As he spoke these latter words he rose from his seat with a light
elastic movement, and seemed altogether another person. When relieved
from the turmoil of passion, he became gay, cheerful, and at the same
time unaffected and natural. He made no effort to pose, nor did he seek
to exalt and idealize himself, as he did afterward in the conversations
at St. Helena, to meet some philosophic conception, or to fill up the
portrait of himself which he desired to bequeath to posterity. He was
far from any thing of this sort: in simple reality, he was himself, as
it were, turned inside out. After a slight pause he advanced a step or
two toward the Pope, who had not moved, and smiling, with an expression
half-serious, half-ironical, proceeded in a new vein, in which were
blended something of the elevated and the petty, of the pompous and the
trivial, as was often his usage--all the time speaking with the
volubility so often exhibited by this most versatile genius.

"Birth is every thing: those who appear on this world's stage poor and
friendless, have a desperate struggle to maintain. According to the
quality of their minds they turn to action or to self-destruction. When
they have resolution to set to work, as I have done, they often play the
winning game. A man must live; he must conquer a position, and make for
himself an abiding-place. I have made mine as a cannon-ball does; so
much the worse for those who stood in my way. Some are content with
little, others never have enough: men eat according to their appetites,
and I have a large one. Mark me, when I was at Toulon, I had not the
price of a pair of epaulets; but instead of them I had on my shoulders
my mother, and I know not how many brothers. All these are now tolerably
well provided for; and as to Josephine, who, it was said, married me
from pity, we are about to crown her in the very teeth of Raguedeau, her
notary, who once told her that I had lost my commission and my sword,
and was not worth a ducat; and faith he was not far wrong! But now, what
is it that rises up in perspective before me? An imperial mantle and a
crown. To me what are such things? a costume, a mere actor's costume. I
shall wear them for the occasion, that's enough: then resuming my
military frock, I'll get on horseback. On horseback said I?--yes, and
perhaps for life; but scarcely shall I have taken up my new position
when I shall run the risk of being pushed off my pedestal. Is that a
state to b