V
A memorandum by Napoleon—English opinions concerning him in other days—His effigy burnt at Norwich—The Chevalier de Bardelin—Interesting relics at Highclere—My sight of Marie Louise—The Emperor at Mass—His love of church bells—Sir Henry Drummond Wolff’s visit to Elba—Hears recollections of Napoleon’s gardener—Anecdotes—The Emperor and General Lecourbe—Baron von Kleist—Mr. Manning—Napoleon in London—“The Midnight Review.”
Amongst the odds and ends which I have pasted into different volumes I found the other day a memorandum, dated 28ème Pluviôse, an 4 de la République, addressed to the Minister of War and signed by Buonaparte, at that time General-in-Chief of the Army of the Interior. The memorandum in question deals with a request for increased pay made by certain officers, which General Buonaparte declares, on account of la modicité de leur traitement, to be fondé et légitime. The signature of the great captain is a very original one, the letters running very much together, and the whole ending with a double and determined flourish. Looking at it my mind wandered back to the days of my childhood when Napoleon was still remembered as having been a terrible and dangerous foe to this country.
NAPOLEON’S EFFIGY BURNT
It is difficult, indeed, for those of a later generation to realise the feelings of Englishmen of even seventy years ago towards our neighbours—now our friendly allies—across the Channel. To those who had lived through the time of the Napoleonic wars France was ever a rapacious and world-enslaving country, only awaiting another Buonaparte to make a descent upon the shores of England.
To-day the name of the great Emperor, now almost a mythical figure, arouses as much admiration here as across the Channel, but to those who had actually experienced the feeling that a French invasion was immediately imminent, the French were brigands and Napoleon merely “Boney”—feared, hated, and despised.
In the early years of the nineteenth century, when all England was in daily anticipation of a French invasion, Norwich was not behindhand in publicly demonstrating its hatred of the Corsican tyrant.
At a celebration of his defeat in 1813 an effigy of Buonaparte was burned in the market-place, whilst a year later another effigy, loaded with fetters, was paraded in processions both at Yarmouth and Thetford. On the restoration of the Bourbons there was a great demonstration in the market-place at Norwich, the church bells being rung and bonfires lit, whilst amidst uproarious cheering the Chevalier de Bardelin, for some twenty years an exile from France who had supported himself by giving drawing and French lessons at Thurgar’s school, took his seat on the mail coach, free, as he said, once more to return to his beloved France. He received a real old English farewell, horses, guard, coachman, and passengers being decorated with the emblem of the Bourbons, the white cockade. Before he came to Norwich (where he was universally popular) the Chevalier de Bardelin had been a garde du corps of Louis XVI., in which capacity he acted at Versailles on that memorable day, October 6, 1789, when the mob from Paris nearly assassinated the King and Queen. In 1816 M. de Bardelin married a Norfolk lady, Miss Sutton, and until his death in 1852, at the age of eighty-five, he kept in constant communication with his Norwich friends, whom he always delighted to welcome on their visits to France. His daughter became the Baroness de Fabry.
As late as 1843 there died at Lynn a man who had been a schoolfellow of Napoleon, and who in the days of his boyhood was said to have taken part in many a rough and tumble with him. This was Mr. Peter Lewis Dacheux, who, having many years before immigrated into England, had, as a Roman Catholic priest, long attended to the religious wants of such of his co-religionists as resided in the old Norfolk town.
There are a good many relics of Napoleon in England. At Hertford House is the table on which was signed the Treaty of Tilsit, whilst in the library of Highclere Castle, the beautiful home of Lord Carnarvon, is shown the table and chair used by the Emperor when putting his signature to the act of abdication at Fontainbleau. On the right arm of the chair is an “N,” roughly cut as if with a penknife, said to be the work of Napoleon himself, it having been a well-known habit of his to cut almost mechanically an initial upon the arm of his chair whilst pondering over the various schemes which perpetually occupied his mind.
My father possessed a very fine bust of the Emperor by Canova, but what has now become of it I am quite unable to say. I also remember at Wolterton a print of Napoleon, given to my uncle, General Walpole, by the lovely Pauline Borghese—this, fortunately, my nephew, the present Lord Orford, still retains.
It is curious to read of the difference which Napoleon showed in his treatment of Marie Louise and Josephine. The former he sometimes allowed to enter his cabinet de travail, whereas Josephine would never have been permitted to set foot in it. The Emperor in all probability allowed his Austrian consort more latitude on account of her royal birth, for of the two women Josephine without question was the better loved of the two.
