Page:Napoleon's Addresses.djvu/133

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THE FALL OF NAPOLEON.
129

your committees you have excluded the friends of the Government, extraordinary commission, committee of finance, committee of the address, all, all my enemies. M. Lainé, I repeat it, is a traitor; he is a wicked man, the others are mere intriguers. I do justice to the eleven-twelfths; but the factious I know and will pursue. Is it, I ask again, is it while the enemy is in France that you should have done this? But nature has gifted me with a determined courage—nothing can overcome me. It cost my pride much, too,—I made that sacrifice; I—but I am above your miserable declamations. I was in need of consolation, and you would mortify me,—but, no, my victories shall crush your clamors; in three months we shall have peace, and you shall repent your folly. I am one of those who triumph or die.

"Go back to your departments. If any one of you dare to print your address, I shall publish it in the Moniteur with notes of my own. Go, France stands more in need of me than I do of France. I bear the eleven-twelfths of you in my heart. I shall nominate the deputies of the two series which are vacant, and I shall reduce the legislative body to the discharge of its proper duties. The inhabitants of Alsace and Franche-Comté have a better