29th.—During dinner somebody mentioned a pool which stands in our
garden, not far from the house, and which is deep enough to admit of a
lamb having once been drowned in it, in attempting to drink. The Emperor
said on that occasion, to one of the inmates of the house: “Is it
possible, Sir, that you have not yet had this pool filled up? How guilty
you would be, and what would not your grief be, if your son were to be
drowned in it, as it might easily happen!” The person thus censured
answered that he had often intended to have it done, but that it was
impossible to get workmen. “That is not an excuse,” said the Emperor
sharply: “if _my_ son were here, I should go and fill it up with my own
hands.”
The Emperor was already in bed when he sent for me: he wished, he said,
to put some questions to me, and to inquire concerning some dates
connected with matters which concerned us materially. . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . .
ELOQUENT DICTATIONS OF THE EMPEROR.—CHARACTERISTIC
DETAILS, AND PARTICULARS.
30th.—Whenever the Emperor took up a subject, if he was in the least
animated, his language was fit to be printed. He has often, when an idea
struck him forcibly, dictated in an off-hand way to any one of us who
happened to be in his way, pages of the most polished diction. The other
gentlemen of his suite must possess a great many of these dictations,
which are all most valuable. Unfortunately for me, the weak state of my
eyes, which prevented me from writing, most frequently deprived me of
this advantage.
On one occasion, when the English ministerial newspapers adverted to the
treasures which Napoleon must possess, and which he, no doubt,
concealed, the Emperor dictated as follows:
“You wish to know the treasures of Napoleon? They are immense, it is
true, but they are all exposed to light. They are: The noble harbours of
Antwerp and Flushing, which are capable of containing the largest
fleets, and of protecting them against the ice from the sea,—the
hydraulic works at Dunkirk, Havre, and Nice,—the immense harbour of
Cherbourg,—the maritime works at Venice,—the beautiful roads from
Antwerp to Amsterdam; from Mentz to Metz; from Bordeaux to Bayonne;—the
passes of the Simplon, of Mont Cenis, of Mont Genevre, of La Corniche,
which open a communication through the Alps in four different
directions; and which exceed in grandeur, in boldness, and in skill of
execution, all the works of the Romans: in these alone you will find
eight hundred millions;—the roads from the Pyrenees to the Alps, from
Parma to Spezzia, from Savona to Piedmont,—the bridges of Jena,
Austerlitz, the Arts, Sevres, Tours, Rouanne, Lyons, Turin, of the
Isere, of the Durance, of Bordeaux, of Rouen, &c.—the canal which
connects the Rhine with the Rhone by the Doubs, and thus unites the
North Sea with the Mediterranean; the canal which connects the Scheldt
with the Somme, and thus joins Paris and Amsterdam; the canal which
unites the Rance with the Vilaine; the canal of Arles, that of Pavia,
and the canal of the Rhine—the draining of the marshes of Burgoing, of
the Cotentin, of Rochfort—the rebuilding of the greater number of the
churches destroyed during the Revolution—the building of others—the
institution of numerous establishments of industry for the suppression
of mendicity—the works at the Louvre—the construction of public
warehouses, of the Bank, of the canal of the Ourcq—the distribution of
water in the city of Paris—the numerous sewers, the quays, the
embellishments, and the monuments of that large capital—the works for
the embellishment of Rome—the re-establishment of the manufactures of
Lyons—the creation of many hundreds of cotton manufactories for spinning
and for weaving, which employ several millions of hands—funds
accumulated to establish upwards of 400 manufactories of sugar from
beet-root, for the consumption of part of France, and which would have
furnished sugar at the same price as the West Indies, if they had
continued to receive encouragement for only four years longer—the
substitution of woad for indigo, which would have been at last brought
to equal in quality, and not to exceed in price, the indigo from the
Colonies—numerous manufactories for all kinds of objects of art,
&c.—fifty millions expended in repairing and beautifying the palaces
belonging to the Crown—sixty millions in furniture for the palaces
belonging to the Crown in France and in Holland, at Turin, and at
Rome—sixty millions in diamonds for the Crown, all purchased with
Napoleon’s money—_the Regent_ (the only diamond that was left belonging
to the former diamonds of the Crown) withdrawn from the hands of the
Jews at Berlin, with whom it had been pledged for three millions—the
Napoleon Museum, valued at upwards of four hundred millions, filled with
objects legitimately acquired either by money or treaties of peace known
to the whole world, by virtue of which the master-pieces it contains
were given in lieu of territory or of contributions—several millions
amassed for the encouragement of agriculture, which is the paramount
consideration for the interest of France—the introduction into France of
Merino sheep, &c.——these form a treasure of several thousand millions,
which will endure for ages! these are the monuments that will confute
calumny!”
