Count de Las Cases
Memorial de Sainte Hélène
London, 1823
MY RESIDENCE WITH THE EMPEROR NAPOLEON.

Volume 1, Part 2
page 323 - 362
1816, March 16 – 31

Message for the Prince Regent.

16.—The Emperor had quitted the Encyclopedia Britannica, to take his lessons in English, in the Annual Register.  He read there the adventure of a Mr. Spencer Smith, arrested at Venice, ordered to be sent to Valenciennes, and who made his escape on the road.  This must be a very simple affair, said the Emperor, which the narrator has converted into a statement of importance.  The circumstance was totally unknown to him :  it was a detail of police of too little consequence, he observed, to have found its way up to him.

About four o’clock the captain of the Spy arrived from Europe, and the captain of the Ceylon about to sail for England, were presented to the Emperor.  He was in low spirits—he was unwell :  the audience of the first was very short ;  that of the second would have been the same, had he not roused the Emperor by asking if we had any letters to send to Europe.  The Emperor then desired me to ask him if he should see the Prince Regent ;  on his answering in the affirmative, I was charged to inform him that the Emperor was desirous of writing to the Prince Regent, but that in consequence of the observation of the Admiral, that he would open the letter, he had abstained from it, as being inconsistent with his dignity, and with that of the Prince Regent himself.  That he had, indeed, heard the laws of England much boasted of, but that he could not discover their benefits any where ;  that he had only now to expect, indeed to desire, an executioner ;  that the torture they made him endure was inhuman, savage ;  that it would have been more open and energetic to put him to death.  The Emperor made me request of the captain that he would take upon him to deliver these words, and dismissed him.  He looked very red and was much embarrassed.

Spirit of the Inhabitants of the Isle of France.

17th.—An English Colonel, arrived from the Cape on his return from the Isle of France, came in the morning and addressed himself to me, to try to get an introduction to the Emperor.  The Admiral had only allowed his vessel to remain two or three hours in the road.  Having prevailed on the Emperor to receive him at four o’clock, he assured me that he would rather miss his vessel than lose such an opportunity.  The Emperor was not very well, he had passed several hours in his bath ;  at four he received the Colonel.

The Emperor put many questions to him concerning the Isle of France, lately ceded to the English :  it seems that its prosperity and its commerce suffer from its change of sovereignty.

After the departure of the Colonel, being alone with the Emperor in the garden, I told him that his person seemed to have remained very dear to the inhabitants of the Isle of France ;  that the Colonel had informed me that the name of Napoleon was never pronounced there but with commiseration.  It was precisely on the day of a great festival in the colony, that they learned his departure from France and his arrival at Plymouth ;  the theatre was to be universally attractive ;  the news having arrived during the day, in the evening there was not a single colonist, either white or of colour, in the house :  there were only some English, who were exceedingly confused and irritated at the circumstance.  The Emperor listened to me.  “ It is quite plain,” said he, after some moments of silence ;  “ this proves that the inhabitants of the Isle of France have continued French.  I am the country ;  they love it :  it has been wounded in my person, they are grieved at it.”  I added that the change of dominion restraining their expressions, they did not dare propose his health publicly ;  but that the Colonel said they never neglected it notwithstanding ;  they drank to him, this word was become consecrated to Napoleon.  These details touched him.  “ Poor Frenchmen !” he said with expression—“ Poor People !  Poor Nation !  I deserved all that, I loved thee !  But thou, thou surely didst not deserve all the ills that press upon thee !  Ah !  thou didst merit well that one should devote himself to thee !  But, it must be confessed, what infamy, what baseness, what degradation I had about me !”  And addressing himself to me, he added :  “ I do not speak here of your friends of the Fauxbourg Saint-Germain ;  for with respect to them it is another matter.”

There frequently reached us incidents and expressions which, like those from the Isle of France, were calculated to excite emotion in the heart.  The Island of Ascension, in our neighbourhood, had always been desert and abandoned ;  since we have been here, the English have thought proper to form an establishment there.  The Captain who went to take possession of it told us on his return, that he was much astonished on landing to find upon the beach, May the great Napoleon live for ever !

In the last papers that reached us, among many good-natured sallies and jeux de mots, it was remarked, in several languages, that Paris would never be happy till his Helena should be restored to him :  these were a few drops of honey in our cup of wormwood.

His intentions respecting Rome.—Horrible food.—Britannicus.

18th—19th.  The Emperor was on horseback by eight o’clock.  He had abstained from it for a long time :  want of space to ride over was the cause.  His health suffers visibly in consequence, and it is astonishing that the want of exercise is not still more hurtful to him, who was in the daily habit of taking it to a violent degree.  On our return, the Emperor breakfasted out of doors ;  he detained us all.  After breakfast, the conversation fell on Herculaneum and Pompeii ;  the phenomenon and epoch of their destruction, the time and the accident of their modern discovery, the monuments and the curiosities they have since afforded us.  The Emperor said, that if Rome had remained under his dominion, she would have risen again from her ruins :  he intended to have cleared away all the rubbish ;  to have restored as much as possible, &c.  He did not doubt that the same spirit extending through all the vicinity, it might have been in some degree the same with Herculaneum and Pompeii.

Breakfast being concluded, the Emperor sent my son to bring the volume of Crevier which contains this event ;  and he read it to us, as well as the death and character of Pliny.  He retired about noon to take some rest.  Towards six o’clock we took our usual round in the carriage.  The Emperor took with him Mr. and Mrs. Skelton, who were come to visit him.

