Religious Ideas of Napoleon.—Bishop of Nantez (de Voisin).—The Pope.—Liberties of the Gallican Church.—Anecdotes.—Concordat of Fontainebleau.

17th.—While the Emperor was at breakfast in the tent, two persons described the excesses which they had witnessed in the army, and which had not come to his knowledge.  They noticed the numerous violations of his orders, the violent abuses of authority, and other outrages besides.  The Emperor listened ;  but some were so shocking, that he could not, he said, give credit to them and observed ;  “Come, gentlemen, these are libels.”

The wind was very violent ;  it blew a tempest with occasional showers of rain.  The wetness obliged the Emperor to go in again.

After dinner Zaire and the beautiful scenes of OEdipe were read, among which he particularly pointed out that of the discovery, which he pronounced the finest and the most finished of the drama.

In speaking of priests and religion, the conversation led the Emperor to say ;  “Man entering into life asks himself :  From whence do I come ?  What am I ?  Whither am I to go ?  These are so many mysterious questions, which urge us on to religion.  We eagerly embrace it ;  we are attracted by our natural propensity ;  but as we advance in knowledge our course is stopped.  Instruction and history are the great enemies of religion, deformed by human imperfection.  Why, we ask ourselves, is the religion of Paris, neither that of London nor of Berlin ?  Why is that of Petersburgh different from that of Constantinople ?  Why is the latter different from that of Persia, of the Ganges and of China ?  Why is the religion of ancient times different from that of our days ?  Then reason is sadly staggered ;  it exclaims, O religions, religions ! the children of man ! .... We very properly believe in God, because every thing around us proclaims him, and the most enlightened minds have believed in him ;  not only Bossuet, whose profession it was, but also Newton and Leibnitz, who had nothing to do with it.  But we know not what to think of the doctrine, that is taught us, and we find ourselves like the watch which goes, without knowing the watchmaker that made it.  And observe a little the stupidity of those who educate us ;  they should keep away from us the idea of paganism and idolatry ;  because their absurdity excites the first exercise of our reason, and prepares as for a resistance to passive belief ;  and they bring us up, notwithstanding, in the midst of the Greeks and Romans, with their myriads of divinities.  Such, for my own part, has literally been the progress of my understanding.  I felt the necessity of belief ;  I did believe, but my belief was shocked and undecided, the moment I acquired knowledge and began to reason ;  and that happened to me, at so early an age as thirteen.  Perhaps, I shall again believe implicitly ;  God grant I may.  I shall certainly make no resistance, and I do not ask a greater blessing ;  it must, in my mind, be a great and real happiness.

“ In violent agitations, however, and in the casual suggestions of immorality itself, the absence of that religious faith has never, I assert, influenced me in any respect, and I never doubted the existence of God ;  for, if my reason was inadequate to comprehend it, my mind was not the less disposed to adopt it.  My nerves were in sympathy with that sentiment.

“ When I seized on the helm of affairs, I had already fixed ideas of all the primary elements by which society is bound together ;  I had weighed all the importance of religion ;  I was convinced, and I determined to re-establish it.  But the resistance I had to overcome, in restoring catholicism, would scarcely be credited.  I should have been more willingly followed, had I hoisted the standard of protestantism.  This reluctance was carried so far, that in the Council of State, where I found great difficulty in getting the Concordat adopted, several yielded only in forming a plan to extricate themselves from it.  ‘Well !’ they said to one another, ‘let us turn Protestants, and that will not affect us.’ It is unquestionable, that in the disorder to which I succeeded, that on the ruins where I was placed, I was at liberty to choose between catholicism and protestantism ;  and it may also be said, with truth, that the general disposition, at the moment, was quite in favour of the latter ;  but, besides my real adherence to the religion in which I was born, I had the most important motives to influence my decision.  What should I have gained by proclaiming protestantism ?  I should have created two great parties, very nearly equal, in France, when I wished for the existence of none at all ;  I should have revived the fury of religious disputes, when their total annihilation was called for by the light of the century, and my own feelings.  These two parties would, by their mutual distractions, have destroyed France, and rendered her the slave of Europe, when I had the ambition to make her the mistress of it.  By the help of catholicism I attained, much more effectually, all the grand results I had in view.  In the interior, at home, the smaller number was swallowed up by the greater, and I relied upon my treating the former with such an equality, that there would be shortly no motive for marking the difference.  Abroad, the Pope was bound to me by catholicism ;  and with my influence, and our forces in Italy, I did not despair, sooner or later, by some means or another, of obtaining for myself the direction of that Pope, and from that time, what an influence !  What a lever of opinion on the rest of the world !” &c. &c.  And he concluded with saying :  “Francis I. was really in a state to adopt protestantism, at its birth, and declare himself the head of it in Europe.  Charles V., his rival, was the zealous champion of Rome, because he considered that measure as an additional means to assist him in his project of enslaving Europe.  Was not that circumstance alone sufficient to point out to Francis the necessity of taking care of his independence ;  but he abandoned the greater to run after the lesser advantage.  He persevered in pursuing his imprudent designs on Italy, and with the intention of paying court to the Pope, he burnt protestants at Paris.

“ Had Francis I. embraced Lutheranism, which is favourable to royal supremacy, he would have preserved France from the dreadful religious convulsions brought on, at later periods, by the Calvinists, whose efforts, altogether republican, were on the point of subverting the throne, and dissolving our noble monarchy.  Unfortunately, Francis I. was ignorant of all that, for he could not allege his scruples for an excuse ;  he who entered into an alliance with the Turks, and brought them into the midst of us.  It was precisely because he was incapable of extending his views so far.  The folly of the time !  The extent of feudal intellect !  Francis I. was, after all, but a hero for tilts and tournaments, and a gallant for the drawing-room, one of those pigmy great men.

“ The Bishop of Nantez (De Voisin),” said the Emperor, “made me a real Catholic by the efficacy of his arguments, by the excellence of his morals and by his enlightened toleration.  Marie Louise, whose confessor he was, consulted him once on the obligation of abstaining from meat on Fridays. —‘At what table do you dine, asked the Bishop ?’- ‘At the Emperor’s.’ ‘Do you give all the orders there ?’- ‘No.’ ‘You cannot, then, make any alteration in it ;  would he do it himself ?’ —‘I am inclined to think not.’ ‘Be obedient then, and do not provoke a subject for scandal.  Your first duty is to obey, and make him respected ;  you will not be in want of other means to amend your life, and to suffer privations in the eyes of God.’

“ He also behaved in the same way with respect to a public communion, which some persons put into Marie Louise’s head to celebrate on Easter-day.  She would not, however, consent, without the advice of her prudent confessor, who dissuaded her from it by similar arguments.  What a difference, said the Emperor, had she been worked upon by a fanatic !  What quarrels, what disagreements might he not have caused between us !  What mischief might he not have done, in the circumstances in which I was placed !”

The Emperor remarked to us, “that the bishop of Nantez had lived with Diderot, in the midst of unbelievers, and had uniformly conducted himself with consistency ;  he was ready with an answer to every one ;  and above all, he had the good sense to abandon every thing that was not maintainable, and to strip religion of every thing which he might not be capable of defending.—He was asked, ‘has not an animal, which moves, combines, and thinks, a soul ?’  ‘Why not,’ was his answer.  ‘But whether does it go ?  For it is not equal to ours.’  ‘What is that to you ?  It dwells, perhaps, in limbo.’  He used to retreat within the last intrenchments, even within the fortress itself, and there he reserved excellent means for defending himself.  He argued better than the Pope whom he often confounded.  He was the firmest pillar, among our bishops, of the Gallican liberties.  He was my oracle, my luminary ;  in religious matters, he possessed my unbounded confidence.  For, in my quarrels with the Pope, it was my first care, whatever intriguers and marplots in cassocs may say, not to touch upon any dogmatic point :  I was so steady in this conduct, that the instant this good and venerable bishop of Nantez said to me, ‘take care, there you are grappling with a dogma,’ I immediately turned off from the course I was taking, to return to it by other ways, without amusing myself by entering into dissertations with him, or by seeking even to comprehend his meaning, and as I had not let him into my secret, how amazed must he not have been at the circuits I made !  How whimsical, obstinate, capricious, and incoherent, must I not have appeared to him !  It was because I had an object in view, and he was unacquainted with it.