History will say that all these things were accomplished amidst
perpetual wars, without having recourse to any loan, and whilst the
national debt was even diminishing every day, and that nearly fifty
millions of taxes had been remitted. Very large sums still remained in
his private treasury; they were guaranteed to him by the treaty of
Fontainebleau, as the result of the savings effected on his civil list
and of his other private revenues. These sums were divided and did not
go entirely into the public treasury, nor altogether into the treasury
of France!!
On another occasion, the Emperor reading in an English newspaper that
Lord Castlereagh had said, at a meeting in Ireland, that Napoleon had
declared at St. Helena that he never would have made peace with England
but to deceive her, to take her by surprise, and to destroy her; and
that, if the French army was attached to the Emperor, it was because he
was in the habit of giving the daughters of the richest families of his
empire in marriage to his soldiers: the Emperor, moved with indignation,
dictated as follows: “These calumnies uttered against a man who is so
barbarously oppressed, and whose voice is not allowed to be heard in
answer to them, will be disbelieved by all persons well educated and
susceptible of feeling. When Napoleon was seated on the first throne in
the world, then no doubt his enemies had a right to say whatever they
pleased; his actions were public, and were a sufficient answer to them;
at any rate, that conduct now belonged to public opinion, and history;
but to utter new and base calumnies against him at the present moment is
an act of the utmost meanness and cowardice, and which will not answer
the end proposed. Millions of libels have been and are still published
every day, but they are without effect. Sixty millions of men, of the
most polished nations in the world, raise their voices to confute them,
and fifty thousand English, who are now travelling on the Continent,
will, on their return home, publish the truth to the inhabitants of the
three kingdoms of Great Britain, who will blush at having been so
grossly deceived.
“As for the Bill, by virtue of which Napoleon has been dragged to this
rock, it is an act of proscription similar to those of Sylla, and still
more atrocious. The Romans unrelentingly pursued Hannibal to the utmost
extremities of Bithynia; and Flaminius persuaded King Prusias to assent
to the death of that great man; yet at Rome Flaminius was accused of
having acted thus in order to satisfy his personal hatred. It was in
vain that he urged in his defence that Hannibal, yet in the vigour of
life, might still become a dangerous enemy, and that his death was
necessary; a thousand voices were raised, and answered that acts of
injustice and ungenerous actions can never be useful to a great nation;
and that, upon such pretences as that now set forth, murder, poisoning,
and every species of crime might be justified! Succeeding generations
reproached their ancestors with this base act. They would have paid a
high price to efface the stain from their history, and, since the
revival of letters among modern nations, there is not a generation that
has not added its imprecations to those pronounced by Hannibal at the
moment when he drank the fatal cup: he cursed Rome, who, whilst her
fleets and legions covered Europe, Asia, and Africa, wreaked her
vengeance against a man alone and unprotected, because she feared, or
pretended to fear, him.
“The Romans, however, never violated the rights of hospitality: Sylla
found an asylum in the house of Marius. Flaminius, before he proscribed
Hannibal, did not receive him on board his ship and declare that he had
orders to treat him favourably; the Roman fleet did not convey him to
the Port of Ostia; and Hannibal, instead of placing himself under the
protection of the Romans, preferred trusting his person to a King of
Asia. When he was proscribed, he was not under the protection of the
Roman flag; he was under the banners of a king who was an enemy of Rome.
“If ever, in the revolutions of ages, a King of England should be
brought before the awful tribunal of his nation, his defenders will urge
in his favour the sacred character of a king, the respect due to the
throne, to all crowned heads, to the anointed of the Lord! But his
accusers will have a right to answer thus: ‘One of the ancestors of this
King, whom you defend, banished a man that was his guest, in time of
peace; afraid to put him to death in the presence of a nation governed
by positive laws and by regular and public forms, he caused his victim
to be exposed on the most unhealthy point of a rock, situated in another
hemisphere, in the midst of the ocean, where this guest perished, after
a long agony, a prey to the climate, to want, to insults of every kind!
Yet that guest was also a great Sovereign, raised to the throne on the
shields of thirty-six millions of citizens. He had been master of almost
every Capital of Europe; the greatest Kings composed his Court; he was
generous towards all; he was during twenty years the arbiter of nations;
his family was allied to every reigning family, even to that of England;
he was twice the anointed of the Lord; twice consecrated by the august
ceremonies of religion!!!’”
This passage is certainly very fine, for its truth, its diction, and
above all, for its historical richness.