On our return, the Emperor, banished from the garden on account of the damp, went to see General Gourgaud, who was recovering rapidly.  After dinner, on leaving the table and returning to the drawing-room, we could not help reverting to the meal we had just made ;—literally nothing was fit to eat :  the bread bad, the wine not drinkable, the meat disgusting and unwholesome ;  we are frequently obliged to send it back again ;  they continue, in spite of our remonstrances, to send it us dead, because by that method they can put upon us such animals as have died naturally.

The Emperor, shocked at this description, could not refrain from saying, with warmth :  “ No doubt there are some individuals whose physical situation is still worse ;  but that circumstance does not deprive us of the right of giving an opinion on our own condition, or on the infamous manner in which we are treated.  The injustice of the English government has not been contented with sending us hither, it has selected the individuals to whom our persons and our supplies are intrusted !  For my part, I should suffer less, if I were sure that it would one day be divulged to the whole world in such a way as to brand with infamy those who are guilty of it.  But let us talk of something else,” said he—“ what is the day of the month ?”  He was told it was the 19th of March :  “ What !” he exclaimed, “ the eve of the 20th of March !”  And a few seconds afterwards :  “ But let us talk of something else.”  He sent for a volume of Racine, and at first began to read the comedy of the Plaideurs ;  but after a scene or two, he turned to Britannicus, which he read to us.  When the reading was concluded, and the due tribute of admiration had been paid, he said that Racine was censured for making the denouement of this piece too sudden, that the poisoning of Britannicus was not expected so early in the play as it ought to have been.  He praised the truth of the character of Narcissus highly, observing, that it was always by wounding the self-love of princes that their determinations were most influenced.

20th of March.—The Accouchement of the Empress.

20th.—After dinner one of us observed to the Emperor, that he had been less solitary, less quiet that day twelvemonth at the same hour.  “ I was sitting down to table at the Tuileries,” said the Emperor.  “ I had found it difficult to get there :  the dangers I went through in that attempt were at least equal to those of a battle.”  In fact he had been seized upon, on his arrival, by thousands of officers and citizens ;  one party had snatched him from another ;  he had been carried to the palace, and amidst a tumult like that of a mob about to tear a man to pieces, instead of the orderly and respectful attendance of a multitude intent on shewing their veneration for an individual.  But we ought to look at the sentiment and intention in this case :  it was enthusiasm and love carried to a pitch that resembled delirious rage.

The Emperor added, that in all probability more than one person in Europe would talk of him that evening ;  and that, in spite of all observation, many a bottle would be emptied in his cause.

The conversation then turned on the King of Rome ;  that day was the anniversary of his birth ;  the Emperor reckoned that he must be five years old.  He then spoke of the accouchement of the Empress, and seemed to take some pleasure in boasting that he had proved himself, on that occasion, as good a husband as any in the world :  he assisted the Empress to walk about all night ;  we, who were of the household knew something of the matter ;  we had all been called together at the palace at ten in the evening ;  we passed the night there ;  and the cries of the Empress sometimes reached our ears.  Towards morning the accoucheur having told the Emperor that the pains had ceased, and that the labour might yet be tedious, the Emperor went into a bath, and sent us away, desiring us, however, not to go from home.  The Emperor had not been long in the bath, when the pains came on again, and the accoucheur ran to him, almost out of his wits, saying he was the most unfortunate of men ;  that out of a thousand labours in Paris there was not one more difficult.  The Emperor, dressing himself again as fast as he could, encouraged him, saying that a man who understood his business ought never to lose his presence of mind ;  that there was nothing in this case that he ought to be uneasy about ;  that he had only to fancy he was delivering a citizen’s wife of the Rue Saint-Denis ;  that nature had but one law ;  that he was sure he would act for the best ;  and, above all, that he need not fear any reproach.  It was then represented to the Emperor that there was great danger either for the mother or the child.  “ If the mother live,” said he, without hesitation, “ I shall have another child.  Act in this case as if you were attending the birth of a cobbler’s son.”

When he reached the Empress, she really was in danger ;  the child presented itself in an unfavourable posture, and there was every reason to fear it would be stifled.*

The Emperor asked Dubois why he did not deliver her.  He excused himself, being unwilling to do it, he said, except in the presence of Corsivart, who had not yet arrived, “ But what can he tell you ?” said the Emperor.  “ If it is a witness, or a justification you want to secure, here am I.”  Then Dubois, taking off his coat, commenced the operation.  When the Empress saw the instruments, she cried out in a piteous manner, exclaiming that they were going to kill her.  She was strongly held by the Emperor, Madame de Montesquiou, Corvisart, who had just come in, &c.  Madame de Montesquiou dexterously took an opportunity to encourage her, by declaring that she herself had more than once been in the same situation.

The Empress, however, still persuaded herself that she was treated differently from other women, and often repeated, “ Am I to be sacrificed because I am an Empress !”  She declared, afterwards, to the Emperor, that she really had entertained this fear.  At length she was delivered.  The danger had been so imminent, said the Emperor, that all the etiquette which had been studied and ordered was disregarded, and the child put on one side, on the floor, whilst every one was occupied about the mother only.  The infant remained some moments in this situation :  it was Corvisart who took him up, chafed him, and brought him to utter a cry, &c.

Catiline’s Conspiracy.—The Gracchi.—Historians.—Sleep during a battle.—Cæsar and his Commentaries.—Of different Military Systems.

21st—22d.  The Emperor rode out very early :  we made the tour of our limits in several directions.  It is during these rides that the Emperor now takes his lessons in English.  I walk by his side ;  he speaks a few sentences in English, which I translate, word by word, as he pronounces them ;  by which method he perceives when he is understood, or is enabled to correct his mistakes.  When he has finished a sentence, I repeat it to him in English, so that he may understand it well himself ;  this helps to form his ear.

The Emperor was reading to-day, in the Roman History, of Catiline’s conspiracy ;  he could not comprehend it in the way in which it is described.  “ However great a villain Catiline might be,” observed he, “ he must have had some object in view :  it could not be that of governing in Rome, since he is accused of having intended to set fire to the four quarters of the city.”  The Emperor conceived it to be much more probable that it was some new faction similar to those of Marius and Sylla, which having failed, all the accusations calculated to excite the horror of patriots, were, as usual in such cases, heaped on the head of its leader.  It was then observed to the Emperor, that the same thing would infallibly have happened to himself, had he been overpowered in Vendemiaire, Fructidor, or Brumaire, before he had illumined with such radiant brilliancy an horizon cleared of clouds.

The Gracchi gave rise to doubts and suspicions of a very different sort in his mind, which, he said, became almost certainties to those who had been engaged in the politics of our times.  “ History,” said he, “ presents these Gracchi, in the aggregate, as seditious people, revolutionists, criminals ;  and, nevertheless, allows it to appear in detail, that they had virtues ;  that they were gentle, disinterested, moral men ;  and, besides, they were the sons of the illustrious Cornelia, which, to great minds, ought to be a strong primary presumption in their favour.  How then can such a contrast be accounted for ?  It is thus :  the Gracchi generously devoted themselves for the rights of the oppressed people, against a tyrannical senate ;  and their great talents and noble character endangered a ferocious aristocracy, which triumphed, murdered, and calumniated them.  The historians of a party have transmitted their characters in the same spirit.  Under the Emperors it was necessary to continue in the same manner ;  the bare mention of the rights of the people, under a despotic master, was a blasphemy, a downright crime.  Afterwards the case was the same under the feudal system, which was so fruitful in petty despots.  Such, no doubt, is the fatality which has attended the memory of the Gracchi.  Throughout succeeding ages their virtues have never ceased to be considered crimes ;  but at this day, when, possessed of better information, we have thought it expedient to reason, the Gracchi may and ought to find favour in our eyes.

“ In that terrible struggle between the aristocracy and democracy, which has been renewed in our times—in that exasperation of ancient territory against modern industry, which still ferments throughout Europe, there is no doubt but that if the aristocracy should triumph by force, it would point out many Gracchi in all directions, and treat them in future as mercifully as its predecessors have done the Gracchi of Rome.”

The Emperor added, that it was, moreover, easy to see that there was an hiatus in the ancient authors at this period of history ;  that all which the moderns now presented to us on this subject was mere gleaning.  He then reverted to the charges already made against honest Rollin and his pupil Crevier :  they were both devoid of talent, system, or object.  It was to be allowed that the ancients were far superior to us in this point ;  and that because, amongst them, the statesmen were literary men, and the men of letters statesmen ;  they accumulated professions, whilst we divide them absolutely.  This famous division of labour, which in our times produces such a perfection in mechanical arts, is quite fatal to excellence in mental productions ;  every work of genius is superior in proportion to the universality of the mind whence it emanates.  We owe to the Emperor the attempt to establish this principle by frequently employing men on various objects wholly unconnected with each other ;—it was his system.  He once appointed, of his own accord, one of his chamberlains to go into Illyria to liquidate the Austrian debt :  this was a matter of importance, and extremely complicated.  The chamberlain, who had previously been a total stranger to public business, was alarmed ;  and the minister, on hearing of this appointment, being dissatisfied with it, ventured to represent to the Emperor, that his nomination having fallen on a man entirely new to such matters, it might be feared that he would not acquit himself satisfactorily ;  “ I have a lucky hand, Sir,” was his answer ;  “ those on whom I lay it are fit for every thing.”

The Emperor, proceeding in his criticism, also censured severely what he called historical fooleries, ridiculously exalted by translators and commentators.  “ Such things prove, in the first place,” said he, “that the historians formed erroneous judgments of men and circumstances.  For instance,” said Napoleon, “ when they applaud so highly the continence of Scipio, and fall into ecstasies at the calmness of Alexander, Cæsar, and others, for having been able to sleep on the eve of a battle ;  even a monk, debarred from women, whose face brightens up at the very name—who neighs behind his barrier at their approach, would not give Scipio much credit for forbearing to violate the females whom chance threw into his power, while he had so many others entirely at his disposal.  A famished man might as well praise the hero for having quietly passed by a table covered with victuals, without greedily snatching at them.”  As to sleeping just before a battle, there was not, he assured us, one of our soldiers or generals who had not twenty times performed that miracle ;  their chief heroism lay in supporting the fatigue of watching the day before.

Here the Grand Marshal added, that he could safely say he had seen Napoleon sleep, not only on the eve of an engagement, but even during the battle.  “ I was obliged to do so,” said Napoleon, “ when I fought battles that lasted three days ;  Nature was also to have her due :  I took advantage of the smallest intervals, and slept where and when I could.”  He slept on the field of battle at Wagram, and at Bautzen, even during the action, and completely within the range of the enemy’s balls.  On this subject, he said, that independently of the necessity of obeying nature, these slumbers afforded a general, commanding a very great army, the important advantage of enabling him to await, calmly, the relations and combinations of all his divisions, instead of, perhaps, being hurried away by the only event which he himself could witness.

