t the estates
which they had acquired in the conquered countries, and the greater part
only sighed to recross the Rhine.

As to the recruits who arrived, they were a mixture of men from several
of the German nations. In order to join us they had passed through the
Prussian states, from whence arose the exhalation of so much hatred. As
they approached, they encountered our discouragement and our long train
of disorder; when they entered into line, far from being put into
companies with, and supported by old soldiers, they found themselves
left alone, to fight with every kind of scourge, to support a cause
which was abandoned by those who were most interested in its success;
the consequence was, that at the very first bivouac, most of these
Germans disbanded themselves. At sight of the disasters of the army
returning from Moscow, the tried soldiers of Macdonald were themselves
shaken. Notwithstanding this corps d'armee, and the completely fresh
division of Heudelet preserved their unity. All these remains were
speedily collected into Dantzic; thirty-five thousand soldiers from
seventeen different nations, were shut up in it. The remainder, in small
numbers, did not begin rallying until they got to Posen and upon the
Oder.

Hitherto it was hardly possible for the King of Naples to regulate our
flight any better; but at the moment he passed through Marienwerder on
his way to Posen, a letter from Naples again unsettled all his
resolutions. The impression which it made upon him was so violent, that
by degrees as he read it, the bile mixed itself with his blood so
rapidly, that he was found a few minutes after with a complete jaundice.

It appeared that an act of government which the queen had taken upon
herself had wounded him in one of his strongest passions. He was not at
all jealous of that princess, notwithstanding her charms, but furiously
so of his royal authority; and it was particularly of the queen, as
sister of the Emperor, that he was suspicious.

Persons were astonished at seeing this prince, who had hitherto appeared
to sacrifice every thing to glory in arms, suffering himself to be
mastered all at once by a less noble passion; but they forgot that, with
certain characters, there must be always a ruling passion.

Besides, it was still the same ambition under different forms, and
always entering completely into each of them; for such are passionate
characters. At that moment his jealousy of his authority triu