A Bourbon pamphleteer, named Peltier, circulated widely through England the most atrocious libels against the First Consul, his wife, her children, his brothers and sisters. They were charged with the most low, degrading, and revolting vices. These accusations were circulated widely through England and America. They produced a profound impression. They were believed. Many were interested in the circulation of these reports, wishing to destroy the popularity of Napoleon, and to prepare the populace of England for the renewal of the war. Napoleon remonstrated against such infamous representations of his character being allowed in England. But he was informed that the British press was free; that there was no resource but to prosecute for libel in the British courts; and that it was the part of true greatness to treat such slanders with contempt. But Napoleon felt that such false charges were exasperating nations, were paving the way to deluge Europe again in war, and that causes tending to such woes were too potent to be despised.

The Algerines were now sweeping with their paretic crafts the Mediterranean, exacting tribute from all Christian powers. A French ship had been wrecked upon the coast, and the crew were made prisoners. Two French vessels and a Neapolitan ship had also been captured and taken to Algiers. The indignation of Napoleon was aroused. He sent an officer to the Dey with a letter, informing him that if the prisoners were not released and the captured vessels instantly restored, and promise given to respect in future the flags of France and Italy, he would send a fleet and an army and overwhelm him with ruin. The Dey had heard of Napoleon's career in Egypt. He was thoroughly frightened, restored the ships and the prisoners, implored clemency, and with barbarian injustice doomed to death those who had captured the ships in obedience to his commands. Their lives were saved only through the intercession of the French minister Napoleon then performed one of the most gracious acts of courtesy toward the Pope. The feeble monarch had no means of protecting his coasts from the pirates who still swarmed in those seas. Napoleon selected two fine brigs in the naval arsenal at Toulon, equipped them with great elegance, armed them most effectively, filled them with naval stores, and conferring upon them the apostolical names of St. Peter and St. Paul, sent them as a present to the Pontiff. With characteristic grandeur of action, he carried his attentions so far as to send a cutter to bring back the crews, that the papal treasury might be exposed to no expense. The venerable Pope, in the exuberance of his gratitude, insisted upon, taking the French seamen to Rome. He treated them with every attention in his power; exhibited to them St. Peter's, and dazzled them with the pomp and splendor of cathedral worship. They returned to France loaded with humble presents, and exceedingly gratified with the kindness with which they had been received.

It was stipulated in the treaty of Amiens, that both England and France should evacuate Egypt, and that England should surrender Malta to its ancient rulers. Malta, impregnable in its fortifications, commanded the Mediterranean, and was the key of Egypt. Napoleon had therefore, while he professed a willingness to relinquish all claim to the island himself, insisted upon it, as an essential point, that England should do the same. The question upon which the treaty hinged, was the surrender of Malta to a neutral power. The treaty was signed. Napoleon promptly and scrupulously fulfilled his agreements. Several embarrassments, for which England was not responsible, delayed for a few months the evacuation of Malta. But now nearly a year had passed since the signing of the treaty. All obstacles were removed from the way of its entire fulfillment, and yet the troops of England remained both in Egypt and in Malta. The question was seriously discussed in Parliament and in the English journals, whether England were bound to fulfill her engagements, since France was growing so alarmingly powerful. Generously and eloquently Fox exclaimed, "I am astonished at all I hear, particularly when I consider who they are that speak such words. Indeed I am more grieved than any of the honorable friends and colleagues of Mr. Pitt, at the growing greatness of France, which is daily extending her power in Europe and in America. That France, now accused of interfering with the concerns of others, we invaded, for the purpose of forcing upon her a government to which she would not submit, and of obliging her to accept the family of the Bourbons, whose yoke she spurned. By one of those sublime movements, which history should recommend to imitation, and preserve in eternal memorial, she repelled her invaders. Though warmly attached to the cause of England, we have felt an involuntary movement of sympathy with that generous outburst of liberty, and we have no desire to conceal it. No doubt France is great, much greater than a good Englishman ought to wish, but that ought not to be a motive for violating solemn treaties. But because France now appears too great to us—greater than we thought her at first—to break a solemn engagement, to retain Malta, for instance, would be an unworthy breach of faith, which would compromise the honor of Britain. I am sure that if there were in Paris an assembly similar to that which is debating here, the British navy and its dominion over the seas would he talked of, in the same terms as we talk in this house of the French armies, and their dominion over the land."

Napoleon sincerely wished for peace. He was constructing vast works to embellish and improve the empire. Thousands of workmen were employed in cutting magnificent roads across the Alps. He was watching with intensest interest the growth of fortifications and the excavation of canals. He was in the possession of absolute power, was surrounded by universal admiration, and, in the enjoyment of profound peace, was congratulating himself upon being the pacificator of Europe. He had disbanded his armies, and was consecrating all the resources of the nation to the stimulation of industry. He therefore left no means of forbearance and conciliation untried to avert the calamities of war. He received Lord Whitworth, the English embassador in Paris, with great distinction. The most delicate attentions were paid to this lady, the Duchess of Dorset. Splendid entertainments were given at the Tuileries and at St. Cloud in their honor. Talleyrand consecrated to them all the resources of his courtly and elegant manners. The two Associate Consuls, Cambaceres and Lebrum, were also unwearied in attentions. Still all these efforts on the part of Napoleon to secure friendly relations with England were unavailing. The British government still, in open violation of the treaty, retained Malta. The honor of France was at stake in enforcing the sacredness of treaties Malta was too important a post to be left in the hands of England. Napoleon at last resolved to have a personal interview himself with Lord Whitworth, and explain to him, with all frankness, his sentiments and his resolves.

It was on the evening of the 18th of February, 1803, that Napoleon received Lord Whitworth in his cabinet in the Tuileries. A large writing-table occupied the middle of the room. Napoleon invited the embassador to take a seat at one end of the table, and seated himself at the other. "I have wished," said he, "to converse with you in person, that I may fully convince you of my real opinions and intentions." Then with that force of language and that perspicuity which no man ever excelled, he recapitulated his transactions with England from the beginning; that he had offered peace immediately upon the accession to the consulship; that peace had been refused; that eagerly he had renewed negotiations as soon as he could with any propriety do so: and that he had made great concessions to secure the peace of Amiens. "But my efforts," said he, "to live on good terms with England, have met with no friendly response. The English newspapers breathe but animosity against me. The journals of the emigrants are allowed a license of abuse which is not justified by the British constitution. Pensions are granted to Georges and his accomplices, who are plotting my assassination. The emigrants, protected in England, are continually making excursions to France to stir up civil war. The Bourbon princes are received with the insignia of the ancient royalty. Agents are sent to Switzerland and Italy to raise up difficulties against France. Every wind which blows from England brings me but hatred and insult. Now we have come to a situation from which we must relieve ourselves. Will you or will you not execute the treaty of Amiens? I have executed it on my part with scrupulous fidelity. That treaty obliged me to evacuate Naples, Tarento, and the Roman States, within three months. In less than two months, all the French troops were out of those countries. Ten months have elapsed since the exchange of the ratifications, and the English troops are still in Malta, and at Alexandria. It is useless to try to deceive us on this point. Will you have peace, or will you have war? If you are for war, only say so; we will wage it unrelentingly. If you wish for peace, you must evacuate Alexandria and Malta. The rock of Malta, on which so many fortifications have been erected, is, in a maritime point of view, an object of great importance infinitely greater, inasmuch as it implicates the honor of France. What would the world say, if we were to allow a solemn treaty, signed with us, to be violated! It would doubt our energy. For my part, my resolution is fixed. I had rather see you in possession of the Heights of Montmartre, than in possession of Malta."

"If you doubt my desire to preserve peace, listen, and judge how far I am sincere. Though yet very young, I have attained a power, a renown to which it would be difficult to add. Do you imagine that I am solicitous to risk this power, this renown, in a desperate struggle? If I have a war with Austria. I shall contrive to find the way to Vienna. If I have a war with you, I will take from you every ally upon the Continent. You will blockade us; but I will blockade you in my turn. You will make the Continent a prison for us; but I will make the seas a prison for you. However, to conclude the war, there must be more direct efficiency. There must be assembled 150,000 men, and an immense flotilla. We must try to cross the Strait, and perhaps I shall bury in the depths of the sea my fortune, my glory, my life. It is an awful temerity, my lord, the invasion of England." Here, to the amazement of Lord Whitworth, Napoleon enumerated frankly and powerfully all the perils of the enterprise: the enormous preparations it would be necessary to make of ships, men, and munitions of war-the difficulty of eluding the English fleet. "The chance that we shall perish," said he, "is vastly greater than the chance that we shall succeed . Yet this temerity, my lord, awful as it is, I am determined to hazard, if you force me to it. I will risk my army and my life. With me that great enterprise will have chances which it can not have with any other. See now if I ought, prosperous, powerful, and peaceful as I now am, to risk power, prosperity, and peace in such an enterprise. Judge, if when I say I am desirous of peace, if I am not sincere. It is better for you; it is better for me to keep within the limits of treaties. You must evacuate Malta. You must not harbor my assassins in England. Let me be abused, if you please, by the English journals, but not by those miserable emigrants, who dishonor the protection you grant them, and whom the Alien Act permits you to expel from the country. Act cordially with me, and I promise you, on my part, an entire cordiality. See what power we should exercise over the world, if we could bring our two nations together. You have a navy, which, with the incessant efforts of ten years, in the employment of all resources, I should not be able to equal. But I have 500,000 men ready to march, under my command, whithersoever I choose to lead them. If you are masters of the seas, I am master of the land. Let us then think of uniting, rather than of going to war, and we shall rule at pleasure the destinies of the world France and England united, can do every thing for the interests of humanity."

