"You here, Caulaincourt?" said the astonished prelate.--"And where is the Emperor?"--"At the hôtel d'Angleterre, waiting for you."--"Why not stop at the palace?"--"He travels incognito."--"Do you need any thing?"--"Some Burgundy or Malaga."--"All is at your service--but whither are you travelling?"--"To Paris."--"To Paris! But where is the army?"--"It exists no longer," said Caulaincourt, looking upwards.--"And the victory of the Beresina--and the 6000 prisoners?"[227]--"We got across, that is all--the prisoners were a few hundred men, who have escaped. We have had other business than to guard them." His curiosity thus far satisfied, the Abbé de Pradt hastened to the hotel. In the yard stood three sledges in a dilapidated condition. One for the Emperor and Caulaincourt, the second for two officers of rank, the third for the Mameluke Rustan and another domestic. He was introduced with some mystery into a bad inn's bad room, where a servant wench was blowing a fire made of green wood. Here was the Emperor, whom the Abbé de Pradt had last seen when he played King of Kings among the assembled sovereigns of Dresden. He was dressed in a green pelisse, covered with lace and lined with furs, and, by walking briskly about the apartment, was endeavouring to obtain the warmth which the chimney refused. He saluted "Monsieur l'Ambassadeur," as he termed him, with gaiety. The abbé felt a movement of sensibility, to which he was disposed to give way, but, as he says, "The poor man did not understand me." He limited his expressions of devotion, therefore, to helping Napoleon off with his cloak. To us, it seems that Napoleon repelled the effusions of the Bishop of Maline's interest, because he did not choose to be the object either of his interest or his pity. He heard from his minister, that the minds of the inhabitants of the grand duchy had been much changed since they had been led to despair of the regeneration of their country; and that they were already, since they could not be free Polanders, studying how to reconcile themselves with their former governors of Prussia. The entrance of two Polish ministers checked the ambassador's communications. The conversation was maintained from that moment by Napoleon alone; or rather he indulged in a monologue, turning upon the sense he entertained that the failure of his Russian expedition would diminish his reputation, while he struggled against the painful conviction, by numbering up the plans by which he might repair his losses, and alleging the natural obstacles to which he had been obliged to succumb. "We must levy 10,000 Poles," he said, "and check the advance of these Russians. A lance and a horse are all that is necessary.--There is but a single step betwixt the sublime and the ridiculous."[228] The functionaries congratulated him on his escape from so many dangers. "Dangers!" he replied; "none in the world. I live in agitation. The more I bustle the better I am. It is for Kings of Cockaigne to fatten in