A Parisian publication, _La Belle Assemblée_, gives a circumstantial account of Madame Tussaud being sent for to take the likeness of Napoleon--when he was First Consul--at the Tuileries as early as six o’clock in the morning. It would appear that Madame went at the invitation of Napoleon’s first wife, Josephine, who was desirous of having a permanent record of her husband’s features. The young modeller was ushered into a room at the palace where the great soldier waited for her. _La Belle Assemblée_ states that Josephine greeted Madame Tussaud with kindness, and conversed much and most affably. Napoleon said little, spoke in sharp sentences, and rather abruptly. He would have shown her special consideration had she chosen to remain in France; but it is not to be wondered at that Madame Tussaud cared no longer to remain amid the sorrowful recollections of the Revolution, and that she seized the opportunity, on the signing of the Peace of Amiens, to leave France for ever. It was to England she turned for refuge and the prosecution of her life’s work. Madame boldly transported across the Channel to England her uncle’s two Paris Exhibitions, which, as already related, had been made into one. Here she decided to settle, and here her descendants have lived ever since. [Illustration: MADAME TUSSAUD AT THE AGE OF 42 When she left France for England, never to return. A Portrait Study by John T. Tussaud.] CHAPTER IX Madame Tussaud leaves France for England, never to return--Early days in London--On tour--Some notable figures--Shipwreck in the Irish Channel. Madame Tussaud arrived in this country with her Exhibition some time in May, 1802. There is considerable difficulty in tracing her movements during the first few years after her arrival. The information points to her having remained in London with her Exhibition for some six or seven years. In London there is some amount of evidence of her having shown her exhibits in Fleet Street and also at the Lowther Arcade in the Strand. However, it is fairly clear that she first showed her collection at the old Lyceum Theatre in the Strand, then known as the English Opera House, which she vacated in 1803 that Mr. Winsor might make the experiment of lighting the place with gas. It was the first house of entertainment to be illuminated in this way, and the innovation was regarded as dangerous. Then she went on tour, and visited the more important places in England, Scotland, and Ireland. Wherever the town visited boasted a Mayor, the Exhibition was almost invariably opened by him, or under his auspices. The figures that Madame Tussaud modelled and the dates when she executed the work give some idea of her activities at the time.