"COUNCIL OF STATE, PARIS,
"10th Thermidor, Year X of the French Republic.
"To GENERAL DUMAS.
"MY DEAR GENERAL,—A superstition prevents my complying with your request. I have been godfather five times, and my five godsons have all died! When the last died I vowed I would never name another child. You will probably think my superstition fanciful, but it would make me wretched to change my mind. I am an old friend of your family, therefore I feel sure I can count on your indulgence. My resolution must indeed be firmly fixed to refuse to act with your charming daughter. Offer my sincerest regrets to her and to your charming wife, and accept the assurance of my sincere attachment.
"BRUNE.
"P.S.—I have despatched various parcels for the little godmother and her mamma."
Nevertheless, my father insisted, in spite of this refusal and the superstitious fears it implied. I never saw the second letter, but I presume the omens were even more propitious and more convincing than in the first instance, for, at my father's urgent entreaties, a mezzo termine (half-way house) was arranged, and Brune agreed to stand, but he was to have a proxy in the person of my father, who was to hold me at the font in his stead.
No change was made with regard to my godmamma, who had no feelings of repugnance whatever towards her part in the ceremony, since it had already brought her so many bonbons, and promised more. For her it was a fête.
Brune, by proxy, and Aimée-Alexandre Dumas, my sister, aged nine years, were, therefore, my godfather and godmother.
It will be remembered that just before the Egyptian campaign it had been settled that if my mother bore a son, the godparents of this said son were to be Bonaparte and Joséphine. But things had changed greatly since then, and my father had no inclination to remind the First Consul of the general-in-chief's promise.
Bonaparte cruelly proved to my mother that he was not a Louis XII., who forgave the injuries he had received when duc d'Orléans.
The first glimmering of recollection in the darkness of my infant life would be about the year 1805. I can faintly remember the arrangements of the small country house we lived in, which was called les Fossés.
My topographical recollections stop short at the kitchen and dining-room, the two parts of the house I doubtless frequented with most sympathy.
I have not seen this house since 1805, but I can still recollect that there was a step down into the kitchen and a big block opposite the door; that the kitchen table came directly behind it; and, in front of this kitchen table, to the left, was the chimneyplace. This chimneyplace was an immense one, and inside it nearly always lay my father's favourite gun, a silver-mounted one, with a pad of green morocco at the butt-end. I was forbidden ever to touch this gun, under penalty of the most severe punishment, but I was always touching it, and my mother, in spite of her fears, never carried her threats into execution. Then, farther on, beyond the chimneyplace, was the dining-room, up three steps: the floor was parqueted in deal, and the wooden wainscoting was painted grey.