The Emperor farther said, that he found in Rollin, and even Cæsar, circumstances of the Gallic war which he could not understand.  He could not by any means comprehend the invasion of the Helvetii ;  the road they took ;  the object ascribed to them ;  the time they spent in crossing the Rhone ;  the diligence of Cæsar, who found time to go into Italy, as far as Aquileia, to seek the legions, and overtook the invaders before they had passed the Saone, &c.  That it was equally difficult to comprehend what was meant by establishing winter-quarters that extended from Treves to Vannes.  And when he also spoke of the immense works which the generals got performed by their soldiers, the ditches, walls, great towers, galleries, &c. the Emperor observed that in those times every exertion was directed to constructions on the spot, whereas in ours they were employed in conveyance.  He also thought the ancient soldiers laboured, in fact, more than ours.  He had thoughts of dictating something on that subject.  “ Ancient history, however,” said he, “ embraces a long period, and the system of war often changed.  In our days it is no longer that of the times of Turenne and Vauban :  campaign works were growing useless ;  even the system of our fortresses had become problematical or ineffectual ;  the enormous quantity of bombs and howitzers changed every thing.  It was no longer against the horizontal attack that defence was requisite, but also against the curve and the reflected lines.  None of the ancient fortresses thenceforth afforded shelter ;  they ceased to be tenable ;  no country was rich enough to maintain them.  The revenue of France would be insufficient for her lines of Flanders, for the exterior fortifications were now not above a fourth or fifth of the necessary expense.  Casemates, magazines, places of shelter secure from the effects of bombs, were now requisite, and were too expensive.”  The Emperor complained particularly of the weakness of modern masonry :  the engineer department is radically deflective in this point ;  it had cost him immense sums, wholly thrown away.

Struck with these novel truths, the Emperor had invented a system altogether at variance with the axioms hitherto established ;  it was to have metal of an extraordinary calibre, to advance beyond the principal line towards the enemy ;  and to have that principal line itself, on the contrary, defended by a great quantity of small moveable artillery :  hence the enemy would be stopped short in his sudden advance ;  he would have only weak pieces to attack powerful ones with ;  he would be commanded by this great calibre, round which the resources of the fortress, the small pieces, would form in groups, or even advance to a distance, as skirmishers, and might follow all the movements of the enemy by means of their lightness and mobility.  The enemy would then stand in need of battering-cannon ;  he would be obliged to open trenches :  time would be gained, and the true object of fortification accomplished.  The Emperor employed this method with great success, and to the great astonishment of the engineers, in the defence of Vienna, and in that of Dresden ;  he wished to have employed it in that of Paris, which city could not, he thought, be defended by any other means ;  but of the success of this method he had no doubt.

Days at Longwood.—Trial of Drouot.—Military characters.—Soult.—Masseraa.—The Emperor’s comrades in the artillery.— His name thought by him to be unknown to some people, even in Paris.

23d—26th.  The weather was very unfavourable during the greater part of these mornings, on account of the heavy rains, which scarcely allowed us to stir out of doors.  The Emperor read a work by a Miss Williams, on the return from the Isle of Elba ;  it had just reached us from England.  He was much disgusted with it, and with good reason :  this production is quite calumnious and false ;  it is the echo and collection of all the reports invented at the time in certain malevolent Parisian societies.

As to our evenings, the weather was almost indifferent to us ;  whether it rained, or the moon shone brightly, we literally made ourselves prisoners.  Towards nine o’clock we were surrounded by sentinels ;  to meet them would have been painful.  It is true that both the Emperor and ourselves might have gone out at a later hour, accompanied by an officer ;  but this would have been rather a punishment than a pleasure to us, although the officer never could conceive this feeling.  He gave us reason to conclude, at first, that he imagined this seclusion to be merely the effect of ill-humour, and thought it would not last long.  I know not what he may subsequently have thought of our perseverance.

The Emperor, as I believe I have already mentioned, sat down to table pretty regularly at eight o’clock ;  he never remained there above half an hour ;  sometimes scarcely a quarter of an hour.  When he returned to the drawing-room, if he happened to be unwell or taciturn, we had the greatest difficulty in the world to get on to half past nine or ten o’clock ;  indeed, we could not effect it without the assistance of reading.  But when he was cheerful, and entered into conversation with spirit, we were presently surprised to find it eleven o’clock, and later :  these were our pleasant evenings.  He would then retire, with a kind of satisfaction, at having, as he expressed it, conquered time.  And it was precisely on those days, when the remark applied with least force, that he used to observe that it must require our utmost courage to endure such a life.

One of these evenings, the conversation ran on the military trials, which are now instituting in France.  The Emperor thought that General Drouot could not be condemned for coming in the suite of one acknowledged sovereign to make war upon another.  Upon this it was remarked, that what was now mentioned as his justification, would be his greatest danger at the tribunal of legitimacy.

The Emperor acknowledged, in fact, that there was nothing to be said to the doctrines brought forward at this day :  but, on the other hand, that in condemning General Drouot, they would condemn emigration, and legitimate the condemnation of the emigrants.  Whosoever was found in arms against France, the Republican doctrines punished him with death ;  it was not so with the royal doctrine.  If they should in this instance adopt the Republican doctrine, the emigrant and royal party would condemn themselves.