“ The Popes could not forgive us our liberties of the Gallican church.  The four famous propositions of Bossuet, in particular, provoked their resentment.  It was, in their opinion, a real hostile manifesto, and they accordingly considered us at least as much out of the pale of the church as the protestants.  They thought us as guilty as them, perhaps, more so, and if they did not overwhelm us with their ostensive thunders, it was because they dreaded the consequences—our separation.  The example of England was before them.  They did not wish to cut off their right arm with their own hand, but they were constantly on the watch for a favourable opportunity, they trusted to time for it.  They are, no doubt, on the point of believing, that it has now actually happened.  They will, however, be again disappointed by the light of the century and the manners of the times.

“ Some time before my coronation,” said the Emperor, “the Pope wished to see me, and made it a point to visit me himself.  He had made many concessions.  He had come to Paris for the purpose of crowning me, he consented not to place the crown on my head, he dispensed with the ceremony of the public communion, he had, therefore, in his opinion, many compensations to expect in return.  He had accordingly at first, dreamt of Romagna and the Legations, and he began to suspect that he should be obliged to give up all that.  He then lowered his pretensions to a very trifling favour, as he called it, my signature to an ancient document, a worn-out rag, which he held from Louis XIV. ‘Do me that favour, said he, in fact, it signifies nothing.’  ‘Cheerfully, most holy father, and the thing is done, if it be feasible.’  It was, however, a declaration, in which Louis XIV. at the close of his life, seduced by Madame de Maintenon, or prevailed upon by his confessors, expressed his disapprobation of the celebrated articles of 1682, the foundations of the liberties of the Gallican church.  The Emperor shrewdly replied, that he had not, for his own part, any personal objection, but that it was requisite for him, as a matter of form, to speak to the bishops about it ;  on which the Pope repeatedly observed, that such a communication was, by no means necessary, and that the thing did not deserve to make so much noise.  ‘I shall never,’ he remarked, ‘shew the signature, it shall be kept as secret as that of Louis XIV.’  ‘But if it signifies nothing,’ said Napoleon, ‘what use is there for my signature ?  And if any signification can be drawn from it, I am bound by a sense of propriety to consult my doctors.’ ”

With the view, however, of avoiding the imputation of a constant refusal of every request, the Emperor wished to seem rather inclined to grant the favour.  “The Bishop of Nantez and the other bishops, who were really French, came to me in great haste.  They were furious, and watched me,” said the Emperor, “as they would have watched Louis XIV. on his death-bed, to prevent him from turning protestant.  The Sulpicians were called in ;  they were Jesuits au petit pied, they strove to find out my intention, and were ready to do whatever I wished.”  The Emperor concluded with observing ; —“The Pope had dispensed with the public communion in my favour, and it is by his determination in that respect, that I form my opinion of the sincerity of his religious belief.  He had held a congregation of cardinals for the purpose of settling the ceremonial.  The greater number warmly insisted upon my taking the communion in public, asserting the great influence of the example on the people, and the necessity of my holding it out.  The Pope, on the contrary, fearful lest I should fulfil that duty as if I were going through one of the articles of M. de Ségur’s program, looked upon it as a sacrilege, and was inflexible in opposing it.  ‘Napoleon,’ he observed, ‘is not perhaps a believer ;  the time will, no doubt, come, in which his faith will be established, and in the meantime, let us not burthen his conscience or our own.’

“ In his Christian charity, for he really is a worthy, mild, and excellent man, he never once despaired of seeing me a penitent at his tribunal ;  he has often let his hopes and thoughts on that subject escape him.  We sometimes conversed about it in a pleasant and friendly manner.  ‘It will happen to you, sooner or later,’ said he, with an innocent tenderness of expression ;  ‘you will be converted by me or by others, and you will then feel how great the content, the satisfaction of your own heart,’ &c.  In the mean time, my influence over him was such, that I drew from him, by the mere power of my conversation, that famous concordat of Fontainebleau, in which he renounced the temporal sovereignty, an act, on account of which, he has since shown that he dreaded the judgment of posterity, or rather the reprobation of his successors.  He had no sooner signed than he felt the stings of repentance.  He was to have dined the following day with me in public ;  but at night, he was, or pretended to be ill.  The truth is, that immediately after I left him, he again fell into the hands of his habitual advisers, who drew a terrible picture of the error he had committed.  Had we been left by ourselves, I might have done what I pleased with him ;  I should have governed the religious with the same facility that I did the political world.  He was, in truth, a lamb, a good man in every respect, a man of real worth, whom I esteem and love greatly, and who, on his part, is, I am convinced, not altogether destitute of interest with regard to me.  You will not see him make any severe complaints against me, nor prefer, in particular, any direct and personal accusation against me, no more than the other sovereigns.  There may, perhaps, be some vague and vulgar declamations against ambition and bad faith, but nothing positive and direct ;  because statesmen are well aware, that when the hour of libels is past, no one would be allowed to prefer a public accusation without corroborative proofs, and they have none of these to produce ;  such will be the province of history.  On the other hand, there will be at most, but some wretched chroniclers, shallow enough to take the ravings of clubs, or intrigues, for authentic facts, or some writers of memoirs, who, deceived by the errors of the moment, will be dead, before they are enabled to correct their mistakes, &c. &c.

“ When the real particulars of my disputes with the Pope shall be made public, the world will be surprised at the extent of my patience, for it is known, that I was not of a very enduring temper.  When he left me, after my coronation, he felt a secret disgust at not having obtained the compensations he thought he had deserved.  But, however grateful I might have been in other respects, I could not, after all, make a traffic of the interests of the empire by way of acquitting my own obligations, and, I was, besides, too proud to exhibit a seeming acknowledgment, that I had purchased his kindnesses.  He had hardly set his foot on the soil of Italy, when the intriguers and mischief-makers, the enemies of France, took advantage of the disposition he was in, to govern his conduct, and from that instant every thing was hostile on his part.  He no longer was the gentle, the peaceable Chiaramonti, that worthy bishop of Imola, who had at so early a period shown himself worthy of the enlightened state of the century.  His signature was thenceforth affixed to acts only which characterised the Gregories and Bonifaces more than him.  Rome became the focus of all the plots hatched against us.  I strove in vain, to bring him back by the force of reason, but I found it impossible to ascertain his sentiments.  Our wrongs became so serious, and the insults offered to us were so ostensible, that I was imperiously called upon to act, in my turn.  I, therefore, seized upon his fortresses, I took possession of some provinces, and I finished by occupying Rome itself, at the same time declaring and strictly observing that I held him sacred in his spiritual capacity, which was far from being satisfactory to him.  A crisis, however, presented itself ;  it was believed, that fortune had abandoned me at Essling, and measures were in immediate readiness for exciting the population of that great capital to insurrection.  The officer, who commanded there, thought that he could escape the danger only by getting rid of the Pope, whom he sent forward on his journey to France.  That measure was carried into effect without my orders, and was even in direct opposition to my views.  I despatched instant orders for stopping the Pope, wherever he might be met with, and he was kept at Savona, where he was treated with every possible care and attention ;  for I wished to make myself feared, but not to ill-treat him ;  to bend him to my views, not to degrade him ;— I entertained very different projects !  This removal served only to inflame the spirit of resentment and intrigue.  Until then, the quarrel had been but temporal ;  the Pope’s advisers, in the hope of re-establishing their affairs, involved it in all the jumble of spirituality.  I then found it necessary to carry on the contest with him on that head ;  I had my council of conscience, my ecclesiastical councils, and I invested my imperial courts with the power of deciding in cases of appeal from abuses ;  for my soldiers could be of no further use in all this ;  I felt it necessary to fight the Pope with his own weapons.  To his men of erudition, to his sophists, his civilians, and his scribes, it was incumbent upon me to oppose mine.

