefore constrained to silence, and had no argument to combat the 
 tears of two innocent creatures at his feet exclaiming, ' Do not abandon our mother ; 
 she will break her heart 1 And ought injustice to take from us, poor orphans, whose 
 natural protector the scaffold has already deprived us of, the support of one whom 
 Providence has sent to replace him 1 " 
 
 " The scene, as Bonaparte has since stated, was long and painful, and the two chil- 
 dren at length introduced their mother, and placed her in his arms. The unhappy 
 woman had awaited his decision at the door of a small back staircase, extended at 
 almost full length upon the stairs, suffering the acutest pangs of mental torture. 
 
 " Whatever might be his wife's errors, Bonaparte appeared entirely to forget them, 
 and the reconciliation was complete. Of all the members of the family Madame 
 Leclerc was most vexed at the pardon which Napoleon had granted to his wife. Bo- 
 naparte's mother was also very ill pleased ; but she said nothing. Madame Joseph 
 Bonaparte, who was always very amiable, took no part in these family quarrels ; 
 therefor* she could easily determine what part to take when fortune smiled on Jo- 
 sephine. As to Madame Bacciocchi, she gave free vent to her ill-humour and dis- 
 dain ; the consequence was, that her sister-in-law could never endure her. Christine 
 who was a beautiful creature, followed the example of Madame Joseph, and Caroline 
 was so young that her opinion could have no weight in such an affair. As to Bona- 
 parte'* brothers, they were at open *ar with Josephine."
 
 1799. 249 
 
 CHAPTER XXDI. 
 1799. 
 
 Moreau and Bernadotte Bonaparte's opinion of Bernadotfce False re- 
 port The crown of Sweden and the Constitution of the year III. 
 Intrigues of Bonaparte's brothers Angry conversation between Bona- 
 parte and Bernadotte Bonaparte's version Josephine's version An 
 unexpected visit The Manege Club Salicetti and Joseph Bonaparte 
 Bonaparte invites himself to breakfast with Bernadotte Country 
 excursion Bernadotte dines with Bonaparte The plot and con- 
 spiracy Conduct of Lucien Dinner given to Bonaparte by the 
 Council of the Five Hundred Bonaparte's wish to be chosen a mem- 
 ber of the Directory His reconciliation with Sieyes Offer made by 
 the Directory to Bonaparte He is falsely accused by Barras. 
 
 To throw a clear light on the course of the great events 
 which will presently be developed it is necessary to state 
 briefly what intrigues had been hatched and what ambi- 
 tious hopes had risen up while we were in Egypt. When 
 in Egypt Bonaparte was entirely deprived of any means 
 of knowing what was going on in France ; and in our 
 rapid journey from Frejus to Paris we had no opportunity 
 of collecting much information. Yet it was very impor- 
 tant that we should know the real state of affairs, and the 
 sentiments of those whom Bonaparte had counted among 
 his rivals in glory, and whom he might now meet among 
 his rivals in ambition. 
 
 Moreau's military reputation stood very high, and Ber- 
 nadotte's firmness appeared inflexible. Generally speak- 
 ing, Bonaparte might have reckoned among his devoted 
 partisans the companions of his glory in Italy, and also 
 those whom he subsequently denominated "his Egyp- 
 tians." But brave men had distinguished themselves in
 
 250 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 the army of the Khine ; and if they did not withhold their 
 admiration from the conqueror of Italy, they felt at least 
 more personally interested in the admiration which they 
 lavished on him who had repaired the disaster of Scherer. 
 Besides, it must be borne in mind that a republican spirit 
 prevailed, almost without exception, in the army, and that 
 the Directory appeared to be a Government invented ex- 
 pressly to afford patronage to intriguers. All this planted 
 difficulties in our way, and rendered it indispensably nec- 
 essary that we should know our ground. We had, it is 
 true, been greeted by the fullest measure of popular en- 
 thusiasm on our arrival ; but this was not enough. We 
 wanted suffrages of a more solid kind. 
 
 During the campaign of Egypt Bernadotte, who was a 
 zealous republican, had been War Minister, 1 but he had 
 resigned the portfolio to Dubois-Crance three weeks be- 
 fore Bonaparte's return to France. Some partisans of the 
 old Minister were endeavouring to get him recalled, and 
 it was very important to Bonaparte's interests that he 
 should prevent the success of this design. I recollect that 
 on the second day of our arrival Bonaparte said to me, "I 
 have learned many things ; but we shall see what will 
 happen. Bernadotte is a singular man. When he was 
 War Minister Augereau, Salicetti, and some others in- 
 formed him that the Constitution was in danger, and that 
 it was necessary to get rid of Sieyes, Barras, and Fouche, 
 who were at the head of a plot. What did Bernadotte 
 do? Nothing. He asked for proofs. None could be 
 produced. He asked for powers. Who could grant them? 
 Nobody. He should have taken them ; but he would not 
 venture on that. He wavered. He said he could not 
 enter into the schemes which were proposed to him. He 
 only promised to be silent on condition that they were re- 
 
 Bernadotte was Minister of War from 2d July 1799 to 14th September 1799, when, 
 as he himself wrote to the Directory, they " accepted " the resignation he had not 
 offered.
 
 1799. BERNADOTTE AND MOREAU. 251 
 
 nounced. Bernadotte is not a help ; he is an obstacle. I 
 have heard from good authority that a great number of 
 influential persons wished to invest him with extensive 
 power for the public good ; but he was obstinate, and 
 would listen to nothing." 
 
 After a brief interval of silence, during which Bonaparte 
 rubbed his forehead with his right hand, he thus resumed : 
 "I believe I shall have Bernadotte and Moreau against me. 
 But I do not fear Moreau. He is devoid of energy. I 
 know he would prefer military to political power. The 
 promise of the command of an army would gain him over. 
 But Bernadotte has Moorish blood in his veins. He is 
 bold and enterprising. He is allied to my brothers. ' He 
 does not like me, and I am almost certain that he will op- 
 pose me. If he should become ambitious he will venture 
 anything. And yet, you recollect in what a lukewarm way 
 he acted on the 18th Fructidor, when I sent him to second 
 Augereau. This devil of a fellow is not to be seduced. He 
 is disinterested and clever. But, after all, we have but 
 just arrived, and know not what may happen." 
 
 Bernadotte, it was reported, had advised that Bonaparte 
 should be brought to a court-martial, on the twofold 
 charge of having abandoned his army and violated the 
 quarantine laws. This report came to the ears of Bona- 
 parte ; but he refused to believe it and he was right. 
 Bernadotte thought himself bound to the Constitution 
 which he had sworn to defend. Hence the opposition he 
 manifested to the measures of the 18th Brumaire. But 
 he cherished no personal animosity against Bonaparte as 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte and Bernadotte had married sisters, Marie-Julie and Eug6nio 
 Bernardine-Desiroe Clary. The feeling of Bourrienne for Bernadotte makes this 
 passage doubtful. It is to be noticed that in the same conversation he makes Napo- 
 leon describe Bernadotte as not venturing to act without powers and as enterpris- 
 ing. The stern republican becoming Prince de Monte Corvo and King of Sweden, in 
 a way compatible with his fidelity to the Constitution of the year III., is good. 
 Lanfrey attributes Bernadotte's refusal to join more to rivalry than to principle 
 (Lanfrev, tome i. p. 440). But in any case Napoleon did not dread Bernadotte, and 
 was soon threatenimg to shoot him ; see Lucien, tome ii. p. 107.
 
 253 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 long as he was ignorant of his ambitious designs. The 
 extraordinary and complicated nature of subsequent events 
 rendered his possession of the crown of Sweden in no way 
 incompatible with his fidelity to the Constitution of the 
 year m. 
 
 On our first arrival in Paris, though I was almost con- 
 stantly with the General, yet, as our routine of occupa- 
 tion was not yet settled, I was enabled now and then to 
 snatch an hour or two from business. This leisure time I 
 spent in the society of my family and a few friends, and 
 in collecting information as to what had happened during 
 our absence, for which purpose I consulted old news- 
 papers and pamphlets. I was not surprised to learn that 
 Bonaparte's brothers that is to say, Joseph and Lucien 
 had been engaged in many intrigues. I was told that 
 Sieyes had for a moment thought of calling the Duke of 
 Brunswick to the head of the Government ; that Barraa 
 would not have been very averse to favouring the return 
 of the Bourbons ; and that Moulins, Roger Ducos, and 
 Gohier alone believed or affected to believe, in the pos- 
 sibility of preserving the existing form of government. 
 From what I heard at the time I have good reasons for 
 believing that Joseph and Lucien made all sorts of en- 
 deavours to inveigle Bernadotte into their brother's party, 
 and in the hope of accomplishing that object they had 
 assisted in getting him appointed War Minister. How- 
 ever, I cannot vouch for the truth of this. I was told that 
 Bernadotte had at first submitted to the influence of Bona- 
 parte's two brothers ; but that their urgent interference 
 in their client's behalf induced him to shake them off, 
 to proceed freely in the exercise of his duties, and to 
 open the eyes of the Directory on what the Republic 
 might have to apprehend from the enterprising character 
 of Bonaparte. It is certain that what I have to relate re- 
 specting the conduct of Bernadotte to Bonaparte is calcu- 
 lated to give credit to these assertions.
 
 1799. DISPUTES WITH BERNADOTTE. 253 
 
 All the generals who were in Paris, with the exception 
 of Bernadotte, had visited Bonaparte during the first three 
 days which succeeded his arrival. Bernadotte's absence 
 was the more remarkable because he had served under 
 Bonaparte in Italy. It was not until a fortnight had 
 elapsed, and then only on the reiterated entreaties of 
 Joseph and Madame Joseph Bonaparte (his sister-in-law), 
 that he determined to go and see his old General-in-Chief. 
 I was not present at their interview, being at that moment 
 occupied in the little cabinet of the Rue Chantereine. 
 But I soon discovered that their conversation had been 
 long and warm ; for as soon as it was ended Bonaparte 
 entered the cabinet exceedingly agitated, and said to me, 
 " Bourrienne, how do you think Bernadotte has behaved ? 
 You have traversed France with me you witnessed the 
 enthusiasm which my return excited you yourself told 
 me that you saw in that enthusiasm the desire of the 
 French people to be relieved from the disastrous position 
 in which our reverses have placed them. Well ! would 
 you believe it ? Bernadotte boasts, with ridiculous exag- 
 geration, of the brilliant and victorious situation of France ! 
 He talks about the defeat of the Eussians, the occupation 
 of Genoa, the innumerable armies that are rising up 
 everywhere. In short, I know not what nonsense he has 
 got in his head." "What can all this mean?" said L 
 "Did he speak about Egypt?" " Oh, yes! Now you re- 
 mind me. He actually reproached me for not having 
 brought the army back with me ! ' But,' observed I, 
 ' have you not just told me that you are absolutely over- 
 run with troops ; that all your frontiers are secure, that 
 immense levies are going on, and that you will have 200,- 
 000 infantry ? If this be true, what do you want with a 
 few thousand men who may ensure the preservation of 
 Egypt ? ' He could make no answer to this. But he is 
 quite elated by the honour of having been War Minister ; 
 and he told me boldly that he looked upon the army of
 
 254 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Egypt as lost. Nay, more. He made insinuations. He 
 spoke of enemies abroad and enemies at home ; and as he 
 uttered these last words he looked significantly at me. I 
 too gave him a glance ! But stay a little. The pear will 
 soon be ripe ! You know Josephine's grace and address. 
 She was present. The scrutinising glance of Bernadotte 
 did not escape her, and she adroitly turned the conversa- 
 tion. Bernadotte saw from my countenance that I had 
 had enough of it, and he took his leave. But don't let me 
 interrupt you further. I am going back to speak to 
 Josephine." 
 
 I must confess that this strange story made me very im- 
 patient to find myself alone with Madame Bonaparte, for 
 I wished to hear her account of the scene. An opportun- 
 ity occurred that very evening. I repeated to her what I 
 had heard from the General, and all that she told me 
 tended to confirm its accuracy. She added that Berna- 
 dotte seemed to take the utmost pains to exhibit to the 
 General a flattering picture of the prosperity of France ; 
 and she reported to me, as follows, that part of the con- 
 versation which was peculiarly calculated to irritate Bona- 
 parte : " ' I do not despair of the safety of the Kepublic, 
 which I am certain can restrain her enemies both abroad 
 and at home.' As Bernadotte uttered these last words," 
 continued Josephine, " his glance made me shudder. One 
 word more and Bonaparte could have commanded himself 
 no longer ! It is true," added she, " that it was in some 
 degree his own fault, for it was he who turned the con- 
 versation on politics ; and Bernadotte, in describing the 
 flourishing condition of France, was only replying to the 
 General, who had drawn a very opposite picture of the 
 state of things. You know, my dear Bourrienne, that 
 Bonaparte is not always very prudent. I fear he has said 
 too much to Bernadotte about the necessity of changes in 
 the Government." Josephine had not yet recovered from 
 the agitation into which this violent scene had thrown her.
 
 1799. A DIPLOMATIC VISIT. 255 
 
 After I took leave of her I made notes of what she had 
 told me. 
 
 A few days after, when Bonaparte, Josephine, Hortense, 
 Eugene, and I were together in the drawing-room, Berna- 
 dotte unexpectedly entered. His appearance, after what 
 had passed, was calculated to surprise us. He was ac- 
 companied by a person whom he requested permission to 
 introduce to Bonaparte. I have forgotten his name, but 
 he was, I think, secretary-general while Bernadotte was in 
 office. Bonaparte betrayed no appearance of astonish- 
 ment. He received Bernadotte with perfect ease, and they 
 soon entered into conversation. Bonaparte, who seemed 
 to acquire confidence from the presence of those who were 
 about him, said a great deal about the agitation which 
 prevailed among the republicans, and expressed himself 
 in very decided terms against the Manege Club. 1 I sec- 
 onded him by observing that M. Moreau de Worms of my 
 department, who was a member of that club, had himself 
 complained to me of the violence that prevailed in it. 
 "But, General," said Bernadotte, "your brothers were its 
 most active originators. Yet," added he in a tone of 
 firmness, " you accuse me of having favoured that club, and 
 I repel the charge. It cannot be otherwise than false. 
 When I came into office I found everything in the greatest 
 disorder. I had no leisure to think about any club to 
 which my duties did not call me. You know well that 
 your friend Salicetti, and that your brother, who is in your 
 confidence, are both leading men in the Manege Club. 
 To the instructions of / know not whom is to be attributed 
 the violence of which you complain." At these words, 
 and especially the tone in which Bernadotte uttered / 
 know not whom, Bonaparte could no longer restrain him- 
 
 1 The Manage Club, the last resort of the Jacobins, formed in 1799, and closed 
 seven or eight months afterwards. Joseph Bonaparte (Erreurs, tome i. p. 251) de- 
 nies that he or Lucien for whom the allusion is meant were members of this club, 
 and he disputes this conversation ever having taken place. Lucien (tome i. p. 819} 
 treats this club as opposed to his party.
 
 256 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 self. "Well, General," exclaimed he furiously, "I tell 
 you plainly, I would rather live wild in the woods than in 
 a state of society which affords no security." Bernadotte 
 then said, with great dignity of manner, " Good God ! 
 General, what security would you have?" From the 
 warmth evinced by Bonaparte I saw plainly that the con- 
 versation would soon be converted into a dispute, and 
 in a whisper I requested Madame Bonaparte to change 
 the conversation, which she immediately did by address- 
 ing a question to some one present. Bernadotte, observ- 
 ing Madame Bonaparte's design, checked his warmth. 
 The subject of conversation was changed, and it be- 
 came general. Bernadotte soon took up his hat and de- 
 parted. 
 
 One morning, when I entered Bonaparte's chamber it 
 was, I believe, three or four days after the second visit of 
 Bernadotte he said : 
 
 " Well, Bourrienne, I wager you will not guess with 
 whom I am going to breakfast this morning ? " " Really, 
 
 General, I " "With Bernadotte ; and the best of 
 
 the joke is, that I have invited myself. You would have 
 seen how it was all brought about if you had been with us 
 at the Theatre Franais, yesterday evening. You know we 
 are going to visit Joseph to-day at Mortfontaine. Well, as 
 we were coming out of the theatre last night, finding my- 
 self side by side with Bernadotte and not knowing what 
 to talk about, I asked him whether he was to be of our 
 party to-day ? He replied in the affirmative ; and as we 
 were passing his house in the Hue Cisalpine, 1 I told him, 
 without any ceremony, that I should be happy to come and 
 take a cup of coffee with him in the morning. He seemed 
 pleased. What do you think of that, Bourrienne?" 
 " Why, General, I hope you may have reason on your part 
 to be pleased with him." "Never fear, never fear. I 
 
 i Joseph Bonaparte lays great stress on the fact that Napoleon would not have 
 passed this house, which was far from the theatre (Erreurs, tome i, p. 251).
 
 1799. A DIPLOMATIC VISIT. 257 
 
 know what I am about This will compromise him with 
 Gohier. Remember, you must always meet your enemies 
 with a bold face, otherwise they think they are feared, and 
 that gives them confidence." 
 
 Bonaparte stepped into the carriage with Josephine, 
 who was always ready when she had to go out with him, 
 for he did not like to wait. They proceeded first to Ber- 
 nadotte's to breakfast, and from thence to Mortfontaine. 
 On his return Bonaparte told me very little about what had 
 passed during the day, and I could see that he was not in 
 the best of humours. I afterwards learned that Bonaparte 
 had conversed a good deal with Bernadotte, and that he 
 had made every effort to render himself agreeable, which 
 he very well knew how to do when he chose ! but that, in 
 spite of all his conversational talent, and supported as he 
 was by the presence of his three brothers, and Beg- 
 nault de St. Jean d'Angely, 1 he could not withstand the 
 republican firmness of Bernadotte. However, the number 
 of his partisans daily augmented ; for all had not the un- 
 compromising spirit of Bernadotte ; and it will soon be seen 
 that Moreau himself undertook charge of the Directors 
 who were made prisoners on the 18th Brumaire. 
 
 Bernadotte's shrewd penetration made him one of the 
 first to see clearly into Bonaparte's designs. He was well 
 convinced of his determination to overthrow the constitu- 
 tion and possess himself of power. He saw the Directory 
 divided into two parties ; the one duped by the promises 
 and assurances of Bonaparte, and the other conniving with 
 him for the accomplishment of his plans. In these cir- 
 cumstances Bernadotte offered his services to all persons 
 connected with the Government who, like himself, were 
 averse to the change which he saw good reason to appre- 
 hend. But Bonaparte was not the man to be outdone in 
 
 1 Etienne Regnault or Regnaud (de St. Jean d'Angely) became Comte, and a 
 Member of the Council of State, Secretaire <fltatcle la Famille fmperiale, etc., 
 but was, though much employed and showing much devotion, never given office. 
 
 VOL. L 17
 
 258 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 cunning or activity ; and every moment swelled the ranks 
 of his adherents. 
 
 On the 16th Brumaire I dined in the Hue de la Victoire. 
 Bernadotte was present, and I believe General Jourdan 
 also. While the grand conspiracy was hastening to its 
 accomplishment Madame Bonaparte and I had contrived 
 a little plot of a more innocent kind. We let no one into 
 our secret, and our 16th Brumaire was crowned with com- 
 plete success. We had agreed to be on the alert to pre- 
 vent any fresh exchange of angry words. All succeeded 
 to the utmost of our wishes. The conversation lan- 
 guished during dinner ; but it was not dulness that we 
 were afraid of. It turned on the subject of war, and in 
 that vast field Bonaparte's superiority over his interlocu- 
 tors was undeniable. 
 
 When we retired to the drawing-rooms a great number 
 of evening visitors poured in, and the conversation then 
 became animated, and even gay. Bonaparte was in high 
 spirits. He said to some one, smiling, and pointing to 
 Bernadotte, " You are not aware that the General yonder 
 is a Chouan." "A Chouan ?" repeated Bernadotte, also 
 in a tone of pleasantry. " Ah ! General you contradict 
 yourself. Only the other day you taxed me with favour- 
 ing the violence of the friends of the Republic, and now 
 you accuse me of protecting the Chouans. 1 You should 
 at least be consistent" A few moments after, availing 
 himself of the confusion occasioned by the throng of vis- 
 itors, Bernadotte slipped off. 
 
 As a mark of respect to Bonaparte the Council of the 
 Five Hundred appointed Lucien its president. The event 
 proved how important this nomination was to Napoleon. 
 Up to the 19th Brumaire, and especially on that day, 
 Lucien evinced a degree of activity, intelligence, courage, 
 and presence of mind which are rarely found united in 
 
 i The " Chouans," so called from their use of the cry of the screech-owl (cha 
 houan) as a signal, were the revolted peasants of Brittany and of Maine.
 
 1799. PROMOTION OF LUGIEN. 259 
 
 one individual. I have no hesitation in stating that to Lu- 
 cien's nomination and exertions must be attributed the 
 success of the 19th Brumaire. 
 
 The General had laid down a plan of conduct from 
 which he never deviated during the twenty-three days 
 which intervened between his arrival in Paris and the 
 18th Brumaire. He refused almost all private invitations, 
 in order to avoid indiscreet questions, unacceptable offers, 
 and answers which might compromise him. 
 
 It was not without some degree of hesitation that he 
 yielded to a project started by Lucien, who, by all sorts of 
 manoeuvring, had succeeded in prevailing on a great number 
 of his colleagues to be present at a grand subscription din- 
 ner to be given to Bonaparte by the Council of the Ancients. 
 
 The disorder which unavoidably prevailed in a party 
 amounting to upwards of 250 persons, animated by a di- 
 versity of opinions and sentiments ; the anxiety and dis- 
 trust arising in the minds of those who were not in the 
 grand plot, rendered this meeting one of the most dis- 
 agreeable I ever witnessed. It was all restraint and dul- 
 ness. Bonaparte's countenance sufficiently betrayed his 
 dissatisfaction ; besides, the success of his schemes de- 
 manded his presence elsewhere. Almost as soon as he had 
 finished his dinner he rose, saying to Berthier and me, " 7 
 am tired : let us be gone." He went round to the differ- 
 ent tables, addressing to the company compliments and 
 trifling remarks, and departed, leaving at table the per- 
 sons by whom he had been invited. 
 
 This short political crisis was marked by nothing more 
 grand, dignified, or noble than the previous revolutionary 
 commotions. All these plots were so contemptible, and 
 were accompanied by so much trickery, falsehood, and 
 treachery, that, for the honour of human nature, it is desir- 
 able to cover them with a veil. 
 
 General Bonaparte's thoughts were first occupied with 
 the idea he had conceived even when in Italy, namely, to
 
 260 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 
 
 be chosen a Director. Nobody dared yet to accuse him 
 of being a deserter from the army of the East. The only 
 difficulty was to obtain a dispensation on the score of age. 
 And was this not to be obtained ? No sooner was he 
 installed in his humble abode in the Rue de la Victoire 
 than he was assured that, on the retirement of Bewbell, 
 the majority of suffrages would have devolved on him 
 had he been in France, and had not the fundamental law 
 required the age of forty ; but that not even his warmest 
 partisans were disposed to violate the yet infant Constitu- 
 tion of the year HX 
 
 Bonaparte soon perceived that no efforts would succeed in 
 overcoming this difficulity, and he easily resolved to possess 
 himself wholly of an office of which he would nominally have 
 had only a fifth part had he been a member of the Directory. 
 
 As soon as his intentions became manifest he found him- 
 self surrounded by all those who recognised in him the 
 man they had long looked for. These persons, who were 
 able and influential in their own circles, endeavoured to 
 convert into friendship the animosity which existed be- 
 tween Sieyes and Bonaparte. This angry feeling had been 
 increased by a remark made by Sieyes, and reported to 
 Bonaparte. He had said, after the dinner at which Bona- 
 parte treated him so disrespectfully," Do you see how that 
 little insolent fellow behaves to a member of a Government 
 which would do well to order him to be SHOT ? " 
 
 But all was changed when able mediators pointed out 
 to Bonaparte the advantage of uniting with Sieyes for the 
 purpose of overthrowing a Constitution which he did not 
 like. He was assured how vain it would be to think of 
 superseding him, and that it would be better to flatter him 
 with the hope of helping to subvert the constitution and 
 raising up a new one. One day some one said to Bona- 
 parte in my hearing, " Seek for support among the party 
 who call the friends of the Republic Jacobins, and be as- 
 sured that Sieyes is at the head of that party."
 
 1799. FALSELY ACCUSED BY B ARRAS. 261 
 
 On the 25th Vendemiaire (17th of October) the Direc- 
 tory summoned General Bonaparte to a private sitting. 
 " They offered me the choice of any army I would com- 
 mand," said he to me the next morning. " I would not 
 refuse, but I asked to be allowed a little time for the re- 
 covery of my health ; and, to avoid any other embarrassing 
 offers, I withdrew. I shall go to no more of their sittings." 
 [He attended only one after this.] " I am determined to 
 join Sieyes' party. It includes a greater diversity of opin- 
 ions than that of the profligate Barras. He proclaims 
 everywhere that he is the author of my fortune. He will 
 never be content to play an inferior part, and I will never 
 bend to such a man. He cherishes the mad ambition of 
 being the support of the Republic. What would he do 
 with me ? Sieyes, on the contrary, has no political ambi- 
 tion." 
 
 No sooner did Sieyes begin to grow friendly with Bona- 
 parte than the latter learned from him that Barras had 
 said, " The ' little corporal ' has made his fortune in Italy 
 and does not want to go back again." Bonaparte repaired, 
 to the Directory for the sole purpose of contradicting this 
 allegation. He complained to the Directors of its false- 
 hood, boldly affirmed that the fortune he was supposed to 
 possess had no existence, and that even if he had made 
 his fortune it was not, at all events, at the expense of the 
 Republic. " You know," said he to me, " that the mines 
 of Hydria have furnished the greater part of what I pos- 
 sess." " Is it possible, " said I, " that Barras could have 
 said so, when you know so well of all the peculations of 
 which he has been guilty since your return ? " 
 
 Bonaparte had confided the secret of his plans to very 
 few persons to those only whose assistance he wanted. 
 The rest mechanically followed their leaders and the im- 
 pulse which was given to them ; they passively awaited 
 the realisation of the promises they had received, and on 
 the faith of which they had pledged themselves.
 
 26* 1799. 
 
 CHAPTER XXTV. 
 1799. 
 
 Cambacer^s and Lebrun Gohier deceived My nocturnal visit to Barras 
 The command of the army given to Bonaparte The morning of the 
 18th Brumaire Meeting of the generals at Bonaparte's house Ber- 
 nadotte's firmness Josephine's interest for Madame Gohier Disap- 
 pointment of the Directors Review in the gardens of the Toileries 
 Bonaparte's harangue Proclamation of the Ancients Moreau, 
 jailer of the Luxembourg My conversation with La Vallette Bon- 
 aparte at St. Cloud. 
 
 THE parts of the great drama which was shortly to be en- 
 acted were well distributed. During the three days pre- 
 ceding the 18th Brumaire every one was at his post. Lu- 
 cien, with equal activity and intelligence, forwarded the 
 conspiracy in the two Councils ; Si6yes had the manage- 
 ment of the Directory ; Real, 1 under the instructions of 
 Fouche, 3 negotiated with the departments, and dexterously 
 managed, without compromising Fouch6, to ruin those 
 from whom that Minister had received his power. There 
 was no time to lose ; and Fouche said to me on the 14th 
 Brumaire, " Tell your General to be speedy ; if he delays, 
 he is lost." 
 
 On the 17th Eegnault de St. Jean d'Angely told Bona- 
 
 1 Pierre Francois Real (1757-1834) ; public accuser before the revolutionary crim- 
 inal tribunal, became, under Napoleon, Conseiller d'etat and Comte, and was 
 charged with the affairs of the "haute police." 
 
 a Joseph Fouch6 (1754-1820) ; Conventionalist ; member of extreme Jacobin party ; 
 Minister of Police under the Directory, August 1799 ; retained by Napoleon in that 
 Ministry till 1802, and again from 1801 to 1810 ; became Due d'Otrante in 1809; dis- 
 graced in 1810, and sent in 1813 as governor of the Illyrian Provinces ; Minister of 
 Police during the Cent Jours ; President of the Provisional Government, 1816 ; and 
 Iwr a short time Minister of Police under second restoration.
 
 1799. INTRIGUES OF THE \1TH BRUMAIRE. 263 
 
 parte that the overtures made to Cambaceres and Lebrun 
 had not been received in a very decided way. "I will 
 have no tergiversation," replied Bonaparte with warmth. 
 " Let them not flatter themselves that I stand in need of 
 them. They must decide to-day ; to-morrow will be too 
 late. I feel myself strong enough now to stand alone." 
 
 Cambaceres ' and Lebrun * were almost utter strangers 
 to the intrigues which preceded the 18th Brumaire. 
 Bonaparte had cast his eyes on the Minister of Justice to 
 be one of his colleagues when he should be at liberty to 
 name them, because his previous conduct had pledged him 
 as a partisan of the Revolution. To him Bonaparte added 
 Lebrun, to counterbalance the first choice. Lebrun was 
 distinguished for honourable conduct and moderate prin- 
 ciples. By selecting these two men Bonaparte hoped to 
 please every one ; besides, neither of them were able to 
 contend against his fixed determination and ambitious 
 views. 
 
 What petty intrigues marked the 17th Brumaire ! On 
 that day I dined with Bonaparte ; and after dinner he 
 said, "I have promised to dine to-morrow with Gohier; 
 but, as you may readily suppose, I do not intend going. 
 However, I am very sorry for his obstinacy. By way of 
 restoring his confidence Josephine is going to invite him 
 to breakfast with us to-morrow. It will be impossible for 
 him to suspect anything. I saw Barras this morning, and 
 left' him much disturbed. He asked me to return and visit 
 him to-night. I promised to do so, but I shall not go. 
 To-morrow all will be over. There is but little time ; he 
 
 1 Cnmbac6res ( J. J. Regis de) (1758-1824), Conventionalist ; Minister of Justice 
 under Directory, 1799 ; Second Consul, 25th December 1799 ; Arch -Chancellor of the 
 Empire, 1804 ; Due de Parma, 1806 ; Minister of Justice during the Cent Jours ; 
 took great part in all the legal and administrative projects of the Consulate and 
 Empire. 
 
 s Charles Francois Lebrun (1737-1824), Deputy to the National Assembly, and 
 member of the Council of the Five Hundred ; Third Consul, 25th December 1799 ; 
 Arch-Treasurer of the Empire, 1804 ; Due de Plaisance, 1806 ; Governor-General of 
 Holland, 1805 ; Lieutenant-Governor of Holland, 1810 to 1813 ; chiefly engaged in 
 financial measures.
 
 264 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 expects me at eleven o'clock to-night. You shall there- 
 fore take my carriage, go there, send in my name, and 
 then enter yourself. Tell him that a severe headache 
 confines me to my bed, but that I will be with him with- 
 out fail to-morrow. Bid him not be alarmed, for all will 
 soon be right again. Elude his questions as much as 
 possible ; do not stay long, and come to me on your re- 
 turn." 
 
 At precisely eleven o'clock I reached the residence of 
 Barras, in General Bonaparte's carriage. Solitude and 
 silence prevailed in all the apartments through which I 
 passed to Barras' cabinet. Bonaparte was announced, and 
 when Barras saw me enter instead of him, he manifested 
 the greatest astonishment and appeared much cast down. 
 It was easy to perceive that he looked on himself as a lost 
 man. I executed my commission, and stayed only a short 
 time. I rose to take my leave, and he said, while showing 
 me out, "I see that Bonaparte is deceiving me : he will 
 not come again. He has settled everything ; yet to me he 
 owes all." I repeated that he would certainly come to- 
 morrow, but he shook his head in a way which plainly 
 denoted that he did not believe me. When I gave Bona- 
 parte an account of my visit he appeared much pleased. 
 He told me that Joseph was going to call that evening on 
 Bernadotte, and to ask him to come to-morrow. I replied 
 that, from all I knew, he would be of no use to him. " I 
 believe so too," said he ; " but he can no longer injure me, 
 and that is enough. Well, good-night ; be here at seven 
 in the morning." It was then one o'clock. 
 
 I was with him a little before seven o'clock on the morn- 
 ing of the 18th Brumaire, and on my arrival I found a 
 great number of generals and officers assembled. I en- 
 tered Bonaparte's chamber, and found him already up a 
 thing rather unusual with him. At this moment he was 
 as calm as on the approach of a battle. In a few moments 
 Joseph and Bernadotte arrived. Joseph had not found
 
 1799. COMMAND OF ARMY GIVEN TO BONAPARTE. 265 
 
 him at home on the preceding evening, and had called for 
 him that morning. I was surprised to see Bernadotte in 
 plain clothes, and I stepped up to him and said in a low 
 voice, " General, every one here, except you and I, is in 
 uniform." "Why should I be in uniform?" said he. As 
 he uttered these words Bonaparte, struck with the same 
 surprise as myself, stopped short while speaking to several 
 persons around him, and turning quickly towards Berna- 
 dotte said, "How is this? you are not in uniform!" "I 
 never am on a morning when I am not on duty," replied 
 Bernadotte. "You will be on duty presently." "I have 
 not heard a word of it : I should have received my orders 
 sooner." 1 
 
 Bonaparte then led Bernadotte into an adjoining room. 
 Their conversation was not long, for there was no time to 
 spare. 
 
 On the other hand, by the influence of the principal 
 conspirators the removal of the legislative body to St. 
 Cloud was determined on the morning of the 18th Bru- 
 maire, and the command of the army was given to Bona- 
 parte. 
 
 All this time Barras was no doubt waiting for Bona- 
 parte, and Madame Bonaparte was expecting Gohier to 
 breakfast. At Bonaparte's were assembled all the generals 
 who were devoted to him. I never saw so great a number 
 before in the Rue de la Victoire. They were all, except 
 Bernadotte, in full uniform ; and there were, besides, half 
 a dozen persons there initiated in the secrets of the day. 
 The little hotel of the conqueror of Italy was much too 
 small for such an assemblage, and several persons were 
 standing in the court-yard. Bonaparte was acquainted 
 
 1 All this account Is denied by Joseph Bonaparte, who says (Erreurs, tome i. p. 
 252) that Bernadotte did not see Napoleon nor enter his bouse on the 18th Brumaire, 
 and appeals to Bernadotte himself, then alive. Thiers (tome v. p. 494) and Lanfrey 
 (tome i. p. 451) follow Bourrienne. A letter of Bernadotte to Joseph (Luclen, tomo 
 i. pp. 362, 363) seems to show that Bernadotte, believing he could resist, had yielded 
 to Joseph's advice ; see also his reference to his youth at that time (Lttcien, tome i!. 
 p. 393).
 
 266 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 with the decree of the Council of the Ancients, and only 
 waited for its being brought to him before he should 
 mount his horse. That decree was adopted in the Council 
 of the Ancients by what may be called a false majority, 
 for the members of the Council were summoned at differ- 
 ent hours, and it was so contrived that sixty or eighty of 
 them, whom Lucien and his friends had not been able to 
 gain over, should not receive their notices in time. 
 
 As soon as the message from the Council of the Ancients 
 arrived Bonaparte requested all the officers at his house 
 to follow him. At that announcement a few who were in 
 ignorance of what was going on did not follow at least I 
 saw two groups separately leave the hotel. Bernadotte 
 said to me, "I shall stay with you." I perceived there 
 was a good deal of suspicion in his manner. Bonaparte, 
 before going down the stairs which led from the small 
 round dining-room into the courtyard, returned quickly 
 to bid Bernadotte follow him. He would not, and Bona- 
 parte then said to me, while hurrying off, "Gohier is not 
 come so much the worse for him," and leaped on his 
 horse. Scarcely was he off when Bernadotte left me. 
 Josephine and I being now left alone, she acquainted me 
 with her anxiety. I assured her that everything had been 
 so well prepared that success was certain. She felt much 
 interest about Gohier on account of her friendship for his 
 wife. She asked me whether I was well acquainted with 
 Gohier. "You know, Madame," replied I, "that we have 
 been only twenty days in Paris, and that during that time 
 I have only gone out to sleep in the Rue Martel. I have 
 seen M. Gohier several times, when he came to visit the 
 General, and have talked to him about the situation of our 
 affairs in Switzerland, Holland, France, and other political 
 matters, but I never exchanged a word with him as to 
 what is now going on. This is the whole extent of my 
 acquaintance with him." 
 
 " I am sorry for it," resumed Josephine, " because I
 
 1799. THE 1STH BRUMAIRE 267 
 
 should have asked you to write to him, and beg him to 
 make no stir, but imitate Sie"y6s and Boger, who will vol- 
 untarily retire, and not to join Barras, who is probably at 
 this very moment forced to do so. Bonaparte has told 
 me that if Gohier voluntarily resigns, he will do every- 
 thing for him." I believe Josephine communicated di- 
 rectly with the President of the Directory through a 
 friend of Madame Gohier's. 
 
 Gohier and Moulins, no longer depending on Sieyes 
 and Eoger Ducos, waited for their colleague, Barras, in 
 the hall of the Directory, to adopt some measure on the 
 decree for removing the Councils to St. Cloud. But they 
 were disappointed ; for Barras, whose eyes had been 
 opened by my visit on the preceding night, did not join 
 them. He had been invisible to his colleagues from the 
 moment that Bruix and M. de Talleyrand had informed 
 him of the reality of what he already suspected, and in- 
 sisted on his retirement. 
 
 On the 18th Brumaire a great number of military, 
 amounting to about 10,000 men, were assembled in the 
 gardens of the Tuileries, and were reviewed by Bonaparte, 
 accompanied by Generals Beurnonville, Moreau, and Mac- 
 donald. Bonaparte read to them the decree just issued by 
 the commission of inspectors of the Council of the An- 
 cients, by which the legislative body was removed to St. 
 Cloud, and by which he himself was entrusted with the 
 execution of that decree, and appointed to the command 
 of all the military force in Paris, and afterwards delivered 
 an address to the troops. 
 
 Whilst Bonaparte was haranguing the soldiers, the 
 Council of the Ancients published an address to the 
 French people, in which it was declared that the seat of 
 the legislative body was changed, in order to put down 
 the factions, whose object was to control the national rep- 
 resentation. 
 
 While all this was passing abroad I was at the General's
 
 268 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 house in the Rue de la Victoire ; which I never left during 
 the whole day. Madame Bonaparte and I were not with- 
 out anxiety in Bonaparte's absence. I learned from Jose- 
 phine that Joseph's wife had received a visit from Adju- 
 tant-General Eapatel, who had been sent by Bonaparte 
 and Moreau to bring her husband to the Tuileries. Joseph 
 was from home at the time, and so the message was use- 
 less. This circumstance, however, awakened hopes which 
 we had scarcely dared to entertain. Moreau was then in 
 accordance with Bonaparte, for Rapatel was sent in the 
 name of both Generals. This alliance, so long despaired 
 of, appeared to augur favourably. It was one of Bona- 
 parte's happy strokes. Moreau, who was a slave to military 
 discipline, regarded his successful rival only as a chief 
 nominated by the Council of the Ancients. He received 
 his orders and obeyed them. Bonaparte appointed him 
 commander of the guard of the Luxembourg, where the 
 Directors were under confinement. He accepted the com- 
 mand, and no circumstance could have contributed more 
 effectually to the accomplishment of Bonaparte's views and 
 to the triumph of his ambition. 
 
 At length Bonaparte, whom we had impatiently ex- 
 pected, returned. Almost everything had gone well with 
 him, for he had had only to do with soldiers. In the 
 evening he said to me, " I am sure that the committee of 
 inspectors of the hall are at this very moment engaged in 
 settling what is to be done at St. Cloud to-morrow. It is 
 better to let them decide the matter, for by that means 
 their vanity is flattered. I will obey orders which I have 
 myself concerted." What Bonaparte was speaking of had 
 been arranged nearly two or three days previously. The 
 committee of inspectors was under the influence of the 
 principal conspirators. 
 
 In the evening of this anxious day, which was destined 
 to be succeeded by a stormy morrow, Bonaparte, pleased 
 with having gained over Moreau, spoke to me of Berna-
 
 1799. ' BERNADOTTE 13 A BAR OP IRON." 269 
 
 dotte's visit in the morning. " I saw," said he, " that you 
 were as much astonished as I at Bernadotte's behaviour. 
 A general out of uniform ! He might as well have come 
 in slippers. Do you know what passed when I took him 
 aside ? I told him all ; I thought that the best way. I 
 assured him that his Directory was hated, and his Consti- 
 tution worn out ; that it was necessary to turn them all 
 off, and give another impulse to the government. ' Go 
 and put on your uniform/ said I : 'I cannot wait for you 
 long. You will find me at the Tuileries, with the rest of 
 our comrades. Do not depend on Moreau, Beurnonville, 
 or the generals of your party. When you know them 
 better you will find that they promise much but perform 
 little. Do not trust them.' Bemadotte then said that he 
 would not take part in what he called a rebellion. A 
 rebellion ! Bourrienne, only think of that ! A set of im- 
 beciles, who from morning to night do nothing but debate 
 in their kennels ! But all was in vain. I could not move 
 Bernadotte. He is a bar of iron. I asked him to give me 
 his word that he would do nothing against me ; what do 
 you think was his answer ? " " Something unpleasant, no 
 doubt." " Unpleasant ! that is too mild a word. He 
 said, ' I will remain quiet as a citizen ; but if the Direc- 
 tory order me to act, I will march against all disturbers.' 
 But I can laugh at all that now. My measures are taken, 
 and he will have no command. However, I set him at 
 ease as to what would take place. I flattered him with a 
 picture of private life, the pleasures of the country, and 
 the charms of Malmaison ; and I left him with his head 
 full of pastoral dreams. In a word, I am very well satisfied 
 with my day's work. Good-night, Bourrienne ; we shall 
 see what will turn up to-morrow." 
 
 On the 19th I went to St. Cloud with my friend La 
 Vallette. 1 As we passed the Place Louis XV., now Louis 
 
 1 Marie Chamans, Comte de La Vallette (1769-1830), aide de camp to Napoleon 
 from 1796 ; married, 1798, Louise Emilia de Beauharnuia, uiece o Josephine ; Min-
 
 270 MEMOIKS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 XVI., he asked me what was doing, and what my opinion 
 was as to the coming events ? Without entering into any 
 detail I replied, " My friend, either we shall sleep to-mor- 
 row at the Luxembourg, or there will be an end of us." 
 Who could tell which of the two things would happen ! 
 Success legalised a bold enterprise, which the slightest 
 accident might have changed into a crime. 
 
