tails, and bears strong internal evidence of accuracy.* Buonaparte, he says, was too cunning to let him into the secret of his means, and thereby to place himself at the mercy of a single man; and well it was for his own interests that Buonaparte did so, at least if he thought of Fouché as Fouche thought of himself.

"The revolution of St. Cloud would have failed had I opposed it; it was in my power to mislead Sieyes, put Barras on his guard, and enlighten Gohier and Moulins; I had only to back Dubois de Crance, the only opposing minister, and the whole would have fallen to the ground." Vol. I. p. 97.

We come now to the most interesting part of the work.— Marengo confirmed the power which Buonaparte had seized, and he was only exposed to domestic treachery. It became therefore one of the chief objects of the Minister of Police, to guard the First Consul's person: the means upon which he fixed are sufficiently characteristic of the state of public morals.

"Luckily I had Josephine in my interest; Duroc was not against me; and the private secretary was devoted to my views. This personage, who was replete with ability and talent, but whose greediness of gain very shortly caused his disgrace, always exhibited so much cupidity that there is no occasion to name him in order to point him out. Having the controul over the papers and secrets of his master, he discovered that I spent 100,000 francs monthly, for the purpose of incessantly watching over the existence of the First Consul. The idea come into his head to make me pay for such intelligence as he might supply me, in order to furnish means of accomplishing the aim I had in view. He sought me, and offered to inform me exactly of all the proceedings of Buonaparte for 25,000 francs per month; and he made me this offer as a means of saving 900,000 francs per annum. I took care not to let this opportunity slip, of having the private secretary of the chief of the state in my pay; that chief whom it was so requisite for me to follow step by step, in order to know what he had done, and what he was about to do. The proposal of the secretary was accepted, and he every month very punctually received a blank order for 25,000 francs, the promised sum, which he was to draw out of the treasury. On my side, I had full reason to congratulate myself on his dexterity and accuracy. But I took care not to starve the funds which I employed, in order to protect the person of Buonaparte from any unforeseen attack. The palace alone dried up more than half the resource of my 100,000

We have been much struck by the close accordance of the details given by Fouché, who was an eye-witness to many of the transactions, and had an intimate knowledge of them all, with the account which is to be found in Rivington's Annual Register for 1800; a work which was compiled before the appearance of

these Memoirs

francs, which were monthly available. In fact, I was by that means very accurately apprized of all that was important for me to know; and I was enabled, reciprocally, to control the information of the secretary, by that of Josephine, and that of the latter by the secretary." Vol. I. p. 161.

The violence of Buonaparte's temper is forcibly pourtrayed by many anecdotes, some of which must be true. Though owing his elevation in a great degree to the exertions of Lucien, as President of the Council of Five Hundred, their communication soon afterwards was interrupted by scenes of intemperate quarrelling. On one occasion, Lucien threw on his brother's desk his portfolio of Minister, and disclaimed all future connection with "such a despot." Buonaparte, equally exasperated, called his aides-de-camp on duty, and turned out the citizen who had forgotten the respect due to the First Consul. Lucien soon after was sent as Ambassador to Madrid. On the receipt of the intelligence of the assassination of the Emperor Paul, Fouché found the First Consul grasping and twisting the despatch, while he walked about the room with a hurried manner and a haggard air. "What," said he, " an Emperor not in safety in the midst of his guards!" Fouché pointedly drew his attention to the difference of habits in the south of Europe; but Buonaparte dwelt upon his own similar danger, and his thoughts plainly reverted to his escape from the infernal machine. "He gave vent to his passion in ejaculations, stamping of the foot, and short fits of rage. I never beheld so striking a scene."

By a Court intrigue the administration of Police was soon afterwards annexed to the Minister of Justice, and Fouché received his dismissal. The reserve of money belonging to the account of secret management, which he transferred to the First Consul on retiring, amounted to the enormous sum of nearly 2,400,000 francs; of this Buonaparte presented him with one half.

