"I have not time to be kind." "Sir, I will make you repent your cruelty!" "Repent! Ah! Postilion, stop a moment." The Englishman stepped out of the chaise, and with characteristic calmness said: "What do you mean, sir, by saying you will make me repent ?" "What I meant I scarcely know. Perhaps I am mad; but, mad or not, it depends upon you to prevent me from being killed." The Englishman looked hard at the young man, and then turning round as if to re-enter his chaise, he superciliously remarked: "And what is it to me, sir, if you are killed ?" George, irritated by his contemptuous indifference, raised his hand. At the very moment a loud noise was heard on the road. It was a post-chaise coming at full gallop. George heard his own name called out in a well-known voice. "Ah! I am lost!" exclaimed the young man ; and a cold perspiration bedewed his brow. It was Captain Rodet in pursuit; it was Captain Rodet who was calling to him. George saw him stepping rapidly towards him. At the sight of the man, whom he looked upon as his executioner, George advanced to the encounter. "Kill me-assassinate me, sir!" he exclaimed, "for I warn you I shall not fight. I am a coward; I admit it. Kill me at once, for I am frightened of you!" George, notwithstanding his unmanly avowal, stood in presence of his enemy, his head erect, his arms crossed on his breast, as if awaiting death. The captain looked at the young man as if thunderstruck, but a strange smile played upon his lips. A little group of bystanders had, in the mean time, gathered around. The Englishman himself, taken aback by the strangeness of the scene, had forgotten to get into his chaise. Like the rest, he looked at George Bénier and then at Captain Rodet in presence of one another. At last the captain opened his mouth, and, holding out his right hand to George, "Who says anything about killing, sir ?" he said, in an affectionate tone. "Who speaks to you about fighting? Why should I kill you? I am Blanche's uncle, sir; and I come in her name to give you this trifle, which belongs to you-yourself." George looked at the hand that was held out to him, and uttered an exclamation of joyful surprise. It contained the third pellet of bread! The captain renounced the last meeting, to which he was entitled by the code of honour! Had Captain Rodet, in reply to George's invitation, raised a dagger at his breast, the young man would not have shrunk, but to find that he was for ever delivered of an implacable hostility was too much for him. He fell fainting to the ground. When he regained consciousness, he found himself on a bed in the inn, and Captain Rodet by his side. Involuntarily he shuddered; but the captain was smiling. "What, sir," he said, "are you" "Yes, I am going to be your uncle, young man-precisely so." And, as George was about to reply, "Two words more," said the old soldier. "I have, perhaps, shown myself very severe for a slight fault. I admit it. But my excuse-you will understand it, my excuse-good or bad, is, that I served the Emperor and you served the Bourbons. Austerlitz could not permit itself to be eclipsed by the Trocadero. But so that you may not deem me more truculent than I really am, know, young man, that long before my sister wrote to me that you desired to be her son-in-law, I had made up my mind that I would no longer cross swords with you. It was quite enough twice, was it not ?" George rose up in his bed. "From all this, captain, it results-" "It results, my dear George, that you are going to marry a charming young person.' That is not precisely what I was about to say, captain." "What, then, were you going to say, my dear young friend ?" ፡፡ Why, captain, that I was frightened. I must confess it, I was horribly frightened." The captain burst out into a joyous laugh. "So frightened, that, to avoid fighting me, you were going to fight that Englishman because he would not cede his horses to you! Come, George.' And the old soldier took him by the hand. "But Blanche-but her mother! What shall we say to them to excuse my conduct ?" said George, after reflecting a few seconds. "We will tell them the truth," exclaimed the captain; "it is far the shortest." "True. I was mad when I ran away from Blanche." "She thought so. Let her still deem you mad when you return." "How so ?" "Madly in love!" George wedded Blanche, and they were happy. The moral of which is, that if there had been no flies in the Café du Palais Royal in October, 1824, George Bénier would never have fought-most probably-Captain Rodet. If Captain Rodet had not persecuted George, he would-most probably-have never gone to Italy. If he had not gone to Italy, he would-most probably-have never met Blanche, and become Captain Rodet's happy nephew, and a respectable member of society. All's well that ends well. "MY DINNER FRIENDS." IMITATED FROM LA MOTTE. (The HOST, solus, rings the bell. A SERVANT enters.) "I'VE invited to-day a well-bred company- *The French throw off these light things with much more ease than we are accustomed to do. I have made an alteration or two, to render it more applicable to our state of society. "There's a prelate, none loving so much as the poor, "There's a magistrate, clever in law, who at sight, A squire not muddled with home-brew'd October, John, go see if they are coming, John, &c. "A fair one who praises her lovelier friend, "A physician whose talk is not tenfold his skill, A painter who praises his own rival's brush, "And good Mr. Newdegate all in a bustle, Lest Church and Protection be wreck'd by Earl Russell- "I hope before all, not in vain, I shall see (JOHN, returning :) "I've looked, sir, as hard as my both eyes can stare, Cross the lawn, down the road, not a soul is seen there!" "Then serve me up the dinner, John Go, serve me up the dinner!" CYRUS REDDING. THE TRANSLATION OF NAPOLEON'S REMAINS