The case of Drouot, however, in a general point of view, was very different even from that of Ney ;  and besides, Ney had evinced an unfortunate vacillation of which Drouot had never been guilty.  Thus the interest which Ney had excited was wholly founded on opinion ;  whilst that which was felt for Drouot was personal.

The Emperor dilated on the dangers and difficulties which the tribunals and ministers of justice must experience, throughout the affairs connected with his return from the Isle of Elba.  Above all, he was extremely struck by a particular circumstance relating to Soult, who, we were told, was to be brought to trial.  He, Napoleon, knew, he said, how innocent Soult was ;  and yet, were it not for that circumstance, and were he an individual and juror in Soult’s case, he had no doubt he should declare him guilty, so strongly were appearances combined against hint.  Ney, in the course of his defence, through some sentiment which it is difficult to account for, stated, contrary to the truth, that the Emperor had said Soult was in intelligence with him.  Now, every circumstance of Soult’s conduct during his administration, the confidence which the Emperor placed in him after his return, &c. agreed with that deposition :  who, then, would not have condemned him ?  “ Yet Soult is innocent,” said the Emperor, “ he even acknowledged to me that he had taken a real liking to the king.  The authority he enjoyed under him, he said, so different from that of my ministers, was a very agreeable thing, and had quite gained him over.”

Massena (whose proscription was also announced to us by the papers) was, the Emperor said, another person whom they would perhaps condemn as guilty of treason.  All Marseilles was against him, appearances were overwhelming, and yet he had fulfilled his duty up to the very moment of declaring himself openly.  On his return to Paris, he had even been far from claiming any credit with the Emperor, when the latter asked him whether he might have reckoned upon him.  “ The truth is,” continued the Emperor, “ that all the commanders did their duty ;  but they could not withstand the torrent of opinion, and no one had sufficiently calculated the sentiments of the mass of the people and the national impetuosity.  Carnot, Fouché, Maret, and Cambacérès, confessed to me, at Paris, that they had been greatly deceived on this point.  And no one understands it well, even now.

“ Had the King remained longer in France,” continued he, “ he would probably have lost his life in some insurrection ;  but had he fallen into my hands, I should have thought myself strong enough to have allowed him every enjoyment in some retreat of his own selection ;  as Ferdinand was treated at Valency.”

Immediately before this conversation, the Emperor was playing at chess, and his king having fallen, he cried out—“ Ah ! my poor king, you are down !”  Some one having picked it up, and restored it to him in a mutilated state—“ Horrid !” he exclaimed ;  “ I certainly do not accept the omen, and I am far from wishing any such thing :  my enmity does not extend so far.”

I would not, on any account, have omitted this circumstance, trifling as it may appear, because it is in many respects characteristic.  We ourselves, when the Emperor had retired, reverted to the incident.  What cheerfulness, what freedom of mind in such dreadful circumstances ! we said.  What serenity in the heart ! what absence of malice, irritation, or hatred !  Who could discover in him the man whom enmity and falsehood have depicted as such a monster ?  Even amongst his own followers, who is there that has well understood him, or taken sufficient pains to make him known ?

Another evening, the Emperor was speaking of his early years when he was in the artillery, and of his companions at the mess :  he always delighted in reverting to those days.  One of his messmates was mentioned, who, having been Prefect of the same department under Napoleon and under the King, had not been able to retain his place on the return of Napoleon.  The Emperor, when he recollected him, said that this person had at a certain period, missed the opportunity of making his fortune through him.  When Napoleon obtained the command of the army of the Interior, he loaded this person with favours, made him his aide-de-camp, and intended to place great confidence in him ;  but this favoured aide-de-camp had behaved very ill to him at the time of his departure for the Army of Italy ;  he then abandoned his General for the Directory.  “ Nevertheless,” said the Emperor, “ when once I was seated on the throne, he might have done much with me, if he had known how to set about it.  He had the claim of early friendship, which never loses its influence !  I should certainly never have withstood an unexpected overture in a hunting-party, for instance, or half an hour’s conversation on old times at any other opportunity.  I should have forgotten his conduct :  it was no longer important whether he had been on my side or not :  I had united all parties.  Those who had an insight into my character were well aware of this :  they knew that with me, however I might have felt disposed towards them, it was like the game of prison-bars ;  when once the point was touched, the game was won.  In fact, if I wished to withstand them, I had no resource but that of refusing to see them.”

He mentioned another old comrade, who, with wit and the requisite qualifications, might have done any thing with him.  He also said that a third would never have been removed from him, had he been less rapacious.

We disputed amongst ourselves whether these people ever suspected the secret, or their own chances ;  and whether the elevated station, and the Imperial splendour of Napoleon, would have allowed of their availing themselves of his favourable disposition towards them.

