MEMOIRS OF M. DE BOURIENNE.
Wm are likely at length to learn the exact truth respecting NAPO- LEON. So much falsehood never was written about any man who ever existed; and in a few years surely the truth will amount to as enormous a mass. No person could be better placed for viewing the real course of events and the truth of circumstances than M. de BOURIENNE; he is the highest authority that has yet put pen to paper on the subject. He was the comrade of NAPOLEON at school ; and became the chief of his closet, or, principal se- cretary, at the first opening of his great achievements in Italy, having in the mean time kept up a close intimacy with him. Only the first two volumes of these. Memoirs have made their ap- pearance; but they relate perhaps to the most interesting period of the life of a great man—those dubious years when he hangs loose upon the world, when he is the sport of circumstances, when he is pregnant with projects, full of day-dreams, and agitated between hope and disappointment. This picture is drawn of BoNApAirra by M. de BOURIENNE; and we have the great satisfaction of pe- rusing it with a moral certainty of its exactness. Whatever may have been the ability with which former writers have sketched this interesting period of this great man's life, we have always viewed them with some distrust—we were not clear how far the writer drew upon his fancy, how far from genuine sources of information. M. de BOURIENNE was NAPOLEON'S intimate friend, his daily visitor, and when they ceased to be on terms of equality, his secre- tary and adviser : he speaks from memoranda made at the time, from documents which he quotes, and from an accurate remem- brance of scenes which made a deep impression upon him. A great number of points are cleared up in this work ; numerous errors corrected ; and perhaps the nearest as well as the most ac- curate views obtained of NAPOLEON'S character.
This first livraison extends to BONAPARTE'S departure from Egypt; and up to this point it shows his real position in each of the political crises in which he was engaged.
M. de BOURIENNE is very severe upon Sir WALTER SCOTT'S Life of NAPOLEON, which he repeatedly terms an historical romance. His book is certainly a much more effective answer to it than the ill-advised pamphlet which Loots lately published under the name of a Reponse. We are afraid that we must allow Sir WALTER'S work to be simply an able and entertaining compilation of the popular notions of NAPOLEON'S history as they exist in England—the last country in the world to know the real truth. It is not to his nationality that we object, the spirit of which perhaps exasperates the French more than his errors ; but we certainly learn from day to day, proof upon proof, that there is extremely little. re- liance to be placed upon the motives he assigns to the movers in events, or to the pictures he draws of the events them- selves. Thus, when NAPOLEON returned from his first con quest of Italy, Sir WALTER represents him as still under the power of the Directory, though they were jealous of him ; and the Egyptian expedition was an invention of their jealousy to get him out of the way—a sort of ostracism. M. de BOURPENNE shows vithout any doubt, that at this very moment he had a power which the Directory would in vain have endeavoured to resist ; and that the expedition to Egypt was an old and favourite part of his Oriental dreams, adopted at. this moment solely because there was nothing to do in Europe, and he felt that in order to preserve a
Parisian reputation he must be doing something. We refer the reader to the details in both works for a full conviction that the
colour of Sir WALTER SCOTT'S history in this as well as in many other points is as far from being that of the true history as true blue is from true orange. How could it be otherwise ? Sir WALTER with all his taleng does not write history with the aids of him who wrote at Patmos : he consulted no sources of information but the English works and newspapers of the time, and indeed a great part of his history was in fact written at the time the events were in progress. Let the curious reader compare the historical depart- ment in the volatiles of the Edinburgh Annual Register with the pages of the "Historical Romance of Napoleon." It may be said of Sir WALTER, as of the French emissr6s, since the events took place he has neither learnt any thing nor forgot any thing. When he wrote NAPOLEON'S Life, he well remembered all that had been said on this side the Channel about our old enemy ; but he would learn nothing-of what had passed on the other respecting him. We cannot believe an anecdote on this subject, which M. de BOURIENNE relates, but it is nevertheless manufactured of the truth : when Marshal MACDONALD offered to introduce Sir WALTER to the Generals and others who had most enjoyed the confidence of NAPOLEON, Sir WALTER declined, saying, " Je prends mes refl. seignemens dons les bruits populaires." When we reflect upon the happy genius of Sir WALTER, his knowledge of human nature, his facility in entering into the characters dl men, and the bril- liant pictures he conceives of stirring events, it is lamentable to think that he should have spent so much of his invaluable labour on so unstable a foundation. The book too is so pleasant to read, and if it were true would be so useful, that we cannot help looking on it as on a fair palace built on the ice : when the thaw comes, alas ! how soon the memory of the structure will be lost, "leaving not a wreck behind."