 The sitting of the Ancients, under the presidency of 
 Lemercier, commenced at one o'clock. A warm discussion 
 took place upon the situation of affairs, the resignation 
 of the members of the Directory, and the immediate elec- 
 tion of others. Great heat and agitation prevailed dur- 
 ing the debate. Intelligence was every minute carried to 
 Bonaparte of what was going forward, and he determined 
 to enter the hall and take part in the discussion. He 
 entered in a hasty and angry way, which did not give me 
 a favourable foreboding of what he was about to say. We 
 passed through a narrow passage to the centre of the hall ; 
 our backs were turned to the door. Bonaparte had the 
 President to his right. He could not see him full in the 
 face. I was close to the General on his right. Berthier 
 was at his left. 
 
 All the speeches which have been subsequently passed 
 off as having been delivered by Bonaparte on this oc- 
 casion differ from each other ; as well they may, for he 
 delivered none to the Ancients, unless his confused con- 
 versation with the President, which was alike devoid of 
 dignity and sense, is to be called a speech. He talked of 
 his "brothers in arms" and the "frankness of a soldier." 
 The questions of the President followed each other rapid- 
 ly : they were clear ; but it is impossible to conceive any- 
 thing more confused or worse delivered than the ambig- 
 uous and perplexed replies of Bonaparte. He talked 
 without end of "volcanoes, secret agitations, victories, a 
 
 ister of Posts from 1800 to 1814, and during the Cent Joun ; condemned to death by 
 the Bourbons in 1815, but escaped.
 
 1799. INCOHERENT ACCUSATIONS. 271 
 
 violated constitution ! " He blamed the proceedings of 
 the 18th Fructidor, of which he was the first promoter 
 and the most powerful supporter. He pretended to be 
 ignorant of everything until the Council of Ancients had 
 called him to the aid of his country. Then came " Caesar 
 Cromwell tyrant ! " and he several times repeated, " I 
 have nothing more to say to you ! " though, in fact, he 
 had said nothing. He alleged that he had been called to 
 assume the supreme authority, on his return from Italy, 
 by the desire of the nation, and afterwards by his com- 
 rades in arms. Next followed the words "liberty equal- 
 ity ! " though it was evident he had not come to St. Cloud 
 for the sake of either. No sooner did he utter these 
 words than a member of the Ancients, named, I think, 
 Linglet, interrupting him, exclaimed, " You forget the 
 Constitution ! " His countenance immediately lighted up ; 
 yet nothing could be distinguished but " The 18th Fructi- 
 dor the 30th Prairial hypocrites intriguers I will dis- 
 close all ! I will resign my power, when the danger 
 which threatens the Republic shall have passed away ! " 
 
 Bonaparte, believing all his assertions to be admitted 
 as proved, assumed a little confidence, and accused the 
 two directors Barras and Moulins " of having proposed to 
 put him at the head of a party whose object was to op- 
 pose all men professing liberal ideas." 
 
 At these words, the falsehood of which was odious, a 
 great tumult arose in the hall. A general committee was 
 loudly called for to hear the disclosures. " No, no ! " ex- 
 claimed others, " no general committee ! Conspirators 
 have been denounced : it is right that France should 
 know all ! " 
 
 Bonaparte was then required to enter into the particu- 
 lars of his accusation against Barras and Moulins, and of 
 the proposals which had been made to him : " You must 
 no longer conceal anything." 
 
 Embarrassed by these interruptions and interrogatories
 
 272 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Bonaparte believed that he was completely lost. Instead 
 of giving an explanation of what he had said, he began to 
 make fresh accusations ; and against whom ? The Coun- 
 cil of the Five Hundred, who, he said, wished for " scaf- 
 folds, revolutionary committees, and a complete overthrow 
 of everything." 
 
 Violent murmurs arose, and his language became more 
 and more incoherent and inconsequent. He addressed 
 himself at one moment to the representatives of the peo- 
 ple, who were quite overcome by astonishment ; at an- 
 other to the military in the courtyard, who could not hear 
 him. Then, by an unaccountable transition, he spoke of 
 " the thunderbolts of war ! " and added, that he was " at- 
 tended by the God of war and the God of fortune." 
 
 The President, with great calmness, told him that he 
 saw nothing, absolutely nothing, upon which the Council 
 could deliberate ; that there was vagueness in all he had 
 said. " Explain yourself ; reveal the plot which you say 
 you were urged to join." 
 
 Bonaparte repeated again the same things. But only 
 those who were present can form any idea of his manner. 
 There was not the slightest connection in what he stam- 
 mered out. Bonaparte was then no orator. It may well 
 be supposed that he was more accustomed to the din of 
 war than to the discussions of the tribunes. He was more 
 at home before a battery than before a President's chair. 
 
 Perceiving the bad effect which this unconnected bab- 
 bling produced on the assembly, as Avell as the embarrass- 
 ment of Bonaparte, I said, in a low voice, pulling him 
 gently by the skirt of his coat, " Withdraw, General ; you 
 know not what you are saying." I made signs to Berthier, 
 who was on his left, to second me in persuading him to 
 leave the hall ; and all at once, after having stammered 
 out a few more words, he turned round exclaiming, " Let 
 those who love me follow me ! " The sentinels at the door 
 offered no opposition to his passing. The person who
 
 1799. INCOHERENT ACCUSATIONS. 27? 
 
 went before him quietly drew aside the tapestry which 
 concealed the door, and General Bonaparte leaped upon 
 his horse, which stood in the court-yard. It is hard to say 
 what would have happened if, on seeing the General re- 
 tire, the President had said, " Grenadiers, let no one 
 pass ! " Instead of sleeping next day at the Luxembourg 
 he would, I am convinced, have ended his career on the 
 Place de la Revolution 1 
 VOL. I. 18
 
 274 1799 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 1799. 
 
 The two Councils Ban-as' letter Bonaparte at the Council of the Five 
 Hundred False reports Tumultuous sitting Lucien's speech He 
 resigns the Presidency of the Council of the Five Hundred He is 
 carried out by grenadiers He harangues the troops A dramatic 
 scene Murat and his soldiers drive out the Five Hundred Council 
 of Thirty Consular commission Decree Return to Paris Conver- 
 sation with Bonaparte and Josephine respecting Gohier and Berna- 
 dotte The directors Gohier and Moulins imprisoned. 
 
 THE scene which occurred at the sitting of the Council of 
 the Ancients was very different from that which passed 
 outside. Bonaparte had scarcely reached the courtyard 
 and mounted his horse when cries of " Vive Bonaparte ! " 
 resounded on all sides. But this was only a sunbeam be- 
 tween two storms. He had yet to brave the Council of the 
 Five Hundred, which was far more excited than the Coun- 
 cil of the Ancients. Everything tended to create a dread- 
 ful uncertainty ; but it was too late to draw back. We 
 had already staked too heavily. The game was desperate, 
 and everything was to be ventured. In a few hours all 
 would be determined. 
 
 Our apprehensions were not without foundation. In 
 the Council of the Five Hundred agitation was at its 
 height. The most serious alarm marked its deliberations. 
 It had been determined to announce to the Directory the 
 installation of the Councils, and to inquire of the Council 
 of the Ancients their reasons for resolving upon an ex- 
 traordinary convocation. But the Directory no longer ex- 
 isted. Sieyes and Roger Ducos had joined Bonaparte's
 
 1799. BONAPARTE AND THE FIVE HUNDRED. 275 
 
 party. Gohier and Moulins were prisoners in the Luxem- 
 bourg, and in the custody of General Moreau ; and at the 
 very moment when the Council of the Five Hundred had 
 drawn up a message to the Directory, the Council of the 
 Ancients transmitted to them the following letter, received 
 from Barras. This letter, which was addressed to the 
 Council of the Ancients, was immediately read by Lucien 
 Bonaparte, who was President of the Council of the Five 
 Hundred. 
 
 CITIZEN PRESIDENT Having entered into public affairs solely 
 from my love of liberty, I consented to share the first magistracy of 
 the State only that I might be able to defend it in danger ; to pro- 
 tect against their enemies the patriots compromised in its cause ; 
 and to ensure to the defenders of their country that attention to 
 their interests which no one was more calculated to feel than a citi- 
 zen, long the witness of their heroic virtues, and always sensible to 
 their wants. 
 
 The glory which accompanies the return of the illustrious war- 
 rior to whom I had the honour of opening the path of glory, the 
 striking marks of confidence given him by the legislative body, and 
 the decree of the National Convention, convince me that, to what- 
 ever post he may henceforth be called, the dangers to liberty will 
 be averted, and the interests of the army ensured. 
 
 I cheerfully return to the rank of a private citizen : happy, after 
 so many storms, to resign, unimpaired, and even more glorious than 
 ever, the destiny of the Republic, which has been, in part, com- 
 mitted to my care. (Signed) BARRAS. 
 
 This letter occasioned a great sensation in the Council 
 of the Five Hundred. A second reading was called for, 
 and a question was started, whether the retirement was 
 legal, or was the result of collusion, and of the influence 
 of Bonaparte's agents ; whether to believe Barras, who de- 
 clared the dangers of liberty averted, or the decree for the 
 removal of the legislative corps, which was passed and exe- 
 cuted under the pretext of the existence of imminent peril ? 
 At that moment Bonaparte appeared, followed by a party 
 of grenadiers, who remained at the entrance of the hall.
 
 276 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 I did not accompany him to the Council of the Five 
 Hundred. He had directed me to send off an express to 
 ease the apprehensions of Josephine, and to assure her 
 that everything would go well. It was some time before 
 I joined him again. 
 
 However, without speaking as positively as if I had 
 myself been an eye-witness of the scene, I do not hesitate 
 to declare that all that has been said about assaults and 
 poniards is pure invention. I rely on what was told me, 
 on the very night, by persons well worthy of credit, and 
 who were witnessess of all that passed. 
 
 As to what passed at the sitting, the accounts, given 
 both at the time and since, have varied according to 
 opinions. Some have alleged that unanimous cries of in- 
 dignation were excited by the appearance of the military. 
 From all parts of the hall resounded, "The sanctuary of 
 the laws is violated. Down with the tyrant! down with 
 Cromwell ! down with the Dictator ! " Bonaparte stam- 
 mered out a few words, as he had done before the Council 
 of the Ancients, but his voice was immediately drowned 
 by cries of "Vive la Kepublique ! " Vive la Constitution ! " 
 "Outlaw the Dictator !" The grenadiers are then said to 
 have rushed forward, exclaiming, " Let us save our Gen- 
 eral ! " at which indignation reached its height, and cries, 
 even more violent than ever, were raised ; that Bonaparte, 
 falling insensible into the arms of the grenadiers, said, 
 " They mean to assassinate me ! " All that regards the ex- 
 clamations and threats I believe to be correct ; but I rank 
 with the story of the poniards the assertion of the mem- 
 bers of the Five Hundred being provided with firearms, 
 and the grenadiers rushing into the hall ; because Bona- 
 parte never mentioned a word of anything of the sort to 
 me, either on the way home, or when I was with him in his 
 chamber. Neither did he say anything on the subject to 
 his wife, who had been extremely agitated by the different 
 reports which reached her.
 
 1799. TUMULTUOUS SITTING OF THE COUNCIL. 277 
 
 After Bonaparte left the Council of the Five Hundred 
 the deliberations were continued with great violence. The 
 excitement caused by the appearance of Bonaparte was 
 nothing like subsided when propositions of the most 
 furious nature were made. The President, Lucien, did all 
 in his power to restore tranquillity. As soon as he could 
 make himself heard he said, "The scene which has just 
 taken place in the Council proves what are the sentiments 
 of all ; sentiments which I declare are also mine. It was, 
 however, natural to believe that the General had no other 
 object than to render an account of the situation of affairs, 
 and of something interesting to the public. But I think 
 none of you can suppose him capable of projects hostile 
 to liberty." 
 
 Each sentence of Lucien's address was interrupted by 
 cries of "Bonaparte has tarnished his glory ! He is a dis- 
 grace to the Republic ! " 
 
 Lucien 1 made fresh efforts to be heard, and wished to 
 be allowed to address the assembly as a member of the 
 Council, and for that purpose resigned the Presidentship 
 to ChasaL He begged that the General might be introduced 
 again and heard with calmness. But this proposition was 
 furiously opposed. Exclamations of " Outlaw Bonaparte ! 
 outlaw him ! " rang through the assembly, and were the 
 only reply given to the President. Lucien, who had reas- 
 sumed the President's chair, left it a second time, that he 
 might not be constrained to put the question of outlawry 
 demanded against his brother. Braving the displeasure 
 of the assembly, he mounted the tribune, resigned the 
 
 1 The next younger brother of Napoleon, President of the Council of the Fire 
 Hundred in 1799 ; Minister of the Interior, 1st December 1799 to 1801 ; Ambassador 
 in Spain, 1801 to December 1801 ; left France in disgrace in 1804 ; retired to Papal 
 States ; Prisoner in Malta and England, 1810 to 1814 ; created by Pope in 1814 
 Prince de Caniuo and Due de Masignano ; married firstly, 1794, Christine Boyer, 
 who died 1800 ; married secondly, 1802 or 1803, a Madame Jouberthon. Of his 
 part in the 18th Brnmaire Napoleon said to him in 1807, " I well know that you were 
 useful to me on the 18th Brumaire, but it is not BO clear to me that you saved me 
 theu ' (lung's Lucien, tome iii. p. 89).
 
 278 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Presidentship, renounced his seat as a deputy, and threw 
 aside his robes. 
 
 Just as Lucien left the Council I entered. Bonaparte, 
 who was well informed of all that was passing, 1 had sent 
 in soldiers to the assistance of his brother ; they carried 
 him off from the midst of the Council, and Bonaparte 
 thought it a matter of no little importance to have with 
 him the President of an assembly which he treated as re- 
 bellious. Lucien was reinstalled in office ; but he waa 
 now to discharge his duties, not in the President's chair, 
 but on horseback, and at the head of a party of troops 
 ready to undertake anything. Roused by the danger to 
 which both his brother and himself were exposed he de- 
 livered on horseback the following words, which can never 
 be too often remembered, as showing what a man then 
 dared to say, who never was anything except from the re- 
 flection of his brother's glory : 
 
 CITIZENS ! SOLDIERS ! The President of the Council of the Five 
 Hundred declares to you that the majority of that Council is at this 
 moment held in terror by a few representatives of the people, who 
 are armed with stilettoes, and who surround the tribune, threaten- 
 ing their colleagues with death, and maintaining most atrocious dis- 
 cussions. 
 
 I declare to you that these brigands, who are doubtless in the pay 
 of England, have risen in rebellion against the Council of the 
 Ancients, and have dared to talk of outlawing the General, who is 
 charged with the execution of its decree, as if the word " outlaw" 
 was still to be regarded as the death-warrant of persons most be- 
 loved by their country. 
 
 I declare to you that these madmen have outlawed themselves by 
 their attempts upon the liberty of the Council. In the name of 
 that people, which for so many years have been the sport of terror- 
 ism, I consign to you the charge of rescuing the majority of theii 
 
 1 Lucien distinctly states that he himself, noting within his right as President, had 
 demanded an escort of the grenadiers of the Councils as soon as he saw his with- 
 drawal might be opposed. Thus the first entry of the soldiers with Napoleon would 
 be illegal. The second, to withdraw Lucien, was nominally legal (see lung's Lucien, 
 tome 1. pp. 318-323).
 
 1799. LTJCIEN APPEALS TO THE TROOPS. 279 
 
 representatives ; so that, delivered from stilettoes by bayonets, they 
 may deliberate on the fate of the Republic. 
 
 General, and you, soldiers, and you, citizens, you will not ac- 
 knowledge, as legislators of France, any but those who rally round 
 me. As for those who remain in the orangery, let force expel 
 them. They are not the representatives of the people, but the re- 
 presentatives of the poniard. Let that be their title, and let it 
 follow them everywhere ; and whenever they dare show themselves 
 to the people, let every finger point at them, and every tongue de- 
 signate them by the well-merited title of representatives of the 
 poniard ! 
 
 Vive la Republique I 
 
 Notwithstanding the cries of " Vive Bonaparte ! " which 
 followed this harangue, the troops still hesitated. It was 
 evident that they were not fully prepared to turn their 
 swords against the national representatives. Lucien then 
 drew his sword, exclaiming, " I swear that I will stab my 
 own brother to the heart if he ever attempt anything 
 against the liberty of Frenchmen." This dramatic action 
 was perfectly successful ; hesitation vanished ; and at a 
 signal given by Bonaparte, Murat, at the head of his 
 grenadiers, rushed into the hall, and drove out the repre- 
 sentatives. Everyone yielded to the reasoning of bay- 
 onets, and thus terminated the employment of the armed 
 force on that memorable day. 
 
 At ten o'clock at night the palace of Si Cloud, where 
 so many tumultuous scenes had occurred, was perfectly 
 tranquil. All the deputies were still there, pacing the 
 hall, the corridors, and the courts. Most of them had an 
 air of consternation ; others affected to have foreseen the 
 event, and to appear satisfied with it ; but all wished to 
 return to Paris, which they could not do until a new order 
 revoked the order for the removal of the Councils to St 
 Cloud. 
 
 At eleven o'clock Bonaparte, who had eaten nothing all 
 day, but who was almost insensible to physical wants in 
 moments of great agitation, said to me, " We must go
 
 280 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 and write, Bourrienne ; I intend this very night to address 
 a proclamation to the inhabitants of Paris. To-morrow 
 morning I shall be all the conversation of the capital." 
 He then dictated to me the following proclamation, which 
 proves, no less than some of his reports from Egypt, how 
 much Bonaparte excelled in the art of twisting the truth 
 to his own advantage : 
 
 To THE PEOPLE. 
 
 19tfl Brumaire, 11 o'clock, p.m. 
 
 Frenchmen ! On my return to France I found division reigning 
 amongst all the authorities. They agreed only on this single point, 
 that the Constitution was half destroyed, and was unable to pro- 
 tect liberty 1 
 
 Each party in turn came to me, confided to me their designs, im- 
 parted their secrets, and requested my support. I refused to be the 
 man of a party. 
 
 The Council of the Ancients appealed to me. I answered their 
 appeal. A plan of general restoration had been concerted by men 
 whom the nation has been accustomed to regard as the defenders 
 of liberty, equality, and property. This plan required calm and 
 free deliberation, exempt from all influence and all fear. The 
 Ancients, therefore, resolved upon the removal of the legislative 
 bodies to St. Cloud. They placed at my disposal the force necessary 
 to secure their independence. I was bound, in duty to my fellow- 
 citizens, to the soldiers perishing in our armies, and to the national 
 glory, acquired at the cost of so much blood, to accept the com- 
 mand. 
 
 The Councils assembled at St. Cloud. Republican troops guar- 
 anteed their safety from without, but assassins created terror with- 
 in. Many members of the Council of the Five Hundred, armed 
 with stilettoes and pistols, spread menaces of death around them. 
 
 The plans which ought to have been developed were withheld. 
 The majority of the Council was rendered inefficient ; the boldest 
 orators were disconcerted, and the inutility of submitting any salu- 
 tary proposition was quite evident. 
 
 I proceeded, filled with indignation and grief, to the Council of 
 the Ancients. I besought them to carry their noble designs into 
 execution. I directed their attention to the evils of the nation, 
 which were their motives for conceiving those designs. They con* 
 curred in giving me new proofs of their uniform goodwill.
 
 1799. BONAPARTE'S ADDRESS TO THS PEOPLE. 281 
 
 I presented myself before the Council of the Five Hundred, 
 alone, xmarmed, my head uncovered, just as the Ancients had re- 
 ceived and applauded me. My object was to restore to the majority 
 the expression of its will, and to secure to it its power. 
 
 The stilettoes which had menaced the deputies were instantly 
 raised against their deliverer. Twenty assassins rushed upon me 
 and aimed at my breast. The grenadiers of the legislative body, 
 whom I had left at the door of the hall, ran forward, and placed 
 themselves between me and the assassins. One of these brave 
 grenadiers (Thome) 1 had his clothes pierced by a stiletto. They 
 bore me off. 
 
 At the same moment cries of " Outlaw him ! " were raised against 
 the defender of the law. It was the horrid cry of assassins against 
 the power destined to repress them. 
 
 They crowded round the President, uttering threats. With arms 
 in their hands they commanded him to declare "the outlawry." I 
 was informed of this. I ordered him to be rescued from their fury, 
 and six grenadiers of the legislative body brought him out. Imme- 
 diately afterwards some grenadiers of the legislative body charged 
 into the hall and cleared it. 
 
 The factious, intimidated, dispersed and fled. The majority, 
 freed from their assaults, returned freely and peaceably into the 
 hall, listened to the propositions made for the public safety, de- 
 liberated, and drew up the salutary resolution which will become 
 the new and provisional law of the Republic. 
 
 Frenchmen, you doubtless recognise in this conduct the zeal of a 
 soldier of liberty, of a citizen devoted to the Republic. Conserva- 
 tive, tutelary, and liberal ideas resumed their authority upon the 
 dispersion of the factious, who domineered in the Councils, and 
 who, in rendering themselves the most odious of men, did not cease 
 to be the most contemptible. 
 
 (Signed) BONAPARTE, General, etc. 
 
 The day had been passed in destroying a Government ; 
 it was necessary to devote the night to framing a new 
 one. Talleyrand, Roederer, and Sieyes were at St. Cloud. 
 The Council of the Ancients assembled, and Lucien set 
 himself about finding some members of the Five Hun- 
 
 1 Thomii merely had a small part of his coat torn by a deputy, who took him by 
 the collar. This constituted the whole of the attempted assassinations of the 19th 
 Brumaire. jBourrienne.
 
 282 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 dred on whom he could reckon. He succeeded in getting 
 together only thirty, who, with their President, repre- 
 sented the numerous assembly of which they formed part. 
 This ghost of representation was essential, for Bonaparte, 
 notwithstanding his violation of all law on the preceding 
 day, wished to make it appear that he was acting legally. 
 The Council of the Ancients had, however, already decided 
 that a provisional executive commission should be ap- 
 pointed, composed of three members, and was about to 
 name the members of the commission a measure which 
 should have originated with the Five Hundred when 
 Lucien came to acquaint Bonaparte that his chamber in- 
 trouvable was assembled. 
 
 This chamber, which called itself the Council of the 
 Five Hundred, though that Council was now nothing but 
 a Council of Thirty, hastily passed a decree, the first 
 article of which was as follows : 
 
 The Directory exists no longer ; and the individuals hereafter: 
 named are no longer members of the national representation, on 
 account of the excesses and illegal acts which they have constantly 
 committed, and more particularly the greatest part of them, in the 
 sitting of this morning. 
 
 Then follow the names of sixty-one members expelled. 
 
 By other articles of the same decree the Council in- 
 stituted a provisional commission, similar to that which 
 the Ancients had proposed to appoint, resolved that the 
 said commission should consist of three members, who 
 should assume the title of Consuls ; and nominated as 
 Consuls Sieyes, Roger Ducos, and Bonaparte. The other 
 provisions of the nocturnal decree of St. Cloud had for 
 their object merely the carrying into effect those already 
 described. This nocturnal sitting was very calm, and in- 
 deed it would have been strange had it been otherwise, 
 for no opposition could be feared from the members of 
 the Five Hundred, who were prepared to concur with
 
 1796. BONAPARTE MADE CONSUL. 283 
 
 Lucien. All knew beforehand what they would have to 
 do. Everything was concluded by three o'clock in the 
 morning ; and the palace of St. Cloud, which had been 
 so agitated since the previous evening, resumed in the 
 morning its wonted stillness, and presented the appear- 
 ance of a vast solitude. 
 
 All the hurrying about, the brief notes which I had to 
 write to many friends, and the conversations in which I 
 was compelled to take part, prevented me from dining be- 
 fore one o'clock in the morning. It was not till then that 
 Bonaparte, having gone to take the oath as Consul before 
 the Five Hundred, afforded me an opportunity of taking 
 some refreshment with Admiral Bruix and some other 
 officers. 
 
 At three o'clock in the morning I accompanied Bona- 
 parte, in his carriage to Paris. He was extremely fatigued 
 after so many trials and fatigues. A new future was 
 opened before him. He was completely absorbed in 
 thought, and did not utter a single word during the jour- 
 ney. But when he arrived at his house in the Rue de la 
 Victoire, he had no sooner entered his chamber and 
 wished good morning to Josephine, who was in bed, and 
 in a state of the greatest anxiety on account of his absence, 
 than he said before her, " Bourrienne, I said many ridicu- 
 lous things?" "Not so very bad, General." "I like bet- 
 ter to speak to soldiers than to lawyers. Those fellows 
 disconcerted me. I have not been used to public assem- 
 blies ; but that will come in time." 
 
 We then began, all three, to converse. Madame Bona- 
 parte became calm, and Bonaparte resumed his wonted 
 confidence. The events of the day naturally formed the 
 subject of our conversation. Josephine, who was much 
 attached to the Gohier family, mentioned the name of that 
 Director in a tone of kindness. " What would you have, 
 my dear ? " said Bonaparte to her. " It is not my fault. 
 H is a respectable man, but a simpleton. He does not
 
 284 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 understand me ! I ought, perhaps, to have him trans- 
 ported. He wrote against me to the Council of the An- 
 cients ; but I have his letter, and they know nothing 
 about it. Poor man ! he expected me to dinner yester- 
 day. And this man thinks himself a statesman ! Speak 
 no more of him." 
 
 During our discourse the name of Bernadotte was also 
 mentioned. "Have you seen him, Bourrienne?" said 
 Bonaparte tome. "No, General." "Neither have I. I 
 have not heard him spoken of. Would you imagine it ? 
 I had intelligence to-day of many intrigues in which he is 
 concerned. Would you believe it? he wished nothing 
 less than to be appointed my colleague in authority. He 
 talked of mounting his horse and marching with the 
 troops that might be placed under his command. He 
 wished, he said, to maintain the Constitution : nay, 
 more ; I am assured that he had the audacity to add that, 
 if it were necessary to outlaw me, the Government might 
 come to him and he would find soldiers capable of carry- 
 ing the decree into execution." "All this, General, should 
 give you an idea how inflexible his principles are." " Yes, 
 I am well aware of it ; there is something in that : he is 
 honest. But for his obstinacy, my brothers would have 
 brought him over. They are related to him. His wife, 
 who is Joseph's sister-in-law, has ascendency over him. 
 As for me, have I not, I ask you, made sufficient advances 
 to him ? You have witnessed them. Moreau, who has a 
 higher military reputation than he, came over to me at 
 once. However, I repent of having cajoled Bernadotte. 
 I am thinking of separating him from all his coteriea 
 without any one being able to find fault with the pro- 
 ceeding. I cannot revenge myself in any other manner. 
 Joseph likes him. I should have everybody against me. 
 These family considerations are follies ! Good-night, 
 Bourrienne. By the way, we will sleep in the Luxembourg 
 to-morrow."
 
 1799. CASTILIAN ETIQUETTE. 285 
 
 I then left the General, whom, henceforth, I will call 
 the First Consul, after having remained with him con- 
 stantly during nearly twenty-four hours, with the excep- 
 tion of the time when he was at the Council of the Five 
 Hundred. I retired to my lodging, in the Kue Martel, at 
 five o'clock in the morning. 
 
 It is certain that if Gohier had come to breakfast on the 
 morning of the 18th Brumaire, according to Madame 
 Bonaparte's invitation, he would have been one of the 
 members of the Government. But Gohier acted the part 
 of the stern republican. He placed himself, according to 
 the common phrase of the time, astride of the Constitu- 
 tion of the year ILL ; and as his steed made a sad stumble, 
 he fell with it. 
 
 It was a singular circumstance which prevented the two 
 Directors Gohier and Moulins from defending their be- 
 loved Constitution. It was from their respect for the Con- 
 stitution that they allowed it to perish, because they would 
 have been obliged to violate the article which did not 
 allow less than three Directors to deliberate together. 
 Thus a king of Castile was burned to death, because there 
 did not happen to be in his apartment men of such rank 
 as etiquette would permit to touch the person of th 
 monarch.
 
 286 1798L 
 
 CHAPTER XXVL 
 1799. 
 
 General approbation of the 18th Brumaire Distress of the treasury M. 
 Collet's generosity Bonaparte's ingratitude Gohier set at liberty 
 Constitution of the year VIII. The Senate, Tribunate, and Council 
 of State Notes required on the character of candidates Bonaparte's 
 love of integrity and talent Influence of habit over him His hatred 
 of the Tribunate Provisional concessions The first Consular Min- 
 istry Mediocrity of La Place Proscription lists Cambacerea' 
 report M. Moreau de Worms Character of Sie'y^s Bonaparte at the 
 Luxembourg Distribution of the day and visits Lebrun's opposi- 
 tion Bonaparte's singing His boyish tricks Resumption of the 
 titles " Madame " and " Monseigneur " The men of the Revolution 
 and the partisans of the Bourbons Bonaparte's fears Confidential 
 notes on candidates for office and the assemblies. 
 
 IT cannot be denied that France hailed, almost with unani- 
 mous voice, Bonaparte's accession to the Consulship as a 
 blessing of Providence. I do not speak now of the ulterior 
 consequences of that event ; I speak only of the fact itself, 
 and its first results, such as the repeal of the law of host- 
 ages, and the compulsory loan of a hundred millions. 
 Doubtless the legality of the acts of the 18th Brumaire 
 may be disputed ; but who will venture to say that the 
 immediate result of that day ought not to be regarded as 
 a great blessing to France? Whoever denies this can 
 have no idea of the wretched state of every branch of the 
 administration at that deplorable epoch. A few persons 
 blamed the 18th Brumaire ; but no one regretted the 
 Directory, with the exception, perhaps, of the five Direc- 
 tors themselves. But we will say no more of the Direc- 
 torial Government. What an administration ! In what a
 
 1799. IN THE LUXEMBOURG. 287 
 
 state were the finances of France ! Would it be believed ? 
 on the second day of the Consulate, when Bonaparte 
 wished to send a courier to General Championet, com- 
 mander-in-chief of the army of Italy, the treasury had not 
 1200 francs disposable to give to the courier ! 
 
 It may be supposed that in the first moments of a new 
 Government money would be wanted. M. Collot, who 
 had served under Bonaparte in Italy, and whose conduct 
 and administration deserved nothing but praise, was one 
 of the first who came to the Consul's assistance. In this 
 instance M. Collot was as zealous as disinterested. He 
 gave the Consul 500,000 francs in gold, for which service 
 he was badly rewarded. Bonaparte afterwards behaved 
 to M. Collot as though he was anxious to punish him for 
 being rich. This sum, which at the time made so fine an 
 appearance in the Consular treasury, was not repaid for a 
 long time after, and then without interest. 1 This was 
 not, indeed, the only instance in which M. Collot had 
 cause to complain of Bonaparte, who was never inclined 
 to acknowledge his important services, nor even to render 
 justice to his conduct. 
 
 On the morning of the 20th Brumaire Bonaparte sent 
 his brother Louis to inform the Director Gohier that he was 
 free. This haste in relieving Gohier was not without a 
 reason, for Bonaparte was anxious to install himself in 
 the Luxembourg, and we went there that same evening. 
 
 Everything was to be created. Bonaparte had with 
 him almost the whole of the army, and on the soldiers he 
 could rely. But the military force was no longer sufficient 
 for him. "Wishing to possess a great civil power estab- 
 lished by legal forms, he immediately set about the com- 
 position of a Senate and Tribunate ; a Council of State and 
 a new legislative body, and, finally, a new Constitution. 3 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte states, however, that this sum was lent by M. Collot with an 
 express declaration that he did not wish to receive interest (Erreurs, tome i. p. 254). 
 
 8 The Constitution of the year VIII. was presented on the 13th of December 1799 
 (22d Frimaire, year VIII.), and accepted by the people on the 7th of 1'ebruary 1 MQ
 
 288 MEMOIRS Of NAPOLEON SONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 As Bonaparte had not time to make himself acquainted 
 with the persons by whom he was about to be surrounded* 
 he requested from the most distinguished men of the 
 period, well acquainted with France and the Revolution, 
 notes respecting the individuals worthy and capable of 
 entering the Senate, the Tribunate, and the Council of 
 State. From the manner in which all these notes were 
 drawn up it was evident that the writers of them studied 
 to make their recommendation correspond with what they 
 conceived to be Bonaparte's views, and that they imag- 
 ined he participated in the opinions which were at that 
 time popular. Accordingly they stated, as grounds for 
 preferring particular candidates, their patriotism, their re- 
 publicanism, and their having had seats in preceding 
 assemblies. 
 
 Of all qualities, that which most influenced the choice 
 of the First Consul was inflexible integrity ; and it is but 
 just to say that in this particular he was rarely deceived. 
 He sought earnestly for talent ; and although he did not 
 like the men of the Revolution, he was convinced that he 
 could not do without them. He had conceived an ex- 
 treme aversion for mediocrity, and generally rejected a 
 man of that character when recommended to him ; but if 
 he had known such a man long, he yielded to the influ- 
 ence of habit, dreading nothing so much as change, or, as 
 he was accustomed to say himself, new faces. 1 
 
 Bonaparte then proceeded to organise a complaisant 
 
 (18th Pluviose, year VIII.)- It established a Consular Government, composed of 
 Bonaparte, First Consul, appointed for ten years ; Cambacer6s, Second Consul, also 
 for ten years; and Lebrun, Third Consul, appointed for five years. It established 
 a conservative Senate, a legislative body of 800 members, and a Tribunate com- 
 posed of 100 members. The establishment of the Council of State took place on the 
 24th of December 1799. The installation of the new legislative body and the Trib- 
 unate was fixed for the 1st of January 1800. Bourrienne. Lanfrey (tome i. p. 329) 
 Bees this Constitution foreshadowed in that proposed by Napoleon in 1797 for the 
 Cisalpine Republic. 
 
 1 Napoleon loved only men with strong passions and great weaknesses ; he 
 judged the most opposite qualities in men by these defects (MetternicA, tome iii. 
 p. 689).
 
 1799. FIRST CONSULAR MINISTRY. 289 
 
 Senate, a mute legislative body, and a Tribunate which 
 was to have the semblance of being independent, by the 
 aid of some fine speeches and high-sounding phrases. 
 He easily appointed the Senators, but it was different 
 with the Tribunate. He hesitated long before he fixed 
 upon the candidates for that body, which inspired him 
 with an anticipatory fear. However, on arriving at power 
 he dared not oppose himself to the exigencies of the 
 moment, and he consented for a time to delude the am- 
 bitious dupes who kept up a buzz of fine sentiments 
 of liberty around him. He saw that circumstances were 
 not yet favourable for refusing a share in the Constitution 
 to this third portion of power, destined apparently to 
 advocate the interests of the people before the legislative 
 bod} r . But in yielding to necessity, the mere idea of the 
 Tribunate filled him with the utmost uneasiness ; and, 
 in a word, Bonaparte could not endure the public dis- 
 cussions on law projects. 1 
 
 Bonaparte composed the first Consular Ministry as 
 follows: Berthier was Minister of War; Gaudin, formerly 
 employed in the administration of the Post Office, was 
 appointed Minister of Finance ; Cambaceres remained 
 Minister of Justice ; Forfait was Minister of Marine ; La 
 Place of the Interior ; Fouche of Police ; and Reinhard 
 of Foreign Affairs.* 
 
 1 The Tribunate under this Constitution of the 'year VIII. was the only body 
 allowed to debate in public on proposed laws, the legislative body simply hearing in 
 silence the orators sent by the Council of State and by the Tribunate to state reasons 
 for or against propositions, and then voting in silence. Its orators were constantly 
 giving umbrage to Napoleon. It was at first purified, early in 1802, by the Senate 
 naming the members to go out in rotation, then reduced to from 100 to 50 members 
 later in 1802, and suppressed in 1807 ; its disappearance being regarded by Napo- 
 leon as his last break with the Revolution. 
 
 * Berthier remained Minister of War till 1807 ; Gaudin, later Due de Gaeta, held 
 the name office till the end of Napoleon's reign ; Cambaceres was soon replaced by 
 Abrial ; Forfait was replaced by Decr6s ; Fouch6 held the Police till 1802, when the 
 Ministry was suppressed ; and again from its re-establishment in 1804 till 1810. He 
 became Due d'Otrante. 
 
 In giving to Abrial the portfolio of the Ministry of Justice, Bonaparte said to him, 
 " Citizen Abrial, I do not know you, but I am told you are the honestest man in the 
 magistracy, and that is why I name you Minister of Justice." Bourriennt. 
 
 VOL. I. 19
 
 290 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 Reinhard and La Place were soon replaced, the former 
 by the able M. Talleyrand, the latter by Lucien Bona- 
 parte. 1 It may be said that Lucien merely passed through 
 the Ministry on his way to a lucrative embassy in Spain. 
 As to La Place, Bonaparte always entertained a high 
 opinion of his talents. His appointment to the Ministry 
 of the Interior was a compliment paid to science ; but it 
 was not long before the First Consul repented of his 
 choice. La Place, so happily calculated for science, dis- 
 played the most inconceivable mediocrity in administra- 
 tion. He was incompetent to the most trifling matters ; 
 as if his mind, formed to embrace the system of the world, 
 and to interpret the laws of Newton and Kepler, could not 
 descend to the level of subjects of detail, or apply itself to 
 the duties of the department with which he was entrusted 
 for a short, but yet, with regard to him, too long a time. 
 
 On the 26th Brumaire (17th November 1799) the Con- 
 suls issued a decree, in which they stated that, conform- 
 ably with Article HI. of the law of the 19th of the same 
 month, which especially charged them with the re-estab- 
 lishment of public tranquillity, they decreed that thirty- 
 eight individuals, who were named, should quit the con- 
 tinental territory of the Republic, and for that purpose 
 should proceed to Rochefort, to be afterwards conducted 
 to, and detained in, the department of French Guiana. 
 They likewise decreed that twenty-three other individuals, 
 who were named, should proceed to the commune of Ro- 
 chelle, in the department of the lower Charente, in order 
 to be afterwards fixed and detained in such part of that 
 department as should be pointed out by the Minister of 
 General Police. I was fortunate enough to keep my friend 
 M. Moreau de Worms, deputy from the Yonne, out of the 
 
 1 When I quitted the service of the First Consul Talleyrand was still at the head 
 of the Foreign Department. I have frequently been present at this great statesman's 
 conferences with Napoleon, and I can declare that I never saw him flatter his 
 dreams of ambition ; but, on the contrary, he always endeavoured to make him sen- 
 sible of his true interests. Bourrienne.
 
 1799. BONAPARTE BECOMES FIRST CONSUL. 291 
 
 list of exiles. This proscription produced a mischievous 
 effect. It bore a character of wanton severity quite incon- 
 sistent with the assurances of mildness and moderation 
 given at St. Cloud on the 19th Brumaire. Cambaceres 
 afterwards made a report, in which he represented that it 
 was unnecessary for the maintenance of tranquillity to sub- 
 ject the proscribed to banishment, considering it sufficient 
 to place them under the supervision of the superior police. 
 Upon receiving the report the Consuls issued a decree, in 
 which they directed all the individuals included in the pro- 
 scription to retire respectively into the different communes 
 which should be fixed upon by the Minister of Justice, 
 and to remain there until further orders. 
 
 At the period of the issuing of these decrees Sieyes was 
 still one of the Consuls, conjointly with Bonaparte and 
 Roger Ducos ; and although Bonaparte had, from the first 
 moment, possessed the whole power of the government, 
 a sort of apparent equality was, nevertheless, observed 
 amongst them. It was not until the 25th of December 
 that Bonaparte assumed the title of First Consul, Cam- 
 baceres and Lebrun being then joined in the office with 
 him. He had fixed his eyes on them previously to the 
 18th Brumaire, and he had no cause to reproach them 
 with giving him much embarrassment in his rapid pro- 
 gress towards the imperial throne. 
 
 I have stated that I was so fortunate as to rescue M. 
 Moreau de Worms from the list of proscription. Some 
 days after Siuyes entered Bonaparte 2 s cabinet and said to 
 him, "Well, this M. Moreau de Worms, whom M. Bour- 
 rienne induced you to save from banishment, is acting 
 very finely ! I told you how it would be ! I have received 
 from Sens, his native place, a letter which informs me that 
 Moreau is in that town, where he has assembled the peo- 
 ple in the market-place, and indulged in the most violent 
 declamations against the 18th Brumaire." " Can you rely 
 upon your agent ? " asked Bonaparte. " Perfectly. I can
 
 292 MEMOIRS Off NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 answer for the truth of his communication." Bonaparte 
 showed me the bulletin of Sieyes' agent, and reproached 
 me bitterly. " What would you say, General," I observed, 
 " if I should present this same M. Moreau de Worms, who 
 is declaiming at Sens against the 18th Brumaire, to you 
 within an hour ? " " I defy you to do it." " I have made 
 myself responsible for him, and I know what I am about. 
 He is violent in his politics ; but he is a man of honour, 
 incapable of failing in his word." "Well, we shall see. 
 Go and find him." I was very sure of doing what I had 
 promised, for within an hour before I had seen M. Moreau 
 de Worms. He had been concealed since the 19th Bru- 
 maire, and had not quitted Paris. Nothing was easier than 
 to find him, and in three-quarters of an hour he was at the 
 Luxembourg. I presented him to Bonaparte, who con- 
 versed with him a long time concerning the 18th Bru- 
 maire. When M. Moreau departed Bonaparte said to me, 
 "You are right. That fool Sieyes is as inventive as a 
 Cassandra. This proves that one should not be too ready 
 to believe the reports of the wretches whom we are obliged 
 to employ in the police." Afterwards he added, "Bour- 
 rienne, Moreau is a nice fellow : I am satisfied with him ; 
 I will do something for him." It was not long before M. 
 Moreau experienced the effect of the Consul's good opin- 
 ion. Some days after, whilst framing the council of prizes, 
 he, at my mere suggestion, appointed M. Moreau one of 
 the members, with a salary of 10,000 francs. On what 
 extraordinary circumstances the fortunes of men frequently 
 depend ! As to Sieyes, in the intercourse, not very fre- 
 quent certainly, which I had with him, he appeared to be 
 far beneath the reputation which he then enjoyed. ' He 
 
 1 M. da Talleyrand, who is so capable of estimating men, and whose admirable 
 sayings well deserve to occnpy a place in history, had long entertained a similar 
 opinion of Si&yda. One day, when he was conversing with the Seconci Consul con- 
 cerning Si6y6s, Cambac6r6s said to him. " Sieyes, however, is a very profound man." 
 ''Profound?" said Talleyrand. "Yes, he is a cavity, a perfect cavity, as you 
 would say." Sourrienne, _
 
 1799. LIFE AT THE LUXEMBOURG. 293 
 
 reposed a blind confidence in a multitude of agents, whom 
 he sent into all parts of France. When it happened, on 
 other occasions, that I proved to him, by evidence as suffic- 
 ient as that in the case of M. Moreau, the falseness of the 
 reports he had received, he replied, with a confidence truly 
 ridiculous, " I can rely on my men. " Sieyes had written 
 in his countenance, " Give me money ! " I recollect that 
 I one day alluded to this expression in the anxious face of 
 Sieyes to the First Consul. "You are right," observed he 
 to me, smiling ; " when money is in question, Sieyes is 
 quite a matter-of-fact man. He sends his ideology to the 
 right about and thus becomes easily manageable. He 
 readily abandons his constitutional dreams for a good 
 round sum, and that is very convenient." ' 
 
 Bonaparte occupied, at the Little Luxembourg, the 
 apartments on the ground floor which lie to the right on 
 entering from the Rue de Vaugirard. His cabinet was 
 close to a private staircase, which conducted me to the 
 first floor, where Josephine dwelt. My apartment was 
 above. 
 
