[273] Napoleon in a dispatch of 22 March (Correspondance, xxi. 496) blames Lahoussaye for not stopping in northern Estremadura, in touch with Soult.
[274] See Miot de Melito’s Mémoires, iii. 153-6.
[275] See vol. iii. pp. 506-7.
[276] See Miot’s Mémoires, iii. 160, for the discouraging results of this embassy.
[277] All this from the letter of the Queen of Spain, detailing her interview with the Duc de Cadore, who sent for her in the Emperor’s name on January 15, 1811, and administered this bitter message to her, for her husband’s benefit. See the letter given in Miot’s Mémoires, iii. 171-2. Cf. Napoleon’s dispatch to Laforest, ambassador at Madrid, Correspondance, 17,111.
[278] Miot’s Mémoires, iii. 176.
[279] Napoleon to Berthier, from Caen, May 27. Correspondance, no. 17,752.
[280] See Miot de Melito’s Mémoires, iii. 197-8, and compare it with the actual terms of Napoleon’s concession given in his letter to Berthier quoted above.
[281] All from the Caen memorandum for Berthier quoted above.
[282] For dispatches concerning this, and notes as to the troops and ships to be employed, see Correspondance, 17,824, 17,875, &c. The project seems to have been seriously thought over, the Emperor wrongly believing that England was stripped of regular troops.