As I have thus alluded to the Admiral, and as he is now about to quit us, I will once for all sum up the insults with which we have to reproach him, with as much impartiality as our situation and the state of our feelings will admit of.
We cannot pardon the affected familiarity with which he treated us, though our conduct afforded but little encouragement to it. Still less can we forgive him for having endeavoured to extend this familiarity to the Emperor. We can never forget the haughty and self-complacent air with which he addressed Napoleon by the title of _General_. The Emperor, it is true, has immortalized that title; but the tone and the intention with which it was applied were sufficiently insulting.
On our arrival at St. Helena, he lodged the Emperor in a little room, a few feet square, where he kept him for two months, though other residences could have been procured, and there was one which the Admiral had himself fixed upon. He indirectly prohibited the Emperor from riding on horseback, even in the grounds surrounding the Briars; and the individuals of the Emperor’s suite were loaded with embarrassments and humiliations, when they came to pay their daily visits to him in his little cell.
On our removal to Longwood, he stationed sentinels under the very windows of the Emperor; and then, by an evasion, which savoured of the bitterest irony, he alleged that this step had been taken only with a view to the _General’s_ own advantage and protection. He suffered no one to come near us without a note from him, and, having thus placed us in close confinement, he declared that these arrangements had been made solely to secure the Emperor against importunity, and that he (the Admiral) was merely acting the part of _Grand Marshal_. He gave a ball, and sent a written invitation to _General Buonaparte_, in the same manner as he did to every individual in the suite. He replied with the most unbecoming jeers to the notes of the Grand Marshal, who used the title of _Emperor_, saying that he knew no _Emperor_ at the Island of St. Helena, nor any such Sovereign in Europe, or elsewhere, who was not in his own dominions. He refused to forward a letter from the Emperor to the Prince Regent, unless it were delivered to him open, or he were permitted to read it. He even stifled the sentiments and expressions of respect which other individuals manifested for Napoleon. We were assured that he had put persons in inferior situations under arrest, merely for having used the title of Emperor or other similar expressions; which, however, were frequently employed in the 53rd regiment, doubtless, as the Emperor observed, through an irresistible sentiment with which these brave men were inspired.