Note (Back to main text) — HISTORY OF THE REVOLUTION OF THE 20th OF MARCH.

We entered the road of Porto Ferrajo[34], without any difficulty, at the moment when the cannon fired, announcing that the harbour was about to close. I heard the French drums sounding the roll: my heart beat high: I passed the night on the deck of the boat. Notwithstanding the joy which I felt at my arrival, I could not help indulging in a certain degree of melancholy, inspired, perhaps, by the silence of the night, and the aspect of the arid and gloomy mountains which surrounded me. Ah, how vain is human grandeur! thought I. The air of that sterile islet is breathed by that incomprehensible man who lately felt that he had not breathing room in Europe. It is in that humble hovel that he now dwells with his scanty train of faithful followers; He whom I have seen in the palace of the Cæsars, receiving the homage and the worship of the most brilliant court in the world; He whom I have seen sitting covered, whilst eight Kings stood before him with their hats in their hands. It is over this little tribe alone, not exceeding the population of a village, that Napoleon the Great is now doomed to reign! Napoleon the Great! He who endowed the thrones of his allies with the leavings of his conquests—He who so long was the master and the terror of the universe!