The Emperor always dictated without the least preparation. I never saw
him, on any occasion, make any research respecting our history or that
of any other nation; and yet no man ever quoted history more faithfully,
more _apropos_, or more frequently. One might have supposed that he knew
history by quotations only, and that these quotations occurred to him as
by inspiration. And here I must be allowed to mention a fact which has
often struck me, and which I never could satisfactorily account for to
myself; but it is so very remarkable, and I have witnessed it so often,
that I cannot pass it in silence. It is that Napoleon seems to possess a
stock of information on several points, which remains within him, in
reserve as it were, to burst forth with splendour on remarkable
occasions, and which in his moments of carelessness appears to be not
only slumbering, but almost unknown to him altogether. With respect to
history, for instance, how often has it happened that he has asked me
whether St. Louis reigned before or after Philip the Fair, and other
questions of the same kind. But, when occasion offered, when his moment
came, then he would quote without hesitation, and with the most minute
details; and when I have sometimes happened to be in doubt, and to go
and verify, I have always found him to be right and most scrupulously
exact: I have never been able to detect him in error.
Another singular peculiarity in him of the same kind is this:—In his
common intercourse of life, and his familiar conversation, the Emperor
mutilated the names most familiar to him, even ours; yet I do not think
that this would have happened to him on a public occasion. I have heard
him many times, during our walks, repeat the celebrated speech of
Augustus; and he has never missed saying, “Take a seat, Sylla.”[30] He
would frequently create names of persons according to his fancy; and,
when he had once adopted them, they remained fixed in his mind, although
we pronounced them as they should be, a hundred times in the day, within
his hearing; but he would have been struck if we had used them as he had
altered them. It was the same with respect to orthography: in general,
he did not attend to it; yet, if our copies had contained any faults of
spelling, he would have complained of it. One day the Emperor said to
me; “You do not write orthographically, do you?” This question gave rise
to a sarcastic smile from a bystander, who thought that it was meant to
convey a reproach. The Emperor, who saw this, continued:—“At least, I
suppose you do not; for a man occupied with public or other important
business, a Minister, for instance, cannot, and need not, attend to
orthography. His ideas must flow faster than his hand can trace; he has
only time for hieroglyphics; he must put letters for words, and words
for sentences; and leave the scribes to make it out afterwards.”—The
Emperor left a great deal for the copyists to do; he was their torment:
his handwriting actually formed hieroglyphics; he often could not
decipher it himself. My son was one day reading to him a chapter of the
Campaign of Italy: on a sudden he stopped short, unable to make out the
writing. “The little blockhead,” said the Emperor, “cannot read his own
writing!”—“It is not mine, Sire.”—“And whose then?” “Your
Majesty’s.”—“How, you little rogue! do you mean to insult me?” The
Emperor took the manuscript, tried a long while to read it, and at last
threw it down, saying, “He is right: I cannot tell myself what is
written.”—He has often sent the copyists to me, to try to read to them
what he had himself been unable to decipher.
Footnote 30:
Instead of Cinna, in Corneille’s tragedy of _Cinna_, act v. scene
1st.—_Eng. Ed._
The Emperor accounted for the clearness of his ideas, and the faculty of
extremely protracted application which he possessed, by saying that the
different affairs were arranged in his head as in a closet. “When I wish
to turn from any business,” said he, “I close the drawer which contains
it, and I open that which contains another. They do not mix together,
and do not fatigue me or inconvenience me.” He had never been kept
awake, he said, by an involuntary pre-occupation of mind. If I wish to
sleep, I shut up all the drawers, and I am soon asleep. So that he had
always, he added, slept when he wanted rest, and almost at will.
MY ATLAS.—PREDESTINATION, &C.—THE GOVERNOR MAKES FRUITLESS ATTEMPTS TO
BE RECEIVED BY THE EMPEROR.
Tuesday, 1st October. When I entered the Emperor’s room, he had my Atlas
in his hands. He turned over several of the genealogical maps, whose
relation and correspondence with each other he now understands
remarkably well. On closing the book, he said, “What a concatenation!
how each part results from and corroborates what goes before it! How
every part unfolds itself and remains fixed in the mind! Las Cases, if
you had done nothing more than point out the true method for
instruction, you would still have rendered a most essential service.
Every one may now clothe the skeleton as they like; it will, no doubt,
be improved upon, but the first conception is yours,” &c.
