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ANECDOTES OF NAPOLEON,' 



By his confidential Fellow- Student at Brienne, who was afterwards his 

 Chamberlain for many years. 



On issuing from a Revolution whence, thanks to our authors, the facts 

 reach us only by passing over victims and executioners, proscriptions, 

 accusations, and atrocious calumnies, — amid this throng of sanguinary 

 narratives would it be irregular or undesirable to display certain facts 

 altogether or nearly unknown, in a less tragic point of view ? It 

 would be possible to paint less darkly a terrible and extraordinai-y 

 man, of whom we unhappily know what he did, but not what he 

 was. Domestic facts, private interviews, certain expressions, out- 

 breaks of sentiment and the heart, depict much better an individual, 

 in my opinion, than all the extended treatises of history. What have 

 I concluded from my observation of Buonaparte ** That at fourteen 

 years of ao-e he was a being the most eminently jealous, the most 

 eminently ambitious, that ever trod the globe. Yet a youth, his 

 ambition and his jealousy were proportioned to his age and means. 

 These two passions increased with his years, placed him on the 

 throne of his king, and precipitated him from it. Whence did he 

 derive his jealousy, his ambition, his taciturnity, and his disdain for 

 the human race ? He owed these vices to the indigence of his 

 family. Had not his regards been so often and so painfully turned 

 to the enjoyments of his young comrades, almost all sons of good 

 families, he would not have felt those secret chagrins, followed by a 

 gloomy jealousy, which led him to scorn and shun those whom he 

 could not imitate. It was M. de Marbeuf who procured his admis- 

 sion to the school of Brienne. Soon a report became current that 

 this protector was his father, though it be certain that Napoleon was 

 two years old when M. de Marbeuf, for the first time, set foot in 

 Corsica. The pupils did not the less indulge in bitter pleasantries, 

 which the offended youth did not always sutler with patience. Wit- 

 ness the following fact: — Buonaparte had just received a letter and 

 three pieces of six francs from the bishop of Autun, brother of M. de 

 Marbeuf. As he was occupied in reading his letter, Defoulers, a 

 cadet, had the imprudence to say to him, "Well, how is mamma 

 Marbeuf? Is she always Mrs. Joy? "* The young Corsican, indig- 

 nant at such an insult, threw at him the three pieces of six livres 

 which were in his hand, and the blow was so violent that it struck 

 Defoulers to the ground. His forehead was cut open and a tooth 

 broken. He is still living, and the scar still strongly marked. Na- 

 poleon was put under an arrest in his chamber, but obtained his 



* Allusion to the Latin word Lcetitia, which was the Christian name of 

 Buonaparte's mother. 



M. M.— No. 4. Y 