TO FRANCE. BY J. ENGLISH TORBETT. Funus sine imaginibus et pompâ per laudes et memoriam virtutem ejus celebre fuit. Et erant qui formam, ætatem, genus mortis ab propinquitatem etiam locorum in quibus interiit, Magni Alexandri fatis adæquarent. Ascendit classem cum cineribus Germanici. TACITUS, Annal. ii. s. 73. AT a time when the "bon ami" between France and England is an accomplished fact, nothing, we feel sure, can be better suited to the public taste than a subject connected with the late Emperor Napoleon I. There was a period when that mighty conqueror's name was rather feared than cherished by the nations of Europe; and there was also a period when vain and fickle France deserted him, and left him to escape out of the net he had fallen into-alas! to surrender himself into the hands of those whose duty it was to prevent that restless warrior from again disturbing the peace of the world, by sending him as an exile-far from the scenes of his former glory,-far from the land which gave that noble genius birth, to expire on a lonely island, where the din of battle is never heard, nor where the tempest ever rages-to the island of St. Helena. But Time, the true ameliorator of all factions, restored the memory of that wonderful man to the heart of every loving Frenchman, when, by royal commands, his body was brought from exile to be henceforth and for all ages laid among his own countrymen, among "the nation whom he so much loved," to repose on the banks of the Seine, in a tomb specially prepared to receive his remains in the Chapel of the Invalides. It is, therefore, our intention to give the readers of this magazine a full and descriptive account of the French expedition to St. Helena, and the exhumation and removal of Napoleon's remains. Hitherto but little has appeared of the doings of the French and English commissions at St. Helena; most writers having given their readers the account taken from hearsay and from pamphlets, many of them, no doubt, spurious. Thackeray himself complained of the want of true information at the time he wrote upon the "Second Funeral of Napoleon," under the assumed name of Michael Angelo Titmarsh, for he says: "Newspapers have been filled for some days past with details regarding the St. Helena expedition-many pamphlets have been published, men go about crying little books and broadsheets with real or sham particulars;" and he goes on to state that from these " scarce and valuable documents" his work was "chiefly compiled." Now, without the least wish or desire to impugn the accuracy of his information, from whatever sources he may have obtained it, the author of the present pages wishes it to be understood that most of his particulars of the exhumation are obtained from his father, who acted as secretary to the English commissioner, Captain Alexander, Royal Engineers, and who was consequently present during the whole ceremony, and, as a resident on the island at that period, knew even the minutest events of the expedition during its stay at St. Helena. The words which Napoleon is said to have addressed to those faithful followers, Bertrand and Montholon, and others, concerning his body, were these: "I desire my ashes may repose upon the banks of the Seine, in the midst of the French nation I so much loved ;" and they were words which found an echo in every heart-for surely every one must desire to be buried among their own countrymen-and in none sooner than in that of the British government, for we find, immediately after that great man's death, application is made by his companions in exile-who left the island directly after his death in the store-vessel Camel-to the King of England, demanding the surrender of his body to the French nation. This demand the English government signified its readiness to comply with as soon as the French nation should desire it. But, of course, such an event as the restoration of Napoleon's remains to France could not take place so soon after the restoration of the royal family to the throne; but when Louis Philippe ascended the throne, it was made rather a speculation for popularity to the royalists, and an act to gratify the will of the Bonapartists-at least, so it has been asserted, and with every degree of probability. Surely those lines of Byron must arise uppermost in the minds of most of my readers when they contemplate this period, so appropriate and prophetic are they: Can glory's lust Touch the freed spirit of the fettered dust? As if his ashes found their latest home In Rome's Pantheon or Gaul's mimic dome, He wants not this; but France shall feel the want Of this last consolation, though so scant; Her honour, fame, and faith demand his bones M. Thiers was at the head of the French ministry at this time, and he directed the French ambassador in London to apply to Lord Palmerston for Napoleon's remains. Consequently we find that Monsieur Guizot wrote to Lord Palmerston, then our foreign minister, requesting him "to give the orders necessary for the removal of any obstacle to the transfer of Napoleon's remains from St. Helena to France." Earl Granville, the British ambassador in Paris, is also said to have addressed a letter to Lord Palmerston, acquainting him of the wish of the French nation for the remains of Napoleon. The answer of our foreign secretary was short, but extremely courteous. He expressed his willingness to comply immediately with the request of the French government, and, at the same time, hoped that if any sentiments hostile to the two nations should unhappily still exist, they "will be buried for ever in the tomb destined to receive the mortal remains of Napoleon." These negotiations took place in the month of May, 1840. The expedition was soon on its "glorious pilgrimage." The king selected his son, the Prince de Joinville, to command it. The English |