Page:A French Volunteer of the War of Independence.djvu/242

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218
A FRENCH VOLUNTEER

CHAPTER VII.

Arrival at Hamburg—Departure for France—I become a smuggler at Antwerp—Condition of France—My residence in France—Departure for Trieste—Joseph la Brosse, the banker—The Governors Junot, Bertrand, Fouchė (Duke of Otranto)—Gustavson, King of Sweden—Jérôme Bonaparte.

I believe I am not exaggerating when I say that this city, and Altona, which is only separated from it by a fine avenue of trees, then contained seven or eight thousand French émigrés.

Hamburg, being a neutral city, did an immense business, and offered even more opportunity than the United States for the industry and activity of our French emigres, who were obliged to make a living somehow. Some wrote books, and others sold them.

I met there a M. de P——, who had a small capital of a hundred louis. He exchanged money, and was obliged to trot