“ An English plot was laid to carry him off from Savona ;  it was of service to me, I caused him to be removed to Fontainebleau ;  but that was to be the period of his sufferings, and the regeneration of his splendor.  All my grand views were accomplished in disguise and mystery ;— I had brought things to such a point, as to render the developement infallible, without any exertion, and in a way altogether natural.  It was accordingly consecrated by the Pope in the famous concordat of Fontainebleau, in spite even of my disasters at Moscow.  What then would have been the result, had I returned victorious and triumphant ?  I had consequently obtained the separation, which was so desirable, of the spiritual from the temporal, which is so injurious to his Holiness, and the commixture of which produces disorder in society in the name and by the hands of him, who ought himself to be the centre of harmony ;  and from that time, I intended to exalt the Pope beyond measure, to surround him with grandeur and honours.  I should have succeeded in suppressing all his anxiety for the loss of his temporal power ;  I should have made an idol of him ;  he would have remained near my person.  Paris would have become the capital of Christendom, and I should have governed the religious as well as the political world.  It was an additional means of binding tighter all the federative parts of the empire, and of preserving the tranquillity of every thing placed without it.  I should have had my religious as well as my legislative sessions ;  my councils would have constituted the representation of Christianity, and the Popes would have only been the presidents.  I should have called together and dissolved those assemblies, approved and published their discussions as Constantine and Charlemagne had done ;  and if that supremacy had escaped the Emperors ;  it was, because they had committed the fault of letting the spiritual heads reside at a remote distance from them, who took advantage of the weakness of the princes, or of the critical events, to shake off their dependence and enslave them in their turn.

“ But” resumed the Emperor, “to accomplish that object, I had found it requisite to manoeuvre with a great deal of dexterity ;  above all, to conceal my real way of thinking, to give a direction, altogether different to general opinion, and to feed the public with vulgar trifles for the purpose of more effectually concealing the importance and depth of my secret design.  I accordingly experienced a kind of satisfaction in finding myself accused of barbarity towards the Pope, and of tyranny in religious matters.  Foreigners, in particular, promoted my wishes in this respect by filling their, wretched libels with invectives against my pitiful ambition, which, according to them, had driven me to devour the miserable patrimony of Saint Peter, &c. &c.  But I was perfectly aware, that public opinion would again declare itself in my favour at home, and that no means could exist abroad for disconcerting my plan.  What measures would not have been employed for its prevention, had it been anticipated at a seasonable period, for how vast its future ascendency over all the Catholic countries, and how great its influence even upon those that are not so, by the co-operation of the members of that religion who are spread throughout these countries, &c. &c.

The Emperor said, that this deliverance from the Court of Rome, this legal union, the control of religion in the hands of the sovereign, had been, for a long time, the constant object of his meditations and his wishes.  “England, Russia, the northern crowns, and part of Germany, are,” he said, “in possession of it.  Venice and Naples had enjoyed it.  No government can be carried on without it ;  a nation is otherwise, every instant, affected in its tranquillity, its dignity, its independence.  But the task,” he added, “was very difficult ;  at every step I was alive to the danger.  I was induced to think, that once engaged in it, I should be abandoned by the nation.  I more than once sounded and strove to elicit public opinion, but in vain, and I have been enabled to convince myself that I never should have had the national co-operation.”  And this explains a sally, which I had witnessed.

The Emperor perceiving, at one of those grand Sunday audiences, which were very numerously attended, the Archbishop of Tours (de Barral) addressed him in a very elevated tone ;  “Well !  Your Grace, how do our affairs with the Pope go on ?  -‘Sire, the deputation of your bishops is about to set out for Savona.’  Very well ! endeavour to make the Pope listen to reason ;  prevail upon him to conduct himself with prudence ;  otherwise, the consequences will be unpleasant.  Tell him plainly, that he is no longer in the times of the Gregories, and that I am not a Débonnaire.  He has the example of Henry the VIII., and without his wickedness.  I possess more strength and power than he had.  Let him know, that whatever part I may take, I have 600,000 Frenchmen in arms, who, in every contingency will march with me, for me, and as myself.  The peasantry and mechanics look to me alone and repose unlimited confidence in me.  The prudent and enlightened part of the intermediate class, those who take care of their interest, and wish for tranquillity will follow me ;  the only class favourable to him will be the meddling and talkative, who, will forget him at the end of ten days, to chat upon some fresh subject.”

And as the archbishop, who betrayed his embarassment by his countenance, was about to stammer out some words, the Emperor added in a very softened tone ;  “You are unacquainted with all this ;  I participate in your doctrines ;  I honour your piety ;  I respect your character !”

The Emperor, I now understand him perfectly, had, no doubt, merely thrown out those observations in order, that we might give effect to them in other places ;  but he deceived himself with respect to our dispositions, or at least to those of the palace.  Some, the least reflecting part, were decided and loud in censuring his conduct on these occasions ;  others, with the best intentions, were extremely cautious not to let a word of it transpire, least it should prove injurious to him in the public opinion ;  for such was, in general, our misconception, our singular manner of understanding and explaining the Emperor’s meaning, that although without any bad design, and solely through levity, incoherency, or for fashion’s sake, instead of making him popular, we were, perhaps, the very persons, who did him most injury.  I very well remember, that the morning, when that famous concordat of Fontainebleau unexpectedly appeared in the Moniteur, some persons confidentially assured each other in the saloons of Saint Cloud, that nothing was less authentic than that document, and that it was a base fabrication ;  others whispered, that it was, no doubt, genuine in the main points, but that it had been extracted from the Pope by the Emperor’s anger and violence.  And this was so well described, that I should not be surprized, were the happy dramatic episode of Napoleon, at Fontainebleau, dragging the father of the faithful by his white hair, not supplied by the imagination of the poetical proser who wrote it, but caught up from the mouths of the courtiers and even of the Emperor’s servants themselves ;  yet this is the way in which history is written !

Warm Conversation with the Governor, in the Admiral’s Presence.

18th.—The weather was most dreadful during the whole of the night and day.  About three o’clock, the Emperor took advantage of its clearing up a little and went out.  He came to my apartment, and we called on General Gourgaud who was indisposed.  We then visited Madame de Montholon, who followed us to the garden.  The Emperor was in excellent spirits, which enlivened the conversation.  He undertook to persuade Madame de Montholon to make a general confession, particularly insisting upon her setting out with her first sin.  “Come,” said he, “speak out without apprehension, do not let our neighbour constrain you ;  consider him merely as your confessor ;  we shall forget it all in a quarter of an hour afterwards,” &c. &c.

