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LIFE OF COLONEL MACERONI-

conducted by the official organs of the British government.The conspirators, to the number of forty-two, were conveyedto France in a British ship of war, commanded by a CaptainWright, who must have acted according to official orders.They were in active correspondence with Mr. Brake, theBritish envoy at Munich , who supplied them with money.Is it at all credible, that the envoy would have acted thuswithout authority from his government ? The plot was de-tected, through the treachery of one of Drake’s worthy cor-respondents. The original letters of the envoy, were lodgedin the hands of the Elector of Bavaria , who invited thepublic to peruse them, and their authenticity was neverdenied.

The First Consul had evidence from his police, that theDuke dr’Engliien was implicated in this legitimate con-spiracy, 1 . the principal focus of which was at Strasburg.It was never denied, that he (the Duke) was also in corre-spondence with Drake.

Buonaparte was surrounded with dangers from conspira-tors, which was all he had to fear, and he saw that the Bour-bons were at the bottom of them all. Without justifying theact, allowance ought to be made for what was natural in achief magistrate in Buonaparte ’s situation, and so provoked.I opine, that one of the errors was in the mockery of a trial.Had Buonaparte ordered his soldiers, when they seized thedetected conspirator, to put him instantly to death, itwould have been better; as it was evident that he wasengaged in a base plot of assassination. Better still, wouldit have been, had he adopted the reasoning used by Muratin the worse case of Cadoudal , and granted the Duke hislife under a promise to “ go and sin no more.”

Napoleon being crowned Emperor of the French , Muratwas created a Marshal and Grand Admiral of the Empire,and as such, assisted at the imposing ceremony at which,