Government to the French emigrant.  I say emigrant because I have been forced to be one.  I had no intention of being one, but a horde of brigands, who came from Caen to my house to assassinate me, considered I had committed the great crime in being the senior general of the canton and in having the Grand Cross of St. Louis:  this was too much for them; if it had not been for the cries of my neighbours, my door would have been broken open, and I should have been assassinated; and I had but time to fly by a door at the back, only carrying away what I had on me.  At first I retired to Paris, but there they told me that I could do nothing but go into a foreign country, so great was the hate entertained for me by my fellow-citizens, although I lived in retirement, never having any discussion with any one.  Thus, General; I have abandoned all I possessed, money and goods, leaving them at the mercy of what they call the nation, which has profited a good deal by this, as I have nothing left in the world, not even a spot to put my foot on.  If even a horse had been reserved for me, General, I could ask for what depends on you, for I have heard it said that some emigrants have been allowed to return home.  I do not even ask this favour, not having a place to rest my foot.  And, besides, I have with me here an exiled brother, older than I am, very ill and in perfect second childhood, whom I could not abandon.  I am resigned to my own unhappy fate, but my sole and great grief is that not only I myself have been ill-treated, but that my fate has, contrary to the law, injured relations whom I love and respect.  I have a mother-in-law, eighty years old, who has been refused the dower I had given her from my property, and this will make me die a bankrupt if nothing is changed, which makes me miserable.

I acknowledge, General, that I know little of the new style, but,
according to the old form, I am your humble servant,

DuroselBeaumanoir.

I read this letter to the First Consul, who immediately said, “Bourrienne, this is sacred!  Do not lose a minute.  Send the old man ten times the sum.  Write to General Durosel that he shall be immediately erased from the list of emigrants.  What mischief those brigands of the Convention have done!  I can never repair it all.”  Bonaparte uttered these words with a degree of emotion which I rarely saw him evince.  In the evening he asked me whether I had executed his orders, which I had done without losing a moment.  The death of M. Froth had given me a lesson as to the value of time!

Availing myself of the privilege I have already frequently taken of making abrupt transitions from one subject to another, according as the recollection of past circumstances occurs to my mind, I shall here note down a few details, which may not improperly be called domestic, and afterwards describe a conspiracy which was protected by the very man against whom it was hatched.