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72 a man who has not the power of admiration. It marks, I think, not a superiority, but an inferiority of temperament.

friend Méneval, as I have said, had the bump of admiration in a remarkable degree. He would perhaps have been a better writer of Memoirs if he had been a less fervent worshipper; but let us forgive the good fellow for his defects in style because of the pleasant impression he leaves of himself. He was introduced to Napoleon by Joseph Bonaparte. He was not very eager to enter into the service of the great captain. "I did not," he says, "feel myself at all capable of filling the post for which he intended me, and confessed that I feared the loss of my independence." But it was of no avail:

"On the morning of the second of April Joseph Bonaparte gave me a letter from General Duroc, who wrote to tell me that the First Consul could receive me at five o'clock in the afternoon of that day. I was obliged to accept an invitation which was really a command. General Duroc conducted me to Madame Bonaparte, who received me with exquisite grace and politeness. She was kind enough to talk to me of the business which had brought me to the Tuileries. I was encouraged by her kindness to tell her the objections I felt