the Consul to passing fancies, and promoting his secret intrigues, I begged her to keep quiet. I could see that if Bonaparte loved his wife, it was because her habitual gentleness gave him repose, and that she would lose her power if she troubled or disturbed him. However, during my first years at Court, the slight differences which arose between them always ended in satisfactory explanations and in redoubled tenderness.
After 1802 I never saw General Moreau at Bonaparte’s Court; they were already estranged. Moreau’s mother-in-law and wife were schemers, and Bonaparte could not endure a spirit of intrigue in women. Moreover, on one occasion the mother of Mme. Moreau, being at Malmaison, had ventured to jest about the suspected scandalous intimacy between Bonaparte and his young sister Caroline, then newly married. The Consul had not forgiven these remarks, for which he had severely censured both the mother and the daughter. Moreau complained, and was sharply questioned about his own attitude. He lived in retirement, among people who kept him in a state of constant irritation; and Murat, who was the chief of an active secret police, spied out causes of offense which were wholly unimportant, and continually carried malicious reports to the Tuileries. This multiplication of the police was one of the evils of Bonaparte’s government, and was the result of his suspicious disposition. The agents acted as spies upon each other, denounced each other, endeavored to make themselves necessary, and kept alive Bonaparte’s habitual mistrust. After the affair of the infernal machine, of which M. de Talleyrand availed himself to procure the dismissal of Fouché, the police had been put into the hands of Regnier, the chief judge. Bonaparte thought that his suppressing the Ministry of Police, which was a revolutionary invention, would look like liberalism and moderation. He soon repented of this step, and replaced the regular ministry by a multitude of spies, whom he continued to employ even after he had reinstated Fouché. His Prefect of Police, Murat, Duroc, Savary (who then commanded the gend’armerie d’élite), Maret (who had also a secret police, at the head of which was M. de Sémonville), and I don’t know how many others, did the work of the suppressed ministry.
Fouché, who possessed in perfection the art of making himself necessary, soon crept back secretly into the favor of the First Consul, and succeeded in getting himself made minister a second time. The badly conducted trial of General Moreau aided him in that attempt, as will be seen by what follows.
At this time Cambecérès and Le Brun, Second and Third Consuls, took very little part in the administration of the Government. The latter, who was an old man, gave Bonaparte no concern. The former, a distinguished magistrate, who was of great weight in all questions within the province of the Council of State, took part only in the discussion of certain laws. Bonaparte profited by his knowledge, and relied with good reason on the ridicule which his petty vanity excited to diminish his importance. Cambacérès, charmed with the distinctions conferred on him, paraded them with childish pleasure, which was humored and laughed at. His self-conceit on certain points frequently secured his safety.
At the time of which I speak, M. de Talleyrand had vast influence. Every great political question passed through his hands. Not only did he regulate foreign affairs at that period, and principally determine the new State constitutions to be given to Germany—a task which laid the foundations of his immense fortune—but he had long conferences with Bonaparte every day, and urged him to measures for the establishment of his power on the basis of reparation and reconstruction. At that time I am certain that measures for the restoration of monarchy were frequently discussed between them. M. de Talleyrand always remained unalterably convinced that monarchical government only was suitable to France; while, for his own part, it would have enabled him to resume all his former habits of life, and replaced him on familiar ground. Both the advantages and the abuses proper to courts would offer him chances of acquiring power and influence. I did not know M. de Talleyrand, and all I had heard of him had prejudiced me strongly against him. I was, however, struck by the elegance of his manners, which presented so strong a contrast to the rude bearing of the military men by whom I was surrounded. He preserved among them the indelible characteristics of a grand seigneur. He overawed by his disdainful silence, by his patronizing politeness, from which no one could escape. M. de Talleyrand, who was the most artificial of beings, contrived to make a sort of natural character for himself out of a number of habits deliberately adopted; he adhered to them under all circumstances, as though they had really constituted his true nature. His habitually light manner of treating the most momentous matters was almost always useful to himself, but it frequently injured the effect of his actions.
For several years I had no acquaintance with him—I distrusted him vaguely; but it amused me to hear him talk, and see him act with ease peculiar to himself, and which lent infinite grace to all those ways of his, which in any other man would be regarded as sheer affectation.
The winter of this year (1803) was very brilliant. Bonaparte desired that fêtes should be given, and he also occupied himself with the restoration of the theatres. He confided the carrying out of the latter design to his Prefects of the Palace. M. de Rémusat was intrusted with the charge of the Comédie Française; a number of pieces which had been prohibited by Republican policy were put upon the stage. By degrees all the former habits of social life were resumed. This was a clever way of enticing back those who had been familiar with that social life, and of reuniting the ties that bind civilized men together. This system was skilfully carried out. Hostile opinions became weaker daily. The Royalists, who had been baffled on the 18th Fructidor, continued to hope that Bonaparte, after having reëstablished order, would include the return of the house of Bourbon among his restorations. They deceived themselves on this point indeed, but at least they might thank him for the reëstablishment of order; and they looked forward to a decisive blow, which, by disposing of his person and suddenly rendering vacant a place which henceforth no one but he could fill, would make it evident that only the legitimate sovereign could be his natural successor. This secret idea of a party which is generally confident in what it hopes, and always imprudent in what it attempts, led to renewed secret correspondences with our princes, to attempts by the émigrés, and to movements in La Vendée; and all these proceedings Bonaparte watched in silence.
On the other hand, those who were enamored of federal government observed with uneasiness that the consular authority tended toward a centralization which was by degrees reviving the idea of royalty. These malcontents were almost of the same mind as the few individuals who, notwithstanding the errors into which the cause of liberty had led some of its partisans, were forced by their consciences to acknowledge that the French Revolution was a movement of public utility, and who feared that Bonaparte might succeed in paralyzing its action. Now and then a few words were said on this subject, which, although very moderate in tone, showed that the Royalists were not the only antagonists the secret projects of Bonaparte would meet with. Then there were the ultra-Jacobins to be kept within bounds, and also the military, who, full of their pretensions, were astonished that any rights except their own should be recognized. The state of opinion among all these different parties was accurately reported to Bonaparte, who steered his way among them prudently. He went on steadily toward a goal, which at that time few people even guessed at. He kept attention fixed upon a portion of his policy which he enveloped in mystery. He could at will attract or divert attention, and alternately excite the approbation of the one or the other party—disturb or reassure them as he found it necessary; now exciting wonder, and then hope. He regarded the French as fickle children ready to be amused by a new plaything at the expense of their own dearest interests. His position as First Consul was advantageous to him, because, being so undefined, it excited less uneasiness among a certain class of people. At a later period the positive rank of Emperor deprived him of that advantage; then, after having let France into his secret, he had no other means left whereby to efface the impression from the country, but that fatal lure of military glory which he displayed before her. From this cause arose his never-ending wars, his interminable conquests; for he felt we must be occupied at all hazards. And now we can see that from this cause, too, arose the obligation imposed on him to push his destiny to its limits, and to refuse peace either at Dresden or even at Châtillon. For Bonaparte knew that he must infallibly be lost, from that day on which his compulsory quietude should give us time to reflect upon him and upon ourselves.
At the end of 1802, or the beginning of 1803, there appeared in the “Moniteur” a dialogue between a Frenchman, enthusiastic on the subject of the English constitution, and a so-called