



Produced by David Widger





MEMOIRS OF THE COURT OF ST. CLOUD

By Lewis Goldsmith

Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London



PUBLISHERS' NOTE.


The present work contains particulars of the great Napoleon not to be
found in any other publication, and forms an interesting addition to the
information generally known about him.

The writer of the Letters (whose name is said to have been Stewarton, and
who had been a friend of the Empress Josephine in her happier, if less
brilliant days) gives full accounts of the lives of nearly all Napoleon's
Ministers and Generals, in addition to those of a great number of other
characters, and an insight into the inner life of those who formed
Napoleon's Court.

All sorts and conditions of men are dealt with--adherents who have come
over from the Royalist camp, as well as those who have won their way
upwards as soldiers, as did Napoleon himself.  In fact, the work abounds
with anecdotes of Napoleon, Talleyrand, Fouche, and a host of others, and
astounding particulars are given of the mysterious disappearance of those
persons who were unfortunate enough to incur the displeasure of Napoleon.




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

At Cardinal Caprara's

Cardinal Fesch

Episode at Mme. Miot's

Napoleon's Guard

A Grand Dinner

Chaptal

Turreaux

Carrier

Barrere

Cambaceres

Pauline Bonaparte




SECRET COURT MEMOIRS.

THE COURT OF ST. CLOUD.

INTRODUCTORY LETTER.


PARIS, November 10th, 1805.

MY LORD,--The Letters I have written to you were intended for the private
entertainment of a liberal friend, and not for the general perusal of a
severe public.  Had I imagined that their contents would have penetrated
beyond your closet or the circle of your intimate acquaintance, several
of the narratives would have been extended, while others would have been
compressed; the anecdotes would have been more numerous, and my own
remarks fewer; some portraits would have been left out, others drawn, and
all better finished.  I should then have attempted more frequently to
expose meanness to contempt, and treachery to abhorrence; should have
lashed more severely incorrigible vice, and oftener held out to ridicule
puerile vanity and outrageous ambition.  In short, I should then have
studied more to please than to instruct, by addressing myself seldomer to
the reason than to the passions.

I subscribe, nevertheless, to your observation, "that the late long war
and short peace, with the enslaved state of the Press on the Continent,
would occasion a chasm in the most interesting period of modern history,
did not independent and jud