Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. IFleury de Chaboulon, Pierre Alexandre Édouard, baron
History
Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I
Fleury de Chaboulon, Pierre Alexandre Édouard, baron
Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, 1769-1821 -- Elba and the Hundred Days, 1814-1815
Shall they, whom we have seen for five and twenty years traversing all
Europe, to stir up enemies against us--who have spent their lives in
fighting against us in the ranks of foreign armies, and cursing our
lovely France--now pretend to command us, and to enchain our eagles,
the looks of which they could never withstand? Shall we suffer them to
inherit the fruits of our glorious toils? to seize upon our honours,
and our property, and calumniate our fame? Should their reign
continue, all would be lost, even the remembrance of our memorable
victories.
With what virulence do they distort them! They endeavour to poison
what is the admiration of the world; and if any defenders of our glory
still remain, it is among those very enemies whom we combated in the
field.
Soldiers! in my exile I heard your voice: I am arrived through every
obstacle, through every danger.
Your general, called to the throne by the voice of the people, and
raised on your shields, is restored to you. Come and join him.
Tear down those colours, which the nation has proscribed, and which
for five and twenty years served as a signal to rally all the enemies
of France. Mount that tricoloured cockade, which you wore in our
great victories. We must forget, that we have been the masters of
other nations; but we must not suffer any to interfere in our affairs.
Who shall pretend to be our master? Who is able to be so? Resume the
eagles you bore at Ulm, at Austerlitz, at Jena, at Eylau, at Wagram,
at Friedland, at Tudela, at Eckmuhl, at Essling, at Smolensko, at
Moscow, at Lutzen, at Wurtchen, at Montmirail. Think you that handful
of Frenchmen, now so arrogant, can support their sight? They will
return whence they came; and there, if they please, they may reign, as
they pretend to have reigned for nineteen years.
Your property, your rank, your glory--the property, the rank, the
glory of your children--have no greater enemies than those princes,
who have been imposed on us by foreigners. They are the enemies of our
glory; since the recital of so many glorious actions, which have
rendered illustrious the French people, fighting against them to
emancipate themselves from their yoke, is their condemnation.
The veterans of the armies of the Sambre and Meuse, of the Rhine, of
Italy, of Egypt, of the west, of the grand army, are humiliated; their
honourable scars are disgraced; their successes would be crimes, the
valiant would be rebels, if, as the enemies of the people assert,
legitimate sovereigns were among the foreign armies. Their honours,
rewards, affections, are for those who have served them, against us
and against our country.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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