England, however, still refused, upon one pretense and another, to yield Malta; and both parties were growing more and more exasperated, and were gradually preparing for the renewal of hostilities. Napoleon, at times, gave very free utterance to his indignation. "Malta," said he, "gives the dominion of the Mediterranean. Nobody will believe that I consent to surrender the Mediterranean to the English, unless I fear their power. I thus loose the most important sea in the world, and the respect of Europe. I will fight to the last, for the possession of the Mediterranean; and if I once get to Dover, it is all over with those tyrants of the seas. Besides, as we must fight, sooner or later, with a people to whom the greatness of France is intolerable, the sooner the better. I am young. The English are in the wrong; more so than they will ever be again. I had rather settle the matter at once. They shall not have Malta."

Still Napoleon assented to the proposal for negotiating with the English for the cession of some other island in the Mediterranean. "Let them obtain a port to put into," said he. "To that I have no objection. But I am determined that they shall not have two Gibraltars in that sea, one at the entrance, and one in the middle." To this proposition, however, England refused assent.

Napoleon then proposed that the Island of Malta should be placed in the hands of the Emperor of Russia; leaving it with him in trust, till the discussions between France and England were decided. It had so happened that the emperor had just offered his mediation, if that could be available, to prevent a war. This the English government also declined, upon the plea that it did not think that Russia would be willing to accept the office thus imposed upon her. The English embassador now received instructions to demand that France should cede to England, Malta for ten years; and that England, by way of compensation, would recognize the Italian republic. The embassador was ordered to apply for his passports, if these conditions were not accepted within seven days. To this proposition France would not accede. The English minister demanded his passports, and left France. Immediately the English fleet commenced its attack upon French merchant-ships, wherever they could be found. And the world was again deluged in war.

France has recorded her past history and her present condition, in the regal palaces she has reared. Upon these monumental walls are inscribed, in letters more legible than the hieroglyphics of Egypt, and as ineffaceable, the long and dreary story of kingly vice, voluptuousness and pride, and of popular servility and oppression. The unthinking tourist saunters through these magnificent saloons, upon which have been lavished the wealth of princes and the toil of ages, and admires their gorgeous grandeur. In marbled floors and gilded ceilings and damask tapestry, and all the appliances of boundless luxury and opulence, he sees but the triumphs of art, and bewildered by the dazzling spectacle, forgets the burning outrage upon human rights which it proclaims. Half-entranced, he wanders through uncounted acres of groves and lawns, and parterres of flowers, embellished with lakes, fountains, cascades, and the most voluptuous statuary, where kings and queens have reveled, and he reflects not upon the millions who have toiled, from dewy morn till the shades of night, through long and joyless years, eating black bread, clothed in coarse raiment—the man, the woman, the ox, companions in toil, companions in thought—to minister to this indulgence. But the palaces of France proclaim, in trumpet tones, the shame of France. They say to her kings. Behold the undeniable monuments of your pride, your insatiate extortion, your measureless extravagance and luxury. They say to the people, Behold the proofs of the outrages which your fathers, for countless ages, have endured. They lived in mud hovels that their licentious kings might riot haughtily in the apartments, canopied with gold, of Versailles, the Tuileries, and St. Cloud—the Palaces of France. The mind of the political economist lingers painfully upon them. They are gorgeous as specimens of art. They are sacred as memorials of the past. Vandalism alone would raze them to their foundations. Still, the judgment says, It would be better for the political regeneration of France, if, like the Bastile, their very foundations were plowed up, and sown with salt. For they are a perpetual provocative to every thinking man. They excite unceasingly democratic rage against aristocratic arrogance. Thousands of noble women, as they traverse those gorgeous halls, feel those fires of indignation glowing in their souls, which glowed in the bosom of Madame Roland. Thousands of young men, with compressed lip and moistened eye, lean against those marble pillars, lost in thought, and almost excuse even the demoniac and blood-thirsty mercilessness of Danton, Marat, and Robespierre. These palaces are a perpetual stimulus and provocative to governmental aggression. There they stand, in all their gorgeousness, empty, swept, and garnished. They are resplendently beautiful. They are supplied with every convenience, every luxury. King and Emperor dwelt there. Why should not the President ? Hence the palace becomes the home of the Republican President. The expenses of the palace, the retinue of the palace, the court etiquette of the palace become the requisitions of good taste. In America, the head of the government, in his convenient and appropriate mansion, receives a salary of twenty-five thousand dollars a year. In France, the President of the Republic receives four hundred thousand dollars a year, and yet, even with that vast sum, can not keep up an establishment at all in accordance with the dwellings of grandeur which invite his occupancy, and which unceasingly and irresistibly stimulate to regal pomp and to regal extravagance. The palaces of France have a vast influence upon the present politics of France. There is an unceasing conflict between those marble walls of monarchical splendor, and the principles of republican simplicity. This contest will not soon terminate, and its result no one can foresee. Never have I felt my indignation more thoroughly aroused than when wandering hour after hour through the voluptuous sumptuousness of Versailles. The triumphs of taste and art are admirable, beyond the power of the pen to describe. But the moral of exeerable oppression is deeply inscribed upon all. In a brief description of the Palaces of France. I shall present them in the order in which I chanced to visit them.

1. Palais des Thermes .—In long-gone centuries, which have faded away into oblivion, a wandering tribe of barbarians alighted from their canoes, upon a small island in the Seine, and there reared their huts. They were called the Parisii. The slow lapse of centuries rolled over them, and there were wars and woes, bridals and burials, and still they increased in numbers and in strength, and fortified their little isle against the invasions of their enemies; for man, whether civilized or savage, has ever been the most ferocious wild beast man has had to encounter. But soon the tramp of the Roman legions was heard upon the banks of the Seine, and all Gaul with its sixty tribes, came under the power of the Caesars. Extensive marshes and gloomy forests surrounded the barbarian village; but, gradually, Roman laws and institutions were introduced; and Roman energy changed the aspect of the country. Immediately the proud conquerors commenced rearing a palace for the provincial governor. The Palace of Warm Baths rose, with its massive walls and in imposing grandeur. Roman spears drove the people to the work; and Roman ingenuity knew well how to extort from the populace the revenue which was required. Large remains of that palace continue to the present day. It is the most interesting memorial of the past which can now be found in France. The magnificence of its proportions still strike the beholder with awe. "Behold," says a writer, who trod its marble floors nearly a thousand years ago: "Behold the Palace of the Kings, whose turrets pierce the skies, and whose foundations penetrate even to the empire of the dead." Julius Caesar gazed proudly upon those turrets; and here the shouts of Roman legions, fifteen hundred years ago proclaimed Julian emperor; and Roman maidens, with throbbing hearts, trod these floors in the mazy dance. No one can enter the grand hall of the haths, without being deeply impressed with the majestic aspect of the edifice, and with the grandeur of its gigantic proportions. The decay of nearly two thousand years has left its venerable impress upon those walls. Here Roman generals proudly strode, encased in brass and steel, and the clatter of their arms resounded through these arches. In these mouldering, crumbling tubs of stone, they laved their sinewy limbs. But where are those fierce warriors now? In what employments have their turbulent spirits been engaged, while generation after generation has passed on earth, in the enactment of the comedies and the tragedies of life? Did their rough tutelage in the camp, and their proud hearing in the court, prepare them for the love, the kindness, the gentleness, the devotion of Heaven? In fields of outrage, clamor, and blood, madly rushing to the assault, shouting in frenzy, dealing, with iron hand, every where around, destruction and death, did they acquire a taste for the "green pastures and the still waters?" Alas! for the mystery of our being! They are gone, and gone forever! Their name has perished—their language is forgotten.

"The storm which wrecks the wintry sky. No more disturbs their deep repose, Than summer evening's gentlest sign, Which shuts the rose."

Upon a part of the rums of this old palace of Caesars, there has been reared by more modern ancients , still another palace, where mirth and revelry have resounded, where pride has elevated her haughty head, and vanity displayed her costly robes—but over all those scenes of splendor, death has rolled its oblivious waves. About four hundred years ago, upon a portion of the crumbling walls of this old Roman mansion, the Palace of Cluny was reared. For three centuries, this palace was one of the abodes of the kings of France. The tide of regal life ebbed and flowed through those saloons, and along those corridors. There is the chamber where Mary of England, sister of Henry VIII., and widow of Louis XII., passed the weary years of her widowhood. It is still called the chamber of the "white queen," from the custom of the queens of France to wear white mourning. Three hundred years ago, these Gothic turrets, and gorgeously ornamented lucarne windows, gleamed with illuminations, as the young King of Scotland, James V., led Madeleine, the blooming daughter of Francis I., to the bridal altar. Here the haughty family of the Guises ostentatiously displayed their regal retinue—vying with the Kings of France in splendor, and outvying them in power. These two palaces, now blended by the nuptails of decay into one, are converted into a museum of antiquities—silent despositories of memorials of the dead. Sadly one loiters through their deserted halls. They present one of the most interesting sights of Paris. In the reflective mind they awaken emotions which the pen can not describe.