And I really believe he would have succeeded in persuading her, when the governor unfortunately came to interrupt so pleasant a scene ;  he made his appearance, and the Emperor to avoid receiving him, hastily took shelter in the bottom of the wood.  We were joined in a few instants by M. de Montholon, who acquainted the Emperor, that the governor and the admiral earnestly requested the honour of speaking with him.  He thought that some communication was to be made on their part and returned to the garden, where he received them.

We remained behind, with the governor’s officers.  The conversation soon became animated on the part of the Emperor, who, as he walked between the governor and the admiral, almost uniformly addressed himself to the latter, even when he spoke to the former.  We continued at too great a distance to hear any thing distinctly ;  but I have since learnt, that he again repeated, and with, perhaps, more energy and warmth, all that he had said to him in the preceding conversations.

In consequence of the favourable explanations, which the Admiral, who acted the part of mediator, laboured to give of the Governor’s intentions, the Emperor observed :  “The faults of M. Lowe proceed from his habits of life.  He has never had the command of any but foreign deserters, of Piedmontese, Corsicans, and Sicilians, all renegadoes, and traitors to their country ;  the dregs and scum of Europe.  If he had commanded Englishmen ;  if he were one himself, he would shew respect to those who have a right to be honoured.”  In another instance, the Emperor declared, that there was a moral courage, as necessary as courage on the field of battle ;  that M. Lowe did not exercise it here with regard to us, in dreaming only of our escape, rather than in employing the only real, prudent, reasonable, and sensible means for preventing it.  The Emperor also told him, that, although his body was in the hands of evilminded men, his soul was as lofty and independent as when at the head of 400,000 men, or on the throne, when he disposed of kingdoms.

To the article respecting the reduction of our expenses, and the money which was asked of the Emperor, he answered ;  “All those details are very painful to me ;  they are mean.  You might place me on the burning pile of Montezuma or Guatimozin without extracting from me gold, which I do not possess.  Besides, who asks you for any thing ?  Who entreats you to feed me ?  When you discontinue your supply of provisions, those brave soldiers, whom you see there,” pointing, with his hand, to the camp of the 53d, “will take pity on me ;  I shall go place myself at the grenadier’s table, and they will not, I am confident, drive away the first, the oldest soldier of Europe.”

The Emperor having reproached the Governor with having kept some books, which were addressed to him, he answered, that he had done so in consequence of their having been sent under the address of Emperor.  “And who,” replied the Emperor, with emotion, “gave you the right of disputing that title ?  In a few years, your Lord Castlereagh, your Lord Bathurst, and all the others ;  you, who speak to me, will be buried in the dust of oblivion, or if your names be remembered, it will be only on account of the indignity with which you have treated me, while the Emperor Napoleon shall, doubtless, continue for ever the subject, the ornament of history, and the star of civilized nations.  Your libels are of no avail against me ;  you have expended millions on them ;  what have they produced ?  Truth pierces through the clouds, it shines like the sun, and like it, is imperishable.”

The Emperor admitted that he had, during this conversation, seriously and repeatedly offended Sir Hudson Lowe ;  and he also did him the justice to acknowledge, that Sir Hudson Lowe had not precisely shewn, in a single instance, any want of respect ;  he had contented himself with muttering, between his teeth, sentences which were not audible.  He once said, that he had solicited his recall, and the Emperor observed, that that was the most agreeable word he could possibly have said.  He also said, that we endeavoured to blacken his character in Europe, but that our conduct, in that respect, was a matter of indifference to him.  The only failure, perhaps, said the Emperor, on the part of the Governor, and which was trifling, compared with the treatment he had received, was the abrupt way in which he retired, while the Admiral withdrew slowly, and with numerous salutes.  “The Admiral was precisely then,” observed the Emperor, in a gay tone of voice, “what the Marquis de Gallo was at the time of my rupture of Passeriano,” &c. &c.  An allusion to one of the chapters of the campaign of Italy, which he had dictated to me.

The Emperor remarked, that, after all, he had to reproach himself with that scene.  “I must see this officer no more ;  he makes me fly into a violent passion ;  it is beneath my dignity ;  expressions escape me which would have been unpardonable at the Tuileries ;  if they can at all be excused here, it is because I am in his hands, and subject to his power.”

After dinner, the Emperor caused a letter to be read, in answer to the Governor, who had officially sent the treaty of the 2d of August, by which the allied Sovereigns stipulated for the imprisonment of Napoleon.  Sir Hudson Lowe, by the same conveyance, asked to introduce the foreign commissioners to Longwood.  The Emperor had, in the course of the day, dictated the letter to Monsieur de Montholon.  It was his wish, that every one of us should propose his objections, and state his opinions.  It seemed to us a master-piece of dignity, energy, and sound reasoning.

The Conversation with the Governor again noticed, &c.—Effect of the Libels against Napoleon.—Treaty of Fontainebleau.—The Work of General S——n.

19th.—The weather continued as dreadful as we had ever seen it.  It has been, for several days, like one of our equinoctial storms in Europe.  The Emperor exposed himself to it to come to my apartment about ten o’clock ;  in going out he struck one of his legs against a nail near the door ;  his stocking was torn halfway down the leg ;  happily, the skin was only scratched.  He was obliged to return to change.  “You owe me a pair of stockings,” he said, while his valet de chambre was putting on another pair ;  “a polite man does not expose his visitors to such dangers in his apartments.  You are lodged too much like a seaman ;  it is true, that is not your fault.  I thought myself careless about these matters, but you actually surpass me.” —“Sire,” I answered, “my merit is not great, no choice is left me.  I am truly a hog in its mire, I must confess ;  but as your Majesty says, it is not altogether my fault.”

We went into the garden, when it had cleared up for a moment.  The Emperor reverted to the conversation which he had yesterday with the Governor, in the Admiral’s presence, and again reproached himself with the violence of his expressions.  “It would have been more worthy of me, more consistent and more dignified, to have expressed all these things with perfect composure ;  they would, besides, have been more impressive.”  He recollected, in particular, a name which had escaped him against M. Lowe (scribe d’etat-major), which must have shocked him, and the more so because it described the truth, and that, we know, is always offensive.  “I have myself,” said the Emperor, “experienced that feeling in the island of Elba.  When I ran over the most infamous libels, they did not affect me even in the slightest manner.  When I was told or read, that I had strangled, poisoned, ravished ;  that I had massacred my sick ;  that my carriage had been driven over my wounded ;  I laughed out of commiseration.  How often did I not then say to Madame ;  ‘Make haste, my mother, come and see the savage, the man-tiger, the devourer of the human-race ;  come and admire the fruit of your womb !’  But when their was a slight approach to truth, the effect was no longer the same, I felt the necessity of defending myself ;  I accumulated reasons for my justification, and even then, it never happened, that I was left without some traces of a secret torment.  My dear Las Cases, this is man !”

