NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2580, 15 May 1923, Page 4

NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA.

A vivid and touching account of Napoleon in his later years is given by his second valet, Louis Etienne St. Denis, whose personal recollections have just been published under the title of “Napoleon From the Tuileries to St. Helena.”.

These memoirs are, writes the Daily Mail, of far greater trustworthiness than Constant’s famous but very dubious volumes. They were seen and examined by that great Napoleonic authority M. Frederic Masson ten years or more ago, and pronounced genuine. The world has long been waiting for the publication of Marchand’s memoirs, which have also been scrutinised by M. Masson. St. Denis was a good observer and an educated man, the son of a minor official at Louis NVl.’s court. He was not only Napoleon’s valet, but also in the sad days of his captivity and illness acted as his librarian and copyist. He was devoted body and soul to his master. He wrote some time after Napoleon’s death, and did not keep a journal, so that at times he makes small mistakes.

He records a good deal about Napoleon that is new and most interesting. The Emperor kept a sharp eye on the books read by his valets. If it was a good book he would put it back where he found it, but if it was bad he would show a lively displeasure at the fact that the reading of such books in his palace was permitted. I am not sure that he did not throw them into the fire.

At St, Helena, in his banishment, nothing was more striking than the Emperor’s simplicity of habits: “He wore a shooting coat at first, and when after having been turned, became really too bad, he wore in its place, a civilian coat, green or brown. He never wore anything but silk stockings. He never wore gloves unless lie was going out on horseback, and then lie was more likely to put them in his pocket than on his hands. The Emperor never wore any jewellery except a watch.” "lie was annoyed at anything he regarded as a personal slight, and kicked St, Denis with his imperial toe for using the pronoun “you” instead of “your majesty.” He was careless of himself: “The Emperor did not at all know how to take care of his health. He knew that dampness gate him colds; well, it often happened that he went for a walk and allowed himself to lie caught in the rain. He would let himself get wet. He was absolutely like a child.” In the long, sad nights at St. Helena, when death was drawing near to him, “he would rough so loud that he could be heard all over the house” —awake while the rats scurried to and fro in the rambling corridors. The account of his last illness is, in its perfect simplicity, an affecting one: “The Emperor died without the slightest perceptible convulsion, and without the least stiffening; he went out as the light of a lamp goes out.” St. Denis does not mention the “last words” with which history credits Napoleon —“France . . . . army . . . heiad of the army I . .

Josephine.” The only utterance of his during that tremendous closing scene is his life which the valet records is this: “He would ask for a little wine from time to time, which they hastened to' give him. He said after drinking a few drops, ‘Ah! how good wine is! How good wine is!’ ”