_Napoleon's Bees_ (Vol. vii., p. 535.).--No one, I believe, having
addressed you farther on the subject of the Napoleon Bees, the models of
which are stated to have been found in the tomb of Childeric when opened in
1653, "of the purest gold, their wings being inlaid with a red stone, like
a cornelian," I beg to mention that the small ornaments resembling bees
found in the tomb of Childeric, were only what in French are called
_fleurons_ (supposed to have been attached to the harness of his
war-horse). Handfuls of them were found when the tomb was opened at
Tournay, and sent to Louis XIV. They were deposited on a green ground at
Versailles.
Napoleon wishing to have some regal emblem more ancient than the
_fleur-de-lys_, adopted the _fleurons_ as bees, and the green ground as the
original Merovingian colour.
This fact was related to me as unquestionable by Augustin Thierry, the
celebrated historian, when I was last in Paris.