Oh! how touched he was by this act of respectful affection on my part!
Who knows but at that moment he recollected the words I had addressed to
him in his palace, 'Whenever you shall find yourself in a situation of
danger, you will learn to distinguish your real friends from the friends
of your fortune.'" A very few days after this affecting scene, on the
night of the 20th May, Murat crossed over in disguise to Ischia, and
embarked for France. On the 23d, took place the triumphal entry of the
Austrians into the city of Naples.

The particulars of Murat's last mad act, his landing in Italy at the
head of thirty men, and of his consequent capture and tragical death,
have been related by many writers, and General Pépé could add little in
the way of facts to what was already known. He makes some interesting
reflections on the subject, and traces the supreme ill-luck by which
Joachim was pursued in his last desperate venture. On the return of the
Bourbons to France, two of his followers, who had accompanied him from
Naples, hired a vessel to convey him to England or America. But, as fate
would have it, the place of rendezvous was misunderstood. Murat missed
his friends, and, being in hourly peril of his life, put to sea in a
boat. Landed in Corsica, the affectionate welcome he met from thousands
of the inhabitants, many of whom had formerly served under him, cheered
his drooping spirits, and inspired him with the idea of a descent in
Italy. He had two hundred and seventy followers, hardy Corsican
mountaineers, and had they landed with him, General Pépé is of opinion
that he would soon have raised a force sufficiently strong to maintain
the campaign, and extort favourable conditions from Austria, as far, at
least, as regarded his life and liberty. But the six small vessels in
which he left Ajaccio were scattered by a tempest, and he was driven,
with but a tithe of his followers, to the very last port he ought to
have made. The inhabitants of Pizzo, whose coasting trade had been