 After breakfast, which was served at ten o'clock, Bona- 
 parte would converse for a few moments with his usual 
 guests, that is to say, his aides de camp, the persons he 
 invited, and myself, who never left him. He was also 
 visited very often by Defermont, Kegnault (of the town of 
 St. Jean d'Angely), Boulay (de la Meurthe), Monge, and 
 Berlier, who were, with his brothers, Joseph and Lucien, 
 those whom he most delighted to see ; he conversed famil- 
 iarly with them. Cambaceres generally came at mid-day, 
 and stayed some time with him, often a whole hour. 
 Lebrun visited but seldom. Notwithstanding his eleva- 
 tion, his character remained unaltered ; and Bonaparte 
 
 1 Everybody knows, in fact, that Sieyes refused to resign his consular dignities 
 unless he received in exchange a beautiful farm situated in the park of Versailles, 
 and worth about 15,000 livres a year. The good abb6 consoled himself for no longer 
 forming a third of the republican sovereignty by making himself at home in th 
 ancient domain of the Kings of France. Bourrlenne.
 
 294 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 considered him too moderate, because be always opposed 
 his ambitious views and his plans to usurp power. When 
 Bonaparte left the breakfast-table it was seldom that he 
 did not add, after bidding Josephine and her daughter 
 Hortense good-day, " Come, Bourrienne, come, let us to 
 work." 
 
 After the morning audiences I stayed with Bonaparte 
 all the day, either reading to him, or writing to his dicta- 
 tion. Three or four times in the week he would go to 
 the Council. On his way to the hall of deliberation he 
 was obliged to cross the courtyard of the Little Luxem- 
 bourg and ascend the grand staircase. This always vexed 
 him, and the more so as the weather was very bad at the 
 time. This annoyance continued until the 25th of De- 
 cember, and it was with much satisfaction that he saw 
 himself quit of it. After leaving the Council he used to 
 enter his cabinet singing, and God knows how wretchedly 
 he sung ! He examined whatever work he had ordered 
 to be done, signed documents, stretched himself in his 
 arm-chair, and read the letters of the preceding day and 
 the publications of the morning. When there was no 
 Council he remained in his cabinet, conversed with me, 
 always sang, and cut, according to custom, the arm of his 
 chair, giving himself sometimes quite the air of a great 
 boy. Then, all at once starting up, he would describe a 
 plan for the erection of a monument, or dictate some of 
 those extraordinary productions which astonished and 
 dismayed the world. He often became again the same 
 man who, under the walls of St. Jean d'Acre, had dreamed 
 of an empire worthy his ambition. 
 
 At five o'clock dinner was served up. When that was 
 over the First Consul went upstairs to Josephine's apart- 
 ments, where he commonly received the visits of the 
 Ministers. He was always pleased to see among the num- 
 ber the Minister o f Foreign Affairs, especially since the 
 portfolio of that department had been entrusted to the
 
 4799. LIFE AT THE LUXEMBOURG. 295 
 
 hands of M. de Talleyrand. At midnight, and often 
 sooner, he gave the signal for retiring by saying in a hasty 
 manner, "Allans nous coucher." 
 
 It was at the Luxembourg, in the salons of which the 
 adorable Josephine so well performed the honours, that the 
 word Madame came again into use. This first return to- 
 wards the old French politeness was startling to some sus- 
 ceptible Kepublicans ; but things were soon carried farther 
 at the Tuileries by the introduction of Votre Altesse on 
 occasions of state ceremony, and Monseigneur in the 
 family circle. 
 
 If, on the one hand, Bonaparte did not like the men of 
 the Revolution, on the other he dreaded still more the 
 partisans of the Bourbons. Ou the mere mention of 
 the name of those princes he experienced a kind of inward 
 alarm ; and he often spoke of the necessity of raising a 
 wall of brass between France and them. To this feeling, 
 no doubt, must be attributed certain nominations, and 
 the spirit of some recommendations contained in the 
 notes with which he was supplied on the characters of 
 candidates, and which for ready reference were arranged 
 alphabetically. Some of the notes just mentioned were in 
 the handwriting of Regnault de St. Jean d'Angely, and 
 some in Lucien Bonaparte's. 1 
 
 1 Among them was the following, under the title of "General Observations": 
 " In choosing among the men who were members of the Constituent Assembly it ia 
 necessary to be on guard against the Orleans' party, which is not altogether a 
 chimera, and may one day or other prove dangerous. 
 
 "There is no doubt that the partisans of that family are intriguing secretly; 
 and among many other proofs of this fact the following is a striking one : the jour- 
 nal called the Aristarque, which undisgnisedly supports royalism, is conducted by a 
 man of the name of Voidel, one of the hottest patriots of the Eevolution. He was 
 for several months president of the committee of inquiry which caused the Marquis 
 de Favras to be arrested and hanged, and gave so much uneasiness to the Court. 
 There was no one in the Constituent Assembly more hateful to the Court than 
 Votdel, as much on account of his violence as for his connection with the Duke of 
 Orleans, whose advocate and counsel he was. When the Duke of Orleans was ar- 
 rested, Voidel, braving the fury of the revolutionary tribunals, had the courage to 
 defend him, and placarded all the walls of Paris with an apology for the Duke and 
 his two sons. This man, writing now in favour of royalism, can have no other object 
 than to advance a member of the Orleans family to the throne." Buurrtenne.
 
 296 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799. 
 
 At the commencement of the First Consul's administra- 
 tion, though he always consulted the notes he had collected, 
 he yet received with attention the recommendations of 
 persons with whom he was well acquainted ; but it was 
 not safe for them to recommend a rogue or a fool. The 
 men whom he most disliked were those whom he called 
 babblers, who are continually prating of everything and on 
 everything. He often said, " I want more head and less 
 tongue." What he thought of the regicides will be seen 
 farther on, but at first the more a man had given a gage 
 to the Revolution, the more he considered him as offering 
 a guarantee against the return of the former order of 
 things. Besides, Bonaparte was not the man to attend 
 to any consideration when once his policy was con- 
 cerned. 
 
 As I have said a few pages back, on taking ^the govern- 
 ment into his own hands Bonaparte knew so little of the 
 Revolution and of the men engaged in civil employments 
 that it was indispensably necessary for him to collect in- 
 formation from every quarter respecting men and things. 
 But when the conflicting passions of the moment became 
 more calm and the spirit of party more prudent, and when 
 order had been, by his severe investigations, introduced 
 where hitherto unbridled confusion had reigned, he be- 
 came gradually more scrupulous in granting places, 
 whether arising from newly-created offices, or from those 
 changes which the different departments often experi- 
 enced. He then said to me, " Bourrienne, I give up your 
 department to you. Name whom you please for the ap- 
 pointments ; but remember you must be responsible to 
 me." 
 
 What a list would that be which should contain the 
 names of all the prefects, sub-prefects, receivers-general, 
 and other civil officers to whom I gave places ! I have 
 kept no memoranda of their names ; and indeed, what 
 advantage would there have been in doing so? It was
 
 1799. PLACES UNDER THE NEW GOVERNMENT. 291 
 
 impossible for me to have a personal knowledge of all the 
 fortunate candidates ; but I relied on recommendations 
 in which I had confidence. 
 
 I have little to complain of in those I obliged ; though 
 it is true that, since my separation from Bonaparte, I have 
 seen many of them take the opposite side of the street in 
 which I was walking, and by that delicate attention save 
 me the trouble of raising my hat
 
 296 1799- 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 1799-1800. 
 
 Difficulties of a new Government State of Europe Bonaparte's wish 
 for peace M. de Talleyrand Minister for Foreign Affairs Negotia- 
 tions with England and Austria Their failure Bonaparte's views on 
 the East His sacrifices to policy General Bonaparte denounced to 
 the First Consul KleT>er's letter to the Directory Accounts of the 
 Egyptian expedition published in the Moniteur Proclamation to the 
 army of the East Favour and disgrace of certain individuals ac- 
 counted for. 
 
 WHEN a new Government rises on the ruins of one that 
 has been overthrown, its best chance of conciliating the 
 favour of the nation, if that nation be at war, is to hold 
 out the prospect of peace ; for peace is always dear to a 
 people. Bonaparte was well aware of this ; and if in his 
 heart he wished otherwise, he knew how important it was 
 to seem to desire peace. Accordingly, immediately after 
 his installation at the Luxembourg he notified to all the 
 foreign powers his acccession to the Consulate, and, for 
 the same purpose, addressed letters to all the diplomatic 
 agents of the French Government abroad. 
 
 The day after he got rid of his first two colleagues, 
 Sieyes and Roger Ducos, he prepared to open negotia- 
 tions with the Cabinet of London. At that time we were 
 at war with almost the whole of Europe. We had also 
 lost Italy. The Emperor of Germany was ruled by his 
 Ministers, who in their turn were governed by England. 
 It was no easy matter to manage equally the organisation 
 of the Consular Government and the no less important af- 
 fairs abroad ; and it was very important to the interests
 
 1800. FIBBT CONSUL TO GEORGE THE THIRD. 299 
 
 of the First Consul to intimate to foreign powers, -while 
 at the same time he assured himself against the return of 
 the Bourbons, that the system which he proposed to adopt 
 was a system of order and regeneration, unlike either the 
 demagogic violence of the Convention or the imbecile arti- 
 fice of the Directory. In fulfilment of this object Bona- 
 parte directed M. de Talleyrand, the new Minister for 
 Foreign Affairs, to make the first friendly overtures to 
 the English Cabinet. A correspondence ensued, which 
 was published at the time, and which showed at once the 
 conciliatory policy of Bonaparte and the arrogant policy 
 of England. 1 
 
 1 We give here the opening letters of this remarkable correspondence. 
 
 PABIS, le 5 Nivdse, an. VIII. (26tfi December 1799). 
 
 "French Republic. 
 " Sovereignty of the People Liberty Equality. 
 
 " BONAPARTE. FIRST CONSUL OF THE REPUBLIC, TO His MAJESTY THB 
 KINO OF GBEAT BBITAIN AND IRELAND. 
 
 " Called by the wishes of the French nation to occupy the First Magistracy of the 
 Eepubiic, I have thought proper, in commencing the discharge of the duties of this 
 office, to communicate the event directly to your Majesty. 
 
 " Must the war which for eight years has ravaged the four quarters of the world 
 be eternal ? Is there no room for accommodation ? How can the two most en- 
 lightened nations in Europe, stronger and more powerful than is necessary for their 
 safety and independence, sacrifice commercial advantages, internal prosperity, and 
 domestic happiness to vain ideas of grandeur? Whence is it that they do not feel 
 peace to be the first of wants as well as the first of glories ? 
 
 " These sentiments cannot be new to the heart of your Majesty, who rules over a 
 free nation with no other view than to render it happy. 
 
 " Tour Majesty will see in this overture only my sincere desire to contribute 
 effectually, for the second time, to a general pacification by a prompt step taken in 
 confidence, and freed from those forms which, however necessary to disguise the 
 apprehensions of feeble States, only serve to discover in those that are powerful a 
 mutual wish to deceive. 
 
 " France and England may, by the abuse of their strength, long defer the period 
 of its utter exhaustion, unhappily for all nations. But I will venture to say that 
 the fate of all civilised nations is concerned in the termination of a war the flames 
 of which are raging throughout the whole world. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, etc., 
 
 " (Signed) BONAPABTE." 
 
 " LORD GBBNVILLE IN REPLY TO THE MINISTBB OF POBEIGN RELATIONS 
 AT PABIS. 
 
 " DOWNING STREET, 4tfi January 1800. 
 " Sir I have received and laid before the King the two letters which you have
 
 300 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799^ 
 
 The exchange of notes which took place was attended 
 by no immediate result. However, the First Consul had 
 partly attained his object: if the British Government 
 would not enter into negotiations for peace, there was at 
 least reason to presume that subsequent overtures of the 
 Consular Government might be listened to. The corre- 
 spondence had at all events afforded Bonaparte the oppor- 
 tunity of declaring his principles, and above all, it had 
 enabled him to ascertain that the return of the Bourbons 
 to France [mentioned in the official reply of Lord Gren- 
 ville] would not be a sine qua non condition for the res- 
 toration of peace between the two powers. 
 
 Since M. de Talleyrand had been Minister for Foreign 
 Affairs the business of that department had proceeded 
 with great activity. It was an important advantage to 
 Bonaparte to find a nobleman of the old regime among the 
 republicans. The choice of M. de Talleyrand was in some 
 sort an act of courtesy to the foreign Courts. It was a 
 delicate attention to the diplomacy of Europe to introduce 
 to its members, for the purpose of treating with them, a 
 man whose rank was at least equal to their own, and who 
 was universally distinguished for a polished elegance of 
 manner combined with solid good qualities and real 
 talents. 
 
 It was not only with England that Bonaparte and his 
 Minister endeavoured to open negotiations ; the Consular 
 Cabinet also offered peace to the House of Austria ; but 
 not at the same time. The object of this offer was to 
 
 transmitted to me ; and his Majesty, seeing no reason to depart from those forms 
 which have long been established in Europe for transacting business with Foreign 
 States, has commanded me to return, in his name, the official answer which I send 
 you herewith enclosed. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, with high consideration, Sir, your most obedient humble 
 servant, 
 
 " (Signed) GBENVILI.I:." 
 
 The official letter of Lord Orenville to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, ana Talley- 
 rand's reply to it, wW be found in the edition 0/1836, but are too lengthy to repro- 
 duce here.
 
 TALLEYRAND.
 
 1800. BONAPABTE'S VIEWS ON THE EAST. 301 
 
 sow discord between the two powers. Speaking to me 
 one day of his earnest wish to obtain peace Bonaparte 
 said, " You see, Bourrienne, I have two great enemies to 
 cope with. I will conclude peace with the one I find most 
 easy to deal with. That will enable me immediately to 
 assail the other. I frankly confess that I should like best 
 to be at peace with England. Nothing would then be 
 more easy than to crush Austria. She has no money ex- 
 cept what she gets through England." 
 
 For a long time all negotiations proved abortive. None 
 of the European powers would acknowledge the new 
 Government, of which Bonaparte was the head ; and the 
 battle of Marengo was required before the peace of 
 Amiens could be obtained. 
 
 Though the affairs of the new Government afforded 
 abundant occupation to Bonaparte, he yet found leisure 
 to direct attention to the East to that land of despotism 
 whence, judging from his subsequent conduct, it might 
 be presumed he derived his first principles of government. 
 On becoming the head of the State he wished to turn 
 Egypt, which he had conquered as a general, to the ad- 
 vantage of his policy as Consul. If Bonaparte triumphed 
 over a feeling of dislike in consigning the command of 
 the army to Kleber, it was because he knew Kleber to be 
 more capable than any other of executing the plans he 
 had formed ; and Bonaparte was not the man to sacrifice 
 the interests of policy to personal resentment. It is cer- 
 tainly true that he then put into practice that charming 
 phrase of Moliere's " I pardon you, but you shall pay 
 me for this ! " 
 
 With respect to all whom he had left in Egypt Bona- 
 parte stood in a very singular situation. On becoming 
 Chief of the Government he was not only the depositary 
 of all communications made to the Directory ; but letters 
 sent to one address were delivered to another, and the 
 First Consul received the complaints made agaiait the
 
 302 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1799- 
 
 General who had so abruptly quitted Egypt. In almost 
 all the letters that were delivered to us he was the object 
 of serious accusation. According to some he had not 
 avowed his departure until the very day of his embarka- 
 tion ; and he had deceived everybody by means of false 
 and dissembling proclamations. Others canvassed his 
 conduct while in Egypt : the army which had triumphed 
 under his command he had abandoned when reduced to 
 two-thirds of its original force and a prey to all the 
 horrors of sickness and want. It must be confessed that 
 these complaints and accusations were but too well 
 founded, and one can never cease wondering at the chain 
 of fortunate circumstances which so rapidly raised Bona- 
 parte to the Consular seat. In the natural order of 
 things, and in fulfilment of the design which he him- 
 self had formed, he should have disembarked at Toulon, 
 where the quarantine laws would no doubt have been ob- 
 served ; instead of which, the fear of the English and the 
 uncertainty of the pilots caused him to go to Frejus, where 
 the quarantine laws were violated by the very persons 
 most interested in respecting them. Let us suppose that 
 Bonaparte had baen forced to perform quarantine at 
 Toulon. What would have ensued ? The charges against 
 him would have fallen into the hands of the Directory, 
 and he would probably have been suspended, and put 
 upon his trial. 
 
 Among the letters which fell into Bonaparte's hands, 
 by reason of the abrupt change of government, was an 
 official despatch (of the 4th Vendemiaire, year VIII. ) from 
 General Kleber at Cairo to the Executive Directory, in 
 which that general spoke in very stringent terms of the 
 sudden departure of Bonaparte and of the state in which 
 the army in Egypt had been left. General Kleber further 
 accused him of having evaded, by his flight, the difficulties 
 which he thus transferred to his successor's shoulders, 
 and also of leaving the army " without a sou in the chest,"
 
 1800. LETTERS FROM THE EAST. 303 
 
 with pay in arrear, and very little supply of munitions or 
 clothing. 
 
 The other letters from Egypt were not less accusatory 
 than Kleber's ; and it cannot be doubted that charges of 
 BO precise a nature, brought by the general who had now 
 become commander-in-chief against his predecessor, 
 would have had great weight, especially backed as they 
 were by similar complaints from other quarters. A trial 
 would have been inevitable ; and then, no 18th Brumaire, 
 no Consulate, no Empire, no conquest of Europe but 
 also, it may be added, no St. Helena. None of these 
 events would have ensued had not the English squadron, 
 when it appeared off Corsica, obliged the Muiron to scud 
 about at hazard, and to touch at the first land she could 
 reach. 
 
 The Egyptian expedition filled too important a place in 
 the life of Bonaparte for him to neglect frequently re- 
 viving in the public mind the recollection of his conquests 
 in the East. It was not to be forgotten that the head of 
 the Republic was the first of her generals. While 
 Moreau received the command of the armies of the 
 Rhine, while Massena, as a reward for the victory of 
 Zurich, was made Commander-in-Chief in Italy, and 
 while Brune was at the head of the army of Batavia, 
 Bonaparte, whose soul was in the camps, consoled him- 
 self for his temporary inactivity by a retrospective glance 
 on his past triumphs. He was unwilling that Fame 
 should for a moment cease to blazon his name. Accord- 
 ingly, as soon as he was established at the head of the 
 Government, he caused accounts of his Egyptian expedi- 
 tion to be from time to time published in the Moniteur. 
 He frequently expressed his satisfaction that the accusa- 
 tory correspondence, and, above all, Kleber's letter, had 
 fallen into his own hands. 1 Such was Bonaparte's perfect 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte (Erreurt, tome i. p. 255) remarks on this passage : " Having 
 communicated this letter to ui, the Consul, laughing at my indignation, laid, If
 
 304 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 
 
 self-command that immediately after perusing that letter 
 he dictated to me the following proclamation, addressed 
 to the army of the East : 
 
 SOLDIERS I The Consuls of the French Republic frequently 
 direct their attention to the army of the East. 
 
 France acknowledges all the influence of your conquests on th 
 restoration of her trade and the civilisation of the world. 
 
 The eyes of all Europe are upon you, and in thought I am often 
 with you. 
 
 In whatever situation the chances of war may place you, prove 
 yourselves still the soldiers of Bivoli and Ahoukir you will be in- 
 vincible. 
 
 Place in Kleber the boundless confidence which you reposed in 
 me. He deserves it. 
 
 Soldiers, think of the day when you will return victorious to the 
 sacred territory of France. That will be a glorious day for the 
 whole nation. 
 
 Nothing can more forcibly show the character of Bona- 
 parte than the above allusion to Kleber, after he had seen 
 the way in which Kleber spoke of him to the Directory. 
 Could it ever have been imagined that the correspondence 
 of the army, to whom he addressed this proclamation, 
 teemed with accusations against him? Though the major- 
 ity of these accusations were strictly just, yet it is but fair 
 to state that the letters from Egypt contained some 
 calumnies. In answer to the well-founded portion of the 
 charges Bonaparte said little ; but he seemed to feel deep- 
 ly the falsehoods that were stated against him, one of 
 which was, that he had carried away millions from Egypt. 
 I cannot conceive what could have given rise to this false 
 and impudent assertion. So far from having touched 
 the army chest, Bonaparte had not even received all his 
 own pay. Before he constituted himself the Government 
 the Government was his debtor. 
 
 Kleber were here, I would appoint him Governor of Paris, and he would do good 
 service.' " But Bee also Miot's account of the reception of the newi of the death of 
 KlAber, when he says Napoleon (as reported by Joseph, it ii true) looked oa it at a 
 fresh favour of fortune (Jfiot, tome i. p. 290).
 
 1800. INDIVIDUAL FAVOURS AND DISGRACES. 305 
 
 Though he knew well all that was to be expected from 
 the Egyptian expedition, yet those who lauded that affair 
 were regarded with a favourable eye by Bonaparte. The 
 correspondence which had fallen into his hands was to him 
 of the highest importance in enabling him to ascertain the 
 opinions which particular individuals entertained of him. 
 It was the source of favours and disgraces which those 
 who were not in the secret could not account for. It 
 serves to explain why many men of mediocrity were ele- 
 vated to the highest dignities and honours, while other 
 men of real merit fell into disgrace or were utterly 
 neglected. 1 
 
 1 Bonaparte's praise of General Kleber, after that general's attack upon him t 
 the Directory alluded to orer leaf, which may be due only t the policy of the 
 moment, should, however, be borne in mind. 
 
 VOL. I. 20
 
 S06 . 1800. 
 
 CHAPTER 
 1800. 
 
 Great and common men Portrait of Bonaparte The varied expression of 
 his countenance His convulsive shrug Presentiment of his cor- 
 pulency Partiality for bathing His temperance His alleged capa- 
 bility of dispensing with sleep Good and bad news Shaving, and 
 reading the journals Morning business Breakfast Coffee and snuff 
 Bonaparte's idea of his own situation His ill opinion of mankind 
 His dislike of a tete-d-tete His hatred of the Revolutionists Ladies 
 in white Anecdotes Bonaparte's tokens of kindness, and his droll 
 compliments His fits of ill humour Sound of bells Gardens of 
 Malmaison His opinion of medicine His memory His poetic in- 
 sensibility His want of gallantry Cards and conversation The 
 dress-coat and black cravatBonaparte's payments His religious 
 ideas His obstinacy. 
 
 IN perusing the history of the distinguished characters of 
 past ages, how often do we regret that the historian should 
 have portrayed the hero rather than the man ! We wish 
 to know even the most trivial habits of those whom great 
 talents and vast reputation have elevated above their 
 fellow -creatures. Is this the effect of mere curiosity, or 
 rather is it not an involuntary feeling of vanity which 
 prompts us to console ourselves for the superiority of 
 great men by reflecting on their faults, their weaknesses, 
 their absurdities ; in short, all the points of resemblance 
 between them and common men ? For the satisfaction of 
 those who are curious in details of this sort, I will here 
 endeavour to paint Bonaparte, as I saw him, in person and 
 in mind, to describe what were his tastes and habits, and 
 even his whims and caprices. 
 
 Bonaparte was now ia the prime of life, and about thirty.
 
 1800. PORTRAIT OF BONAPARTE. 307 
 
 The person of Bonaparte has served as a model for the 
 most skilful painters and sculptors ; many able French 
 artists have successfully delineated his features, and yet it 
 may be said that no perfectly faithful portrait of him exists. 
 His finely-shaped head, his superb forehead, his pale 
 countenance, and his usual meditative look, have been 
 transferred to the canvas ; but the versatility of his ex- 
 pression was beyond the reach of imitation. All the 
 various workings of his mind were instantaneously de- 
 picted in his countenance ; and his glance changed from 
 mild to severe, and from angry to good-humoured, almost 
 with the rapidity of lightning. It may truly be said that 
 he had a particular look for every thought that arose in 
 his mind. 
 
 Bonaparte had beautiful hands, and he was very proud 
 of them ; while conversing he would often look at them 
 with an air of self-complacency. He also fancied he had 
 fine teeth, but his pretension to that advantage was not so 
 well founded as his vanity on the score of his hands. 
 
 When walking, either alone or in company with any one, 
 in his apartments or in his gardens, he had the habit of 
 stooping a little, and crossing his hands behind his back. 
 He frequently gave an involuntary shrug of his right 
 shoulder, which was accompanied by a movement of his 
 mouth from left to right. This habit was always most re- 
 markable when his mind was absorbed in the considera- 
 tion of any profound subject. It was often while walking 
 that he dictated to me his most important notes. 1 He 
 
 1 Napoleon always walked while dictating. He sometimes began while seated, 
 but at the first word he rose. He began walking in the room where he was, and 
 walked up and down it. This promenade lasted all the time he was dictating. A 
 he entered into his subject he experienced a sort of " tic," Consisting in a movement 
 of his right arm, which he twisted, while pulling with his hand the lining of the cuff 
 of his coat. Still, his delivery was not quickened by this movement, his step was 
 also alow and measured. 
 
 Expressions came without effort to render his thoughts. If they were sometimes 
 incorrect, this very incorrectness added to their energy, and always marvellously 
 depicted to the mind what he wished to say. . . . Napoleon seldom wrote him- 
 elf . Writing was a fatigue for him. His hand could not follow the rapidity of his
 
 308 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 could endure great fatigue, not only on horseback but on 
 foot ; he would sometimes walk for five or six hours in 
 succession without being aware of it. 
 
 When walking with any person whom he treated with 
 familiarity he would link his arm into that of his com- 
 panion, and lean on it. 
 
 He used often to say to me, "You see, Bourrienne, 
 how temperate, and how thin I am ; but, in spite of that, 
 I cannot help thinking that at forty I shall become a great 
 eater, and get very fat. I foresee that my constitution 
 will undergo a change. I take a great deal of exercise ; 
 but yet I feel assured that my presentiment will be ful- 
 filled." This idea gave him great uneasiness, and as I 
 observed nothing which seemed to warrant his appre- 
 hensions, I omitted no opportunity of assuring him that 
 they were groundless. But he would not listen to me, and 
 all the time I was about him, he was haunted by this pre- 
 sentiment, which, in the end, was but too well verified. 
 
 His partiality for the bath he mistook for a necessity. 
 He would usually remain in the bath two hours, during 
 which time I used to read to him extracts from the journals 
 and pamphlets of the day, for he was anxious to hear and 
 know all that was going on. While in the bath he was 
 continually turning on the warm water to raise the temper- 
 ature, 30 that I was sometimes enveloped in such a dense 
 
 conception. His writing was an assemblage of indecipherable characters without 
 connection. Half of the letters of each word were deficient. He could not read it 
 over himself or would not take the trouble to do so. If any explanation were asked 
 of him, he retook his draft, which he tore or threw into the fire, while he dictated 
 afresh, giving the same ideas, but with different expressions and words. His spelling 
 was incorrect, though he knew well enough to point out errors in the writings of 
 others. ... In figures, where there is absolute and positive exactness, Napoleon 
 also committed errors. It is, however, right to say that these errors were not always 
 committed undesignedly. For instance, he always increased the total of the number 
 of men composing his battalioni, regiments, and divisions. Whatever representa- 
 tions were made to him he repulsed the evidence, and obstinately persisted in hii 
 voluntary error in calculation. His writing was illegible, and he detested any writings 
 which were difficult to read. His notes, or the few lines he happened to write, and 
 which did not require any effort of the mind, were generally exempt from faults of 
 spelling, except in certain words which were always wrong. For instance, h wroto 
 " cabinet " as " 0abinet " (Afeneaal, tome iii. p. 118-121).
 
 1800. PARTIALITY FOR BATHING. 309 
 
 vapour that I could not see to read, and was obliged to 
 open the door. 1 
 
 Bonaparte was exceedingly temperate, and averse to all 
 excess. He knew the absurd stories that were circulated 
 about him, and he was sometimes vexed at them. It has 
 been repeated, over and over again, that he was subject to 
 attacks of epilepsy ; but during the eleven years that I was 
 almost constantly with him I never observed any symptom 
 which in the least degree denoted that malady. His health 
 was good and his constitution sound. If his enemies, by 
 way of reproach, have attributed to him a serious peri- 
 odical disease, his flatterers, probably under the idea that 
 sleep is incompatible with greatness, have evinced an equal 
 disregard of truth in speaking of his night-watching. 
 Bonaparte made others watch, but he himself slept, and 
 slept well. His orders were that I should call him every 
 morning at seven. I was therefore the first to enter his 
 chamber ; but very frequently when I awoke him he would 
 turn himself, and say, " Ah, Bourrienne ! let me lie a little 
 longer." When there was no very pressing business I did 
 not disturb him again till eight o'clock. He in general 
 slept seven hours out of the twenty-four, besides taking a 
 short nap in the afternoon." 
 
 1 At St. Helena he is said to have continued in the bath three hours at * time. 
 May not his immoderate use of baths of very high temperature hare contributed t 
 produce the premature corpulency which he so greatly dreaded ? I recollect having 
 several times hinted such a possibility to him. Bourrienne. 
 
 1 Bonaparte rose at uncertain hours, but ordinarily at seven o'clock. When he 
 awoke in the night he sometimes began to work, or he bathed, or ate. His awaken- 
 ing was generally melancholy, and appeared painful. Not infrequently he had 
 convulsive spasms in the stomach, which made him vomit. Sometimes he seemed 
 much disquieted by such attacks, as if he dreaded having been poisoned, and then 
 there was great difficulty to prevent him increasing this tendency by trying all he 
 could to excite the vomiting. I have this detail from Corvisart, his chief physician 
 (Remusat, tome ii. p. 335). 
 
 Napoleon knew that I (Meneval) did not possess the precious faculty enjoyed by 
 him of sleeping at will, and that it was impossible for me to sleep during the day. 
 After any work which had occupied part of the night he recommended me to take a 
 bath, and often he himself gave orders for preparing one for me. Sometimes he 
 passed entire days without working, and still he did not leave his palace or even his 
 abinet. He seemed puzzled how to employ his time on such days of an idleness
 
 310 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Among the private instructions which Bonaparte gave 
 me, one was very curious. " During the night," said he, 
 " enter my chamber as seldom as possible. Do not awake 
 me when you have any good news to communicate : with 
 that there is no hurry. But when you bring bad news, 
 rouse me instantly ; for then there is not a moment to be 
 lost." 
 
 This was a wise regulation, and Bonaparte found his 
 advantage in it. 
 
 As soon as he rose his valet de chambre shaved him and 
 dressed his hair. While he was being shaved I read to 
 him the newspapers, beginning always with the Moniteur. 1 
 He paid little attention to any but the German and Eng- 
 lish papers. " Pass over all that," he would say, while I 
 was perusing the French papers; "I know it already. 
 They say only what they think will please me." I was 
 often surprised that his valet did not cut him while I was 
 
 which was only apparent, for if the body were inactive his mind was not. He would 
 pass an hour with the Empress, then return, sit on his sofa and sleep, or appear to 
 sleep, for some moments. He would then sit on a corner of my desk, or on the arm 
 of my chair, sometimes on my knees, he would put his arm round my neck, and 
 amuse himself by gently pulling my ear. or striking me on the shoulder or cheek. 
 He talked disjointedly of himself, his fancies, his organisation, of me, or of any plan 
 he had in his head. He liked to jest on one, but never in a rough or disagreeable 
 manner, but, on the contrary, laughingly and with real kindness. . . . He read 
 aloud, then he closed the book and walked up and down, (Claiming. . . . The 
 passages he repeated with the most pleasure were 
 
 " J'ai servi, commando, vaincu, quarante annees." 
 " Du monde entre mes mains j'ai vu les destinees." 
 " Et j'ai toujours connu qu'en chaque 6venement." 
 " Le destin des fitats dependait d'un moment." . . . 
 
 When he was tired of reading poetry he would sing with a strong but false voice 
 (Menceal, tome iii. pp. 134-126), 
 
 1 Often enough I took the morning papers to the Emperor, and while he finished 
 dressing I read to him the articles he pointed out to me, or those I believed likely 
 to attract his attention. They almost always caused him to make some observa- 
 tions. His chief physician, Corvisart, or his surgeon-in-ordinary Ivan, sometimes 
 were present at his toilet. The Emperor liked challenging Corvisart about medical 
 matters, and he always did so by sallies and bitter remarks against doctors. Cor- 
 visart, while acknowledging the uncertainty of medicine, defended its utility with 
 arguments strong enough to often stop the sarcasms of his antagonist on his very 
 lips (Meneval, tome i. pp. 143, 144).
 
 1800. BONAPARTE'S TASTES AND HABITS. 811 
 
 reading ; for whenever he heard anything interesting ho 
 turned quickly round towards me. 1 
 
 When Bonaparte had finished his toilet, which he did 
 with great attention, for he was scrupulously neat in his 
 person, we went down to his cabinet. There he signed 
 the orders on important petitions which had been analysed 
 by me on the preceding evening. On reception and pa- 
 rade days he was particularly exact in signing these orders, 
 because I used to remind him that he would be likely to 
 see most of the petitioners, and that they would ask him 
 for answers. To spare him this annoyance I used often 
 to acquaint them beforehand of what had been granted or 
 refused, and what had been the decision of the First Con- 
 sul. He next perused the letters which I had opened and 
 laid on his table, ranging them according to their impor- 
 tance. He directed me to answer them in his name ; he 
 occasionally wrote the answers himself, but not often. 
 
 At ten o'clock the maitre d'hdtel entered, and announced 
 breakfast, saying, " The General is served." * We went 
 to breakfast, and the repast was exceedingly simple. He 
 ate almost every morning some chicken, dressed with oil 
 and onions. This dish was then, I believe, called poulet d 
 la Provenpale; but our restaurateurs have since conferred 
 upon it the more ambitious name of poulet d la Marengo. 3 
 
 * > It was Constant's task to shave Bonaparte, and he thus speaks of the difficulties 
 he experienced in the discharge of this duty : 
 
 "While I was shaving him he would often converse, read the journals, move 
 restlessly in his chair, or turn round suddenly, so that I was obliged to observe the 
 utmost caution in order to avoid cutting him. Luckily that misfortune never 
 occurred to me. When by chance he was not engaged in conversation or reading, 
 he would sit as motionless as a statue, and I could not get him to raise, lower, or 
 incline his head to facilitate my operation. He had a singular whim of having only 
 one side of his face soaped and shaved at once ; and he would not allow me to pro- 
 ceed to the other side until the first was finished " (Mimoires de Constant). 
 
 Constant adds that Bonaparte could not shave himself until he instructed him in 
 the mode of holding and applying the razor ; but that, owing to his natural impa- 
 tience and hastiness of manner, he never attempted the operation without severely 
 cutting himself. 
 
 3 This, of course, refers to the time when we were at the Luxembourg- Sour- 
 rienne. 
 
 3 Napoleon was irregular in his meals, and ate fast and ill ; but there again was
 
 812 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Bonaparte drank little wine, always either claret or 
 Burgundy, and the latter by preference. After breakfast, 
 as well as after dinner, he took a cup of strong coffee. ' I 
 never saw him take any between his meals, and I cannot 
 imagine what could have given rise to the assertion of his 
 being particularly fond of coffee. When he worked late 
 at night he never ordered coffee, but chocolate, of which 
 he made me take a cup with him. But this only hap- 
 pened when our business was prolonged till two or three 
 in the morning.* 
 
 to be traced that absolute will which he carried into everything which he did. The 
 moment appetite was felt it was necessary that it should be satisfied, and his estab- 
 lishment was so arranged that in all places, and at all hours, chicken, cutlets, and 
 coffee might be forthcoming at a word (Brillat Savartn, tome i. p. 262). 
 
 The habit of eating fast and carelessly is supposed to have paralysed Napoleon on 
 two of the most critical occasions of his life the battles of Borodino and Leipzig. 
 On each of these occasions he is known to have been suffering from indigestion. 
 On the third day of Dresden, too (as the German novelist Hoffman, who was in the 
 town, asserts), the Emperor's energies were impaired by the effects of a shoulder of 
 mutton stuffed with onions. There can be no doubt that Napoleon's irregularity as 
 to meals injured his health and shortened his life. 
 
 The general order to his household to have cutlets and roast chicken ready at all 
 hours, night and day, was observed to the letter by his maitre <fh6tel, Dunand, 
 who had been a celebrated cook. In his more dignified capacity he contrived to 
 fall in with the humours of his Imperial master, and by so doing to be of essential 
 use at critical emergencies when an hour of prolonged flurry or irritation might 
 have cost a province or a throne. On one occasion, when matters had gone wrong 
 in some quarter, Napoleon returned from the Conseil d'etat in one of his worst 
 tempers and most discontented moods. A dejeuner <J la fourchette comprising his 
 favourite dishes was served up, and Napoleon, who had fasted since daybreak, took 
 his seat. But he had hardly swallowed a mouthful when apparently some Inoppor- 
 tune thought or recollection stung his brain to madness ; receding from the table 
 without rising from his chair he uplifted his foot and crash went the dejeuner to the 
 ground, while the Etnperor, springing up, paced the room with rapid and perturbed 
 strides, indicative of frenzied rage. Dunand looked on without moving a muscle, 
 and quietly gave the fitting orders to his staff. Quick as thought the wreck was 
 cleared away, an exact duplicate of the dejeuner appeared as if by magic, and itn 
 presence was quietly announced by the customary " Sa Jfajeste est tervie." Napo- 
 leon felt the delicacy and appreciated the tact of this mode of service. " JUerci bien, 
 man cfter Dunand ! " and one of his inimitable smiles, showed that the hurricane 
 had blown over (Hay ward's Art of Dining, p. 62). 
 
 1 M. Brillat de Savarin, whose memory is dear to all gourmands, had established, 
 as a gastronomic principle, that " he who does not take coffee after each meal is 
 assuredly not a man of taste." Bourrienne. 
 
 a Meneval says of the night work of the Emperor: "I would find him in hia 
 white dressing-gown, with a Madras handkerchief on his head, walking up and 
 down his cabinet, with his hands crossed behind his back, or else dipping in his 
 muff-box, less from liking than from preoccupation, fox he only smelt the snuff,
 
 x800. BONAPARTE'S TASTES AND HABIT& 318 
 
 All that has been said about Bonaparte's immoderate 
 use of snuff has no more foundation in truth than his pre- 
 tended partiality for coffee. It is true that at an early 
 period of his life he began to take snuff, but it was very 
 sparingly, and always out of a box ; and if he bore any re- 
 semblance to Frederick the Great, it was not by filling 
 his waistcoat-pockets with snuff, for I must again observe 
 he carried his notions of personal neatness to a fastidious 
 degree. 1 
 
 Bonaparte had two ruling passions, glory and war. He 
 was never more gay than in the camp, and never more 
 morose than in the inactivity of peace. Plans for the 
 construction of public monuments also pleased his imag- 
 ination, and filled up the void caused by the want of active 
 occupation. He was aware that monuments form part 
 of the history of nations, of whose civilisation they bear 
 evidence for ages after those who created them have dis- 
 
 and his handkerchiefs of white cambric were not soiled by it. His ideas developed 
 under his dictation with an abundance and a clearness that showed his attention was 
 much drawn to the object of his work. They leapt from his head aa Minerva, all 
 armed, from the head of Jupiter. When the work was ended, and sometimes in 
 the middle of it, he had ices or sherbet brought. He asked me which I preferred, 
 and his care went so far as to advise me which he thought best for my health. 
 After this he returned to bed, if it were only for an hour, and fell asleep again as if 
 he had not been interrupted. . . . When the Emperor rose in the night without 
 any object except to occupy his sleepless hours, he forbad my being awakened 
 before seven o'clock in the morning. Then I found my desk covered with reports 
 and papers annotated by him" (Meneval, tome i. pp. 134-136). 
 
 1 It has been alleged that liis Majesty took an inordinate deal of snuff, and that 
 in order to take it with the greater facility he carrier! it in his waistcoat-pockets, 
 which for that purpose were lined with leather. This is altogether untrue. The 
 fact is, the Emperor never took snuff except from a snuff-box, and though he used a 
 great deal, he actually took but very little. He would frequently hold the snuff-box 
 to his nose merely to smell the snuff ; at other times he would take a pinch, and 
 after smelling it for a moment, he would throw it away. Thus it frequently hap- 
 pened that the spot where he was sitting or standing was strewed with snuff ; but 
 his handkerchiefs, which were of the finest cambric, were scarcely ever soiled. 
 Napoleon had a great collection of snuff-boxes ; but those which he preferred were 
 of dark tortoiseshel), lined with gold, and ornamented with cameos or antique 
 medals in gold or silver. Their form was a narrow oval, with hinged lids. He 
 did not like round boxes, because it was necessary to employ both hands to open 
 them, and in this operation he not unfreqnently let the box or the lid fall. His 
 snuff wan generally very coarse rappee ; but he sometimes liked to have seven) 
 kinds of snuff mixed together (Memoir es de Coiutunt).
 
