[617] Napoleon to Champagny, Sept. 9, 1810.
[618] I cannot find anywhere any authority for Napier’s strange statement (iii. p. 261) that it was Almenara, and not Napoleon, who started the idea that Portugal should be exchanged for the Ebro Province. The nearest thing to it is that ‘M. d’Almenara déclare formellement qu’il ne consente à aucune cession de territoire espagnol, que cette compensation [Portugal] ne soit pas stipulée et garantie; mais comme il est dans l’intention formelle du roi de ne pas consentir à aucun démembrement, même avec une compensation plus avantageuse, il n’aurait jamais ratifié un pareil traité.’ Ducasse, Correspondance, vii. 190.
[619] Napoleon to Laforest, ambassador at Madrid, Nov. 7.
[620] Joseph to the Queen of Spain, Oct. 12. Ducasse, Correspondance, vii. 355.
[621] See his letters to his wife in December 1810 and January 1811, about his brother’s ‘mauvaises dispositions à mon égard.’
[622] He writes that at his most splendid State banquets nothing but china is now to be seen on his table.
[623] The question of the Consuls and Soult (mentioned in an earlier chapter) crops up again in Joseph to Berthier, Nov. 28.
[624] Napoleon to Berthier, Oct. 4, orders Digeon’s brigade of Lahoussaye’s dragoons to cross the Sierra Morena, thus leaving the king only four regiments of French cavalry in New Castile.
[625] Ducasse, Correspondance, vii. p. 361.
[626] Argüelles, Cortes de Cadiz, p. 160.