o, to
which time has imparted interest, since subsequent events have fulfilled
the predictions it contained.

CHAPTER XVI

1802.

The day after my disgrace--Renewal of my duties--Bonaparte's
affected regard for me--Offer of an assistant--M. de Meneval--My
second rupture with Bonaparte--The Due de Rovigo's account of it--
Letter from M. de Barbe Marbois--Real causes of my separation from
the First Consul--Postscript to the letter of M. de Barbe Marbois--
The black cabinet--Inspection of letters dining the Consulate--
I retire to St. Cloud--Communications from M. de Meneval--A week's
conflict between friendship and pride--My formal dismissal--Petty
revenge--My request to visit England--Monosyllabic answer--Wrong
suspicion--Burial of my papers--Communication from Duroc--My letter
to the First Consul--The truth acknowledged.

I shall now return to the circumstances which followed my first disgrace,
of which I have already spoken. The day after that on which I had
resumed my functions I went as usual to awaken the First Consul at seven
in the morning. He treated me just the same as if nothing had happened
between us; and on my part I behaved to him just as usual, though I
really regretted being obliged to resume labours which I found too
oppressive for me. When Bonaparte came down into his cabinet he spoke to
me of his plans with his usual confidence, and I saw, from the number of
letters lying in the basket, that during the few days my functions had
been suspended Bonaparte had not overcome his disinclination to peruse
this kind of correspondence. At the period of this first rupture and
reconciliation the question of the Consulate for life was yet unsettled.
It was not decided until the 2d of August, and the circumstances to which
I am about to refer happened at the end of February.

I was now restored to my former footing of intimacy with the First
Consul, at least for a time; but I soon perceived that, after the scene
which M. de Talleyrand had witnessed, my duties in the Tuileries were
merely provisional, and might be shortened or prolonged according to
circumstances. I saw at the very first moment that Bonaparte had
sacrificed his wounded pride to the necessity (for such I may, without
any vanity, call it) of employing my services. The forced preference he
granted to me arose from the fact of his being unable to find any one
able to supply my place; for Duroc, as I have alrea