The Love Affairs Of A Bibliomaniac [45]
have devised this atrocious libel. One has to read the literature current in the earlier part of this century in order to get a correct idea of the terror with which Bonaparte filled his enemies, and this literature is so extensive that it seems an impossibility that anything like a complete collection should be got together; to say nothing of the histories, the biographies, the volumes of reminiscence and the books of criticism which the career of the Corsican inspired, there are Napoleon dream-books, Napoleon song-books, Napoleon chap-books, etc., etc., beyond the capability of enumeration.
The English were particularly active in disseminating libels upon Napoleon; they charged him in their books and pamphlets with murder, arson, incest, treason, treachery, cowardice, seduction, hypocrisy, avarice, robbery, ingratitude, and jealousy; they said that he poisoned his sick soldiers, that he was the father of Hortense's child, that he committed the most atrocious cruelties in Egypt and Italy, that he married Barras' discarded mistress, that he was afflicted with a loathsome disease, that he murdered the Duc d'Enghien and officers in his own army of whom he was jealous, that he was criminally intimate with his own sisters--in short, there was no crime, however revolting, with which these calumniators were not hasty to charge the emperor.
This same vindictive hatred was visited also upon all associated with Bonaparte in the conduct of affairs at that time. Murat was ``a brute and a thief''; Josephine, Hortense, Pauline, and Mme. Letitia were courtesans; Berthier was a shuffling, time-serving lackey and tool; Augereau was a bastard, a spy, a robber, and a murderer; Fouche was the incarnation of every vice; Lucien Bonaparte was a roue and a marplot; Cambaceres was a debauchee; Lannes was a thief, brigand, and a poisoner; Talleyrand and Barras were--well, what evil was told of them has yet to be disproved. But you would gather from contemporaneous English publications that Bonaparte and his associates were veritable fiends from hell sent to scourge civilization. These books are so strangely curious that we find it hard to classify them: we cannot call them history, and they are too truculent to pass for humor; yet they occupy a distinct and important place among Napoleonana.
Until William Hazlitt's life of Bonaparte appeared we had no English treatment of Bonaparte that was in any sense fair, and, by the way, Hazlitt's work is the only one in English I know of which gives the will of Bonaparte, an exceedingly interesting document.
For a good many years I held the character of Napoleon in light esteem, for the reason that he had but small regard for books. Recent revelations, however, made to me by Dr. O'Rell (grandnephew of ``Tom Burke of Ours''), have served to dissipate that prejudice, and I question not that I shall duly become as ardent a worshipper of the Corsican as my doctor himself is. Dr. O'Rell tells me--and his declarations are corroborated by Frederic Masson and other authorities-- that Bonaparte was a lover and a collector of books, and that he contributed largely to the dignity and the glorification of literature by publishing a large number of volumes in the highest style of the art.
The one department of literature for which he seems to have had no liking was fiction. Novels of all kinds he was in the habit of tossing into the fire. He was a prodigious buyer of books, and those which he read were invariably stamped on the outer cover with the imperial arms; at St. Helena his library stamp was merely a seal upon which ink was smeared.
Napoleon cared little for fine bindings, yet he knew their value, and whenever a presentation copy was to be bound he required that it be bound handsomely. The books in his own library were invariably bound ``in calf of indifferent quality,'' and he was wont, while reading a book, to fill the margin with comments in pencil. Wherever he went he took a library of books with him, and these volumes he had deprived of all superfluous margin, so as to save weight
The English were particularly active in disseminating libels upon Napoleon; they charged him in their books and pamphlets with murder, arson, incest, treason, treachery, cowardice, seduction, hypocrisy, avarice, robbery, ingratitude, and jealousy; they said that he poisoned his sick soldiers, that he was the father of Hortense's child, that he committed the most atrocious cruelties in Egypt and Italy, that he married Barras' discarded mistress, that he was afflicted with a loathsome disease, that he murdered the Duc d'Enghien and officers in his own army of whom he was jealous, that he was criminally intimate with his own sisters--in short, there was no crime, however revolting, with which these calumniators were not hasty to charge the emperor.
This same vindictive hatred was visited also upon all associated with Bonaparte in the conduct of affairs at that time. Murat was ``a brute and a thief''; Josephine, Hortense, Pauline, and Mme. Letitia were courtesans; Berthier was a shuffling, time-serving lackey and tool; Augereau was a bastard, a spy, a robber, and a murderer; Fouche was the incarnation of every vice; Lucien Bonaparte was a roue and a marplot; Cambaceres was a debauchee; Lannes was a thief, brigand, and a poisoner; Talleyrand and Barras were--well, what evil was told of them has yet to be disproved. But you would gather from contemporaneous English publications that Bonaparte and his associates were veritable fiends from hell sent to scourge civilization. These books are so strangely curious that we find it hard to classify them: we cannot call them history, and they are too truculent to pass for humor; yet they occupy a distinct and important place among Napoleonana.
Until William Hazlitt's life of Bonaparte appeared we had no English treatment of Bonaparte that was in any sense fair, and, by the way, Hazlitt's work is the only one in English I know of which gives the will of Bonaparte, an exceedingly interesting document.
For a good many years I held the character of Napoleon in light esteem, for the reason that he had but small regard for books. Recent revelations, however, made to me by Dr. O'Rell (grandnephew of ``Tom Burke of Ours''), have served to dissipate that prejudice, and I question not that I shall duly become as ardent a worshipper of the Corsican as my doctor himself is. Dr. O'Rell tells me--and his declarations are corroborated by Frederic Masson and other authorities-- that Bonaparte was a lover and a collector of books, and that he contributed largely to the dignity and the glorification of literature by publishing a large number of volumes in the highest style of the art.
The one department of literature for which he seems to have had no liking was fiction. Novels of all kinds he was in the habit of tossing into the fire. He was a prodigious buyer of books, and those which he read were invariably stamped on the outer cover with the imperial arms; at St. Helena his library stamp was merely a seal upon which ink was smeared.
Napoleon cared little for fine bindings, yet he knew their value, and whenever a presentation copy was to be bound he required that it be bound handsomely. The books in his own library were invariably bound ``in calf of indifferent quality,'' and he was wont, while reading a book, to fill the margin with comments in pencil. Wherever he went he took a library of books with him, and these volumes he had deprived of all superfluous margin, so as to save weight