The Surrender of Napoleon / Being the narrative of the surrender of Buonaparte, and of his residence on board H.M.S. Bellerophon, with a detail of the principal events that occurred in that ship between the 24th of May and the 8th of August 1815

by Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland

It is a sin to mix up any trifling story with so great an event; but a circumstance occurred so laughable of itself, rendered more so from the solemnity of the occasion, that I cannot resist mentioning it. While in this state of eager expectation, a young midshipman, one of the Bruces of Kennet, I think, walked very demurely up to Manning, the boatswain, who was standing all importance at the gangway, and after comically eyeing his squat figure and bronzed countenance, Bruce gently laid hold of one of his whiskers, to which the boatswain good-naturedly submitted, as the youngster was a great favourite with him.

"Manning," says he, most sentimentally, "this is the proudest day of your life; you are this day to do the honours of the side to the greatest man the world ever produced or ever will produce."

Here the boatswain eyed him with proud delight.

"And along with the great Napoleon, the name of Manning, the boatswain of the Bellerophon, will go down to the latest posterity; and, as a relic of that great man, permit me, my dear Manning, to preserve a lock of your hair."

Here he made an infernal tug at the boatswain's immense whisker, and fairly carried away a part of it, making his way through the crowd, and down below with the speed of an arrow. The infuriated boatswain, finding he had passed so rapidly from the sublime to the ridiculous, through the instrumentality of this imp of a youngster, could vent his rage in no way but by making his glazed hat spin full force after his tantalizer, with a "G—d d——n your young eyes and limbs." The hat, however, fell far short of young Bruce, and the noise and half burst of laughter the trick occasioned drew the attention of the Captain, who, coming up, with a "What, what's all this?" the poor boatswain was glad to draw to his hat and resume his position.

The barge approached, and ranged alongside. The first lieutenant came up the side, and to Maitland's eager and blunt question, "Have you got him?" he answered in the affirmative. After the lieutenant came Savary, followed by Marshal Bertrand, who bowed and fell back a pace on the gangway to await the ascent of their master. And now came the little great man himself, wrapped up in his gray greatcoat buttoned to the chin, three-cocked hat and Hussar boots, without any sword, I suppose as emblematical of his changed condition. Maitland received him with every mark of respect, as far as look and deportment could indicate; but he was not received with the respect due to a crowned head, which was afterwards insidiously thrown out against Maitland. So far from that, the captain, on Napoleon's addressing him, only moved his hat, as to a general officer, and remained covered while the Emperor spoke to him. His expressions were brief, I believe only reiterating what he had stated the day previous in his letter to the Prince Regent, "That he placed himself under the protection of the British nation, and under that of the British commander as the representative of his sovereign." The captain again moved his hat, and turned to conduct the Emperor to the cabin. As he passed through the officers assembled on the quarter-deck, he repeatedly bowed slightly to us, and smiled. What an ineffable beauty there was in that smile, his teeth were finely set, and as white as ivory, and his mouth had a charm about it that I have never seen in any other human countenance. I marked his fine robust figure as he followed Captain Maitland into the cabin, and, boy as I was, I said to myself, "Now have I a tale for futurity."

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I shall never forget that morning we made Ushant. I had come on deck at four in the morning to take the morning watch, and the washing of decks had just begun, when, to my astonishment, I saw the Emperor come out of the cabin at that early hour, and make for the poop-ladder. Had I known what human misery is as well as I do now, when I have myself experienced the most cruel injustice and persecution on a lesser scale, the restlessness of Napoleon, or his being unable to close an eye, would have in no way surprised me. If a petty care can break our sleep, what must have been his feeling who had lost the fairest empire on the face of the globe; nay, who had lost a world? From the wetness of the decks, he was in danger of falling at every step, and I immediately stepped up to him, hat in hand, and tendered him my arm, which he laid hold of at once, smiling, and pointing to the poop, saying in broken English, "the poop, the poop"; he ascended the poop-ladder leaning on my arm; and having gained the deck, he quitted his hold and mounted upon a gun-slide, nodding and smiling thanks, for my attention, and pointing to the land he said, "Ushant, Cape Ushant." I replied, "Yes, sire," and withdrew. He then took out a pocket-glass and applied it to his eye, looking eagerly at the land. In this position, he remained from five in the morning to nearly mid-day, without paying any attention to what was passing around him, or speaking to one of his suite, who had been standing behind him for several hours.

No wonder he thus gazed, it was the last look of the land of his glory, and I am convinced he felt it such. What must have been his feelings in those few hours, how painful the retrospect, and how awful the look forward!—there still lay before him that land which he had made so famous, where his proud name had risen until it "o'ershadowed the earth with his fame"; there had he been worshipped almost as a god, and bowed to by every servile knee, that now, in the hour of bitter adversity, had basely deserted and betrayed him. Never man was read such a lesson as must have passed before him in that brief space, unless, really, that the greatness of the change, the suddenness of the fall had benumbed all feeling, and left him only a mass of contending passions which combated and stilled each other by the very violence of their working. But this was not the case with Napoleon, his emotion was visible, he hung upon the land until it looked only a speck in the distance, and then, turning, stepped from the gun-slide into the arms of his faithful Bertrand, who stood ready to receive his fallen master. He uttered not a word as he tottered down the poop-ladder, his head hung heavily forward, so as to render his countenance scarcely visible, and in this way he was conducted to his cabin.

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