Bonaparte's private room, which was on the ground floor, were lighted up

throughout the night. In the adjoining room there was a Council of War.

From the sentry-box where he was stationed Boillay saw defined on the

windows black profiles and gesticulating shadows, which were

Magnan, Saint-Arnaud, Persigny, Fleury,--the spectres of the crime.

Korte, the General of the Cuirassiers, had been summoned, as also

Carrelet, who commanded the division which did the hardest work on the

following day, the 4th. From midnight to three o'clock in the morning

Generals and Colonels "did nothing but come and go." Even mere captains

had come there. Towards four o'clock some carriages arrived "with

women." Treason and debauchery went hand in hand. The boudoir in the

palace answered to the brothel in the barracks.

The courtyard was filled with lancers, who held the horses of the

generals who were deliberating.

Two of the women who came that night belong in a certain measure to

History. There are always feminine shadows of this sort in the

background. These women influenced the unhappy generals. Both belonged

to the best circles. The one was the Marquise of ----, she who became

enamored of her husband after having deceived him. She discovered that

her lover was not worth her husband. Such a thing does happen. She was

the daughter of the most whimsical Marshal of France, and of that pretty

Countess of ---- to whom M. de Chateaubriand, after a night of love,

composed this quatrain, which may now be published--all the personages

being dead.

359

The History of a Crime