For
Napoleon must now be hurled from the throne!"
CHANCELLOR VON HARDENBERG.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE INTERRUPTED SUPPER.
It was on the 4th of January, 1813. The brilliant official
festivities with which the beginning of a new year had been
celebrated, were at an end, and, the ceremonious dinner-parties
being over, one was again at liberty to indulge in the enjoyment of
familiar suppers, where more attention was paid to the flavor of
choice wines and delicacies than to official toasts and political
speeches. Marshal Augereau gave at Berlin on this day one of those
pleasant little entertainments to his favored friends, to indemnify
them, as it were, for the great gala dinner of a hundred covers,
given by him on the 1st of January, as official representative of
the Emperor Napoleon.
To-day the supper was served in the small, cozy saloon, and it was
but a petit comite that assembled round the table in the middle of
the room. This comite consisted only of five gentlemen, with
pleasant, smiling faces, in gorgeous, profusely-embroidered
uniforms, on the left sides of which many glittering orders
indicated the high rank of the small company. There was, in the
first place, Marshal Augereau, governor of Berlin, once so furious a
republican that he threatened with death all the members of his
division who would address any one with "monsieur," or "madame"--now
the most ardent imperialist, and an admirer of the Emperor Napoleon.
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