he appointment and promotion of
officers, the higher posts of his army were often most inefficiently
occupied. "He could never resist the supplications of the courtiers,
still less the entreaties of the ladies about the court."--(_Pepe's
Memoirs_, page 262.) And again, "Murat was a Charles XII. in the field,
but a Francis I. in his court. He would have regarded the refusal of a
favour to any lady of the court, even though she were not his mistress,
as an indignity." His _debonnaire_ facility was so well known, that
people used to way-lay him in the street with a petition and an
ink-stand, and he often signed, without inquiry, things that should
never have been granted. "One day he was returning from the Campo di
Marte, when a woman, in tears, and holding a petition in her hand, stood
forward to present it to him. His horse, frightened at the sight of the
paper, kicked and reared, and ended by throwing his majesty some
distance from the spot. After swearing roundly, in the French fashion,
Joachim took the paper and granted its request--the life of the woman's
husband, who was to have been executed the following day." As his
orderly officer, and subsequently, when promoted to a higher military
grade, as his aide-de-camp, General Pepe saw a great deal of Murat, and
we are disposed to place great faith in his evidence concerning that
splendid soldier but poor king. His feelings towards Joachim were of a
nature to ensure the impartiality of his testimony: as his military
chief, and as a private friend, he adored him; as a sovereign he blamed
his acts, and was strenuously opposed to his system of government. He
seems never to have satisfactorily ascertained the king's real feelings
towards himself: at times he thought that he was really a favourite, at
others, he imagined himself disliked for his obstinate political
opposition, and for the pertinacity with which he urged Murat to grant
the nation a constitution. It is probable that Joachim's sentiments
towards his wrong-headed follower, whom he used to call the _tribune_,
and the _savage_, were of a mixed nature; but, whether he liked him or
not, he evidently esteemed and valued him. No other officer was so
constantly employed on confidential, important, and hazardous missions,
both previously to the battle of Wagram, when the Anglo-Sicilians
menaced Naples with an invasion, and at a later period, when Murat
entertained a design of landing in Sicily. In this project the king wa