The Life, Exile and Conversations with Napoleon. Emmanuel-Auguste-Dieudonné Las Cases
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2nd.—My son having been, for some time past, troubled with a pain in his chest, accompanied by violent palpitation of the heart, I called in three surgeons, and they ordered him to be bled.—Bleeding is at present the favourite remedy with the English; it is their universal panacea. They employ it in all disorders, and sometimes where there is no disorder at all. They laughed at the astonishment we evinced at a treatment which was altogether new to us.
About the middle of the day we took a ride in the calash. On our return home, the Emperor wished to see a horse that had just been purchased for him: he thought him very handsome and well made. He tried him, declared that he liked him uncommonly, and then, with the most captivating good-nature, made me a present of him. However, I could not ride him: he proved vicious, and he was transferred to General Gourgaud, who is a much better horseman than I am.
THE EMPEROR’S PROGRESS IN LEARNING ENGLISH.
3rd–6th. The 3rd was a terrible day; the rain fell incessantly, and we found it impossible to stir out. The weather has continued wet for several days in succession. I never imagined that we could have contrived to stay for such a length of time within doors. The damp is penetrating on every side of our dwelling, and the rain is making its way through the roof. The bad weather without doors had an unpleasant effect upon us within.—I became very dull; the Emperor was by no means well, and I was not better. “What is the matter with you?” said he to me, one morning; “you seem quite altered for these few days past. Is your mind ailing? Are you conjuring up dragons, like Madame de Sevigné?”—“Sire,” I replied, “my illness is altogether bodily. The state of my eyes afflicts me exceedingly. As for my mind, I know how to keep that under the bridle. I can even use the curb, if needful; and your Majesty has given me a pair of spurs which will be my last and victorious resource.”
The Emperor devoted three, four, and even five hours at a time to the study of English. His progress was really very remarkable; he felt this, and was delighted at it. He frequently says that he is indebted to me for this conquest, and that he considers it a very important one. For my part, however, I can claim no other merit than the method which I adopted with regard to the other occupations of the Emperor. I first suggested the idea, and then continually reverted to it: and when it was once fairly set on foot, I followed up its execution with a promptitude and daily regularity which stimulated the Emperor to proceed. If any of us happened not to be ready at the moment he wanted us, if it was found necessary to postpone any business till the following day, he was immediately seized with disgust, and his labours were suspended until some circumstance occurred to induce him to renew them. “I stand in need of excitement,” said he, in one of these transient interruptions, “nothing but the pleasure of advancement can bear me through: for, between you and me, it must needs be confessed that there is nothing very amusing in all this. Indeed there is very little diversion in the whole routine of our present existence.”
The Emperor still continued to play two or three games at chess before dinner; in the afternoons we resumed reversis, long abandoned. Formerly we had not been regular in paying our debts of honour; and we henceforth agreed to pay the sums that we owed to each other into a general bank. We began to consider how the money thus accumulated should be disposed of. The Emperor asked our opinions, and one proposed that the money should be applied to the liberation of the prettiest female slave in the island. This idea was universally approved; we sat down to play with great spirit, and the first evening produced two Napoleons and a half.
THE EMPEROR LEARNS THE DEATH OF MURAT.
7th—8th. The Theban frigate arrived from the Cape, and brought us some newspapers. I translated them to the Emperor while we walked in the garden. One of these papers brought intelligence of a great catastrophe. I read that Murat, having landed in Calabria, with a few troops, had been seized and shot. At this unexpected news, the Emperor interrupted me by exclaiming, “The Calabrians were more humane, more generous, than those who sent me hither.” This was all he said; and after a few moments’ silence, as he said nothing, I continued to read.
Murat, without real judgment, without solid views, without a character proportioned to the circumstances in which he was placed, had perished in an attempt evidently desperate. It is not impossible that the Emperor’s return from Elba may have turned his brain, and inspired him with the hope of renewing the prodigy in his own person. Such was the miserable end of him who had been one of the most active causes of our reverses! In 1814, his courage and intrepidity might have saved us from the abyss in which his treachery involved us. He neutralized the Viceroy on the Po, and fought against him; whereas, by uniting together, they might have forced the passes of the Tyrol, made a descent into Germany, and arrived on Bâle and the banks of the Rhine, to destroy the rear of the allies and cut off their retreat from France.
The Emperor, while he was at Elba, disdained all communication with the King of Naples; but, on departing for France, he wrote to inform him that, being about to resume possession of his throne, he felt pleasure in declaring to him that all their past differences were at an end. He pardoned his late conduct, tendered him his friendship, sent some one to sign the guarantee of his States, and recommended him to maintain a good understanding with the Austrians, and to content himself with merely keeping them in check, in case they should attempt to march upon France. Murat, at this moment, inspired with the sentiments of his early youth, would receive neither guarantee nor signature. He declared that the Emperor’s promise and friendship were sufficient for him, and that he would prove he had been more unfortunate than guilty. His devotedness and ardour, he added, would obtain for him oblivion of the past.
“Murat,” said the Emperor, “was doomed to be our bane. He ruined us by forsaking us, and he ruined us by too warmly espousing our cause. He observed no sort of discretion. He himself attacked the Austrians, without any reasonable plan and without adequate forces; and he was subdued without striking a blow.”
The Austrians, when rid of Murat, cited his conduct either as a reason or as a pretence for attributing ambitious views to Napoleon when he again appeared on the scene. They constantly referred to Murat, whenever the Emperor made protestations of his moderation.
Before these unlucky hostilities of the King of Naples, the Emperor had already set on foot negotiations with Austria. Other inferior states, which I think it unnecessary to mention by name, had signified to him that he might rely on their neutrality. Doubtless the fall of the King of Naples gave another turn to affairs.
Endeavours have been made to represent Napoleon as a man of furious and implacable temper; but the truth is that he was a stranger to revenge, and he never cherished any vindictive feeling, whatever wrong he suffered. His anger was usually vented in violent transports, and was soon at an end. Those who knew him must be convinced of this fact. Murat had scandalously betrayed him; as I have already observed, he had twice ruined his prospects, and yet Murat came to seek an asylum at Toulon. “I should have taken him with me to Waterloo,” said Napoleon; “but such was the patriotic and moral feeling of the French army that it was doubtful whether the troops would surmount the disgust and horror which they felt for the man who had betrayed and lost France. I did not consider myself sufficiently powerful to protect him. Yet he might have enabled us to gain the victory. How useful would he have been at certain periods of the battle! For what was required, at certain moments of the day, to insure our success?—to break through three or four English squares; and Murat was admirable in such a service as this—he was precisely the man for it. At the head of a body of cavalry, no man was ever more resolute, more courageous, or more brilliant.
“As to drawing a parallel,” said the Emperor, ”between the circumstances of Napoleon and Murat—between the landing of the former in France and the entrance of the latter into the Neapolitan territory; no such parallel exists. Murat could have no good argument to support his cause,