Part 6

It is well known that Napoleon was scarcely ever more than fifteen minutes at his dinner; here the two courses alone occupied from an hour to an hour and a half: this was to him a most serious annoyance, though he never mentioned it; his features, gestures, and manner, always evinced perfect indifference. Neither the new system of cookery, the difference nor quality of the dishes, ever met with his censure or approbation; he never expressed any wish or objection on the subject. He was attended by his two valets, who stood behind his chair. At first the Admiral was in the habit of offering to help the Emperor; but the acknowledgment of Napoleon was expressed so coldly that this practice was discontinued. The Admiral continued very attentive, but thenceforth only pointed out to the servants what was preferable; they alone attended to these matters, to which the Emperor seemed totally indifferent, neither seeing, noticing, nor seeking, any thing. He was generally silent, remaining in the midst of conversation as if totally unacquainted with the language, though it was French. If he spoke, it was to ask some technical or scientific question, and to address a few words to those whom the Admiral occasionally asked to dinner. I was the person to whom the Emperor generally addressed his questions, in order to translate them.

I need scarcely observe that the English are accustomed to remain a long time at table after the dessert, drinking and conversing: the Emperor, already tired by the tedious dinner, could never have endured this custom, and he rose, therefore from the first day, immediately after coffee had been handed round, and went out on deck followed by the Grand Marshal and myself. This disconcerted the Admiral, who took occasion to express his surprise to his officers; but Madame Bertrand, whose maternal language is English, warmly replied—“Do not forget, Admiral, that your guest is a man who has governed a large portion of the world, and that kings once contended for the honour of being admitted to his table.” “Very true,” rejoined the Admiral; and this officer, who possesses good sense, a becoming pliability of manners, and sometimes much elegance, did his utmost from that moment to accommodate the Emperor in his habits. He shortened the time of sitting at table, ordering coffee for Napoleon and those who accompanied him, even before the rest of the company had finished their dinner. The moment Napoleon had taken his coffee, he left the cabin; upon which every body rose till he had quitted the room, and then continued to take their wine for another hour.

The Emperor remained walking on deck till dark, attended by the Grand Marshal and myself. This became a regular practice, and was seldom omitted. On returning to the after-cabin, he sat down to play _vingt-et-un_ with us, and generally retired in about half an hour.

SINGULAR GOOD FORTUNE OF THE EMPEROR.

15th.—We asked permission to be admitted into the Emperor’s presence this morning, and all entered his cabin at the same time. He was not aware of the cause of this visit:—it was his birthday, which seemed to have altogether escaped his recollection. We had been in the habit of seeing him on that anniversary, on a much larger stage, and in the midst of his power, but never were our wishes more sincere, or our hearts more full of attachment, than on the present occasion.

The days now exactly resembled each other: at night we constantly played at _vingt-et-un_; the Admiral and some of his officers being occasionally of the party. The Emperor used to retire after losing, according to custom his ten or twelve Napoleons; this happened to him daily, because he would persist in leaving his stake on the table, until it had produced a considerable number. To-day he had gained from eighty to a hundred. The Admiral dealt the cards: the Emperor still wished to leave his winnings, in order to see how far he could reach; but thought he could perceive it would be quite as agreeable to the Admiral if he stopped where he was. The Emperor had won sixteen times, and might have won more than sixty thousand Napoleons. While all present were expatiating on his being thus singularly favoured by fortune, an English officer observed that it was the anniversary of his birth-day.

CONTINUATION OF THE VOYAGE.—OCCUPATIONS.—THE EMPEROR’S ORIGIN AND FAMILY.—ANECDOTES.

16th—21st. We doubled Cape Finisterre on the 16th, passed Cape St. Vincent on the 18th, and were off the Straits of Gibraltar next day. Continuing our course along the coast of Africa towards Madeira, nothing worthy of remark occurred, there being a perfect uniformity in our habits and mode of passing the time; if there was any difference, it could only arise from the subject of our conversation.

The Emperor usually remained in his cabin during the whole morning: so excessive was the heat that he only wore a very slight dress. He could not sleep, and frequently rose in the night. Reading was his chief occupation. I was sent for almost every morning, and translated from the “Encyclopædia Britannica,” and such other books as were on board, whatever they contained relative to St. Helena, or the countries near which we were sailing. This led to my Historical Atlas being brought under review. Napoleon had merely glanced at it on board the Bellerophon, and before that time he had but a very indistinct notion of the work. I now had the satisfaction of seeing it in the Emperor’s hands for several days, and of hearing him express the warmest approbation of my labours. The quantity and arrangement of the matter seemed more

## particularly to please him: he had, in fact, hitherto been but little

acquainted with the book. Passing over all the others, his chief attention was attracted by the geographical charts; more especially the map of the world, which seemed principally to excite his notice and applause. I did not attempt to convince him that the geography was the weakest part of the work, displaying far less labour and research than other parts; the general tables could not easily be surpassed, either as to their method, symmetry, or facility for use; while each of the genealogical tables presented a miniature history of the country they concerned and of which they were, in all respects, both a complete analysis and a collection of elementary materials.

The Emperor asked me whether the work had been used in all our systems of education; adding, that had it been better known to him, all the schools and lyceums should have been furnished with it. He further asked, why I had published it under the borrowed name of Le Sage? I replied that a very imperfect sketch had been published in England, just after my emigration, at a time when we could not acknowledge our names as emigrants abroad, without danger to our relations in France; “and, perhaps,” said I, laughing, “I was not then cured of the prejudices of my youth; like the nobles of Bretagne, who deposited their swords with the registrar of the Civil Court, while engaged in trade, that they might not derogate from their family dignity.”

As already observed, the Emperor always rose from table long before the rest of the company: the Grand Marshal and I always followed him to the quarter-deck, where I was frequently left alone with him; as General Bertrand had often to attend his wife, who suffered excessively from sea-sickness.

After the preliminary remarks on the weather, the ship’s progress, and the winds, Napoleon used to start a subject of conversation, or revive that of the preceding or some other former, day; and when he had taken eight or nine turns the whole length of the deck, he would seat himself on the second gun from the gangway on the larboard side. The midshipmen soon observed this habitual predilection, so that the cannon was thenceforth called the _Emperor’s gun_.

It was there that Napoleon often conversed for hours together, and that I learned for the first time a part of what I am about to relate: in doing which, I wish to observe that I shall at the same time add whatever I collected in a variety of subsequent conversations; thus presenting at one view, all that I have heard worth noting on the subject.

The name of Bonaparte may be spelt either _Bonaparte_ or _Buonaparte_; as all Italians know. Napoleon’s father always introduced the _u_; and his uncle, the Archdeacon Lucien (who survived Napoleon’s father and was a parent to Napoleon and his brothers), at the same time, and under the same roof, wrote it _Bonaparte_. During his youth, Napoleon followed the example of his father. On attaining the command of the Army of Italy he took good care not to alter the orthography, which agreed with the spirit of the language; but at a later period, and when amongst the French, he wished to adopt their orthography, and thenceforth wrote his name Bonaparte.

This family for many years made a distinguished figure in the Bolognese territory: it was very powerful at Treviso; and is to be found inscribed in the Golden book of Bologna, as also amongst the patricians of Florence. When Napoleon, as General in chief of the army of Italy, entered Treviso, at the head of his victorious army, the principal inhabitants came to meet him, bringing title deeds and records, which proved that his family had once been one of the most eminent in their city.

At the interview of Dresden, before the Russian campaign, the Emperor Francis one day told Napoleon, then his son-in-law, that his family had governed as sovereigns at Treviso: a fact of which there could be no doubt, as Francis had caused all the documents proving it to be drawn up and presented to him. Napoleon replied, with a smile, that he did not wish to know anything about it, and that he preferred being the Rodolph of Hapsburgh of his own family. Francis attached much more importance to the matter: he said that it was of very little consequence to have fallen from wealth to poverty; but that it was above all price to have been of sovereign rank, and that the fact must be communicated to Maria Louisa, to whom it would afford infinite pleasure.

When, during the campaign of Italy, Napoleon entered Bologna, Marescalchi, Caprara, and Aldini, since so well known in France, and at that time deputies in the senate of their native city, came of their own accord to present the golden book, in which the name and arms of his ancestors were inscribed.

There are several houses at Florence which attest the former existence of the Buonaparte family there; many houses are even still seen bearing the escutcheons of the family.

Cesari, a Corsican or Bolognese, residing in London, who was shocked at the manner in which the British Government had received Napoleon’s pacific letter on assuming the Consulate, published a genealogical notice, wherein he established the Emperor’s alliance with the ancient house of _Este_, _Welf_, or _Guelf_, supposed to be the parent stem of the present royal family of England.[10]

Footnote 10:

This paragraph was in such a state in the manuscript as to excite doubts; and I was on the point of suppressing it: I must therefore state my reasons for its insertion. What is my object? chiefly to leave materials behind me. When I indicate how these were collected, and say that I obtained them from a mere conversation—that I may have disfigured them in thus suddenly seizing their sense—when I admit their probable inaccuracy, and place the reader in the way of rectifying my errors—have I not sufficiently fulfilled my object and duty?

