The autograph copy of the above list contains some of those orthographical blunders which Bonaparte so frequently committed.  Whether these blunders are attributable to the limited course of instruction he received at Brienne, to his hasty writing, the rapid flow of his ideas, or the little importance he attached to that indispensable condition of polite education, I know not.  Knowing so well as he did the authors and generals whose names appear in the above list, it is curious that he should have written Ducecling for Duguesclin, and Ocean for Ossian.  The latter mistake would have puzzled me not a little had I not known his predilection for the Caledonian bard.

Before his departure Bonaparte laid in a considerable stock of Burgundy.  It was supplied by a man named James, of Dijon.  I may observe that on this occasion we had an opportunity of ascertaining that good Burgundy, well racked off, and in casks hermetically sealed, does not lose its quality on a sea voyage.  Several cases of this Burgundy twice crossed the desert of the Isthmus of Suez on camels’ backs.  We brought some of it back with us to Frejus, and it was as good as when we departed.  James went with us to Egypt.

During the remainder of our stay in Paris nothing occurred worthy of mention, with the exception of a conversation between Bonaparte and me some days before our departure for Toulon.  He went with me to the Luxembourg to get signatures to the official papers connected with his expedition.  He was very silent.  As we passed through the Rue Sainte Anne I asked him, with no other object than merely to break a long pause, whether he was still determined to quit France.  He replied, “Yes:  I have tried everything.  They do not want me (probably alluding to the office of Director).  I ought to overthrow them, and make myself King; but it will not do yet.  The nobles will never consent to it.  I have tried my ground.  The time is not yet come.  I should be alone.  But I will dazzle them again.”  I replied, “Well, we will go to Egypt;” and changed the conversation.

—­[Lucien and the Bonapartists of course deny that Napoleon wished to become Director, or to seize on power at this time; see Lucien, tome 1. p. 154.  Thiers (vol. v. p. 257) takes the same view.  Lanfrey (tome i. p. 363) believes Napoleon was at last compelled by the Directory to start and he credits the story told by Desaix to Mathieu Dumas, or rather to the wife of that officer, that there was a plot to upset the Directory, but that when all was ready Napoleon judged that the time was not ripe.  Lanfrey, however, rather enlarges what Dumas says; see Dumas, tome iii. p. 167.  See also the very remarkable conversation of Napoleon with Miot de Melito just before leaving Italy for Rastadt:  “I cannot obey any longer.  I have tasted the pleasures of command, and I cannot renounce it.  My decision is taken.  If I cannot be master, I shall quit France.”  (Miot, tome i. p. 184).]—­

The squabble with Bernadotte at Vienna delayed our departure for a fortnight, and might have had the most disastrous influence on the fate of the squadron, as Nelson would most assuredly have waited between Malta and Sicily if he had arrived there before us.’