d the state of society during the reign of Terror can fully
appreciate the satisfaction which the first steps towards the
restoration of social order produced in the breasts of all honest men.
The Directory, more base and not less perverse than the Convention, had
retained the horrible 21st of January among the festivals of the
Republic. One of Bonaparte's first ideas on attaining the possession of
power was to abolish this; but such was the ascendency of the abettors
of the fearful event that he could not venture on a straightforward
course. He and his two colleagues, who were Sieyes and Roger Ducos,
signed, on the 5th Nivose, a decree, setting forth that in future the
only festivals to be celebrated by the Republic were the 1st Vendemiaire
and the 14th of July, intending by this means to consecrate
provisionally the recollection of the foundation of the Republic and of
liberty.

All was calculation with Bonaparte. To produce effect was his highest
gratification. Thus he let slip no opportunity of saying or doing things
which were calculated to dazzle the multitude. While at the Luxembourg,
he went sometimes accompanied by his 'aides de camp' and sometimes by a
Minister, to pay certain official visits. I did not accompany him on
these occasions; but almost always either on his return, after dinner, or
in the evening, he related to me what he had done and said. He
congratulated himself on having paid a visit to Daubenton, at the Jardin
des Plantes, and talked with great self-complacency of the distinguished
way in which he had treated the contemporary of Buffon.

On the 24th Brumaire he visited the prisons. He liked to make these
visits unexpectedly, and to take the governors of the different public
establishments by surprise; so that, having no time to make their
preparations, he might see things as they really were. I was in his
cabinet when he returned, for I had a great deal of business to go
through in his absence. As he entered he exclaimed, "What brutes these
Directors are! To what a state they have brought our public
establishments! But, stay a little! I will put all in order. The
prisons are in a shockingly unwholesome state, and the prisoners
miserably fed. I questioned them, and I questioned the jailers, for
nothing is to be learned from the superiors. They, of course, always
speak well of their own work! When I was in the Temple I could not help
thinking of the unfortunate Louis XVI. He was an excellent man