The Emperor expressed a wish to go out, though the wind was extremely boisterous: we all walked to the extremity of the wood. He took a review of the Governor’s conduct, making remarks upon it in the rapid and copious way peculiar to himself; and he concluded by saying that if to-day we should agree to sign the declaration, in order to avoid being separated from him, to-morrow another ground of expulsion would be brought forward; and that he should wish our removal to be effected forcibly and at once, rather than tranquilly and in detail. Then, suddenly assuming a tone of pleasantry, he said that, after all, he could hardly believe the Governor wished to reduce his subjects to one only; and what sort of subject would that one be! added he—an absolute porcupine, on which he would not dare to lay a finger.
During our walk, two strangers approached pretty near to us. The Emperor made some one enquire who they were, and he was informed that they belonged to a vessel which was about to sail to-morrow for Europe. The Emperor asked whether they were likely to see any of the Ministers on their arrival in London; and they replied that they should see Lord Bathurst. “Tell him,” said Napolean, “[Napolean, “]that his instructions with respect to my treatment here are most odious, and that his agent executes them with scrupulous fidelity. If he wished to get rid of me, he should have despatched me at a blow, instead of thus killing me by inches. This conduct is truly barbarous; there is nothing English in it; and I can only attribute it to some personal hatred. I have too much respect for the Prince Regent, the majority of the Ministers, and the English nation, to suppose that they are responsible for my treatment. Be this as it may, their power extends only to the body; the soul is beyond their reach: it will soar to Heaven even from the dungeon.”
The Emperor, on his return home, took a bath; he was fatigued and harassed by the events of the day. He fell asleep, and I watched beside him, meditating on our new grievances.
At dinner he ate but a little. Some one made an observation, and the Emperor, not having heard it distinctly, asked what had been said—a thing which frequently happens. The words were then repeated in a louder tone, upon which he observed: “I am certainly growing deaf, for I occasionally miss hearing what is said, and I feel inclined to be angry when people speak louder than usual.” He concluded the evening by reading a part of Don Quixote. He was much amused at some comic passages; and, laying down the book, he remarked that we certainly showed a great deal of courage, since we could laugh at such trifles under our present circumstances. He paused for some moments, and seemed deeply wrapped in thought: then rising, he withdrew, saying: “Adieu, my dear friends.”
During dinner, a letter had been delivered to me from the Grand Marshal; but I had kept it concealed, conceiving that it augured no good. I opened it as soon as the Emperor withdrew. It enclosed a letter from the Governor, announcing that if we still persisted in our refusal to sign the declaration, he would immediately give orders for our removal to Europe. We yielded to the dictates of our hearts: to determine on leaving the Emperor was beyond our power; while at the same time it would have been going beyond his wishes, and perhaps too beyond his orders. With unanimous sentiments, we eagerly signed the declarations in the form in which they were presented to us, and delivered them to the English officer on duty at Longwood, together with a letter to the Grand Marshal, acquainting him with what we had done without his participation. We had been guided solely by our feelings, and we trusted that those feelings would afford us consolation, even though the Emperor should disapprove of the step we had taken.
We have now reached the consummation of our absolute slavery and dependence on the will and caprice of Sir Hudson Lowe; not merely by the signature we have just given him, but because he now knows our secret, and therefore it is in his power to compel us to submit to any thing he pleases.
ANECDOTES OF SIEYES.—THE EMPEROR FREQUENTLY ATTENDED POPULAR FESTIVITIES IN DISGUISE.—HIS VISITS TO THE FAUBOURG SAINT-ANTOINE, AFTER HIS RETURN FROM MOSCOW AND FROM THE ISLAND OF ELBA.—MANNERS DURING THE TIME OF THE DIRECTORY.—REMARKABLE OFFICIAL NOTE.
16th.—The Emperor sent for me about noon. He had been[been] reading and was just finishing his coffee. He desired me to sit down, and he entered into conversation. Not a word escaped him that could lead me to suppose he knew the determination we had adopted yesterday evening; he made no allusion to the subject, and it was not mentioned throughout the whole of the day. After breakfast, the Emperor walked about his apartments. The turn of the conversation introduced some anecdotes of former times, of which Sieyes was the subject. The Emperor related that while Sieyes was chaplain to the Princes of Orleans, being one day engaged in performing mass, something unexpectedly occasioned the Princes to withdraw during the service; upon which the Abbé, looking up and seeing only the valets present, immediately closed his book, observing that he was not engaged to perform mass to the rabble.
“Your Majesty,” said I, “was the first who made me acquainted with the name and person of Sieyes. A few days after my presentation at Court, your Majesty, at one of your audiences, having passed by me, stopped to speak to the person who stood next to me, addressing him by name. All my emigrant prejudices were yet in full force and I thought myself polluted by coming in contact with one whom I regarded as an absolute monster, and whom I had never heard mentioned except as an object of the bitterest imprecation.” “Doubtless,” said the Emperor, “you were thinking of the mort sans phrase. But I have heard it affirmed that Sieyes denied that.”
I now repeated an anecdote which used to be circulated in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, and on which, the first time I related it, the Emperor made no observation. Sieyes was described as having used the epithet tyrant in speaking of Louis XVI., to which Napoleon was said to have replied, “Monsieur l‘Abbé, if he had been a tyrant, I should not be here, and you would still be performing mass.” “I might have thought so,” said the Emperor, on my relating this anecdote for the second time; “but I should certainly not have been fool enough to say so. This is one of the absurd stories invented in the drawing-rooms of Paris. I never committed blunders of that kind: my object was to extinguish, and not to feed, the flame. The torrent of hostility was already too forcibly directed against certain leaders of the Revolution. I found it necessary to support and countenance them; and I did so. Some one having procured—God knows where—a bust of Sieyes in his ecclesiastical character, it was publickly exhibited, and occasioned a universal uproar. Sieyes, in a furious passion, set out to make a complaint to me; but I had already given the necessary reprimand, and the bust was again consigned to obscurity.