The Emperor passed from this subject to his protestation against the treaty of the 2d of August, which had been read to us after dinner.  I Presumed to ask him, whether, after noticing in a conspicuous manner, the acknowledgment of his title of Emperor by the English, during their negociations at Paris and Chatillon, he had not forgotten that, which they must have made on the treaty of Fontainebleau, and which, it struck me was omitted.  “It was,” he quickly replied, “done on purpose ;  I have nothing to do with that treaty ;  I disclaim it ;  I am far from boasting of it, I am rather ashamed of it.  It was discussed for me.  I was betrayed by N...., who brought it to me.  If I had been then willing to treat with common sense, I should have obtained the kingdom of Italy, Tuscany, or Corsica, &c. &c, all that I could have desired.  My decision was the result of a fault inherent in my character, a caprice on my part, a real constitutional excess.  I was seized with a dislike and contempt of every thing around me, I was affected with the same feeling for fortune, which I took delight in out-facing.  I cast my eye on a spot of land, where I might be uncomfortable and take advantage of the mistakes that might be made.  I fixed upon the island of Elba.  It was the act of a soul of rock.  I am, no doubt, my dear Las Cases, of a very singular disposition ;  but we should not be extraordinary, were we not of a peculiar mould ;  I am a piece of rock, lanched into space !  You will not, perhaps, easily believe me, but I do not regret my grandeur ;  you see me slightly affected by what I have lost.”  “And why, Sire,” I observed, “should I not believe You ?  What have you to regret ?....  The life of man is but an atom in the duration of history, but with regard to your majesty, the one is already so full, that you scarcely ought to take any interest but in the other ;  if your body suffers here, your memory is enriched a hundred-fold.  Had it been your lot to end your days in the bosom of uninterrupted prosperity, how many grand and striking circumstances would have passed away unknown !  You yourself, Sire, have assured me of this, and I have remained impressed with the force of that truth.  Not a day, in fact, passes in which those, who were your enemies, do not repeat with us, who are your faithful servants, that you are unquestionably greater here than in the Tuileries.  And even on this rock to which you have been transplanted by violence and perfidy, do you not still command ?  Your jailors, your masters, are at your feet, your soul captivates every one that comes near you ;  you shew yourself what history represents Saint Louis, in the chains of the Saracens, the real master of his conquerors.  Your irresistible ascendency accompanies you here.  We, who are all about you, Sire, entertain this opinion of you ;  the Russian commissioner expressed the same sentiment, we are assured, the other day, and it is felt by those who guard you. ...  What have you to regret ?”

On our return the Emperor, in spite of the storm, ordered his breakfast in the tent, and kept me with him.  The water did not penetrate ;  the only inconvenience was a considerable degree of moisture ;  but the squalls of wind and rain whirled round us, and vented themselves far before us, towards the bottom of the valley ;  the spectacle was not destitute of beauty.

The Emperor retired about two o’clock ;  he sent for me some time afterwards to his cabinet.  “I have,” said he, laying down the book, “just read General S——n ;  he is a madman, a hair-brained fellow, he writes nonsense.  He is, however, after all, readable and amusing ;  he cuts up, dissects, judges, and pronounces sentence upon men and things.  He does not hesitate to give advice, in several instances, to Wellington, and asserts, that he ought to have made some campaigns under Kleber, &c.  Kleber was no doubt a great general, but the notice taken of Soult is not precisely the best part of the book ;  he is much better as an excellent director, as a good war minister.”

“ This S——n,” he continued, “deserted from the camp at Boulogne, with all my secrets, to the English ;  that might have been attended with serious consequences.  S——n was a general officer ;  his conduct was dreadful and unpardonable.  But observe how a man in the moment of revolution may be a bad character, impudent, and shameless.  I found him, on my return from the island of Elba, he waited for me with confidence, and wrote a long letter in which he attempted to make me his dupe.  The English, he said, were miserable creatures ;  he had been a long time among them ;  he was acquainted with their means and resources, and could be very useful to me.  He knew that I was too magnanimous, too great to remember the wrongs I had suffered from him, &c.  I ordered him to be arrested, and as he had been already tried and condemned, I am at a loss to know why he was not shot.  Either there was not time to carry his sentence into effect, or he was forgotten.  There can be no forbearance, no indulgence for the general, who has the infamy to prostitute himself to a foreign power.”

The grand marshal came in ;  the Emperor, after continuing the conversation for some time, took him away to play at chess.  He suffered much from the badness of the weather.

After dinner he read Le Tartufe ;  but he was so fatigued, that he could not get through it.  He laid down the book, and after paying a just tribute of eulogy to Moliere, he concluded in a manner which we little expected.  “The whole of the “Tartufe” he remarked, is, unquestionably, finished with the hand of a master, it is one of the chefs d’oeuvre of an inimitable writer.  This piece is, however, marked with such a character, that I am not at all surprized, its appearance should have been the subject of interesting negociations at Versailles, and of a great deal of hesitation, on the part of Louis XIV.  If I have a right to be astonished at any thing, it is at his allowing it to be performed.  It holds out, in my mind, devotion under such odious colours ;  a certain scene presents so decisive a situation, so completely indecent, that for my own part, I do not hesitate to say, if the comedy had been written in my time, I would not have allowed it to be represented.”

The Baroness de S... &c.

20th.—About four o’clock, I attended the Emperor, according to his orders, in the billiard room.  The weather still continued dreadful ;  it did not allow him to set his foot out of doors, and he was, he said, notwithstanding, driven from his apartment and the saloon by the smoke.  He found my countenance, he remarked, quite cast down ;  it was with the most lively indignation, and he wished to know the cause of it.

“ Two or three years,” I said, “have passed since a clerk in the war office, a very worthy man, as far as I know, used to come to my house to give my son lessons in writing and in Latin.  He had a daughter, whom he wished to make a governess, and begged us to recommend her, should an occasion present itself.  Madame Las Cases sent for her ;  she was charming, and in every respect highly attractive.  From that moment, Madame Las Cases invited her occasionally to her house, with the view of introducing her into the world, and obtaining same acquaintances for her who might prove useful.  But how strange !  this young person, our acquaintance, our obliged friend, is actually at this moment, the Baroness de S...., the wife of one of the Commissioners of the allied powers, who arrived nearly a month since, in the island.

“ Your Majesty may judge of my surprize, and of all my joy at this singular caprice of fortune.  I am then about to have, I said to myself, positive, particular, and even secret information respecting every thing that interests me.  Several days passed without any communication, but without any anxiety, and even with some satisfaction on my part.  For, I thought the greater the caution, the more I had to expect.  At length hurried on by my impatience, I sent three or four days ago my servant to Madam de S....;  I had described her, very properly, and as an inhabitant of the island he found no difficulty in gaining admittance.  He returned shortly with an answer from Madam de S...., that she did not know the person who had sent him.  I might, under every circumstance, be still induced to think, that this was an excess of prudence, and that she was unwilling to place confidence in one unknown to her.  But this very day, I received notice from the governor, not to attempt to form any secret connexion in the island, that I ought to be aware of the danger to which I exposed my self, and that the attempt with which he reproached me was not a matter of doubt ;  for he was put in possession of it by the very person to whom I had addressed myself.  Your Majesty now knows what has confounded me.  To find so villanous a charge in a quarter where I had a right to expect some interest in my affairs, and even gratitude, has irritated me beyond measure ;  I am no longer the same person.”

The Emperor laughed in my face ;  “How little do you know of the human heart !  What ! her father was your son’s tutor, or something of that kind ;  she enjoyed your wife’s protection when she was in want of it, and she is become a German baroness !  But, my dear Las Cases, you are the person whom she dreads most here, who lay her most under constraint ;  she did not even see your wife at Paris, and besides, this mischievous Sir Hudson Lowe may have been delighted with giving an odious turn to the thing ;  he is so artful, so malignant.”.....  And he then began again to laugh at me and my anger.

After dinner the Emperor resumed his reading of the Tartufe, which he had not finished yesterday, and there was enough left for to-day.  The Emperor was quite dejected ;  the bad weather has a visible effect upon him.

Corvisard.—Anecdotes of the Saloons of Paris.

21st.—The weather as horrible as ever.—We are seriously incommoded with the wet in our apartments ;  the rain penetrates every where.  The governor’s secretary brought me a letter from Europe ;  it communicated a few moments of real happiness ;  it contained the recollections and good wishes of my dearest friends.  I went and read it to the Emperor.