Amongst the numerous subjects of conversation which followed,
predestination was mentioned. The Emperor made many remarkable
observations on that subject; amongst others, “Pray,” said he, “am I not
said to be given to the belief in predestination?” “Yes, Sire, at least
by many people.” “Well, well! let them say on; one may sometimes be
tempted to imitate, and it may occasionally be useful.... But what are
men!... How much easier it is to occupy their attention, and to strike
their imaginations, by absurdities than by rational ideas! But can a man
of sound sense listen for one moment to such a doctrine? Either
predestination admits the existence of free will, or it rejects it. If
it admits it, what kind of predetermined result is that which the mere
will, a step, a word, may alter or modify, _ad infinitum_? If
predestination, on the contrary, rejects the existence of free will, it
is quite another question; in that case a child need only be thrown into
its cradle as soon as it is born; there is no necessity for bestowing
the least care upon it; for if it be irrevocably determined that it is
to live, it will grow though no food should be given to it. You see that
such a doctrine cannot be maintained: predestination is but a word
without meaning. The Turks themselves, those patrons of fatalism, are
not convinced of the doctrine, or medicine would not exist in Turkey;
and a man residing in a third floor would not take the trouble to go
down by the longer way of the stairs, he would immediately throw himself
out of the window: you see to what a string of absurdities that will
lead.”
At about three o’clock, the Emperor was told that the Governor wished to
communicate to him some instructions which he had just received from
London. The Emperor replied that he was unwell, that the instructions
might be sent to him, or communicated to some of his suite; but the
Governor insisted on being admitted, saying, that he wished to
communicate directly with the Emperor: he added that he had also a few
words to say to us in private, after having spoken to _the General_. The
Emperor again refused; upon which the Governor retired, saying that he
begged he might be informed when he _could_ see _the General_. This
period may be distant indeed; the Emperor, with whom I was at that
moment, having said to me that he was determined never to receive him
again.
After dinner, the Emperor had Buffon and Valmont de Bomare brought to
him. He looked at what these authors say respecting the diversities in
the human species, the difference between a negro and a white; but he
was not much satisfied with what he found in them on the subject. He
retired early to his apartment: he was unwell.
2d. The Emperor having told me that he was determined to apply again to
the study of English, and that I must oblige him every morning to take
his lesson, I accordingly went to his apartment at about half-past
twelve. I was not fortunate in the choice of the moment, for he was
lying on his sofa asleep after his breakfast. I must have vexed him, and
was very much vexed myself. However, he would not let me go away, and
read a little English for about half an hour. He was not very well. He
dressed. Having told him that we had finished what he had given us to
do, he at first proposed to go to work on the chapters of the Campaign
of Italy; but he afterwards altered his mind, and was busy the whole day
on something else. At about five o’clock he attempted to walk out, but
found the weather too cold. After dinner, he tried to read, but in vain;
he could not go on: he felt tired, drowsy, indisposed, and withdrew
almost immediately.
JURISPRUDENCE; THE CODE; MERLIN, &C.—MONUMENTS IN EGYPT.—PLAN OF AN
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE IN PARIS.
3d. After breakfast, the Emperor took two or three turns in the garden.
We were all with him. He spoke of the communications which the Governor
had to make to us, and took a review of the different conjectures—some
good, some bad—which each of us formed on the subject. The weather was
tolerable; he ordered the calash, and we went round the wood. The heat
and the heaviness of the atmosphere, though the sun was obscured,
obliged him to go into the house again. He sat down and dictated to my
son until five o’clock.
We again tried to take a few turns in the garden; but the air was cold
and damp. He went in-doors again, and made me go to converse with him.
He turned over an English book, and stopped at a part relating to
jurisprudence, and the criminal codes of France and England,
endeavouring to compare them. Every body knows how extremely well versed
he is in our codes; but he has little knowledge of that of England, and,
with the exception of some general points, I could not answer his
questions. In the course of the conversation he said: Laws which in
theory are a model of clearness become too often a chaos in their
application; because men, with their passions, spoil every thing they
touch, &c.... Men can only avoid being exposed to the arbitrary acts of
the judge, by submitting to the despotism of the law, &c.... I had at
first fancied it would be possible to reduce all laws to simple
geometrical demonstrations; so that every man who could read, and
connect two ideas together, would be able to decide for himself; but I
became convinced, almost immediately that this idea was absurd.
However,” added he, “I should have wished to start from some fixed
point, and follow one road known to all; to have no other laws but those
inserted in the code; and to proclaim, once for all, that all laws which
were not in the code were null and void. But it is not easy to obtain
simplicity from practical lawyers: they first prove to you that
simplicity is impossible, that it is a mere chimera; and endeavour next
to demonstrate that it is incompatible with the stability and the
existence of power. Power, they say, is exposed alone to the unforeseen
machinations of all: it must therefore have, in the moment of need, arms
kept in reserve for such cases: so that, with some old edicts of
Chilperic or Pharamond, ferreted out for the occasion,” said Napoleon,
“nobody can say that he is secure from being hanged in due form and
according to law.
