During our discourse the name of Bernadotte was also mentioned.  “Have you seen him, Bourrienne?” said Bonaparte to me.—­“No, General”—­ “Neither have I. I have not heard him spoken of.  Would you imagine it?  I had intelligence to-day of many intrigues in which he is concerned.  Would you believe it? he wished nothing less than to be appointed my colleague in authority.  He talked of mounting his horse and marching with the troops that might be placed under his command.  He wished, he said, to maintain the Constitution:  nay, more; I am assured that he had the audacity to add that, if it were necessary to outlaw me, the Government might come to him and he would find soldiers capable of carrying the decree into execution.”—­“All this, General, should give you an idea how inflexible his principles are.”—­“Yes, I am well aware of it; there is something in that:  he is honest.  But for his obstinacy, my brothers would have brought him over.  They are related to him.  His wife, who is Joseph’s sister-in-law, has ascendency over him.  As for me, have I not, I ask you, made sufficient advances to him?  You have witnessed them.  Moreau, who has a higher military reputation than he, came over to me at once.  However, I repent of having cajoled Bernadotte.  I am thinking of separating him from all his coteries without any one being able to find fault with the proceeding.  I cannot revenge myself in any other manner.  Joseph likes him.  I should have everybody against me.  These family considerations are follies!  Goodnight, Bourrienne.—­By the way, we will sleep in the Luxembourg to-morrow.”

I then left the General, whom, henceforth, I will call the First Consul, after having remained with him constantly during nearly twenty-four hours, with the exception of the time when he was at the Council of the Five Hundred.  I retired to my lodging, in the Rue Martel, at five o’clock in the morning.

It is certain that if Gohier had come to breakfast on the morning of the 18th Brumaire, according to Madame Bonaparte’s invitation, he would have been one of the members of the Government.  But Gohier acted the part of the stern republican.  He placed himself, according to the common phrase of the time, astride of the Constitution of the year iii.; and as his steed made a sad stumble, he fell with it.

It was a singular circumstance which prevented the two Directors Gohier and Moulins from defending their beloved Constitution.  It was from their respect for the Constitution that they allowed it to perish, because they would have been obliged to violate the article which did not allow less than three Directors to deliberate together.  Thus a king of Castile was burned to death, because there did not happen to be in his apartment men of such rank as etiquette would permit to touch the person of the monarch.

CHAPTER XXVI.

1799.