their palaces--horseback and the fields are for me.--From the sublime to the ridiculous there is but a single step--Why do I find you so much alarmed here?" "We are at a loss to gather the truth of the news about the army." "Bah!" replied the Emperor; "the army is in a superb condition. I have 120,000 men--I have beat the Russians in every action--they are no longer the soldiers of Friedland and Eylau. The army will recruit at Wilna--I am going to bring up 300,000 men--Success will render the Russians fool-hardy--I will give them battle twice or thrice upon the Oder, and in a month I will be again on the Niemen--I have more weight when on my throne, than at the head of my army.--Certainly I quit my soldiers with regret; but I must watch Austria and Prussia, and I have more weight seated on my throne than at the head of my army. All that has happened goes for nothing--a mere misfortune, in which the enemy can claim no merit--I beat them every where--they wished to cut me off at the Beresina--I made a fool of that ass of an admiral"--(He could never pronounce the name Tchitchagoff)--"I had good troops and cannon--the position was superb--500 toises of marsh--a river"----This he repeated twice, then run over the distinction in the 29th bulletin between men of strong and feeble minds, and proceeded. "I have seen worse affairs than this--At Marengo I was beaten till six o'clock in the evening--next day I was master of Italy--At Essling, that archduke tried to stop me--He published something or other--My army had already advanced a league and a half--I did not even condescend to make any disposition. All the world knows how such things are managed when I am in the field. I could not help the Danube rising sixteen feet in one night--Ah! without that, there would have been an end of the Austrian monarchy. But it was written in Heaven that I should marry an archduchess." (This was said with an air of much gaiety.) "In the same manner, in Russia, I could not prevent its freezing. They told me every morning that I had lost 10,000 horses during the night. Well, farewell to you!" He bade them adieu five or six times in the course of the harangue, but always returned to the subject. "Our Norman horses are less hardy than those of the Russians--they sink under ten degrees of cold (beneath zero.) It is the same with the men. Look at the Bavarians; there is not one left. Perhaps it may be said that I stopped too long at Moscow; that may be true, but the weather was fine--the winter came on prematurely--besides, I expected peace. On the 5th October, I sent Lauriston to treat. I thought of going to St. Petersburgh, and I had time enough to have done so, or to have gone to the south of Russia, or to Smolensk. Well, we will make head at Wilna; Murat is left there. Ha, ha, ha! It is a great political game. Nothing venture, nothing win--It is but one step from the sublime to the ludicrous. The Russians have shown they have character--their