It was then that Bonaparte sent Joubert with a letter in his own handwriting, to be delivered into the hands of the Grand Seignior himself.  This Joubert is a foundling, and, was from his youth destined and educated to be one of the secret agents of our secret diplomacy.  You already, perhaps, have heard that our Government selects yearly a number of young foundlings or orphans, whom it causes to be brought up in foreign countries at its expense, so as to learn the language as natives of the nation, where, when grown up, they are chiefly to be employed.  Joubert had been educated under the inspection of our consuls at Smyrna, and, when he assumes the dress of a Turk, from his accent and manners even the Mussulmans mistake him for one of their own creed and of their country.  He was introduced to Bonaparte in 1797, and accompanied him to Egypt, where his services were of the greatest utility to the army.  He is now a kind of undersecretary in the office of our secret diplomacy, and a member of the Legion of Honour.  Should ever Joseph Bonaparte be an Emperor or Sultan of the East, Joubert will certainly be his Grand Vizier.  There is another Joubert (with whom you must not confound him), who was; also a kind of Dragoman at Constantinople some years ago, and who is still somewhere on a secret mission in the East Indies.

Joubert’s arrival at Constantinople excited both curiosity among the people and suspicion among the Ministry.  There is no example in the Ottoman history of a chief of a Christian nation having written to the Sultan by a private messenger, or of His Highness having condescended to receive the letter from the bearer, or to converse with him.  The Grand Vizier demanded a copy of Bonaparte’s letter, before an audience could be granted.  This was refused by Joubert; and as Brune threatened to quit the capital of Turkey if any longer delay were experienced, the letter was delivered in a garden near Constantinople, where the Sultan met Bonaparte’s agent, as if by chance, who, it seems, lost all courage and presence of mind, and did not utter four words, to which no answer was given.

This impertinent intrigue, and this novel diplomacy, therefore, totally miscarried, to the great shame and greater disappointment of the schemers and contrivers.  I must, however, do Talleyrand the justice to say that he never approved of it, and even foretold the issue to his intimate friends.  It was entirely the whim and invention of Bonaparte himself, upon a suggestion of Brune, who was far from being so well acquainted with the spirit and policy of the Divan as he had been with the genius and plots of Jacobinism.  Not rebuked, however, Joubert was ordered away a second time with a second letter, and, after an absence of four months, returned again as he went, less satisfied with the second than with his first journey.