would you say, General,” I observed, “if I should present this same M. Moreau de Worms, who is declaiming at Sens against the 18th Brumaire, to you within an hour?”—­“I defy you to do it.”—­“I have made myself responsible for him, and I know what I am about.  He is violent in his politics; but he is a man of honour, incapable of failing in his word.”—­” Well, we shall see.  Go and find him.”  I was very sure of doing what I had promised, for within an hour before I had seen M. Moreau de Worms.  He had been concealed since the 13th Brumaire, and had not quitted Paris.  Nothing was easier than to find him, and in three-quarters of an hour he was at the Luxembourg.  I presented him to Bonaparte, who conversed with him a long time concerning the 18th Brumaire.  When M. Moreau departed Bonaparte said to me, “You are right.  That fool Sieyes is as inventive as a Cassandra.  This proves that one should not be too ready to believe the reports of the wretches whom we are obliged to employ in the police.”  Afterwards he added, “Bourrienne, Moreau is a nice fellow:  I am satisfied with him; I will do something for him.”  It was not long before M. Moreau experienced the effect of the Consul’s good opinion.  Some days after, whilst framing the council of prizes, he, at my mere suggestion, appointed M. Moreau one of the members, with a salary of 10,000 francs.  On what extraordinary circumstances the fortunes of men frequently depend!  As to Sieyes, in the intercourse, not very frequent certainly, which I had with him, he appeared to be far beneath the reputation which he then—­enjoyed.’

—­[M. de Talleyrand, who is so capable of estimating men, and whose admirable sayings well deserve to occupy a place in history, had long entertained a similar opinion of Sieyes.  One day, when he was conversing with the Second Consul concerning Sieyes, Cambaceres said to him.  “Sieyes, however, is a very profound man.”—­“Profound?” said Talleyrand.  “Yes, he is, a cavity, a perfect cavity, as you would say.”—­Bourrienne.]—­

He reposed a blind confidence in a multitude of agents, whom he sent into all parts of France.  When it happened, on other occasions, that I proved to him, by evidence as sufficient as that in the case of M. Moreau, the falseness of the reports he had received, he replied, with a confidence truly ridiculous, “I can rely on my men.”  Sieyes had written in his countenance, “Give me money!” I recollect that I one day alluded to this expression in the anxious face of Sieyes to the First Consul.  “You are right,” observed he to me, smiling; “when money is in question, Sieyes is quite a matter-of-fact man.  He sends his ideology to the right about and thus becomes easily manageable.  He readily abandons his constitutional dreams for a good round sum, and that is very convenient.”