Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 3,263 pages of information about Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon.

Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 3,263 pages of information about Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon.
crowned by the armistice, concluded on the 6th of July.  This armistice was broken on the 1st of September, and renewed after the battle of Hohenlinden.  On his return from Marengo Bonaparte was received with more enthusiasm than ever.  The rapidity with which, in a campaign of less than two months, he had restored the triumph of the French standard, excited universal astonishment.  He then actively endeavoured to open negotiations with England and Austria; but difficulties opposed him in every direction.  He frequently visited the theatre, where his presence attracted prodigious throngs of persons, all eager to see and applaud him.

The immense number of letters which were at this time addressed to the First Consul is scarcely conceivable.  They contained requests for places, protestations of fidelity, and, in short, they were those petitionary circulars that are addressed to all persons in power.  These letters were often exceedingly curious, and I have preserved many of them; among the rest was one from Durosel Beaumanoir, an emigrant who had fled to Jersey.  This letter contains some interesting particulars relative to Bonaparte’s family.  It is dated Jersey, 12th July 1800, and the following are the most remarkable passages it contains: 

I trust; General, that I may, without indiscretion, intrude upon your notice, to remind you of what, I flatter myself, you have not totally forgotten, after having lived eighteen or nineteen years at Ajaccio.  But you will, perhaps, be surprised that so trifling an item should be the subject of the letter which I have the honour to address to you.  You cannot have forgotten, General, that when your late father was obliged to take your brothers from the college of Autun, from whence he went to see you at Brienne, he was unprovided with mousy, and he asked me for twenty-five louis, which I lent him with pleasure.  After his return he had no opportunity of paying me, and when I left Ajaccio your mother offered to dispose of some plate in order to pay the debt.  To this I objected, and told her that I would wait until she could pay me at her convenience, and previous to the breaking out of the revolution I believe it was not in her power to fulfil her wish of discharging the debt.
I am sorry, General, to be obliged to trouble you about such a trifle.  But such is my unfortunate situation that even this trifle is of some importance to me.  Driven from my country, and obliged to take refuge in this island, where everything is exceedingly expensive, the little sum I have mentioned, which was formerly a matter of indifference, would now be of great service to me.
You will understand, General, that at the age of eighty-six, after serving served my country well for sixty years, without the least interruption, not counting the time of emigration, chased from every place, I have been obliged to take refuge here, to subsist on the scanty succour given by the English
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