Though nominally unengaged in administration, Fouché still received occasional employment; and in 1802, he was appointed one of a Commission to treat with the Swiss deputies. He was an observer of politics, and frequently was in open communication with Buonaparte; enough so to condemn what he terms "his imprudent interview" with Lord Whitworth, and that act of "exaggeration, indignation and rage," the arrest of all English travellers, which he justly stigmatizes as an unprecedented violence against the Rights of nations. The following is his account of the murder of the Duke d'Enghien:

"I was one of the first to obtain a knowledge of the mission of

Căulincourt and Ordener to the banks of the Rhine; but when I was informed that the telegraph had just announced the arrest of the Prince, and that the order to transfer him from Strasbourg to Paris was given, I foresaw the catastrophe, and I trembled for the life of the noble victim. I hurried to Malmaison, where the First Consul then was; it was the 29th Ventose, (20th March 1804). I arrived there at nine o'clock in the morning, and I found him in a state of agitation, walking by himself in the park. I entreated permission to say a word to him about the great events of the day. "I see," said he, "what brings you; I am about this day to strike a great and necessary blow." I represented to him that France and Europe would be roused against him, if he did not supply undeniable proof that the Duke had conspired against his person at Ettenheim. “ What necessity is there for proof?" he exclaimed: “Is he not a Bourbon, and the most dangerous of all of them." I persisted in offering arguments of policy calculated to silence the reasons of state. But all in vain; he concluded by impatiently telling me, "Have not you and your friends told me a thousand times, that I should conclude by becoming the General Monk of France, and by restoring the Bourbons? Very well! there will no longer be any way of retreating. What stronger guarantee can I give to the Revolution, which you have cemented by the blood of a king? It is, besides, indispensible to bring things to a conclusion; I am surrounded by plots; I must imprint terror or perish." In saying these last words, which left nothing more to hope, he had approached the castle; I saw M. de Tallyrand arrive, and a moment after the two consuls, Cambacérès and Lebrun. I regained my carriage, and re-entered my own house in a state of consternation.

"The next day I learned, that after my departure a council had been held, and that Savary had proceeded at night to the execution of the unfortunate victim; atrocious circumstances were quoted. Savary had revenged himself, it was reported, of having missed his prey in Normandy, where he had flattered himself with having ensnared, by means of the net-work of the conspiracy of Georges, the Duke de Berri and the Count d'Artois, whom he would have more willingly sacrificed than the Duke d'Enghien. Réal assured me that he was so little prepared for the nocturnal execution, that he had departed in the morning to go to the Prince at Vincennes, expecting to conduct him to Malmaison, and conceiving that the First Consul would finish the affair in a magnanimous manner. But a coup d'état appeared indispensible to impress Europe with terror, and eradicate all the germs of conspiracy against his person.

Indignation, which I had foreseen, broke out in the most sanguinary manner. I was not the person who hesitated to express himself with the least restraint respecting this violence against the rights of nations and humanity. "It is more than a crime," I said, "it is a political fault;" words which I record because they have been repeated and attributed to others." Vol. I. p. 263.

Buonaparte was now Emperor; the Imperial power was

hereditary in his family, but having no issue male, he might adopt the children or grand-children of his brothers. Well may Fouché say, that the "domestic situation" which he here presents us, requires the pen of a Suetonius! Are we to believe the disgusting tale, or to attribute it to the malignity of the writer's imagination.

"For a long time Napoleon was convinced, notwithstanding the artifices of Josephine, that she would never give him any progeny. This situation was calculated sooner or later to tire the patience of the founder of a great empire, in all the vigour of his age. Josephine, therefore, found herself between two rocks; infidelity and divorce. Her anxieties and alarms had increased since his accession to the consulship for life, which she knew was only a stepping stone to the empire. In the interim, mortified by her sterility, she conceived a plan for substituting her daughter Hortense in the affection of her husband, who already, in a sensual point of view, was escaping from her, and who, in the hope of seeing himself born again in a son, might break the knot which united him to her; it would not have been without pain. On one side, habit; on the other, the amiable temper of Josephine, and a kind of superstition. seemed to secure to her for ever the attachment, or at least the attentions, of Napoleon; but great subject for inquietude and anxiety did not the less exist. The preservative naturally presented itself to the mind of Josephine; she was even little impeded in the execution of her plan.

