person who should attempt an intrusion on his privacy. It is stated in a
note in O'Meara's journal that "the Emperor was so firmly impressed with
the idea that an attempt would be made forcibly to intrude on his
privacy, that from a short time after the departure of Sir George
Cockburn he always kept four or five pairs of loaded pistols and some
swords in his apartment, with which he was determined to despatch the
first who entered against his will." It seems this practice was
continued to his death.

Napoleon continued to pass the mornings in dictating his Memoirs and the
evenings in reading or conversation. He grew fonder of Racine, but his
favourite was Corneille. He repeated that, had he lived in his time, he
would have made him a prince. He had a distaste to Voltaire, and found
considerable fault with his dramas, perhaps justly, as conveying opinions
rather than sentiments. He criticised his Mahomet, and said he had made
him merely an impostor and a tyrant, without representing him as a great
man. This was owing to Voltaire's religious and political antipathies;
for those who are free from common prejudices acquire others of their own
in their stead, to which they are equally bigoted, and which they bring
forward on all occasions. When the evening passed off in conversation
without having recourse to books he considered it a point gained.

Some one having asked the Emperor which was the greatest battle that he
had fought, he replied it was difficult to answer that question without
inquiring what was implied by the greatest battle. "Mine," continued he,
"cannot be judged of separately: they formed a portion of extensive
plans. They must therefore be estimated by their consequences. The
battle of Marengo, which was so long undecided, procured for us the
command of all Italy. Ulm annihilated a whole army; Jena laid the whole
Prussian monarchy at our feet; Friedland opened the Russian empire to us;