the alleged attachment of Madame Campan to the Queen, by the fact of her
having received the daughters of many of the regicides for education into
her establishment at Rouen. Far be it from me to sanction so unjust a
censure. Although what I mention hurt her character very much in the
estimation of her former friends, and constituted one of the grounds of
the dissolution of her establishment at Rouen, on the restoration of the
Bourbons, and may possibly in some degree have deprived her of such aids
from their adherents as might have made her work unquestionable, yet what
else, let me ask, could have been done by one dependent upon her
exertions for support, and in the power of Napoleon's family and his
emissaries? On the contrary, I would give my public testimony in favour
of the fidelity of her feelings, though in many instances I must withhold
it from the fidelity of her narrative. Her being utterly isolated from
the illustrious individual nearest to the Queen must necessarily leave
much to be desired in her record. During the whole term of the Princesse
de Lamballe's superintendence of the Queen's household, Madame Campan
never had any special communication with my benefactress, excepting once,
about the things which were to go to Brussels, before the journey to
Varennes; and once again, relative to a person of the Queen's household,
who had received the visits of Petion, the Mayor of Paris, at her private
lodgings. This last communication I myself particularly remember,
because on that occasion the Princess, addressing me in her own native
language, Madame Campan, observing it, considered me as an Italian, till,
by a circumstance I shall presently relate, she was undeceived.

I should anticipate the order of events, and incur the necessity of
speaking twice of the same things, were I here to specify the express
errors in the work of Madame Campan. Suffice it now that I observe
generally her want of knowledge of the Princesse de Lamballe; her
omission of many of the most interesting circumstances of the Revolution;