Napoleon next asserts that in the Duke’s arrest and condemnation all the usual forms were strictly observed.  But he has also declared that the death of that unfortunate Prince will be an eternal reproach to those who, carried away by a criminal zeal, waited not for their Sovereign’s orders to execute the sentence of the court-martial.  He would, perhaps, have allowed the Prince to live; but yet he said, “It is true I wished to make an example which should deter.”

It has been said that the Due d’Enghien addressed a letter to Napoleon, which was not delivered till after the execution.  This is false and absurd!  How could that Prince write to Bonaparte to offer him his services and to solicit the command of an army?  His interrogatory makes no mention of this letter, and is in direct opposition to the sentiments which that letter would attribute to him.  The truth is, no such letter ever existed.  The individual who was with the Prince declared he never wrote it.  It will never be believed that any one would have presumed to withhold from Bonaparte a letter on which depended the fate of so august a victim.

In his declarations to his companions in exile Napoleon endeavoured either to free himself of this crime or to justify it.  His fear or his susceptibility was such, that in discoursing with strangers he merely said, that had he known of the Prince’s letter, which was not delivered to him.—­God knows why!—­until after he had breathed his last, he would have pardoned him.  But at a subsequent date he traced, with his own hand, his last thoughts, which he supposed would be consecrated in the minds of his contemporaries, and of posterity.  Napoleon, touching on the subject which he felt would be one of the most important attached to his memory, said that if the thing were to do again he would act as he then did.  How does this declaration tally with his avowal, that if he had received the Prince’s letter he should have lived?  This is irreconcilable.  But if we compare all that Napoleon said at St. Helena, and which has been transmitted to us by his faithful followers; if we consider his contradictions when speaking of the Due d’Enghien’s death to strangers, to his friends, to the public, or to posterity, the question ceases to be doubtful Bonaparte wished to strike a blow which would terrify his enemies.  Fancying that the Duc de Berri was ready to land in France, he despatched his aide de camp Savary, in disguise, attended by gendarmes, to watch the Duke’s landing at Biville, near Dieppe.  This turned out a fruitless mission.  The Duke was warned in time not to attempt the useless and dangerous enterprise, and Bonaparte, enraged to see one prey escape him, pounced upon another.  It is well known that Bonaparte often, and in the presence even of persons whom he conceived to have maintained relations with the partisans of the Bourbons