oduced by the exceptional circumstances which
surrounded him, and the extraordinary temptations to which he was
subjected.

Certainly a truer and fuller light is cast by these volumes, upon the
colossal figure which will always remain one of the most interesting
studies in all human history.

THE TRANSLATOR.

INTRODUCTION.

By Constant.

The career of a man compelled to make his own way, who is not an artisan
or in some trade, does not usually begin till he is about twenty years of
age. Till then he vegetates, uncertain of his future, neither having,
nor being able to have, any well-defined purpose. It is only when he has
arrived at the full development of his powers, and his character and bent
of mind are shown, that he can determine his profession or calling. Not
till then does he know himself, and see his way open before him. In
fact, it is only then that he begins to live.

Reasoning in this manner, my life from my twentieth year has been thirty
years, which can be divided into equal parts, so far as days and months
are counted, but very unequal parts, considering the events which
transpired in each of those two periods of my life.

Attached to the person of the Emperor Napoleon for fifteen years, I have
seen all the men, and witnessed all the important events, which centered
around him. I have seen far more than that; for I have had under my eyes
all the circumstances of his life, the least as well as the greatest, the
most secret as well as those which are known to history,--I have had, I
repeat, incessantly under my eyes the man whose name, solitary and alone,
fills the most glorious pages of our history. Fifteen years I followed
him in his travels and his campaigns, was at his court, and saw him in
the privacy of his family. Whatever step he wished to take, whatever
order he gave, it was necessarily very difficult for the Emperor not to
admit me, even though involuntarily, into his confidence; so that without
desiring it, I have more than once found myself in the possession of
secrets I should have preferred not to know. What wonderful things
happened during those fifteen years! Those near the Emperor lived as if
in the center of a whirlwind; and so quick was the succession of
overwhelming events, that one felt dazed, as it were, and if he wished to
pause and fix his attention for a moment, there instantly came, like
another flood, a succession of events which carried him along with them
without g