The Duke de Feltre, French ambassador in Tuscany, brought to Paris, from the Gallery de Medici, the portrait of a Buonaparte who had married a princess of the Grand Duke’s family. The mother of Pope Nicholas V. or Paul V., of Sarzana, was also a Buonaparte.

It was a Buonaparte who negotiated the treaty by which Leghorn was exchanged for Sarzana. It is to a Buonaparte that we are indebted for one of the oldest comedies written at the period of the revival of letters intitled _The Widow_. It may still be seen in the Royal Library at Paris.[11]

Footnote 11:

Verified at the Royal Library: the manuscript being really there, and the play itself printed.

When Napoleon marched against Rome at the head of the French army, and received the propositions of the Pope at Tolentino, one of the negotiators of the enemy observed that he was the only Frenchman who had marched against Rome since the Constable de Bourbon; but what rendered this circumstance still more singular was that the history of the first expedition was written by an ancestor of him who executed the second, that is to say, Signor Niccolo Buonaparte, who has in reality left us a work, called _The Sacking of Rome by the Constable de Bourbon_.[12]

Footnote 12:

Also verified at the Royal Library, where the account of the sacking of Rome is deposited, but by _Jacopo Buonaparte_, and not _Niccolo_. Jacopo was a contemporary and an eye-witness of the event: his manuscript was printed for the first time at Cologne, in 1756; and the volume actually contains a genealogy of the Buonapartes, which is carried back to a very remote period, and describes them as one of the most illustrious houses of Tuscany.

The above genealogy presents a fact which is certainly of a very singular nature: it is that of the first Buonaparte having been exiled from his country as a _Ghibeline_. Was it, then, the destiny of his family, in all times, and at every epoch, that it must yield to the influence of the _Guelfs_!

The Cologne editor sometimes writes _Buonaparte_, and at others, _Bonaparte_.

This Signor Niccolo Buonaparte, named in the text as the historian, is only the uncle; he is, however, mentioned in the genealogy as a very distinguished man of letters, and as having founded the class of jurisprudence in the University of Pisa.

Hence, perhaps, or from the Pope mentioned above, the name of Niccolo, which the writers of certain pamphlets pretended to be that of the Emperor, instead of Napoleon. This work is to be found in most libraries; it is preceded by a history of the house of Buonaparte, printed about forty or fifty years ago, and edited by Dr. Vaccha, a professor of Pisa.

M. de Cetto, ambassador of Bavaria, has often told me that the archives of Munich contained a great number of documents, in Italian, which proved the antiquity and importance of the Buonaparte family.

During the continuance of his power, Napoleon always refused to take any pains, or even to enter into conversation, on the subject. The first attempt to turn his attention to this matter occurred in the time of his Consulate, and was so much discouraged that no one ever sought to renew the discussion. Some person published a genealogy, in which he contrived to connect the family of Napoleon with certain northern kings. Napoleon caused this specimen of flattery to be ridiculed in the public papers in which the writers concluded by observing that the nobility of the First Consul only dated from _Montenotte_, or from the 18th of Brumaire.

This family suffered, like many others, from the numerous revolutions which desolated the cities of Italy. The troubles of Florence placed the Buonapartes amongst the _fuorusciti_, or emigrants. One of the family retired to Sarzana in the first instance, and thence went to Corsica, from which island his descendants always continued to send their children to Tuscany, where they were educated under the care of the branch that remained at San Miniato. The second sons of this branch had borne the name of Napoleon for several generations, which was derived from an ancestor thus named, celebrated in the annals of Italy.

When on his way to Florence, after the expedition to Leghorn, Napoleon slept at the house of an old Abbé Buonaparte, at San Miniato, who treated the whole of his staff with great magnificence. Having exhausted all the family recollections, the Abbé told the young General that he was going to bring forth the most precious document of all. Napoleon thought he was about to shew him a fine genealogical tree, well calculated to gratify his vanity (said he, laughing); but it was a memorial regularly drawn up in favour of father Buonaventura Buonaparte, a Capuchin friar of Bologna, long since beatified, but who had not yet been canonized owing to the enormous expense which it required. “The Pope will not refuse you,” said the good Abbé, “if you ask him; and should it be necessary to pay the sum now, it will be a mere trifle for you.” Napoleon laughed heartily at this simplicity, so little in harmony with the manners of the day: the old man never dreamt that the saints were no longer in fashion.