2. The Lourre .—When Paris consisted only of the little island in the Seine, and kings and feudal lords, with wine and wassail were reveling in the saloons of China, a hunting-seat was reared in the the dense forest which spread itself along the banks of the river. As the city extended, and the forest disappeared, the hunting-seat was enlarged, strengthened, and became a fortress and a state-prison Thus it continued for three hundred years. In its gloomy dungeons prisoners of state, and the victims of crime, groaned and died; and countless tragedies of despotic power there transpired, which the Day of Judgment alone can reveal. Three hundred years ago, Francis I, tore down the dilapidated walls of this old castle, and commerces the magnificent Palace of the Louver upon their foundations. But its construction has required candle, while Gilpin, who was taller and stronger than either of the other boys, bored the hole in the door, in the place which Rodolphus indicated. When the hole was bored, the boys inserted an iron rod into it. and running this rod under the hasp, they pried the hasp up and unfastened the door. They opened the door, and then, to their great joy, found themselves all safe in the office.

They put the dark lantern down upon the table, and covered it with its screen, and then listened, perfectly whist, a minute or two, to be sure that nobody was coming.

"You go and watch at the shed-door," said Gilpin to Rodolphus, "while we open the desk."

So Rodolphus went to the shed-door. He peeped out, and looked up and down the village-street, but all was still.

Presently he heard a sort of splitting sound within the office, which he knew was made by the forcing open of the lid of the desk. Very soon afterward the boys came out, in a hurried manner—Griff had the lantern and Gilpin the box.

"Have you got it!" said Rodolphus.

"Yes," said Griff.

"Let's see," said Rodolphus.

Griff held out the box to Rodolphus. It was very heavy and they could hear the sound of the money within. All three of the boys seemed almost wild with trepidation and excitement. Griff however immediately began to hurry them away, pulling the box from them and saying, "Come, come, boys, we must not stay fooling here."

"Wait a minute till I hide the tools again!" said Rodolphus, "and then we'll run."

Rodolphus hid the tools behind the wood-pile, in the shed, where they had been before, and then the boys sallied forth into the street. They crept along stealthily in the shadows of the houses and the most dark and obscure places, until they came to the tavern, where they were to turn down the lane to the corn-barn. As soon as they got safely to this lane, they felt relieved, and they walked on in a more unconcerned manner; and when at length they got fairly in under the corn-barn they felt perfectly secure.

"There," said Griff, "was not that well done!"

"Yes," said Rodolphus, "and now all that we have got to do is to get the box open."

"We can break it open with stones," said Griff.

"No," said Gilpin, "that will make too much noise. We will bury it under this straw for a few days, and open it somehow or other by-and-by, when they have given up looking for the box. You can get the real key of it for us, Rodolphus, can't you!"

"How can I get it?" asked Rodolphus.

"Oh, you can contrive some way to get it from old Kerber, I've no doubt. At any rate the best thing is to bury it now.'

To this plan the boys all agreed. They pulled away the straw, which was spread under the corn-barn, and dug a hole in the ground beneath, working partly with sticks and partly with their fingers. When they had got the hole deep enough, they put the box in and covered it up. Then they covered it up. Then they spread the straw over the place as before.

During all this time the lantern had been standing upon a box pretty near by, having been put there by the boys, in order that the light might shine down upon the place where they had been digging. As soon as their work was done, the boys went softly outside to see if the way was clear for them to go home, leaving the lantern on the box; and while they were standing at the corner of the barn outside, looking up the lane, and whispering together, they saw suddenly a light beginning to gleam up from within. They ran in and found that the lantern had fallen down, and that the straw was all in a blaze. They immediately began to tread upon the fire and try to put it out, but the instant that they did so they were all thunderstruck by the appearance of a fourth person, who came rushing in among them from the outside. They all screamed out with terror and ran. Rodolphus separated from the rest and crouched down a moment behind the stone wall, but immediately afterward, feeling that there would be no safety for him here, he set off again and ran across some back fields and gardens, in the direction toward Mr. Kerber's. He looked back occasionally and found that the light was rapidly increasing. Presently he began to hear cries of fire. He ran on till he reached the house; he scrambled over the fences into the back yard, climbed up upon a shed, crept along under the chimneys to the window of his room, got in as fast as he could, undressed himself and went to bed, and had just drawn the clothes up over him, when he heard a loud knocking at the door, and Mrs. Kerber's voice outside, calling out to him, that there was a cry of fire in the village, and that he must get up quick as possible and help put it out.

The Expedition to Egypt was one of the most magnificent enterprises which human ambition ever conceived. The Return to France combines still more, if possible, of the elements of the moral sublime. But for the disastrous destruction of the French fleet the plans of Napoleon, in reference to the East, would probably have been triumphantly successful. At least it can not be doubted that a vast change would have been effected throughout the Eastern world. Those plans were now hopeless. The army was isolated, and cut off from all reinforcements and all supplies. the best thing which Napoleon could do for his troops in Egypt was to return to France, and exert his personal influence in sending them succor. His return involved the continuance of the most honorable devotion to those soldiers whom he necessarily left behind him. The secrecy of his departure was essential to its success. Had the bold attempt been suspected, it would certainly have been frustrated by the increased vigilance of the English cruisers. The intrepidity of the enterprise must elicit universal admiration.

Contemplate, for a moment, the moral aspects of this undertaking. A nation of thirty millions of people, had been for ten years agitated by the most terrible convulsions. There is no atrocity, which the tongue can name, which had not desolated the doomed land. Every passion which can degrade the heart of fallen man, had swept with simoom blast over the cities and the villages of France. Conflagrations had laid the palaces of the wealthy in ruins, and the green lawns where their children had played, had been crimsoned with the blood of fathers and sons, mothers and daughters. A gigantic system of robbery had seized upon houses and lands and every species of property and had turned thousands of the opulent out into destitution, beggary, and death. Pollution had been legalized by the voice of God-defying lust, and France, la belle France , had been converted into a disgusting warehouse of infamy. Law, with suicidal hand, had destroyed itself, and the decisions of the legislature swayed to and fro, in accordance with the hideous clamors of the mob. The guillotine, with gutters ever clotted with human gore, was the only argument which anarchy condescended to use. Effectually it silenced every remonstrating tongue. Constitution after constitution had risen, like mushrooms, in a night, and like mushrooms had perished in a day. Civil war was raging with bloodhound fury in France, Monarchists and Jacobins grappling each other infuriate with despair. The allied kings of Europe, who by their alliance had fanned these flames of rage and ruin, were gazing with terror upon the portentous prodigy, and were surrounding France with their navies and their armies.

The people had been enslaved for centuries by the king and the nobles. Their oppression had been execrable, and it had become absolutely unendurable. "We, the millions," they exclaimed in their rage, "will no longer minister to your voluptuousness, and pride, and lust." "You shall, you insolent dogs," exclaimed king and nobles, "we heed not your barking." "You shall," reiterated the Pope, in the portentous thunderings of the Vatican. "You shall," came echoed back from the palaces of Vienna, from the dome of the Kremlin, from the seraglio of the Turk, and, in tones deeper, stronger, more resolute, from constitutional, liberty-loving, happy England. Then was France a volcano, and its lava-streams deluged Europe. The people were desperate. In the blind fury of their frenzied self-defense they lost all consideration. The castles of the nobles were but the monuments of past taxation and servitude. With yells of hatred the infuriated populace razed them to the ground. The palaces of the kings, where, for uncounted centuries, dissolute monarchs had reveled in enervating and heaven-forbidden pleasures, were but national badges of the bondage of the people. The indignant throng swept through them, like a Mississippi inundation, leaving upon marble floors, and cartooned walls and ceilings, the impress of their rage. At one bound France had passed from despotism to anarchy. The kingly tyrant, with golden crown and iron sceptre, surrounded by wealthy nobles and dissolute beauties, had disappeared, and a many-headed monster, rapacious and blood-thirsty, vulgar and revolting, had emerged from mines and workshops and the cellars of vice and penury, like one of the spectres of fairy tales to fill his place. France had passed from Monarchy, not to healthy Republicanism, but to Jacobinism, to the reign of the mob. Napoleon utterly abhorred the tyranny of the king. He also utterly abhorred the despotism of vulgar, violent, sanguinary Jacobin misrule. The latter he regarded with even far deeper repugnance than the former. "I frankly confess," said Napoleon, again and again, "that if I must choose between Bourbon oppression, and mob violence, I infinitely prefer the former.

Such had been the state of France, essentially, for nearly ten years. The great mass of the people were exhausted with suffering, and longed for repose. The land was filled with plots and counterplots. But there was no one man of sufficient prominence to carry with him the nation. The government was despised and disregarded. France was in a state of chaotic ruin. Many voices here and there, began to inquire "Where is Bonaparte, the conqueror of Italy, the conqueror of Egypt? He alone can save us." His world-wide renown turned the eyes of the nation to him as their only hope.

Under these circumstances Napoleon, then a young man but twenty-nine years of age, and who, but three years before, had been unknown to fame or to fortune, resolved to return to France, to overthrow the miserable government, by which the country was disgraced, to subdue anarchy at home and aggression from abroad, and to rescue thirty millions of people from ruin. The enterprise was undeniably magnificent in its grandeur and noble in its object. He had two foes to encounter, each formidable, the royalists of combined Europe and the mob of Paris. The quiet and undoubting self-confidence with which he entered upon this enterprise, is one of the most remarkable events in the whole of his extraordinay career. He took with him no armies to hew down opposition. He engaged in no deep-laid and wide-spread conspiracy. Relying upon the energies of his own mind, and upon the sympathies of the great mass of the people, he went alone, with but one or two companions, to whom he revealed not his thoughts, to gather into his hands the scattered reins of power. Never did he encounter more fearful peril. The cruisers of England, Russia, Turkey, of allied Europe in arms against France, thronged the Mediterranean. How could he hope to escape them? The guillotine was red with blood. Every one who had dared to oppose the mob had perished upon it. How could Napoleon venture, single-handed, to beard this terrible lion in his den?

