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192 learning the cause of it, went to let their chief know that General Marbot had been thrown over for him. At the same moment Bonaparte himself, through the open window, perceived my father's two carriages standing before the door. Up to then he had known nothing of his landlord's shabby behaviour towards my father, and seeing that General Marbot, recently Commandant of Paris, and at that moment at the head of a division of the army in Italy, was too important a man for any off-hand treatment, and that, more-over, he himself was returning with the intention of being on a good footing with everybody, he ordered one of his officers to go down at once and offer General Marbot to come and share his lodging with him in soldier fashion. But the carriages went on before the aide-de-camp could speak to my father; so Bonaparte started at once on foot in order to come and express his regret in person. The cheers of the crowd which followed him as he drew near our hotel might have given us notice, but we had heard so much cheering since we entered the town that it occurred to none of us to look out into the street. We were all in the sitting-room, and my father was pacing up and down plunged in meditation, when suddenly a waiter, throwing open both folding-doors, announced General Bonaparte.

"On entering he ran up to my father and embraced him; my father received him courteously