I have served against them in Holland
and in Egypt and I will never flinch from rendering justice to their
exemplary conduct and lofty valour.
No! it is not the French soldiery who
can be accused of plundering and exaction, but what brought the French name
in disrepute was the conduct of certain prefects and administrators in
Germany who were promoted to these posts for no other reason than because
they were of the old noblesse or returned Emigrants, whom Napoleon
favoured in preference to the Republicans whom he feared. These emigrants
repaid his favours with the basest ingratitude; after being guilty of the
grossest and most infamous concussions on the inhabitants of those parts
of Germany where their jurisdiction extended, they had the hypocrisy after
the restoration to declaim against the oppression of the Usurper's
government and its system: but Napoleon richly deserved to meet with this
ingratitude for employing such unprincipled fellows. I believe he was never
aware of the villany they carried on, or they would have met with his
severest displeasure in being removed from office, as was the case with
Wirion at Verdun.[49]
I do not find that the French soldiers with whom I have conversed are so
much attached to the person of the Emperor as I was led to believe; but
they are attached to their country and liberty; and in serving him, they
conceived they were serving the man par excellence of the People.
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