On the 16th Brumaire I dined in the Rue de la Victoire. Bernadotte was present, and I believe General Jourdan also. While the grand conspiracy was hastening to its accomplishment Madame Bonaparte and I had contrived a little plot of a more innocent kind. We let no one into our secret, and our 16th Brumaire was crowned with complete success. We had agreed to be on the alert to prevent any fresh exchange of angry words. All succeeded to the utmost of our wishes. The conversation languished during dinner; but it was not dulness that we were afraid of. It turned on the subject of war, and in that vast field Bonaparte's superiority over his interlocutors was undeniable.
When we retired to the drawing-rooms a great number of evening visitors poured in, and the conversation then became animated, and even gay.
Bonaparte was in high spirits. He said to some one, smiling, and pointing to Bernadotte, "You are not aware that the General yonder is a Chouan."--"A Chouan?" repeated Bernadotte, also in a tone of pleasantry.
"Ah! General you contradict yourself. Only the other day you taxed me with favouring the violence of the friends of the Republic, and now you accuse me of protecting the Chouans.'
--[The "Chouans," so called from their use of the cry of the screech-owl (chathouan) as a signal, were the revolted peasants of Brittany and of Maine.]--You should at least be consistent." A few moments after, availing himself of the confusion occasioned by the throng of visitors, Bernadotte slipped off.
As a mark of respect to Bonaparte the Council of the Five Hundred appointed Lucien its president. The event proved how important this nomination was to Napoleon. Up to the 19th Brumaire, and especially on that day, Lucien evinced a degree of activity, intelligence, courage, and presence of mind which are rarely found united in one individual I have no hesitation in stating that to Lucien's nomination and exertions must be attributed the success of the 19th Brumaire.
The General had laid down a plan of conduct from which he never deviated during the twenty-three days which intervened between his arrival in Paris and the 18th Brumaire. He refused almost all private invitations, in order to avoid indiscreet questions, unacceptable offers, and answers which might compromise him.
It was not without some degree of hesitation that he yielded to a project started by Lucien, who, by all sorts of manoeuvring, had succeeded in prevailing on a great number of his colleagues to be present at a grand subscription dinner to be given to Bonaparte by the Council of the Ancients.
The disorder which unavoidably prevailed in a party amounting to upwards of 250 persons, animated by a diversity of opinions and sentiments; the anxiety and distrust arising in the minds of those who were not in the grand plot, rendered this meeting one of the moat disagreeable I ever witnessed. It was all restraint and dulness. Bonaparte's countenance sufficiently betrayed his dissatisfaction; besides, the success of his schemes demanded his presence elsewhere. Almost as soon as he had finished his dinner he rose, saying to Berthier and me, "I am tired: let us be, gone." He went round to the different tables, addressing to the company compliments and trifling remarks, and departed, leaving at table the persons by whom he had been invited.
This short political crisis was marked by nothing more grand, dignified, or noble than the previous revolutionary commotions. All these plots were so contemptible, and were accompanied by so much trickery, falsehood, and treachery, that, for the honour of human nature, it is desirable to cover them with a veil.
