ware of
this; he knew that to insert a name in a bulletin was conferring a great
honour, and that its exclusion was a severe disappointment. General
Berthier, to whom I had expressed a strong desire to examine the works
of the siege, took me over them; but notwithstanding his promise of
secrecy; he mentioned the circumstance to the General-in-Chief, who had
desired me not to approach the works. "What did you go there for?"
said Bonaparte to me, with some severity; "that is not your place." I
replied that herthier told me that no assault would take place that day;
and he believed there would be no sortie, as the garrison had made one
the preceding evening. "What matters that? There might have been
another. Those who have nothing to do in such places are always the
first victims. Let every man mind his own business. Wounded or killed,
I would not even have noticed you in the bulletin. You could have been
laughed at, and that justly."

Bonaparte; not having at this time experienced reverses, having
continually proceeded from triumph to triumph, confidently anticipated
the taking of St, Jean d'Acre. In his letters to the generals in Egypt
he fixed the 25th of April for the accomplishment of that event. He
reckoned that the grand assault against the tower could not be made
before that day; it took place, however, twenty-four hours sooner. He
wrote to Desaix on the 19th of April, "I count on being master of Acre in
six days." On the 2d of May he told Junot, "Our 18 and 24 pounders have
arrived. We hope to enter Acre in a few days. The fire of their
artillery is completely extinguished." Letters have been printed, dated
30th Floreal' (19th. May), in which he announces to, Dugua and to
Poussielque that they can rely on his being in Acre on 6th Floreal
(25th April). Some mistake has evidently been made. "The slightest
circumstances produce the greatest events," said Napoleon, according to
the Memorial of St. Helena; "had St. Jean d'Acre fallen, I should have
changed the face of the world." And again, "The fate of the East lay in
that small town."

This idea is not one which he first began to entertain at St. Helena; he
often repeated the very same words at St. Jean d'Acre. On the shore of
Ptolemes gigantic projects agitated him, as, doubtless, regret for not
having carried them into execution tormented him at St. Helena.

Almost every evening Bonaparte and myself used to walk together, at a
little distance from the sea-shore.