The Emperor suffered seriously from the badness of the weather.  He went to his saloon about four o’clock ;  he thought he had the fever, and found himself much depressed ;  he called for some punch, and played a few games of chess with the grand marshal.  The doctor is arrived from the town.  The two vessels just arrived came from the Cape ;  one of them is the Podargus, which left Europe ten days after the Griffin ;  the other, a small frigate on her way from India to Europe.  There was, it was said, a letter for the Emperor Napoleon, but it was not delivered, and we did not know from whom it came.

After dinner it was said, that the medicines in the island were exhausted, and it was remarked, that the Emperor could not be accused of having contributed to it.  This led him to observe, that he did not recollect having ever taken medicine at the Tuileries.  He had had three blisters at once, and he had stopped them without taking any.  He received a serious wound at Toulon ;  it was he said, like that of Ulysses, by which his old nurse knew him again ;  he had recovered, altogether without taking physic.  One of us taking the liberty to say ;  “If your majesty had the dysentary to-morrow, would you still reject all kind of medicine ?”  The Emperor answered ;  “At present that I am tolerably well, I answer, yes, without hesitation ;  but if I got very ill, I should, perhaps, alter my mind, and should then feel that kind of conversion, which is produced on a dying man through the fear of the devil.”  He again mentioned his incredulity in physic, but he did not think so, he said, of surgery.  He had three times commenced a course of anatomical study ;  but he had been always interrupted by business and disgust.  “On a certain occasion and at the end of a long discussion, Corvisard, desirous of speaking to me with his proofs in hand, was so abominable and filthy as to bring a stomach, wrapped up in his pocket handkerchief to Saint Cloud, and I was instantly compelled, at that horrible sight, to cast up all I had in mine.”

The Emperor attempted, after dinner, to read a comedy, but he was so fatigued and suffered so much, that he was forced to stop and retire about nine o’clock.  He made me follow him, and as he felt no inclination to sleep, he said ;  “Come, my dear Las Cases, let us see ;  let us have a story about your fauxbourg Saint Germain, and let us endeavour to laugh at it, as if we were listening to the Thousand and One Nights’ Tales!” —“Very well, Sire ;  there was formerly one of your Majesty’s chamberlains, who had a grand uncle, who was very old, very old indeed,.... and I remember your Majesty telling us the story of a heavy German officer, who, taken prisoner at the opening of the campaign of Italy, complained that a young conceited fellow had been sent to command against them, who spoiled the profession, and made it intolerable.  Well ! we had precisely his likeness among us ;  it was the old grand-uncle, who was still dressed nearly in the costume of Louis XIV.  He showed off, whenever you sent accounts of any extraordinary achievements on the other side of the Rhine ;  your bulletins of Ulm and Jena operated upon him like so many revulsions of bile.  He was far from admiring you.  You also spoiled the profession in his opinion.  He had, he frequently said, made the campaigns of the Marshal de Saxe, which indeed were prodigies in war, and had not been sufficiently appreciated.  ‘War was, no doubt, then an art, but now !!!’ he remarked, shrugging up his shoulders....  ‘In our time, we carried on war with great decorum ;  we had our mules ;  we were followed by our canteens ;  we had our tents ;  we lived well ;  we had even plays performed at head-quarters ;  the armies approached each other ;  admirable positions were occupied ;  a battle took place ;  a siege occasionally carried on, and afterwards we went into winter-quarters, to renew our operations in the Spring.  That is,’ he exclaimed, with exultation, ‘what may be called making war !  But now, a whole army disappears before another in a single battle, and a monarchy is overturned ;  a hundred leagues are run over in ten days ;  as for sleeping and eating, they are out of the question.  Truly, if you call that genius, I am, for my own part, obliged to acknowledge, that I know nothing about it ;  and accordingly, you excite my pity, when I hear you call him a great man.’ ”

The Emperor burst into fits of laughter, particularly when the mules and canteens were mentioned.  He then added ;  “you were of course accustomed to say a great many foolish things about me.”—“O yes, Sire, and in vast abundance.”  “Very well !  We are alone ;  nobody will intrude ;  tell me some more of them.”  “A fine gentleman, who had formerly been a captain of cavalry, and who seemed perfectly satisfied with his own person and accomplishments, was introduced to a select society where I was present.  ‘I come,’ he said, ‘from the plain des Sablons.  I have just seen our Ostrogoth manoeuvre.’  That, Sire, was your Majesty.  ‘He had two or three regiments which he threw into confusion upon each other, and they were all lost in some bushes.  I would have taken him and all his men prisoners with fifty maitres (formerly troopers) only.  An usurped reputation !’ he exclaimed.  ‘Accordingly, Moreau was always of opinion, that he would fail in Germany.  A war with Germany is talked of ;  if it take place, we shall see how he will extricate himself.  He will have justice done to him.’

“ The war took place, and your Majesty sent us in a very few days the bulletin of Ulm and that of Austerlitz, &c.;  our fine gentleman again made his appearance in the same company, and for the instant, we could not, notwithstanding our malevolence, help crying out all in the same breath ;  ‘And your fifty maitres !’  ‘Oh ! truly,’ said he, ‘it is impossible to comprehend the thing ;  this man triumphs over every obstacle ;  fortune leads him by the hand, and besides, the Austrians are so awkward ;  such fools !’”....

The Emperor laughed heartily, and wished for some anecdote still more absurd.  “That would indeed, Sire, be very difficult.  I recollect, however, an old dowager, who to the day of her death obstinately refused to give credit to any of your successes in Germany.  When Ulm, Austerlitz, and your entrance into Vienna were mentioned in her presence ;— ‘So you believe all that,’ said she, shrugging up her shoulders.  ‘It is all his fabrication.  He would not presume to set a foot in Germany ;  be assured, that he is still behind the Rhine, where he is perishing from fear, and sends us those silly stories :  you will learn in time that I am not to be imposed upon.’”

And these stories being over, the Emperor sent me away, saying ;  “What are they doing, what must they say, at present ?  I am certainly now giving them a fine opportunity.”

22d.—This was a day of real mourning for me, it was the first, since our departure from France, in which I did not see the Emperor.  I was the only one, in consequence of fortunate circumstances, who, until now, had enjoyed that happiness.  His sufferings were great, and his seclusion complete.  He did not wish to see a single person.

The Emperor continues ill.—Remarkable Official Document, addressed to Sir Hudson Lowe.

23d.—The weather has continued wet and rainy.  About half-past three, the Emperor sent for me to his chamber.  He was dressing himself ;  he had been very seriously indisposed, but thanks to his mode of treating himself, he said, and to his hermetical seclusion of the preceding day, his complaint was over.  He was again well.

I dared to express my sincere grief ;  I had, inscribed, I said, an unhappy day in my journal ;  I should have marked it in red ink.  And when he learned what it was ;  “What, in fact,” he said, “is it the only day, since we left France, in which you have not seen me ?...  And you are the only one !......”  And after some seconds of silence, he added, in a tone peculiarly adapted to make me amends, if that were possible ;  “But, my dear Las Cases, if you set such a value on it, if you consider it of so much moment, why did you not come and knock at my door ?  I am not inaccessible to you.”

The Doctor was introduced ;  he assured us that the Governor had promised never again to set foot at Longwood.  It was ironically observed by one of us, that he began to make himself agreeable.

The Emperor then went to his library, where a long letter I had written to Rome,^[1} was read to him by my son.  He was driven out by the wet, and, on his way to the saloon and billiardroom, he was tempted by the sight of the steps to walk a little.  “I know,” he said, “I am doing what is not prudent.”  Happily, the wet weather forced him to return almost instantly.  He took a seat in the saloon, where there was a good fire, called for some orange-leaf ptisan, and played some games of chess.