Some of the most important parts of M. de BOURIENNE'S work are documents taken from the autographs of NAPOLEON himself and of his Generals ; but they are neither the most entertaining, nor the best adapted for extract. The only part which we shall at this moment present to our readers, is a portion of a memoran- dum written by Madame and not M. de BOURIENNE, which appears to have been composed soon after the time to which it relates. It gives a portrait Of BONAPARTE in obscurity.
" The day after our second return from Germany in 1795, in the month of May, we found Bonaparte in the Palais Royal, near a news-room kept by one Giraidin. Bonaparte embraced Bourienne, and appeared delighted to see his comrade. We went to the Theatre-Francais ; where we saw a play, the Deaf Man or the Inn Full. All the house laughed to excess. The part of Desnieres was played by Batiste the younger, admirably. The bursts of laughter were so violent and so continued, that the actor was repeatedly obliged to stop. Bonaparte alone retained an icy silence. I ob- served at this period that his character was often cold and sombre: his smile was hollow, and often ill-timed ;—and apropos to this, I remember about this same epoch, a few days after our return, he had one of his fits of unnatural gayety, which absolutely made me ill, and certainly prevented me from liking him. He told us in an exceedingly pleasant manner, that when he was before Toulon, where he commanded the artillery, an officer under his orders had a visit from his wife, to whom he had been very lately married, and whom he loved with great tenderness. A few days after, an assault was to take place, and the officer was ordered for the duty. His wife came to seek out Bonaparte, and begged of him with tears in her eyes to dispense with her husband's services on that day. He was inexorable, according to his own very bomy but very ferocious manner of telling the story. The moment of attack arrived ; and this officer, who was well known for his extraordinary bravery, as Bonaparte said himself, felt a presentiment of his approaching death : he became pale, and trembled. He was by the side of Bonaparte : the fire from the town became very hot, and Bonaparte said to him, 'Take care I see there is a bomb coming.' The officer; said he, instead of getting out of the way, bowed his head, and was separated into two. Bonaparte burst into loud laughter when he mentioned the part of his person that was carried away,
" At this period, we saw him almost every day. He came often to dine with us ; and as there was a scarcity of bread, and but two ounces per day were delivered at the section, it was customary to bid the guests brink their bread with them, since it was not to be procured for money. Bonaparte, and his young brother Louis, who was his aid-de-camp, brought their ration bread ; it was black, and half bran : I am sorry to say the aid-de-camp had to eat it all to himself; and we gave the general bread of an extreme whiteness, which we procured by having it made at a pastry- cook's in secret, of flour which had been brought clandestinely from Sens, where my husband had some farms. If we had been denounced, it was enough to take us to the scaffold.
" We passed six months at Paris. We went very frequently with him to the play, and to the charming concerts given by Garat in the Rue St. Marc. These were the first brilliant parties after the death of Robespierre. There was always an eccentricity in Bonaparte's conduct : he would leave us without saying a word ; and when we believed him anywhere hut at the theatre, we would perceive him up in the upper boxes, or in the gallery, alone in a box, having the air of being offended at something.
" Before leaving for Sens, the country where my husband's family re- sided, we were looking for more extensive and handsomer apartments than those in the Rue Grenier St. Lazare. Bonaparte went about with us to seek them ; and we stopped at a set in the Rue des Marais, No. 19, in a handsome new house. He was desirous of staying at Paris, and went to look at the house opposite to ours. He had a design of taking it in conjunction with his uncle Fesch, afterwards Cardinal, and another person named Patraulet, one of his old comrades of the Military School ; and he said to us one day—' With this house, and with my friends, and oppo- site to you, and a cabriolet, I should be the happiest of men.' We went to Sens a few days after. The house was not taken, for great events were in preparation. In the interval between our departure and the fatal day of Vendaniaire, several letters were interchanged between him and his comrade. These letters were most affectionate, and very amiable. On our return in November, all was changed. The school friend was become a grand personage : he commanded Paris, in recompense for his services on the day of Vend6tniaire (when he commanded the sections); the small house in the Rue des Marais was become a magnificent hotel in the Rue des Capucines; the modest cabriolet a superb equipage ; and he himself
was no longer the same person. He gave sumptuous breakfasts, where ladies were absolutely to be seen ; Madame Tallien was there, and Madame Beauharnais, to whom he was becoming attached. He gave himself little trouble about his friends, and tutoyed no longer."
We should observe, that on the whole M. de BOURIENNE'S book is not favourable to NAPOLEON, and that it has an impartial air. He throws great discredit on NAPOLEON'S assertions at St. Helena ; and seems to think, as others have thought, that he could believe what he pleased to be truth. He had always an eye to posterity.
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