Note (return) — THE SELECTOR; AND LITERARY NOTICES OF NEW WORKS.

There was gentleness, and even softness, in his character. He was affected when he rode over the fields of battle, which his ambition had strewed with the dead and the dying, and seemed not only desirous to relieve the victims,—issuing for that purpose directions, which too often were not, and could not be, obeyed,—but showed himself subject to the influence of that more acute and imaginative species of sympathy which is termed sensibility. He mentions a circumstance which indicates a deep sense of feeling. As he passed over a field of battle in Italy, with some of his generals, he saw a houseless dog lying on the body of his slain master. The creature came towards them, then returned to the dead body, moaned over it pitifully, and seemed to ask their assistance. "Whether it were the feeling of the moment," continued Napoleon, "the scene, the hour, or the circumstance itself, I was never so deeply affected by any thing which I have seen upon a field of battle. That man, I thought, has perhaps had a house, friends, comrades, and here he lies deserted by every one but his dog. How mysterious are the impressions to which we are subject! I was in the habit, without emotion, of ordering battles which must decide the fate of a campaign, and could look with a dry eye on the execution of manoeuvres which must be attended with much loss, and here I was moved—nay, painfully affected—by the cries and the grief of a dog. It is certain that at that moment I should have been more accessible to a suppliant enemy, and could better understand the conduct of Achilles in restoring the body of Hector to the tears of Priam."3 The anecdote at once shows that Napoleon possessed a heart amenable to humane feelings, and that they were usually in total subjection to the stern precepts of military stoicism. It was his common and expressive phrase, that the heart of a politician should be in his head; but his feelings sometimes surprised him in a gentler mood.