After dinner, the Emperor read Marmontel’s tales, and stopped at that of the self-styled philosopher.  He still coughed a great deal, and again called for some of the same ptisan.  He entered into a long and most interesting review of Jean Jaques, of his talents, his influence, his eccentricities, his private vices, &c.  He retired at ten o’clock.  I regret very much, that I cannot now recollect the particulars relative to all these objects.

In the course of the day M. de Montholon addressed the following official answer to the Governor, who had sent a letter, respecting the commissioners of the allied powers, and the embarrassed state of his finances.  It is the letter, which I have already noticed, the 18th of this month.

OFFICIAL DOCUMENT.

“ General,—I have received the treaty of the 2d of August, 1815, concluded between his Britannic Majesty, the Emperor of Austria, the Emperor of Russia, and the King of Prussia, which was annexed to your letter of the 23d of July.

“ The Emperor Napoleon protests against the purport of that treaty ;  he is not the prisoner of England.  After having placed his abdication in the hands of the representatives of the nation, for the benefit of the constitution, adopted by the French people, and in favour of his son, he proceeded voluntarily and freely to England, for the purpose of residing there, as a private person, in retirement, under the protection of the British laws.  The violation of all laws cannot constitute a right in fact.  The person of the Emperor Napoleon is in the power of England ;  but neither, as a matter of fact, nor of right, has it been, or is it, at present, in the power of Austria, Russia, and Prussia ;  even according to the laws and customs of England, which has never included, in its exchange of prisoners, Russians, Austrians, Prussians, Spaniards, or Portuguese, although united to these powers by treaties of alliance, and making war conjointly with them.  The Convention of the 2d of August, made fifteen days after the Emperor Napoleon had arrived in England, cannot, as a matter of right, have any effect ;  it merely presents the spectacle of the coalition of the four principal powers of Europe, for the oppression of a single man ;  a coalition which the opinion of every people disavows, as do all the principles of sound morality.  The Emperors of Austria and Russia, and the King of Prussia not possessing, either in fact or by right, any power over the person of the Emperor Napoleon, were incapable of enacting any thing with regard to him.  If the Emperor Napoleon had been in the power of the Emperor of Austria, that prince would have remembered the relations formed by religion and nature between a father and a son, relations which are never violated with impunity.  He would have remembered that, four times, Napoleon re-established him on his throne ;  at Leoben, in 1797, and at Luneville in 1801, when his armies were under the walls of Vienna ;  at Presburg in 1806, and at Vienna in 1809, when his armies were in possession of the capital and of three fourths of the monarchy.  That prince would have remembered the protestations which he made to him at the bivouac of Moravia in 1806, and at the interview at Dresden in 1812.  If the person of the Emperor Napoleon had been in the power of the Emperor Alexander, he would have remembered the ties of friendship, contracted at Tilsit, at Erfurth, and during twelve years of daily intercourse ;  he would have remembered the conduct of the Emperor Napoleon the day subsequent to the battle of Austerlitz, when having it in his power to take him prisoner with the remains of his army, he contented himself with his word, and let him effect his retreat ;  he would have remembered the dangers to which the Emperor Napoleon personally exposed himself to extinguish the fire of Moscow and preserve that capital for him ;  unquestionably that prince would not have violated the duties of friendship and gratitude towards a friend in distress.  If the person of the Emperor Napoleon had been even in power of the King of Prussia, that sovereign would not have forgotten that it was optional with the Emperor, after the battle of Friedland, to place another prince on the throne of Berlin ;  he would not have forgotten, in the presence of a disarmed enemy, the protestations of devotedness and the sentiments which he expressed to him in 1812, at the interviews at Dresden.  It is, accordingly, evident from the 2d and 5th articles of the said treaty, that being incapable of any influence whatever over the fate, and the person of the Emperor Napoleon, who is not in their power, these princes refer themselves in that respect to the future conduct of his Britannic Majesty, who undertakes to fulfil all obligations.

“ These princes have reproached the Emperor Napoleon with preferring the protection of the English laws to theirs.  The false ideas which the Emperor Napoleon entertained of the liberality of the English laws, and of the influence of a great, generous, and free people on its government, decided him in preferring the protection of these laws to that of his father-in-law, or of his old friend.  The Emperor Napoleon always would have been able to obtain the security of what related personally to himself, whether by placing himself again at the head of the army of the Loire, or by putting himself at the head of the army of the Gironde, commanded by General Clauzel ;  but looking for the future only to retirement and to the protection of the laws of a free nation, either English or American, all stipulations appeared useless to him.  He thought, that the English people would have been more bound by his frank conduct, which was noble and full of confidence, than it could have been by the most solemn treaties.  He has been deceived, but this delusion will for ever excite the indignation of real Britons, and with the present as well as future generations, it will be a proof of the perfidy of the English administration.  Austrian and Prussian commissioners are arrived at Saint Helena ;  if the object of their mission be to fulfil part of the duties, which the Emperors of Austria and Russia have contracted by the treaty of the 2d of August, and to take care, that the English agents, in a small colony, in the middle of the Ocean, do not fail in the attentions, due to a prince, connected with them by the ties of affinity, and by so many relations, the characteristics of these two sovereigns will be recognized in that measure.  But you, Sir, have asserted, that these commissioners possessed neither the right nor the power of giving any opinion on whatever may be transacted on this rock.