 814 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 180a 
 
 appeared from the earth, and that they likewise often 
 bear false witness to remote posterity of the reality oi 
 merely fabulous conquests. Bonaparte was, however, 
 mistaken as to the mode of accomplishing the object he 
 had in view. His ciphers, his trophies, and subsequently 
 his eagles, splendidly adorned the monuments of his reign. 
 But why did he wish to stamp false initials on things with 
 which neither he nor his reign had any connection ; as, 
 for example the old Louvre ? Did he imagine that the 
 letter " N," which everywhere obtruded itself on the eye, 
 had in it a charm to controvert the records of history, or 
 alter the course of time ? ' 
 
 Be this as it may, Bonaparte well knew that the fine 
 arts entail lasting glory on great actions, and consecrate 
 the memory of princes who protect and encourage them. 
 He oftener than once said to me, "A great reputation 
 is a great noise ; the more there is made, the farther off it 
 is heard. Laws, institutions, monuments, nations, all fall ; 
 but the noise continues and resounds in after ages." 
 This was one of his favourite ideas. "My power," he 
 would say at other times, " depends on my glory, and my 
 
 1 When Louis XVIII. returned to the Tuileries in 1814 he found that Bonaparte 
 had been an excellent tenant, and that he had left everything in very good condi- 
 tion. Some one having called his attention to the profusion of N's which were 
 conspicuous in every part of the palace, the monarch appropriately quoted the 
 following lines of La Fontaine : 
 
 "II aura volontiers ecrit sur son chapean, 
 C'est moi qui suis Quillot, berger de ce troupeau." Bourrienne. 
 
 Th Bourbons might have been' more grateful for the improvements in the 
 Tuileries made by Napoleon. When the Comte d'Artois entered Paris in 1814 " h 
 was struck when he saw how much had been made of the Tuileries, the beauty of 
 the Place du Carrousel and of the garden. ' Can you imagine that I have heard a 
 hundred times people saying at Versailles that there was nothing to be made of the 
 Tuileries, and that it was made up of a Jot of garrets ? And here are convenient 
 and magnificent apartments 1 What I it waa an officer of Bonaparte's Court that 
 occupied the rooms where we now are ? It is incredible ! ' " (Seugnot, tome ii. p. 
 122). Indeed Louis himself seems, later, to have acknowledged this, as on Metter- 
 nich remarking that he had passed many hours with Napoleon in the same room in 
 which in 1814 he found the King, " It must be allowed," answered the King, " that 
 Napoleon waa a very good tenant. He made everything most comfortable. H 
 fcas arranged everything excellently for me ! " (Xetterntcft, tome i, p. 248).
 
 1800. GROWING LOVE FOR FRANCE. 315 
 
 glory on my victories. My power would fall were I not to 
 support it by new glory and new victories. Conquest 
 has made me what I am, and conquest alone can main- 
 tain me." This was then, and probably always continued 
 to be, his predominant idea, and that which prompted 
 him continually to scatter the seeds of war through Eu- 
 rope. He thought that if he remained stationary he 
 would fall, and he was tormented with the desire of con- 
 tinually advancing. Not to do something great and de- 
 cided was, in his opinion, to do nothing. "A newly-born 
 Government," said he to me, " must dazzle and astonish. 
 When it ceases to do that it falls." It was vain to look 
 for rest from a man who was restlessness itself. 
 
 His sentiments towards France now differed widely from 
 what I had known them to be in his youth. He long in- 
 dignantly cherished the recollection of the conquest of 
 Corsica, which he was once content to regard as his coun- 
 try. But that recollection was effaced, and it might be 
 said that he now ardently loved France. His imagination 
 was fired by the very thought of seeing her great, happy, 
 and powerful, and, as the first nation in the world, dictat- 
 ing laws to the rest. He fancied his name inseparably 
 connected with France, and resounding in the ears of pos- 
 terity. In all his actions he lost sight of the present mo- 
 ment, and thought only of futurity ; so, in all places where 
 he led the way to glory, the opinion of France was ever pres- 
 ent in his thoughts. As Alexander at Arbela prided him- 
 self less in having conquered Darius than in having gained 
 the suffrage of the Athenians, so Bonaparte at Marengo 
 was haunted by the idea of what would be said in France. 
 
 Before he fought a battle Bonaparte thought little about 
 what he should do in case of success, but a great deal 
 about what he should do in case of a reverse of fortune. I 
 mention this as a fact of which I have often been a witness, 
 and I leave to his brothers in arms to decide whether his 
 calculations were always correct. He had it in his power
 
 316 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 to do much, for he risked everything and spared nothing. 
 His inordinate ambition goaded him on to the attain- 
 ment of power ; and power when possessed served only 
 to augment his ambition. Bonaparte was thoroughly con- 
 vinced of the truth that trifles often decide the greatest 
 events ; therefore he watched rather than provoked op- 
 portunity, and when the right moment approached, he sud- 
 denly took advantage of it. It is curious that, amidst all 
 the anxieties of war and government, the fear of the Bour- 
 bons incessantly pursued him, and the Faubourg St. Ger- 
 main was to him always a threatening phantom. 1 
 
 He did not esteem mankind, whom, indeed, he despised 
 more and more in proportion as he became acquainted 
 with them. In him this unfavourable opinion of human 
 nature was justified by many glaring examples of baseness, 
 and he used frequently to repeat, " There are two levers 
 for moving men, interest and fear." What respect, in- 
 deed, could Bonaparte entertain for the applicants to the 
 treasury of the opera ? Into this treasury the gaming- 
 houses paid a considerable sum, part of which went to 
 cover the expenses of that magnificent theatre. The rest 
 was distributed in secret gratuities, which were paid on 
 orders signed by Duroc. Individuals of very different 
 characters were often seen entering the little door in the 
 Rue Rameau. The lady who was for a while the favourite 
 of the General-in-Chief in Egypt, and whose husband was 
 maliciously sent back by the English, was a frequent visi- 
 tor to the treasury. On one occasion would be seen 
 assembled there a distinguished scholar and an actor, a 
 celebrated orator and a musician ; on another, the treas- 
 urer would have payments to make to a priest, a courte- 
 san, and a cardinal. 2 
 
 > I have been informed on good authority that after I quitted France orders were 
 given for intercepting even notes of invitation to dinners, etc. The object of thii 
 measure was, either to prevent assemblies of any kind, or to render them less nuraer 
 ous, and to ascertain the names of the guests. Eourrienne. 
 
 a This, of course, refers to Cardinal Fesch (see p. 213).
 
 1800. INSENSIBILITY TO FRIENDSHIP. 317 
 
 One of Bonaparte's greatest misfortunes was, that he 
 neither believed in friendship nor felt the necessity of 
 loving. How often have I heard him say, " Friendship is 
 but a name ; I love nobody. I do not even love my 
 brothers. Perhaps Joseph, a little, from habit and be- 
 cause he is my elder ; and Duroc, I love him too. But 
 why ? Because his character pleases me. He is stern 
 and resolute ; and I really believe the fellow never shed a 
 tear. 1 For my part, I know very well that I have no true 
 friends. As long as I continue what I am, I may have as 
 many pretended friends as I please. Leave sensibility to 
 women ; it is their business. But men should be firm in 
 heart and in purpose, or they should have nothing to do 
 with war or government." 
 
 In his social relations Bonaparte's temper was bad ; but 
 his fits of ill -humour passed away like a cloud, and spent 
 themselves in words. His violent language and bitter im- 
 precations were frequently premeditated. When he was 
 going to reprimand any one he liked to have a witness 
 present. He would then say the harshest things, and level 
 blows against which few could bear up. But he never 
 gave way to those violent ebullitions of rage until he ac- 
 quired undoubted proofs of the misconduct of those 
 against whom they were directed. In scenes of this sort 
 I have frequently observed that the presence of a third 
 person seemed to give him confidence. Consequently, in 
 a tete-d-tete interview, any one who knew his character, and 
 who could maintain sufficient coolness and firmness, was 
 sure to get the better of him. He told his friends at St. 
 Helena that he admitted a third person on such occasions 
 only that the blow might resound the farther. That was 
 not his real motive, or the better way would have been to 
 perform the scene in public. He had other reasons. I 
 
 1 Dnroc must not be judged of from what Bonaparte said, under the idea that h 
 was complimenting him. Duroc's manners, it is true, were reserved and somewhat 
 cold, but there were few better or kinder men. JBourrientu,
 
 318 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 observed that he did not like a t&e-d-t&e ; and when he 
 expected any one, he would say to me beforehand, 
 "Bourrienne, you may remain; " and when any one was 
 announced whom he did not expect, as a minister or a 
 general, if I rose to retire he would say in a half- whisper, 
 " Stay where you are." Certainly this was not done with 
 the design of getting what he said reported abroad ; for it 
 belonged neither to my character nor my duty to gossip 
 about what I had heard. Besides, it may be presumed, 
 that the few who were admitted as witnesses to the con- 
 ferences of Napoleon were aware of the consequences at- 
 tending indiscreet disclosures under a Government which 
 was made acquainted with all that was said and done. 1 
 
 Bonaparte entertained a profound dislike of the sanguin- 
 ary men of the Revolution, and especially of the regicides. 
 He felt, as a painful burden, the obligation of dissembling 
 towards them. He spoke to me in terms of horror of 
 
 1 Meneval (the successor of Bourrienne as secretary) says of this (tome iii. p. 3) : 
 " When Napoleon was excited by any violent passion his countenance took a severe 
 and even terrible expression. His eyes flashed, while a sort of rotatory movement 
 took place on his forehead between his eyebrows ; and his nostrils distended from 
 the passion within. But these transitory emotions, whatever was their cause, never 
 disordered his mind. He seemed to govern at will these explosions, which indeed 
 became less and less frequent with time. His head remained cold, his blood never 
 ran to it, but flowed to his heart. In his ordinary state his face wis calm and gently 
 serious. A most gracious smile illuminated his countenance when he was cheered by 
 good humour, or by the wish to be agreeable. In familiar conversation his laugh 
 was sharp and mocking. 
 
 Madame de Remusat (tome i. p. 119) gives a memorable instance of this rapid as- 
 sumption of anger. Before the celebrated stormy scene with Lord Whitworth Napo- 
 leon had been playing with the young son of his brother Louis, and giving his wife 
 and Madame de Remusat advice as to their dress. " Suddenly they came to inform 
 him that the circle was formed. While he rose abruptly, and his gaiety disappeared 
 from his lips, I was struck with the severe expression which suddenly replaced it. 
 His colour seemed to almost blanch at his will, his features contracted, and all this 
 in less time than it takes to tell it." M. Paul de Remusat himself says that once, 
 after a violent scene, the Emperor went up to the Abb6 de Pradt, and said to him, 
 "You believed I was really angry? undeceive yourself. With me anger never 
 passes that," and he glanced his hand before his neck, to indicate that the motion of 
 his bile never reached so far as to trouble his head (Remusat, tome i. p. 120). 
 
 Madame de Remusat praises his smile (tome i. p. 101), and Mol6 said " qu'il n'a 
 jamaiSYU de sourire plus aimable, ou du moins plus distingu6, plus fin, que celui de 
 Napoleon et celui de Chateaubriand. Mais ni 1'un ni 1'autre ne souriaient tous lea 
 iours" (Sainte-JBeuve, Chateaubriand, tome i. p. 157).
 
 ISOtt HATRED OF THE REGICIDES. 319 
 
 those whom he caJled the assassins of Louis XVI., and he 
 was annoyed at the necessity of employing them and 
 treating them with apparent respect. How many times 
 has he not said to Cambaceres, pinching him by the ear, 
 to soften, by that habitual familiarity, the bitterness of 
 the remark, " My dear fellow, your case is clear ; if ever 
 the Bourbons come back you will be hanged." A forced 
 smile would then relax the livid countenance of Cam- 
 bace"res, and was usually the only reply of the Second 
 Consul, who, however, on one occasion said in my hear- 
 ing, "Come, come, have done with this joking." 1 
 
 One thing which gave Bonaparte great pleasure when in 
 the country was to see a tall, slender woman, dressed in 
 white, walking beneath an alley of shaded trees. He de- 
 tested coloured dresses, and especially dark ones. To fat 
 women he had an invincible antipathy, and he could not 
 endure the sight of a pregnant woman ; it therefore rarely 
 happened that a female in that situation was invited to his 
 parties. He possessed every requisite for being what is 
 called in society an agreeable man, except the will to be 
 so. His manner was imposing rather than pleasing, and 
 those who did not know him well experienced in his pres- 
 ence an involuntary feeling of awe. In the drawing-room, 
 where Josephine did the honours with so much grace and 
 affability, all was gaiety and ease, and no one felt the pres- 
 ence of a superior ; but on Bonaparte's entrance all was 
 changed, and every eye was directed towards him, to read 
 his humour in his countenance, whether he intended to 
 be silent or talkative, dull or cheerful. 
 
 He often talked a great deal, and sometimes a little too 
 much ; but no one could tell a story in a more agreeable 
 and interesting way. His conversation rarely turned on 
 
 1 Napoleon a opinions were always strong on the regicides. " Let Salicctti know," 
 said he to Mathieu Dumas in 1808, " that I am not powerful enough to defend the 
 wretches who voted for the death of Louis XVI. from public contempt and indigna- 
 tion " (Dumas, tome iii. p. 316). See also his expression of distrust in Roederer be- 
 oause he believed him guilty of treachery to Louis XVI. (Miot, tome i. p. 174).
 
 320 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 gay or humorous subjects, and never on trivial mattera 
 He was so fond of argument that in the warmth of discus- 
 sion it was easy to draw from him secrets which he was 
 most anxious to conceal. Sometimes, in a small circle, he 
 would amuse himself by relating stories of presentiments 
 and apparitions. For this he always chose the twilight 
 of evening, and he would prepare his hearers for what was 
 coming by some solemn remark. On one occasion of this 
 kind he said, in a very grave tone of voice, " When death 
 strikes a person whom we love, and who is distant from 
 us, a foreboding almost always denotes the event, and the 
 dying person appears to us at the moment of his dissolu- 
 tion." He then immediately related the following anec- 
 dote : "A gentleman of the Court of Louis XIV. was in 
 the gallery of Versailles at the time that the King was 
 reading to his courtiers the bulletin of the battle of Fried- 
 lingen gained by Villars. Suddenly the gentleman saw, 
 at the farther end of the gallery, the ghost of his son, who 
 served under Villars. He exclaimed, 'My son is no more ! ' 
 and next moment the King named him among the dead." 
 
 When travelling Bonaparte was particularly talkative. 
 In the warmth of his conversation, which was always char- 
 acterised by original and interesting ideas, he sometimes 
 dropped hints of his future views, or, at least, he said 
 things which were calculated to disclose what he wished 
 to conceal. I took the liberty of mentioning to him this 
 indiscretion, and far from being offended, he acknowl- 
 edged his mistake, adding that he was not aware he had 
 gone so far. He frankly avowed this want of caution 
 when at St. Helena. 
 
 When in good humour his usual tokens of kindness 
 consisted in a little rap on the head or a slight pinch of the 
 ear. In his most friendly conversations with those whom 
 he admitted into his intimacy he would say, " You are a 
 fool" "a simpleton " " a ninny" "a blockhead." 
 These, and a few other words of like import, enabled him
 
 1800. IN THE GARDENS OF MALMAISON. 321 
 
 to vary his catalogue of compliments ; but he never em- 
 ployed them angrily, and the tone in which they were 
 uttered sufficiently indicated that they were meant in 
 kindness. 
 
 Bonaparte had many singular habits and tastes. When- 
 ever he experienced any vexation, or when any unpleasant 
 thought occupied his mind, he would hum something 
 which was far from resembling a tune, for his voice was 
 very unmusical. 1 He would, at the same time, seat him- 
 self before the writing-table, and swing back in his chair 
 so far that I have often been fearful of his falling. 
 
 He would then vent his ill-humour on the right arm of 
 his chair, mutilating it with his penknife, which he seemed 
 to keep for no other purpose. I always took care to keep 
 good pens ready for him ; for, as it was my business to 
 decipher his writing, I had a strong interest in doing 
 what I could to make it legible. 
 
 The sound of bells always produced in Bonaparte pleas- 
 urable sensations, which I could never account for. When 
 we were at Malmaison, and walking in the alley leading 
 to the plain of Ruel, how many times has the bell of the 
 village church interrupted our most serious conversations ! 
 He would stop, lest the noise of our footsteps should 
 drown any portion of the delightful sound. He was al- 
 most angry with me because I did not experience the im- 
 pressions he did. So powerful was the effect produced 
 upon him by the sound of these bells that his voice would 
 falter as he said, " Ah ! that reminds me of the first years 
 I spent at Brienne ! I was then happy ! " When the bells 
 
 1 Bonaparte conld not sing, because nature had given him the most untunable 
 voice imaginable. He was, however, very fond of humming any airs or fragments 
 of musical compositions which pleased him, and which he happened to recollect. 
 These little reminiscences usually came across his mind in the morning while I was 
 dressing him. The air which he most frequently hummed, though in a very imper- 
 fect way, was the "Marseillaise Hymn." The Emperor used also to whistle tunes 
 occasionally ; and whenever he whistled the air of " Marlbrook," I knew it to be a 
 sure prognostic of his approaching departure for the army. I recollect that he never 
 whistled so much nor appeared so cheerful, as when on the eve of departing for the 
 Russian campaign " (Mcmoires de Constant). 
 
 VOL. I. 21
 
 322 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 180ft 
 
 ceased he would resume the course of his speculations, 
 carry himself into futurity, place a crown on his head, 
 and dethrone kings. 
 
 Nowhere, except on the field of battle, did I ever see 
 Bonaparte more happy than in the gardens of Malmaison. 1 
 At the commencement of the Consulate we used to go 
 there every Saturday evening, and stay the whole of Sun- 
 day, and sometimes Monday. Bonaparte used to spend 
 a considerable part of his time in walking and superin- 
 tending the improvements which he had ordered. At 
 first he used to make excursions about the neighbour- 
 hood, but the reports of the police disturbed his natural 
 confidence, and gave him reason to fear the attempts of 
 concealed royalist partisans. 
 
 During the first four or five days that Bonaparte spent 
 at Malmaison he amused himself after breakfast with cal- 
 culating the revenue of that domain. According to his 
 estimates it amounted to 8000 francs. " That is not 
 bad ! " said he ; " but to live here would require an in- 
 come of 30,000 livres." I could not help smiling to see 
 him seriously engaged in such a calculation. 
 
 Bonaparte had no faith in medicine. He spoke of it as 
 an art entirely conjectural, and his opinion on this sub- 
 ject was fixed and incontrovertible. 2 His vigorous mind 
 rejected all but demonstrative proofs. 
 
 1 As Bonaparte was one day walking in these gardens with Madame de Clermont- 
 Tonnerre, now Madame de Talaru, in whose agreeable conversation he took much 
 delight, he suddenly addressed her thus : " Madame de Clermont-Tonnerre, what do 
 you think of me ? " This abrupt and unexpected question rendered the answer deli- 
 cate and difficult. " Why, General," said the lady, after a moment's hesitation, '' I 
 think you are like a skillul architect who never allows his structure to be seen until 
 it is quite finished. You are building behind a scaffolding which you will throw 
 down when your work is completed." "Just so, madame, you are right, quite 
 right," said Bonaparte hastily. " I never look forward less than two years." S&ur- 
 rlenne. 
 
 a Had a long conversation with the Emperor on medical subjects. He appeared 
 to entertain an idea that in cases purely the province of the physician the patient 
 has an equal chance of being despatched to the other world either by the doctor 
 mistaking the complaint, or by the remedies administered operating in a different 
 manner from what was expected. He acknowledged the great utility, however, of 
 aurgery. I endeavoured to convince him that in some complaints nature was a bad
 
 1800. OPINION OF LITERARY MEN. 323 
 
 He bad little memory for proper names, words, or dates, 
 but lie had a wonderful recollection of facts and places. 
 I recollect that, on going from Paris to Toulon, he pointed 
 out to me ten places calculated for great battles, and he 
 never forgot them. They were memoranda of his first 
 youthful journeys. 
 
 Bonaparte was insensible to the charms of poetic har- 
 mony. He had not even sufficient ear to feel the rhythm 
 of poetry, and he never could recite a verse without 
 violating the metre ; yet the grand ideas of poetry charmed 
 him. He absolutely worshipped Corneille ; and, one day, 
 after having witnessed a performance of Cinna, he said to 
 me, " If a man like Corneille were living in my time I 
 would make him my Prime Minister. It is not his poetry 
 that I most admire ; it is his powerful understanding, his 
 vast knowledge of the human heart, and his profound 
 policy ! " At St. Helena he said that he would have made 
 Corneille a prince ; but at the time he spoke to me of 
 Corneille he had no thought of making either princes or 
 kings. ' 
 
 physician, and mentioned in proof of my argument the examples that had taken 
 place under his own eyes in the cases of Countess Montholon, General Gourgand, and 
 others, who if they had been left to nature would have gone to the other world. 
 Napoleon, however, was sceptical, and inclined to think that if they had taken no 
 medicine, and abstained from everything except plenty of diluents, they would have 
 done equally well. ... I instanced a case of inflammation of the lungs. He 
 appeared a little staggered at this at first, but after asking me what were the reme- 
 dies, to which I replied that venefaection was the sheet anchor, he said, " That com- 
 plaint appertains, then, to the surgeon because he cures it with the lancet, and not 
 to the physician. . . . Suppose now," he continued, "that the best-informed 
 physician visits forty patients each, day, among them he will kill say one or two a 
 month by mistaking the disease, and in the country towns the charlatans will kill 
 bout half of those who die under their hands " (O'Meara's Napoleon in Exile, voL 
 ii. p. 3). 
 
 Breakfasted with Napoleon in the garden. Had a long medical argument with 
 him, in which he maintained that his practice in case of malady viz. to eat noth- 
 ing, drink plenty of barley water, and no wine, and ride for seven or eight leagues to 
 promote perspiration was much better than wine " (fbid., yol. i. p. 60). 
 
 1 Sainte-Benve says, " The persons who best knew Napoleon have remarked that 
 in the rapid literary education he had to improvise for himself when he had obtained 
 possession of power, he began by much preferring Corneille : it was only later that 
 he got so far as to enjoy Racine, but he did reach that point. He began as everyone 
 begins; he ended as cultivated and well-informed intellects like to end (Causertes,
 
 824 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Gallantry to women was by no means a trait in Bona- 
 parte's character. He seldom said anything agreeable to 
 females, and he frequently addressed to them the rudest 
 and most extraordinary remarks. To one he would say, 
 "Heavens, how red your elbows are!" To another, 
 " What an ugly headdress you have got ! " At another 
 time he would say, " Your dress is none of the cleanest. 
 . . . Do you ever change your gown? I have seen 
 you in that twenty times ! " He showed no mercy to any 
 who displeased him on these points. He often gave 
 Josephine directions about her toilet, and the exquisite 
 taste for which she was distinguished might have helped 
 to make him fastidious about the costume of other ladies. 
 At first he looked to elegance above all things : at a later 
 period he admired luxury and splendour, but he always 
 required modesty. He frequently expressed his disap- 
 proval of the low-necked dresses which were so much in 
 fashion at the beginning of the Consulate. 
 
 Bonaparte did not love cards, and this was very fortunate 
 for those who were invited to his parties ; for when he was 
 seated at a card-table, as he sometimes thought himself 
 obliged to be, nothing could exceed the dulness of the 
 drawing-room either at the Luxembourg or the Tuileries. 
 When, on the contrary, he walked about among the com- 
 pany, all were pleased, for he usually spoke to everybody, 
 though he preferred the conversation of men of science, 
 especially those who had been with him in Egypt ; as, for 
 
 tome i. p. 287). In another place Sainte-Beuve says, " Napoleon wrote to his brother 
 Joseph, then King of Naples, who was fond of literary men, ' You live too much 
 with literary and with scientific men. They are like coquettes, with whom one 
 ehould maintain an intercourse of gallantry, but of whom one should never make a 
 wife or a minister.' This," says Sainte-Beuve, "is true of many literary men, and 
 even of some of them who in our time we have seen as ministers, but it is not true of 
 M. Guizot, nor of M. Thiers ( Cauteries, tome i. p. 313). 
 
 1 Bonaparte, after he became Emperor, said one day to the Deautiful Duchesse de 
 Chevreuse, in the presence of all the circle at the Tuileries : "Ah 1 that's droll 
 enough; your hair is red?" " Perpaps it is, Sire," replied the lady; "but this is 
 the first time a man ever told me so." Madame de Chevreuse, whose hair was, on 
 the contrary, a beautiful blonde, was shortly after exiled to Tours for having de- 
 clined the office of maid of honor to the Queen of Spain. Bourrienne.
 
 1800. BONAPARTE AND THE CONTRACTORS. 335 
 
 example, Monge and Berthollet. He also liked to talk 
 with Chaptal and Lacepede, and with Lemercier, the 
 author of Agamemnon. 
 
 Bonaparte was seen to less advantage in a drawing-room 
 than at the head of his troops. His military uniform 
 became him much better than the handsomest dress of any 
 other kind. His first trials of dress-coats were unfortunate. 
 I have been informed that the first time he wore one he 
 kept on his black cravat. This incongruity was remarked 
 to him, and he replied, " So much the better ; it leaves 
 me something of a military air, and there is no harm in 
 that." For my own part, I neither saw the black cravat 
 nor heard this reply. ' 
 
 The First Consul paid his own private bills very punc- 
 tually ; but he was always tardy in settling the accounts of 
 the contractors who bargained with Ministers for supplies 
 for the public service. He put off these payments by all 
 sorts of excuses and shufflings. Hence arose immense 
 arrears in the expenditure, and the necessity of appointing 
 a committee of liquidation. In his opinion the terms con- 
 tractor and rogue were synonymous. 3 All that he avoided 
 
 1 On the subject of Bonaparte's dress Constant gives the following details : 
 " His Majesty's waistcoats and small-clothes were always of white cassimir. He 
 changed them every morning, and never wore them after they had been washed 
 three or four times. The Emperor never wore any but white silk stockings. His 
 shoes, which were very light and lined with silk, were ornamented with gold buckles 
 of an oval form, either plain or wrought. He also occasionally wore gold knee- 
 bnckles. During the Empire I never saw him wear pantaloons. The Emperor 
 never wore jewels. In his pockets he carried neither purse nor money, but merely 
 his handkerchief, snuff-box, and bonbonniere (or sweetmeat-box). He usually wore 
 only two decorations, viz., the cross of the Legion of Honour, and that of the Iron 
 Crown. Across his waistcoat, and under his uniform coat, he wore a cordon rouge, 
 the two ends of which were scarcely perceptible. When he received company at the 
 Tuileries. or attended a review, he wore the grand cordon on the outside of his coat. 
 His hat, which it is almost superfluous to describe, as long aa portraits of his 
 Majesty are extant, was of an extremely fine and light kind of beaver. The inside 
 was wadded and lined with silk. It was unadorued with either cord, tassel, or 
 feather, its only ornament being a silk loop, fastening a small tri-coloured cockade." 
 a For a remarkable instance of the strong feeling of Napoleon against peculation 
 see ifeiieval, tome iii. p. 225. When Emperor, he one day entered his cabinet full of 
 joy at having caught " a man who had robbed the army of Italy disgracefully. 
 Under the Directory he found protectors who assured him of impunity. Thank
 
 326 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 paying them be regarded as a just restitution to himself ; 
 and all the sums which were struck off from their ac- 
 counts he regarded as so much deducted from a theft. 
 The less a Minister paid out of his budget the more Bona- 
 parte was pleased with him ; and this ruinous system of 
 economy can alone explain the credit which Decres so 
 long enjoyed at the expense of the French navy. 
 
 God, I have found him, and I shall make him a severe example." Again, a few 
 years later, in a letter to his brother he says, " I send you a copy of the decree re- 
 quiring the sums of which the Treasury has been robbed to be repaid. Massena 
 
 and S 1 have stolen 6,400,000 francs. They shall repay to the last farthing ! 
 
 . . . Let Masse'na be advised to return the 6,000,000. To do so quickly is his only 
 salvation ! If he does not I shall send a military commission of inquiry to Padua, 
 for such robbery is intolerable. To suffer soldiers to starve and be unpaid, and to 
 pretend that the sums destined for their use were a present to himself from the pro- 
 vince, ia too impudent I Such conduct would make it impossible to carry on a war. 
 
 Let 8 be watched. The details of their plunderings are incredible. I learnt 
 
 them from the Austrians who themselves are ashamed of them. They allowed corn 
 to go to Venice. The evil is intolerable. I will soon find a remedy. I order Ardent 
 to be arrested. He ia an agent of S . If he should be at Naples have him ar- 
 rested and sent under a good escort to Paris. You have seen that Flachat has been 
 condemned to a year's imprisonment in irons, and that his transactions have been 
 declared void?" (Napoleon to Joseph, March 12, 1806. Du Casse, tome ii. p. 
 101). 
 
 The evil handed down from the Revolutionary times was too widespread to be 
 stopped by all the efforts of Napoleon, directed though they were against the highest 
 as well as the lowest officials. When Davoust took the command at Hamburg he re- 
 ported to the Emperor that a large part of the contributions raised in the times of 
 his predecessor had not reached the public exchequer, and Meneval (tome iii. p. 
 265) attributes much of the discontent felt towards the Emperor in the last years of 
 his reign to the energy with which he pressed the pursuit of these and similar mis- 
 deeds. Bourrienne himself was believed to have received large sums from Hamburg 
 (see Meneval in the passage just referred to, and Puymaigre, p. 135), as well as 
 Brune. 
 
 Daru told Meneval that a marshal had appropriated 200,000 out of 300,000 francs 
 raised from Brfurth, letting his ordonnateur take the rest. The unfortunate ordon- 
 nateur had to pay up the whole sum, as nothing was recovered from the marshal. 
 Bernadotte appears to have been the culprit ("The marshal. . . since raised to a rank 
 placing him above all jurisdiction "). One of the worst instances in Spain was that 
 
 of Marshal L , concerning which reference may be made to the Jfemoirs oj 
 
 Madame fAbrantes, English edition of 1882, vol. iii. p. 214. 
 
 To quote again from the Emperor's letters to his brother : "I am well pleased 
 with my affairs here ; it gave me great trouble to bring them into order, and to force 
 a dozen rogues, at whose head is Ouvrard, to refund. Barbe-Marbois has been duped 
 }nst as the Cardinal do Rohan was duped in the affair of the necklace, with the dif- 
 ference that in this case more than 90,000,000 were iu question. I had made up my 
 mind to have them shot without trial ! Thank God, I have been repaid t This has 
 
 > The S was probably Salicetti.
 
 1800. BONAPARTE ON RELIGION. 327 
 
 On the subject of religion Bonaparte's ideas were very 
 vague. " My reason," said he, " makes me incredulous 
 respecting many things ; but the impressions of my child- 
 hood and early youth throw me into uncertainty." He 
 was very fond of talking of religion. In Italy, in Egypt, and 
 on board the Orient and the Muiron, I have known him to 
 take part in very animated conversations on this subject. 
 He readily yielded up all that was proved against religion 
 as the work of men and time : but he would not hear of 
 materialism. I recollect that one fine night, when he was 
 on deck with some persons who were arguing in favour of 
 materialism, Bonaparte raised his hand to heaven and, 
 pointing to the stars, said, " You may talk as long as you 
 please, gentlemen, but who made all that ?" The per- 
 petuity of a name in the memory of man was to him 
 the immortality of the soul. He was perfectly tolerant 
 towards every variety of religious faith. ' 
 
 Among Bonaparte's singular habits was that of seating 
 himself on any table which happened to be of a suitable 
 height for him. He would often sit on mine, resting his 
 left arm on my right shoulder, and swinging his left leg, 
 which did not reach the ground ; and while he dictated 
 to me he would jolt the table so that I could scarcely write. 
 
 put me somewhat out of humour, and I tell yon about it that you may see how dis- 
 honest men are. You are now at the head of a great army, and will soon be at that 
 of a great administration, and ought to be aware of this. Roguery has been the 
 cause of all the misfortunes of France" (Napoleon to Joseph, February 7, 1806. 
 Du Cas-ie, tome ii. p. 55). 
 
 Nothing could exceed the severity with which Napoleon pursued such acts when 
 known to him. H made it almost a personal affair, as will be seen from the fore- 
 going instances, and the difficulty with which Bourrienne persuaded him not to try, 
 years after the act, a man who had committed peculation in Italy. 
 
 While on this topic a pleasing contrast will be found in the instances of Marshal 
 Mortier, who left Hanover a poorer man than when he entered upon its administra- 
 tion, and Marshal Snchet, who received from the Spanish under his rule a public 
 recognition of the honesty and justice of his administration in Valencia and 
 Arragon. 
 
 1 Policy induced Bonaparte to re-establish religions worship in France, which he 
 thought would be a powerful aid to the consolidation of his power ; but he would 
 never consent to the persecution of other religious. He wished to influence man- 
 kind in temporal things, but not in points of belief. Bourrienn*.
 
 328 MEMOIRS OP NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 180(X 
 
 Bonaparte had a great dislike to reconsider any de- 
 cision, even when it was acknowledged to be unjust. In 
 little as well as in great things he evinced his repugnance 
 to retrograde. An instance of this occurred in the affair 
 of General Latour-Foissac. The First Consul felt how 
 much he had wronged that general ; but he wished some 
 time to elapse before he repaired his error. His heart 
 and his conduct were at variance ; but his feelings were 
 overcome by what he conceived to be political necessity. 
 Bonaparte was never known to say, "I have done wrong : " 
 his usual observation was, "I begin to think there is some- 
 thing wrong." 
 
 In spite of this sort of feeling, which was more worthy 
 of an ill-humoured philosopher than the head of a govern- 
 ment, Bonaparte was neither malignant nor vindictive. I 
 cannot certainly defend him against all the reproaches 
 which he incurred through the imperious law of war and 
 cruel necessity ; but I may say that he has often been un- 
 justly accused. None but those who are blinded by fury 
 will call him a Nero or a Caligula. I think I have avowed 
 his faults with sufficient candour to entitle me to credit 
 when I speak in his commendation ; and I declare that, out 
 of the field of battle, Bonaparte had a kind and feeling 
 heart. He was very fond of children, a trait which seldom 
 distinguishes a bad man. In the relations of private life 
 to call him amiable would not be using too strong a word, 
 and he was very indulgent to the weakness of human nature. 
 The contrary opinion is too firmly fixed in some minds for 
 me to hope to root it out. I shall, I fear, have contra- 
 dictors, but I address myself to those who look for truth. 
 To judge impartially we must take into account the in- 
 fluence which time and circumstances exercise on men ; 
 and distinguish between the different characters of the 
 Collegian, the General, the Consul, and the Emperor.
 
 1800. 82 
 
 CHAPTEK XXIX. 
 1800. 
 
 Bonaparte's laws Suppression of the festival of the 21st of January- 
 Official visits The Temple Louis XVI. and Sir Sidney Smith 
 Peculation during the Directory Loan raised Modest budget The 
 Consul and the Member of the Institute The figure of the Republic 
 Duroc'a missions The King of Prussia The Emperor Alexander 
 General Latour-Foissac Arbitrary decree Company of players for 
 Egypt Singular ideas respecting literary property The preparatory 
 Consulate The journals Sabres and muskets of honour The First 
 Consul and his Comrade The bust of Brutus Statues in the gallery 
 of the Tuileries Sections of the Council of State Costumes of 
 public functionaries Masquerades The opera-balls Recall of the 
 exiles. 
 
 IT is not my purpose to say much about the laws, de- 
 crees, and Senatus-Consultes, which the First Consul either 
 passed, or caused to be passed, after his accession to 
 power. What were they all, with the exception of the 
 Civil Code ? The legislative reveries of the different men 
 who have from time to time ruled France form an im- 
 mense labyrinth, in which chicanery bewilders reason and 
 common sense ; and they would long since have been buried 
 in oblivion had they not occasionally served to authorise 
 injustice. I cannot, however, pass over unnoticed the 
 happy effect produced in Paris, and throughout the whole 
 of France, by some of the first decisions of the Consuls. 
 Perhaps none but those who witnessed the state of society 
 during the reign of Terror can fully appreciate the satis- 
 faction which the first steps towards the restoration of 
 social order produced in the breasts of all honest men. 
 The Directory, more base and not less perverse than the
 
 330 MEMOIRS OP NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Convention, had retained the horrible 21st of January 
 among the festivals of the Republic. One of Bonaparte's 
 first ideas on attaining the possession of power was to 
 abolish this ; but such was the ascendency of the abettors 
 of the fearful event that he could not venture on a straight- 
 forward course. He and his two colleagues, who were 
 Sieves and Roger Ducos, signed, on the 5th Nivose, a 
 decree, setting forth that in future the only festivals to be 
 celebrated by the Republic were the 1st Vendemiaire and 
 the 14th of July, intending by this means to consecrate 
 provisionally the recollection of the foundation of the 
 Republic and of liberty. 
 
 All was calculation with Bonaparte. To produce effect 
 was his highest gratification. Thus he let slip no oppor- 
 tunity of saying or doing things which were calculated to 
 dazzle the multitude. While at the Luxembourg, he went 
 sometimes accompanied by his aides de camp and some- 
 times by a Minister, to pay certain official visits. I did not 
 accompany him on these occasions; but almost always 
 either on his return, after dinner, or in the evening, he re- 
 lated to me what he had done and said. He congratulated 
 himself on having paid a visit to Daubenton, at the Jardin 
 des Plantes, and talked with great self-complacency of the 
 distinguished way in which he had treated the contem- 
 porary of Buffon. 
 
 On the 24th Brumaire he visited the prisons. He liked 
 to make these visits unexpectedly, and to take the gover- 
 nors of the different public establishments by surprise ; so 
 that, having no time to make their preparations, he might 
 see things as they really were. I was in his cabinet when 
 he returned, for I had a great deal of business to go 
 through in his absence. As he entered he exclaimed, 
 "What brutes these Directors are ! To what a state they 
 have brought our public establishments! But, stay a 
 little! I will put all in order. The prisons are in a 
 ghockingly unwholesome state, and the prisoners miser-
 
 1800. TEE FIR8T CONSUL AT THE TEMPLE. 331 
 
 ably fed. I questioned them, and I questioned the jailers, 
 for nothing is to be learned from the superiors. They, 
 of course, always speak well of their own work ! When I 
 was in the Temple I could not help thinkimg of the un- 
 fortunate Louis XVL Ho was an excellent man, but too 
 amiable, too gentle for the times. He knew not how to 
 deal with mankind ! And Sir Sidney Smith ! I made 
 them show me his apartment. If the fools had not let 
 him escape I should have taken St. Jean d'Acre ! There 
 are too many painful recollections connected with that 
 prison ! I will certainly have it pulled down some day or 
 other! What do you think I did at the Temple? I 
 ordered the jailers' books to be brought to me, and finding 
 that some hostages were still in confinement I liberated 
 them. 'An unjust law,' said I, 'has deprived you of 
 liberty ; my first duty is to restore it to you. ' Was not 
 this well done, Bourrienne ? " As I was, no less than Bona- 
 parte himself, an enemy to the revolutionary laws, I con- 
 gratulated him sincerely ; and he was very sensible to my 
 approbation, for I was not accustomed to greet him with 
 "Good; very good," on all occasions. It is true, knowing 
 his character as I did, I avoided saying anything that was 
 calculated to offend him ; but when I said nothing, he 
 knew very well how to construe my silence. Had I flat- 
 tered him I should have continued longer in favour. 
 
 Bonaparte always spoke angrily of the Directors he had 
 turned off. Their incapacity disgusted and astonished 
 him. " What simpletons ! what a government ! " he 
 would frequently exclaim when he looked into the meas- 
 ures of the Directory. "Bourrienne," said he, "can you 
 imagine anything more pitiable than their system of 
 finance ? Can it for a moment be doubted that the prin- 
 cipal agents of authority daily committed the most fraud- 
 ulent peculations ? What venality ! what disorder ! what 
 wastefulness ! everything put up for sale : places, provis- 
 ions, clothing, and military, all were disposed of. Have
 
 332 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 they not actually consumed 75,000,000 in advance? And 
 then, think of all the scandalous fortunes accumulated, all 
 the malversations ! But are there no means of making 
 them refund ? "We shall see." 
 
 In these first moments of poverty it was found neces- 
 sary to raise a loan, for the funds of M. Collot did not 
 last long, and 12,000,000 were advanced by the different 
 bankers of Paris, who, I believe, were paid by bills of the 
 receivers-general, the discount of which then amounted to 
 about 33 per cent. The salaries of the first offices were 
 not very considerable, and did not amount to anything 
 like the exorbitant stipends of the Empire. The follow- 
 ing table shows the modest budget of the Consular Gov- 
 ernments for the year VJULL. : 
 
 Franca. 
 
 The Legislative Body 2,400,000 
 
 The Tribunate 1,312,000 
 
 The Archives 75,000 
 
 The three Consuls, including 750,000 francs for 
 
 secret service money. .... 1,800,000 
 
 The Council of State 675,000 
 
 Secretaries to the Councils and to the Councillors 
 
 of State ....... 
 
 The Six Ministers ..'.-. 
 The Minister for Foreign Affairs 
 
 Total . 6,824,500 
 
 Bonaparte's salary was fixed at 500,000 francs. What 
 a contrast to the 300,000,000 in gold which were re- 
 ported to have been concealed in 1811 in the cellars of 
 the Tuileries! 
 
 In mentioning Bonaparte's nomination to the Institute, 
 and his affectation in putting at the head of his proclama- 
 tion his title of member of that learned body before that 
 of General-in-Chief, I omitted to state what value he 
 really attached to that title. The truth is that, when 
 young and ambitious, he was pleased with the proffered 
 title, which he thought would raise him in public estima-
 
 1800. DVROC AND TEE KINO OF PRUSSIA. 838 
 
 tion. How often have we laughed together when he 
 weighed the value of his scientific titles ! Bonaparte, to 
 be sure, knew something of mathematics, a good deal of 
 history, and, I need not add, possessed extraordinary 
 military talent ; but he was nevertheless a useless member 
 of the Institute. 
 