MARIE LOUISE
Oddly enough, I can say that in a sort of way I once saw the Empress Marie Louise. In 1843, when travelling on the Continent with my parents, we stopped an evening at Villach, a town in Germany just on the Italian frontier. There was at that time no railway, and the very evening we arrived the ex-Empress Marie Louise was expected at seven o’clock, having sent on orders for horses to be in readiness. I remember that the postillions in the courtyard were in a great state of excitement, being helped to don their state liveries by the bustling damsels of the inn. Everybody, indeed, was eagerly expectant, but all had to wait till nine o’clock before Marie Louise arrived, and when she did come all our hopes of seeing her were dashed to the ground, for it was too dark to see much, except the four exceedingly dusty carriages which conveyed her and her suite.
A certain number of the numerous portraits of the Emperor were drawn from life whilst he was at Mass. This was said to be the best time to catch his expression. Couder sketched him thus in 1811, and Girodet twice in 1812, whilst many other portraits of him are known to have been inspired during this religious function. During Mass Napoleon stood, according to the military custom, with his arms folded and his eyes glancing in all directions. He made little pretence of following the service or taking any especial interest in it, never knelt, but stood, grave, serious, and meditative. In front of him, at a prie-dieu, knelt the Empress, to whom he would occasionally stoop down and address a remark. On the whole his attitude was in no way irreverent, and contrasted very favourably with that which Louis XVI. is reported to have adopted in the Chapel of Versailles, where some English visitors were scandalised at seeing the King laughing and joking with the Comte d’Artois.
THE EMPEROR AT MASS
The Emperor’s attendance at Mass was accompanied with considerable ceremonial. On each side of the altar in the chapel a grenadier stood on guard, whilst a roll of drums announced the entry of the Emperor and Josephine. The whole building glittered with the brilliant uniforms of the imperial household, whilst a certain portion was set aside for ladies-in-waiting and other friends of the Empress. Nevertheless, Napoleon would never allow any special passes of admission to be issued for his chapel, declaring that public worship should be free and for the people. Any charge for chairs in a building devoted to religious purposes seemed to him odious. “One ought not to deprive the poor,” said he, “because they are poor, of that which is a consolation in their poverty.”
When Napoleon re-established the Catholic religion in France, Girardin told him that he would find attendance at Mass a bore, and advised him to see that some excellent musicians and singers should always be present to mitigate the tedium of the ceremony. The Emperor took his advice and procured some of the best artistes that Paris could produce. These were well paid, dividing between them some six thousand pounds.
In matters of religion Napoleon betrayed the genius of a consummate politician, as was shown by his conciliatory attitude when in Egypt towards Mahomedanism, which faith he ordered his troops to respect. As regards his own personal beliefs it would seem that at all events he was very far from being an unbeliever, his habit of crossing himself in moments of danger, for instance, going to prove this. One of the Emperor’s favourite maxims, indeed, was, “The future is in the hand of God.” By nature inclined to fatalism, he was also imbued with a good deal of native Corsican superstition. Friday in particular he ever considered a momentous day: on a Friday he entered the military school of Brienne, and on a Friday he left Saint Cloud to set out upon his disastrous Russian campaign.
The sound of church bells was always especially pleasing to Napoleon and produced a most extraordinary effect upon him. At Malmaison he would listen to the church bell of the village of Rueil with the greatest pleasure, breaking off from any conversation in which he might be engaged to do so. “Ah!” he would say, “that sound recalls to me my early days at Brienne; how happy I was in those days!”
Never, probably, did any man excite such hatred, and, on the other hand, arouse such devotion as the Emperor.
NAPOLEON’S GARDENER
When travelling in the island of Elba in 1854, my cousin, Sir Henry Drummond Wolff (then Mr. Wolff), came across an octogenarian who had been Napoleon’s gardener, and had gone with him to the palace of La Malmaison. Monsieur Holard, as this old man was called, told Mr. Wolff that though he had for ever lost his benefactor his name was graven on his heart—he had indeed made desperate efforts to follow the Emperor to St. Helena, but, not being allowed to do so, found himself, by the irony of fate, gardener to the Duke of Wellington, then (1817) residing at Mont St. Martin in the department of the Aisne. He had been recommended to the Duke by Sir Neil Campbell, and at first had had some scruples as to the propriety of entering the service of his imperial master’s conqueror. These, however, were overcome, and Monsieur Holard spoke gratefully of the kindness shown both to himself and his wife.
A great favourite with the Emperor, he told how, wishing to give his master a pleasant surprise, he rose one morning early, in order to arrange a number of small flower-pots in the cyphers of each member of the imperial family. Before his task was quite finished, however, Napoleon, ever an early riser, appeared on the scene and expressed his pleasure at such an ingenious device, adding, however, that one cypher had been forgotten—one which, as he said, should have been placed first—the cypher of Queen Hortense. But Holard was not to be found wanting, for, producing a quantity of pots filled with the flower called hortensia, he explained how at that very moment he was just about to arrange the missing cypher.
“Ah! Coquin,” said his master, whilst he affectionately pulled the gardener’s ear, “I have never found you fail yet.”
A CHEQUERED CAREER
The hortensia, as it is called in France and Germany, is the magnificent Chinese flower known in England as the hydrangea. The French sea-captain who brought home the plant from China in 1790 named it hortensia as a compliment to his wife, whose name was Hortense. It quickly became very popular in Europe, and was the “Lieblings blume” or favourite flower of Queen Louisa of Prussia and also of the great Goethe. When Mr. Wolff paid his visit to Elba, Claude Holard was, as has been said, an old man of eighty, but his mental faculties were in no wise impaired by age or by the many vicissitudes which had fallen to his lot, and he gave his visitor many details of his life, which had been anything but an uneventful one. Born at Metz in 1773, he became a soldier in the Austrian army at the early age of fifteen, saw service, and was taken prisoner by the forces of Dumouriez near Brussels. Allowed to return to his native place, he afterwards joined the army of the Ardennes, and was wounded at the battle of Fleurus whilst fighting under Jourdan. This wound ended his military career, and he became Syndic of Marine at the port of Breskens, a small town on the Scheldt opposite Flushing, and married, for his prosperity seemed now assured. A trading vessel, however, in which he had sunk his little fortune, was captured by the enemy, and this loss, in addition to the difficulty of collecting certain debts, eventually caused him to leave Breskens and make his way to Fontainebleau, there to lay before the Emperor the story of his misfortunes, which were much aggravated by the poor state of health into which he had fallen. Certain persons of influence interested themselves on his behalf, and he was nominated gardener to the Emperor’s sister, Princess Elise of Piombino, afterwards Grand Duchess of Tuscany, in which capacity he served till 1814, when, being ordered to repair to Elba, he was made director of the imperial gardens, becoming, in due course, gardener of the palace of La Malmaison during the hundred days. After the Emperor’s final defeat and fall, the poor man, as has been said, made every effort to be allowed to accompany his imperial master to St. Helena; but this was not to be, and then followed a long period filled with undeserved misfortune. It was in 1851 that Prince Demidoff engaged him once more as head gardener in the gardens of San Martino at Elba, the same post which the old man had occupied many years before under the great Emperor; and, though this relieved him of all fear of actual penury, Mr. Wolff was informed that he was much hampered and worried by many vexatious restrictions and regulations not at all to the taste of an old soldier of the Napoleonic times.
Whilst at Elba, Mr. Wolff was told several anecdotes about the Emperor, of which the following shows very clearly that the idea of a return to France was ever present in the great captain’s mind.
A balustrade being in course of erection in some part of the so-called palace of San Martino, one of the Emperor’s suite declared the wood to be so bad and the bars so thin that the whole affair could not last for any time at all. “How long,” asked his imperial master, “do you give it then—a year?” “Yes, sire,” was the reply. “That will do,” rejoined the Emperor, with a smile.
During his stay at Porto Ferrajo, Mr. Wolff had an opportunity of inspecting the books left behind by the Emperor. Amongst them he particularly noticed two French handbooks to the study of the English language, a rough cypher “N” being pasted on the back of each. Most of the leaves were uncut, but another linguistic guide showed signs of having been a good deal perused. This work, in which the original English was placed side by side with a French translation, was entitled The Hundred Thoughts of a Young Lady—“Cent pensées d’une Jeune Anglaise”—written by Mistress Gillet. Queer reading this must have been for the conqueror of Austerlitz!
