Although an entire stranger to politics, I had read with deep interest the newspapers I received in my retreat, since the great political change to which the name of the Restoration was given; and it seemed to me to need only the simplest common-sense to see the marked difference which existed between the government which had been overthrown and the new.  In all departments I saw a succession of titled men take the places of the long list of distinguished men who had given under the Empire so many proofs of merit and courage; but I was far from thinking, notwithstanding the large number of discontented, that the fortunes of the Emperor and the wishes of the army would ever restore him to that throne which he had voluntarily abdicated in order that he might not be the cause of a civil war in Dance.  Therefore, it would be impossible to describe my astonishment, and the multiplicity of varied feelings which agitated me, when I received the first news of the landing of the Emperor on the coast of Provence.  I read with enthusiasm the admirable proclamation in which he announced that his eagles would fly from steeple to steeple, and that he himself would follow so closely in his triumphal march from the Bay of Juan to Paris.

Here I must make a confession, which is, that only since I had left the Emperor, had I fully comprehended the immensity of his greatness.  Attached to his service almost from the beginning of the Consulate, at a time when I was still very young, he had grown, so to speak, without my having perceived it, and I had above all seen in him, from the nature of my duties, the excellent master rather than the great man; consequently, in this instance the effects of distance were very different from what it usually produces.  It was with difficulty I could realize, and I am often astonished to-day in recalling the frank candor with which I had dared to defend to the Emperor what I knew to be the truth; his kindness, however, seemed to encourage me in this, for often, instead of becoming irritated by my vehemence, he said to me gently, with a benevolent smile, “Come, come!  M. Constant, don’t excite yourself.”  Adorable kindness in a man of such elevated rank!  Ah, well I this was the only impression it made on me in the privacy of his chamber, but since then I have learned to estimate it at its true value.

On learning that the Emperor was to be restored to us, my first impulse was to repair at once to the palace, that I might be there on his arrival; but more mature reflection and the advice of my family made me realize that it would be more suitable for me to await his orders, in case he wished to recall me to my former service.  I congratulated myself on deciding to take the latter course, since I had the happiness to learn that his Majesty had been kind enough to express his approval of my former conduct.  I learned from most reliable authority, that he had hardly arrived at the Tuileries, when he condescended