148 



part the foolhardy adventure of the nephew, and sent 

 him, in an armed vessel, to America. In May, 1838, the 

 banished Bonaparte left this country for England, but not 

 before thoroughly acquainting himself with the geogra- 

 phy and civil polity of the States of America. At Bou- 

 logne, Aug. G, 1840, he made his second attempt to seize 

 the throne, having eml)arked by steamer from England 

 with a written proclamation, a few followers, and a tame 

 eagle, which was to typify the French Empire in this fee- 

 ble melodrama. For this act he was incarcerated for life 

 in the castle at Ilam, from which he escaped in disguise 

 six years later. 



It will be seen, then, that the destined Emperor of 

 the French enjoyed, between 1840 and 1846, six years 

 of leisure in which to ponder upon his future, — his pre- 

 conceived ideas of policy and war, and the knowledge he 

 had obtained of the Western Continent. During this 

 period he was in constant receipt of communications call- 

 ing his attention to the brilliant future of the Central 

 American States, and urging him, upon eftecting his es- 

 cape, to undertake the prosecution of public works, for 

 connecting, by a ship channel at this point, the Pacific 

 ocean with the Caribbean Sea. Immediately upon his 

 flight from Ilam in 184G, he put forth over the letters "L. 

 N. B.," a pamphlet now included in his published works, 

 — in which he shows that certain countries, "situated," as 

 he says, " on the high-road of commerce, are destined, 

 from their geographical position, to a high prosperity." 

 He cites, for examples, Tyre, Carthage, Constantinople, 

 Venice, Liverpool and London, as exhibiting "the aston- 

 ishing spectacle of powerful states, springing suddenly 

 from unwholesome swamps." Constantinople he de- 

 scribes as "the central point between Europe, Asia and 

 Africa, — situated between two seas where she might have 



