Napoleon Bonaparte at Breakfast

Preface: The following is an article is a snippet from the book Memoirs of the Interior of the Palace, and of some public events of the Imperial Reign, from 1805 to the 1st May 1814; to serve as a contribution to the History of Napoleon: by L. F. J. DE BAUSSETI former Prefect of the Imperial Palace. Enjoy...

The Emperor Napoleon "breakfasted from off a little mahogany table, covered with a napkin." When the breakfast was served, M. de Bausset—a count, and nearly allied to some of the most illustrious patrician families of France—announced that all was ready. While the Emperor ate, he, as Prefect of the Palace,"stood up, his hat under his arm, at the end of the little table," awaiting any directions. During dinner, the Prefect "had only to superintend the whole, and answer such questions as were put to him."

When coffee was introduced, the Empress poured it from the cup into the saucer, and M. de Bausset then "presented it to Napoleon." The Court of the French ruler was modelled, in good part, after that of Constantine and his successors; for the composition and arrangement of which, we may refer to the seventeenth chapter of Gibbon's Decline and Fall. The duty of the Roman "Prefect of the sacred bed-chamber," was to at-tend the Emperor in his hours of state, or in those of amusement, and to perform about his person all those menial offices, "which can only derive their splendour from the influence of royalty." The Roman "Counts of the Domestics" aspired, at times, from the service of the palace to the command of the armies; but it does not seem that this ambition ever seized our French Count.