With respect to the splendour of the Imperial power, the Grand Marshal said, that however great and magnificent the Emperor had appeared to him on the throne, he had never made on him a superior, perhaps an equal impression, to that which his situation at the head of the Army of Italy had stamped on his memory.  He explained and justified this idea very successfully, and the Emperor heard him with some complacency.—But, we observed, what great events took place afterwards ! what elevation ! what grandeur ! what renown throughout the world !  The Emperor had listened.  “ For all that,” said he, “ Paris is so extensive, and contains so many people of all sorts, and some so eccentric, that I can conceive there may be some who never saw me, and others who never even heard my name mentioned.  Do not you think so ?”  And it was curious to see with what whimsical ingenuity he himself maintained this assertion, which he knew to be untenable.  We all insisted loudly, that, as to his name, there was not a town or village in Europe, perhaps even in the world, where it had not been pronounced.  One person in company added—“ Sire, before I returned to France at the treaty of Amiens, your Majesty being then only FIRST Consul, I determined to make a tour in Wales, as one of the most extraordinary parts of Great Britain.  I climbed the wildest mountains, some of which are of prodigious height :  I visited cabins that seemed to me to belong to another world.  As I entered one of these secluded dwellings, I observed to my fellow-traveller, that, in this spot, one would expect to find repose, and escape the din of revolution.  The cottager, suspecting us to be French, on account of our accent, immediately enquired the news from France, and what Bonaparte, the First Consul, was about.”

“ Sire,” said another, “ we had the curiosity to ask the Chinese officers whether our European affairs had been heard of in their Empire.  ‘ Certainly,’ they replied ;  ‘in a confused manner, to be sure, because we are totally uninterested in those matters ;  but the name of your Emperor is famous there, and connected with grand ideas of conquest and revolution :’  exactly as the names of those who have changed the face of that part of the world have arrived in ours, such as Gengis Khan, Tamerlane,” &c.

Political examination of conscience.—Loyalty and prosperity of the Empire.—Liberal ideas of the Emperor on the indifference of parties.—Marmont.—Murat.—Berthier.

27th.—This day the Emperor was walking in the garden with the Grand Marshal and me.  The conversation led us to make our political self-examination.

The Emperor said, he had been very warm and sincere at the commencement of the Revolution ;  that he had cooled by degrees, in proportion as he acquired more just and solid ideas.  His patriotism had sunk under the political absurdities and monstrous domestic excesses of our legislatures.  Finally, his republican faith had vanished on the violation of the choice of the people, by the Directory, at the time of the battle of Aboukir.

The Grand Marshal said, that for his part, he had never been a republican ;  but a very warm constitutional, until the 10th of August, the horrors of which day had cured him of all illusion.  He had very nearly been massacred in defending the King at the Tuileries.

As for me, it was notorious that I had begun my career as a pure and most ardent royalist.  “ Why, then, it seems, gentlemen,” said the Emperor, with vivacity, “ that I am the only one amongst us who has been a republican.”—“ And something more, Sire.”  Bertrand and I both replied.—“ Yes,” repeated the Emperor, “ republican and patriot.”—“ And I have been a patriot, Sire,” replied one of us, “ notwithstanding  my royalism ;  but what is still more extraordinary, I did not become so till the period of the Imperial reign.”—“ How ! villain !—are you compelled to own that you did not always love your country ?”—“ Sire, we are making our political self-examination, are we not ?  I confess my sins.  When I returned to Paris, by virtue of your amnesty, could I at first look upon myself as a Frenchman, when every law, every decree, every ordinance that covered the walls, constantly added the most opprobrious epithets to my unlucky denomination of Emigrant.  Nor did I think of remaining, when I first arrived.  I had been attracted by curiosity, yielding to the invincible influence of one’s native land, and the desire of breathing the air of one’s country.  I now possessed nothing there :  I had been compelled, at the frontier, to swear to the relinquishment of my patrimony, to accede to the laws which decreed its loss ;  and I looked on myself as a mere traveller in that country once mine.  I was a true foreigner, discontented, and even malevolent.  The empire came ;  it was a great event.  Now,” said I, “ my manners, prejudices, and principles triumph ;  the only difference is in the person of the sovereign.  When the campaign of Austerlitz opened, my heart, with surprise, found itself once more French.  My situation was painful ;  I felt as if torn limb from limb ;  I was divided between blind passion and national sentiment the triumphs of the French army and their general displeased me ;  yet their defeat would have humbled me.  At length, the prodigies of Ulm, and the splendour of Austerlitz, put an end to my embarrassment.  I was vanquished by glory.  I admired, I acknowledged, I loved Napoleon ;  and from that moment I became French to enthusiasm.  Henceforth I have had no other thoughts, spoken no other language, felt no other sentiments ;  and here I am by your side.”

The Emperor then asked innumerable questions relative to the Emigrants, their numbers, and disposition.  I related many curious facts respecting our princes, the Duke of Brunswick, and the King of Prussia.  I made him laugh at the extravagance of our presumption, our unbounded confidence of success, the disorder of our affairs, the incapability of our leaders.  “ Men,” said I, “ really were not at that time what they have since been.  Fortunately, those with whom we had to contend were, at first, only our equals in strength.  Above all, we thought, and repeated to one another, that an immense majority of the French nation was on our side ;  and, for my part, I firmly believed it.  I soon had, however, an opportunity of being undeceived ;  when our assemblages having arrived at Verdun, and beyond it, not a single person came to join us ;  on the contrary, every one fled at our approach.  Nevertheless I still believed it, even after my return from England ;  so greatly did we desceive ourselves afterwards with the absurdities we related to each other.  We said, the government rested in a handful of people ;  that it was maintained by force alone ;  that it was detested by the nation ;  and there must be some who have never ceased to think so.  I am persuaded that amongst those who now talk in that manner in the Legislative Body, there are some who speak as they think ;  so perfectly do I recognise the spirit, the ideas, and the expressions of Coblentz.”—“ But at what period were you undeceived ?” said the Emperor.—“ Very late, Sire.  Even when I rallied, and came to your Court, I was led much more by admiration and sentiment, than by conviction of your strength and durability.  However, when I came into your Council of State, seeing the freedom with which the most decisive decrees were voted, without a single thought of the slightest resistance ;  seeing around me nothing but conviction and entire persuasion, it then appeared to me, that your power, and the state of affairs, gained strength with a rapidity I could not account for.  By pondering on the cause of this change, I at length made a great and important discovery ;  namely, that matters had long stood thus, but that I had neither known, nor been willing to perceive it ;  I had hid my head in a bush, lest the light should reach my eyes.  Now that I found myself forced into the midst of its brightness, I was dazzled by it.  From that moment, all my prejudices fell to the ground ;  the film was taken off my eyes.

