Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 3,263 pages of information about Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon.

Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 3,263 pages of information about Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon.

Baron Louis, Minister of Finance.

The Duke of Otranto, Minister of the Police.

Baron Pasquier, Minister of Justice, and Keeper of the Seals.

Marshal Gouvion St. Cyr, War Minister.

Comte de Jaucourt, peer of France, Minister of the Marine.

The Duc de Richelieu, peer of France, Minister of the King’s Household.

The portfolio of the Minister of the Interior, which was not immediately disposed of, was provisionally entrusted to the Minister of Justice.  But what was most gratifying to the public in the composition of this new ministry was that M. de Blacas, who had made himself so odious to everybody, was superseded by M. de Richelieu, whose name revived the memory of a great Minister, and who, by his excellent conduct throughout the whole course of his career, deserves to be distinguished as a model of honour and wisdom.

General satisfaction was expressed on the appointment of Marshal Macdonald to the post of Grand Chancellor of the Legion of Honour in lieu of M. de Pradt.  M. de Chabrol resumed the Prefecture of the Seine, which, during the Hundred Days, had been occupied by M. de Bondi, M. de Mole was made Director-General of bridges and causeways.  I was superseded in the Prefecture of Police by M. Decazes, and M. Beugnot followed M. Ferrand as Director-General of the Post-office.

I think it was on the 10th of July that I went to St. Cloud to pay a visit of thanks to Blucher.  I had been informed that as soon as he learned I had a house at St. Cloud he sent a guard to protect it.  This spontaneous mark of attention was well deserving of grateful acknowledgment, especially at a time when there was so much reason to complain of the plunder practised by the Prussians.  My visit to Blucher presented to observation a striking instance of the instability of human greatness.  I found Blucher residing like a sovereign in the Palace of St. Cloud, where I had lived so long in the intimacy of Napoleon, at a period when he dictated laws to the Kings of Europe before he was a monarch himself.

—­[The English occupied St. Cloud after the Prussians.  My large house, in which the children of the Comte d’Artois were inoculated, was respected by them, but they occupied a small home forming part of the estate.  The English officer who commanded the troops stationed a guard at the large house.  One morning we were informed that the door had been broken open and a valuable looking-glass stolen.  We complained to the commanding officer, and on the affair being inquired into it was discovered that the sentinel himself had committed the theft.  The man was tried by a court-martial, and condemned to death, a circumstance which, as may naturally be supposed, was very distressing to us.  Madame de Bourrienne applied to the commanding officer for the man’s pardon, but could only obtain his reprieve.  The regiment departed some weeks after, and we could never learn
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