It was ten o'clock at night, the 22d of August, 1799, when Napoleon ascended the sides of the frigate Muiron, to France. A few of his faithful Guards, and eight companions, either officers in the army or members of the scientific corps, accompanied him. There were five hundred soldiers on board the ships. The stars shone brightly in the Syrian sky, and under their soft light the blue waves of the Mediterranean lay spread out most peacefully before them. The frigates unfurled their sails. Napoleon, silent and lost in thought, for a long time walked the quarter deck of the ship, gazing upon the low outline of Egypt as, in the dim starlight, it faded away. His companions were intoxicated with delight, in view of again returning to France. Napoleon was neither elated nor depressed. Serene and silent he communed with himself, and whenever we can catch a glimpse of those secret communings we find them always bearing the impress of grandeur. Though Napoleon was in the habit of visiting the soldiers at their camp fires, of sitting down and conversing with them with the greatest freedom and familiarity, the majesty of his character overawed his officers, and adoration and reserve blended with their love. Though there was no haughtiness in his demeanor, he habitually dwelt in a region of elevation above them all. Their talk was of cards, of wine, of pretty women. Napoleon's thoughts were of empire, of renown, of moulding the destinies of nations. They regarded him not as a companion, but as a master, whose wishes they loved to anticipate; for he would surely guide them to wealth, and fame, and fortune. He contemplated them, not as equals and confiding friends, but as efficient and valuable instruments for the accomplishment of his purposes. Murat was to Napoleon a body of ten thousand horsemen, ever ready for a resistless charge. Lannes was a phalanx of infantry, bristling with bayonets, which neither artillery nor cavalry could batter down or break. Augereau was an armed column of invincible troops, black, dense, massy, impetuous, resistless, moving with gigantic tread wherever the finger of the conqueror pointed. These were but the members of Napoleon's body, the limbs obedient to the mighty soul which swayed them. They were not the companions of his thoughts, they were only the servants of his will. The number to be found with whom the soul of Napoleon could dwell in sympathetic friendship was few—very few.

Napoleon had formed a very low estimate of human nature, and consequently made great allowance for the infirmities incident to humanity. Bourrienne reports him as saying, "Friendship is but a name. I love no one; no, not even my brothers. Joseph perhaps a little. And if I do love him, it is from habit, and because he is my elder. Duroc! Ah, yes! I love him too. But why? His character please me. He is cold, reserved, and resolute, and I really believe that he never shed a tear. As to myself, I know well that I have not one true friend. As long as I continue what I am, I may have as many pretended friends as I please. We must leave sensibility to the women. It is their business. Men should have nothing to do with war or government. I am not amiable. No; I am not amiable. I never have been. But I am just."

In another mood of mind, more tender, more subdued, he remarked, at St. Helena, in reply to Las Casas, who with great severity was condemning those who abandoned Napoleon in his hour of adversity: "You are not acquainted with men. They are difficult to comprehend if one wishes to be strictly just. Can they understand or explain even their own characters? Almost all those who abandoned me would had I continued to be prosperous, never perhaps have dreamed of their own defection. There are vices and virtues which depend upon circumstances. Our last trials were beyond all human strength! Besides I was forsaken rather than betrayed; there was more weakness than of perfidy around me. It was the denial of St. Peter . Tears and penitence are probably at hand. And where will you find in the page of history any one possessing a greater number of friends and partisans? Who was ever more popular and more beloved? Who was ever more ardently and deeply regretted? Here from this very rock on viewing the present disorders in France who would not be tempted to say that I still reign there? No; human nature might have appeared in a more odious light."

Las Casas, who shared with Napoleon his weary years of imprisonment at St. Helena says of him: "He views the complicated circumstances of his from so high a point that individuals escape his notice. He never evinces the least symptom of virulence toward those of whom it might be supposed he has the greatest reason to complain. His strongest mark of reprobation, and I have had frequent occasions to notice it, is to preserve silence with respect to them whenever they are mentioned in his presence. But how often has he been heard to restrain the violent and less reserved expressions of those about him?"

"And here I must observe," say Las Casas, "that since I have become acquainted with the Emperor's character, I have never known him to evince, for a single moment, the least feeling of anger or animosity against those who had most deeply injured him. He speaks of them coolly and without resentment, attributing their conduct in some measure to the place, and throwing the rest to the account of human weakness."

Marmont, who surrendered Paris to the allies was severely condemned by Las Casas. Napoleon replied: "Vanity was his ruin. Posterity will justly cast a shade upon his character, yet his heart will be more valued than the memory of his career." "Your attachment for Berthier," said Las Casas, "surprised us. He was full of pretensions and pride." "Berthier was not with out talent." Napoleon replied, "and I am far from wishing to disavow his merit, or my partiality; but he was so undecided!" He was very harsh and overbearing." Las Casas rejoined. "And what, my dear Las Casas," Napoleon replied, "is more overbearing than weakness which feels itself protected by strength! Look at women for example." This Berthier had with the utmost meanness, abandoned his benefactor, and took his place in front of the carriage of Louis XVIII. as he rode triumphantly into Paris. "The only revenge I wish on this poor Berthier," said Napoleon at the time, "would be to see him in his costume of captain of the body-guard of Louis."

Says Bourrienne, Napoleon's rejected secretary, "The character of Napoleon was not a cruel one. He was neither rancorous nor vindictive. None but those who are blinded by fury, could have given him the name of Nero or Caligula. I think that I have stated his real fault with sufficient sincerity to be believed upon my word. I can assert that Bonaparte, apart from politics, was feeling kind, and accessible to pity. He was very fond of children, and a bad man has seldom that disposition. In the habits of private life he had and the expression is not too strong, much benevolence and great indulgence for human weakness. A contrary opinion is too firmly fixed in some minds for me to hope to remove it. I shall, I fear, have opposers; but I address myself to those who are in search of truth. I lived in the most unreserved confidence with Napoleon until the age of thirty-four years, and I advance nothing lightly." This is the admission of one who had been ejected from office by Napoleon, and who become a courtier of the reinstated Bourbons. It is a candid admission of an enemy.

The ships weighed anchor in the darkness of the night, hoping before the day should dawn to escape the English cruisers which were hovering about Alexandria. Unfortunately, at midnight, the wind died away, and it became almost perfectly calm. Fearful of being captured, some were anxious to seek again the shore. "Be quiet," said Napoleon, "we shall pass in safety."

Admiral Gantheaume wished to take the shortest route to France. Napoleon, however, directed the admiral to sail along as near as possible the coast of Africa, and to continue that unfrequented route, till the ships should pass the Island of Sardinia. "In the mean while," said he, "should an English fleet present itself, we will run ashore upon the sands, and march, with the handful of brave men and the few pieces of artillery we have with us, to Oran or Tunis, and there find means to re-embark." Thus Napoleon, is this hazardous enterprise braved every peril. The most imminent and the most to be dreaded of all was captivity in an English prison. For twenty days the wind was so invariable adverse, that the ships did not advance three hundred miles. Many were so discouraged and so apprehensive of capture that it was even proposed to return to Alexandria. Napoleon was much in the habit of peaceful submission to that which he could not remedy. During all these trying weeks he appeared perfectly serene and contented. To the murmuring of his companions he replied, "We shall arrive in France in safety. I am determined to proceed at all hazards. Fortune will not abandon us." "People frequently speak," says Bourrienne, who accompanied Napoleon upon this voyage, "of the good fortune which attaches to an individual, and even attends him this sort of predestination, yet, when I call to mind the numerous dangers which Bonaparte escaped in so many enterprises, the hazards he encountered, the chances he ran, I can conceive that others may have this faith. But having for a length of time studied the 'man of destiny', I have remarked that what was called his fortune was, in reality, his genius; that his success was the consequence of his admirable foresight—of his calculations, rapid as lightning, and of the conviction that boldness is often the truest wisdom. If, for example, during our voyage from Egypt to France, he had not imperiously insisted upon pursuing a course different from that usually taken, and which usual course was recommended by the admiral, would he have escaped the perils which beset his path! Probably not. And was all this the effect of chance. .......... Certainly not."

During these days of suspense Napoleon, apparently as serene in spirit as the calm which often silvered the unrippled surface of the sea held all the energies of his mind in perfect control. A choice library he invariably took with him wherever he went. He devoted the hours to writing study, finding recreation in solving the most difficult problems in geometry, and in investigating chemistry and other scientific subjects of practical utility. He devoted much time to conversation with the distinguished scholars whom he had selected to accompany him. His whole soul seemed engrossed in the pursuit of literary and scientific attainments. He also carefully, and with most intense interest, studied the Bible and Koran, scrutinizing, with the eye of a philosopher, the antagonistic system of the Christian and the Moslem. The limity of the Scriptures charmed him. He read again and again, with deep admiration, Christ's sermon upon the mount and called his companions form their card-tables, to read it to them, that they might also appreciate its moral beauty and its eloquence. "You will ere long, become devout yourself," said one of his infidel companions. "I wish I might become so," Napoleon replied. "What a solace Christianity must be to one who has an undoubting conviction of its truth." But practical Christianity he had only seen in the mummeries of the papal church. Remembering the fasts, the vigils, the penances, the cloisters, the scourgings of a corrupt Christianity, and contrasting them with the voluptuous paradise and the sensual houries which inflamed the eager vision of the Moslem, he once exclaimed in phrase characteristic of his genius, "The religion of Jesus is a threat, that of Mohammed." The religion of Jesus is not a threat. Though the wrath of God shall fall upon the children of disobedience, our Saviour invites us, in gentle accents, to the green pastures and the still waters of the Heavenly Canaan; to cities resplendent with pearls and gold; to mansions of which God is the architect; to the songs of seraphim, and the flight of cherubim, exploring on tireless pinion the wonders of infinity; to peace of conscience and rapture dwelling in pure heart and to blest companionship loving and beloved; to majesty of person and loftiness of intellect; to appear as children and as nobles in the audience-chamber of God; to an immorality of bliss. No! the religion of Jesus is not a threat, though it has too often been thus represented by its mistaken or designing advocates.

