viewed as a favour. Each animal carried two men with their arms and
baggage: the uniform was sky-blue with a white turban; and the speed
and precision of their movements enabled them to deal terrible blows,
even at distant tribes of Bedouins, who bent before a genius that
could outwit them even in their own deserts.

The pleasures of his officers and men were also met by the opening of
the Tivoli Gardens; and there, in sight of the Pyramids, the life of
the Palais Royal took root: the glasses clinked, the dice rattled, and
heads reeled to the lascivious movements of the eastern dance; and
Bonaparte himself indulged a passing passion for the wife of one of
his officers, with an openness that brought on him a rebuke from his
stepson, Eugène Beauharnais. But already he had been rendered
desperate by reports of the unfaithfulness of Josephine at Paris; the
news wrung from him this pathetic letter to his brother Joseph--the
death-cry of his long drooping idealism:

"I have much to worry me privately, for the veil is entirely torn
aside. You alone remain to me; your affection is very dear to me:
nothing more remains to make me a misanthrope than to lose her and
see you betray me.... Buy a country seat against my return, either
near Paris or in Burgundy. I need solitude and isolation: grandeur
wearies me: the fount of feeling is dried up: glory itself is
insipid. At twenty-nine years of age I have exhausted everything.
It only remains to me to become a thorough egoist."[109]

Many rumours were circulated as to Bonaparte's public appearance in
oriental costume and his presence at a religious service in a mosque.
It is even stated by Thiers that at one of the chief festivals he
repaired to the great mosque, repeated the prayers like a true Moslem,