On reaching Florence, Napoleon conceived it would be very satisfactory to his namesake to send him the ribbon of the order of St. Stephen, of which he was merely a knight; but the pious Abbé was much less anxious about the favours of this world than the religious justice which he so pertinaciously claimed: and, as it afterwards appeared, not without reason. The Pope, when he came to Paris to crown the Emperor, also recurred to the claims of Father Buonaventura. “It was doubtless he,” said the Pope, “who, from his seat amongst the blessed, had led his relative, as it were, by the hand through the glorious earthly career he had traversed; and who had preserved Napoleon in the midst of so many dangers and battles.” The Emperor, however, always turned a deaf ear to these remarks; leaving it to the holy father’s own discretion to provide for the glory of Buonaventura. As to the old Abbé of San Miniato, he left his fortune to Napoleon, who presented it to one of the public establishments in Tuscany.

It would, however, be very difficult to connect any genealogical data in this place, from the conversations of the Emperor, who used often to say he had never looked at one of his parchments: these having always remained in the hands of his brother Joseph, whom he styled the “genealogist of the family.” And, lest I may forget it, I will here mention the fact of Napoleon’s having, when on the point of embarking, delivered a packet to his brother, containing all the original letters addressed to him by the sovereigns of Europe in their own hand-writing. I frequently expressed my regret to the Emperor at his parting with such a precious historical manuscript.[13]

Footnote 13:

On my return to Europe, I did not fail to inquire for the invaluable deposit, and hastened to suggest the importance of making another copy to Prince Joseph, in order to become still more sure of its existence. What was my grief to hear that this historical monument had been mislaid, and that no person knew what had become of it! Into whose hands can it have fallen? May they know how to appreciate such a collection, and preserve it for history!

Charles Buonaparte, the father of Napoleon, was extremely tall, handsome, and well-made; his education had been well conducted at Rome and Pisa, where he studied the law: he is said to have possessed great spirit and energy. It was he who, on its being proposed to submit to France, in the public assembly of Corsica, delivered a speech which electrified the whole country: he was not more than twenty years of age at this period. “If it only depended on the will to become free,” said he, “all nations would be so; yet history teaches us that very few have attained the blessings of liberty, because few have had energy, courage, and virtue enough to deserve them.”

When the island was conquered, he wished to accompany Paoli in his emigration; but an old uncle, the Archdeacon Lucien, who exercised the authority of a parent over him, prevented his departure.

In 1779, Charles Buonaparte was elected deputy to represent the nobles of Corsica at Paris, whither he brought young Napoleon with him, then only ten years old. He passed through Florence on his way, and obtained a letter of introduction from the Grand Duke Leopold to his sister the Queen of France. It was to his known rank and the respectability of his name and family in Tuscany, that he was indebted for this mark of attention.

[Illustration:

_Charles Bonaparte._

_London. Published for Henry Colburn. January, 1836._ ]

There were two French generals in Corsica, at the above period, so inimical to each other that their quarrels formed two parties; one was M. de Marbeuf, a mild and popular character, and the other, M. de Narbonne Pellet, distinguished for haughtiness and violence. The latter, from his birth and superior interest, must have been a dangerous man for his rival: fortunately for M. de Marbeuf, he was much more beloved in the island. When the deputation headed by Charles Buonaparte arrived at Versailles, he was consulted on the dispute, and the warmth of his testimony obtained a triumph for Marbeuf. The Archbishop of Lyons, nephew to Marbeuf, thought it his duty to wait on the deputy, and thank him for the service he had rendered. On young Napoleon’s being placed in the military school of Brienne, the Archbishop gave him a special recommendation to the family of Brienne, which lived there during the greater part of the year: hence the friendly demeanour of the Marbeufs and Briennes towards the children of the Buonaparte family. Calumny has assigned another cause, but the simple examination of dates is fully sufficient to prove its absurdity.

Old M. de Marbeuf, who commanded in Corsica, lived at Ajaccio, where the family of Charles Buonaparte was one of the principal. Madame Buonaparte being the most fascinating and beautiful woman in the town, it was very natural for the General to frequent her house in preference to many other places of resort.

Charles Buonaparte died at the age of thirty-eight, of an induration in the glands of the stomach. He had experienced a temporary cure during one of his visits to Paris, but became the victim of a second attack at Montpellier, where he was interred in one of the convents of the city.

During the Consulate, the notables of Montpellier, through the medium of their countryman Chaptal, minister of the interior, solicited the permission of the First Consul to erect a monument to the memory of his father. Napoleon thanked them for their good intentions, but declined acceding to their solicitation. “Let us not disturb the repose of the dead,” said he; “let their ashes remain in peace. I have also lost my grandfather and great-grandfather; why not erect monuments to them? This might lead too far. Had my father died yesterday, it would be proper and natural that my grief should be accompanied by some signal mark of respect. But his death took place twenty years ago: it is an event of no public interest, and it is useless to revive the recollection of it.” At a subsequent period Louis Buonaparte, without the knowledge of Napoleon, had his father’s remains disinterred, and removed to St. Leu, where he erected a monument to his memory.