After the departure of Baron Kohler, Colonel Sir Niel Campbell was the only one of the four commissioners who continued to remain at Elba by orders of the British Cabinet. It was difficult to say what his office really was, or what were his instructions. He had neither power, title, nor means, to interfere with Napoleon's motions. The Emperor had been recognised by a treaty--wise or foolish, it was too late to ask--as an independent sovereign. It was therefore only as an envoy that Sir Niel Campbell could be permitted to reside at his court; and as an envoy also, not of the usual character, for settling affairs concerning the court from which he was despatched, but in a capacity not generally avowed--the office, namely, of observing the conduct of that at which he was sent to reside. In fact, Sir Niel Campbell had no direct or ostensible situation whatever, and of this the French minister of Elba soon took advantage. Drouet, the governor of Porto Ferrajo, made such particular inquiries into the character assumed by the British envoy, and the length of his stay, as obliged the latter to say that his orders were to remain in Elba till the breaking up of the Congress, which was now settling the affairs of Europe; but if his orders should direct him to continue there after that period, he would apply to have his situation placed on some recognised public footing, which he did not doubt would be respectable. Napoleon did not oppose or murmur at the continued, though equivocal residence of Sir Niel Campbell at Elba; he affected, on the contrary, to be pleased with it. For a considerable time, he even seemed to seek the society of the British envoy, held frequent intercourse with him, and conversed with apparent confidence upon public affairs. The notes of such conversations are now before us; and though it is, on the one hand, evident that Napoleon's expressions were arranged, generally speaking, on a premeditated plan, yet, on the other, it is equally certain, that his ardent temperament, when once engaged in discourse, led him to discover more of his own private thoughts than he would, on cool reflection, have suffered to escape him.