Napoleon’s flag at Elba, which is, I believe, still in existence—three golden bees on a red band running diagonally over a white ground—was a modification of an old Tuscan ensign, made by the ship’s tailors of the Undaunted, the vessel which brought him to Elba.
Another smaller flag of the same sort, which is said to have been the regimental banner of the Old Guard which accompanied the Emperor to the island, may be seen amidst other Napoleonic relics at the Invalides in Paris, where also is his cocked hat decorated with an Elban cockade.
MONSIEUR LARABIT
During his visit to the island in 1854, Mr. Wolff had many conversations with persons who had been in close contact with Napoleon. He chanced to travel in company with a certain Monsieur Larabit, who, as a young officer of engineers, had superintended the repair and reconstruction of most of the defences of the island some forty years before, and who would often speak of the great interest taken by the Emperor in the completion of his palace (in reality little more than a country house) at San Martino; and also of the remark which he used to make, “Ce sera la maison d’un bon bourgeois riche de quinze mille livres de rente.” With this old senator (as he had now become) Mr. Wolff witnessed the tunny fishing for which Elba is noted, at the same time hearing from the veteran’s lips an account of how he had seen the Emperor on the 27th of June 1814 attempt to land one of these fish, and fail owing to lack of sufficient strength. As an instance of an extraordinary link between the present and the past, it may be mentioned that during his visit to Elba, Mr. Drummond Wolff was on one occasion rowed in a boat by a man whose father had for years been a prisoner in the hands of Algerian corsairs.
A striking instance of the almost mesmeric power which the Emperor Napoleon undoubtedly possessed, is shown by the reconciliation which he effected with General Lecourbe, the story of which, I think, has never been told in English.
Holding command in the army of the Rhine under Moreau, General Lecourbe must certainly be mentioned in the foremost rank of those who contributed to the military glory of France; but, nevertheless, owing to his devotion to Moreau, whose cause, when brought to trial by the First Consul, he warmly espoused, his name was ruthlessly obliterated from the roll of the French army. He had offended Buonaparte, and for ten years remained in the obscurity of civil life.
In 1815, however, after the Emperor’s return from Elba, generals of tried capacity had to be found, and Napoleon’s thoughts flew to Lecourbe. Accordingly, an order from the Ministry of War commanded him to present himself at the Tuileries, to which a curt reply was returned to the effect that General Lecourbe, being no longer a soldier, could not recognise any order of the sort; if the Emperor wished to see him one of his aides-de-camp must convey the intimation. On the morrow arrived an officer with a personal invitation from His Imperial Majesty to come the next day to the Tuileries at eleven o’clock in the morning. “I will go,” said the old warrior to a friend, “but I shall speak my mind—at last I shall be able to have it out with him.” The interview, indeed, seemed likely to be a stormy one.
GENERAL LECOURBE
At eleven the next morning the General (not in uniform) awaited the Emperor in the hall next his breakfast-room, from which Napoleon soon emerged. Perceiving Lecourbe, he at once motioned him to approach, but before he was able to do so strode forward himself (a thing he never did for anybody), and then, drawing himself up, fixed the old soldier with his eagle gaze.
“General Lecourbe,” said he in a resonant and penetrating voice, “your grievances against the Emperor Napoleon I confess are great, but they have not, I hope, obliterated all recollection of your old friend, General Buonaparte. He, remember, is still your friend; will you be his?”
At these words the veteran, already strangely moved by the mere appearance of the Emperor, completely lost his self-possession, whilst two big tears slowly rolled down his cheeks on to his grizzled moustache. Terribly embarrassed, he could hardly stammer out a few words of thanks, and his emotion rather increased than lessened when Napoleon said, “I was sure I should find again the comrade of other days!” Then, unbuckling his sword; “There will be work to do on the banks of the Rhine; you know the ground, and I can rely upon you?” “Yes, Sire, you may be sure of that.” “Take then this sword, General, as a pledge of our reconciliation; there is no one able to use it better than yourself.”
Upon this the old man, completely overcome, seized the hand of the Emperor in both of his own, and, rapturously kissing it, ejaculated: “Rely upon me, Sire! Rely upon me!”
That afternoon General Lecourbe’s name appeared in the Gazette as commander of an important army corps.
