“They have seized your papers, amongst which, they know there were some belonging to me, without the least formality, in the room next to mine, with a ferocious eclat and manifestation of joy. I was informed of it a few moments afterwards, and looked from the window, when I saw that they were hurrying you away. A numerous staff was prancing round the house; me thought I saw the inhabitants of the Pacific Ocean dancing round the prisoner whom they are about to devour.”
[25]. “There is in this country a German botanist, who has been here for the last six months, and who saw them in the gardens of Shoenbruna, a few months before his departure. The barbarians have carefully prevented him from coming to give me any news respecting them.”
[26]. “The last moments of which will be an opprobrium to the English name; and Europe will one day stigmatize with horror that perfidious and wicked man; all true Englishmen will disown him as Briton.”
[27]. This letter was written by one of Napoleon’s suite; but the Emperor himself, with his own hand, marked the punctuation. I have mentioned in a former part of my Journal that, in his writing, the Emperor was perfectly careless of orthography; yet it is singular that, in the letter here alluded to, he has himself corrected the slightest errors.
[28]. I must here introduce a correction respecting General Gourgaud. It was, by mistake, mentioned in the early part of this work that General Gourgaud negotiated for permission to proceed to St. Helena. He was one of the individuals selected by the Emperor.
[29]. Chance has thrown in my way a document, which affords a decided proof of the manner in which Lord Charles Somerset acted. I have now in my possession a duplicate of a letter from Mr. Goulburn, the Under Secretary of State, addressed to Madame Las Cases, at Paris, and dated February 21st, 1817. The letter states that Mr. Goulburn is commissioned, by Lord Bathurst, to inform Madame Las Cases of the departure of her husband from St. Helena for the Cape; and that, in case he should determine on returning to Europe, he might be expected about the month of May. Yet I did not leave the Cape until three months later, namely, about the end of August! Thus it would appear that Lord Bathurst had no intention of detaining me there; and that Lord Charles Somerset, instead of executing the orders of the English Minister, merely obeyed the suggestions of Sir Hudson Lowe. I certainly have no reason to suppose that Lord Bathurst would, in the slightest degree, regret this irregularity, however fatal it might be to me. But, if I know any thing of the character of Lord Charles, I am sure he must have been sorry for it. Being fully persuaded of this, I sincerely forgive him for the treatment I experienced.
[30]. See the Letter from the Emperor Napoleon to Count Las Cases, after his removal from Longwood.
[31]. Letter from Count Montholon in answer to Sir Hudson Lowe.
[32]. Similar letters had been addressed to the Emperor of Austria and to the King of Prussia, varied only in some particulars, as the individual circumstances of these Princes respectively required.
[33]. Unless this should be what a Minister intended to allude to in the British Parliament, on the 14th May, 1818. Endeavouring to justify the persecutions exercised against Count de Las Cases, he said that he had been found out in an attempt to establish a correspondence in Europe through the medium of England. But the noble Lord only made the assertion orally, and refused to exhibit the official documents that would have afforded a proof of it. An opinion may be formed on this subject from this latter circumstance.