ed with the affairs of his army,
but he directed the whole machinery of the French Government just the
same as if he had been in Paris. Daily estafettes, and frequently the
useless auditors of the Council of State, brought him reports more or
less correct, and curious disclosures which were frequently the invention
of the police. The portfolios of the Ministers arrived every week, with
the exception of those of the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the
Minister of the War Department; the former had first stopped at Mayence
with the Empress, but had been called on to Warsaw; and the latter,
Clarke, was, for the misfortune of Berlin, governor of that city. This
state of things lasted during the ten months of the Emperor's absence
from Paris. Louis XIV. said, "I am myself the State." Napoleon did not
say this; but, in fact, under his reign the Government of France was
always at his headquarters. This circumstance had well-nigh proved fatal
to him, on the occasion of the extraordinary conspiracy of Malet, with
some points of which I alone, perhaps, am thoroughly acquainted. The
Emperor employed the month of January in military preparations for the
approaching attack of the Russians, but at the same time he did not
neglect the business of the cabinet: with him nothing was suffered to
linger in arrear.

While Napoleon was at Warsaw a battle was not the only thing to be
thought about; affairs were much more complicated than during the
campaign of Vienna. It was necessary, on the one hand, to observe
Prussia, which was occupied; and on the other to anticipate the Russians,
whose movements indicated that they were inclined to strike the first
blow. In the preceding campaign Austria, before the taking of Vienna,
was engaged alone. The case was different now: Austria had had only
soldiers; and Prussia, as Blucher declared to me, was beginning to have
citizens. There was no difficulty in returning from Vienna, but a great
deal in returning from Warsaw, in case of failure, notwithstanding the
creation of the Kingdom of Saxony, and the provisional government given
to Prussia, and to the other States of Germany which we had conquered.
None of these considerations escaped the penetration of Napoleon: nothing
was omitted in the notes, letters, and official correspondence which came
to me from all quarters. Receiving, as I did, accurate information from
my own correspondents of all that was passing in Germany, it often
happened that I tra