One evening a group of officers were conversing together, upon the quarter deck, respecting the existence of God. Many of them believed not in his being. It was a calm, cloudless, brilliant night. The heavens, the work of God's fingers, canopied them gloriously. The moon and the stars, which God had ordained beamed down upon them with serene lustre. As they were flippantly giving utterance to the arguments of atheism. Napoleon paced to and fro upon the deck, taking no part in the conversation, and apparently absorbed in his own thoughts. Suddenly he stopped before them and said, in those tones of dignity which ever overawed, "Gentlemen, your arguments are very fine. But who made all those worlds, beaming so gloriously above us? Can you tell me that?" No one answered. Napoleon resumed his silent walk, and the officers selected another topic for conversation.

In these intense studies Napoleon first began to appreciate the beauty and the sublimity of Christianity. Previously to this, his own strong sense had taught him the principles of a noble toleration; and Jew, Christian, and Moslem stood equally regarded before him. Now he began to apprehend the surpassing excellence of Christianity. And though the cares of the busiest life through which a mortal has ever passed soon engrossed his energies, this appreciation and admiration of the gospel of Christ, visibly increased with each succeeding year. He unflinchingly braved the scoffs of infidel Europe, in re-establishing the Christian religion in paganized France. He periled his popularity with the army, and disregarded the opposition of his most influential friends, from his deep conviction of the importance of religion to the welfare of the state. With the inimitable force of his own glowing eloquence, he said to Montholon, at St. Helena, "I know men, and I tell you that Jesus Christ is not a man! The religion of Christ is a mystery, which subsists by its own force, and proceeds from a mind which is not a human mind. We find in it a marked individuality which originated a train of words and maxims unknown before. Jesus borrowed nothing from our knowledge. He exhibited himself the perfect example of his precepts. Jesus is not a philosopher: for his proofs are his miracles, and from the first his disciples adored him. In fact, learning and philosophy are of no use for salvation; and Jesus came into the world to reveal the mysteries of heaven and the laws of the spirit. Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and myself have founded empires. But upon what did we rest the creations of our genius? upon force . Jesus Christ alone founded his empire upon love. And at this moment millions of men would die for him. I die before my time, and my body will be given back to earth, to become food for worms. Such is the fate of him who has been called the great Napoleon. What an abyss between my deep misery and the eternal kingdom of Christ, which is proclaimed, loved, and adored, and which is extending over the whole earth! Call you this dying? Is it not living rather? The death of Christ is the death of a God!"

At the time of the invasion of Egypt, Napoleon regarded all forms of religion with equal respect. And though he considered Christianity superior, in intellectuality and refinement, to all other modes of worship, he did not consider any religion as of divine origin. At one time, speaking of the course which he pursued in Egypt, he said, "Such was the disposition of the army, that in order to induce them to listen to the bare mention of religion, I was obliged to speak very lightly on the subject; to place Jews beside Christians, and rabbis beside bishops. But after all it would not have been so very extraordinary had circumstances induced me to embrace Islamism. But I must have had good reasons for my conversion. I must have been secure of advancing at least as far as the Euphrates. Change of religion for private interest is inexcusable. But it may be pardoned in consideration of immense political results. Henry IV. said, Paris is well worth a mass . Will it then be said that the dominion of the East, and perhaps the subjugation of all Asia, were not worth a turban and a pair of trousers ? And in truth the whole matter was reduced to this. The sheiks had studied how to render it easy to us. They had smoothed down the great obstacles, allowed us the use of wine, and dispensed with all corporeal formalities. We should have lost only our small-clothes and hats."

Of the infidel Rousseau, Napoleon ever spoke in terms of severe reprobation. "He was a bad man, a very bad man," said he, "he caused the revolution." "I was not aware," another replied, "that you considered the French Revolution such an unmixed evil." "Ah," Napoleon rejoined, "you wish to say that without the revolution you would not have had me. Nevertheless, without the revolution France would have been more happy." When invited to visit the hermitage of Rousseau, to see his cap, table, great chair, &c., he exclaimed, "Bah! I have no taste for such fooleries. Show them to my brother Louis. He is worthy of them."

Probably the following remarks of Napoleon, made at St. Helena, will give a very correct idea of his prevailing feeling upon the subject of religion. "The sentiment of religion is so consolatory, that it must be considered a gift from Heaven. What a resource would it not be for us here, to possess it. What rewards have I not a right to expect, who have run a career so extraordinary, so tempestuous, as mine has been, without committing a single crime. And yet how many might I not have been guilty of? I can appear before the tribunal of God, I can await his judgment, without fear. He will not find my conscience stained with the thoughts of murder and poisonings; with the infliction of violent and premeditated deaths, events so common in the history of those whose lives resemble mine. I have wished only for the power, the greatness, the glory of France. All my faculties, all my efforts, all my movements, were directed to the attainment of that object. These can not be crimes. To me they appeared acts of virtue. What then would be my happiness, if the bright prospect of futurity presented itself to crown the last moments of my existence."

After a moment's pause, in which he seemed lost in thought, he resumed: "But, how is it possible that conviction can find its way to our hearts, when we hear the absurd language, and witness the iniquitous conduct of the greater part of those whose business it is to preach to us. I am surrounded by priests, who repeat incessantly that their reign is not of this world; and yet they lay their hands upon every thing which they can get. The Pope is the head of that religion which is from Heaven. What did the present chief pontiff, who is undoubtedly a good and a holy man, not offer, to be allowed to return to Rome. The surrender of the government of the church, of the institution of bishops was not too much for him to give, to become once more a secular prince.

"Nevertheless," he continued, after another thoughtful pause, "it can not be doubted that, as emperor, the species of incredulity which I felt was beneficial to the nations I had to govern. How could I have favored equally sects so opposed to one another, if I had joined any one of them? How could I have preserved the independence of my thoughts and of my actions under the control of a confessor, who would have governed me under the dread of hell!" Napoleon closed this conversation, by ordering the New Testament to be brought. Commencing at the beginning, he read aloud as far as the conclusion of our Savior's address to his disciples upon the mountain. He expressed himself struck with the highest admiration, in contemplating its purity, its sublimity, and the beautiful perfection of its moral code.

For forty days the ships were driven about by contrary winds, and on the 1st of October they made the island of Corsica, and took refuge in the harbor of Ajaccio. The tidings that Napoleon had landed in his native town swept over the island like a gale, and the whole population crowded to the port to catch a sight of their illustrious countryman. "It seemed," said Napoleon, "that half of the inhabitants had discovered traces of kindred." But a few years had elapsed since the dwelling of Madame Letitia was pillaged by the mob, and the whole Bonaparte family, in penury and friendlessness, were hunted from their home, effecting their escape in an open boat by night. Now, the name of Bonaparte filled the island with acclamations. But Napoleon was alike indifferent to such unjust censure, and to such unthinking applause. As the curse did not depress, neither did the hosanna elate.

After the delay of a few days in obtaining supplies, the ships again weighed anchor, on the 7th of October, and continued their perilous voyage. The evening of the next day, as the sun was going down in unusual splendor, there appeared in the west, painted in strong relief against his golden rays, an English squadron. The admiral, who saw from the enemy's signals that he was observed, urged an immediate return to Corsica. Napoleon, convinced that capture would be the result of such a manoeuvre, exclaimed, "To do so would be to take the road to England.

I am seeking that to France. Spread all sail. Let every one be at his post. Steer to the northwest. Onward." The night was dark, the wind fair. Rapidly the ships were approaching the coast of France, through the midst of the hostile squadron, and exposed to the most imminent danger of capture. Escape seemed impossible. It was a night of fearful apprehension and terror to all on board, excepting Napoleon. He determined, in case of extremity, to throw himself into a boat, and trust for safety to darkness and the oars. With the most perfect self-possession and composure of spirits, he ordered the long-boat to be prepared, selected those whom he desired to accompany him, and carefully collected such papers as he was anxious to preserve. Not an eye was closed during the night. It was indeed a fearful question to be decided. Are these weary wanderers, in a few hours, to be in the embrace of their wives and their children, or will the next moment show them the black hull of an English man-of war, emerging from the gloom, to consign them to lingering years of captivity in an English prison? In this terrible hour no one could perceive that the composure of Napoleon was in the slightest degree ruffled. The first drawn of the morning revealed to their straining vision the hills of France stretching along but a few leagues before them, and far away, in the northeast, the hostile squadron, disappearing beneath the horizon of the sea. The French had escaped. The wildest bursts of joy rose from the ships. But Napoleon gazed calmly upon his beloved France, with pale cheek and marble brow, too proud to manifest emotion. At eight o'clock in the morning the four vessels dropped anchor in the little harbor of Frejus. It was the morning of the 8th of October. Thus for fifty days Napoleon had been tossed upon the waves of the Mediterranean, surrounded by the hostile flects of England, Russia, and Turkey, and yet had eluded their vigilance.

