Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte

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8

olitical manoeuvres

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the curb of a representative government, but we may well believe that he only yielded, with a mental reservation that as soon as victory should return to his standards and his army be

e proclaimed a constitution under the title of "Acte additionnel aux Constitutions de l'Empire," which greatly resembled the charter granted by Louis XVIII. the year before. An hereditary Chamber of Peers was to be appointed by the Emperor, a Chamber of Representatives chosen by the Electoral Co

nd the ancient capital of the Franks, Napoleon arranged his ministry, and issued sundry decrees, which show h

ance," and were dated on the 13th of March, although not promulgated until the 21st of that month. The first of these decrees abrogated all changes in the courts of justice and tribunals which had taken place during the absence of Napoleon. The second banished anew all emigrants who had returned to France before 1814 without proper authority, and displaced all officers belonging to the class of emigrants introduced

ession of the Bourbons, to which was added confiscation of their property. The seventh restored the Legion of Honour in every respect as it had existed under the Emperor; uniting to its funds the confiscated revenues of the Bourbon order of St. Louis. The eighth and last decree was the most important of all. Under pretence that emigr

parte knew there was little hope of their return from Vienna. These various enactments were well calculated to serve Napoleon's cause. They flattered the army, and at the same time stimulated their resentment against the emigrants, by insinuating that they had been sacrificed by Louis to the interest of his followers. They held out to the Republicans a prospect of confiscation, proscription, and, revolution of go

mass of the people that I owe everything; it is they who have brought me back to the capital. It is the poor subaltern officers and common soldiers that have done all this. I owe everything to the common people and the ranks of the army. Remember that! I owe everything to the army and the people!" Some time after he took occasional rides through the Faubourg S

ft in the hands of Davoust a written authority for the publication of his bulletins, many clauses of which were written long before the battles were fought that they were to describe. He gave to the same Marshal a plan of his campaign, which he had arranged for the defensive. This was not confided to him without an injunction of the

ty to ascertain Napoleon's sentiments and intentions. Constant was a lover of constitutional liberty, and an old opponent of Nap

he conversation, and kept it nearly all to himself during the rest of the audien

, the Noailles, the Rohans, the Beauveaus, the Montemarts, in my train. But there never was any cordiality between us. The steed made his curvets-he was well broken in, but I felt him quiver under me. With the people it is another thing. The popular fibre responds to mine. I have risen from the ranks of the people: my voice sets mechanically upon them. Look at those conscripts, the sons of peasants: I never flattered them; I treated them roughly. They did not crowd round me the less; they did not on that account cease to cry, 'Vive l'Empereur!' It is that between them and me there is one and the same nature. They look to me as their support, their safeguard against the nobles. I have but to make a sign, or even to look another way, and the nobles would be massacred in every province. So well have they managed matters in the last ten months! but I do not desire to be the King of a mob. If there are the means to govern by a constitution well and good. I wished for the empire of the world, and to ensure it complete liberty of action was necessary to me. To govern France merely it is possible that a constitution may be better. I wished for the empire of the world, as who would not have done in my place? The world invited me to rule over it. Sovereigns and subjects alike emulously bowed the neck under my sceptre. I have seldom met with opposition in France, but still I have encountered more of it from some obscure and unarmed Frenchmen than from all these Kings so resolute, just now, no longer to have a man of the people for their equal! See then what appears to you possible; let me know your ideas. Public discus

eing convinced that circumstances had changed, he had made up his mind to conform to them. He says, and we cannot doubt it, "that he listened to Napoleon

edom were strong: the real lovers of a rational and feasible liberty-the constitutional monarchy men were few-the mad ultra-Liberals, the Jacobins, the refuse of one revolution and the provoker

the priests let us strangle the last of the kings," were all roared out in fearful chorus by a drunken, filthy, and furious mob. Many a day had elapsed since they had dared to sing these blasphemous and antisocial songs in public. Napoleon himself as soon as he had power enough suppressed them, and he was as proud of this feat and his triumph over the dregs of the Jacobins as he was of any of his victories; and in this he was right, in this he proved himself the friend of humanity. As the tumultuous mass ap

sed him to lay aside the style of Emperor, and assume that of High President or Lord General of the Republic! Annoyed with such puerilities while the enemy was every day drawing nearer the frontiers he withdrew from the Tuileries to the comparatively small and retired palace of the Elysee, where he esca