“ Being afterwards sent by your Majesty on a mission, and having traversed more than sixty departments, I employed the most scrupulous attention, and the most perfect sincerity, in ascertaining the truth of which I had so long doubted.  I interrogated the prefects, the inferior authorities, I caused documents and registers to be produced to me ;  I questioned private individuals without being known to them, I employed all possible means of trying the truth of my conclusions, and I remained fully convinced that the government was completely national, and founded in the will of the people ;  that France had, at no period of her history, been more powerful, more flourishing, better governed, or more happy ;  the roads had never been better maintained ;  agriculture had increased by a tenth, a ninth, perhaps an eighth in its productions.**  A restlessness, a general ardour animated all minds to exertion, and inspired them to aim at a daily personal improvement.  Indigo was gained ;  sugar would inevitably be so.  Never, at any period, had internal commerce and industry of every species, been carried to such a pitch ;  instead of four millions of livres in cotton, which were used at the Revolution, more than thirty millions were now manufactured, although we could obtain none by sea, and received it over land from the distance of Constantinople.  Rouen was become quite a prodigy in production.  The taxes were everywhere paid ;  the Conscription was nationalized ;  France, instead of being exhausted, contained a more numerous population than before, and was daily increasing.

“ When I again appeared amongst my former acquaintance with these data, there was an absolute insurrection against me.  They laughed in my face, and almost hooted me.  Yet there were some sensible people amongst them, and I now possessed strong grounds of argument ;  I staggered many, and convinced a few thus, I too have had my victories.”

The Emperor said, it must be agreed that our being assembled at Saint-Helena from political causes was certainly a most extraordinary circumstance :  that we had come to a common centre by roads originally in very different directions.  However, we had travelled through them with sincerity.  Nothing more clearly proved the sort of chance, the uncertainty, and the fatality which usually, in the labyrinth of revolutions, direct upright and honest hearts.

Nor can any thing more clearly prove, continued he, how necessary indulgence and intelligent views are to recompose society after long disorders.  It was these dispositions and these principles which had made him, he said, the most fit man for the circumstances of the month of Brumaire ;  and it was those which still rendered him without doubt the fittest in the actual state of France.  On this point, he had neither mistrust, nor prejudice, nor passion ;  he had constantly employed men of all classes, of all parties, without ever looking back, without enquiring what they had done, what they had said, what they had thought, only requiring, he said, that they should pursue in future and with sincerity the common object :  the welfare and the glory of all ;  that they should show themselves true and good Frenchmen.  Above all, he had never made overtures to leaders in order to gain over parties ;  but on the contrary, he had attacked the mass of the parties, that he might be in a situation to despise their leaders.  Such had ever been the uniform system of his internal policy ;  and in spite of the last events, he was far from repenting it ;  if he had to begin again he should pursue the same course.  “ It is totally without reason,” he said, “ that I have been reproached with employing nobles and emigrants—a perfectly trite and vulgar imputation !  The fact is that under me there only existed individual opinions and senments.  It is not the nobles and the emigrants who have brought about the restoration, but rather the restoration that has again raised the nobles and the emigrants.  They have not contributed more particularly to our ruin than others :  those really in fault are the intriguers of all parties and all opinions.  Fouché was not a noble ;  Talleyrand was not an emigrant ;  Augereau and Marmont were neither.  To conclude, do you desire a final proof of the injustice of blaming whole classes, when a revolution like ours has operated in the midst of them ?  Reckon yourselves here :  among four, you find two nobles, one of whom was even an emigrant.  The excellent M. de Ségur, in spite of his age, at my departure, offered to follow me.  I could multiply examples without end.—It is with as little reason,” he continued, “ that I have been blamed for having neglected certain persons of influence ;  I was too powerful not to despise with impunity the intrigues, and the known immorality of the greater part of them.  Neither had that any thing to do with my downfall ;  but only unforeseen and unheard-of catastrophes ;  compulsory circumstances ;  500,000 men at the gates of the capital ;  a revolution still recent ;  a crisis too powerful for French heads ;  and above all, a dynasty not sufficiently ancient.  I would have risen again even from the foot of the Pyrenees, could I but have been my own grandson.

“ And, moreover, what a fascination there is respecting past times !  It is most certain that I was chosen by the French ;  their new worship was their own work.  Well ! immediately upon the return of their old forms, see with what facility they have recurred to idols !

