"
"It is true, it is the language of a madman, but one who knows very
well what he says. For he is right; he dares utter what all my
marshals are thinking, and gives utterance to their thoughts,
because he imagines that my friendship for him gives him that right.
The fool! I shall prove to him that I am, first and above all, the
emperor, and that the emperor will, without regard to the person,
punish the man who is so audacious as to threaten him. Oh, I am glad
that it is Junot who has made himself the mouth-piece of my generals
and marshals! I shall punish him with inexorable rigor, and that
will silence the others forever. They will not dare that which not
even Junot was permitted to do with impunity; they will obey when my
first anger has crushed this traitor Junot. For he is a traitor, a--
"
"Oh, sire, I implore you, do not proceed!" interposed Maret; "have
mercy upon him who stands already before a higher Judge, to receive
his sentence!"
"What do you mean?" asked Napoleon.
"I mean, sire," replied Maret, solemnly, "that I came to bring you a
sad message, and that your majesty, therefore, just now did me
injustice. Sire, when you deplored the death of your lamented
friend, the Duke de Frioul, I was silent and embarrassed, not
because I deemed such regrets unbecoming, but because I was filled
with unbounded grief at the thought that I had come to communicate a
similar affliction.
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