“ The English ministry have caused the Emperor Napoleon to be transported to Saint Helena, two thousand leagues from Europe.  This rock, situated under the tropic at the distance of five hundred leagues from every kind of continent is, in that latitude, exposed to a devouring heat ;  it is, during three-fourths of the year, covered with clouds and mists, it is at once the dryest and wettest country in the world.  This is the most inimical climate to the Emperor’s health.  It is hatred which dictated the selection of this residence as well as the instructions, given by the English ministry to the officers, who command in this country ;  they have been ordered to call the Emperor Napoleon, General, being desirous of compelling him to acknowledge, that he never reigned in France, which decided him not to take an incognito title, as he had determined, in quitting France.  First magistrate for life, under the title of first-consul, he concluded the preliminaries of London and the treaty of Amiens with the king of Great Britain.  He received as ambassadors, Lord Cornwallis, Mr. Merry, and Lord Whitworth, who resided in that quality at his court.  He sent to the King of England, Count Otto and General Andreossi, who resided as ambassadors at the Court of Windsor.  When, after the exchange of letters between the ministers for foreign affairs belonging to the two monarchies, Lord Lauderdale came to Paris, provided with full powers from the King of England, he treated with the plenipotentiaries provided with full powers from the Emperor Napoleon, and resided several months at the court of the Tuileries.  When, afterwards, at Chatillon, Lord Castlereagh signed the ultimatum, which the allied powers presented to the plenipotentiaries of the Emperor Napoleon, he thereby, recognized the fourth dynasty.  That ultimatum was more advantageous than the treaty of Paris ;  but France was required to renounce Belgium and the left bank of the Rhine, which was contrary to the propositions of Frankfort and to the proclamations of the allied powers ;  and was also contrary to the oath by which, at his consecration, the Emperor had sworn the integrity of the empire.  The Emperor then thought these national limits, were necessary to the security of France as well as to the equilibrium of Europe ;  he thought that the French nation, in the circumstances under which she found herself, ought rather to risk every chance of war than to give them up.  France would have obtained that integrity, and with it preserved her honour, had not treason contributed to the success of the allies.  The treaty of the 2d of August, and the bill of the British parliament style the Emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte, and give him only the title of General.  The title of General Bonaparte is, no doubt, eminently glorious ;  the Emperor bore it at Lodi, at Castiglione, at Rivoli, at Arcole, at Leoben, at the Pyramids, at Aboukir ;  but for seventeen years he has borne that of First Consul and of Emperor ;  it would be an admission, that he has been neither first magistrate of the republic, nor sovereign of the fourth dynasty.  Those, who think that nations are flocks, which, by divine right, belong to some families, are neither of the present age, nor of the spirit of the English legislature, which has several times changed the succession of its dynasties, because the great alterations occasioned by opinions, in which the reigning princes did not participate, had made them enemies to the happiness of the great majority of that nation.  For kings are but hereditary magistrates, who exist but for the happiness of nations, and not nations for the satisfaction of kings.  It is the same spirit of hatred, which directed that the Emperor Napoleon should not write, nor receive any letter without its being opened and read by the English ministers and the officers of Saint Helena.  He has, by that regulation, been interdicted the possibility of receiving intelligence from his mother, his wife, his son, his brothers ;  and when, wishing to free himself from the inconvenience of having his letters read by inferior officers, he desired to send sealed letters to the Prince Regent, he was told, that open letters only could be taken charge of and, conveyed, and that such were the instructions of the ministry.  That measure stands in need of no comment ;  it will suggest strange ideas of the spirit of the administration by which it was dictated ;  it would be disclaimed even at Algiers !  Letters have been received for general officers in the Emperor’s suite ;  they were opened and delivered to you ;  you have retained them, because they had not been transmitted through the medium of the English ministry ;  it was found necessary to make them travel four thousand leagues over again, and these officers had the misfortune to know, that there existed on this rock news from their wives, their mothers, and their children, and that they could not be put in possession of it, in less than six months !!!—The heart revolts.  Permission could not be obtained to subscribe to the Morning Chronicle, to the Morning Post, or to some French journals :  some broken numbers of the Times have been occasionally sent to Longwood.  In consequence of the demand made on board of the Northumberland, some books have been sent, but all those, which relate to the transactions of late years, have been carefully kept back.  It was since intended to open a correspondence with a London bookseller for the purpose of being directly supplied with books which might be wanted, and with those relative to the events of the day ;  that intention was frustrated.  An English author having published at London, an account of his travels in France, took the trouble to send it, as a present to the Emperor, but you did not think yourself authorized to deliver it to him, because it had not reached you through the channel of your government.  It is also said, that other books, sent by their authors have not been delivered, because the address of some was,—To the Emperor Napoleon, and of others,—To Napoleon the Great.  The English ministry are not authorized to order any of these vexations.  The law, however unjust, considers the Emperor Napoleon as a prisoner of war ;  but prisoners of war have never been prohibited from subscribing to the journals, or receiving books that are printed ;  such a prohibition is exercised only in the dungeons of the inquisition.

“ The island of St. Helena is ten leagues in circumference ;  it is every where inaccessible ;  the coast is guarded by brigs, posts within sight of each other are placed on the shore, and all communication with the sea is rendered impracticable.  There is but one small town, James Town, where the vessels anchor, and from which they sail.  In order to prevent the escape of an individual, it is sufficient to guard the coast by land and sea.  By interdicting the interior of the island, one object only can be in view, that of preventing a ride of eight or ten miles, which it would be possible to take on horseback, and the privation of which, according to the consultations of medical men, is abridging the Emperor’s days.

“ The Emperor has been placed at Longwood, which is exposed to every wind ;  a barren piece of ground, uninhabited, without water, and incapable of any kind of cultivation.  The space contains about 1200 uncultivated fathoms.  At the distance of 11 or 1200 fathoms, a camp was established on a small eminence ;  another has been since placed nearly at the same distance in an opposite direction, so that in the intense heat of the tropic, whatever way the eye is directed, nothing is seen but encampments.  Admiral Malcolm, perceiving the utility of which a tent would be to the Emperor in that situation, has had one pitched by his seamen at the distance of twenty paces from the house ;  it is the only spot in which shade is to be found.  The Emperor, has, however, every reason to be satisfied with the spirit which animates the officers and soldiers of the gallant 53d, as he had been with the crew of the Northumberland.  Longwood house was constructed to serve as a barn to the company’s farm ;  some apartments were afterwards made in it by the Deputy-Governor of the island ;  he used it for a country-house ;  but it was, in no respect, adapted for a residence.  During the year it has been inhabited, it has been always in want of repair, and the Emperor has been constantly exposed to the inconvenience and unwholesomeness of a house, in which workmen are employed.  His bedchamber is too small to contain a bedstead of ordinary size ;  but every kind of building at Longwood would prolong the inconvenience arising from the workmen employed.  There are, however, in this wretched island, some beautiful situations, with fine trees, gardens, and tolerably good houses, among others Plantation House ;  but you are prevented by the positive instructions of the ministry from granting this house, which would have saved a great deal of expense laid out in building, at Longwood, huts covered with pitched paper, which are no longer of any use.  You have prohibited every kind of intercourse between us and the inhabitants of the island ;  you have, in fact, converted Longwood House into a secret prison ;  you have even thrown difficulties in the way of our communication with the officers of the garrison.  The most anxious care would seem to be taken to deprive us of the few resources afforded by this miserable country, and we are no better off here than we should be on Ascension Rock.  During the four months you have been at St. Helena, you have, Sir, rendered the Emperor’s condition worse.  It was observed to you by Count Bertrand, that you violated the law of your legislature, that you trampled upon the privileges of general officers, prisoners of war.  You answered, that you knew nothing but the letter of your instructions, and that they were still worse than your conduct appeared to us.

I have the honour, &c. &c.
(Signed)
COUNT DE MONTHOLON.

“ P.S.—I had, Sir, signed this letter, when I received yours of the 17th, to which you annex the estimate of an annual sum of 20,000l. sterling, which you consider indispensable to meet the expenses of the establishment of Longwood, after having made all the reductions which you have thought possible.  The consideration of this estimate can, in no respect, concern us ;  the Emperor’s table is scarcely supplied with what is necessary ;  all the provisions are of a bad quality and four times dearer than at Paris.  You require a fund of twelve thousand pounds sterling from the Emperor, as your government only allows you eight thousand pounds for all these expenses.  I have had the honour of telling you, that the Emperor had no funds ;  that no letter had been received or written for a year, and that he was altogether unacquainted with what is passing or what may have passed in Europe.  Transplanted by violence to this rock, at the distance of two thousand leagues, without being able to receive or to write any letter, he now finds himself at the discretion of the English agents.  The Emperor has uniformly desired and still desires to provide himself for all his expenses of every nature, and he will do so, as speedily as you shall give possibility to the means, by taking off the prohibition, laid upon the merchants of the island, of carrying on his correspondence, and releasing it from all kind of inquisition on your part or on that of any of your agents.  The moment the Emperor’s wants shall be known in Europe, the persons who interest themselves for him, will transmit the necessary funds for his supplies.

“ The letter of Lord Bathurst, which you have communicated to me, gives rise to strange ideas ! can your ministers then be so ignorant as not to know, that the spectacle of a great man struggling with adversity is the most sublime of spectacles ?  Can they be ignorant, that Napoleon at Saint Helena, in the midst of persecutions of every kind, against which his serenity is his only shield, is greater, more sacred, more venerable than on the first throne of the world, where he was, so long, the arbiter of Kings ?  Those, who, fail in respect to Napoleon, thus situated, merely degrade their own character and the nation which they represent !”

1 It was my letter to Prince Lucien, since so celebrated in the history of my persecutions, and which will be found in its proper place.