retaining the glorious title of grenadiers of the island of Elba. Vain
illusions! the Emperor's thoughts, entirely absorbed by other cares,
were no longer turned to those brave fellows, who had shared his exile
and his misfortunes. The moment of forgetfulness, however, had not
time to degenerate into ingratitude: it was repaired: promotions,
endowments, indemnifications, were bestowed on them; and, if they did
not feel themselves completely satisfied with the conduct of Napoleon,
they had at least no reason to complain.

The Emperor would have wished from feeling, and perhaps too from
ostentation, to have had it in his power, to acknowledge in a manner
more worthy of himself their services and attachment: but he was
deterred by the fear of being charged with imitating the Bourbons, and
of preferring those Frenchmen, who had gone into exile with him, to
those who had retained their fidelity in their mother country.

These scruples appear to me unfounded.

The emigrants had sullied their native land with blood, shed either by
their own weapons, or in the civil wars they had fomented and
cherished; and the indignant nation had long combated them, and
pursued them with its maledictions, as the enemies of its happiness
and tranquillity.

The Frenchmen who returned from the island of Elba with Napoleon, on
the contrary, had spilt their blood in the defence of their country.
They were beloved, honoured, respected and the recompenses the Emperor
might have bestowed upon them, instead of tending to alienate France,
would have fulfilled her wishes. She would have enjoyed it with that
feeling of pride and pleasure, which a mother experiences, when she
hears the triumphs of her children proclaimed in the lists opened for
youth, and sees their heads adorned with the rewards of their success.

Policy, no less than justice, required, that Napoleon should confer,
even with prodigality, his favours and benefits on men, who had
sacrificed themselves for him. In his situation it would have been
better, to have been deemed prodigal than ungrateful: but fortune
favoured him so highly, that he might be allowed, in some degree, to
neglect the means of securing the feeble support of men.

The re-establishment of the imperial government, which appeared as if
it would experience some obstacles, took place on all sides with a
promptitude and facility truly extraordinary. Marshal Augereau, who
had endeavoured in his proclamation of 1814 to