He certainly was not a prey to torpor and dumb despair.  His brain still clutched eagerly at public affairs, as if unable to realize that they had slipped beyond his control; and his behaviour showed that he was still un etre politique, with whom power was all in all.  He evinced few signs of deep emotion on bidding farewell to his devoted followers:  but whether this resulted from inner hardness, or resentment at his fall, or a sense of dignified prudence, it is impossible to say.  When Denon, the designer of his medals, sobbed on bidding him adieu, he remarked:  Mon cher, ne nous attendrissons pas:  il faut dans les crises comme celle-ci se conduire avec froid.  This surely was one source of his power over an emotional people:  his feelings were the servant, not the master, of his reason.

Meanwhile the Prussians were drawing near to Paris.  Early on the 29th they were at Argenteuil, and Bluecher detached a flying column to seize the bridge of Chatou over the Seine near Malmaison and carry off Napoleon on the following night.  But Davoust and Fouche warded off the danger.  While the Marshal had the nearest bridges of the Seine barricaded or burnt, Fouche on the night of the 28th-29th sent an order to Napoleon to leave at once for Rochefort and set sail with two frigates, even though the English passports had not arrived.

He received the news calmly, and then with unusual animation requested Becker to submit to the Government a scheme for rapidly rallying the troops around Paris, whereupon he, as General Bonaparte, would surprise first Bluecher and then Wellington—­they were two days’ marches apart:  then, after routing the foe, he would resume his journey to the coast.  The Commission would have none of it.  The reports showed that the French troops were so demoralized that success was not to be hoped for.[532] And if a second Montmirail were snatched from Bluecher, would it bring more of glory to Napoleon or of useless bloodshed to France?  Those who look on the world as an arena for the exploits of heroes at the cost of ordinary mortals may applaud the scheme.  But could men who were responsible to France regard it as anything but a final proof of Napoleon’s perverse optimism, or a flash of his unquenchable ambition, or a last mad bid for power?  He showed signs of anger on hearing of their refusal, but set out for Rochefort at 6 p.m.; and thus the Prussians were cheated of their prey by a few hours.  Bertrand, Savary, Gourgaud, and Becker accompanied him.

The cheers of troops and people at Niort, and again at Rochefort, where he arrived on July 3rd, re-awakened his fighting instincts; and as the westerly winds precluded all hope of the two frigates slipping quickly down either of the practicable outlets so as to elude the British cruisers, he again sought permission to take command of the French forces, now beginning to fall back from Paris behind the line of the Loire.  Again his offer was refused; and messages came thick