This wonderful passage of Napoleon, gave rise to many caricatures, both in England and France. One of these caricatures, which was conspicuous in the London shop windows, possessed so much point and historic truth, that Napoleon is said to have laughed most heartily on seeing it. Lord Nelson, as is well known, with all his heroism, was not exempt from the frailties of humanity. The British admiral was represented as guarding Napoleon. Lady Hamilton makes her appearance, and his lordship becomes so engrossed in caressing the fair enchantress, that Napoleon escapes between his legs. This was hardly a caricature. It was almost historic verity. While Napoleon was struggling against adverse storms off the coast of Africa, Lord Nelson, adorned with the laurels of his magnificent victory, in fond dalliance with his frail Delilah, was basking in the courts of voluptuous and profligate kings. "No one," said Napoleon, "can surrender himself to the dominion of love, without the forfeiture of some palms of glory."

When the four vessels entered the harbor of Frejus, a signal at the mast-head of the Muiron informed the authorities on shore that Napoleon was on board. The whole town was instantly in commotion. Before the anchors were dropped the harbor was filled with boats, and the ships were surrounded with an enthusiastic multitude, climbing their sides, thronging their decks, and rending the air with their acclamations. All the laws of quarantine were disregarded. The people, weary of anarchy, and trembling in view of the approaching Austrian invasion, were almost delirious with delight in receiving thus as it were from the clouds, a deliverer, in whose potency they could implicitly trust. When warned that the ships had recently sailed from Alexandria, and that there was imminent danger that the plague, might be communicated, they replied, "We had rather have the plague than the Austrians," Breaking over all the municipal regulations of health, the people took Napoleon, almost by violence, hurried him over the side of the ship to the boats, and conveyed him in triumph to the shore. The tidings had spread from farm-house to farm-house with almost electric speed, and the whole country population, men, women, and children, were crowding down to the shore. Even the wounded soldiers in the hospital, left their cots and crawled to the beach, to get a sight of the hero. The throng became so great that it was with difficulty that Napoleon could land. The gathering multitude, however, opened to the right and the left, and Napoleon passed through them, greeted with the enthusiastic cries of "Long live the conqueror of Italy, the conqueror of Egypt, the liberator of France." The peaceful little harbor of Frejus was suddenly thrown into a state of the most unheard of excitement. The bells rang their merriest peels. The guns in the forts rolled forth their heaviest thunders over the hills and over the waves; and the enthusiastic shouts of the ever increasing multitudes, thronging Napoleon, filled the air. The ships brought the first tidings, of the wonderful victories of Mount Tabor and of Aboukir. The French, humiliated by defeat, were exceedingly elated by this restoration of the national honor. The intelligence of Napoleon's arrival was immediately communicated, by telegraph, to Paris, which was six hundred miles from Frejus.

When the tidings of Napoleon's landing of Frejus, arrived in Paris, on the evening of the 9th of October, Josephine was at a large party at the house of M. Gohier, President of the Directory. All the most distinguished men of the metropolis were there. The intelligence produced the most profound sensation. Some, rioting in the spoils of office, turned pale with apprehension; knowing well the genius of Napoleon, and his boundless popularity, they feared another revolution, which should eject them from their seats of power. Others were elated with hope; they felt that Providence had sent to France a deliverer, at the very moment when a deliverer was needed. One of the deputies, who had been deeply grieved at the disasters which were overwhelming the Republic, actually died of joy, when he heard of Napoleon's return. Josephine, intensely excited by the sudden and totally unexpected announcement, immediately withdrew, hastened home, and at midnight, without allowing an hour for repose, she entered her carriage, with Louis Bonaparte and Hortense, who subsequently became the bride of Louis, and set out to meet her husband. Napoleon almost at the same hour, with his suite, left Frejus. During every stop of his progress he was greeted with the most extraordinary demonstrations of enthusiasm and affection. Bonfires blazed from the hills, triumphed arches, hastily of maidens spread a carpet of flowers for his chariot wheels, and greeted him with smiles and choruses of welcome. He carried at Lyons in the evening. The whole city was brilliant with illuminations. An immense concourse surrounded him with almost delirious shouts of joy. The constituted authorities received him as he descended from his carriage. The major had prepared a long and eulogistic harangue for the occasion. Napoleon had no time to listen to it. With a motion of his hand, imposing silence, he said said, "Gentlemen, I learned that France was in peril, I therefore did not hesitate to leave my army in Egypt, that I might come to he rescue. I now go hence. In a few days, if you think fit to wait upon me, I shall be at leisure to hear you." Fresh horses were by this time attached to the carriages, and the cavalcade, which like a meteor had burst upon them, like a meteor disappeared. From Lyons, for some unexplained reason, Napoleon turned from the regular route to Paris and took a less frequented road. When Josephine arrived at Lyons, to her utter consternation she found that Napoleon had left the city, several hours before her arrival, and that they had passed each other by different roads. Her anguish was inexpressible. For many months she had not received a line from her idolized husband, all communication having been intercepted by the English cruisers. She knew that many, jealous her power, had disseminated, far and wide, false reports respecting her conduct. She knew that these, her enemies, would surround Napoleon immediately upon his arrival, and take advantage of her absence to inflame his mind against her. Lyons is 245 miles from Paris. Josephine had passed over those weary leagues of hill and dale, pressing on without intermission, by day and by night, alighting not for refreshment of repose. Faint, exhausted, and her heart sinking within her with fearful apprehensions of the hopeless alienation of her husband, she received the dreadful tidings that she had missed him. There was no resource left her but to retrace the steps with the utmost possible celerity. Napoleon would, however, have been one or two days in Paris before Josephine could, by any possibility, re-enter the city. Probably in all France, there was not, at that time, a more unhappy woman than Josephine.

Secret wretchedness was also gnawing at the heart of Napoleon. Who has yet fathomed the mystery of human love! Intensest love and intensest hate can, at the same moment, intertwine their fibres in inextricable blending. In nothing is the will so impotent as in guiding or checking the impulses of this omnipotent passion. Napoleon loved Josephine with that almost superhuman energy which characterized all the movements of his impetuous spirit. The stream did not fret and ripple over a shallow bed, but it was serene in its unfathomable depths. The world contained but two objects for Napoleon, glory and Josephine; glory first, and then, closely following the more substantial idol.

Many of the Parisian ladies, proud of a more exalted lineage than Josephine could boast, were exceedingly envious of the supremacy she had attained in consequence of the renown of her husband. Her influence over Napoleon was well known. Philosophers, statesmen, ambitious generals, all crowded her saloons, paying her homage. A favorable word from Josephine they knew would pave the way for them to fame and fortune. Thus Josephine, from the saloons of Paris, with milder radiance, reflected back the splendor of her husband. She solicitous of securing as many friends as possible, to aid him in future emergencies, was as diligent in "winning hearts" at home, as Napoleon was in conquering provinces abroad. The gracefulness of Josephine, her consummate delicacy of moral appreciation, her exalted intellectual gifts, the melodious tones of her winning voice, charmed courtiers, philosophers, and statesmen alike. Her saloons were ever crowded. Her entertainments were ever embellished by the presence of all who were illustrious in rank and power in the metropolis. And in whatever circles she appeared the eyes of the gentlemen first sought for her. Two resistless attractions drew them. She was peculiarly fascinating in person and in character, and, through her renowned husband, she could dispense the most precious gifts. It is not difficult to imagine the envy which must thus have been excited. Many a haughty duchess was provoked, almost beyond endurance, that Josephine, the untitled daughter of a West Indian planter, should thus engross the homage of Paris, while she, with her proud rank, her wit, and her beauty, was comparatively a cipher. Moreau's wife, in particular resented the supremacy of Josephine as a personal affront. She thought General Moreau entitled to as much consideration as General Bonaparte. By the jealousy, rankling in her own bosom, she finally succeeded in rousing her husband to conspire against Napoleon, and thus the hero of Hohenlinden was ruined. Some of the brothers and sisters of Napoleon were also jealous of the paramount influence of Josephine, and would gladly wrest a portion of it from her hands. Under these circumstances, in various ways, slander had been warily insinuated into the ears of Napoleon, respecting the conduct of his wife. Conspiring enemies became more and more bold. Josephine was represented as having forgotten her husband, as reveling exultant with female vanity, in general flirtation; and, finally, as guilty of gross infidelity. Nearly all the letters written by Napoleon and Josephine to each other, were intercepted by the English cruisers. Though Napoleon did not credit these charges in full, he cherished not a little of the pride, which led the Roman monarch to exclaim, "Caesar's wife must not be suspected."

Napoleon was in the troubled state of mind during the latter months of his residence in Egypt. One day he was sitting alone in his tent, which was pitched in the great Arabian desert. Several months had passed since he had heard a word from Josephine. Years might elapse ere they would meet again. Junot entered, having just received, through some channel of jealousy and malignity, communications from Paris. Cautiously, but fully, he unfolded the whole budget of Parisian gossip. Josephine had found, as he represented, in the love of others an ample recompense for the absence of her husband. She was surrounded by admirers with whom she was engaged in an incessant round of intrigues and flirtations. Regardless of honor she had surrendered herself to the dominion of passion. Napoleon was for a few moments in a state of terrible agitation. With hasty strides, like a chafed lion, he paced his tent, exclaiming, "Why do I love that woman so? Why can I not tear her image from my heart? I will do so. I will have an immediate and open divorce-open and public divorce." He immediately wrote to Josephine, in terms of the utmost severity accusing her of playing the coquette with half the world." The letter escaped the British cruisers and she received it. It almost broke her faithful heart. Such were the circumstances under which Napoleon and Josephine were to meet after an absence of eighteen months. Josephine was exceedingly anxious to see Napoleon before he should have an interview with her enemies. Hence the depth of anguish with which she heard her husband had passes her. Two or three days must have elapse ere she could possibly retraced the weary miles over which she had already traveled.

