Emperor is beloved by his people--they have clouds of Cossacks--it is something to have such a kingdom--the peasants of the crown love their government--the nobility are all mounted on horseback. They proposed to me to set the slaves at liberty, but that I would not consent to--they would have massacred every one. I made regular war upon the Emperor Alexander, but who could have expected such a blow as the burning of Moscow? Now they would lay it on us, but it was in fact themselves who did it. That sacrifice would have done honour to ancient Rome." He returned to his favourite purpose of checking the Russians, who had just annihilated his grand army, by raising a large body of Polish lancers, to whom, as things stood, it would have been difficult to have proposed any adequate motive for exertion. The fire went out, and the counsellors listened in frozen despair, while, keeping himself warm by walking up and down, and by his own energies, the Emperor went on with his monologue; now betraying, in spite of himself, feelings and sentiments which he would have concealed; now dwelling upon that which he wished others to believe; and often repeating, as the burden of his harangue, the aphorism which he has rendered immortal, concerning the vicinity of the sublime and the ludicrous. His passage through Silesia being mentioned, he answered in a doubtful tone, "Ha, Prussia?" as if questioning the security of that route. At length he decided to depart in good earnest; cut short the respectful wishes for the preservation of his health with the brief assurance, that he "could not be in better health were the very devil in him;" and threw himself into the humble sledge which carried Cæsar and his fortunes. The horses sprung forward, nearly overturning the carriage as it crossed the courtyard gate, and disappeared in the darkness. Such is the lively account of the Abbé de Pradt, who declares solemnly, that on taxing his memory to the utmost, he accuses himself of neither want of accuracy nor forgetfulness. Napoleon does not deny that such a long conversation took place, but alleges that the abbé has caricatured it. In the meanwhile, he said he scratched an order for Monsieur l'Ambassadeur to return immediately to Paris;[229] which, considering what had happened in Russia, and was about to happen in Poland, could not but be a most welcome mandate, especially as it was likely to be soon enforced by the lances of the Cossacks. [Sidenote: NAPOLEON LEAVES WARSAW.]