He then talked to Caulaincourt with the insight that always illumined his judgments.  Marie Louise ought to have Tuscany, he said:  Parma would not befit her dignity.  Besides, if she had to traverse other States to come to him, would she ever do so?  He next talked of his Marshals.  Massena’s were the greatest exploits:  but Suchet had shown himself the wisest both in war and administration.  Soult was able, but too ambitious.  Berthier was honest, sensible, the model of a chief of the staff; and “yet he has now caused me much pain.”  Not a word escaped him about Davoust, still manfully struggling at Hamburg.  Not one of his Ministers, he complained, had come from Blois to bid him farewell.  He then spoke of his greatest enemy—­England.  “She has done me much harm, doubtless, but I have left in her flanks a poisoned dart.  It is I who have made this debt, that will ever burden, if not crush, future generations.”  Finally, he came back to the hateful compact which Caulaincourt pressed him in vain to sign.  How could he take money from the allies.  How could he leave France so small, after receiving her so great!

That same night he sought to end his life.  On February the 8th he had warned his brother Joseph that he would do so if Paris were captured.  During the retreat from Moscow he had carried about a phial which was said to contain opium, and he now sought to end his miseries.  But Caulaincourt, his valet Constant, and the surgeon Ivan were soon at hand with such slight cures as were possible.  After violent sickness the Emperor sank into deep prostration; but, when refreshed by tea, and by the cool air of dawning day, he gradually revived.  “Fate has decided,” he exclaimed:  “I must live and await all that Providence has in store for me."[454] He then signed the treaty with the allies, presented Macdonald with the sword of Murad Bey, and calmly began to prepare for his departure.

Marie Louise did not come to see him.  Her decision to do so was overruled by her father, in obedience to whose behests she repaired from Blois to Rambouillet.

There, guarded by Cossacks, she saw Francis, Alexander, and Frederick William in turn.  What passed between them is not known:  but the result was that, on April 23rd, she set out for Vienna, whence she finally repaired to Parma; she manifested no great desire to see her consort at Elba, but soon consoled herself with the Count de Neipperg.

No doubts as to her future conduct, no qualms of conscience as to the destiny of France now ruffled Napoleon’s mind.  Like a sky cleared by a thunderstorm, once more it shone forth with clear radiance.  Those who saw him now were astonished at his calmness, except in some moments when he declaimed at his wife and child being kept from him by Austrian schemes.  Then he stormed and wept and declared that he would seek refuge in England, which General Koeller, the Austrian commissioner appointed to escort him to Elba, strongly advised him to do.  But for the most part he showed remarkable composure.  When Bausset sought to soothe him by remarking that France would still form one of the finest of realms, he replied:  “with remarkable serenity—­’I abdicate and I yield nothing.’"[455] The words hide a world of meaning:  they inclose the secret of the Hundred Days.