“From the day when the prisoners of Olmütz owed their liberty to you, to this, when the liberty of my country lays me under still greater obligations to you, I have thought that the continuance of my proscription was not expedient for the government or for myself. Accordingly I am now in Paris. Before going into the country, where I shall meet my family,—before even seeing my friends here,—I delay not a moment to address myself to you; not that I doubt that I am in my appropriate place wherever the Republic is founded upon a worthy basis, but because both my duty and my feelings prompt me to bear to you in person the expression of my gratitude.” [Illustration: NAPOLEON.] Bonaparte was taken completely by surprise. The “man of the people” had outgeneralled the “conqueror of Italy.” Though he could not outwardly express his dissatisfaction, his displeasure was made very evident. Virginie La Fayette says:— “The Premier Consul received this news with a very bad grace. He would have wished my father to remain in Holland, and to solicit like everybody else permission to enter France. The ministers declared that my father must return to Utrecht, there to wait till his name should be effaced from the list of _émigrés_. Those of our friends who approached the Premier Consul assured us that nobody dared for the present say a word to him on the subject. My mother went to see him and was graciously received. She explained to General Bonaparte my father’s peculiar situation, and the effect his return would produce on the mind of every honest patriot. The general was struck with the nobleness, prudence, and tact of her language. ‘I am charmed, Madame,’ he said, ‘to make your acquaintance; _vous avez beaucoup d’esprit, mais vous n’entendez pas les affaires_.’ Nevertheless, it was decided that my father should remain openly in France without asking for any permission, and that he should go to the country, there to remain during the legal term of his proscription. “My sister and her husband arrived from Holland. My brother had already joined my father, and we established ourselves first at Fontenay, then at La Grange, one of my grandmother’s estates which had fallen to my mother. “One of the objects my father had in view on re-entering France was to facilitate the return of his companions in exile. Many difficulties were to be conquered. This task was entrusted to my mother. She was obliged to go constantly to Paris in order to plead the cause of those faithful friends. She succeeded; there is not one amongst them, I believe, who does not owe his radiation to her personal exertions.