1810.] 
recent accounts from Fgypt, Persia, or 
other parts of the East, prove, that the 
fashions with respect to lights, or modes 
of illumination, have little, if at all, va- 
ried during the lapse of ages. _ 
PHILABETHES. 
: a  — 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, 
THINK it will not be uninteresting 
to the readers of your most valuable 
Miscellany, to give you an idea respecting 
the general character of the present Em- 
peror of the French, or the Conqueror of 
Europe, Napoleon Bonaparte, and te pre- 
sent you witha slight sketch of his person. 
Napoleon is about five feet five inches 
in height, well made, and somewhat 
tauscular. It has been observed, that, 
notwithstanding his fatigues, he has a 
tendency to be corpulent. [is com- 
plexion is a pale olive ; his eyes piercing ; 
his hair brown, cut short, and uniformly 
unpowdered. He seldom smiles; and is, 
in the natural disposition of his mind, 
impetuous: but he corrects this habi- 
tude by a powerful command of his pas- 
sions. He is very abstemious; takes 
snuff abundantly; and remains at dinner 
with the imperial family bat thirty mz- 
nutes. When they dine en famille, he 
eats of the plainest food, drinks four or 
five glasses of wine, takes his coffee 
(of which he is extremely fond), and 
departs. He passes the evening ‘in vi- 
siting the Lyceums, or places of public 
etatuitous education (of which Paris and 
its environs are full); examines the scho- 
lars personally ; enters newly-established 
manufacturies ; and when he deems the 
inventor worthy, invests him with the in- 
signia of the legion of honour, which he 
frequently takes from his own coat for 
that purpose, On his return to St, 
Cloud, ifin the country, or to the Thuile# 
ries, if in town, he hears a concert, 
converses with his family, takes a shght 
repast, and retires to bed about’ eleven 
o’clock. In the morning he generally 
rises with the lark, goes to his private 
cabinet, and examines written dpcuments 
upon the affairs of state, or representa. 
tions from all the ministers, both do- 
mestic and foreign; inscribes a concise 
resolution upon each, to be delivered 
to the proper officers in the course of 
the morning. In all these duties he is 
as regular as time itself; and even when 
he is encamped in the field of battle, I 
am informed, that he pursues the same 
system, upon a narrower basis. At 
= gx or seven o'clock, he rings for his 
Description of Bonaparte. 
* sige 
civil 
579 
coffee, and then dresses himself for the 
day; his dress, on ordinary occasions, is 
a blue undress uniform, with white ker- 
seymere waistcoat and breeches, mili- 
tary boots, a cocked hat, with a small 
cockade, placed on the very rim, @ 
sword, and the order of the legion of, 
honour suspended by a red ribbon from 
his button hole. I should inform you, 
that no persen enters his cabinet but his 
pages, and those only when he is pre- 
sent ; and when he departs, he takes the 
key in his pocket. 
His library is fitted up in the English 
taste, and rather plain than otherwise: 
it is decorated with marble busts of great 
men, ameng which you find those of the 
late regretted Mr. Fox, and the immor- 
tal Nelson, The Emperor had a great 
personal esteem for Mr. Fox, and treated 
that illustrious patriot, while he remained 
at Paris, with the most conciliating re- 
spect. [am told, that he has remarked, 
that Mr. Fox was to great Britain what . 
Cassandra was to the Trojans—always 
telling truths, but, unfortunately, never 
believed. 
I carried my curiosity so far, as to 
take measures to learn, what books this 
extraordinary character was fond of pe- 
rusing, and found that Ossian’s Poems, 
(well translated into Italian); the works 
of Newton and Leibnitz; Smith, on the 
Wealth of Nations; the works of Mon- 
tesquieu, Tacitus, Guicciardini, &c¢ 
formed the leading articies with which he 
amused or employed himself in his leisure 
hours, if such an active mind can be 
supposed to have any leisure. 
To indulge the curiosity of those na 
tives and foreigners, whose rank and ta- 
lents: do uot entitle them to an introduc- 
tion at dourt, he takes an airing every 
Sunday evening, in the gardens of St. 
Cloud, with the empress, the imperial 
family, and his marshals; and [ have- 
observed, that his attendant Mamaluke 
is uniformly behind his person ; and I 
was told, that he sleeps at the entrance 
of his apartment, or tent, when he is 
on duty from the capital. 
It cannot be denied, that he is in- 
debtet, for a great portion of his success, 
both in the cabinet and in the field, to 
that judgment whicly he has displayed ~ 
in selecting his ministers and officers, all 
of whom have been advanced for their 
individual merit. He has sometimes 
listened to the recommendatian » 
distinguished persons, in filling © , 
vacancies of little impobg: 
but never any other: Marshal 
