On the conclusion of the Concordat Bonaparte said to me, “I shall let the Republican generals exclaim as much as they like against the Mass.  I know what I am about; I am working for posterity.”  He was now gathering the fruits of his Concordat.  He ordered that the Pope should be everywhere treated in his journey through the French territory with the highest distinction, and he proceeded to Fontainebleau to receive his Holiness.  This afforded an opportunity for Bonaparte to re-establish the example of those journeys of the old Court, during which changes of ministers used formerly to be made.  The Palace of Fontainebleau, now become Imperial, like all the old royal chateaux, had been newly furnished with a luxury and taste corresponding to the progress of modern art.  The Emperor was proceeding on the road to Nemours when courtiers informed him of the approach of Pius VII.  Bonaparte’s object was to avoid the ceremony which had been previously settled.  He had therefore made the pretext of going on a hunting-party, and was in the way as it were by chance when the Pope’s carriage was arriving.  He alighted from horseback, and the Pope came out of his carriage.  Rapp was with the Emperor, and I think I yet hear him describing, in his original manner and with his German accent, this grand interview, upon which, however, he for his part looked with very little respect.  Rapp, in fact, was among the number of those who, notwithstanding his attachment to the Emperor, preserved independence of character, and he knew he had no reason to dissemble with me.  “Fancy to yourself,” said he, “the amusing comedy that was played.”  After the Emperor and the Pope had well embraced they went into the same carriage; and, in order that they might be upon a footing of equality, they were to enter at the same time by opposite doors.  All that was settled; but at breakfast the Emperor had calculated how he should manage, without appearing to assume anything, to get on the righthand side of the Pope, and everything turned out as he wished.  “As to the Pope,” said Rapp, “I must own that I never saw a man with a finer countenance or more respectable appearance than Pius VII.”

After the conference between the Pope and the Emperor at Fontainebleau, Pius VII. set off for Paris first.  On the road the same honours were paid to him as to the Emperor.  Apartments were prepared for him in the Pavilion de Flore in the Tuileries, and his bedchamber was arranged and furnished in the same manner as his chamber in the Palace of Monte-Cavallo, his usual residence in Rome.  The Pope’s presence in Paris was so extraordinary a circumstance that it was scarcely believed, though it had some time before been talked of.  What, indeed, could be more singular than to see the Head of the Church in a capital where four years previously the altars had been overturned, and the few faithful who remained had been obliged to exercise their worship in secret!