of England six weeks. The
assumption of the Imperial dignity procured him another decent
opportunity of offering his olive-branch to those who had caused his
laurels to wither, and by whom, notwithstanding his abuse, calumnies, and
menaces, he would have been more proud to be saluted Emperor than by all
the nations upon the Continent. His vanity, interest, and policy, all
required this last degree of supremacy and elevation at that period.

Bonaparte had so well penetrated the weak side of Moreau's character
that, although he could not avoid doing justice to this general's
military talents and exploits, he neither esteemed him as a citizen nor
dreaded him as a rival. Moreau possessed great popularity; but so did
Dumourier and Pichegru before him: and yet neither of them had found
adherents enough to shake those republican governments with which they
avowed themselves openly discontented, and against which they secretly
plotted. I heard Talleyrand say, at Madame de Montlausier's, in the
presence of fifty persons, "Napoleon Bonaparte had never anything to
apprehend from General Moreau, and from his popularity, even at the head
of an army. Dumourier, too, was at the head of an army when he revolted
against the National Convention; but had he not saved himself by flight
his own troops would have delivered him up to be punished as a traitor.
Moreau, and his popularity, could only be dangerous to the Bonaparte
dynasty were he to survive Napoleon, had not this Emperor wisely averted
this danger." From this official declaration of Napoleon's confidential
Minister, in a society of known anti-imperialists, I draw the conclusion
that Moreau will never more, during the present reign, return to France.
How very feeble, and how badly advised must this general have been, when,
after his condemnation to two years' imprisonment, he accepted a
perpetual exile, and renounced all hopes of ever again entering his own
country. In the Temple, or in any other prison, if he had submitted to
the sentence pronounced against him, he would have caused Bonaparte more
uneasiness than when at liberty, and been more a point of rally to his
adherents and friends than when at his palace of Grosbois, because
compassion and pity must have invigorated and sharpened their feelings.

If report be true, however, he did not voluntarily exchange imprisonment
for exile; racks were shown him; and by the act of banishment was placed
a poisonous draught. This report