The Emperor went to Vienna and from there to Munich, where he had to assist at the marriage of his step-son, Eugene de Beauharnais to the daughter of the King of Bavaria. It seems that the despatches which we carried to this court were concerning this marriage; for we could not have had a better reception. However, we stayed only a few hours in Munich and went on to Ulm, where we found Marshal Augereau and 7th Corps, and where we stayed for a fortnight. In order to move 7th Corps gradually nearer to the electorate of Hesse, a close ally of Prussia, Napoleon ordered it to move to Heidelburg, where we arrived about the end of December and saw the beginning of the year 1806. After a short stay in this town, 7th Corps went to Darmstadt, the capital of the landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, a prince much attached to the King of Prussia by family ties as well as politics. Although this prince had, on accepting Hanover, concluded a treaty of alliance with Napoleon, he had done so with reluctance, and was suspicious of the approach of the French army. Marshal Augereau, before taking his troops into the country of Darmstadt, considered it his duty to inform the landgrave, by letter, of his intentions, and he chose me to effect its delivery. The journey was one of only fifteen leagues; I made it in a night; but on my arrival at Darmstadt I found that the landgrave, to whom it had been suggested that the French intended to make him a prisoner, had left his residence and retired to another part of his state from where he could easily take refuge in Prussia. This created a difficulty for me, however, having heard that his wife was still in the palace, I asked to be presented to her. The princess, whose person greatly resembled the portraits of the Empress Catherine of Russia, had, like her, a masculine character, great capability, and all the qualities necessary to control a vast empire. She also governed her husband as she did her states; she was a masterful woman, and when she saw the letter in my hands, addressed to the landgrave, she took it without further ado, as if it had been addressed her. She then told me quite frankly, that it had been on her advice that her husband had left on the approach of the French, but that she would arrange for him to come back if the marshal would give her an assurance that he did not have any orders to make an attempt on the liberty of the prince. I understood that the arrest and death of the Duc d'Enghien had frightened all those princes who thought that Napoleon might have some reason to complain about their alliances. I protested, as much as I could, the innocence of the French government's intentions, and offered to go back to Heidelburg and ask Marshal Augereau for the assurances which she required, an offer which she accepted.