Hortense, when young, had felt a great dislike to the husband of her mother; she indeed detested him: but by degrees, time, age, and the halo of glory which surrounded Napoleon, and his attentions to Josephine, induced Hortense to pass from the extreme of antipathy to adoration. Without being handsome, she was witty, sparkling, replete with graces and talents. She pleased; and the liking became so animated on both sides, that it was sufficient for Josephine to affect the air of being maternally pleased, and afterwards to shut her eyes upon the matter, in order to secure her domestic triumph. The mother and daughter reigned at the same time in the heart of this haughty man. When, according to the mother's views, the tree began to bear fruit, it was necessary to think of masking, by a sudden marriage, an intrigue which already began to reveal itself to the eyes of the courtiers. Hortense would have willingly given her hand to Duroc but Napoleon, looking to the future, and calculating from that time the possibility of an adoption, wished to concentrate in his own family, by a double incest, the intrigue to which he was about to be indebted for all the charms of paternity. Thence the union of his brother Louis and Hortense-a melancholy union, and which ended in rending the veil of deception.

"Mean time the wishes of all parties, with the exception of those of the new husband, were, at first, auspiciously fulfilled. Hortense gave birth to a son, who took the name of Napoleon, and on whom Napoleon lavished marks of tenderness, of which he was not believed

susceptible. This child came forward in the most charming manner; and by its features alone doubly interested Napoleon at the period of his accession to the empire. No doubt he designed him from that time in his heart as his adopted son." Vol. I. p. 269.

"I recognize myself in this child!--this boy will be worthy to succeed me; he may even surpass me!" were some of Buonaparte's expressions. His hopes were early destroyed. by the croup, which carried off its victim suddenly, and Fouché remarks, that he "never saw Napoleon a prey to deeper or more concentrated grief."

Though not unsusceptible of the attractions of women, no sentiment ever appears to have mingled in Buonaparte's amours. Fouché has related an amusing anecdote, which, in order of time, we should have noticed before the last. While

at Milan, the First Consul had been struck by the beauty of a celebrated Opera singer, and had commissioned Berthier to treat with and transport her to Paris. Her establishment was sufficiently splendid, 13,000 francs per month. To avoid scandal, and to escape the jealous vigilance of Josephine, Buonaparte's visits were abrupt and clandestine; and the haughty and impassioned Italian felt but little honoured by an attachment of which her lover avowed himself to be ashamed. Though invulnerable in the field of Mars, Buonaparte underwent the common lot of mortals in that of Venus, and his frail mistress atoned for his inattention in the embraces of Rode, a violin player.

"While these intrigues were going on, Buonaparte one day told me that he was astonished, with my acknowledged ability, that I did not conduct the police better, and that there were circumstances of which I was ignorant.- Yes," I replied, "there are things of which I was ignorant, but of which I am so no longer; for instance, a little man, muffled up in a gray great coat, often issues, on dark nights, from a back door of the Thuilleries, accompanied by a single attendant, mounts a shabby vehicle, and proceeds to ferret out a certain Signora G; that little man is yourself; and the misjudging vocalist sacrifices her fidelity to you in favour of Rode, the violinplayer." At these words the Consul, turning his back upon me and remaining silent, rang the bell, and I withdrew. An aide-de-camp was commissioned to perform the part of a black eunuch to the unfaithful fair one, who indignantly refused to submit to the regulations of the seraglio. She was first deprived of her establishment and pensions, in hope of reducing her to terms by famine; but deeply in love with Rode, she remained inflexible, and rejected the most brilliant offers of the Pylades Berthier. She was then compelled to quit Paris; she first retired into the country with her lover; but afterwards both made their escape, and went to Russia to recruit their fortune." Vol. I. p. 200.