314 
the refources of a griat taétician, and di- 
recied every movement by the rules of 
art. iViOREAU, in Imitation of Xeno- 
phon, acqu: wed more glory by retreat, 
than others have achi ieved by victory 5 
and BUON*#PARTE. by uniting the war- 
rior ane the ftatef{man in his own cae 
has confummated the glory of his adopred 
country. 
ee extraordinary man, born in the 
town of Ajaccio, in Corfica, in 1767, 1s the 
fon of Cha-les Buonaparte, and Letitia 
Riniolini. His father, who was alfo a 
native of Ajaccio, was bred tothe civil 
law, at Rome, and took part with the 
celebrated “PACLY, in the ever-memor- 
ple firugegle made bya handfui of brave 
landers, againft the, tyrannical efforts 
f Louis RV , and the Machiavelian 
fchemes of his minifter, CHOISEUL. 
1.4m affured, by a near relation of the 
family, thac he rot ee laid afide the 
seu wpen this occafion, but actually 
carried a muiket as a private centinel ! 
Gh the conquett of the ifland, «he 
withed to retire, with the gal llant chief 
tain who had fo nobly frug ggled for it 
independesce; but he was prevented i 
his uncié, a canon, who. exercifled a pa- 
rental authority over him. 
money 14 deputation from nas three 
eftates was icnt to wait on the king of 
France and,’ on this occahon, Ci harles 
Buonaparte was fele€ted to reprefent th 
* Nobles. He: was. foon afrer see 
to the office of precuratore reale of Ajaccio, 
where his: dncettors,  fuppof fed to have 
been origivaily from “Fuicany, had been 
fertled pearly two hank dir ec ¥ neato. 
The family « of the elder Buonaparte 
was ee for he had feven children : 
four fons, and three eae ear: It was 
his good fertune, however,'to be: che- 
riised oy the French Ha both he and 
his family lived in the greate(t intima acy 
with M.de Merecuf, the Governor, who 




* Sir Jens SINCLAIR is insovre€t in the 
following diatement: ‘ His father was ene of 
the three INebles who 3 iepre efented the fiates of 
Carfica, anno E72 when Geputies, were firft 
fent to wait on the king of Eiance, afier the 
congueft of that ifland, on which occ fion ke 
acquitted himfelf wich’ great ability,’ &c. 
The deputation was intended to be repse- 
fentative of the three dittin@ branches of the 
Corfican patlamen:~,atd coniifted --- 
rit, Of the clergy. inthe petlon of a bifhop ; 
2d, Of the Nob! ‘es, in whoie name Charles 
Buonaparte acted ;. and 
3d, Of the tiers etat, or third order, for 
whom a fimple citizen was fubftituted, 
Orizinal Anetdotes.—Busnaparie. 
[ May, 
received a revenue of 60,000 livres 2 
year, on condition of doing nothing}! 
An intendant was paid nearly as much, 
and a {warm of hungry leeches, engen- 
cered in the corruption of the court of 
Verfailles, at one and the fame time 
fucked the blood of the Corficans, and 
drained the treafure of the mother coun- 
try ; in fhort; like the conquefts of more 
recent times, the fubjugation of that 
ifland feems to have been ‘achieved’ for no 
other purpofe, than to sano avarice, 
and fatiate rapacity. 
Os the death of his race Charles 
Buonaparte, M. de Marbevf continued 
to patronize his family, and*placed his 
fecond fon, t Napoleone, the fubjeét of 
thefe memoirs, at the Ecole Militaire, or 
Mihtary Academy. The advantages re- 
fulting from this feminery, which has. 
produ. ‘ed more great men than any other 
in Furope,: were not loft on. young 
Buonapatte; he there applied himfelf 
with sual aifiduity and addrefs, toi 
mat hematics, and ftucied the art of war 
as arecular fcience. Born in the midft 
of a republican firuggle, in his native 
land; it. was his good fortune to burk 
into manhocd, at the moment when the 
country of his choice fhook off the chains 
with which fhe had been manacled for 
centuries, ‘There was alfo femething im 
his manners and habits that announced 
him equal to the fituation’ for which he 
fecms to have been dettined; inftead of 
imitating the frivolity of the age, His 
mind was contiaually cecupied by ufeful 
iiudie S$; and from the Lives of Plutarch, 
a volume of which he always carried in 
fe pocket, he learned, at an early age,. 
to copy the manners, and emulate the 
act ions, cf antiquity. 
With this di Bipenuod. it is but little 
wonder that - he fheuld have dedicated 
his life to the profeffion of arms. We 


tT See Lite of General Demourier, vol. i 
p1Sat ; 
¢ A French periodical writer has been 
pleafed to aflert, that General Paoli was his 
godfather (jon parrain fue le a to Paoli) but 
on making the proper enquiries, I find that this 
civeumitgnce i is doubtrul, 
lefts that he fteod godfather to a ion of 
cL 
Ch.rles Buonaparte, but be is not fure whether 
it was to Napoleone, or one of his brothers,--- 
So much was Charles Buona; arte attached ro- 
Genera ‘L Paoli, that, on lea: ‘ning from ii. de 
NMarboeuf, that iome Frenchsen intended to 
aftailinate him, he failed trom Ajaccio to Leg= 
horn, whence he repaired to Florence, in order 
to communicate the particulars of the plot to 
the Englith minifter, 
accordingly 
General Paoli recol- . 
