duties which it imposes, and to receive the succour which it administers.  You will say mass every day in the adjoining chapel, and you will expose the Holy Sacrament for forty hours.  After I am dead you will place your altar at my head in the funeral chamber; you will continue to celebrate mass, and perform all the customary ceremonies; you will not cease till I am laid in the ground.”  The Abbe (Vignale) withdrew; Napoleon reproved his fellow-countryman for his supposed incredulity.  “Can you carry it to this point?  Can you disbelieve in God?  Everything proclaims His existence; and, besides, the greatest minds have thought so.”—­“But, Sire, I have never called it in question.  I was attending to the progress of the fever:  your Majesty fancied you saw in my features an expression which they had not.”—­ “You are a physician, Doctor,” he replied laughingly; “these folks,” he added, half to himself, “are conversant only with matter; they will believe in nothing beyond.”

In the afternoon of the 25th he was better; but being left alone, a sudden fancy possessed him to eat.  He called for fruits, wine, tried a biscuit, then swallowed some champagne, seized a bunch of grapes, and burst into a fit of laughter as soon as he saw Antommarchi return.  The physician ordered away the dessert, and found fault with the maitre d’hotel; but the mischief was done, the fever returned and became violent.  The Emperor was now on his death-bed, but he testified concern for every one.  He asked Antommarchi if 500 guineas would satisfy the English physician, and if he himself would like to serve Maria Louisa in quality of a physician?  “She is my wife, the first Princess in Europe, and after me you should serve no one else.”  Antommarchi expressed his acknowledgments.  The fever continued unabated, with violent thirst and cold in the feet.  On the 27th he determined to remove from the small chamber into the salon.  They were preparing to carry him.  “No,” he said, “not until I am dead; for the present it will be sufficient if you support me.”

Between the 27th and 28th the Emperor passed a very bad night; the fever increased, coldness spread over his limbs, his strength was quite gone.  He spoke a few words of encouragement to Antommarchi; then in a tone of perfect calmness and composure he delivered to him the following instructions:  “After my death, which cannot be far off, I wish you to open my body:  I wish also, nay, I require, that you will not suffer any English physician to touch me.  If, however, you find it indispensable to have some one to assist you, Dr. Arnott is the only one I am willing you should employ.  I am desirous, further, that you should take out my heart, that you put it in spirits of wine, and that you carry it to Parma to my dear Maria Louisa:  you will tell her how tenderly I have loved her, that I have never ceased to love her; and you will report to her all that you have witnessed, all that relates to my situation and