had seen enough of this world's glory; and he who had
fallen from it had been plunged into a depth of disaster, which ought to
have made him regardless ever after of what man could do to him. A man
of his rank ought to have disdained both the good and ill which he could
receive from the governor of his prison. But he wanted the magnanimity
that bears misfortune well: when he could no longer play the master of
kingdoms, he was content to quarrel about valets; and having lost the
world, to make a little occupation for himself in complaining of the
want of etiquette in his dungeon. But the spirit of the intriguer
survived every other spirit within him, and it is by no means certain
that the return of O'Meara and Gourgaud to Europe was not a part of that
intrigue in which Napoleon played the Italian to the last hour of his
life. It is true that the general returned under a certificate of ill
health, and it is also perfectly possible that the surgeon was
unconscious of the intrigue. But there can be no doubt of the design;
and that design was, to excite a very considerable interest in Europe,
on behalf of the prisoner of St Helena. Gourgaud, immediately after his
arrival, wrote a long letter to Marie Louise, which was palpably
intended more for the Emperors of Russia and Austria than for the
feelings of the Ex-Empress, of whose interest in the matter the world
has had no knowledge whatever.

In this letter it was declared, that Napoleon was dying in the most
frightful and prolonged agony. "Yes, Madame," said this epistle, "he
whom Divine and human laws unite to you by the most sacred ties--he whom
you have beheld an object of homage to almost all the sovereigns of
Europe, and over whose fate I saw you shed so many tears when he left
you, is perishing by a most cruel death--a captive on a rock in the
midst of the ocean, at a distance of two thousand leagues from those
whom he holds most dear."

The letter then proceeds to point out the object of the appeal. "These
sufferings may continue for a long time. There is still time to save
him: the moment seems very favourable. The Sovereigns are about to
assemble at the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle--passions seem
calmed--Napoleon is now far from being formidable. In these
circumstances let your Majesty deign to reflect what an effect a great
step on your part would produce--that, for instance, of going to this
Congress, and there soliciting a termination to the Emperor's
sufferings