or to his old and faithful guard, an account of
which, moreover, has been often enough published for the facts to be well
known concerning this event, which, besides, took place in public. Here
my Memoirs might well close; but the reader, I well believe, cannot
refuse me his attention a few moments longer, that I may recall some
facts which I have a right to explain, and to relate some incidents
concerning the return from the Island of Elba. I, therefore, now
continue my remarks on the first of these heads, and the second will be
the subject of the next chapter.

The Emperor had then already started; and as for myself, shut up alone,
my country house became henceforth a sad residence to me. I held no
communication with any one whatever, read no news, and sought to learn
none. At the end of a short time I received a visit from one of my
friends from Paris, who said to me that the journals spoke of my conduct
without understanding it, and that they condemned it severely. He added
that it was M. de Turenne who had sent to the editors the note in which
I had been so heavily censured. I must say that I did not believe this;
I knew M. de Turenne too well to think him capable of a proceeding so
dishonorable, inasmuch as I had frankly explained everything to him, when
he made the answer I gave above. But however the evil came, it was
nevertheless done; and by the incredible complications of my position I
found myself compelled to keep silence. Nothing certainly would have
been easier than to repel the calumny by an exact rehearsal of the facts;
but should I justify myself in this manner by, so to speak, accusing the
Emperor at a moment especially when the Emperor's enemies manifested much
bitterness? When I saw such a great man made a mark for the shafts of
calumny, I, who was so contemptible and insignificant among the crowd,
could surely allow a few of these envenomed shafts to fall on me. To-day
the time has come to tell the truth, and I have done so without
restriction; not to excuse myself, for on the contrary I blame myself for
not having completely sacrificed myself, and for not having accompanied
the Emperor to the Island of Elba regardless of what might have been
said. Nevertheless, I may be allowed to say in my own defense, that in
this combination of physical and mental sufferings which overwhelmed me
all at once, a person must be very sure of infallibility himself to
condemn completely this sensitiveness so natural i