On the other hand, there were men in whom the great Napoleon inspired the most bitter hatred. Such a one was the Prussian general, Field-Marshal von Kleist, to whom the Emperor sent the Legion of Honour. Baron von Kleist, however, declined to wear it, and, purchasing a toy bust of Napoleon, hung the decoration around its neck, always carrying the bust with him wherever he went. The Emperor heard of this contemptuous treatment and was greatly incensed thereby, declaring that he would shoot von Kleist if he could catch him, but this he never did. The Baron had conceived a violent antipathy for the Man of Destiny on account of his rough and indeed almost brutal treatment of the gentle Queen of Prussia (Königin Louise), always declaring, indeed, that it had been with the greatest difficulty that he had restrained himself from drawing a loaded pistol from his pocket and killing the Emperor during the progress of the interview between the two sovereigns, at which he had been present.
BARON VON KLEIST
Baron von Kleist, when in command of a portion of the Prussian army in 1813, greatly contributed to the defeat of Napoleon at Leipzig. Disregarding the cautious orders of Prince Schwatzenburg, the Commander-in-chief, he marched by night across the heights of Nollendorf, and after a fierce battle completely defeated Marshal Vandamme, capturing sixty thousand men—practically the whole left wing of the French army. For this brilliant military feat he was made Graf von Nollendorf, and received from his King a complete dinner-service of fine Berlin china, included in which were several large vases, bearing on the one side the arms of von Kleist, and on the other the cross of Kulm, a decoration especially instituted for those who had taken part in the battle of that name. This dinner-service is still in the possession of the old soldier’s descendants.
It is believed that the only passport ever signed by Napoleon for an Englishman to visit England was one given to a Mr. Manning. This gentleman, whilst at Oxford, received what he considered to be a very serious affront or injury from the authorities of his college, and took the matter so much to heart that he migrated to France, where he became the intimate of many clever and learned Frenchmen, including Carnot and the Abbé Remusat. Becoming interested in the East, Mr. Manning afterwards set out on a long journey through Thibet, China, and Japan, travelling, it must be added, in native dress. In after-years, owing to his intimate acquaintance with the Chinese language, he was prevailed upon to accompany an English expedition to China, where, by a somewhat extraordinary chance, his vessel being shipwrecked, he was picked up and taken to St. Helena. Here he had an interview with Napoleon, during which, being asked by whom his French passport was signed, he tactfully replied, “Par l’Empereur,” an answer which much pleased the illustrious captive, who, by the special order of Hudson Lowe, was not allowed to be addressed otherwise than as General Buonaparte.
It may not be generally known, perhaps, that from time to time assertions have been made—some of the most emphatic kind—that Napoleon once actually passed a considerable time in London. The date of his visit is said to have been 1791-92, and the place of his residence George Street, Strand. Whilst in all probability there is not the slightest foundation for such a story, it would be curious to know from what circumstance such a report arose.
“THE MIDNIGHT REVIEW”
About the time that I was a child there was written a poem, in which Napoleon and his old army were resuscitated, by the very clever and original pen of a young Hungarian poet, Baron von Sedlitz by name. This poem, called the “Mitternachtliche Heerschau,” or “Midnight Review,” is still, I fancy, very well known on the Continent, but the English translations seem to be now totally forgotten. One of these, by William Ball, was set to music and sung by the famous singer Braham (the father of Frances, Lady Waldegrave) about 1831. He was an old man at the time, but nevertheless is said to have rendered the words with such weird and striking effect as to produce a very great impression upon his hearers. The version in question, which has been reprinted in Notes and Queries within comparatively recent years, rather fails to convey the impressive simplicity of effect attained by the original poem. There are lines, however, which are certainly striking:—
And at the midnight hour the chieftain leaves his grave,
Slowly he comes on his charger white amid his chosen brave;
The ranks salute their silent lord, the stately march renew,
And now with clanging music pass before their master’s view.
. . . . . . .
On their airy steeds on every side the thronging dead obey,
The blood-stained hosts of the battlefield in all their fierce array,
Ghastly beneath their glowing helms the grinning skulls appear,
And countless weapons high in air their bony hands uprear.
. . . . . . .
The weird scene which these verses describe has been depicted by Raffet, in one of whose lithographs the spectre of the great Emperor is shown passing a review of a phantom army.
