could it be otherwise?  Fouche was identified with the Republic by the death of the King, for which he had voted; with the Reign of Terror by his sanguinary missions to Lyons and Nevers; with the Consulate by his real though perhaps exaggerated services; with Bonaparte by the charm with which he might be said to have fascinated him; with Josephine by the enmity of the First Consul’s brothers.  Who would believe it?  Fouche ranked the enemies of the Revolution amongst his warmest partisans.  They overwhelmed him with eulogy, to the disparagement even of the Head of the State, because the cunning Minister, practising an interested indulgence, set himself up as the protector of individuals belonging to classes which, when he was proconsul, he had attacked in the mass.  Director of public opinion, and having in his hands the means at his pleasure of inspiring fear or of entangling by inducements, it was all in his favour that he had already directed this opinion.  The machinery he set in motion was so calculated that the police was rather the police of Fouche than that of the Minister of the General Police.  Throughout Paris, and indeed throughout all France, Fouche obtained credit for extraordinary ability; and the popular opinion was correct in this respect, namely, that no man ever displayed such ability in making it be supposed that he really possessed talent.  Fouche’s secret in this particular is the whole secret of the greater part of those persons who are called statesmen.

Be this as it may, the First Consul did not behold with pleasure the factitious influence of which Fouche had possessed himself.  For some time past, to the repugnance which at bottom he had felt towards.  Fouche, were added other causes of discontent.  In consequence of having been deceived by secret reports and correspondence Bonaparte began to shrug up his shoulders with an expression of regret when he received them, and said, “Would you believe, Bourrienne, that I have been imposed on by these things?  All such denunciations are useless—­scandalous.  All the reports from prefects and the police, all the intercepted letters, are a tissue of absurdities and lies.  I desire to have no more of them.”  He said so, but he still received them.  However, Fouche’s dismissal was resolved upon.  But though Bonaparte wished to get rid of him, still, under the influence of the charm, he dared not proceed against him without the greatest caution.  He first resolved upon the suppression of the office of Minister of Police in order to disguise the motive for the removal of the Minister.  The First Consul told Fouche that this suppression, which he spoke of as being yet remote, was calculated more than anything else to give strength to the Government, since it would afford a proof of the security and internal tranquillity of France.  Overpowered by the arguments with which Bonaparte supported his proposition, Fouche could urge no good reasons in opposition to it, but contented