 On his return from Egypt he began to grow weary of 
 a title which gave him so many colleagues. " Do you not 
 think," said he one day to me, "that there is something 
 mean and humiliating in the words, ' I have the honour to 
 be, my dear Colleague ' ? I am tired of it ! " Generally 
 speaking, all phrases which indicated equality displeased 
 him. It will be recollected how gratified he was that I 
 did not address him in the second person singular on our 
 meeting at Leoben, and also what befell M. de Cominges 
 at Bale because he did not observe the same precaution. 
 
 The figure of the Republic seated and holding a spear 
 in her hand, which at the commencement of the Consulate 
 was stamped on official letters, was speedily abolished. 
 Happy would it have been if Liberty herself had not 
 suffei-ed the same treatment as her emblem ! The title of 
 First Consul made him despise that of Member of the 
 Institute. He no longer entertained the least predilection 
 for that learned body, and subsequently he regarded it 
 with much suspicion. 1 It was a body, an authorised 
 assembly; these were reasons sufficient for him to take 
 umbrage at it, and he never concealed his dislike of all 
 bodies possessing the privilege of meeting and deliberat- 
 ing. 
 
 While we were at the Luxembourg Bonaparte de- 
 spatched Duroc on a special mission to the King of Prussia. 
 This happened, I think, at the very beginning of the year 
 1800. He selected Duroc because he was a man of good 
 education and agreeable manners, and one who could ex- 
 press himself with elegance and reserve, qualities not 
 
 1 See, however, footnote on p. 125-
 
 334 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 often met with at that pei'iod. Duroc had been with us 
 in Italy, in Egypt, and on board the Muiron, and the 
 Consul easily guessed that the King of Prussia would be 
 delighted to hear from an eye-witness the events of Bona- 
 parte's campaigns, especially the siege of St. Jean d'Acre, 
 and the scenes which took place during the months of 
 March and May at Jaffa. Besides, the First Consul con- 
 sidered it indispensable that such circumstantial details 
 should be given in a way to leave no doubt of their correct- 
 ness. His intentions were fully realised ; for Duroc told 
 me, on his return, that nearly the whole of the conversa- 
 tion he had with the King turned upon St. Jean d'Acre 
 and Jaffa. He stayed nearly two whole hours with his 
 Majesty, who, the day after, gave him an invitation to 
 dinner. When this intelligence arrived at the Luxem- 
 bourg I could perceive that the Chief of the Eepublic 
 was flattered that one of his aides de camp should have sat 
 at table with a King, who some years after was doomed to 
 wait for him in his antechamber at Tilsit 
 
 Duroc never spoke on politics to the King of Prussia, 
 which was very fortunate, for, considering his age and the 
 exclusively military life he had led, he could scarcely have 
 been expected to avoid blunders. Some time later, after 
 the death of Paul L, he was sent to congratulate Alexander 
 on his accession to the throne. Bonaparte's design in thus 
 making choice of Duroc was to introduce to the Courts of 
 Europe, by confidential missions, a young man to whom 
 he was much attached, and also to bring him forward in 
 France. Duroc went on his third mission to Berlin after 
 the war broke out with Austria. He often wrote to me, 
 aud his letters convinced me how much he had improved 
 himself within a short time. 
 
 Another circumstance which happened at the commence- 
 ment of the Consulate affords an example of Bonaparte's 
 inflexibility when he had once formed a determination. 
 In the spring of 1799, when we were in Egypt, the Direc-
 
 DUG DE FRIOUF.
 
 1800. THE LOSS OF MANTUA. 335 
 
 tory gave to GeneralLatour-Foissac, a highly distinguished 
 officer, the command of Mantua, the taking of which had 
 so powerfully contributed to the glory of the conqueror 
 of Italy. Shortly after Latour's appointment to this im- 
 portant post the Austrians besieged Mantua. It was well 
 known that the garrison was supplied with provisions and 
 ammunition for a long resistance ; yet, in the month of 
 July it surrendered to the Austrians. The act of capitula- 
 tion contained a curious article, viz. " General Latour- 
 Foissac and his staff shall be conducted as prisoners to 
 Austria ; the garrison shall be allowed to return to France." 
 This distinction between the general and the troops en- 
 trusted to his command, and at the same time the prompt 
 surrender of Mantua, were circumstances which, it must 
 be confessed, were calculated to excite suspicions of 
 Latour-Foissac. The consequence was, when Bernadotte 
 was made War Minister he ordered an inquiry into the 
 general's conduct by a court-martial Latour-Foissac had 
 no sooner returned to France than he published a justi- 
 ficatory memorial, in which he showed the impossibility of 
 his having made a longer defence when he was in want of 
 many objects of the first necessity. 
 
 Such was the state of the affair on Bonaparte's elevation 
 to the Consular power. The loss of Mantua, the posses- 
 sion of which had cost him so many sacrifices, roused his 
 indignation to so high a pitch that whenever the subject 
 was mentioned he could find no words to express his rage. 
 He stopped the investigation of the court-martial, and 
 issued a violent decree against Latour-Foissac even before 
 his culpability had been proved. This proceeding occa- 
 sioned much discussion, and was very dissatisfactory to 
 many general officers, who, by this arbitrary decision, 
 found themselves in danger of forfeiting the privilege of 
 being tried by their natural judges whenever they hap- 
 pened to displease the First Consul. For my own part, 
 I must say that this decree against Latour-Foissac was
 
 336 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 one which I saw issued with considerable regret. I was 
 alarmed for the consequences. After the lapse of a few 
 days I ventured to point out to him the undue severity of 
 the step he had taken ; I reminded him of all that had 
 been said in Latour-Foissac's favour, and tried to convince 
 him how much more just it would be to allow the trial to 
 come to a conclusion. "In a country," said I, "like 
 France, where the point of honour stands above every- 
 thing, it is impossible Foissac can escape condemnation if 
 he be culpable." "Perhaps you are right, Bourrienne," 
 rejoined he ; " but the blow is struck ; the decree is 
 issued. I have given the same explanation to every one ; 
 but I cannot so suddenly retrace my steps. To retro- 
 grade is to be lost. I cannot acknowledge myself in the 
 wrong. By and by we shall see what can be done. Time 
 will bring lenity and pardon. At present it would be pre- 
 mature." Such, word for word, was Bonaparte's reply. 
 If with this be compared what he said on the subject at St. 
 Helena it will be found that his ideas continued nearly 
 unchanged ; the only difference is that, instead of the 
 impetuosity of 1800, he expressed himself with the calm- 
 ness which time and adversity naturally produce. 1 
 
 Bonaparte, as I have before observed, loved contrasts ; 
 and I remember at the very time he was acting so violently 
 against Latour-Foissac he condescended to busy himself 
 about a company of players which he wished to send to 
 Egypt, or rather that he pretended to wish to send there, 
 because the announcement of such a project conveyed an 
 impression of the prosperous condition of our Oriental 
 colony. The Consuls gravely appointed the Minister of 
 the Interior to execute this business, and the Minister in 
 
 1 " It was," says the Jfemartal of St. Selena, " an illegal and tyrannical act, but 
 still it was a necessary evil. It was the fault of the law. He was a hundred, nay, 
 a thousand fold guilty, and yet it was doubtful whether he would be condemned. 
 We therefore assailed him with the shafts of honour and public opinion. Yet I re- 
 peat it was a tyrannical act, and one of those violent measures which are at times 
 necessary in great nations and in extraordinary circumstances. 11
 
 1800. IDEAS RESPECTING LITERARY PROPERTY. 831 
 
 his turn delegated his powers to Florence, the actor. In 
 their instructions to the Minister the Consuls observed 
 that it would be advisable to include some female dancers 
 in the company ; a suggestion which corresponds with 
 Bonaparte's note, in which were specified all that he con- 
 sidered necessary for the Egyptian expedition. 
 
 The First Consul entertained singular notions respect- 
 ing literary property. On his hearing that a piece, en- 
 titled Misanthropic et Repentir, had been brought out at 
 the Odeon, he said to me, " Bouriienne, you have been 
 robbed." " I, General ? how? " "You have been robbed, 
 I tell you, and they are now acting your piece." I have 
 already mentioned that during my stay at Warsaw I 
 amused myself with translating a celebrated play of 
 Kotzebue. "While we were in Italy I lent Bonaparte my 
 translation to read, and he expressed himself much pleased 
 with it. He greatly admired the piece, and often went to 
 see it acted at the Odeon. On his return he invariably 
 gave me fresh reasons for my claiming what he was 
 pleased to call my property. I represented to him that 
 the translation of a foreign work belonged to any one who 
 chose to execute it. He would not, however, give up his 
 point, and I was obliged to assure him that my occupa- 
 tions in his service left me no time to engage in a literary 
 lawsuit. He then exacted a promise from me to translate 
 Goethe's Werther. I told him it was already done, though 
 indifferently, and that I could not possibly devote to the 
 subject the time it merited. I read over to him one of 
 the letters I had translated into French, and which he 
 seemed to approve. 
 
 That interval of the Consular Government during which 
 Bonaparte remained at the Luxembourg may be called the 
 preparatory Consulate. Then were sown the seeds of the 
 great events which he meditated, and of those institutions 
 with which he wished to mark his possession of power. 
 He was then, if I may use the expression, two individuals 
 VOL. I. 22
 
 38 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 in one : the Republican general, who was obliged to appear 
 the advocate of liberty and the principles of the Revolu- 
 tion ; and the votary of ambition, secretly plotting the 
 downfall of that liberty and those principles. 
 
 I often wondered at the consummate address with 
 which he contrived to deceive those who were likely to 
 see through his designs. This hypocrisy, which some, 
 perhaps, may call profound policy, was indispensable to 
 the accomplishment of his projects ; and sometimes, as if 
 to keep himself in practice, he would do it in matters of 
 secondary importance. For example, his opinion of the 
 insatiable avarice of Sieyes is well known ; yet when he 
 proposed, in his message to the Council of Ancients, to 
 give his colleague, under the title of national recompense, 
 the price of his obedient secession, it was, in the words of 
 the message, a recompense worthily bestowed on his disin- 
 terested virtues. l 
 
 While at the Luxembourg Bonaparte showed, by a 
 Consular act, his hatred of the liberty of the press above 
 all liberties, for he loved none. On the 27th Nivose the 
 Consuls, or rather the First Consul, published a decree, 
 the real object of which was evidently contrary to its im- 
 plied object. 
 
 This decree stated that 
 
 The Consuls of the Republic, considering that some of the jour- 
 nals printed at Paris are instruments in the hands of the enemies of 
 the Republic, over the safety of which the Government is specially 
 entrusted by the people of France to watch, decree 
 
 That the Minister of Police shall, during the continuation of the 
 war, allow only the following journals to be printed and published, 
 viz. Le Moniteur- Universel, Le Journal des Debate et Decrets, Le 
 Journal de Paris, Le Bien-lnformt, Le Publicists, L'Ami des Lois, 
 La Cle des Cabinets, Le Citoyen Francois, La Gazette de Prance, Lt 
 Journal des Hommes Libres, Le Journal du Soir by the brothers 
 Chaigneau, Lt Journal des Defenseurs de la Patrie, La Decada 
 
 1 M. de Bourrienne misses the humour of this.
 
 1800. SWORDS AND MUSKETS OF HONOUR. 388 
 
 Phflosophique, and those papers which are exclusively devoted to 
 science, art, literature, commerce, and advertisements. 
 
 Surely this decree may well be considered as prepara- 
 tory ; and the fragment I have quoted may serve as a 
 standard for measuring the greater part of those acts by 
 which Bonaparte sought to gain, for the consolidation of 
 his power, what he seemed to be seeking solely for the 
 interest of the friends of the Republic. The limitation to 
 the period of the continuance of the war had also a certain 
 provisional air which afforded hope for the future. But 
 everything provisional is, in its nature, very elastic ; and 
 Bonaparte knew how to draw it out ad infinitum. The 
 decree, moreover, enacted that if any of the uncondemned 
 journals should insert articles against the sovereignty of the 
 people they would be immediately suppressed. In truth, 
 great indulgence was shown on this point, even after the 
 Emperor's coronation. 
 
 The presentation of swords and muskets of honour also 
 originated at the Luxembourg; and this practice was, 
 without doubt, a preparatory step to the foundation of 
 the Legion of Honour. 1 A grenadier sergeant, named 
 Leon Aune, who had been included in the first distribu- 
 tion, easily obtained permission to write to the First Con- 
 sul to thank him. Bonaparte, wishing to answer him 
 in his own name, dictated to me the following letter for 
 Aune : 
 
 I have received your letter, my brave comrade. You needed not 
 to hare told me of your exploits, for you are the bravest grenadier 
 in the whole army since the death of Benezete. You received one 
 of the hundred sabres I distributed to the army, and all agreed you 
 most deserved it. 
 
 I wish very much again to ee you. Th* War MinisUr lends you 
 an order to come to Paris. 
 
 1 "Armes <fhonneur" decreed 25th December 1799, muskets for infantry, car- 
 bines for cavalry, grenades for artillery, swords for the officers. Gourion St. Cyt 
 received the first sword ( Thiers, tome i. p. 126).
 
 340 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 This wheedling -wonderfully favoured Bonaparte's de- 
 signs. His letter to Aune could not fail to be circulated 
 through the army. A sergeant called my brave comrade by 
 the First Consul the First General of France ! Who but 
 a thorough Republican, the stanch friend of equality, 
 would have done this ? This was enough to wind up the 
 enthusiasm of the army. At the same time it must be 
 confessed that Bonaparte began to find the Luxembourg 
 too little for him, and preparations were set on foot at the 
 Tuileries. 
 
 Still this great step towards the re-establishment of the 
 monarchy was to be cautiously prepared. It was impor- 
 tant to do away with the idea that none but a king could 
 occupy the palace of our ancient kings. What was to be 
 done? A very fine bust of Brutus had been brought 
 from Italy. Brutus was the destroyer of tyrants ! This 
 was the very thing ; and David was commissioned to 
 place it in a gallery of the Tuileries. Could there be a 
 greater proof of the Consul's horror of tyranny ? 
 
 To sleep at the Tuileries, in the bedchamber of the 
 kings of France, was all that Bonaparte wanted ; the rest 
 would follow in due course. He was willing to be satis- 
 fied with establishing a principle the consequences of which 
 were to be afterwards deduced. Hence the affectation of 
 never inserting in official acts the name of the Tuileries, 
 but designating that place as the Palace of the Govern- 
 ment. The first preparations were modest, for it did not 
 become a good Republican to be fond of pomp. Accord- 
 ingly Lecomte, who was at that time architect of the Tui- 
 leries, merely received orders to clean the Palace, an ex- 
 pression which might bear more than one meaning, after 
 the meetings which had been there. For this purpose 
 the sum of 500,000 francs was sufficient. Bonaparte's 
 drift was to conceal, as far as possible, the importance he 
 attached to the change of his Consular domicile. But lit- 
 tle expense was requisite for fitting up apartments for
 
 1800. STATUES IN THE TUILERIES. 341 
 
 the First Consul. Simple ornaments, such as marbles 
 and statues, were to decorate the Palace of the Govern- 
 ment. 
 
 Nothing escaped Bonaparte's consideration. Thus it 
 was not merely at hazard that he selected the statues of 
 great men to adorn the gallery of the Tuileries. Among 
 the Greeks he made choice of Demosthenes and Alexan- 
 der, thus rendering homage at once to the genius of elo- 
 quence and the genius of victory. The statue of Hanni- 
 bal was intended to recall the memory of Rome's most 
 formidable enemy ; and Eome herself was represented in 
 the Consular Palace by the statues of Scipio, Cicero, Cato, 
 Brutus and Caesar the victor and the immolator being 
 placed side by side. Among the great men of modern 
 times he gave the first place to Gustavus Adolphus, and 
 the next to Turenne and the great Conde, to Turenne in 
 honour of his military talent, and to Conde to prove that 
 there was nothing fearful in the recollection of a Bourbon. 
 The remembrance of the glorious days of the French 
 navy was revived by the statue of Duguai Trouin. 
 Marlborough and Prince Eugene had also their places in 
 the gallery, as if to attest the disasters which marked the 
 close of the great reign ; and Marshal Saxe, to show that 
 Louis XV. 's reign was not without its glory. The statues 
 of Frederick and Washington were emblematic of false 
 philosophy on a throne and true wisdom founding a free 
 state. Finally, the names of Dugommier, Dampierre, and 
 Joubert were intended to bear evidence of the high esteem 
 which Bonaparte cherished for his old comrades, those 
 illustrious victims to a cause which had now ceased to be 
 his. 
 
 The reader has already been informed of the attempts 
 made by Bonaparte to induce England and Austria to 
 negotiate with the Consular Government, which the King 
 of Prussia was the first of the sovereigns of Europe to 
 recognise. These attempts having proved unavailing, it
 
 342 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 became necessary to carry on the war with renewed vigour, 
 and also to explain why the peace, which had been prom- 
 ised at the beginning of the Consulate, was still nothing 
 but a promise. In fulfilment of these two objects Bona- 
 parte addressed an energetic proclamation to the armies, 
 which was remarkable for not being followed by the usual 
 sacred words, " Vive la Republique ! " 
 
 At the same time Bonaparte completed the formation of 
 the Council of State, and divided it into five sections : 
 (1) The Interior ; (2) Finance ; (3) Marine ; (4) The War 
 Department ; (5) Legislation. He fixed the salaries of the 
 Councillors of the State at 25,000 francs, and that of the 
 Presidents of Sections at 30,000. He settled the costume 
 of the Consuls, the Ministers, and the different bodies 
 of the State. This led to the re-introduction of velvet, 
 which had been banished with the old regime, and the en- 
 couragement of the manufactures of Lyons was the reason 
 alleged for employing this un-republican article in the 
 different dresses, such as those of the Consuls and Minis- 
 ters. It was Bonaparte's constant aim to efface the Re- 
 public, even in the utmost trifles, and to prepare matters 
 so well that the customs and habits of monarchy being 
 restored, there should only then remain a word to be 
 changed. 
 
 I never remember to have seen Bonaparte in the Con- 
 sular dress, which he detested, and which he wore only 
 because duty required him to do so at public ceremonies. 
 The only dress he was fond of, and in which he felt at ease, 
 was that in which he subjugated the ancient Eridanus and 
 the Nile, namely, the uniform of the Guides, to which corps 
 Bonaparte was always sincerely attached. 
 
 The masquerade of official dresses was not the only one 
 which Bonaparte summoned to the aid of his policy. At 
 that period of the year VHI. which corresponded with the 
 carnival of 1800, masques began to be resumed at Paris. 
 Disguises were all the fashion, and Bonaparte favoured the
 
 1800. MASQUERADES, OFFICIAL AND SOCIAL. 343 
 
 revival of old amusements ; first, because they were old, 
 and next, because they were the means of diverting the 
 attention of the people : for, as he had established the 
 principle that on the field of battle it is necessary to divide 
 the enemy in order to beat him, he conceived it no less 
 advisable to divert the people in order to enslave them. 
 Bonaparte did not say panem et circenses, for I believe his 
 knowledge of Latin did not extend even to that well-known 
 phrase of Juvenal, but he put the maxim in practice. He 
 accordingly authorised the revival of balls at the opera, 
 which they who lived during that period of the Consulate 
 know was an important event in Paris. Some gladly 
 viewed it as a little conquest in favour of the old regime ; 
 and others, who for that very reason disapproved it, were 
 too shallow to understand the influence of little over great 
 things. The women and the young men did not bestow 
 a thought on the subject, but yielded willingly to the at- 
 tractions of pleasure. Bonaparte, who was delighted at 
 having provided a diversion for the gossiping of the Pari- 
 sian salons, said to me one day, " While they are chatting 
 about all this, they do not babble upon politics, and that 
 is what I want. Let them dance and amuse themselves as 
 long as they do not thrust their noses into the Councils of 
 the Government ; besides, Bourrienne," added he, "I have 
 other reasons for encouraging this, I see other advantages 
 in it. Trade is languishing ; Fouche tells me that there 
 are great complaints. This will set a little money in cir- 
 culation ; besides, I am on my guard about the Jacobins. 
 Everything is not bad, because it is not new. I prefer the 
 opera-balls to the saturnalia of the Goddess of Reason. I 
 was never so enthusiastically applauded as at the last 
 parade." 
 
 A Consular decision of a different and more important 
 nature had, shortly before, namely, at the commencement 
 of Nivose, brought happiness to many families. Bonaparte, 
 as every one knows, had prepared the events of the 18th
 
 844 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Fructidor that he might have some plausible reasons for 
 overthrowing the Directory. The Directory being over- 
 thrown, he was now anxious, at least in part, to undo what 
 he had done on the 18th Fructidor. He therefore ordered 
 a report on the persons exiled to be presented to him by 
 the Minister of Police. In consequence of this report he 
 authorised forty of them to return to France, placing them 
 under the observation of the Police Minister, and assigning 
 them their place of residence. However, they did not long 
 remain under these restrictions, and many of them were 
 soon called to fill high places in the Government. It was 
 indeed natural that Bonaparte, still wishing, at least in 
 appearance, to found his government on those principles 
 of moderate republicanism which had caused their exile, 
 should invite them to second his views. 
 
 Barrere wrote a justificatory letter to the First Consul, 
 who, however, took no notice of it, for he could not get so 
 far as to favour Barrere. Thus did Bonaparte receive into 
 the Councils of the Consulate the men who had been exiled 
 by the Directory, just as he afterwards appointed the emi- 
 grants and those exiles of the Kevolution to high offices 
 under the Empire. The time and the men alone dif- 
 fered ; the intention in both cases was the same.
 
 1800. 346 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 1800. 
 
 Bonaparte and Paul I. Lord Whitworth Baron Sprengporten's arrival 
 at Paris Paul's admiration of Bonaparte Their close connection 
 and correspondence The royal challenge General Mack The road 
 to Malmaison Attempts at assassination Death of Washington 
 National mourning Ambitious calculation M. de Fontanes, the 
 skilful orator Fete at the Temple of Mars Murat's marriage with 
 Caroline Bonaparte Madame Bonaparte's pearls. 
 
 THE first communications between Bonaparte and Paul I. 
 commenced a short time after his accession to the Consu- 
 late. Affairs then began to look a little less unfavourable for 
 France ; already vague reports from Switzerland and the 
 banks of the Rhine indicated a coldness existing between 
 the Eussians and the Austrians ; and at the same time, 
 symptoms of a misunderstanding between the Courts of 
 London and St. Petersburg began to be perceptible. The 
 First Consul, having in the meantime discovered the 
 chivalrous and somewhat eccentric character of Paul I., 
 thought the moment a propitious one to attempt breaking 
 the bonds which united Russia and England. He was not 
 the man to allow so fine an opportunity to pass, and he 
 took advantage of it with his usual sagacity. The Eng- 
 lish had some time before refused to include in a cartel 
 for the exchange of prisoners 7000 Russians taken in Hol- 
 land. Bonaparte ordered them all to be armed, and 
 clothed in new uniforms appropriate to the corps to which 
 they had belonged, and sent them back to Russia, without 
 ransom, without exchange, or any condition whatever. 
 This judicious munificence was not thrown away. Paul
 
 340 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 showed himself deeply sensible of it, and closely allied as 
 as he had lately been with England, he now, all at once, 
 declared himself her enemy. This triumph of policy de- 
 lighted the First Consul. 
 
 Thenceforth the Consul and the Czar became the best 
 friends possible. They strove to outdo each other in pro- 
 fessions of friendship ; and it may be believed that Bona- 
 parte did not fail to turn this contest of politeness to his 
 own advantage. He so well worked upon the mind of 
 Paul that he succeeded in obtaining a direct influence 
 over the Cabinet of St. Petersburg. 
 
 Lord Whitworth, at that time the English ambassador 
 in Russia, was ordered to quit the capital without delay, 
 and to retire to Riga, which then became the focus of the 
 intrigues of the north which ended in the death of Paul. 
 The English ships were seized in all the ports, and, at the 
 pressing instance of the Czar, a Prussian army menaced 
 Hanover. Bonaparte lost no time, and, profiting by the 
 friendship manifested towards him by the inheritor of 
 Catherine's power, determined to make that friendship 
 subservient to the execution of the vast plan which he had 
 long conceived : he meant to undertake an expedition by 
 land against the English colonies in the East Indies. 
 
 The arrival of Baron Sprengporten at Paris caused great 
 satisfaction among the partisans of the Consular Govern- 
 ment, that is to say, almost every one in Paris. M. Spreng- 
 porten was a native of Swedish Finland. He had been 
 appointed by Catherine chamberlain and lieutenant-gen- 
 eral of her forces, and he was not less in favour with Paul, 
 who treated him in the most distinguished manner. He 
 came on an extraordinary mission, being ostensibly clothed 
 with the title of plenipotentiary, and at the same time ap- 
 pointed confidential Minister to the Consul. Bonaparte 
 was extremely satisfied with the ambassador whom Paul 
 had selected, and with the manner in which he described 
 the Emperor's gratitude for the generous conduct of the
 
 1800. FRIENDSHIP OF THE GZAR PAUL. 347 
 
 First Consul. M. Sprengporten did not conceal the ex- 
 tent of Paul's dissatisfaction with his allies. The bad 
 issue, he said, of the war with France had already dis- 
 posed the Czar to connect himself with that power, when 
 the return of his troops at once determined him. 
 
 We could easily perceive that Paul placed great confi- 
 dence in M. Sprengporten. As he had satisfactorily dis- 
 charged the mission with which he had been entrusted, 
 Paul expressed pleasure at his conduct in several friendly 
 and flattering letters, which Sprengporten always allowed 
 us to read. No one could be fonder of France than he 
 was, and he ardently desired that his first negotiations 
 might lead to a long alliance between the Russian and 
 French Governments. The autograph and very frequent 
 correspondence between Bonaparte and Paul passed 
 through his hands. I read all Paul's letters, which were 
 remarkable for the frankness with which his affection for 
 Bonaparte was expressed. His admiration of the First 
 Consul was so great that no courtier could have written in 
 a more flattering manner. 
 
 This admiration was not feigned on the part of the Em- 
 peror of Russia : it was no less sincere than ardent, and 
 of this he soon gave proofs. The violent hatred he had 
 conceived towards the English Government induced him 
 to defy to single combat every monarch who would not de- 
 clare war against England and shut his ports against Eng- 
 lish ships. He inserted a challenge to the King of Den- 
 mark in the St. Petersburg Court Gazette; but not choos- 
 ing to apply officially to the Senate of Hamburg to order 
 its insertion in the Correspondant, conducted by M. Stover, 
 he sent the article, through Count Pahlen, to M. Schramm, 
 a Hamburg merchant. The Count told M. Schramm that 
 the Emperor would be much pleased to see the article of 
 the St. Petersburg Court Gazette copied into the Correspond- 
 ant; and that if it should be inserted, he wished to have a 
 dozen copies of the paper printed on vellum, and sent to
 
 348 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTK 1800. 
 
 him by an extraordinary courier. It was Paul's intention 
 to send a copy to every sovereign in Europe ; but this 
 piece of folly, after the manner of Charles XII., led to no 
 further results. 
 
 Bonaparte never felt greater satisfaction in the whole 
 course of his life than he experienced from Paul's enthusi- 
 asm for him. The friendship of a sovereign seemed to 
 him a step by which he was to become a sovereign him- 
 self. At the same time the affairs of La Vendee began to 
 assume a better aspect, and he hoped soon to effect that 
 pacification in the interior which he so ardently desired. 1 
 
 1 This account agrees precisely with the following, dictated by Napoleon himself 
 at St. Helena : 
 
 ' The Emperor Paul had succeeded the Empress Catherine. Half frantic with his 
 hostility to the French Revolution, he had performed what his mother had contented 
 herself with promising ; and engaged in the second coalition. General Snwarrow, at 
 the head of 60,000 Russians, advanced into Italy, whilst another Russian army en- 
 tered Switzerland, and a corps of 15,000 men was placed by the Czar at the disposal 
 of the Duke of York, for the purpose of conquering Holland. These were all the 
 disposable forces the Russian Empire had. Suwarrow, although victorious at the 
 battles of Cassano. the Trebbia, and Novi, had lost half his army in the St. Gothard, 
 and the different valleys of Switzerland, after the battle of Zurich, in which Korsa- 
 kow had been taken. Paul then became sensible of all the imprudence of his con- 
 duct ; and in 1800 Suwarrow returned to Russia with scarcely a fourth of his army. 
 The Emperor Paul complained bitterly of having lost the flower of his troops, who 
 had neither been seconded by the Austrians nor by the English. He reproached the 
 Cabinet of Vienna with having refused, after the conquest of Piedmont, to replace 
 the King of Sardinia upon his throne, with being destitute of grand and generous 
 ideas, and wholly governed by calculation and interested views. He also complained 
 that the English, when they took Malta, instead of reinstating the Order of St. John 
 of Jerusalem, and restoring that island to the knights, had appropriated it to them- 
 selves. The First Consul did all in his power to cherish these seeds of discontent, 
 and to make them productive. A little after the battle of Marengo he found means 
 to flatter the lively and impetuous imagination of the Czar by sending him the sword 
 which Pope Leo X. had given to 1'Ile Adam as a memorial of his satisfaction for hav- 
 ing defended Rhodes against the infidels. From eight to ten thousand Russian sol- 
 diers had been made prisoners in Italy, at Zurich, and in Holland : the First Consul 
 proposed their exchange to the English and Austrians, both refused ; the Austrians, 
 because there were still many of their people prisoners in France ; and the English, 
 although they had a great number of French prisoners, because, as they said, this 
 proposal was contrary to their principles. ' What 1 ' it was said to the Cabinet of St. 
 James, ' do you refuse to exchange even the Russians, who were taken in Holland, 
 fighting in your own ranks under the Duke of York ? ' And to the Cabinet of Vienna 
 it was observed, 'How ! do you refuse to restore to their country those men of the 
 north to whom you are indebted for the victories of the Trebbia, and Novi, and for 
 your conquests in Italy, and who have left in your hands a multitude of French 
 prisoners taken by them ? Such injustice excites my indignation,' said the Firs'-
 
 1800. RETURN OF THE RUSSIAN PRISONERS. 349 
 
 It was during the First Consul's residence at the Lux- 
 embourg that the first report on the civil code was made 
 to the legislative body. It was then, also, that the regu- 
 lations for the management of the Bank of France were 
 adopted, and that establishment so necessary to France 
 was founded. 
 
 There was at this time in Paris a man who has acquired 
 an unfortunate celebrity, the most unlucky of modern gen- 
 erals in a word, General Mack. I should not notice that 
 person here were it not for the prophetic judgment which 
 Bonaparte then pronounced on him. Mack had been 
 obliged to surrender himself at Championnet some time 
 before our landing at Frejus. He was received as a pris- 
 oner of war, and the town of Dijon had been appointed 
 his place of residence, and there he remained until after 
 the 18th Brumaire. Bonaparte, now Consul, permitted 
 
 Consul. ' Well ! I will restore them to the Czar without exchange ; he shall see how 
 I esteem brave men.' The Russian officers who were prisoners immediately received 
 their swords, and the troops of that nation were assembled at Aix-la-Chapelle, where 
 they were soon completely new clothed, and furnished with good arms of French 
 manufacture. A Russian general was instructed to organize them in battalions and 
 regiments. This blow struck at once at London and St. Petersburg. Paul, attacked 
 in so many different directions, gave way to his enthusiastic temper, and attached 
 himself to France with all the ardour of his character. He despatched a letter to 
 the First Consul, in which he said, ' Citizen, First Consul, I do not write to you to 
 discuss the rights of men or citizens : every country governs itself as it pleases. 
 Wherever I see at the head of a nation a man who knows how to rule and how to 
 fight, my heart is attracted towards him. I write to acquaint you of my dissatisfac- 
 tion with England, who violates every article of the law of nations, and has no guide 
 but her egotism and interest. I wish to unite with you to put an end to the unjust 
 proceedings of that Government.' 
 
 " In the beginning of December 1800 General Sprengporten, a Finlander, who had 
 entered the Russian service, and who in his heart was attached to France, arrived 
 at Paris. He brought letters from the Emperor Paul, and was instructed to take the 
 command of the Russian prisoners, and to conduct them to their country. All the 
 officers of that nation who returned to Russia constantly spoke in the highest terms 
 of the kind treatment and attention they had met with in France, particularly after 
 the arrival of the First Consul. The correspondence between the Emperor and Na- 
 poleon soon became daily ; they treated directly on the most important interests, and 
 on the means of humbling the English power. General Sprengporten wag not in- 
 structed to make peace ; he had no powers for that purpose ; neither was he an am- 
 bassador ; peace did not exist. It was therefore an extraordinary mission, which 
 allowed of this general's being treated with every distinction calculated to gratify the 
 sovereign who had sent him, without the potwibilty of the occurrence of any incon- 
 venience from such attentions" (A'apoleoti's Memoirs).
 
 350 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 him to come to Paris, and to reside there on his parrle. 
 He applied for leave to go to Vienna, pledging himself to 
 return again a prisoner to France if the Emperor Francis 
 would not consent to exchange him for Generals Perignon 
 and Grouchy, then prisoners in Austria. His request was 
 not granted, but his proposition was forwarded to Vienna. 
 The Court of Vienna refused to accede to it, not placing 
 perhaps so much importance on the deliverance of Mack 
 as he had flattered himself it would. 1 
 
 Bonaparte speaking to me of him one day said, "Mack 
 is a man of the lowest mediocrity I ever saw in my life ; 
 he is full of self-sufficiency and conceit, and believes him- 
 self equal to anything. He has no talent. I should like 
 to see him opposed some day to one of our good generals ; 
 we should then see fine work. He is a boaster, and that 
 is all. He is really one of the most silly men existing ; 
 and, besides all that, he is unlucky." "Was not this opinion 
 of Bonaparte, formed on the past, fully verified by the 
 future ? 
 
 It was at Malmaison that Bonaparte thus spoke of Gen- 
 eral Mack. That place was then far from resembling what 
 
 1 Mack escaped from Paris in the month of April 1800. He afterwards contrived 
 to excuse the faults which had been imputed to him, and insinuated himself into the 
 good graces of the Emperor of Austria. By means of boasting, intriguing, and plot- 
 ting, he at last succeeded in obtaining employment. He constantly railed against 
 France, and spoke of nothing but his desire to revenge his captivity at Paris. Hia 
 deeds, however, did not correspond with his threats. Every one knows how he re- 
 venged himself at Ulm in the commencement of the campaign of 1805. He would 
 infallibly have paid the forfeit of his head for surrendering that town had not Bo- 
 naparte, then the Emperor Napoleon, stipulated for his life in one of the articles of 
 the treaty of Presburg. Bourrienne. 
 
 Jomini is not so hard upon Mack's failure as some of the non-military writers. At 
 tome ii. p. 130. he says, "Posterity, with more information than we have on tha 
 combinations of Mack and of the Cabinet of Vienna, will allot to each of them their 
 share of the blame. It has been said that Mack had in his army a powerful party 
 disliking him, that he was thwarted and badly obeyed, and that his army was scat- 
 tered against his own wishes. This is quite possible, but a commander- in-chief ought 
 not to consent to be the instrument of the ruin of his army. When placed betwixt 
 dishonour and glory, between the safety of the State and the loss of his army, he 
 should know how to act a worthy part." There is no mention of Mack in the treaty 
 of Presburg (unless in a secret article). He was condemned to death, but only im 
 prisoned for two years.
 
 1800. FETE AT THE TEMPLE OF MARS. 351 
 
 it afterwards became, and the road to it was neither pleas- 
 ant nor sure. There was not a house on the road ; and 
 in the evening, during the season when we were there, it 
 was not frequented all the way from St. Germain. Those 
 numerous vehicles, which the demands of luxury and an 
 increasing population have created, did not then, as now, 
 pass along the roads in the environs of Paris. Everywhere 
 the road was solitary and dangerous ; and I learned with 
 certainty that many schemes were laid for carrying off the 
 First Consul during one of his evening journeys. 1 They 
 were unsuccessful, and orders were given to enclose the 
 quarries, which were too near to the road. On Saturday 
 evening Bonaparte left the Luxembourg, and afterwards 
 the Tuileries, to go to Malmaison, and I cannot better ex- 
 press the joy he then appeared to experience than by com- 
 paring it to the delight of a school-boy on getting a holiday. 
 Before removing from the Luxembourg to the Tuileries 
 Bonaparte determined to dazzle the eyes of the Parisians 
 by a splendid ceremony. He had appointed it to take 
 place on the decadi, Pluviose 20 (9th February 1800), that 
 is to say, ten days before his final departure from the old 
 Directorial palace. These kinds of fetes did not resemble 
 what they afterwards became ; their attraction consisted 
 in the splendour of military dress : and Bonaparte was 
 always sure that whenever he mounted his horse, sur- 
 rounded by a brilliant staff from which he was to be 
 distinguished by the simplicity of his costume, his path 
 
 1 Among the various attempts on the life of Bonaparte which are said to have been 
 made at this period the following is mentioned by Constant : 
 
 "Some repairs and embellishments were required in the fireplaces of the First 
 Consul's apartments at Malmaison. Among the workmen who were sent to execute 
 these repairs there were some fellows of suspicious appearance and manner, who, it 
 was conjectured, were bribed by conspirators. This supposition proved but too well 
 founded. When the apartments were ready for the reception of the First Consul 
 there was found on his desk a snuff-box precisely resembling one of those which he 
 was in the habit of using. It was at first supposed that the box had been acciden- 
 tally left there by one of the valets ; but the suspicions excited by the equivocal ap- 
 pearance of some of the workmen having acquired additional confirmation, it wag 
 deemed advisable to analyse the snuff. It was discovered to be poisoned."
 
 352 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 would be crowded and himself greeted with acclamations 
 by the people of Paris. The object of ikisfcte was at first 
 only to present to the Hotel des Invalides, then called the 
 Temple of Mars, seventy-two flags taken from the Turks 
 in the battle of Aboukir and brought from Egypt to Paris ; 
 but intelligence of Washington's death, who expired on 
 the 14th of December 1799, having reached Bonaparte, he 
 eagerly took advantage of that event to produce more effect, 
 and mixed the mourning cypress with the laurels he had 
 collected in Egypt. 
 
 Bonaparte did not feel much concerned at the death of 
 Washington, that noble founder of rational freedom in the 
 new world ; but it afforded him an opportunity to mask 
 his ambitious projects under the appearance of a love of 
 liberty. In thus rendering honour to the memory of 
 Washington everybody would suppose that Bonaparte in- 
 tended to imitate his example, and that their two names 
 would pass in conjunction from mouth to mouth. A 
 clever orator might be employed, who, while pronouncing 
 a eulogium on the dead, would contrive to bestow some 
 praise on the living ; and when the people were applaud- 
 ing his love of liberty he would find himself one step nearer 
 the throne, on which his eyes were constantly fixed. When 
 the proper time arrived, he would not fail to seize the 
 crown ; and would still cry, if necessary, " Vive la Li- 
 berte ! " while placing it on his imperial head. 
 
 The skilful orator was found. M. de Fontanes 1 was com- 
 missioned to pronounce the funeral eulogium on Washing- 
 ton, and the flowers of eloquence which he scattered about 
 did not all fall on the hero of America. 
 
 Lannes" was entrusted by Bonaparte with the presenta- 
 
 1 L. de Fontanes (17S7-18S1) became president of the Corps L6gislatif, Senator, 
 and Grand Master of the University. He was the centre of the literary group of the 
 Empire. 
 
 a Jean Lannes (1769-1809), named Colonel by Napoleon on the field of Millesimo ; 
 Marshal, 1804 ; Duo de Montebello. Took Saragosss. Died of wounds eight dtgrs 
 after the battle of Essling.
 
 1800. CAREER OF MURAT. 353 
 
 tion of the flags ; and on the 20th Pluviose he proceeded, 
 accompanied by strong detachments of the cavalry then in 
 Paris, to the council-hall of the Invalides, where he was 
 met by the Minister of War, who received the colours. 
 All the Ministers, the councillors of State, and generals 
 were summoned to the presentation. Lannes pronounced 
 a discourse, to which Berthier replied, and M. de Fontanes 
 added his well-managed eloquence to the plain military 
 oratory of the two generals. In the interior of this mili- 
 tary temple a statue of Mars sleeping had been placed, and 
 from the pillars and roof were suspended the trophies of 
 Denain, Fontenoy, and the campaign of Italy, which would 
 still have decorated that edifice had not the demon of con- 
 quest possessed Bonaparte. Two Invalides, each said to be 
 a hundred years old, stood beside the Minister of War ; 
 and the bust of the emancipator of America was placed 
 under the trophy composed of the flags of Aboukir. In a 
 word, recourse was had to every sort of charlatanism usual 
 on such occasions. In the evening there was a numerous 
 assembly at the Luxembourg, and Bonaparte took much 
 credit to himself for the effect produced on this remark- 
 able day. He had only to wait ten days for his removal 
 to the Tuileries, and precisely on that day the national 
 mourning for Washington was to cease, for which a general 
 mourning for freedom might well have been substituted. 
 
 I have said very little about Murat in the course of 
 these Memoirs except mentioning the brilliant part he 
 performed in several battles. Having now arrived at the 
 period of his marriage with one of Napoleon's sisters I 
 take the opportunity of returning to the interesting events 
 which preceded that alliance. 
 
 His fine and well-proportioned form, his great physical 
 strength and somewhat refined elegance of manner, the 
 fire of his eye, and his fierce courage in battle, gave to 
 Murat rather the character of one of those preux cheva- 
 liers so well described by Ariosto and Tasso, than that of 
 VOL. I. 23
 
 354 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 a Republican soldier. The nobleness of his look soon 
 made the lowness of his birth be forgotten. He was affa- 
 ble, polished, gallant ; and in the field of battle twenty 
 men headed by Murat were worth a whole regiment. 
 Once only he showed himself under the influence of fear, 1 
 and the reader shall see in what circumstance it was that 
 he ceased to be himself. 
 
 When Bonaparte in his first Italian campaign had forced 
 Wilrmser to retreat into Mantua with 28,000 men, he 
 directed Miollis, with only 4000 men, to oppose any sortie 
 that might be attempted by the Austrian general. In one 
 of these sorties Murat, who was at the head of a very weak 
 detachment, was ordered to charge Wurmser. He was 
 afraid, neglected to execute the order, and in a moment 
 of confusion said that he was wounded. Murat imme- 
 diately fell into disgrace with the General-in-Chief, whose 
 aide de camp he was. 
 
 Murat had been previously sent to Paris to present to 
 the Directory the first colours taken by the French army 
 of Italy in the actions of Dego and Mondovi, and it was 
 on this occasion that he got acquainted with Madame 
 Tallien and the wife of his General. But he already knew 
 the beautiful Caroline Bonaparte, whom he had seen at 
 Rome in the residence of her brother Joseph, who was 
 then discharging the functions of ambassador of the 
 Republic. It appears that Caroline was not even indiffer- 
 ent to him, and that he was the successful rival of the 
 Princess Santa Croce's son, who eagerly sought the honour 
 of her hand. Madame Tallien and Madame Bonaparte 
 received with great kindness the first aide de camp, and 
 as they possessed much influence with the Directory, they 
 solicited, and easily obtained for him, the rank of briga- 
 
 1 Marshal Lannes, so brave and brilliant in war and so well able to appreciata 
 courage, one day sharply rebuked a colonel for having punished a young officer just 
 arrived from school at Fontainebleau because he gave evidence of fear in his first 
 engagement. " Know, colonel," said he, " none but a poltroon [the term was even 
 more strong] will boast that he never was afraid." Bourrienne.
 
 1800. BONAPAHTE'S COOLNESS TO MURAT. 355 
 
 dier-general. It was somewhat remarkable at that time 
 for Murat, notwithstanding his newly-acquired rank, to 
 remain Bonaparte's aide de camp, the regulations not 
 allowing a general-in-chief an aide de camp of higher rank 
 than chief of brigade, which was equal to that of colonel. 
 This insignificant act was, therefore, rather a hasty antici- 
 pation of the prerogatives everywhere reserved to princes 
 and kings. 
 
 It was after having discharged this 'commission that 
 Murat, on his return to Italy, fell into disfavour with the 
 General-in-Chief. He indeed looked upon him with a sort 
 of hostile feeling, and placed him in Reille's division, and 
 afterwards Baraguay d'Hilliers' ; consequently, when we 
 went to Paris, after the treaty of Campo-Formio, Murat 
 was not of the party. But as the ladies, with whom he 
 was a great favourite, were not devoid of influence with 
 the Minister of War, Murat was, by their interest, attached 
 to the engineer corps in the expedition to Egypt. On 
 board the Orient he remained in the most complete dis- 
 grace. Bonaparte did not address a word to him during 
 the passage ; and in Egypt the General-in-Chief always 
 treated him with coldness, and often sent him from 
 the headquarters on disagreeable services. However, the 
 General-in-Chief having opposed him to Mourad Bey, 
 Murat performed such prodigies of valour in every 
 perilous encounter that he effaced the transitory stain 
 which a momentary hesitation under the walls of Mantua 
 had left on his character. Finally, Murat so powerfully 
 contributed to the success of the day at Aboukir that Bo- 
 naparte, glad to be able to carry another laurel plucked in 
 Egypt to France, forgot the fault which had made so un- 
 favourable an impression, and was inclined to efface from 
 his memory other things that he had heard to the disad- 
 vantage of Murat ; for I have good reasons for believing, 
 though Bonaparte never told me so, that Murat's name, 
 as well as that of Charles, escaped from the lips of Junot
 
 356 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 when he made his indiscreet communication to Bonaparte 
 at the walls of Messoudiah. The charge of grenadiers, 
 commanded by Murat on the 19th Brumaire in the hall 
 of the Five Hundred, dissipated all the remaining traces 
 of dislike ; and in those moments when Bonaparte's polit- 
 ical views subdued every other sentiment of his mind, the 
 rival of the Prince Santa Croce received the command of 
 the Consular Guard. 1 
 
 It may reasonably be supposed that Madame Bonaparte, 
 in endeavouring to win the friendship of Murat by aiding 
 his promotion, had in view to gain one partisan more to 
 oppose to the family and brothers of Bonaparte ; and of 
 this kind of support she had much need. Their jealous 
 hatred was displayed on every occasion ; and the amiable 
 Josephine, whose only fault was being too much of the 
 woman, was continually tormented by sad presentiments. 
 Carried away by the easiness of her character, she did not 
 perceive that the coquetry which enlisted for her so many 
 defenders also supplied her implacable enemies with 
 weapons to use against her. 
 
 In this state of things Josephine, who was well con- 
 vinced that she had attached Murat to herself by the 
 bonds of friendship and gratitude, and ardently desired 
 to see him united to Bonaparte by a family connection, 
 
 1 Joachim Mnrat (1771-1815), the son of an innkeeper, aide de camp to Napoleon 
 in Italy, etc. ; Marshal, 1804 ; Prince in 1805 ; Grand Admiral ; Grand Due de 
 Berg et de Cleves, 1806 ; King of Naples, 1808. Shot by Bourbons 13th October 
 1815. Married Caroline Bonaparte (third sister of Napoleon) 20th January 1800. 
 
 Joseph was not ambassador till long after the battle of Mondovi, so Murat could 
 not have met Caroline at his house in Home. There are several mistakes in this 
 paragraph (see Erreurs, tome i. pp. 6, 259, 312). Reille, at the time Bourrienne 
 speaks of, was a captain on the staff of Massena, and only became general of division 
 in 18(17. As Murat embarked from Genoa for Egypt he was not on board the Orient, 
 but on the Artemise. This asserted cowardice of Murat is denied by Erreurs (tome 
 i. p. 6). See also Erreurs (tome ii. p. 61) giving details of the series of posts given 
 by Napoleon to him to prove that he was not under any disgrace. Joseph Bona- 
 parte (Erreurs, tome i. p. 259) denies that Murat's name was mentioned in connec- 
 tion with Josephine's. It has been already seen that the conversation at Messondiah 
 could not have taken place ; see p. 168, as well as Erreurs, tome i. pp. 4, 61, and 
 tfAbrantes, vol. ii. p. 82, eighth line from bottom.
 
 1800. MARRIAGE OF MURAT AND CAROLINE. 357 
 
 favoured with all her influence his marriage with Caroline. 
 She was not ignorant that a close intimacy had already 
 sprung up at Milan between Caroline and Murat, and she 
 was the first to propose a marriage. Murat hesitated, and 
 went to consult M. Collot, who was a good adviser in all 
 things^ and whose intimacy with Bonaparte had initiated 
 him into all the secrets of the family. M. Collot advised 
 Murat to lose no time, but to go to the First Consul and 
 formally demand the hand of his sister. Murat followed 
 his advice. Did he do well ? It was to this step that he 
 owed the throne of Naples. If he had abstained he would 
 not have been shot at Pizzo. Sed ipsi Dei fata rumpere 
 non possunt ! 
 
 However that might be, Bonaparte received, more in 
 the manner of a sovereign than of a brother in arms, the 
 proposal of Murat. He heard him with unmoved gravity, 
 said that he would consider the matter, but gave no posi- 
 tive answer. 
 
 This affair was, as may be supposed, the subject of 
 conversation in the evening in the salon of the Luxem- 
 bourg. Madame Bonaparte employed all her powers of 
 persuasion to obtain the First Consul's consent, and her 
 efforts were seconded by Hortense, Eugene, and myself. 
 " Murat," said he, among other things, " Murat is an inn- 
 keeper's son. In the elevated rank where glory and fort- 
 une have placed me, I never can mix his blood with mine ! 
 Besides, there is no hurry : I shall see by and by." We 
 forcibly described to him the reciprocal affection of the 
 two young people, and did not fail to bring to his obser- 
 vation Murat's devoted attachment to his person, his 
 splendid courage and noble conduct in Egypt. " Yes," 
 said he, with warmth, "I agree with you ; Murat was 
 superb at Aboukir." We did not allow so favourable a 
 moment to pass by. We redoubled our entreaties, and 
 at last he consented. When we were together in his 
 cabinet in the evening, "Well, Bourrienne," said he to
 
 358 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 me, "you ought to be satisfied, and so am I, too, every- 
 thing considered. Murat is suited to my sister, and then 
 no one can say that I am proud, or seek grand alliances. 
 If I had given my sister to a noble, all your Jacobins 
 would have raised a cry of counter-revolution. Besides, 
 I am very glad that my wife is interested in this marriage, 
 and you may easily suppose the cause. Since it is deter- 
 mined on, I will hasten it forward ; we have no time to 
 lose. If I go to Italy I will take Murat with me. I must 
 strike a decisive blow there. Adieu." 
 
 When I entered the First Consul's chamber at seven 
 o'clock the next day he appeared even more satisfied than 
 on the preceding evening with the resolution he had taken. 
 I easily perceived that in spite of all his cunning, he had 
 failed to discover the real motive which had induced 
 Josephine to take so lively an interest respecting Murat's 
 marriage with Caroline. Still Bonaparte's satisfaction 
 plainly showed that his wife's eagerness for the marriage 
 had removed all doubt in his mind of the falsity of the 
 calumnious reports which had prevailed respecting her 
 intimacy with Murat. 
 
 The marriage of Murat and Caroline was celebrated at the 
 Luxembourg, but with great modesty. 1 The First Consul 
 did not yet think that his family affairs were affairs of state. 
 But previously to the celebration a little comedy was enacted 
 in which I was obliged to take a part, and I will relate how. 
 
 At the time of the marriage of Murat Bonaparte had not 
 much money, and therefore only gave his sister a dowry 
 of 30,000 francs. . Still, thinking it necessary to make her 
 a marriage present, and not possessing the means to 
 purchase a suitable one, he took a diamond necklace which 
 belonged to his wife and gave it to the bride. Josephine 
 was not at all pleased with this robbery, and taxed her 
 wits to discover some means of replacing her necklace. 
 
 1 The marriage of Murat was celebrated in the Commune of Plailly, near Morte- 
 fontaine, in the department of the Oise (Joseph in Erreurs, tome i. p. 259).
 
 1800. JOSEPHINE AND HER PEARLS. 359 
 
 Josephine was aware that the celebrated jeweller Foncier 
 possessed a magnificent collection of fine pearls which 
 had belonged, as he said, to the late Queen, Marie An- 
 toinette. Having ordered them to be brought to her to 
 examine them, she thought there were sufficient to make 
 a very fine necklace. But to make the purchase 250,000 
 francs were required, and how to get them was the diffi- 
 culty. Madame Bonaparte had recourse to Berthier, who 
 was then Minister of War. Berthier, after biting his 
 nails according to his usual habit, set about the liquida- 
 tion of the debts due for the hospital service in Italy with 
 as much speed as possible ; and as in those days the con- 
 tractors whose claims were admitted overflowed with 
 gratitude towards their patrons, through whom they ob- 
 tained payment, the pearls soon passed from Foncier's 
 shop to the casket of Madame Bonaparte. 
 
 The pearls being thus obtained, there was still another 
 difficulty, which Madame Bonaparte did not at first think 
 of. How was she to wear a necklace purchased without her 
 husband's knowledge ? Indeed it was the more difficult 
 for her to do so as the First Consul knew very well that 
 his wife had no money, and being, if I may be allowed the 
 expression, something of the busybody, he knew, or be- 
 lieved he knew, all Josephine's jewels. The pearls were 
 therefore condemned to remain more than a fortnight in 
 Madame Bonaparte's casket without her daring to use 
 them. What a punishment for a woman ! At length her 
 vanity overcame her prudence, and being unable to conceal 
 the jewels any longer, she one day said to me, "Bourrienne, 
 there is to be a large party here to-morrow, and I abso- 
 lutely must wear my pearls. But you know he will 
 grumble if he notices them. I beg, Bourrienne, that you 
 will keep near me. If he asks me where I got my pearls 
 I must tell him, without hesitation, that I have had them 
 a long time." 
 
 Everything happened as Josephine feared and hoped.
 
 360 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Bonaparte, on seeing the pearls, did not fail to say to 
 Madame, " What is it you have got there ? How fine you 
 are to-day ! Where did you get these pearls ? I think I 
 never saw them before." " Oh ! mon Dieu ! you have seen 
 them a dozen times ! It is the necklace which the Cisal- 
 pine Republic gave me, and which I now wear in my hair." 
 
 " But I think " " Stay : ask Bourrienne, he will tell 
 
 you." " Well, Bourrienne, what do you say to it? Do 
 you recollect the necklace ? " " Yes, General, I recollect 
 very well seeing it before." This was not untrue, for 
 Madame Bonaparte had previously shown me the pearls. 
 Besides, she had received a pearl necklace from the 
 Cisalpine Republic, but of incomparably less value than 
 that purchased from Foucier. Josephine performed her 
 part with charming dexterity, and I did not act amiss 
 the character of accomplice assigned me in this little 
 comedy. Bonaparte had no suspicions. When I saw the 
 easy confidence with which Madame Bonaparte got 
 through this scene, I could not help recollecting Suzanne's 
 reflection on the readiness with which well-bred ladies can 
 tell falsehoods without seeming to do so.
 
 1800. 361 
 
 CHAPTER XXXL 
 
 1800. 
 
 Police on police False information Dexterity of Fouche' Police agents 
 deceived Money ill applied Inutility of political police Bonaparte's 
 opinion General considerations My appointment to the Prefecture 
 of police. 
 
 BEFORE taking up his quarters in the Tuileries the First 
 Consul organised his secret police, which was intended, at 
 the same time, to be the rival or check upon Fouch6's 
 police. Duroc and Moncey were at first the Directors 
 of this police ; afterwards Davoust and Junot. Madame 
 Bonaparte called this business a vile system of espionage. 
 My remarks on the inutility of the measure were made in 
 vain. Bonaparte had the weakness at once to fear Fouche 
 and to think him necessary. 1 Fouche, whose talents at 
 this trade are too well known to need my approbation, 
 soon discovered this secret institution, and the names of 
 all the subaltern agents employed by the chief agents. It 
 is difficult to form an idea of the nonsense, absurdity, and 
 falsehood contained in the bulletins drawn up by the 
 noble and ignoble agents of the police. 2 I do not mean 
 to enter into details on this nauseating subject ; and I 
 shall only trespass on the reader's patience by relating, 
 though it be in anticipation, one fact which concerns my- 
 self, and which will prove that spies and their wretched 
 reports cannot be too much distrusted. 
 
 During the second year of the Consulate we were estab- 
 lished at Malmaison. Junot had a very large sum at his 
 
 1 Or the ability to understand his man nnd still to utilise him ? Printer's Devil. 
 1 Bef ereuces to the bad effect of the secret police will b found in moat of t lie mo-
 
 36JJ MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 disposal for the secret police of the capital. He gave 3000 
 francs of it to a wretched manufacturer of bulletins ; the 
 remainder was expended on the police of his stable and 
 his table. In reading one of these daily bulletins I saw 
 the following lines : 
 
 " M. de Bourrienne went last night to Paris. He entered 
 an hdtel of the Faubourg St. Germain, Rue de Varenne, and 
 there, in the course of a very animated discussion, he gave it 
 to be understood that the First Consul wished to make himself 
 King" 
 
 As it happens, I never had opened my mouth, either 
 respecting what Bonaparte had said to me before we went 
 to Egypt or respecting his other frequent conversations 
 with me of the same nature, during this period of his Con- 
 sulship. I may here observe, too, that I never quitted, nor 
 ever could quit Malmaison for a moment. At any time, 
 by night or day, I was subject to be called for by the First 
 Consul, and, as very often was the case, it so happened 
 that on the night in question he had dictated to me notes 
 and instructions until three o'clock in the morning. 
 
 Junot came every day to Malmaison at eleven o'clock in 
 the morning. I called him that day into my cabinet, when 
 I happened to be alone. " Have you not read your bulle- 
 tin? " said I. "Yes, I have." "Nay, that is impossible." 
 "Why?" "Because, if you had, you would have sup- 
 pressed an absurd story which relates to me." "Ah!" 
 he replied, "I am sorry on your account, but lean depend 
 on my agent, and I will not alter a word of his report." I 
 then told him all that had taken place on that night ; but 
 he was obstinate, and went away unconvinced. 
 
 Every morning I placed all the papers which the First 
 Consul had to read on his table, and among the first was 
 Junot's report. The First Consul entered and read it ; on 
 
 moira of the time of Napoleon, but nowhere stronger than in those of Savary, Due da 
 Kovigo, himself the Minister of Police from 1810 to 1814. See Savary, e.g., torn* 
 T . p. 29.
 
 1800. THE SECRET POLICE AT FAULT. 363 
 
 coming to the passage concerning me he began to smile. 
 "Have you read this bulletin?" "Yes, General." 
 " What an ass that Junot is ! " " It is a long time since I 
 have known that." "How he allows himself to be en- 
 trapped ! Is he still here ? " " I believe so. I have just 
 seen him, and made observations to him, all in good part, 
 but he would hear nothing." "Tell him to come here." 
 When Junot appeared Bonaparte began "Imbecile that 
 you are ! how could you send me such reports as these ? 
 Do you not read them ? How shall I be sure that you will 
 not compromise other persons equally unjustly ? I want 
 positive facts, not inventions. It is some time since your 
 agent displeased me ; dismiss him directly." Junot wanted 
 to justify himself, but Bonaparte cut him short " Enough ! 
 It is settled ! " 
 
 I related what had passed to Fouche, who told me that, 
 wishing to amuse himself at Junot's expense, whose police 
 agents only picked up what they heard related in coffee- 
 houses, gaming-houses, and the Bourse, he had given cur- 
 rency to this absurd story, which Junot had credited and 
 reported, as he did many other foolish tales. Fouche 
 often caught the police of the Palace in the snares he laid 
 for them, and thus increased his own credit 
 
 This circumstance, and others of the same nature, in- 
 duced the First Consul to attach less importance than at 
 first he had to his secret police, which seldom reported 
 anything but false and silly stories. That wretched po- 
 lice ! During the time I was with him it embittered hia 
 life, and often exasperated him against his wife, his rela- 
 tions, and friends. 1 Rapp, who was as frank as he was 
 brave, tells us in his Memoirs (p. 233) that when Napoleon, 
 during his retreat from Moscow, while before Smolensko, 
 heard of the attempt of Mallet, 4 he could not get over the 
 
 1 Bonrrienne, it mast be remembered, was a sufferer from the vigilance of thig 
 police. 
 8 For the conspiracy of Mallet, see farther on in this work, under the year 1812.
 
 364 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 adventure of the Police Minister, Savary, and the Prefect 
 of Police, Pasquier. "Napoleon," says Bapp, "was not 
 surprised that these wretches (he means the agents of the 
 police) who crowd the salons and the taverns, who insin- 
 uate themselves everywhere and obstruct everything, 
 should not have found out the plot, but he could not 
 understand the weakness of the Due de Rovigo. The 
 very police which professed to divine everything had let 
 themselves be taken by surprise." The police possessed 
 no foresight or faculty of prevention. Every silly thing 
 that transpired was reported either from malice or stu- 
 pidity. What was heard was misunderstood or distorted 
 in the recital, so that the only result of the plan was mis- 
 chief and confusion. 
 
 The police as a political engine is a dangerous thing. 
 It foments and encourages more false conspiracies than it 
 discovers or defeats real ones. Napoleon has related 
 " that M. de la Rochefoucauld formed at Paris a conspir- 
 acy in favour of the King, then at Mittau, the first act of 
 which was to be the death of the Chief of the Government. 
 The plot being discovered, a trusty person belonging to 
 the police was ordered to join it and become one of the 
 most active agents. He brought letters of recommenda- 
 tion from an old gentleman in Lorraine who had held a 
 distinguished rank in the army of Conde." After this, 
 what more can be wanted ? A hundred examples could not 
 better show the vileness of such a system. Napoleon, 
 when fallen, himself thus disclosed the scandalous means 
 employed by his Government. 
 
 Napoleon on one occasion, in the Isle of Elba, said to 
 an officer who was conversing with him about France, 
 " You believe, then, that the police agents foresee every- 
 thing and know everything ? They invent more than they 
 discover. Mine, I believe, was better than that they have 
 got now, and yet it was often only by mere chance, the im- 
 prudence of the parties implicated, or the treachery of
 
 1800. BONAPAHTE ON POLITICAL POLICE. 865 
 
 some of them, that something was discovered after a week 
 or fortnight's exertion." Napoleon, in directing this offi- 
 cer to transmit letters to him under the cover of a com- 
 mercial correspondence, to quiet his apprehensions that 
 the correspondence might be discovered, said, " Do 
 you think, then, that all letters are opened at the post 
 office ? They would never be able to do so. I have often 
 endeavoured to discover what the correspondence was 
 that passed under mercantile forms, but I never succeeded. 
 The post office, like the police, catches only fools." 
 
 Since I am on the subject of political police, that lep- 
 rosy of modern society, perhaps I may be allowed to over- 
 step the order of time, and advert to its state even in the 
 present day. 
 
 The Minister of Police, to give his prince a favourable 
 idea of his activity, contrives great conspiracies, which he 
 is pretty sure to discover in time, because he is their orig- 
 inator. The inferior agents, to find favour in the eyes 
 of the Minister, contrive small plots. It would be diffi- 
 cult to mention a conspiracy which has been discovered, 
 except when the police agents took part in it, or were its 
 promoters. It is difficult to conceive how those agents 
 can feed a little intrigue, the result at first, perhaps, of 
 some petty ill-h amour and discontent which, thanks to 
 their skill, soon becomes a great affair. How many con- 
 spiracies have escaped the boasted activity and vigilance 
 of the police when none of its agents were parties. I 
 may instance Babeuf s conspiracy, the attempt at the camp 
 at Grenelle, the 18th Brumaire, the infernal machine, 
 Mallet, the 20th of March, the affair of Grenoble, and 
 many others. 
 
 The political police, the result of the troubles of the 
 Revolution, has survived them. The civil police for the 
 security of property, health, and order, is only made a 
 secondary object, and has been, therefore, neglected. 
 There are times in which it is thought of more conse-
 
 366 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 quence to discover whether a citizen goes to mass or con- 
 fession than to defeat the designs of a band of robbers. 
 Such a state of things is unfortunate for a country ; and 
 the money expended on a system of superintendence over 
 persons alleged to be suspected, in domestic inquisitions, 
 in the corruption of the friends, relations, and servants of 
 the man marked out for destruction might be much better 
 employed. The espionage of opinion, created, as I have 
 said, by the revolutionary troubles, is suspicious, restless, 
 officious, inquisitorial, vexatious, and tyrannical. Indiffer- 
 ent to crimes and real offences, it is totally absorbed in 
 the inquisition of thoughts. Who has not heard it said in 
 company, to some one speaking warmly, "Be moderate, 
 M is supposed to belong to the police." This po- 
 lice enthralled Bonaparte himself in its snares, and held 
 him a long time under the influence of its power. 
 
 I have taken the liberty thus to speak of a scourge of 
 society of which I have been a victim. What I here state 
 may be relied on. I shall not speak of the week during 
 which I had to discharge the functions of Prefect of Po- 
 lice, namely, from the 13th to the 20th of March 1815. 
 It may well be supposed that though I had not held in 
 abhorrence the infamous system which I have described, 
 the important nature of the circumstances and the short 
 period of my administration must have prevented me 
 from making complete use of the means placed at my dis- 
 posal. The dictates of discretion, which I consider my- 
 self bound to obey, forbid me giving proofs of what I ad- 
 vance. What it was necessary to do I accomplished with- 
 out employing violent or vexatious means ; and I can take 
 on myself to assert that no one has cause to complain of me. 
 Were I to publish the list of the persons I had orders to 
 arrest, those of them who are yet living would be aston- 
 ished that the only knowledge they had of my' being the 
 Prefect of Police was from the Moniteur. I obtained by 
 mild measures, by persuasion, and reasoning what I could
 
 1800. BONAPARTE'S RIDICULE OF IDEALISTS. 367 
 
 never have got by violence. I am not divulging any se- 
 crets of office, but I believe I am rendering a service to 
 the public in pointing out what I have often observed while 
 an unwilling confidant in the shameful manoeuvres of that 
 poltical institution. 
 
 The word ideologue was often in Bonaparte's mouth ; and 
 in using it he endeavoured to throw ridicule on those men 
 whom he fancied to have a tendency towards the doctrine 
 of indefinite perfectibility. He esteemed them for their 
 morality, yet he looked on them as dreamers seeking for 
 the type of a universal constitution, and considering the 
 character of man in the abstract only. The ideologues, ac- 
 cording to him, looked for power in institutions ; and that 
 he called metaphysics. He had no idea of power except in 
 direct force. All benevolent men who speculate on the 
 amelioration of human society were regarded by Bonaparte 
 as dangerous, because their maxims and principles were 
 diametrically opposed to the harsh and arbitrary system 
 he had adopted. He said that their hearts were better 
 than their heads, and, far from wandering with them in 
 abstractions, he always said that men were only to be 
 governed by fear and interest. The free expression of 
 opinion through the press has been always regarded by 
 those who are not led away by interest or power as useful 
 to society. But Bonaparte held the liberty of the press 
 in the greatest horror ; and so violent was his passion 
 when anything was urged in its favour that he seemed to 
 labour under a nervous attack. Great man as he was, he 
 was sorely afraid of little paragraphs. 1 
 
 1 Joseph Bonaparte fairly enough remarks on this that such writings hod dono 
 great harm in those extraordinary times (Erreurs, tome i. p. 259). Metternioh, 
 writing in 1827 with distruat of the proceedings of Louis XVIII., quotes, with ap- 
 proval, Napoleon's sentiments on this point. " Napoleon, who could not have been 
 wanting in the feeling of power, said to me, ' You see me master of France ; well, 
 I would not undertake to govern her for three months with liberty of the press.' 
 Louis XVIII., apparently thinking himself stronger than Napoleon, is not content 
 with allowing the press its freedom, but has embodied its liberty in the charter " 
 (Metternich, tome iv. p. 391).
 
 568 1800 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIL 
 
 1800. 
 
 Successful management of parties Precautions Removal from the 
 Luxembourg to the Tuileries Hackney-coaches and the Consul** 
 white horses Royal custom and an inscription The review Bona- 
 parte's homage to the standards Talleyrand in Bonaparte's cabinet 
 Bonaparte's aversion to the cap of liberty even in painting The state 
 bed Our cabinet. 
 
 OF the three brothers to whom the 18th Brumaire gave 
 birth Bonaparte speedily declared himself the eldest, and 
 hastened to assume all the rights of primogeniture. He 
 soon arrogated to himself the whole power. The project 
 he had formed, when he favoured the revolution of the 
 18th Fructidor, was now about to be realized. It was 
 then an indispensable part of his plan that the Directory 
 should violate the constitution in order to justify a sub- 
 sequent subversion of the Directory. The expressions 
 which escaped him from time to time plainly showed that 
 his ambition was not yet satisfied, and that the Consulship 
 was only a state of probation preliminary to the complete 
 establishment of monarchy. The Luxembourg was then 
 discovered to be too small for the Chief of the Govern- 
 ment, and it was resolved that Bonaparte should inhabit 
 the Tuileries. Still great prudence was necessary to avoid 
 the quicksands which surrounded him ! He therefore 
 employed great precaution in dealing with the suscepti- 
 bilities of the Republicans, taking care to inure them 
 gradually to the temperature of absolute power. But this 
 mode of treatment was not sufficient ; for such was Bona- 
 parte's situation between the Jacobins and the Royalists
 
 1800. BONAPARTE'S PRECAUTIONS, 36d 
 
 that he could not strike a blow at one party without 
 strengthening the other. He, however, contrived to solve 
 this difficult problem, and weakened both parties by alter- 
 nately frightening each. "You see, Royalists, "he seemed 
 to say, " if you do not attach yourselves to my govern- 
 ment the Jacobins will again rise and bring back the reign 
 of terror and its scaffold." To the men of the Revolution 
 he, on the other hand, said, " See, the counter-Revolution 
 appears, threatening reprisals and vengeance. It is ready 
 to overwhelm you ; my buckler can alone protect you 
 from its attacks." Thus both parties were induced, from 
 their mutual fear of each other, to attach themselves 
 to Bonaparte ; and while they fancied they were only 
 placing themselves under the protection of the Chief of 
 the Government, they were making themselves dependent 
 on an ambitious man, who, gradually bending them to his 
 will, guided them as he chose in his political career. He 
 advanced with a firm step ; but he never neglected any 
 artifice to conceal, as long as possible, his designs. 
 
 I saw Bonaparte put in motion all his concealed springs ; 
 and I could not help admiring his wonderful address. 
 But what most astonished me was the control he possessed 
 over himself, in repressing any premature manifestation 
 of his intentions which might prejudice his projects. 
 Thus, for instance, he never spoke of the Tuileries but un- 
 der the name of " the Palace of the Government," and he 
 determined not to inhabit, at first, the ancient palace of 
 the kings of France alone. He contented himself with 
 selecting the royal apartments, and proposed that the 
 Third Consul should also reside in the Tuileries, and in 
 consequence he occupied the Pavilion of Flora. This 
 skilful arrangement was perfectly in accordance with the 
 designation of " Palace of the Government " given to the 
 Tuileries, and was calculated to deceive, for a time, the 
 most clear-sighted. 
 
 The moment for leaving the Luxembourg having ar- 
 VOL. I. 24
 
 370 MEMOIRS Off NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 rived, Bonaparte still used many deceptive precautions. 
 The day fixed for the translation of the seat of govern- 
 ment was the 30th Pluviose, the previous day having been 
 selected for publishing the account of the votes taken for 
 the acceptance of the new Constitution. He had, be- 
 sides, caused the insertion in the Moniteur of the eulogy 
 on Washington, pronounced by M. de Fontanes, the de- 
 cadi preceding, to be delayed for ten days. He thought 
 that the day when he was about to take so large a step 
 towards monarchy would be well chosen for entertaining 
 the people of Paris with grand ideas of liberty, and for 
 coupling his own name with that of the founder of the 
 free government of the United States. 
 
 At seven o'clock on the morning of the 30th Pluviose I 
 entered, as usual, the chamber of the First Consul. He 
 was in a profound sleep, and this was one of the days on 
 which I had been desired to allow him to sleep a little 
 longer than usual. I have often observed that General 
 Bonaparte appeared much less moved when on the point 
 of executing any great design than during the time of 
 projecting it, so accustomed was he to think that what he 
 had resolved on in his mind was already done. 
 
 When I returned to Bonaparte he said to me, with a 
 marked air of satisfaction, "Well, Bourrienne, to-night, 
 at last, we shall sleep in the Tuileries. You are better off 
 than I : you are not obliged to make a spectacle of your- 
 self, but may go your own road there. I must, however, 
 go in procession : that disgusts me ; but it is necessary to 
 speak to the eyes. That has a good effect on the people. 
 The Directory was too simple, and therefore never enjoyed 
 any consideration. In the army simplicity is in its proper 
 place ; but in a great city, in a palace, the Chief of the 
 Government must attract attention in every possible way, 
 yet still with prudence. Josephine is going to look out 
 from Lebrun's apartments ; go with her, if you like ; but go 
 k> the cabinet as soon as you see me alight from my horse."
 
 1800. DEPARTURE FOR TSE TUILERtES. S 1 ?! 
 
 I did not go to the review, but proceeded to the Tuile- 
 ries, to arrange in our new cabinet the papers which it 
 was my duty to take care of, and to prepare everything 
 for the First Consul's arrival. It was not until the even- 
 ing that I learned, from the conversation in the salon, 
 where there was a numerous party, what had taken place 
 in the course of the day. 
 
 At one o'clock precisely Bonaparte left the Luxembourg. 
 The procession was, doubtless, far from approaching the 
 magnificent parade of the Empire : but as much pomp 
 was introduced as the state of things in France permitted. 
 The only real splendour of that period consisted in fine 
 troops. Three thousand picked men, among whom was 
 the superb regiment of the Guides, had been ordered out 
 for the occasion : all marched in the greatest order, with 
 music at the head of each corps. The generals and their 
 staffs were on horseback, the Ministers in carriages, which 
 were somewhat remarkable, as they were almost the only 
 private carriages then in Paris, for hackney-coaches had 
 been hired to convey the Council of State, and no trouble 
 had been taken to alter them, except by pasting over the 
 number a piece of paper of the same colour as the body 
 of the vehicle. The Consul's carriage was drawn by six 
 white horses. With the sight of those horses was associ- 
 ated the recollection of days of glory and of peace, for 
 they had been presented to the General-in-Chief of the 
 army of Italy by the Emperor of Germany after the treaty 
 of Campo-Formio. Bonaparte also wore the magnificent 
 sabre given him by the Emperor Francis. With Camba- 
 cercjs on his left, and Lebruii in the front of the carriage, 
 the First Consul traversed a part of Paris, taking the Rue 
 de Thionville, and the Quai Voltaire to the Pout Royal. 
 Everywhere he was greeted by acclamations of joy, which 
 at that time were voluntary, and needed not to be com- 
 manded by the police. 
 
 From the wicket of the Carrousel to the gate of the
 
 372 MEMOIRS Off NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Tuileries the troops of the Consular Guard were formed in 
 two lines, through which the procession passed a royal 
 custom, which made a singular contrast with an inscrip- 
 tion in front of which Bonaparte passed on entering the 
 courtyard. Two guard-houses had been built, one on the 
 right and another on the left of the centre gate. On the 
 one to the right were written these words : 
 
 "THE TENTH OF AUGUST 1792. ROYALTY IN FRANCE 
 IS ABOLISHED ; AND SHALL NEVER BE RE-ESTABLISHED ! " 
 
 It was already re-established ! 
 
 In the meantime the troops had been drawn up in line 
 in the courtyard. As soon as the Consul's carriage 
 stopped Bonaparte immediately alighted, and mounted, 
 or, to speak more properly, leaped on his horse, and re- 
 viewed his troops, while the other two Consuls proceeded 
 to the state apartments of the Tuileries, where the Council 
 of State and the Ministers awaited them. A great many 
 ladies, elegantly dressed in Greek costume, which was 
 then the fashion, were seated with Madame Bonaparte at 
 the windows of the Third Consul's apartments in the 
 Pavilion of Flora. It is impossible to give an idea of the 
 immense crowds which flowed in from all quarters. The 
 windows looking to the Carrousel were let for very large 
 sums ; and everywhere arose, as if from one voice, shouts 
 of " Long live the First Consul ! " Who could help being 
 intoxicated by so much enthusiasm ? 
 
 Bonaparte prolonged the review for some time, passed 
 down all the ranks, and addressed the commanders of 
 corps in terms of approbation and praise. He then took 
 his station at the gate of the Tuileries, with Murat on his 
 right, and Lannes on his left, and behind him a numer- 
 ous staff of young warriors, whose complexions had been 
 browned by the sun of Egypt and Italy, and who had
 
 1800. TALLEYRAND'S ACCEPTABLE ADVICE. 371 
 
 been engaged in more battles than they numbered yeara 
 When the colours of the 96th, 43d, and 30th demi- 
 brigades, or rather their flagstaffs, surmounted by some 
 shreds, riddled by balls and blackened by powder, passed 
 before him, he raised his hat and inclined his head in 
 token of respect. Every homage thus paid by a great 
 captain to standards which had been mutilated on the 
 field of battle was saluted by a thousand acclamations. 
 When the troops had finished defiling before him the 
 First Consul, with a firm step, ascended the stairs of the 
 Tuileries. 
 
 The General's part being finished for the day, that of 
 the Chief of the State began ; and indeed it might already 
 be said that the First Consul was the whole Consulate. 
 At the risk of interrupting my narrative of what occurred 
 on our arrival at the Tuileries by a digression which may 
 be thought out of place, I will relate a fact which had no 
 little weight in hastening Bonaparte's determination to 
 assume a superiority over his colleagues. It may be re- 
 membered that when Roger Ducos and Sieyes bore the title 
 of Consuls the three members of the Consular commission 
 were equal, if not in fact at least in right. But when 
 Cambaceres and Lebrun took their places, Talleyrand, 
 who had at the same time been appointed to succeed M. 
 Keinhart as Minister of Foreign Affairs, obtained a private 
 audience of the First Consul in his cabinet, to which I 
 was admitted. The observations of Talleyrand on this 
 occasion were highly agreeable to Bonaparte, and they 
 made too deep an impression on my mind to allow me to 
 forget them. 
 
 "Citizen Consul," said he to him, "you have confided 
 to me the office of Minister for Foreign Affairs, and I will 
 justify your confidence ; but I must declare to you that 
 from this moment I will not transact business with any 
 but yourself. This determination does not proceed from 
 any vain pride on my part, but is induced by a desire to
 
 374 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 serve France. In order that France may be well gov- 
 erned, in order that there may be a unity of action in the 
 government, you must be First Consul, and the First 
 Consul must have the control over all that relates directly 
 to politics ; tbat is to say, over the Ministry of the Inte- 
 rior, and the Ministry of Police, for Internal Affairs, and 
 over my department, for Foreign Affairs ; and, lastly, over 
 the two great means of execution, the military and naval 
 forces. It will therefore be most convenient that the 
 Ministers of those five departments should transact busi- 
 ness with you. The Administration of Justice and the 
 ordering of the Finances are objects certainly connected 
 with State politics by numerous links, which, however, 
 are not of so intimate a nature as those of the other de- 
 partments. If you will allow me, General, I should ad- 
 vise that the control over the Administration of Justice 
 be given to the Second Consul, who is well versed in ju- 
 risprudence ; and to the Third Consul, who is equally well 
 acquainted with Finance, the control over that depart- 
 ment. 1 That will occupy and amuse them, and you, Gen- 
 eral, having at your disposal all the vital parts of the gov- 
 ernment, will be able to reach the end you aim at, the 
 regeneration of France." 
 
 Bonaparte did not hear these remarkable words with 
 indifference. They were too much in accordance with his 
 own secret wishes to be listened to without pleasure ; and 
 he said to me as soon as Talleyrand had taken leave, 
 " Do you know, Bourrienne, I think Talleyrand gives good 
 advice. He is a man of great understanding." " Such is 
 the opinion," I replied, " of all who know him." " He is 
 perfectly right." Afterwards he added, smiling, " Talley- 
 rand is evidently a shrewd man. He has penetrated my 
 designs. What he advises you know I am anxious to do. 
 But again I say, he is right ; one gets on quicker by one- 
 
 1 Here may be recognised the first germ of the Arch-Chancellorship and Arch- 
 ttreasurership of the Empire. Bourrienne.
 
 1800. GETTING RID OF THE GAPS OF LIBERTY. 375 
 
 self. Lebrun is a worthy man, but he has no policy in hia 
 head ; he is a book-maker. Cambac6res carries with him 
 too many traditions of the Revolution. My government 
 must be an entirely new one." 
 
 Talleyrand's advice had been so punctually followed that 
 even on the occasion of the installation of the Consular 
 Government, while Bonaparte was receiving all the great 
 civil and military officers of the State in the hall of pres- 
 entation, Carnbaceres and Lebrun stood by more like 
 spectators of the scene than two colleagues of the First 
 Consul. The Minister of the Interior presented the civil 
 authorities of Paris ; the Minister of War, the staff of the 
 17th military division ; the Minister of Marine, several naval 
 officers ; and the staff of the Consular Guard was presented 
 by Murat. As our Consular republicans were not exactly 
 Spartans, the ceremony of the presentations was followed 
 by grand dinner-parties. The First Consul entertained at 
 his table, the two other Consuls, the Ministers, and the 
 Presidents of the great bodies of the State. Murat treated 
 the heads of the army ; and the members of the Council of 
 State, being again seated in their hackney-coaches with 
 covered numbers, drove off to dine with Lucien. 
 
 Before taking possession of the Tuileries we had fre- 
 quently gone there to see that the repairs, or rather the 
 whitewashing, which Bonaparte had directed to be done, 
 was executed. On our first visit, seeing a number of red 
 caps of liberty painted on the walls, he said to M. Le- 
 comte, at that time the architect in charge, "Get rid of all 
 these things ; I do not like to see such rubbish." 
 
 The First Consul gave directions himself for what little 
 alterations he wanted in his own apartments. A state 
 bed not that of Louis XVI. was placed in the chamber 
 next his cabinet, on the south side, towards the grand 
 staircase of the Pavilion of Flora. I may as well mention 
 here that he very seldom occupied that bed, for Bonaparte 
 was very simple in his manner of living in private, and was
 
 376 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 not fond of state, except as a means of imposing on man- 
 kind. At the Luxembourg, at Malmaison, and during the 
 first period that he occupied the Tuileries, Bonaparte, if I 
 may speak in the language of common life, always slept 
 with his wife. 1 He went every evening down to Josephine 
 by a small staircase leading from a wardrobe attached to 
 his cabinet, and which had formerly been the chapel of 
 Maria de Medici. I never went to Bonaparte's bedcham- 
 ber but by this staircase ; and when he came to our cabinet 
 it was always by the wardrobe which I have mentioned. 
 The door opened opposite the only window of our room, 
 and it commanded a view of the garden. 
 
 As for our cabinet, where so many great, and also small 
 events were prepared, and where I passed so many hours 
 of my life, I can, even now, give the most minute descrip- 
 tion of it to those who like such details. 2 
 
 There were two tables. The best, which was the First 
 Consul's, stood in the middle of the room, and his arm- 
 
 1 See the conversation with Madame de RSmusat on this subject (Hemusat, tome 
 1. p. 213). 
 
 2 With this description may be compared that given by Bourrienne's successor, 
 Meneval, of the cabinet in 1802 : 
 
 " The room of which he had made his cabinet was not very large. It was lighted 
 by a single window cut in a corner, and which looked out on the garden. The chief 
 piece of furniture was a magnificent bureau, placed in the middle of the room, 
 ornamented with gilt bronze and supported by griffins. Its top formed a sort of 
 square box with a cover sliding into a recess, so that it could be shut without dis- 
 turbing the papers. The chair was of antique shape, and its back was covered with 
 green kerseymere, the folds being tied with silk cords. Ita arms ended in griffins' 
 heads. The First Consul generally only sat at his desk to sign papers. More often 
 he placed himself on a sofa covered with green taffeta. Near this was a small tray 
 which received the day's correspondence. It was only taken away to make room for 
 that of the next day, and to be placed on his bureau. A screen with several leaves 
 guarded him from the heat of the fire. At the back of the cabinet were two large 
 bookcases, placed in the corners at right angles to one another, and between these 
 was a large clock of the sort called regulators. A long cupboard with glass windows, 
 breast high, and with a marble base, held some papers. There was a bronze eques- 
 trian statue of the King of Prussia, Frederick II. Some chairs furnished the room. 
 Such, with the exception of the bureau bought at the Exhibition of the Products of 
 Industry, as the masterpiece of the skilful workman Biennais, was the modest fur- 
 niture of the Consular cabinet. In it, as in everything that had to do with the 
 person of Napoleon, was shown the simplicity of his tastes " (Meneval, tome i. pp. 
 79, 80).
 