Another translation of the “Midnight Review” was written by Mr. Leitch Ritchie, a well-known writer in his day, who at one time edited the Era, and also did a good deal of work for publications like the Keepsake and Heath’s Picturesque Annual. This version has not, to the best of my knowledge, been reprinted since it first appeared in a quarterly magazine (now somewhat difficult to obtain), about seventy-seven years ago, which will be my excuse for giving it here side by side with a French version which, it may be added, the Government of Charles X. sought to suppress. Though no great poetic genius is shown in Mr. Ritchie’s lines, avowedly a word for word translation, the writer may nevertheless be said to have caught something of the simple and impressive dignity which caused the German poem to create such a sensation when it first appeared, some six or seven years after the Emperor’s death.
“THE MIDNIGHT REVIEW”
THE MIDNIGHT REVIEW
Nachts um die zwölfte Stunde
Verlasst der Tambour sein Grabe,
Macht mit der Trummel die Runde,
Geht ewig auf und ab.
A minuit, de sa tombe
Le tambour se lève et sort,
Fait sa tournée et marche
Battant la caisse bien fort.
De ses bras décharnés
Remue conjointement
Les baguettes, bat la retraite,
Réveil et roulement.
La caisse sonne étrange,
Fortement elle retentit,
Dans leur fosse en ressuscitent
Les vieux soldats péris;
Et qui au fond du nord
Sous la glace enroidis,
Et qui trop chaudement gissent
Sous la terre d’Italie.
Et sous la bourbe du Nil
Et le sable de l’Arabie;
Ils quittent leur sépulture,
Leurs armes ils ont saisi.
Et à minuit, de sa tombe
Le trompette se lève et sort,
Monte à cheval et sonne
La trompe bruyant et fort.
Alors sur chevaux aériens
Arrivent les cavaliers,
Vieux escadrons célèbres
Sanglants et balafrés.
Sous le casque, leurs crânes
blanchâtres
Ricanent, et fièrement
Leurs mains osseuses soulèvent
Leurs glaives longs et tranchants.
Et à minuit, de sa tombe
Le chef se lève et sort;
A pas lents il s’avance
Suivi de l’état-major.
Petit chapeau il porte,
Habit sans ornemens,
Petite épée pour arme
Au côte gauche lui pend.
La lune à pale lueur
La vaste plaine éclaire;
L’homme au petit chapeau
Des troupes revue va faire.
Les rangs présentent les armes,
Lors sur l’épaule les mettant,
Toute l’armée devant le chef
Défile tambour battant.
On voit former un cercle
Des capitaines et généraux;
An plus voisin à l’oreille
Ce chef souffle un mot.
Ce mot va à la ronde,
Résonne le long de la Seine;
Le mot donné est la France,
La parole: Sainte-Hélène.
C’est là la grande revue
Qu’aux Champs-Élysées,
A l’heure de minuit
Tient César décédé.
At midnight, from his grave
The drummer woke and rose,
And beating loud the drum,
Forth on his round he goes.
Stirred by his fleshless arms,
The drumsticks patly fall,
He beats the loud retreat,
Réveille, and roll-call.
So strangely rolls that drum,
So deep it echoes round!
Old soldiers in their graves
Start to live at the sound.
Both they in farthest north,
Stiff in the ice that lay,
And who too warm repose
Beneath Italian clay.
Below the mud of Nile,
And ’neath Arabian sand;
Their burial-place they quit,
And soon to arms they stand.
And at midnight, from his grave
The trumpeter arose;
And mounted on his horse,
A loud shrill blast he blows.
On aery coursers then
The cavalry are seen,
Old squadrons erst renown’d,
Gory and gash’d, I ween.
Beneath the casque their
blanchèd skulls,
Smile grim, and proud their air
As in their bony hands
Their long sharp swords they bear.
And at midnight, from his tomb
The chief awoke and rose;
And followed by his staff,
With slow steps on he goes.
A little hat he wears,
A coat quite plain has he,
A little sword for arms,
At his left side hangs free.
O’er the vast plain the moon
A paly lustre threw;
The man with the little hat
The troops goes to review.
The ranks present their arms,
Deep roll the drums the while,
Recovering then, the troops
Before the chief defile.
Captains and gen’rals round
In circle form’d appear;
The chief to the first a word
Then whispers in his ear.
The word goes round the ranks,
Resounds along the Seine;
That word they give is—France,
The answer—Sainte-Hélène.
’Tis there, at midnight hour,
The grand review, they say,
Is by dead Cæsar held,
In the Champs-Élysées.