ionary, he
was tied by the strongest bonds to the most despotic monarchy in
Europe. A patriotic Corsican, he was the servant of his country's
oppressor. Conscious of great ability, he was seeking an outlet in the
pursuit of literature, a line of work entirely unsuited to his powers.
The head and support of a large family, he was almost penniless; if he
should follow his convictions, he and they might be altogether so. In
the period of choice and requiring room for experiment, he saw himself
doomed to a fixed, inglorious career, and caged in a framework of
unpropitious circumstance. Whatever the moral obliquity in his feeble
expedients, there is the pathos of human limitations in their
character.

Whether the resolution had long before been taken, or was of recent
formation, Napoleon now intended to make fame and profit go hand in
hand. The meeting of the Corsican estates was, as far as is known,
entirely forgotten, and authorship was resumed, not merely with the
ardor of one who writes from inclination, but with the regular
drudgery of a craftsman. In spite of all discouragements, he appeared
to a visitor in his family, still considered the most devoted in the
island to the French monarchy because so favored by it, as being "full
of vivacity, quick in his speech and motions, his mind apparently hard
at work in digesting schemes and forming plans and proudly rejecting
every other suggestion but that of his own fancy. For this intolerable
ambition he was often reproved by the elder Lucien, his uncle, a
dignitary of the church. Yet these admonitions seemed to make no
impression upon the mind of Napoleon, who received them with a grin of
pity, if not of contempt."[15] The amusements of the versatile and
headstrong boy would have been sufficient occupation for most men.
Regulating, as far as possible, his mother's complicated affairs, he
journeyed frequently to Bastia, probably to collect money due for
young mulberry-trees which had been sold, possibly to get material for
his history. On these visits he met and dined with the artillery
officers of the company stationed there. One of them, M. de Roman, a
very pronounced royalist, has given in his memoirs a striking portrait
of his guest.[16] "His face was not pleasing to me at all, his
character still less; and he was so dry and sententious for a youth of
his age, a French officer too, that I never for a moment entertained
the thought of making him my friend. My knowledge of