sir," said he, was a great man! he loved his country; and I shall never forgive my father for consenting to the union of Corsica with France."

Speaking of his early attachment to Mademoiselle du Colombier, Napoleon said, "We were the most innocent creatures imaginable. We contrived short interviews together. I well remember one which took place on a midsummer's 's morning, just as the light began to dawn. It will hardly be believed that all our happiness consisted in eating cherries together."

1790. When at Auxonne, Napoleon and some subaltern officers were quartered at the house of a barber. Napoleon, as usual when off duty, shut himself in his room and devoted himself to study. The other young

officers amused themselves by coquetting with the barber's pretty wife, who was much annoyed that her charms had no power to draw Napoleon from his studies. Afterwards, when in command of the army in Italy, Napoleon passed through Auxonne, on his way to Marengo. He stopped at the barber's door, and asked his former hostess if she remembered a young officer by the name of Bonaparte, who once quartered in her family. "Indeed I do," she replied pettishly; "and a very disagreeable young man he was. He was always shut up in his room, and if he did walk out, he never condescended to speak to any one."

"Ah! my good woman!" Napoleon rejoined, "had I passed my time as you wished to have me, I should not now have been in command of the army of Italy."

One evening, just after the demolition of the Bastile, Napoleon, in M. Neckar's drawing-room, in a long

speech which he made, much to the astonishment of every one, said, "If our troops are not compelled unhesitatingly to obey the commands of the executive, we shall be exposed to the blind fury of democratic passions, which will render France the most miserable country on the globe. The ministry may be assured that if the daily increasing arrogance of the Parisian mob is not repressed by a strong arm, and social order rigidly maintained, we shall see not only this capital, but every other city in France, thrown into a state of indescribable anarchy, while the real friends of liberty, the enlightened patriots now working for the best good of our country, will sink beneath a set of demagogues, who, with louder outcries for freedom on their tongues, will be in reality but a horde of savages worse than the Neros of old."

1792. While in Paris, on the 20th of June, Napoleon was walking with Bourrienne on the banks of the Seine. They followed the multitude, and saw them swarm into the Tuileries, drag the humiliated king into the embrasure of a window, and force him to put the red cap on his head. Napoleon turned from the sight, exclaiming, "The wretches! how could they suffer this vile mob to enter the palace! They should have swept down the first five hundred with grape shot, and the rest would have soon taken to flight."

"I frankly declare," said Napoleon, "that if I were compelled to choose between the old monarchy and Jacobin misrule, I should infinitely prefer the former."

One evening, in the midst of the Reign of Terror, on returning from a walk through the streets of Paris, a lady asked him—

"How do you like the new Constitution ?" He replied hesitatingly,

"Why, it is good in one sense certainly; but all that is connected with carnage is bad;" and then he exclaimed in an outburst of undisguised feeling, "No! no! no! down with this constitution; I do not like it!"

1794. During the siege of Toulon, one of the agents of the Convention ventured to criticise the position of a gun which Napoleon was superintending. "Do you," he tartly replied, "attend to your duty as national commissioners, and I will be answerable for mine with my head."

Napoleon's younger brother Louis visited him during this siege. They went together one morning to a place where a fruitless assault had been made, and two hundred Frenchmen were dead upon the ground. On beholding them, Napoleon exclaimed, "All those men have been needlessly sacrificed. Had intelligence commanded here, none of these lives need have been lost. Learn from this, my brother, how indispensable and imperatively necessary it is that those should possess knowledge who aspire to assume the command over others."

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'General," said Bonaparte to Dugommier, as he raised the tri-coloured flag over the crumbling walls of the rampart, "go and sleep. We have taken Toulon."

An officer, entering Napoleon's room, found, much to his astonishment, Napoleon dressed and studying.

"What!" exclaimed his friend, "are you not in bed yet?"

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"I have finished my

What, so early!" the other replied.

"Yes," continued Napoleon, "so early. Two or three hours of sleep are enough for any man."

Napoleon had a great contempt for the effeminate young men of his time. He exclaimed one day, "Can it be that upon such creatures Fortune is willing to lavish her favours! How contemptible is human nature!"

When Barras introduced Napoleon to the Convention as a fit man to be entrusted with the command, the President asked,

"Are you willing to undertake the defence of the Convention?"

"Yes," was the reply.

After a time the President continued

"Are you aware of the magnitude of the undertaking?"

"Perfectly," replied Napoleon, fixing his eyes upon his questioner; " and I am in the habit of accomplishing that which I undertake."

"How could you," a lady asked him about this time, "fire thus mercilessly upon your countrymen ?"

"A soldier," he replied calmly, "is only a machine to obey orders. This is my seal which I have impressed upon Paris."

Napoleon's apt replies often excited good humour in

a crowd.

A large and brawny fishwoman once was haranguing the mob, and telling them not to disperse. She finished

by exclaiming, "Never mind those coxcombs with epaulets on their shoulders; they care not if we poor people all starve, if they can but feed well and grow fat."

Napoleon, who was as thin as a shadow, turned to her and said, "Look at me, my good woman, and tell me which of us two is the fatter."

The fishfag was completely disconcerted, and the crowd dispersed.

1796. "Good God!" Napoleon said in Italy, whilst residing at Montebello, "how rare men are. There are eighteen millions in Italy, and I have with difficulty found two, Dandolo and Melzi."

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Europe!" Napoleon exclaimed at Passeriano, "Europe is but a molehill; there never have existed mighty empires, there never have occurred great revolutions, save in the East, where live six hundred millions of men -the cradle of all religions, the birth-place of all metaphysics."

The night following the battle of Arcola, Bonaparte disguised himself in the dress of an inferior officer, and traversed the camp. He found a sentinel leaning on the butt end of his musket, fast asleep. He gently placed his head on the ground, and kept watch for him for two hours. When the soldier woke and discovered Napoleon himself doing duty for him, he was terror-stricken. "The General! Bonaparte !" he exclaimed; "I am then undone."

Bonaparte, with the greatest gentleness, replied, "Not so, fellow-soldier; recover yourself; after so much fatigue, a brave man like you may be allowed to sleep awhile; but in future choose your time better."