olleges were maintained. Land tax and direct taxes were to be voted only for a year, indirect taxes might be imposed for several years. No levy of men for the army nor any exchange of territory was to be made but by a law. Taxes were to be proposed by the Chamber of Representatives. Ministers to be responsible. Judges to be irremovable. Juries to be established. Right of petition, freedom of worship, inviolability of property, were recognised. Liberty of the press was given under legal responsibility, and press offences were to be judged with a jury. No place or part of the territory could be placed in a state of siege except in case of foreign invasion or

s, who embarked heart and soul in the plot; they forged passports, procured relays, of horses; and altogether arranged matters so well that but for a single individual-one who revealed the whole project a few days previously to that fixed upon for carrying it into effect-there is little room to doubt that the plan would have succeeded, and that the daughter of Austria and the titular King of home would have given such, prestige as their presence could give at the Tuileries and the Champs-de-Mai. No sooner had the Emperor of Austria discovered this plot, which, had it been successful, would have placed him in a very awkw

stored to him; he had published his wishes as a certainty, and to prevent it was, in fact, the

t the Empress, wholly enamoured of --, did not even take pains to hide her ridiculous partiality for him. The handwriting of the letter was disguised, yet not so much but that I was able to discover whose it was. I found; however, in the manner in which the secret was expressed a warmth of zeal and a picturesque style that did not belong to the author of the letter. While reading it, I all of a sudden suspected it was a counterfeit, and intended to mislead the Emperor. I communicated this idea to him, and the danger I perceived in this fraud. As I grew more and more animated I found plausible reasons enough to throw the Emperor himself into some uncertainty. 'How is it possible,' I said, 'that --- should have been imprudent enough to write such things to me, who am not his friend, and who have had so little connection with him? How can one suppose that the Empress should fo

I have not the least doubt of the truth of the particulars it contains. The best thing

r he was sincerely attached to the Empress, and still h

hat was also my opinion; but; coming from such a quarter, the advice was not without danger for the person to whom it was given. Besides, that advice having been rejected, it: was the duty of the Minister either to think no more of his plan or to resign his office. Fouché, however, remained in the Cabinet; and continued his correspondence. The Emperor, who placed but little confidence in him; kept a careful eye upon him. One evening the Emperor: had a great deal of company at the Elysee, he told me not to go home, because he wished to speak to me. When everybody was gone the Emperor stopped with Fouché in the apartment next

and kept him three hours long in my garden, hoping that in the course of a friendly conversation he would mention that letter to me, but he said nothing. At last, yesterday evening, I myself opened the subject.' (Here the Emperor repeated to me the words I had heard the night before, 'You are a traitor,' etc.) He acknowledged, in fact, continued the Emperor, 'that he had received such a letter, but that it was not signed and that he had

er saw a more ignoble countenance. Fouché explained to me, on leaving the breakfast table, in what manner all these valets of literature were men of his, and while I acknowledged to myself that the system might be necessary, I scarcely knew who were really more despicable-the wretches who thus sold themselves to the highest bidder, or the minister who boasted of having bought them, as if their acquisition were a glorious conquest. Judging that the Emperor had spoken to me of the scene I have described above, Fouché said to me, 'The Emperor's temper is soured by the resistance he finds, and he thinks it is my fault. He does not know that I have no power but by public

olitical body Napoleon despised them himself, and yet he wanted the nation to respect them. But respect was impossible, and the volatile Parisians made the Peers a constant object of their witticisms. The punsters of Paris made the following somewhat ingenious play upon words. Lallemand, Labedogure, Drouot, and Ney they called Las Quatre

00 stands of new arms; by the extraordinary activity and inducements offered this number was doubled. Workmen were also employed in repairing the old muskets. There was displayed at this momentous period the same activity in the capital as in 1793, and better directed, though without the same ultimate success. The clothing of the army was another difficulty

it was necessary to pay for everything in ready money. The system of public works was at the same time resumed throughout Fr

presented himself at the hotel of the Duke of Wellington with despatches from Blücher. We were all aware that the enemy was in movement, and the ignorant could not solve the enigma of the Duke going tranquilly to the ball at the Duke of

ching, and soon beheld from my windows the 5th reserve of the British army passing; the Highland brigade were the first in advance, led by their noble thanes, the bagpipes pl

which he was one of the first to hear, were clearly distinguished at Brussels. "Upon receiving the information that a powerful French force

icers had no time to change their silk stockings and dancing-shoes; and some, quite overcome by drowsiness, were seen lying asl

ss appeared to move simultaneously. I conversed with several of the officers previous to th

d it was not till some time after they were gone that it was generally known the whole F