Bonaparte left Milan November 17, 1797, accompanied by Marmont, Duroc, Lavalette, as well as by Bourrienne, his secretary, and Yvan, his physician. He passed through Piedmont, but refused to stop at Turin and see the King of Sardinia; but that monarch sent him his compliments and a number of presents -- two handsome horses with magnificent fittings, and two horse-pistols set with diamonds, which had belonged to the late King, Charles Emmanuel. Bonaparte crossed the Mount Cenis.

When he reached Chambery, he was greeted most warmly. Thence he went to Geneva, where he stopped for a day. He refused to call on Necker, who was waiting for him at the roadside, near the castle of Coppet.

He also, in spite of the desires of his aides-de-camp, refused to visit Ferney, having a grudge against the memory of Voltaire. His carriage broke down a league from Morat, and he went part of the way on foot. The roads were filled by a vast crowd, who spent the night standing in order to see the conqueror of Italy.

He reached Morat November 23; it was a market-day, and his arrival was most anxiously awaited: the chief magistrate prepared to receive him with all possible honors. Let us quote from a letter sent to Paris from Morat, and printed in the Moniteur: "I looked with keen interest and extreme admiration at this extraordinary man, who has done such great things, and seems to promise that his career is not yet concluded. I found him very like his portrait, short, slight, pale, looking tired, but not ill, as I had heard. It seemed to me that he listened somewhat absentmindedly and with no great interest, as if much more occupied with his own thoughts than with what was said to him. His face is full of intelligence, and wears an expression of constant reflection, revealing nothing of what is going on inside this thoughtful head, this sturdy nature, in which doubtless were forming plans destined to have great influence over the fate of Europe.

A worthy citizen of Morat, about five feet seven or eight inches tall, was much struck by the general's appearance. 'That's a pretty small height for such a great man,' he exclaimed, loud enough to be heard by an aide-de-camp. 'It's exactly the height of Alexander,' I said, bringing a smile to the aide's face. He said, 'That is not the most striking point of resemblance.'

Bonaparte stopped near the monument of bones at Morat and asked to be shown the place where the battle it commemorated was fought. They pointed out a plain in front of a chapel. An officer who had served in France explained how the Swiss, descending from the neighboring mountains, were able, aided by a dense wood, to outflank the Burgundian army and rout it. 'How large was this army?' asked Bonaparte. 'Sixty thousand men.' 'Sixty thousand men! They must have covered the mountains.' Then General Lannes said, 'Nowadays the French fight better than that.' 'At that time,' replied Bonaparte,' the Burgundians were not Frenchmen.'"

The journey was a series of ovations. Reaching Berne at night, Bonaparte passed through a double line of brilliantly lit carriages, filled with pretty women. His entrance into Basle was announced by cannon on the city ramparts. At once the fortress of Huningue replied to the salvo of artillery.

At Offenburg were the headquarters of Augereau, at that time commander-in-chief of the Army of the Rhine. Augereau was anxious to treat him as an equal; he sent an aide with his compliments to Bonaparte, and an invitation to stay a while with him. Bonaparte sent word that he was too busy to stop, and pushed on without seeing his former subordinate.

He entered Rastadt under the escort of a squadron of Austrian hussars, and found there the plenipotentiaries of the German powers; but he did not care to tire himself in long and tedious negotiations, and was glad to be recalled by the Directory. He hastened to take post for Paris, and reached there December 5, at five o'clock in the afternoon.

Bonaparte went to the little house in the rue de la Chantereine whence he had departed, almost obscure, twenty-one months before, and be returned famous. The ambitious men who leave Paris, and are as anxious about its judgment as was Alexander about that of Athens, can never return thither without anxiety. They wonder, and not without emotion, what their glory will amount to in that vast city, with its population so keenly susceptible, yet withal so fickle, and where everything is soon lost in the waves of that human ocean, the people.

Great curiosity was excited by the return of the young conqueror. How would the Directors greet this hero whose glory eclipsed their pallid renown? And what did he want? To be a Caesar? a Cromwell? a Monk? a Washington? Such were the questions that agitated the multitude; but the prevailing impression was that Bonaparte was one of Plutarch's heroes, that his genius was only equalled by his selfdenial. The Parisians, in their eagerness to create an idol, ascribed to their favorite every merit, every virtue. The infatuation was universal; to see Bonaparte, to speak with him, became every one's ambition. The newspapers showed unvarying zeal in printing the most trivial details about him. Every other subject seemed insipid.

Talleyrand called on him the evening of his arrival. Bonaparte begged to be excused from receiving him, and the next day called at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where he was received with marks of the warmest respect. His interview with the Directors was most cordial. Everywhere his affability and modesty were talked about. Gratitude was felt for the visits he returned, not merely to the principal state functionaries, but also to humbler officials.

In the Moniteur of December 10 we read: "General Bonaparte is living in his wife's house, rue Chantereine, Chaussee d'Antin. This house is simple, and with no pretence to luxury. It has been said that he will leave, on the 26th, for Rastadt. He goes out seldom, and unaccompanied, in a plain, two-horse carriage. He is often seen walking alone in his modest garden."

This little house in the rue Chantereine, which he had left, two days after his wedding, to go to Italy, and which recalled so many happy memories, was for him once more, to use Marmont's expression, the temple of love. But it was no fault of his brothers if he did not suffer there the torments of a keen jealousy.

We have said that he started from Milan November 17, leaving Josephine there, who meant to pass a few days there with her son, Eugene de Beaubarnais, who had come from Rome to see ber before her return to France. Lavalette says in his Memoirs, that Bonaparte's brothers, wishing to be the only ones who had any influence over him, tried to lessen that which Josephine possessed through her husband's love.

"They tried," he goes on, "to arouse his jealousy; and for this purpose made the most of her stay at Milan, a stay which was authorized by Bonaparte. His regard for his wife, his journeyings, his incessant preparations for the expedition to Egypt, gave him no time to indulge in such suspicions. I shall speak later about the intrigues of Bonaparte's brothers, and their determination to undermine Josephine in his heart. I was intimate with both, and thus fortunate enough to prevent, or much relieve, the mischief."

Bonaparte had scarcely time enough for jealousy; but, granting that he felt some pangs, the incessant gratification of his pride must have been an ample compensation. When he was at the theatre, no one listened to the actors; every glass was turned towards the box in which he half hid himself to make curiosity the keener. As soon as he went to walk, a crowd gathered about him. Knowing the Parisian character, and that the attention of the great capital would not long linger on the same subject, he did not make himself common, and in his language, as well as in his dress and manners, he affected a simplicity in marked contrast to his glory, which could not fail of its effect on a Republican public.

In spite of this assumed modesty, he was perpetually devising methods of giving France and the world new surprises. At this time, it was not love, but ambition, that ruled his soul. Nevertheless, he continued to love Josephine; and although his affection had no longer the fire and flame of the first days of his married life, he must have regretted her absence at the triumphal festival of December 10 at the Luxembourg.