“ And, after all, how could another line of policy have prevented that which ruined me ?  I have been betrayed by M . . . . . . . whom I might call my son, my offspring, my own work ;  he to whom I had committed my destinies, by sending him to Paris, at the very moment that he was putting the finishing hand to his treason and my ruin.  I have been betrayed by Murat, whom I had raised from a soldier to a king ;  who was my sister’s husband.  I have been betrayed by Berthier, a mere goose, whom I had converted into a kind of eagle.  I have been betrayed in the senate, by those very men of the national party who owe every thing to me.  All that, then, did not in any way depend upon my system of internal policy.  Undoubtedly I should have been exposed to the charge of too readily employing old enemies, whether nobles or emigrants, if a Macdonald, a Valence³, a Montesquiou had betrayed me ;  but they were faithful :  let them object to me the stupidity of Murat, I can oppose to it the judgment of Marmont.  I have, then, no cause to repent of my interior system of policy,” &c. &c.

Chance of danger in battle, &c.— The Bulletins very correct.

28th.—The Emperor during dinner was speaking of the probability of danger in the China vessels, of which one in thirty perished, according to the accounts he had received from some captains.  This led him to the chances of danger in battle, which he said were less than that.  Wagram was painted out to him as a destructive battle ;  he did not estimate the killed at more than 3,000, which was only a fiftieth :  we were there 160,000.  At Essling they were about 4,000, we were 40,000 :  this was a tenth ;  but it was one of the most severe battles.  The others were incomparably below.

This brought on a conversation on the bulletins.  The Emperor declared them to be very correct ;  assured us, that, excepting what the proximity of the enemy compelled him to disguise, that when they came into their hands they might not derive any information prejudicial to him from them, all the remainder was very exact.  At Vienna and throughout Germany they did them more justice than among us.  If they had acquired an ill reputation in our armies—if it was a common saying, as false as a bulletin, it was personal rivalships, party spirit, that had established it ;  it was the wounded self-love of those whom it had been forgotten to mention in them, and who had, or fancied they had, a right to a place there :  and still more than all, our ridiculous national defect of having no greater enemies to our successes and our glory, than we ourselves were.

The Emperor after dinner played some games at chess.  The day had been very rainy, he was unwell, and retired early.

Unhealthiness of the Island.

29th.—The weather was still bad ;  it was impossible to set foot out of doors.  The rain and the damp invaded our pasteboard apartments.  Every one of us suffered in his health in consequence.  The temperature here is certainly mild, but the climate is among the most unwholesome.  It is a thing ascertained in the island, that few there attain the age of fifty ;  hardly any that of sixty.  Add to this, exclusion from the rest of the world, physical privations, bad moral treatment, it will result, that prisons in Europe are far preferable to liberty in Saint-Helena.

About four o’clock several Captains from China were brought to me, who were to be presented to the Emperor.  They had an opportunity of seeing the smallness, the dampness, and bad state of my habitation.  They enquired how the Emperor found himself in point of health.  It declined visibly, I told them.  Never do we hear a complaint from him :  his great soul suffered nothing to overcome it, and even contributed to deceive him with respect to his own state ;  but we could see him decay very perceptibly.  I led them shortly after to the Emperor, who was walking in the garden.  He seemed to me at that moment more disordered than usual.  He dismissed them in half an hour.  He went in again, and took a bath.

Before and after dinner he seemed in low spirits and in pain.  He began to read to us Les Femmes Savantes ;  but at the second act, he handed the book to the Grand Marshal, and dozed upon the sofa during the reading of the remainder.

Remarks of the Emperor on his Expedition in the East.

30th—31st.  This day the weather has continued very bad ;  we all suffered from it ;  besides, we are absolutely infested with rats, fleas, and bugs :  our sleep is disturbed by them, so that the troubles by night are in perfect harmony with those by day.

The weather changed entirely to fair on the 31st ;  we went out in the carriage.  The Emperor, in the course of conversation, observed, speaking of Egypt and Syria, that if he had taken Saint-Jean-d’Acre, as ought to have been the case, he would have wrought a revolution in the East.  “ The most trivial circumstances,” said he, “ lead to the greatest events.  The weakness of the captain of a frigate, who stood out to sea instead of forcing a passage into the harbour, some trifling impediments with respect to some shallops or light vessels, prevented the face of the world from being changed.  Possessed of Saint-Jean-d’Acre, the French army would fly to Damascus and Aleppo ;  in a twinkling it would have been on the Euphrates ;  the Christians of Syria, the Druses, the Christians of Armenia, would have joined it :  nations were on the point of being shaken.”  One of us having said that they would have presently been reinforced with 400,000 men.  “ Say 600,000,” replied the Emperor ;  “ who can calculate what it might have been ?  I should have reached Constantinople and the Indies ;  I should have changed the face of the world.”

* This event took place in presence of twenty-two persons :
The Emperor.
Dubois, Corvisart, Bourdier and Ivan.
Madames de Montebello, de Lucay, and de Montesquiou.
The six first ladies :  Ballant, Deschamps, Durant, Hureau, Nabusson, and Gerard.
Five ladies of the bed-chamber.  Mademoiselles Honoré, Edouard, Barbier, Aubert, and Geoffroy.
The Keeper ;  Madame Blaise, and two maids of the wardrobe.

** It is a singular fact, that the person from whom I had this information on agriculture, in Languedoc, was the identical M. de Villèle, who has since become celebrated.

³ One day at Longwood running over the list of the senators who had signed the deposition, one of us pointed out the name of M. de Valence, signed as secretary.  But another explained that this signature was false, that M. de Valence had complained of it, and protested against it.  “ It is very true,” said the Emperor, “ I know it ;  he has behaved well ;  Valence was true to the Nation.”