and had we been guilty of such forgetfulness, the Emperor was ever ready
to recall us to this plain and simple duty.




CHAPTER IX.

The only too famous twenty-ninth bulletin of the grand army was not
published in Paris, where the consternation it spread through all classes
is well known, until the 16th of December; and the Emperor, following
close upon the heels of this solemn manifesto of our disasters, arrived
in his capital forty-eight hours after, as if endeavoring to annul by his
presence the evil effects which this communication might produce. On the
28th, at half past eleven in the evening, his Majesty alighted at the
palace of the Tuileries. This was the first time since his accession to
the consulate that Paris had witnessed his return from a campaign without
announcing a new peace conquered by the glory of our arms. Under these
circumstances, the numerous persons who from attachment to the Empress
Josephine had always seen or imagined they saw in her a kind of
protecting talisman of the success of the Emperor, did not fail to remark
that the campaign of Russia was the first which had been undertaken since
the Emperor's marriage to Marie Louise. Without any superstition, it
could not be denied that, although the Emperor was always great even when
fortune was contrary to him, there was a very marked difference between
the reign of the two Empresses. The one witnessed only victories
followed by peace. And the other, only wars, not devoid of glory, but
devoid of results, until the grand and fatal conclusion in the abdication
at Fontainebleau.