 1800. THE CONSULAR CABINET. 377 
 
 chair was turned with its back to the fireplace, having the 
 window on the right. To the right of this again was a 
 little closet where Duroc sat, through which we could 
 communicate with the clerk of the office and the grand 
 apartments of the Court When the First Consul was 
 seated at his table in his chair (the arms of which he so 
 frequently mutilated with his penknife) he had a large 
 bookcase opposite to him. A little to the right, on one 
 side of the bookcase, was another door, opening into the 
 cabinet which led directly to the state bedchamber which 
 I have mentioned. Thence we passed into the grand Pres- 
 entation Saloon, on the ceiling of which Lebrun had 
 painted a likeness of Louis XIV. A tri-coloured cockade 
 placed on the forehead of the great King still bore witness 
 of the imbecile turpitude of the Convention. Lastly came 
 the hall of the Guards, in front of the grand staircase of 
 the Pavilion of Flora, 
 
 My writing-table, which was extremely plain, stood near 
 the window, and in summer I had a view of the thick 
 foliage of the chestnut-trees ; but in order to see the 
 promenaders in the garden I was obliged to raise myself 
 from my seat. My back was turned to the General's side, 
 so that it required only a slight movement of the head to 
 speak to each other. Duroc was seldom in his little cab- 
 inet, and that was the place where I gave some audiences. 
 The Consular cabinet, which afterwards became the Im- 
 perial, has left many impressions on my mind ; and I 
 hope the reader, in going through these volumes, will not 
 think that they have been of too slight a description.
 
 378 1800. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIH 
 
 1800. 
 
 The Tuileries Royalty in perspective Remarkable observation Pres- 
 entations Assumption of the prerogative of mercy M. Defeu M. 
 de Frotte Georges Cadoudal's audience of Bonaparte Rapp's pre- 
 caution and Bonaparte's confidence The dignity of France Napper 
 Tandy and Blackwell delivered up by the Senate of Hamburg Con- 
 tribution in the Egyptian style Valueless bill Fifteen thousand 
 francs in the drawer of a secretaire Josephine's debts Evening 
 walks with Bonaparte. 
 
 THE morning after that ardently wished-for day on which 
 we took possession of the Palace of the Kings of France I 
 observed to Bonaparte on entering his chamber, " Well, 
 General, you have got here without much difficulty, and 
 with the applause of the people ! Do you remember what 
 you said to me in the Eue St. Anne nearly two years 
 ago ? " " Ay, true enough, I recollect. You see what it is 
 to have the mind set on a thing. Only two years have gone 
 by! Don't you think we have not worked badly since 
 that time ? Upon the whole I am very well content. Yes- 
 terday passed off well. Do you imagine that all those who 
 came to flatter me were sincere ? No, certainly not : but 
 the joy of the people was real. They know what is right. 
 Besides, consult the grand thermometer of opinion, the 
 price of the funds : on the 17th Brumaire at 11 francs, 
 on the 20th at 16 and to-day at 21. In such a state of 
 things I may let the Jacobins prate as they like. But let 
 them not talk too loudly either ! " 
 
 As soon as he was dressed we went to look through the 
 Gallery of Diana and examine the statues which had been 
 placed there by his orders. We ended our morning's
 
 1800. PRESENTATIONS TO JOSEPHINE. 379 
 
 work by taking complete possession of our new residence. 
 I recollect Bonaparte saying to me, among other things, 
 " To be at the Tuileries, Bourrienne, is not alL We must 
 stay here. Who, in Heaven's name, has not already in- 
 habited this palace? Kuffians, conventionalists! But 
 hold ! there is your brother's house ! Was it not from 
 those windows I saw the Tuileries besieged, and the good 
 Louis XVI. carried off? But be assured they will not 
 come here again ! " 
 
 The Ambassadors and other foreign Ministers then in 
 Paris were presented to the First Consul at a solemn 
 audience. On this occasion all the ancient ceremonials 
 belonging to the French Court were raked up, and in 
 place of chamberlains and a grand master of ceremonies a 
 Counsellor of State, M. Benezech, who was once Minister 
 for Foreign Affairs, officiated. 
 
 When the Ambassadors had all arrived M. Benezech 
 conducted them into the cabinet, in which were the three 
 Consuls, the Ministers, and the Council of State. The 
 Ambassadors presented their credentials to the First 
 Consul, who handed them to the Minister for Foreign 
 Affairs. These presentations were followed by others ; 
 for example, the Tribunal of Cassation, over which the 
 old advocate, Target, who refused to defend Louis XVI., 
 then presided. All this passed in view of the three Con- 
 suls ; but the circumstance which distinguished the First 
 Consul from his colleagues was, that the official person- 
 ages, on leaving the audience-chamber, were conducted to 
 Madame Bonaparte's apartments, in imitation of the old 
 practice of waiting on the Queen after presentation to the 
 King. 1 
 
 1 The details of this scene, as described by Constant, are curious : 
 " At eight in the evening the apartments of Madame Bonaparte, which were 
 situated on the ground-floor, overlooking the gardens, were crowded with company. 
 There was a dazzling display of splendid dresses, feathers, diamonds, etc. So 
 numerous was the throng that it was found necessary to throw open Madame Bona- 
 parte's bedchamber, the two drawing-rooms being very small. 
 "When, after considerable embarrassment and trouble, the company were ac-
 
 380 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Thus old customs of royalty crept by degrees into the 
 former abodes of royalty. Amongst the rights attached 
 to the Crown, and which the Constitution of the year 
 VIII. did not give to the First Consul, was one which he 
 much desired to possess, and which, by the most happy 
 of all usurpations, he arrogated to himself. 1 This was the 
 right of granting pardon. Bonaparte felt a real pleasure 
 in saving men under the sentence of the law; and whenever 
 the imperious necessity of his policy, to which, in truth, 
 he sacrificed everything, permitted it, he rejoiced in the 
 exercise of mercy. It would seem as if he were thankful 
 to the persons to whom he rendered such service merely 
 because he had given them occasion to be thankful to 
 him. Such was the First Consul : I do not speak of the 
 Emperor. Bonaparte, the First Consul, was accessible to 
 the solicitations of friendship in favour of persons placed 
 under proscription. The following circumstance, which 
 interested me much, affords an incontestable proof of 
 what I state : 
 
 Whilst we were still at the Luxembourg M. Defeu, a 
 French emigrant, was taken in the Tyrol with arms in his 
 
 ranged as well as possible, Madame Bonaparte was announced, and she entered, 
 conducted by M. de Talleyrand. She wore a dress of white muslin, with short 
 sleeves, a pearl necklace, and her hair was simply braided, and confined by a tor- 
 toiseshell comb. The buzz of admiration which greeted her on her entrance must 
 have been exceedingly gratifying to her. She never, I think, looked more graceful 
 or elegant. 
 
 "M. de Talleyrand, still holding Madame Bonaparte by the hand, presented her 
 to the members of the corps diplomatique, one atter another, not introducing them 
 by name, but designating them by the Courts they represented. He then conducted 
 her round the two drawing-rooms. They had not gone above half round the second 
 room when the First Consul entered without being announced. He was dressed in 
 a very plain uniform coat, white cassimir pantaloons, and top-boots. Round his 
 waist he wore a tri-coloured silk scarf, with a fringe to correspond ; and he carried 
 his hat in his hand. Amidst the embroidered coats, cordons, and jewels of the 
 Ambassadors and foreign dignitaries, Bonaparte's costume appeared no less singular 
 than the contrast presented by the simple elegance of Josephine's dress compared 
 with the splendour of the ladies around her " (Mimoires de Constant). 
 
 1 For a previous instance of Napoleon, while simply general, taking on himself 
 the right of pardon see p. 137. Lnnfrey says on this, " How happy and blessed 
 would have been his memory if he had never broken the laws of his country except 
 by similar acts " (Lanfrey, tome i. p. 365).
 
 1800. PREROGATIVE OF MERCY. 381 
 
 hand by the troops of the Eepublic. He was carried to 
 Grenoble, and thrown into the military prison of that town. 
 In the course of January General Ferino, then command- 
 ing at Grenoble, received orders to put the young emi- 
 grant on his trial. The laws against emigrants taken in 
 arms were terrible, and the judges dared not be indul- 
 gent. To be tried in the morning, condemned in the 
 course of the day, and shot in the evening, was the usual 
 course of those implacable proceedings. One of my 
 cousins, the daughter of M. Poitrincourt, came from Sens 
 to Paris to inform me of the dreadful situation of M. 
 Defeu. She told me that he was related to the most re- 
 spectable families of the town of Sens, and that everybody 
 felt the greatest interest in his fate. 
 
 I had escaped for a few moments to keep the appoint- 
 ment made with Mademoiselle Poitrincourt. On my re- 
 turn I perceived the First Consul surprised at finding 
 himself alone in the cabinet, which I was not in the habit 
 of quitting without his knowledge. " Where have you 
 been ? " said he. " I have been to see one of my relations, 
 who solicits a favour of you." "What is it ? " I then in- 
 formed him of the unfortunate situation of M. Defeu. His 
 first answer was dreadful. " No pity ! no pity for emi- 
 grants ! Whoever fights against his country is a child 
 who tries to kill his mother!" This first burst of 
 anger being over, I returned to the charge. I urged the 
 youth of M. Defeu, and the good effect which clemency 
 would produce. " Well," said he, " write 
 
 " "Ihe First Consul orders the judgment on M. Defeu to be 
 suspended.' " 
 
 He signed this laconic order, which I instantly de- 
 spatched to General Ferino. I acquainted my cousin with 
 what had passed, and remained at ease as to the result of 
 the affair. 
 
 Scarcely had I entered the chamber of the First Consul 
 the next morning when he said to me, "Well, Bourrienne,
 
 382 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 you say nothing about your M. Defeu. Are you satisfied ? " 
 " General, I cannot find terms to express my gratitude." 
 " Ah, bah ! But I do not like to do things by halves. 
 Write to Ferino that I wish M. Defeu to be instantly set 
 at liberty. Perhaps I am serving one who will prove un- 
 grateful. Well, so much the worse for him. As to these 
 matters, Bourrienne, always ask them from me. When I 
 refuse, it is because I cannot help it." 
 
 I despatched at my own expense an extraordinary 
 courier, who arrived in time to save M. Defeu's life. His 
 mother, whose only son he was, and M. Blanchet, his uncle, 
 came purposely from Sens to Paris to express their grati- 
 tude to me. I saw tears of joy fall from the eyes of a 
 mother who had appeared to be destined to shed bitter 
 drops, and I said to her as I felt, " that I was amply rec- 
 ompensed by the success which had attended my efforts." * 
 
 Emboldened by this success, and by the benevolent 
 language of the First Consul, I ventured to request the 
 pardon of M. de Frott6, who was strongly recommended to 
 me by most honourable persons. Comte Louis de Frotte 
 had at first opposed all negotiation for the pacification of 
 La Vendee. At length, by a series of unfortunate com- 
 bats, he was, towards the end of January, reduced to the 
 necessity of making himself the advances which he had 
 rejected when made by others. At this period he ad- 
 dressed a letter to General Guidal, in which he offered 
 pacificatory proposals. A protection to enable him to 
 repair to Alen9on was transmitted to him. Unfortunately 
 for M. de Frotte, he did not confine himself to writing 
 to General Guidal, for whilst the safe-conduct which he 
 had asked was on the way to him, he wrote to his 
 lieutenants, advising them not to submit or consent 
 to be disarmed. This letter was intercepted. It gave 
 all the appearance of a fraudulent stratagem to his 
 
 1 M. Defeu, thus snatched from death, was afterwards the father of three chil- 
 dren, and lived for many years in tranquillity at Sens. Bourrienne.
 
 1800. A VEND&AN CHIEF. 383 
 
 proposal to treat for peace. Besides, this opinion ap- 
 peared to be confirmed by a manifesto of M. de Frotte, 
 anterior, it is true, to the offers of pacification, but in 
 which he announced to all his partisans the approaching 
 end of Bonaparte's " criminal enterprise." 
 
 I had more trouble than in M. Defeu's case to induce 
 the First Consul to exercise his clemency. However, I 
 pressed him so much, I laboured so hard to convince him 
 of the happy effect of such indulgence, that at length I 
 obtained an order to suspend the judgment. What a les- 
 son I then experienced of the evil which may result from 
 the loss of time ! Not supposing that matters were so far 
 advanced as they were, I did not immediately send off 
 the courier with the order for the suspension of the judg- 
 ment. Besides, the Minister of Police had marked his 
 victim, and he never lost time when evil was to be done. 
 Having, therefore, I know not for what motive, resolved on 
 the destruction of M. de Frotte, he sent an order to hasten 
 his trial. 
 
 Comte Louis de Frotte was brought to trial on the 28th 
 Pluviose, condemned the same day, and executed the next 
 morning, the day before we entered the Tuileries. The 
 cruel precipitation of the Minister rendered the result of 
 my solicitations abortive. I had reason to think that after 
 the day on which the First Consul granted me the order 
 for delay he had received some new accusation against M. 
 de Frotte, for when he heard of his death he appeared to 
 me very indifferent about the tardy arrival of the order 
 for suspending judgment. He merely said to me, with 
 unusual insensibility, " You should take your measures 
 better. You see it is not my fault." 
 
 Though Bonaparte put no faith in the virtue of men, he 
 had confidence in their honour. I had proof of this in a 
 matter which deserves to be recorded in history. When, 
 during the first period of our abode at the Tuileries, he 
 had summoned the principal chiefs of La Vendee to en-
 
 384 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 deavour to bring about tbe pacification of tbat unhappy 
 country, be received Georges Cadoudal in a private audi- 
 ence. The disposition in which I bebeld bim tbe evening 
 before the day appointed for this audience inspired me 
 with tbe most flattering hopes. Rapp introduced Georges 
 into the grand salon looking into tbe garden. Rapp left 
 bim alone with tbe First Consul, but on returning to tbe 
 cabinet where I was be did not close either of the two 
 doors of the state bedchamber which separated the cabinet 
 from tbe salon. "We saw the First Consul and Georges 
 walk from the window to the bottom of the salon then re- 
 turn then go back again. This lasted for a long time. 
 Tbe conversation appeared very animated, and we beard sev- 
 eral things, but without any connection. There was occa- 
 sionally a good deal of ill-humour displayed in their tone 
 and gestures. The interview ended in nothing. The First 
 Consul, perceiving tbat Georges entertained some appre- 
 hensions for his personal safety, gave him assurances of 
 security in the most noble manner, saying, "You take a 
 wrong view of things, and are wrong in not coming to 
 some understanding ; but if you persist in wishing to re- 
 turn to your country you shall depart as freely as you 
 came to Paris." When Bonaparte returned to bis cabinet 
 be said to Rapp, "Tell me, Rapp, why you left these doors 
 open, and stopped with Bourrienne ? " Rapp replied, " If 
 you bad closed the doors I would have opened them again. 
 Do you think I would have left you alone with a man like 
 that? There would have been danger in it." "No, 
 Rapp," said Bonaparte, "you cannot think so." When 
 we were alone the First Consul appeared pleased with 
 Rapp's attachment, but very vexed at Georges' refusal. 
 He said, " He does not take a correct view of things ; but 
 the extravagance of bis principles has its source in noble 
 sentiments, wbicb must give bim great influence over his 
 countrymen. It is necessary, however, to bring this busi- 
 ness soon to an end."
 
 1800. IRISH STATE PRISONERS. 885 
 
 Of all the actions of Louis XIV., that which Bonaparte 
 most admired was his having made the Doge of Genoa send 
 ambassadors to Paris to apologise to him. The slightest 
 insult offered in a foreign country to the rights and dig- 
 nity of France put Napoleon beside himself. This anxiety 
 to have the French Government respected exhibited itself 
 in an affair which made much noise at the period, but 
 which was amicably arranged by the soothing influence of 
 gold. 
 
 Two Irishmen, Napper Tandy and Blackwell, who had 
 been educated in France, and whose names and rank as 
 officers appeared in the French army list, had retired to 
 Hamburg. The British Government claimed them as 
 traitors to their country, and they were given up ; * but, 
 as the French Government held them to be subjects of 
 France, the transaction gave rise to bitter complaints 
 against the Senate of Hamburg. 
 
 Blackwell had been one of the leaders of the united 
 Irishmen. He had procured his naturalisation in France, 
 and had attained the rank of chef d'escadron. Being sent 
 on a secret mission to Norway, the ship in which he was 
 embarked was wrecked on the coast of that kingdom. He 
 then repaired to Hamburg, where the Senate placed him 
 under arrest on the demand of Mr. Crawford, the English 
 Ministei'. After being detained in prison a whole year he 
 was conveyed to England to be tried. The French Gov- 
 ernment interfered, and preserved, if not his liberty, at 
 least his life. 
 
 Napper Tandy was also an Irishman. To escape the 
 search made after him, on account of the sentiments of 
 independence which had induced him to engage in the 
 con test for the liberty of his country, he got on board a 
 French brig, intending to land at Hamburg and pass into 
 Sweden. Being exempted from the amnesty by the Irish 
 
 1 The Russian and Austrian Governments seconded the demand of England for 
 their surrender. 
 
 VOL. L 35
 
 386 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 1800. 
 
 Parliament, he was claimed by the British Government, 
 and the Senators of Hamburg forgot honour and humanity 
 in their alarm at the danger which at that moment men- 
 aced their little republic both from England and France. 
 The Senate delivered up Napper Tandy ; he was carried to 
 Ireland, and condemned to death, but owed the suspension 
 of his execution to the interference of France. He re- 
 mained two years in prison, when M. Otto, who negotiated 
 with Lord Hawkesbury the preliminaries of peace, obtained 
 the release of Napper Tandy, who was sent back to 
 France. 
 
 The First Consul spoke at first of signal vengeance ; but 
 the Senate of Hamburg sent him a memorial, justificatory 
 of its conduct, and backed the apology with a sum of four 
 millions and a half, which mollified him considerably. 1 
 This was in some sort a recollection of Egypt one of 
 those little contributions with which the General had 
 familiarised the pashas ; with this difference, that on the 
 present occasion not a single sous went into the national 
 treasury. The sum was paid to the First Consul through 
 the hands of M. Chapeau Rouge. 
 
 I kept the four millions and a half in Dutch bonds in a 
 secretaire for a week. Bonaparte then determined to dis- 
 tribute them ; after paying Josephine's debts, and the 
 whole of the great expenses incurred at Malmaison, he 
 dictated to me a list of persons to whom he wished to 
 make presents. My name did not escape his lips, and 
 consequently I had not the trouble to transcribe it ; but 
 some time after he said to me, with the most engaging 
 kindness, "Bourrienne, I have given you none of the 
 money which came from Hamburg, but I will make you 
 amends for it." He took from his drawer a large and 
 broad sheet of printed paper, with blanks filled up in his 
 
 1 A solemn deputation from the Senate arrived at the Tuileries to make public 
 apologies to Napoleon. He again testified his indignation : and when the envoys 
 urged their weakness he said to them. "Welll and had you not the resource of 
 weak states ? was it not in your power to let them escape ': " (Napoleon's Memoirs),
 
 1800. A VALUELESS BILL. 38? 
 
 own handwriting, and said to me, "Here is a bill for 
 300,000 Italian livres on the Cisalpine Republic, for the 
 price of cannon furnished. It is endorsed Haller and 
 Collot I give it you." To make this understood, I 
 ought to state that cannon had been sold to the Cisalpine 
 Republic, for the value of which the Administrator- 
 general of the Italian finances drew on the Republic, and 
 the bills were paid over to M. Collot, a provision con- 
 tractor, and other persons. M. Collot had given one of 
 these bills for 300,000 livres to Bonaparte in quittance of 
 a debt, but the latter had allowed the bill to run out with- 
 out troubling himself about it. The Cisalpine Republic 
 kept the cannons and the money, and the First Consul kept 
 his bill. When I had examined it I said, " General, it has 
 been due for a long time ; why have you not got it paid ? 
 The endorsers are no longer liable." " France is bound 
 to discharge debts of this kind," said he ; " send the paper 
 to de Fermont: he will discount it for three per cent. 
 You will not have in ready money more than about 9000 
 francs of rentes, because the Italian livre is not equal to 
 the franc." I thanked him, and sent the bill to M. de 
 Fermont. He replied that the claim was bad, and that 
 the bill would not be liquidated because it did not come 
 within the classifications made by the laws passed in the 
 months the names of which terminated in aire, ose, al, and 
 or. 
 
 I showed M. de Fermont's answer to the First Consul, 
 who said, " Ah, bah ! He understands nothing about it 
 he is wrong : write." He then dictated a letter, which 
 promised very favourably for the discounting of the bill ; 
 but the answer was a fresh refusal. I said, " General, M. 
 de Fermont does not attend to you any more than to myself." 
 Bonaparte took the letter, read it, and said, in the tone of 
 a man who knew beforehand what he was about to be in- 
 formed of, " Well, what the devil would you have me do, 
 since the laws are opposed to it ? Persevere ; follow tlia
 
 388 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE, isoo, 
 
 usual modes of liquidation, and something will come of 
 it ! " What finally happened was, that by a regular decree 
 this bill was cancelled, torn, and deposited in the archives. 
 These 300,000 livres formed part of the money which 
 Bonaparte brought from Italy. If the bill was useless to 
 me it was also useless to him. This scrap of paper 
 merely proves that he brought more than 25,000 francs 
 from Italy. 
 
 I never had, from the General-in-Chief of the army of 
 Italy, nor from the General in-Chief of the army of Egypt, 
 nor from the First Consul for ten years, nor from the 
 Consul for life, any fixed salary. I took from his drawer 
 what was necessary for my expenses as well as his own. 
 He never asked me for any account. After the transaction 
 of the bill on the insolvent Cisalpine Republic he said to 
 me, at the beginning of the winter of 1800, "Bourrienne, 
 the weather is becoming very bad ; I will go but seldom to 
 Malmaison. Whilst I am at council get my papers and 
 little articles from Malmaison ; here is the key of my 
 secretaire, take out everything that is there." I got into 
 the carriage at two o'clock and returned at six. When he 
 had dined I placed upon the table of his cabinet the various 
 articles which I had found in his secretaire including 15,000 
 francs (somewhere about 600 of English money) in bank- 
 notes which were in the corner of a little drawer. When 
 he looked at them he said, " Here is money what is the 
 meaning of this ? " I replied, " I know nothing about it, 
 except that it was in your secretaire." " Oh yes ; I had 
 forgotten it. It was for my trifling expenses. Here, take 
 it." I remembered well that one summer morning he had 
 given me his key to bring him two notes of 1000 francs for 
 some incidental expense, but I had no idea that he had 
 not drawn further on his little treasure. 
 
 I have stated the appropriation of the four millions and 
 a half, the result of the extortion inflicted on the Senate 
 of Hamburg, in the affair of Napper Tandy and BlackwelL
 
 1800. THE COST OF MALMAISON. 389 
 
 The whole, however, was not disposed of in presents. A 
 considerable portion was reserved for paying Josephine's 
 debts, and this business appears to me to deserve some 
 remarks. 
 
 The estate of Malmaison had cost 160,000 francs. Jose- 
 phine had purchased it of M. Lecouteulx while we were in 
 Egypt. Many embellishments, and some new buildings, 
 had been made there ; and a park had been added, which 
 had now become beautiful. All this could not be done 
 for nothing, and besides, it was very necessary that what 
 was due for the original purchase should be entirely dis- 
 charged ; and this considerable item was not the only debt 
 of Josephine. The creditors murmured, which had a bad 
 effect in Paris ; and I confess I was so well convinced that 
 the First Consul would be extremely displeased that I 
 constantly delayed the moment of speaking to him on the 
 subject. It was therefore with extreme satisfaction I 
 learned that M. de Talleyrand had anticipated me. No 
 person was more capable than himself of gilding the pill, 
 as one may say, for Bonaparte. Endowed with as much 
 independence of character as of mind, he did him the 
 service, at the risk of offending him, to tell him that a 
 great number of creditors expressed their discontent in 
 bitter complaints respecting the debts contracted by 
 Madame Bonaparte during his expedition to the East. 
 Bonaparte felt that his situation required him promptly to 
 remove the cause of such complaints. It was one night 
 about half-past eleven o'clock that M. Talleyrand intro- 
 duced this delicate subject. As soon as he was gone I 
 entered the little cabinet ; Bonaparte said to me, " Bour- 
 rienne, Talleyrand has been speaking to me about the 
 debts of my wife. I have the money from Hamburg 
 ask her the exact amount of her debts : let her confess all. 
 I wish to finish, and not begin again. But do not pay 
 without showing me the bills of those rascals : they are a 
 gang of robbers."
 
 390 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800, 
 
 Hitherto the apprehension of an unpleasant scene, the 
 very idea of which made Josephine tremble, had always 
 prevented me from broaching this subject to the First 
 Consul ; but, well pleased that Talleyrand had first touched 
 upon it, I resolved to do all in my power to put an end to 
 the disagreeable affair. 
 
 The next morning I saw Josephine. She was at first 
 delighted with her husband's intentions ; but this feeling 
 did not last long. When I asked her for an exact account 
 of what she owed she entreated me not to press it, but 
 content myself with what she should confess. I said to 
 her, "Madame, I cannot deceive you respecting the dis- 
 position of the First Consul. He believes that you owe a 
 considerable sum, and is willing to discharge it. You will, 
 I doubt not, have to endure some bitter reproaches, and 
 a violent scene ; but the scene will be just the same for the 
 whole as for a part. If you conceal a large proportion of 
 your debts at the end of some time murmurs will recom- 
 mence, they will reach the ears of the First Consul, and 
 his anger will display itself still more strikingly. Trust to 
 me state all ; the result will be the same ; you will hear 
 but once the disagreeable things he will say to you ; by 
 reservations you will renew them incessantly." Josephine 
 said, "I can never tell all; it is impossible. Do me the 
 service to keep secret what I say to you. I owe, I believe, 
 about 1,200,000 francs, but I wish to confess only 600,000 : 
 I will contract no more debts, and will pay the rest little 
 by little out of my savings." " Here, Madame, my first 
 observations recur. As I do not believe he estimates your 
 debts at so high a sum as 600,000 francs, I can warrant 
 that you will not experience more displeasure for ac- 
 knowledging to 1,200,000 than to 600,000 ; and by going so 
 far you will get rid of them for ever." "I can never do it, 
 Bourrienne ; I know him ; I can never support his violence." 
 After a quarter of an hour's further discussion on the sub- 
 ject I was obliged to yield to her earnest solicitation, and
 
 1800. EXTRAVAGANCE OF JOSEPHINE. 391 
 
 promise to mention only the 600,000 francs to the First 
 Consul. 
 
 The anger and ill-humour of Bonaparte may be 
 imagined. He strongly suspected that his wife was dis- 
 sembling in some respect ; but he said, " Well, take 600,- 
 000 francs, but liquidate the debts for that sum, and let 
 me hear nothing more on the subject. I authorise you to 
 threaten these tradesmen with paying nothing if they do 
 not reduce their enormous charges. They ought to be 
 taught not to be so ready in giving credit" Madame 
 Bonaparte gave me all her bills. The extent to which the 
 articles had been overcharged, owing to the fear of not 
 being paid for a long period, and of deductions being 
 made from the amount, was inconceivable. It appeared 
 to me, also, that there must be some exaggeration in the 
 number of articles supplied. I observed in the milliner's 
 bill thirty-eight new hats, of great price, in one month. 
 There was likewise a charge of 1800 francs for heron 
 plumes, and 800 francs for perfumes. I asked Josephine 
 whether she wore out two hats in one day ? She objected 
 to this charge for the hats, which she merely called a mis- 
 take. The impositions which the saddler attempted, both 
 in the extravagance of his prices and in charging for 
 articles which he had not furnished, were astonishing. I 
 need say nothing of the other tradesmen, it was the 
 same system of plunder throughout. 
 
 I availed myself fully of the First Consul's permission, 
 and spared neither reproaches nor menaces. I am 
 ashamed to say that the greater part of the tradesmen 
 were contented with the half of what they demanded. One 
 of them received 35,000 francs for a bill of 80,000 ; and 
 he had the impudence to tell me that he made a good pro- 
 fit nevertheless. Finally, I was fortunate enough, after the 
 most vehement disputes, to settle everything for 600,000 
 francs. Madame Bonaparte, however, soon fell again into 
 the same excesses, but fortunately money became more
 
 392 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 plentiful. This inconceivable mania of spending money 
 was almost the sole cause of her unhappiness. Her 
 thoughtless profusion occasioned permanent disorder in 
 her household until the period of Bonaparte's second 
 marriage, when, I am informed, she became regular in 
 her expenditure. I could not say so of her when she was 
 Empress in 1804 ' 
 
 The amiable Josephine had not less ambition in little 
 things than her husband had in great. She felt pleasure 
 in acquiring and not in possessing. Who would suppose 
 it ? She grew tired of the beauty of the park of Mal- 
 maison, and was always asking me to take her out on the 
 high road, either in the direction of Nanterre, or on that 
 of Marly, in the midst of the dust occasioned by the pass- 
 ing of carriages. The noise of the high road appeared 
 to her preferable to the calm silence of the beautiful 
 avenues of the park, and in this respect Hortense had the 
 same taste as her mother. This whimsical fancy astonished 
 Bonaparte, and he was sometimes vexed at it. My inter- 
 course with Josephine was delightful, for I never saw a 
 woman who so constantly entered society with such an 
 equable disposition, or with so much of the spirit of kind- 
 ness, which is the first principle of amiability. She was 
 so obligingly attentive as to cause a pretty suite of apart- 
 ments to be prepared at Malmaison for me and my family. 
 
 1 Notwithstanding her husband's wish, she could never bring her establishment 
 into any order or rule. He wished that no tradesmen fhonld ever reach her, but 
 he was forced to yield on this point. The small inner rooms were filled with them, 
 as with artists of all sorts. She had a mania for having herself painted, and gave 
 her portraits to whoever wished for one, relations, femmes de cfiambre, even to 
 tradesmen. They never ceased bringing her diamonds, jewels, shawls, muterials 
 for dresses, and trinkets of all kinds ; she bought everything without ever asking the 
 price ; and generally forgot what she had purchased. . . All the morning she had 
 on a shawl which she draped on her shoulders with a grace I have seen in no one 
 else. Bonaparte, who thought her shawls covered her too much, tore them off, and 
 sometimes threw them into the fire ; then she sent for another (Jlhnusat, tome ii. pp. 
 343-5545). After the divorce her income, large as it was, was insufficient, but the Em- 
 peror was more compassionate then, and when sending the Comte Mollien to settle 
 her affairs gave him strict orders " not to make her weep" (JMeiieval, tome iii. j> 
 837).
 
 1800. THE FIRST CONSUL IN DISQU18K 898 
 
 She pressed me earnestly, and with all her known grace, 
 to accept it ; but almost as much a captive at Paris as a 
 prisoner of state, I wished to have to myself in the coun- 
 try the moments of liberty I was permitted to enjoy. Yet 
 what was this liberty ? I had bought a little house at 
 Ruel, which I kept during two years and a half. When I 
 saw my friends there, it had to be at midnight, or at five 
 o'clock in the morning ; and the First Consul would often 
 send for me in the night when couriers arrived. It was 
 for this sort of liberty I refused Josephine's kind offer. 
 Bonaparte came once to see me in my retreat at Ruel, but 
 Josephine and Hortense came often. It was a favourite 
 walk with these ladies. 
 
 At Paris I was less frequently absent from Bonaparte 
 than at Malmaison. We sometimes in the evening walked 
 together in the garden of the Tuileries after the gates were 
 closed. In these evening walks he always wore a gray 
 greatcoat, and a round hat. I was directed to answer, 
 "The First Consul," to the sentinel's challenge of, "Who 
 goes there?" These promenades, which were of much 
 benefit to Bonaparte, and me also, as a relaxation from our 
 labours, resembled those which we had at Malmaison. As 
 to our promenades in the city, they were often very 
 amusing. 
 
 At the period of our first inhabiting the Tuileries, when 
 I saw Bonaparte enter the cabinet at eight o'clock in the 
 evening in his gray coat, I knew he would say, "Bour- 
 rienne, come and take a turn." Sometimes, then, instead 
 of going out by the garden arcade, we would take the 
 little gate which leads from the court to the apartments of 
 the Due d'Angouleme. He would take my arm, and we 
 would go to buy articles of trifling value in the shops of 
 the Rue St. Honore ; but we did not extend our excursions 
 farther than Rue de 1'Arbre Sec. Whilst I made the shop- 
 keeper exhibit before us the articles which I appeared 
 anxious to buy he played his part in asking questions,
 
 394 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 Nothing was more amusing than to see him endeavouring 
 to imitate the careless and jocular tone of the young men 
 of fashion. How awkward was he in the attempt to put 
 on dandy airs when pulling up the corners of his cravat 
 he would say, "Well, Madame, is there anything new 
 to-day? Citizen, what say they of Bonaparte? Your 
 shop appears to be well supplied. You surely have a great 
 deal of custom. What do people say of that buffoon, 
 Bonaparte?" He was made quite happy one day when 
 we were obliged to retire hastily from a shop to avoid the 
 attacks drawn upon us by the irreverent tone in which 
 Bonaparte spoke of the First Consul
 
 1800. 395 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 1800. 
 
 War and monuments Influence of the recollections of Egypt First 
 improvements in Paris Malmaison too little St. Cloud taken Th 
 Pont des Arts Business prescribed for me by Bonaparte Pecuniary 
 remuneration The First Consul's visit to the Pritanee His exami- 
 nation of the pupils Consular pensions Tragical death of Miack- 
 zinski Introduction of vaccination Recall of the members of the 
 Constituent Assembly The " canary " volunteers Tronchet and 
 Target Liberation of the Austrian prisoners Longchamps and 
 sacred music ANNEX. 
 
 THE destruction of men and the construction of monu- 
 ments were two things perfectly in unison in the mind 
 of Bonaparte. It may be said that his passion for monu- 
 ments amlost equalled his passion for war ; 1 but as in all 
 things he disliked what was little and mean, so he liked vast 
 constructions and great battles. The sight of the colossal 
 ruins of the monuments of Egypt had not a little contrib- 
 uted to augment his natural taste for great structures. 
 It was not so much the monuments themselves that he 
 admired, but the historical recollections they perpetuate, 
 the great names they consecrate, the important events 
 they attest. What should he have cared for the column 
 which we beheld on our arrival in Alexandria had it not 
 been Pompey's pillar ? It is for artists to admire or cen- 
 
 1 Take pleasure, if you can, in reading your returns. The good condition of my 
 armies is owing to my devoting to them one or two hours in every day. When the 
 monthly returns of my armies and of my fleets, which, form twenty thick volumes, 
 are sent to me, I give up every other occupation in order to read them in detail and 
 to observe the difference between one monthly return and another. No young girt 
 enjoys her novel BO much as I do these returns 1 (Napoleon to Joseph, 20th Air 
 gut 1806. Dv Ca*, tome ill. p. 145).
 
 396 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 sure its proportions and ornaments, for men of learning 
 to explain its inscriptions ; but the name of Pompey ren^ 
 ders it an object of interest to all. 
 
 When endeavouring to sketch the character of Bona- 
 parte I ought to have noticed his taste for monuments, 
 for without this characteristic trait something essential is 
 wanting to the completion of the portrait. This taste, or, 
 as it may more properly be called, this passion for monu- 
 ments, exercised no small influence on his thoughts and 
 projects of glory ; yet it did not deter him from directing 
 attention to public improvements of a less ostentatious 
 kind. He wished for great monuments to perpetuate the 
 recollection of his glory ; but at the same time he knew 
 how to appreciate all that was truly useful. He could 
 very rarely be reproached for rejecting any plan without 
 examination ; and this examination was a speedy affair, 
 for his natural tact enabled him immediately to see things 
 in their proper light. 
 
 Though most of the monuments and embellishments 
 of Paris are executed from the plans of men of talent, yet 
 some owe their origin to circumstances merely accidental. 
 Of this I can mention an example. 
 
 I was standing at the window of Bonaparte's cabinet, 
 which looked into the garden of the Tuileries. He had 
 gone out, and I took advantage of his absence to rise from 
 my chair, for I was tired of sitting. He had scarcely been 
 gone a minute when he unexpectedly returned to ask me 
 for a paper. " What are you doing there, Bourrienne ? 
 I'll wager anything you are admiring the ladies walking 
 on the terrace." "Why, I must confess I do sometimes 
 amuse myself in that way," replied I ; "but I assure you, 
 General, I was now thinking of something else. I was 
 looking at that villainous left bank of the Seine, which 
 always annoys me with the gaps in its dirty quay, and the 
 floodings which almost every winter prevent communica- 
 tion with the Faubourg St. Germain, and I was thinking
 
 1800. ST. CLOUD FOR THE FIKST CONSUL. 397 
 
 I would speak to you on the subject." He approached 
 the window, and, looking out, said, "You are right, it is 
 very ugly ; and very offensive to see dirty linen washed 
 before our windows. Here, write immediately : ' The quay 
 of the iZcole de Natation is to be finished during next 
 campaign.' Send that order to the Minister of the Inte- 
 rior." The quay was finished the year following. 
 
 As an instance of the enormous difference which fre- 
 quently appears between the original estimates of archi- 
 tects and their subsequent accounts I may mention what 
 occurred in relation to the Palace of St. Cloud. But I 
 must first say a word about the manner in which Bona- 
 parte originally refused and afterwards took possession of 
 the Queen's pleasure-house. Malmaison was a suitable 
 country residence for Bonaparte as long as he remained 
 content with his town apartments in the little Luxem- 
 bourg ; but that Consular bagatelle was too confined in 
 comparison with the spacious apartments in the Tuileries. 
 The inhabitants of St. Cloud, well-advised, addressed a 
 petition to the Legislative Body, praying that their de- 
 serted chateau might be made the summer residence of the 
 First Consul. The petition was referred to the Govern- 
 ment ; but Bonaparte, who was not yet Consul for life, 
 proudly declared that so long as he was at the head of 
 affairs, and, indeed, for a year afterwards, he would accept 
 no national recompense. Some time after we went to visit 
 the palace of the 18th Brumaire. Bonaparte liked it ex- 
 ceedingly, but all was in a state of complete dilapidation. 
 It bore evident marks of the Kevolution. The First Con- 
 sul did not wish, as yet, to burden the budget of the State 
 with his personal expenses, and he was alarmed at the 
 enormous sum required to render St. Cloud habitable. 
 Flattery had not yet arrived at the degree of proficiency 
 which it subsequently attained ; but even then his flatter- 
 ers boldly assured him he might take possession of Si 
 Cloud for 25,000 francs. I told the First Consul that,
 
 398 MEMOIRS Of NAPOLEOtf BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 considering the ruinous state of the place, I could venture 
 to say that the expense would amount to more than 
 1,200,000 francs. Bonaparte determined to have a regular 
 estimate of the expense, and it amounted to nearly 
 3,000,000. He thought it a great sum ; but as he had re- 
 solved to make St. Cloud his residence he gave orders for 
 commencing the repairs, the expense of which, indepen- 
 dently of the furniture, amounted to 6,000,000. So much 
 for the 3,000,000 of the architect and the 25,000 francs of 
 the flatterers. 
 
 When the First Consul contemplated the building of 
 the Pont des Arts we had a long conversation on the sub- 
 ject. I observed that it would be much better to build 
 the bridge of stone. " The first object of monuments of 
 this kind," said I, "is public utility. They require solid- 
 ity of appearance, and their principal merit is duration. 
 I cannot conceive, General, why, in a country where there 
 is abundance of fine stone of every quality, the use of iron 
 should be preferred." "Write," said Bonaparte, "to 
 Fontaine and Percier, the architects, and ask what they 
 think of it." I wrote and they stated in their answer that 
 "bridges were intended for public utility and the em- 
 bellishment of cities. The projected bridge between the 
 Louvre and the Quatre -Nations would unquestionably ful- 
 fil the first of these objects, as was proved by the great 
 number of persons who daily crossed the Seine at that 
 point in boats ; that the site fixed upon between the Pont 
 Neuf and the Tuileries appeared to be the best that could 
 be chosen for the purpose ; and that on the score of orna- 
 ment Paris would gain little by the construction of an 
 iron bridge, which would be very narrow, and which, from 
 its light form, would not correspond with the grandeur of 
 the two bridges between which it would be placed." 
 
 When we had received the answer of MM. Percier and 
 Fontaine, we again had a conversation on the subject of 
 the bridge. I told the First Consul that I perfectly con-
 
 1800. AN IMPERIAL STREET. 899 
 
 curred in the opinion of MM. Fontaine and Percier ; how- 
 ever, he would have his own way, and thus was authorised 
 the construction of the toy which formed a communication 
 between the Louvre and the Institute. But no sooner 
 was the Pont des Arts finished than Bonaparte pronounced 
 it to be mean and out of keeping with the other bridges 
 above and below it. One day when visiting the Louvre 
 he stopped at one of the windows looking towards the 
 Pont des Arts and said, "There is no solidity, no grandeur 
 about that bridge. In England, where stone is scarce, it 
 is very natural that iron should be used for arches of large 
 dimensions. But the case is different in France, where 
 the requisite material is abundant." 
 
 The infernal machine of the 3d Nivose, of which I shall 
 presently speak more at length, was the signal for vast 
 changes in the quarter of the Tuileries. That horrible 
 attempt was at least so far attended by happy results that 
 it contributed to the embellishment of Paris. It was 
 thought more advisable for the Government to buy and 
 pull down the houses which had been injured by the 
 machine than to let them be put under repair. As an ex- 
 ample of Bonaparte's grand schemes in building I may 
 mention that, being one day at the Louvre, he pointed 
 towards St. Germain 1'Auxerrois and said to me, " That is 
 where I will build an imperial street. It shall run from 
 here to the Barriere du Trone. It shall be a hundred 
 feet broad, and have arcades and plantations. This street 
 shall be the finest in the world." 
 
