16th.—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 police affair of too little consequence, he observed, to have
found its way up to him.
About four o’clock the captain of the Spey, just 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 anywhere; 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.