“So long as the subjects of discussion in the Council of State,” said
the Emperor, “were referable to the code, I felt very strong; but when
they diverged from it, I was quite in the dark, and Merlin was then my
resource—he was my light. Without possessing much brilliancy, Merlin is
very learned, wise, upright, and honest; one of the veterans of the good
old cause: he was very much attached to me.
“No sooner had the code made its appearance, than it was almost
immediately followed by commentaries, explanations, elucidations,
interpretations, and the Lord knows what besides. I usually exclaimed,
on seeing this: Gentlemen, we have cleaned the stable of Augeas; for
God’s sake do not let us fill it again!” &c.
During dinner, the Emperor made some very remarkable observations
respecting Egypt, which will be found in the chapters dictated to
Bertrand. He then reverted to his expedition to Syria, and declared that
the grand object of the expedition to Egypt was to shake the power of
England in the four quarters of the world, by effecting a revolution
capable of changing the whole face of the East, and giving a new destiny
to India. Egypt, he said, was to stand us in stead of St. Domingo, and
our American Colonies, to reconcile the liberty of the blacks with the
prosperity of our commerce. This new colony would have ruined the
English in America, in the Mediterranean, and even on the banks of the
Ganges.
Then, answering the reproach preferred against him of having deserted
his army, he said: “I merely obeyed the call of France, which summoned
me to save her, and I had a right to do so. I had received from the
Directory a _carte blanche_ for all my operations in the basin of the
Mediterranean, in Africa, and in Asia. I had full powers for treating
with the Russians, the Turks, the Barbary States, and the provinces of
India. I was at liberty to appoint a successor, to bring back the army,
or to return myself, if I thought proper.”
The Emperor thought that all he had seen in Egypt, and, particularly,
all those celebrated ruins so much talked of, were not to be compared
with Paris and the Tuileries. The only difference between Egypt and us
was, in his opinion, that Egypt, thanks to the pureness of its air and
the nature of its materials, preserved her ruins for ever; whereas the
nature of our European atmosphere would not admit of our having any for
any length of time, every thing being soon corroded and gone.
Vestiges of a thousand years’ date might be found on the banks of the
Nile; but not one would subsist on the banks of the Seine in fifty
years. He, however, regretted very much that he had not caused an
Egyptian temple to be erected at Paris: he could have wished to adorn
the capital with such a monument, &c.
RESOURCES DURING THE EMIGRATION: ANECDOTES, &C.—OFFICIAL
COMMUNICATIONS.—NEW OFFENCES.
4th. At about twelve o’clock, I went to the Emperor’s apartment. He took
a good lesson of English in Telemachus: he resolved to take up my method
again; he approves of it, he said, and derives great benefit from it. He
observed that he thought I had excellent dispositions for being a very
good schoolmaster; I told him it was the fruit of my experience. He then
made me enter into a great many details respecting the time when I gave
lessons in London, during my emigration, and he was very much amused by
them. “However,” said he, “you gentlemen, must have done credit to the
profession, if not by your learning, at least, by your manners.” I then
told him that one of our Princes had taught mathematics during his
emigration. “And this alone,” said he, with animation, “would make a man
of him, and shew him to have possessed some merit; that is assuredly one
of the greatest triumphs of Madame de Genlis.”
I then related to him the following curious anecdote, which I had heard
on that subject. “The Prince was in Switzerland: and, being so
circumstanced as to find it advisable to conceal his existence, he
wished to take a name that might favour his disguise. One of our
Bishops, from the South of France, fancied that nothing could be better
than to give him the name of a young man from Languedoc then at Nismes,
who was a very zealous Protestant; which was just as it ought to be, the
Prince being in a Protestant canton. The Bishop added that there was no
appearance that the young man would ever be in the way to falsify the
Prince’s assumption of his name. But it had so happened that the young
man had gone into the army, and had become an aide-de-camp to M. de
Montesquiou, and that shortly afterwards he had emigrated precisely into
Switzerland with his general. What was his surprise to find himself at
the _table d’hôte_, at dinner with a person of his own name, of the same
religion, and who belonged to the same town! It was exactly like the
scene of the two Sosias.[31] But the best of the joke was that the young
man had also changed his name, and carefully concealed his own. Such
incidents are only to be met with in novels; they are thought of
impossible occurrence. Perhaps the present story has been rather
embellished; yet, I think, I can affirm that I heard it from the young
man himself.”
Footnote 31: