“Accustomed to dangers, I know a remedy against ennui and the troubles of life.  The wretchedness I endure is not to be measured; I am entitled not to expect it.

“I will wait here until the 9th.  Do not trouble yourself.  Pursue your pleasures; happiness is made for you.  The whole world is too happy when it can please you, and your husband alone is very, very unhappy.

“Bonaparte.”

But this cry of anguish from this crushed heart did not reach Josephine; and the courier, who next day came to Milan from Genoa, brought from Josephine only a letter with numerous commissions for Berthier.  Bonaparte’s anger and sorrow knew no bounds, and he at once writes to her with all the utterances of despair and complaint of a lover, and the proud wrath of an injured husband: 

“Milan, the 8th Frimaire, Year V., eight o’clock, evening.

“The courier whom Berthier had sent to Milan has just arrived.  You have had no time to write to me; that I can understand very well.  In the midst of pleasures and amusements it would have been too much for you to make the smallest sacrifice for me.  Berthier has shown me the letter you wrote to him.  It is not my purpose to trouble you in your arrangements or in the festivities which you are enjoying; I am not worth the trouble; the happiness or the misery of a man you love no longer has not the right to interest you.

“As regards myself, to love you and you alone, to make you happy, to do nothing that can wrong you in any way, is the desire and object of my life.

“Be happy, have nothing to reproach me, trouble not yourself about the felicity of a man who only breathes in your life, who finds enjoyment only in your happiness.  When I claim from you a love which would approach mine, I am wrong:  how can one expect that a cobweb should weigh as much as gold?  When I sacrifice to you all my wishes, all my thoughts, all the moments of my life, I merely obey the spell which your charms, your character, your whole person, exercise over my wretched heart.  I am wrong, for Nature has not endowed me with the power of binding you to me; but I deserve from Josephine in return at least consideration and esteem, for I love her unto madness, and love her exclusively.

“Farewell, adorable wife! farewell, my Josephine!  May fate pour into my heart every trouble and every sorrow; but may it send to my Josephine serene and happy days!  Who deserves it more than she?  When it is well understood that she loves me no more, I will garner up into my heart my deep anguish, and be content to be in many things at least useful and good to her.

“I open this letter once more to send you a kiss.... ah!  Josephine. ...  Josephine!  Bonaparte.”

Meanwhile it was not yet well understood that Josephine loved him no more; for as soon as she knew of Bonaparte’s presence in Milan, she hastened to dispatch him a courier, and to apprise him of her sudden departure.