 The palace of the King of Rome, which was to face the 
 Pont de Jena and the Champ de Mars, would have been 
 in some measure isolated from Paris, with which, how- 
 ever, it was to be connected by a line of palaces. These 
 were to extend along the quay, and were destined as 
 splendid residences for the Ambassadors of foreign sover- 
 eigns, at least as long as there should be any sovereigns 
 in Europe except Napoleon. The Temple of Glory, too,
 
 400 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 which was to occupy the site of the Church of la Made- 
 leine, was never finished. If the plan of this monument 
 proved the necessity which Bonaparte felt of constantly 
 holding out stimulants to his soldiers, its relinquishment 
 was at least a proof of his wisdom. He who had re- 
 established religious worship in France, and had restored 
 to its destination the church of the Invalides, which was 
 for a time metamorphosed into the Temple of Mars, fore- 
 saw that a Temple of Glory would give birth to a sort of 
 paganism incompatible with the ideas of the age. 
 
 The recollection of the magnificent Necropolis of Cairo 
 frequently recurred to Bonaparte's mind. He had ad- 
 mired that city of the dead, which he had partly contrib- 
 uted to people ; and his design was to make, at the four 
 cardinal points of Paris, four vast cemeteries on the plan of 
 that at Cairo. 
 
 Bonaparte determined that all the new streets of Paris 
 should be 40 feet wide, and be provided with foot-pave- 
 ments ; in short, he thought nothing too grand for the 
 embellishment of the capital of a country which he wished 
 to make the first in the world. Next to war, he regarded 
 the embellishment of Paris as the source of his glory ; and 
 he never considered a victory fully achieved until he had 
 raised a monument to transmit its memory to posterity. 
 He wanted glory, uninterrupted glory, for France as well 
 as for himself. How often, when talking over his schemes, 
 has he not said, 8< Bourrienne, it is for France I am doing 
 all this ! All I wish, all I desire, the end of all my labours 
 is, that my name should be indissolubly connected with 
 that of France ! " 
 
 Paris is not the only city, nor is France the only king- 
 dom, which bears traces of Napoleon's passion for great 
 and useful monuments. In Belgium, in Holland, in Pied- 
 mont, in all Italy, he executed great improvements. At 
 Turin a splendid bridge was built over the Po, in lieu of 
 an old bridge which was falling in ruins.
 
 1800. REMOVAL 0& OBSTACLES. 461 
 
 How many things were undertaken and executed in 
 Napoleon's short and eventful reign ! To obviate the dif- 
 ficulty of communication between Metz and Mayence a 
 magnificent road was made, as if by magic, across imprac- 
 ticable marshes and vast forests : mountains were cut 
 through and ravines filled up. He would not allow nature 
 more than man to resist him. One day when he was pro- 
 ceeding to Belgium by the way of Givet, he was detained 
 for a short time at Little Givet, on the right bank of the 
 Meuse, in consequence of an accident which happened to 
 the ferry-boat. He was within a gunshot of the fortress 
 of Charlemont, on the left bank, and in the vexation which 
 the delay occasioned he dictated the following decree : "A 
 bridge shall be built over the Meuse to join Little Givet 
 to Great Givet. It shall be terminated during the ensuing 
 campaign." It was completed within the prescribed time. 
 
 In the great work of bridges and highways Bonaparte's 
 chief object was to remove the obstacles and barriers which 
 nature had raised up as the limits of old France so as to 
 form a junction with the provinces which he successively 
 annexed to the Empire. Thus in Savoy a road, smooth 
 as a garden-walk, superseded the dangerous ascents and 
 descents of the wood of Bramant ; thus was the passage 
 of Mont Cenis a pleasant promenade at almost every 
 season of the year ; thus did the Simplon bow his head, 
 and Bonaparte might have said, "There are now no Alps," 
 with more reason than Louis XIV. said, "There are now 
 no Pyrenees." * 
 
 Such was the implicit confidence which Bonaparte re- 
 posed in me that I was often alarmed at the responsibility 
 it obliged me to incur. 1 Official business was not the only 
 
 1 Metternich (tome iv. p. 187) says on this subject, " If yon look closely at th 
 course of human affairs you will make strange discoveries. For instance, that the 
 Simplon Pass has contributed a* surely to Napoleon's Immortality as the numer- 
 ous works done in the reign of the Emperor Francis will fail to add to his." 
 
 1 Of this confidence the following instructions for me, which he dictated to Duroc, 
 afford sufficient proof : 
 
 " 1st. Citizen Bonrrienne shall open all the letters addressed to the First Consul, 
 
 VOL. I. 26
 
 402 MEMOIRS Of NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 18001 
 
 labour that devolved upon me. I had to write to the dic- 
 tation of the First Consul during a great part of the day, 
 or to decipher his writing, which was always the most 
 laborious part of my duty. 1 I was so closely employed 
 that I scarcely ever went out ; and when by chance I dined 
 in town, I could not arrive until the very moment of din- 
 ner, and I was obliged to run away immediately after it. 
 Once a month, at most, I went without Bonaparte to the 
 Comedie Francaise, but I was obliged to return at nine 
 o'clock, that being the hour at which we resumed business. 
 Corvisart, with whom I was intimately acquainted, con- 
 stantly expressed his apprehensions about my health ; but 
 my zeal carried me through every difficulty, and during 
 our stay at the Tuileries I cannot express how happy I was 
 in enjoying the unreserved confidence of the man on whom 
 the eyes of all Europe were fixed. So perfect was this 
 
 and present them to him three times a day, or of tenor in case of urgent business. 
 The letters shall be deposited in the cabinet when they are opened. Bourrienne is to 
 analyse all those which are of secondary interest, and write the First Consul's deci- 
 ion on each letter. The hours for presenting the letters shall be, first, when the 
 Consul rises ; second, a quarter of an hour before dinner ; and third, at eleven at 
 night. 
 
 " 2d. He is to have the superintendence of the Topographical office, and of an 
 office of Translation, in which there shall be a German and an English clerk. 
 Every day he shall present to the First Consul, at the hours above mentioned, the 
 German and English journals, together with a translation. With respect to the Ital- 
 ian journals, it will only be necessary to mark what the First Consul is to read. 
 
 "3d. He shall keep a register of appointments to offices under Government ; a 
 second, for appointments to judicial posts; a third, for appointments to places 
 abroad ; and a fourth, for the situations of receivers and great financial posts, where 
 he is to inscribe the names of all the individuals whom the First Consul may refer to 
 him. These registers must be written by his own hand, and must be kept entirely 
 private. 
 
 "4th. Secret correspondence, and the different reports of surveillance, are to be 
 addressed directly to Bourrienne, and transmitted by him to the hand of the First 
 Consul, by whom they will be returned without the intervention of any third party. 
 
 " 6th. There shall be a register for all that relates to secret extraordinary expen- 
 diture. Bourrienne shall write the whole with his own hand, in order that the busi- 
 ness may be kept from the knowledge of any one. 
 
 "6th. He shall despatch all the business which maybe referred to him, either 
 from Citizen Duroc, or from the cabinet of the First Consul, taking care to arrange 
 everything so as to secure secrecy. 
 
 (Signed) " BoNArABtx, Firtt Consul. 
 
 "Paris, 13th Germinal, year VIII. 
 "(3d. April 1800.)" 
 
 * Sea Annex to this Chapter.
 
 1800. SOtfAFARTtt A3 INSPECTOR Of SCBOOtS. 403 
 
 confidence that Bonaparte, neither as General, Consul, nor 
 Emperor, ever gave me any fixed salary. In money mat- 
 ters we were still comrades : I took from his funds what 
 was necessary to defray my expenses, and of this Bona- 
 parte never once asked me for any account. 
 
 He often mentioned his wish to regenerate public edu- 
 cation, which he thought was ill managed. The central 
 schools did not please him ; but he could not withhold his 
 admiration from the Polytechnic School, the finest estab- 
 lishment of education that was ever founded, but which 
 he afterwards spoiled by giving it a military organisation. 
 In only one college of Paris the old system of study was 
 preserved : this was the Louis-le-Grand, which had received 
 the name of Pritanee. The First Consul directed the 
 Minister of the Interior to draw up a report on that estab- 
 lishment ; and he himself went to pay an unexpected visit 
 to the Pritanee, accompanied by M. Lebrun and Duroc. 
 He remained there upwards of an hour, and in the evening 
 he spoke to me with much interest on the subject of his 
 visit. " Do you know, Bourrienne," said he, " that I have 
 been performing the duties of professor?" "You, Gen- 
 eral!" "Yes! and I did not acquit myself badly. I 
 examined the pupils in the mathematical class ; and I 
 recollected enough of my Bezout to make some demon- 
 strations before them. I went everywhere, into the bed- 
 rooms and the dining-room. I tasted the soup, which is 
 better than we used to have at Brienne. I must devote 
 serious attention to public education and the management 
 of the colleges. The pupils must have a uniform. I 
 observed some well and others ill dressed. That will not 
 do. At college, above all places, there should be equality. 
 But I was much pleased with the pupils of the Pritan6e. 
 I wish to know the names of those I examined, and I have 
 desired Duroc to report them to me. I will give them 
 rewards ; that stimulates young people. I will provide 
 for some of them."
 
 404 MEMOIH8 Of 1 NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 On this subject Bonaparte did not confine himself to 
 an empty scheme. After consulting with the headmaster 
 of the Pritanee, he granted pensions of 200 francs to 
 seven or eight of the most distinguished pupils of the es- 
 tablishment, and he placed three of them in the depart- 
 ment of Foreign Affairs, under the title of diplomatic pu- 
 pils. 1 
 
 What I have just said respecting the First Consul's 
 visit to the Pritanee reminds me of a very extraordinary 
 circumstance which arose out of it. Among the pupils at 
 the Pritanee there was a son of General Miackzinski, who 
 died fighting under the banners of the Republic. Young 
 Miackzinski was then sixteen or seventeen years of age. 
 He soon quitted the college, entered the army as a volun- 
 teer, and was one of a corps reviewed by Bonaparte in the 
 plain of Sablons. He was pointed out to the First Con- 
 sul, who said to him, " I knew your father. Follow his 
 example, and in six months you shall be an officer." Six 
 months elapsed, and Miackzinski wrote to the First Con- 
 sul, reminding him of his promise. No answer was re- 
 turned, and the young man then wrote a second letter as 
 follows : 
 
 You desired me to prove myself worthy of my father ; I have 
 done so. You promised that I should be an officer in six months ; 
 seven have elapsed since that promise was made. When you re- 
 ceive this letter I shall be no more. I cannot live under a Govern- 
 ment the head of which breaks his word. 
 
 Poor Miackzinski kept his word but too faithfully. 
 After writing the above letter to the First Consul he re- 
 tired to his chamber and blew out his brains with a pis- 
 tol. A few days after this tragical event Miackzin ski's 
 commission was transmitted to his corps, for Bonaparte 
 had not forgotten him. A delay in the War Office had 
 
 1 This institution of diplomatic pupils was originally suggested by M. da Talley- 
 rand.
 
 1800. INTRODUCTION OF VACCINATION. 405 
 
 caused the death of this promising young man. Bona- 
 parte was much affected at the circumstance, and he said 
 to me, " These Poles have such refined notions of honour. 
 . . . Poor Sulkowski, I am sure, would have done the 
 same." 
 
 At the commencement of the Consulate it was gratify- 
 ing to see how actively Bonaparte was seconded in the 
 execution of plans for the social regeneration of France : 
 all seemed animated with new life, and every one strove 
 to do good as if it were a matter of competition. Every 
 circumstance concurred to favour the good intentions of 
 the First Consul. Vaccination, which, perhaps, has saved 
 as many lives as war has sacrificed, was introduced into 
 France by M. de Liancourt ; and Bonaparte, immediately 
 appreciating the value of such a discovery, gave it his de- 
 cided approbation. At the same time a council of Prizes 
 was established, and the old members of the Constituent 
 Assembly were invited to return to France. It was for 
 their sake and that of the Royalists that the First Consul 
 recalled them, but it was to please the Jacobins, whom 
 he was endeavouring to conciliate, that their return was 
 subject to restrictions. At first the invitation to return 
 to France extended only to those who could prove that 
 they had voted in favour of the abolition of nobility. The 
 lists of emigrants were closed, and committees were ap- 
 pointed to investigate their claims to the privilege of re- 
 turning. 
 
 From the commencement of the month of Germinal the 
 reorganisation of the army of Italy had proceeded with 
 renewed activity. The presence in Paris of the fine corps 
 of the Consular Guard, added to the desire of showing 
 themselves off in gay uniforms, had stimulated the mili- 
 tary ardour of many respectable young men of the capitaL 
 Taking advantage of this circumstance the First Consul 
 created a corps of volunteers destined for the army of re- 
 serve, which was to remain at Dijon. He saw the advan-
 
 106 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 tage of connecting a great number of families with hia 
 cause, and imbuing them with the spirit of the army. 
 This volunteer corps wore a yellow uniform which, in 
 some of the salons of Paris where it was still the custom 
 to ridicule everything, obtained for them the nickname of 
 " canaries." Bonaparte, who did not always relish a joke, 
 took this in very ill part, and often expressed to me his 
 vexation at it. However, he was gratified to observe in 
 the composition of this corps a first specimen of privileged 
 soldiers ; an idea which he acted upon when he created 
 the orderly gendarmes in the campaign of Jena, and when 
 he organised the guards of honour after the disasters of 
 Moscow. 
 
 In every action of his life Bonaparte had some particular 
 object in view. I recollect his saying to me one day, 
 "Bourrienne, I cannot yet venture to do anything against 
 the regicides ; but I will let them see what I think of them. 
 To-morrow I shall have some business with Abrial respect- 
 ing the organisation of the court of Cassation. Target, 
 who is the president of that court, would not defend Louis 
 XVI. Well, whom do you think I mean to appoint in his 
 place? . . . Tronchet, who did defend the king. They 
 may say what they please ; / care not." ' Tronchet was 
 appointed. 
 
 Nearly about the same time the First Consul, being in- 
 formed of the escape of General Mack, said to me, " Mack 
 may go where he pleases ; I am not afraid of him. But I 
 will tell you what I have been thinking. There are some 
 other Austrian officers who were prisoners with Mack ; 
 among the number is a Count Dietrichstein, who belongs 
 to a great family in Vienna. I will liberate them all. At 
 the moment of opening a campaign this will have a good 
 effect. They will see that I fear nothing ; and who knows 
 but this may procure me some admirers in Austria." The 
 
 1 On this, as on many other occasions, the cynicism of Bonaparte's language does 
 cot admit of a literal translation.
 
 1800. CHARACTER IN HANDWRITING. 409 
 
 of the thinker. M. Michon has seen many mysterious hands ; but 
 the true Sphinx appears in Napoleon's alone, from the day when his 
 comprehensive glance showed him the mastery of Europe and he 
 began to combine those plans which astonished the world. Fine 
 " gladiolate " strokes, which sometimes terminate almost every 
 word, indicate that marked finesse which, allied to his powers of 
 concealment, made the complete diplomatist who shows himself in 
 the tortuous, horribly serpentine, almost spiral lines of his writing, 
 which Talleyrand, the king of negotiators, never surpassed. These 
 accusing undulations betray his Italian nature, and recall the sinu- 
 ous gliding of a snake through the grass, or trace darkly the under- 
 ground, moleish, diplomatic ways. Sometimes they are so sudden 
 as to resemble the doublings of a hare. 
 
 Napoleon's passionate nature, to which his microscopic historian 
 attributes many of his gigantic mistakes, always acted on first im- 
 pressions when it broke through the habitual firm calm to which 
 he ever tried to school himself. It is true it gave him tenfold 
 force ; but had his marvellous head always governed, he would 
 have taken the logical course of the situation and become the 
 Waghington of France. This mighty struggle of the head with the 
 heart shaped the whole of his fateful history, and is shown to this 
 student of his writing by the constant mixture of upright with 
 sloping letters. In intimate connection with this sign is the ex- 
 treme variability of the height of the letters, which indicates great 
 mobility of impressions. " This soul of fire was volatile as a flame." 
 The faculty of thought was in continual fermentation. The im- 
 agination soars with the long stroke of a d. 
 
 But the volcanic portion of his character would have been con- 
 trolled had it not been for a partial organic lesion of the brain, 
 which is the true key to the great dissonance of his acts. He him- 
 self said (but it was at St. Helena), " he goes mad who sleeps in a 
 bed of kings ; " and it was this cerebral aberration which, com- 
 bining with his headstrong passion, led him constantly to declare 
 war within twenty -four hours against the first comer ; to divorce a 
 wife he loved ; to propose a kingdom of Hayti to Louis XVIII. ; or 
 to take a million of men into the steppes of Russia. Chateaubriand 
 said of the Napoleonic ideas, ' ' systeme d' un f ou ou d'un enfant ; " 
 but the mental derangement was made plainer to the Aob6 by the 
 apparently unconscious leaps and bounds of the imperial pen, and 
 especially by the strange abnormal form and excessive development 
 of the letter p in Napoleon's writing. The historian maintains that 
 the writing of all the partially deranged which he has examined 
 exhibits some similar terrible sign, which he calls "la petite bfite."
 
 410 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 This ' ' sign " generally consists of a nervous, disordered, unusual 
 stroke, which falls fatally and spontaneously from the pen. Pascal, 
 whose imagination was so out of gear that he always saw an abyss 
 yawning at his side, and whose writing in his later years Napoleon's 
 most resembles, used an extravagant and accusing g. 
 
 The clear-headedness and precision of the General, whose whole 
 art of war culminated in being the strongest at a particular point ' 
 is shown by his often using a fresh paragraph for a fresh idea, and 
 in the profusion of space and light between the lines, the words, 
 and often between the letters of his earlier handwriting. But the 
 intuition, the eagle eye which enabled him always to seize this 
 point of concentration, is manifested by the frequent separation of 
 the letters in his words. Like Mazarin, too, he runs several words 
 together : a mark of the deductive logician, of the positive, practical 
 man who tends rapidly and directly towards the realization of his 
 aims. His strong will, his masterful and despotic nature, are de- 
 noted by the forcible manner in which he crosses his t high up. 
 Wonderful tenacity is shown by the "harpoons," or horizontal 
 pot-hooks which terminate the last stroke of many words : they 
 are, as it were, the claws of the eagle. A profusion of club-likft 
 strokes shows indomitable resolution and obstinacy, which may 
 be seen to have been intractable by the implacable hardness and 
 angular rigidity of the whole writing. The dash of meanness 
 which was always present in the man who gave a name to " capo- 
 ral " tobacco is shown in the little crooks which sometimes com- 
 mence or terminate the letter m, and in his signature, which was 
 not royal like that of Louis XIV. Until he became Emperor he 
 
 1 Almost all generals wish to be strong upon one, and that the decisive, point. 
 Where good and bad generals usually differ is in selecting that point. Thus at the 
 beginning of the 1800 campaign both Melas and Kapoleon wished to be strong on 
 the decisive point, but Melas believed that point to be in front of him, while Napo- 
 leon placed that point behind Melas, cutting him off from his base. At Marengo 
 Napoleon nearly ruined himself by being doubtful where the decisive point was, 
 and so sending off Desaix, while Melas ; wisely rushed at him. Putting the decisive 
 point at Marengo, and, with most generals, Melas would have won. Desaix 1 sens* 
 in returning before ordered saved the day. Many instances could be given, but 
 this is a common /tiistake, as if any general wished to be weak. Wellington was 
 not certain ..'bout the decisive point at Waterloo, and so kept pert of his force use- 
 less at Hal, while no man wished more to be strong on one, and that the decisive, 
 point. Generals often make themselves weak everywhere by posting troops every- 
 where, in order they may concentrate in time to be strong on any point, but this is 
 an error of calculation not of intention. The true selection of the decisive point is 
 the mark of a good general, and if Napoleon had a specialty, it wag rather a ten- 
 dency to risk much and grasp at everything, than any special wish to be strong on 
 one point. See Kamley, p. 143, for an example.
 
 1806. CHARACTER IN HANDWRITING. 411 
 
 always wrote his name Buona- or BonaParte, or abbreviated it BP. 
 Afterwards he wrote NaPoleon or NP. 
 
 The numerous facsimiles of signatures, monograms, and speci- 
 mens of writing attach a special value to M. Michon's book, and 
 they are accompanied not alone by his own views but by those of 
 the German "graphologist" Henze. One, from the Memorial, 
 looks, the Abbe says, as if the hand felt the grip of Hudson Lowe ; 
 and there is much that is melancholy in another the profoundly 
 discouraged, utterly beaten, misspelt and indecipherable rough 
 scrawl of his submission to the Prince Regent, written in the island 
 of Aix on the 14th of July 1815. The next day he surrendered 
 himself at Rochefort to Captain Maitland of the Bellerophon. 1 
 
 1 A facsimile of the abdication of Bonaparte in 1814 will be found in the third 
 volume of this work, and, like the note of his submission mentioned above, betrays 
 manifest traces of the disagreeable nature of the task. 
 
 We may, at the risk of irrelevance, perhaps quote a contrary Instance in the case 
 of one of Bonaparte's biographers : Mr. Rnskin was on one occasion showing to a 
 friend the original manuscripts of several of Scott's novels. " I think," he said, 
 taking down one of them, " that the most precious of all is this. It is Woodstock. 
 Scott was writing this book when the news of his ruin came upon him. Do you see 
 the beautiful handwriting? Novr look, as I turn towards the end. Is the writing 
 one jot lens beautiful? Or are tVere more erasures than before? That shows how 
 man can, and should bear adversity. "
 
 413 isoa 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 1800. 
 
 The Memorial of St. Selena Louis XVIII. 's first letter to Bonaparte- 
 Josephine, Hortense, and the Faubourg St. Germain Madame Bona- 
 parte and the fortune-teller Louis XVIIL 's second letter Bona- 
 parte's answer Conversation respecting the recall of Louis XVIIL 
 Peace and war A battle fought with pins Genoa and Melas Real- 
 isation of Bonaparte's military plans Ironical letter to Berthier De- 
 parture from Paris Instructions to Lucein and Cambaceres Joseph 
 Bonaparte appointed Councillor of State Travelling conversation 
 Alexander and Caesar judged by Bonaparte, 
 
 IT sometimes happens that an event which passes away 
 unnoticed at the time of its occurrence acquires impor- 
 tance from events which subsequently ensue. This re- 
 flection naturally occurs to my mind now that I am about 
 to notice the correspondence which passed between Louis 
 XVITL and the First Consul. This is certainly not one 
 of the least interesting passages in the life of Bonaparte. 
 
 But I must first beg leave to make an observation on 
 the Memorial of St. Helena. That publication relates what 
 Bonaparte said respecting the negotiations between Louis 
 XVHL and himself ; and I find it necessary to quote a 
 few lines on the subject, in order to show how far the 
 statements contained in the Memorial differ from the auto- 
 graph letters in my possession. 
 
 At St. Helena Napoleon said that he never thought of 
 the princes of the House of Bourbon. This is true to a 
 certain point. He did not think of the princes of the 
 House of Bourbon with the view of restoring them to 
 their throne j but it has been shown, in several parts of
 
 1800. LETTER FROM LOUIS XVIII. 413 
 
 these Memoirs, that he thought of them very often, and 
 on more than one occasion their very names alarmed him. 1 
 The substance of the two letters given in the Memorial of 
 St. Helena is correct. The ideas are nearly the same as 
 those of the original letters. But it is not surprising that, 
 after the lapse of so long an interval, Napoleon's memory 
 should somewhat have failed him. However, it will not, I 
 presume, be deemed unimportant if I present to the read- 
 er literal copies of this correspondence, together with the 
 explanation of some curious circumstances connected 
 with it 
 
 The following is Louis XVHL's letter : 
 
 February 20, 1800. 
 
 SIR Whatever may be their apparent conduct, men like you 
 never inspire alarm. You have accepted an eminent station, and I 
 thank you for having done so. You know better than any one how 
 much strength and power are requisite to secure the happiness of a 
 great nation. Save France from her own violence, and you will 
 fulfil the first wish of my heart. Restore her King to her, and 
 future generations will bless your memory. You will always be too 
 necessary to the State for me ever to be able to discharge, by im- 
 portant appointments, the debt of my family and myself. 
 
 (Signed) Louis. 
 
 The First Consul was much agitated on the reception of 
 this letter. Though he every day declared his determina- 
 tion to have nothing to do with the Princes, yet he hesitated 
 whether or no he should reply to this overture. The 
 
 1 The Memorial states that " A letter was delivered to the First Consul by Le- 
 brun, who received it from the Abbe de Montesquieu, the secret agent of the Bour- 
 bons in Paris." This letter which was very cautiously written, said ; 
 
 " You are long delaying the restoration of my throne. It is to be feared you are 
 Buffering favourable moments to escape. You cannot secure the happiness of France 
 without me, and I can do nothing for France without you. Hasten, then, to name 
 the offices which you would choose for your friends." 
 
 The answer, Napoleon said, was as follows : 
 
 " I have received your royal highness'' letter. I have always taken a lively Inter- 
 est in your misfortunes, and those of your family. You must not think of nppear- 
 iiijf in France ; you could only return here by trampling over a hundred thousand 
 dead bodies. I shall always be happy to do anything that can alleviate your fate 
 tid help to banish the recollection of yuur misfortunes." Jiourrienne.
 
 414 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 numerous affairs which then occupied his mind favoured 
 this hesitation. Josephine and Hortense conjured him to 
 hold out hope to the King, as by so doing he would in no 
 way pledge himself, and would gain time to ascertain 
 whether he could not ultimately play a far greater part 
 than that of Monk. Their entreaties became so urgent 
 that he said to me, " These devils of women are mad ! 
 The Faubourg St. Germain has turned their heads ! They 
 make the Faubourg the giiardian angel of the royalists ; 
 but I care not ; I will have nothing to do with them." 
 
 Madame Bonaparte said she was anxious he should adopt 
 the step she proposed in order to banish from his mind all 
 thought of making himself King. This idea always gave 
 rise to a painful foreboding which she could never over- 
 come. ' 
 
 In the First Consul's numerous conversations with me 
 ae discussed with admirable sagacity Louis XVHL 's pro- 
 position and its consequences. " The partisans of the 
 Bourbons," said he, " are deceived if they suppose I am 
 the man to play Monk's part." Here the matter rested, 
 and the King's letter remained on the table. In the in- 
 terim Louis XY1U. wrote a second letter, without any date. 
 It was as follows : 
 
 You must have long since been convinced, General, that you pos- 
 sess my esteem. If you doubt my gratitude, fix your reward and 
 mark out the fortune of your friends. As to my principles, I am a 
 Frenchman, merciful by character, and also by the dictates of 
 reason. 
 
 No, the victor of Lodi, Castiglione, and Arcola, the conqueror of 
 Italy and Egypt, cannot prefer vain celebrity to real glory. But 
 you are losing precious time. We may ensure the glory of France. 
 
 1 A strong impression of the fate that awaited her had been made on her mind 
 during Bonaparte's absence in Egypt. She, like many other ladies of Paris, went at 
 that time to consult a celebrated fortune-teller, a Madame Villeneuve, who lived ia 
 the Rue de Lancry. This woman had revealed her destiny as follows : " You are," 
 said she, " the wife of a great General, who will become still greater. He will cross 
 the seas which separate him from you, and you will occupy the first station m 
 France ; but it will be only for a short time." Jiuwrienne.
 
 1800. BONAPARTE 1 8 ANSWER. 415 
 
 I say ire, because I require the aid of Bonaparte, and he can do 
 nothing without me. 
 
 General, Europe observes you. Glry awaita you, and I am im- 
 patient to restore peace to my people. (Signed) Louis. 
 
 This dignified letter the First Consul suffered to remain 
 unanswered for several weeks ; at length he proposed to 
 dictate an answer to me. I observed, that as the King's 
 letters were autographs, it would be more proper that he 
 should write himself. He then wrote with his own hand 
 the following : 
 
 SIR I have received your letter, and I thank you for the com- 
 pliments you address to me. 
 
 You must not seek to return to France. To do so you must 
 trample over a hundred thousand dead bodies. 
 
 Sacrifice your interest to the repose and happiness of France, and 
 history will render you justice. 
 
 I am not insensible to the misfortunes of your family. I shall 
 learn with pleasure, and shall willingly contribute to ensure, the 
 tranquillity of your retirement. (Signed) BONAPARTE. 
 
 He showed me this letter, saying, " What do you think 
 of it ? is it not good ? " He was never offended when I 
 pointed out to him an error of grammar or style, and I 
 therefore replied, " As to the substance, if such be your 
 resolution, I have nothing to say against it ; but," added I, 
 " I must make one observation on the style. You cannot 
 say that you shall learn with pleasure to ensure, etc." On 
 reading the passage over again he thought he had pledged 
 himself too far in saying that he would willingly contribute, 
 etc. He therefore scored out the last sentence, and inter- 
 lined, " I shall contribute with pleasure to the happiness and 
 tranquillity of your retirement." 
 
 The answer thus scored and interlined could not be sent 
 off, and it lay on the table with Bonaparte's signature 
 affixed to it. 
 
 Some time after he wrote another answer, the three first 
 paragraphs of which were exactly alike that first quoted
 
 416 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 but for the last paragraph he substituted the following : 
 "lam not insensible to the misfortunes of your family ; and 
 I shall learn with pleasure that you are surrounded with all 
 that can contribute to the tranquillity of your retirement." 
 By this means he did not pledge himself in any way, not 
 even in words, for he himself made no offer of contrib- 
 uting to the tranquillity of the retirement. Every day 
 which augumented his power and consolidated his posi- 
 tion diminished, he thought, the chances of the Bourbons ; 
 and seven months were suffered to intervene between the 
 date of the King's first letter and the answer of the First 
 Consul, which was written on the 2d Vend6miaire, year 
 IX. (24th September 1800) just when the Congress of 
 Luneville was on the point of opening. 
 
 Some days after the receipt of Louis XVUL's letter we 
 were walking in the gardens of Malmaison ; he was in 
 good humour, for everything was going on to his mind. 
 " Has my wife been saying anything more to you about 
 the Bourbons?" said he. "No, General" "But when 
 you converse with her you concur a little in her opinions. 
 Tell me why you wish the Bourbons back ? You have no 
 interest in their return, nothing to expect from them. 
 Your family rank is not high enough to enable you to 
 obtain any great post. You would be nothing under them. 
 Through the patronage of M. de Charnbonas you got the 
 appointment of Secretary of Legation at Stuttgart ; but had 
 it not been for the change you would have remained all your 
 life in that or some inferior post. Did you ever know men 
 rise by their own merit under kings? Everything de- 
 pends on birth, connection, fortune, and intrigue. Judge 
 things more accurately ; reflect more maturely on the 
 future." "General," replied I, "I am quite of your 
 opinion on one point. I never received gift, place, or 
 favour from the Bourbons ; and I have not the vanity to 
 believe that I should ever have attained any important 
 appointment But you must not forget that my nomina-
 
 1800. THE BOURBONS NOT TO BE TRUSTED. 417 
 
 tion as Secretary of Legation at Stuttgart preceded the 
 overthrow of the throne only by a few days ; and I cannot 
 infer, from what took place under circumstances unfort- 
 unately too certain, what might have happened in the 
 reverse case. Besides, I am not actuated by personal 
 feelings ; I consider not my own interests, but those of 
 France. I wish you to hold the reins of government as 
 long as you live ; but you have no children, and it is 
 tolerably certain that you will have none by Josephine. 
 What will become of us when you are gone ? You talk 
 of the future ; but what will be the future fate of France ? 
 
 I have often heard you say that your brothers are not " 
 
 "You are right," said he, abruptly interrupting me. 
 " If I do not live thirty years to complete my work you 
 will have a long series of civil wars after my death. My 
 brothers will not suit France ; you know what they are. 
 A violent conflict will therefore arise among the most dis- 
 tinguished generals, each of whom will think himself en- 
 titled to succeed me." "Well, General, why not take 
 means to obviate the mischief you foresee?" "Do you 
 imagine I do not think of it ? But look at the difficulties 
 that stand in my way. How are so many acquired rights 
 and material results to be secured against the efforts of a 
 family restored to power, and returning with 80,000 emi- 
 grants and the influence of fanaticism ? What would be- 
 come of those who voted for the death of the King the 
 men who acted a conspicuous part in the Revolution the 
 national domains, and a multitude of things that have 
 been done during twelve years ? Can you see how far 
 reaction would extend ? " " General, need I remind you 
 that Louis, in his letter, guarantees the contrary of all you 
 apprehend ? I know what will be your answer ; but are 
 you not able to impose whatever conditions you may think 
 fit ? Grant what is asked of you only at that price. Take 
 three or four years ; in that time you may ensure the 
 happiness of France by institutions conformable to her 
 VOL. I. 27
 
 418 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 wants. Custom and habit would give them a power which 
 it would not be easy to destroy ; and even supposing such 
 a design were entertained, it could not be accomplished. 
 I have heard you say it is wished you should act the part 
 of Monk; but you well know the difference between a 
 general opposing the usurper of a crown, and one whom 
 victory and peace have raised above the ruins of a sub- 
 verted throne, and who restores it voluntarily to those 
 who have long occupied it. You are well aware what you 
 
 call ideology will not again be revived ; and " "I 
 
 know what you are going to say ; but it all amounts to 
 nothing. Depend upon it, the Bourbons will think they 
 have reconquered their inheritance, and will dispose of it 
 as they please. The most sacred pledges, the most posi- 
 tive promises, will be violated. None but fools will trust 
 them. My resolution is formed ; therefore let us say no 
 more on the subject But I know how these women 
 torment you. Let them mind their knitting, and leave me 
 to do what I think right." 
 
 Every one knows the adage, Si vis pacem para bellum. 
 Had Bonaparte been a Latin scholar he would probably 
 have reversed it and said, Si vis bellum para pacem. 
 While seeking to establish pacific relations with the 
 powers of Europe the First Consul was preparing to strike 
 a great blow in Italy. As long as Genoa held out, and 
 Massena continued there, Bonaparte did not despair of 
 meeting the Austrians in those fields which not four years 
 before had been the scenes of his success. He resolved 
 to assemble an army of reserve at Dijon. Where there 
 was previously nothing he created everything. At that 
 period of his life the fertility of his imagination and the 
 vigour of his genius must have commanded the admira- 
 tion of even his bitterest enemies. I was astonished at 
 the details into which he entered. While every moment 
 was engrossed by the most important occupations he sent 
 24,000 francs to the hospital of Mont St. Bernard. When
 
 1800. A BATTLE FOUGHT WITH PINS. 419 
 
 he saw that his army of reserve was forming, and every- 
 thing was going on to his liking, he said to me, " I hope 
 to fall on the rear of Melas before he is aware I am in 
 Italy . . . that is to say, provided Genoa holds out. 
 But MASSNA is defending it." 
 
 On the 17th of March, in a moment of gaiety and good 
 humour, he desired me to unroll Chauchard's great map 
 of Italy. He lay down upon it, and desired me to do 
 likewise. He then stuck into it pins, the heads of which 
 were tipped with wax, some red and some black. I 
 silently observed him, and awaited with no little curiosity 
 the result of this plan of campaign. When he had 
 stationed the enemy's corps, and drawn up the pins with 
 red heads on the points where he hoped to bring his own 
 troops, he said to me, " Where do you think I shall beat 
 Melas?" "How the devil should I know?" "Why, 
 look here, you fool ! Melas is at Alessandria with his 
 headquarters. There he will remain until Genoa sur- 
 renders. He has in Alessandria his magazines, his hos- 
 pitals, his artillery, and his reserves. Crossing the Alps 
 here (pointing to the Great Mont St. Bernard) I shall fall 
 upon Melas, cut off his communications with Austria, and 
 meet him here in the plains of Scrivia " (placing a red pin 
 at San Giuliano). Finding that I looked on this manoeuvre 
 of pins as mere pastime, he addressed to me some of his 
 usual compliments, such as fool, ninny, etc., and then pro- 
 ceeded to demonstrate his plans more clearly on the map. 
 At the expiration of a quarter of an hour we rose ; I folded 
 up the map, and thought no more of the matter. 
 
 Four months after this, when I was at San Giuliano 
 with Bonaparte's portfolio and despatches, which I had 
 saved from the rout which had taken place during the day, 
 and when that very evening I was writing at Torre di 
 Galifolo the bulletin of the battle to Napoleon's dictation, 
 I frankly avowed my admiration of his military plans. 
 He himself smiled at the accuracy of his own foresight.
 
 420 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 The First Consul was not satisfied with General Ber- 
 thier as War Minister, and he superseded him by Carnot, 1 
 who had given great proofs of firmness and integrity, but 
 who, nevertheless, was no favourite of Bonaparte, on ac- 
 count of his decided republican principles. Berthier was 
 too slow in carrying out the measures ordered, and too 
 slow in carrying out the measures ordered, and too lenient 
 in the payment of past charges and in new contracts. 
 Carnot's appointment took place on the 2d of April 1800 ; 
 and to console Berthier, who, he knew, was more at home 
 in the camp than in the office, he dictated to me the fol- 
 lowing letter for him : 
 
 PAKIS, Zd April 1800. 
 
 CITIZEN-GENERAL The military talents of which you have given 
 so many proofs, and the confidence of the Government, call you to 
 the command of an army. During the winter you have reorganised 
 the War Department, and you have provided, as far as circum- 
 stances would permit, for the wants of our armies. During the 
 spring and summer it must be your task to lead our troops to vic- 
 tory, which is the effectual means of obtaining peace and consolidat- 
 ing the Republic. 
 
 Bonaparte laughed heartily while he dictated this epistle, 
 especially when he uttered the word which I have marked 
 in italics. Berthier set out for Dijon, where he com- 
 menced the formation of the army of reserve. 
 
 The Consular Constitution did not empower the First 
 Consul to command an army out of the territory of 
 France. Bonaparte therefore wished to keep secret his 
 long-projected plan of placing himself at the head of the 
 army of Italy, which he then for the first time called the 
 grand army. I observed that by his choice of Berthier 
 
 1 There were special reasons for the appointment of Carnot. Berthier was re- 
 quired with his master in Italy, while Carnot, who had so long ruled the armies of 
 the Republic, was better fitted to influence Moreau, at this time advancing into Ger- 
 many. Carnot probably fulfilled the main object of his appointment when he was 
 gent to Moreau, and succeeded in getting that general, with natural reluctance, to 
 damage his own campaign by detaching a large body of troops into Italy. Berthier 
 was reappointed to the Ministry on the 8th of October 1800, a very speedy return if 
 be had really been disgraced.
 
 1800. CAESAR AND ALEXANDER. 421 
 
 nobody could be deceived, because it must be evident that 
 he would have made another selection had he not intended 
 to command in person. He laughed at my observation. 
 
 Our departure from Paris was fixed for the 6th of May, 
 or, according to the republican calendar, the 16th FloreaL 
 Bonaparte had made all his arrangements and issued all 
 his orders ; but still he did not wish it to be known that 
 he was going to take the command of the army. On the 
 eve of our departure, being in conference with the two 
 other Consuls and the Ministers, he said to Lucien, "Pre- 
 pare, to-morrow morning, a circular to the prefects, and 
 you, Fouche, will publish it in the journals. Say I am 
 gone to Dijon to inspect the army of reserve. You may 
 add that I shall perhaps go as far as Geneva ; but you 
 must affirm positively that I shall not be absent longer than 
 a fortnight. You, Cambaceres, will preside to-morrow at 
 the Council of State. In my absence you are the Head of 
 the Government State that my absence will be but of 
 short duration, but specify nothing. Express my approba- 
 tion of the Council of State ; it has already rendered great 
 services, and I shall be happy to see it continue in the 
 course it has hitherto pursued. Oh ! I had nearly for- 
 gotten you will at the same time announce that I have 
 appointed Joseph a Councillor of State. Should anything 
 happen I shall be back again like a thunderbolt. I re- 
 commend to you all the great interests of France, and I 
 trust that I shall shortly be talked of in Vienna and in 
 London." 
 
 We set out at two in the morning, taking the Burgundy 
 road, which we had already so often travelled under very 
 different circumstances. 
 
 On the journey Bonaparte conversed about the warriors 
 of antiquity, especially Alexander, Csesar, Scipio, and Han- 
 nibal. I asked him which he preferred, Alexander or 
 Csesar. "I place Alexander in the first rank," said he, 
 " yet I admire Csesar's tine campaign in Africa, But the
 
 422 MEMOIRS OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1800. 
 
 ground of my preference for the King of Macedonia is the 
 plan, and above all the execution, of his campaign in Asia. 
 Only those who are utterly ignorant of war can blame 
 Alexander for having spent seven months at the siege of 
 Tyre. For my part, I would have stayed there seven years 
 had it been necessary. This is a great subject of dispute ; 
 but I look upon the siege of Tyre, the conquest of Egypt, 
 and the journey to the Oasis of Ammon as a decided proof 
 of the genius of that great captain. His object was to give 
 the King of Pei'sia (of whose force he had only beaten a 
 feeble advance-guard at the Granicus and Issus) time to 
 reassemble his troops, so that he might overthrow at a 
 blow the colossus which he had as yet only shaken. By 
 pursuing Darius into his states Alexander would have 
 separated himself from his reinforcements, and would have 
 met only scattered parties of troops who would have drawn 
 him into deserts where his army would have been sacri- 
 ficed. By persevering in the taking of Tyre he secured 
 his communications with Greece, the country he loved as 
 dearly as I love France, and in whose glory he placed his 
 own. By taking possession of the rich province of Egypt 
 he forced Darius to come to defend or deliver it, and in 
 so doing to march half-way to meet him. By represent- 
 ing himself as the son of Jupiter he worked upon the 
 ardent feelings of the Orientals in a way that powerfully 
 seconded his designs. Though he died at thirty-three 
 what a name he has left behind him ! " 
 
 Though an utter stranger to the noble profession of 
 arms, yet I could admire Bonaparte's clever military plans 
 and his shrewd remarks on the great captains of ancient 
 and modern times. I could not refrain from saying, 
 " General, you often reproach me for being no flatterer, 
 but now I tell you plainly I admire you." And certainly 
 I really spoke the true sentiments of my mind. 
 
 END or VOL. i.
 
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