been violently opposed to the arrangement, all the more so as the treaty of Fontainebleau also gave Marie-Louise and her son the nearby Grand Duchy of Tuscany. Castlereagh, too, was very worried, while Sir Charles Stewart wondered ‘whether Napoleon may not bring . . . powder to the iron mines which the island of Elba is so famous for’.22 According to Bonapartist sources, from this dissatisfaction there emerged a settled determination to have him murdered. Whether any of this was true, it is hard to say, but by the beginning of 1815 Napoleon’s household was in the grip of something that amounted to panic. ‘People feared for the emperor’s person,’ wrote Napoleon’s valet, Marchand. ‘News arriving from Vienna, via Livorno and Naples, was not reassuring . . . There was talk of St Helena . . . Navy commander Chautard was ordered to keep a vigilant watch on . . . ships cruising near Elba . . . Some defence measures were decided on for the outer gates.’23 After Waterloo Napoleon claimed that it had been all this that determined him to act as he did, but the sceptic is compelled, first, to observe that Elba was a very small realm for a ruler of Napoleon’s energy, and, second, that the optimism that had so sustained him in 1813 and 1814 had once more started to grip him. ‘The emperor knew . . . that, outside of a few thousand schemers, the entire nation remained attached to him in spirit, opinion and heart, just as it was attached to the principles of national sovereignty and French honour; that it had only submitted to the necessity imposed by its enemy and the new Judas; [and] that out of 30 million inhabitants, 29.5 million kept alive in their hearts the hope of overthrowing the princes.’24 And had not his enemies almost just come to blows? Whatever the truth may have been, by February 1815 Napoleon had resolved on escape. Viewed objectively, the chances of success were slim - in fact it has been claimed that the whole adventure was provoked in an attempt to ensure that ‘the monster’ could be chained up in some place of exile far from Europe - but on 26 February Napoleon sailed from Elba with his entire army of 750 men. Thus began the most extraordinary adventure of the entire Revolutionary and Napoleonic period. Landing on March near Fréjus, Napoleon was soon on the march for Paris via Grenoble. Such forces of troops as were dispatched against him quickly changed sides, and even in areas far removed from his magnetic presence garrisons declared they would not fight against him. In the eastern city of Toul, for example, Marshal Oudinot summoned his officers to see him:
Not long after, a treble row of officers was crammed in our room, forming a circle with the marshal in the centre. He waited until they had all taken their places in silence, and then expressed himself more or less in the following terms. ‘Gentlemen, in the circumstances in which we are placed I wish to make an appeal for your loyalty. We are marching under the white cockade. I am to review you tomorrow before our departure: with what cry will you and your men reply to my “Long live the King!”?’ These words were followed by absolute silence. Nothing so striking ever passed before my eyes . . . I saw the storm was about to break; each second was a century. At last the marshal said, ‘Well, gentlemen?’ Then a young man of inferior rank stepped forward, and said ‘Monsieur le Maréchal, I am bound to tell you, and no one here will contradict me: when you cry “Long live the king!”, our men, and we, will answer, “Long live the emperor!” ’25
Trying to rally the garrison of Lyons, Marshal Macdonald had a similar experience:
I was very excited. I finished my speech by saying that I had too good an opinion of their fidelity and patriotic feelings to think that they would refuse to do as I did, who had never deceived them, and that they would follow me along the path of honour and duty; the only guarantee that I asked of them was to join with me in crying, ‘Long live the King!’ I shouted this several times at the top of my voice. Not one single voice joined me.