"And you request—?"
"Leave to return to France, the first opportunity that presents itself."
"Very good. I promise you I will raise no difficulties in the way of your departure."
"I thank you, General: it is the only favour I ask of you;" and, bowing, my father walked to the door, unbolted it and went out.
As he withdrew, he thought he overheard Bonaparte muttering these words:
"Blind fool! not to believe in my fortunes!"
My father met Dermoncourt a quarter of an hour after, and related what had passed between Bonaparte and himself; and a score of times since has Dermoncourt repeated that conversation to me word for word—a conversation which had so momentous an influence on my father's and on my own future.
On August 1st the battle of Aboukir was fought, and the French fleet was destroyed. That put a stop, for the time, to the question of my father's return or that of anybody else.
That terrible battle had a disastrous effect on the army: even Bonaparte was momentarily overwhelmed by it, and exclaimed with Augustus: "Varus! what have you done with my legions?" He cried out several times, "Brueys! Brueys! what have you done with our ships?"
The uncertainty of his return to France troubled Bonaparte more than all. The fleet destroyed, he was no longer master of his actions; and the prospect of remaining six years in Egypt, which he had faced so calmly, now looked unendurable to him. When Bourrienne tried one day to comfort him, by telling him to rely on the Directory, he exclaimed: