"Sire!" answered De Segur, "it is not the want of numbers, but the
difficulty of the choice among them. I will never recommend a single
individual upon whom I cannot depend; or who, on some future day, may
expose me to the greatest of all evils, the displeasure of my Prince."

"But," continued Napoleon, "what is to be done to-day that I may augment
the number of my suite, and by it impose upon the gaping multitude and
the attending deputations?"--"Command," said De Segur, "all the officers
of Your Majesty's staff, and of the staff of the Governor of Paris,
General Murat, to surround Your Majesty's sacred person, and order them
to accoutre themselves in the most shining and splendid manner possible.
The presence of so many military men will also, in a political point of
view, be useful. It will lessen the pretensions of the constituted
authorities, by telling them indirectly, 'It is not to your Senatus
Consultum, to your decrees, or to your votes, that I am indebted for my
present Sovereignty; I owe it exclusively to my own merit and valour, and
to the valour of my brave officers and men, to whose arms I trust more
than to your counsels.'"

This advice obtained Napoleon's entire approbation, and was followed. De
Segur was permitted to retire, but when Madame Remusat made a curtsey
also to leave the room, she was stopped with his terrible 'aux arrets'
and left under the care and responsibility of his aide-de-camp, Lebrun,
who saw her safe into her room, at the door of which he placed two
grenadiers. Napoleon then went out, ordering his wife, at her peril, to
be in time, ready and brilliantly dressed, for the drawing-room.

Dreading the consequences of her husband's wrath, Madame Napoleon was not
only punctual, but so elegantly and tastefully decorated with jewels and
ornaments that even those of her enemies or rivals who refused her