Note 11 — Chapter III

I do not know whether it is necessary to point out that, though Talleyrand was one of the most tactful and forbearing of men, he was bound to create numbers of enemies. When he passed on from the clergy and nobility to the Revolution, from the Directorate to Napoleon, from Napoleon to the Restoration, and finally from the Bourbons to the Orleanists, he left a shoal of bitter enemies behind him at each step. His personality, his caustic wit, and his curious experiences, formed an excellent nucleus for legends to gather about. You have to pick your way through hundreds of these to reach the real Talleyrand.