In the mean time the carriage of Napoleon was rapidly approaching the metropolis. By night his path was brilliant with bonfires and illuminations. The ringing of bells, the thunders of artillery, and the acclamations of the multitude, accompanied him every step of his way. But no smile of triumph played upon his pale and pensive cheeks. He felt that he was returning to a desolated home. Gloom reigned in his heart. He entered Paris, and drove rapidly to his own dwelling. Behold, Josephine was not there. Conscious guilt, he thought, had made her afraid to meet him. It is in vain to attempt to penetrate the hidden anguish of Napoleon's soul. That his proud spirit must have suffered intensity of woe no one can doubt. The bitter enemies of Josephine immediately surrounded him, eagerly taking advantage of her absence, to inflame, to a still higher degree, by adroit insinuations, his jealousy and anger. Eugene had accompanied him in his return from Egypt, and his affectionate heart ever glowed with love and admiration for his mother. With anxiety, amounting to anguish, he watched at the window for her arrival. Said one to Napoleon, maliciously endeavoring to prevent the possibility of reconciliation, "Josephine will appear before you, with all her fascinations. She will explain matters. You will forgive all, and tranquillity will be restored." "Never!" exclaimed Napoleon, with pallid cheek and trembling lip, striding nervously too and fro, through the room, "never! I forgive! ever!" Then stopping suddenly, and gazing the interlocutor wildly in the face, he exclaimed, with passionate gesticulation, "You know me. Were I not sure of my resolution, I would tear out this heart, and cast it into the fire."

How strange is the life of the heart of man. From this interview, Napoleon, two hours after his arrival in Paris with his whole soul agitated by the tumult of domestic woe, went to the palace of the Luxembourg, to visit the Directory, to form his plans for overthrow the government of France. Pale, pensive, joyless, his inflexible purposes of ambition wavered not—his iron energies yielded not. Josephine was an idol. He execrated her and he adored her. He loved her most passionately. He hated her most virulently. He could clasp her one moment to his bosom with burning kisses; the next moment he would spurn her from him with as the most loathsome wretch. But glory was a still more cherished idol, at whose shrine he bowed with unwavering adoration. He strove to forget his domestic wretchedness by prosecuting, with new vigor, his schemes of grandeur. As he ascended the stairs of the Luxembourg, some of the guard, who had been with him in Italy, recognized his person, and he was instantly greeted, with enthusiastic shouts. "Long live Bonaparte." The clamor rolled like a voice of thunder through the spacious halls of the palace, and fell, like a death knell, upon the ears of the Directors. The populace upon the pavement, caught the sound and reechoed it from street to street. The plays at the theatres, and the songs at the Opera, were stopped, that it might be announced, from the stage, that Bonaparte had arrived in Paris. Men, women, and children simultaneously rose to their feet, and a wild burst of enthusiastic joy swelled upon the night air. All Paris was in commotion. The name of Bonaparte was upon every lip. The enthusiasm was contagious. Illuminations began to blaze, here and there, without concert, from the universal rejoicing, till the whole city was resplendent with light. One bell rang forth its merry peal of greeting, and then another, and another till every steeple was vocal with its clamorous welcome. One gun was heard, rolling its heavy thunders over the city. It was the signal for an instantaneous, tumultuous roar, from artillery and musketry, from all the battalions in the metropolis. The tidings of the great victories of Aboukir and Mount Tabor, reached Paris with Napoleon. Those Oriental names were shouted through the streets, and blazed upon the eyes of the delighted people in letters of light. Thus in an hour the whole of Paris was thrown into a delirium of joy, was displayed the most triumphant and gorgeous festival.

The government of France was at the time organized somewhat upon the model of that the United States. Instead of one President, they have five, called Directors. Their Senate was called The House of Ancients; their House of Representatives, The Council of Five Hundred. The five Directors, as might have been expected, were ever quarreling among themselves, each wishing for the lion's share of power. The Monarchist, the Jacobin, and the moderate Republican could not harmoniously co-operate in the government They only circumvented each other, while the administration sank into disgrace and ruin. The Abbe'Sieyes was decidedly the most able man of the Executive. He was a proud patrician, and his character may be estimated from the following anecdote, which Napoleon has related respecting him:

"The abbe, before the revolution, was chaplain to one of the princesses. One day, when he was performing mass before herself, her attendants, and a large congregation, something occurred which rendered it necessary for the princess to leave the room. The ladies in waiting and the nobility, who attended church more out of complaisance to her than from any sense of religion followed her example. Sieyes was very busy reading his prayers, and, for a few moments, he did not perceive their departure. At last, raising his eyes from his book, behold the princess, the nobles, and all the ton had disappeared. With an air of displeasure and contempt he shut the book, and descended from the pulpit, exclaiming, 'I do not read prayers for the rabble.' He immediately went out of the chapel, leaving the service half-finished."

Napoleon arrived in Paris on the evening of the 17th of October, 1799. Two days and two nights elapse ere Josephine was able to retrace the weary leagues over which she had passed. It was the hour of midnight on the 19th when the rattle of her carriage wheels was heard entering the court-yard of their dwelling in the Rue Chanteraine. Eugene, anxiously awaiting her arrival, was instantly at his mother's side, folding her in his embrace. Napoleon also heard the arrival, but he remained sternly in his chamber. He had ever been accustomed to greet Josephine at the door of her carriage, even when she returned from an ordinary morning ride. No matter what employments engrossed his mind, no matter what guest were present, he would immediately leave every thing, and hasten to the door to assist Josephine to alight and to accompany her into the house. But now, after an absence of eighteen months, the faithful Josephine, half-dead with exhaustion, was at the door, and Napoleon, with pallid check and compressed lip, and jealousy rankling in his bosom, remained sternly in his room, preparing to overwhelm her with his indignation.

Josephine was in a state of terrible agitation. Her limbs tottered and her heart throbbed most violently. Assisted by Eugene, and accompanied by Hortense, she tremblingly ascended the stairs to the little parlor where she had so often received the caresses of her most affectionate spouse. She opened the door. There stood Napoleon, as immovable as a statue, leaning against the mantle, with his arms folded across his breast. Sternly and silently, he cast a withering look upon Josephine, and then exclaimed in tones, which, like a dagger pierced her heart "Madame! It is my wish that you retire immediately to Malmaison."

Josephine staggered and would have fallen, as if struck by a mortal blow, had she not been caught in the arms of her son. Sobbing bitterly with anguish, she was conveyed by Eugene to her own apartment. Napoleon also was dreadfully agitated. The sight of Josephine had revived all his passionate love. But he fully believed that Josephine had unpardonably trifled with his affections, that she had courted the admiration of a multitude of flatterers, and that she had degraded herself and her husband by playing the coquette. The proud spirit of Napoleon could not brook such a requital for his fervid love. With hasty strides he traversed the room, striving to nourish his indignation. The sobs of Josephine had deeply moved him. He yearned to fold her again in fond love to his heart. But he proudly resolved that he would not relent. Josephine, with that prompt obedience which ever characterized her, prepared immediately to comply with his orders. It was midnight. For a week she had lived in her carriage almost without food or sleep. Malmaison was thirty miles from Paris. Napoleon did not suppose that she would leave the house until morning. Much to his surprise, in a few moments he heard Josephine, Eugene, and Hortense descending the stairs to take the carriage. Napoleon, even in his anger, could not be thus inhuman. "My heart," he said, "was never formed to witness tears without emotion." He immediately descended to the court-yard, though his pride would not yet allow him to speak to Josephine. He, however, addressing Eugene, urged the party to return and obtain refreshment and repose. Josephine, all submission, unhesitatingly yielded to his wishes, and re-ascending the stairs, in the extremity of exhaustion and grief, threw herself upon a couch, in her apartment. Napoleon, equally wretched, returned to his cabinet. Two days of utter misery passed away, during which no intercourse took place between the estranged parties, each of whom loved the other with almost superhuman intensity.

Love in the heart will finally triumph over all obstructions. The struggle was long, but gradually pride and passion yielded, and love regained the ascendency. Napoleon so far surrendered on the third day, as to enter the apartment of Josephine. She was seated at a toilet-table, her face buried in her hands, and absorbed in the profoundest woe. The letters, which she had received from Napoleon, and which she had evidently been reading, were spread upon the table. Hortense the picture of grief and despair, was standing in the alcove of a window. Napoleon had opened the door softly, and his entrance had not been heard. With an irresolute step he advanced toward his wife, and then said, kindly and sadly, "Josephine!" She started at the sound of that well-known voice, and raising her swollen eyes, swimming in tears, mournfully exclaimed, "Monami" —my friend . This was the term of endearment with which she had invariably addressed her husband. It recalled a thousand delightful reminiscences. Napoleon was vanquished. He extended his hand. Josephine threw herself into his arms, pillowed her aching head upon his bosom, and in the intensity of blended joy and anguish, wept convulsively. A long explanation ensued. Napoleon became satisfied that Josephine had been deeply wronged. The reconciliation was cordial and entire, and was never again interrupted.

Napoleon now, with a stronger heart, turned to the accomplishment of his designs to rescue France from anarchy. He was fully conscious of his own ability to govern the nation. He knew that it was the almost unanimous wish of the people that he should grasp the reins of power. He was confident of their cordial co-operation in any plans he might adopt. Still it was an enterprise of no small difficulty to thrust the five Directors from their thrones, and to get the control of the Council of Ancients and of The Five Hundred. Never was a difficult achievement more adroitly and proudly accomplished.

For many days Napoleon almost entirely secluded himself from observation, affecting a studious avoidance of the public gaze. He laid aside his military dress and assumed the peaceful costume of the National Institute. Occasionally he wore a beautiful Turkish sabre, suspended by a silk ribbon. This simple dress transported the imagination of the beholder to Aboukir, Mount Tabor, and the Pyramids. He studiously sought the society of literary men, and devoted to them his attention. He invited distinguished men of the Institute to dine with him, and avoiding political discussion, conversed only upon literary and scientific subjects.

Moreau and Bernadotte were the two rival generals from whom Napoleon had the most to fear. Two days after his arrival in Paris Napoleon said to Bourrienne, "I believe that I shall have Bernadotte and Moreau against me. But I do not fear Moreau. He is devoid of energy. He prefers military to political power. We shall gain him by the promise of a command. But Bernadotte has Moorish blood in his veins. He is bold and enterprising. He does not like me, and I am certain that he will oppose me. If he should become ambitious he will venture anything. Besides, this fellow is not to be seduced. He is disinterested and clever. But, after all, we have just arrived. We shall see."

Napoleon formed no conspiracy. He confided to no one his designs. And yet, in his own solitary mind, relying entirely upon his own capacious resources, he studied the state of affairs and he matured his plans. Sieyes was the only one whose talents and influence Napoleon feared. The abbe also looked with apprehension upon his formidable rival. They stood aloof and eyed each other. Meeting at a dinner party, each was too proud to make advances. Yet each thought only of the other. Mutually exasperated, they separated without having spoken. "Did you see that insolent little fellow?" said Sieyes, "he would not even condescend to notice a member of the government, who, if they had done right, would have caused him to be shot." "What on earth," said Napoleon, "could have induced them to put that priest in the Directory. He is sold to Prussia. Unless you take care, he will deliver you up to that power." Napoleon dined with Moreau, who afterward in hostility to Napoleon pointed the guns of Russia against the columns of his countrymen. The dinner party was at (Gohier's, one of the Directors. The following interesting conversation took place between the rival generals. When first introduced, they looked at each other a moment without speaking, Napoleon, conscious of his own superiority, and solicitous to gain the powerful co-operation of Moreau, made the first advances, and, with great courtesy, expressed the earnest desire he felt to make his acquaintance. "You have returned victorious from Egypt." replied Moreau, "and I from Italy after a great defeat. It was the month which General Joubert passed in Pairs after his marriage, which caused our disasters. This gave the allies time to reduce Mantua, and to bring up the force which besieged it to take a part in the action. It is always the greater number which defeats the less." "True," replied Napoleon, "it is always, the greater number which beats the less" "And yet," said Gohier, "with small armies you have frequently defeated large ones." "Even then," rejoined Napoleon, "it was always the inferior force which was defeated by the superior. When with a small body of men I was in the presence of a large one, collecting my little band, I fell like lightning on one of the wings of the hostile army, and defeated it. Profiting by the disorder which such an event never failed to occasion in their whole line, I repeated the attack, with similar success, in another quarter, still with my whole force. I thus beat it in detail. The general victory which was the result, was still an example of the truth of the principle that the greater force defeats the lesser." Napoleon, by those fascinations of mind and manner, which enabled him to win to him whom he would, soon gained an ascendency over Moreau. And when, two days after, in token of his regard, he sent him a beautiful poniard set with diamonds, worth two thousand dollars: the work was accomplished, and Moreau was ready to do his bidding. Napoleon gave a small and very select dinner party. Gohier was invited. The conversation turned on the turquoise used by the Orientals to clasp their turbans. Napoleon, rising from the table took from a private drawer, two very beautiful brooches, richly set with those jewels. One he gave to Gohier, the other to his tried friend Desaix. "It is a little toy," said he, "which we republicans may give and receive without impropriety." The Director, flattered by the delicacy of the compliment, and yet not repelled by any thing assuming the grossness of a bribe, yielded his heart's homage to Napoleon.

Republican France was surrounded by monarchies in arms against her. Their hostility was so inveterate, and, from the very nature of the case, so inevitable, that Napoleon thought that France should ever be prepared for an attack, and that the military spirit should be carefully fostered. Republican America, most happily, has no foe to fear, and all her energies may be devoted to filling the land with peace and plenty, But a republic in monarchical Europe must sleep by the side of its guns. "Do you, really," said Napoleon, to Gohier, in this interview, "advocate a general peace! You are wrong. The Republic should never make but partial accommodations. It should always contrive to have some war on hand to keep alive the military spirit." We can, perhaps, find a little extenuation for this remark, in its apparent necessity, and in the influences of the martial ardor in which Napoleon from his very infancy had been enveloped. Even now, it is to be feared that the time is far distant ere the nations of the earth can learn war no more.

Lefebvre was commandant of the guard of the two legislative bodies. His co-operation was important. Napoleon sent a special invitation for an interview. "Lefebvre," said he, "will you, one of the pillars of the Republic, suffer it to perish in the hands of these lawyers ? Join me and assist to save it." Taking from his own side the beautiful Turkish scimitar which he wore, he passed the ribbon over Lefebvre's neck, saying, "accept this sword, which I wore at the battle of the Pyramids. I give it to you as a token of my esteem and confidence." "Yes," replied Lefebvre, most highly gratified at this signal mark of confidence and generosity, "let us throw the lawyers into the river."

Napoleon soon had an interview with Bernadotte. "He confessed," said Napoleon to Bourrienne, "that he thought us all lost. He spoke of external enemies, of internal enemies, and, at that word he looked steadily in my face. I also gave him a glance. But patience; the pear will soon be ripe."

In this interview Napoleon inveighed against the violence and lawlessness of the Jacobin club. "Your own brothers," Bernadotte replied, "were the founders of that club. And yet you reproach me with favoring its principles. It is to the instructions of some one, I know not who , that we are to ascribe the agitation which now prevails." "True, general," Napoleon replied, most vehemently, "and I would rather live in the woods, than in a society which presents no security against violence." This conversation only strengthened the alienation already existing between them.

Bernadotte, though a brave and efficient officer, was a jealous braggadocio. At the first interview between these two distinguished men, when Napoleon was in command of the army of Italy, they contemplated each other with mutual dislike. "I have seen a man," said Bernadotte, "of twenty-six or seven years of age, who assumes the air of one of fifty; and he presages any thing but good to the Republic." Napoleon summarily dismissed Bernadotte by saying, "he has a French head and a Roman heart."

There were three political parties now dividing France, the old royalist party, in favor of the restoration of the Bourbons; the radical democrats, or Jacobins, with Barras at its head, supported by the mob of Paris; and the moderate republicans led by Sieyes. All these parties struggling together, and fearing each other, in the midst of the general anarchy which prevailed, immediately paid court to Napoleon, hoping to secure the support of his all-powerful arm. Napoleon determined to co-operate with the moderate republicans. The restoration of the Bourbons was not only out of the question, but Napoleon had no more power to secure that result, than had Washington to bring the United States into peaceful submission to George III. "Had I joined the Jacobins," said Napoleon, "I should have risked nothing. But after conquering with them, it would have been necessary almost immediately, to conquer against them. A club can not endure a permanent chief. It wants one for every successive passion. Now to make use of a party one day, in order to attack it the next, under whatever pretext it is done, is still an act of treachery. It was inconsistent with my principles."

Sieyes, the head of the moderate republicans, and Napoleon soon understood each other, and each admitted the necessity of co-operation. The government was in a state of chaos. "Our salvation now demands," said the wily diplomatist, "both a head and a sword." Napoleon had both. In one fortnight from the time when he landed at Frejus, "the pear was ripe." The plan was all matured for the great conflict. Napoleon, in solitary grandeur, kept his own counsel. He had secured the cordial co-operation, the unquestioning obedience of all his subordinates. Like the general upon the field of battle, he was simply to give his orders, and columns marched, and squadrons charged, and generals swept the field in unquestioning obedience. Though he had determined to ride over and to destroy the existing government, he wished to avail himself, so far as possible, of the mysterious power of law, as a conqueror turns a captured battery upon the foe from whom it had been wrested. Such a plot, so simple, yet so bold and efficient, was never formed before. And no one, but another Napoleon, will be able to execute another such again. All Paris was in a state of intense excitement. Something great was to be done. Napoleon was to do it. But nobody knew when, or what, or how. All impatiently awaited orders. The majority of the Senate, or Council of Ancients, conservative in its tendencies, and having once seen, during the reign of terror, the horrors of Jacobin domination, were ready, most obsequiously, to rally beneath the banner of so resolute a leader as Napoleon. They were prepared, without question, to pass any vote which he should propose. The House of Representatives or Council of Five Hundred, more democratic in its constitution, contained a large number of vulgar, ignorant, and passionate demagogues, struggling to grasp the reins of power. Carnot, whose co-operation Napoleon had entirely secured, was President of the Senate. Lucien Bonaparte, the brother of Napoleon, was Speaker of the House. The two bodies met in the palace of the Tuileries. The constitution conferred upon the Council of Ancients, the right to decide upon the place of meeting for both legislative assemblies.