Like his father, a major in the fortress of Sedan, Savary entered the army at an early age. His promotion was not rapid; though he served in the campaigns under Hoche, and Pichegru, and Moreau, at the time of the expedition to Egypt he had obtained no higher rank than that of lieutenant-colonel. Of personal courage he was not destitute, but his head was a blundering one, and he was consequently unfit for an important command. Besides, he was no favourite either with his brother officers or the men. His manners were coarse even to brutality: to his equals, and much more to his inferiors, his language was insolent; to his superiors fawning so as to be absolutely disgusting; and his disposition was at once prying and malignant. Under the exterior of military bluntness, however, he concealed an unrivalled duplicity.

In the Egyptian campaign, he was aid-de-camp to General Dessaix, with whom he returned to France, and hastened to join the First Consul, in Italy. When that brave chief fell at his side, he went to communicate the event to Buonaparte, who placed him on his personal staff. Thus if he lost one patron he gained another; and how much he benefited by the change will soon appear.

Savary was not slow in perceiving that the surest way to fortune was the favour of the First Consul, whose ready instrument he became. Prompt to perform the most criminal as well as the meanest offices--to be the executioner or the spy -- and skilful to mix flattery with his bluntness, so as to render the former more acceptable, he was the slave of his employer, and of all slaves the basest. He hesitated neither to superintend the murder of the Duke d'Enghien *, nor to preside over the most odious system of espionage ever despot devised. As head of the Counter, or Private Police, his object was not merely to spy the spyers -- to watch the motions of Fouché and his police -- but to trace the footsteps of every one whom he suspected to be unfriendly to Buonaparte. He had his agents in the houses of the great, in the cabinet of the ministers, and in the camp: nothing escaped him. His reports were regularly laid before his employer; and his malignant heart took care that they should be unfavourable enough to such as either he or Napoleon had reason to hate or fear.
 

* For the particulars of that tragic event, see the History of Napoleon Buonaparte, -- Vol. I. pl 259-269.
 

After the peace of Tilsit, Savary was sent on a mission to St. Petersburg, -- not so much to transact any important business, as to spy out the sentiments of the court and people. With the latter his being a Frenchman was sufficient guilt: he acknowledged that he found every house closed against him. But to many of the Russians the infamy of his character was well known: he was universally shunned, and often insulted. On his first arrival, the very inn-keepers refused to admit him, and he might have starved in the street, had he not accidentally met with an old acquaintance who kept the Hotel de Londres. The emperor indeed received him with civility, but the empress and the whole court regarded him with equal scorn and hatred. His manners were not of a character to conciliate those whom the unprincipled ambition of his master, and his own ruffian habits had alienated; and our ambassador made way for the more plausible but equally worthless Caulaincourt. The next exploit of General Savary was one exactly suited to his nature -- requiring at once duplicity, cunning, and some degree of ferocity. It was to prevail on the Prince of the Asturias to meet Buonaparte at Bayonne. There is no other example in all history of a plot so wickedly designed and executed. On his first interview with Ferdinand, he asserted that the only object of his mission was to ascertain whether the new king wished to remain on friendly terms with the emperor. He observed, with as much apparent carelessness as he could assume, that Napoleon was coming to Spain, and that he was sure if the prince would meet him on the way, this mark of respect would be very favourably received -- in short, that the emperor would not hesitate to acknowledge Ferdinand. He was not, he said, empowered to make any such proposal: he spoke only from his knowledge of the emperor's character, and from his own good-will to the new king. Fearing that if he did not see Napoleon, his father Charles would, and in his presence declare the preceding abdication at Aranjuez compulsory, Ferdinand at length resolved to go, especially as he was given to understand, that before he had proceeded many leagues he would meet the illustrious visitor. He reached Vittoria, but no signs of Buonaparte. He began to take the alarm, so much so as to suspect some snare was prepared for him: he even refused to proceed: "Then how can your majesty expect that the emperor will acknowledge you?" inquired Savary: "When he has only your majesty's advantage in view, is it he who is to come three-fourths of the way? Assuredly, sire, you should meet him on the frontiers!" The poor prince was disgusted with the villain and would see him no more, but the attendants saw him. He continued to protest that the emperor would not dismember Spain of a single town, and that if Ferdinand proceeded to meet him without distrust, he (the prince) would be immediately acknowledged. Still Ferdinand's friends asserted they should not advise him to go any farther. "Then you may all take the consequences!" answered the ruffian, who was now resolved to lay aside his hypocrisy. "We wish to have nothing to do with your emperor," said one of them: "we do not require or expect him to interfere in our concerns." "But he will interfere whether you choose it or not!" replied Savary. The weak Ferdinand had gone too far to recede: he knew that the French troops were not far distant, and he soon found that if he shewed any hesitation to proceed, he would be compelled to do so. A letter from Napoleon too reassured his hopes, and he crossed the frontier in opposition to the advice of at least one honest follower. How instead of a crown he found a prison, on the French territory, is known to all.

When the tyrant in the exultation of success, and in the consciousness of power, declared that the house of Bourbon had ceased to reign, and that the crown of Spain must adorn the brows of his brother Joseph, Savary, whom he had created Duke of Rovigo, was sent to assume ad interim the command of the French forces at Madrid. But the general directed none of the great military operations; indeed, none of the marshals would have obeyed him. He was soon recalled; and such was the indignation of the people at the part he had acted, in the imprisonment of Ferdinand, that he had the utmost difficulty to leave Spain alive. He disguised himself in mean apparel, and rode some miles in advance of his carriage.

In the Austrian campaign, of 1809, Savary, as usual, accompanied the emperor, and served with some distinction. Soon after his return (June 1810), on the disgrace of Fouché, he was presented with the Portfolio of the General Police; an appointment which gave great dissatisfaction to the Parisians. For the sake of his own popularity, Fouché had lately exercised his tremendous powers with moderation; and had been severe only with respect to such as were plotting for the overthrow of the state. But Savary--the agent of midnight murder, the basest and most malignant of all the imperial satellites, -- he whose name was but another word for all that could be feared and hated -- if he had exercised such a galling surveillance while over the Counter Police, what might not the people expect from him now that the prisons, and spies, and gens-d'armerie, of all France were under his command?

It was Fouché's task to initiate the new minister into the secrets of his office ; but according to his statement he did no such thing: he communicated only what he could not avoid: he shewed the wheels of the machine, but not the secret springs which put it in motion. He has drawn an amusing picture -- a caricature no doubt -- of the awkwardness with which the rude soldier entered on his new functions. "When reading the reports of his agents" (says he of Nantes), "he was compelled to spell the words, stammering, and interlarding his observations with curses enough." In all he said or did, he was as anxious to imitate his master's manner, as ever Boswell was that of Johnson. An anecdote will shew that, however he might be deficient in sagacity, and in that profound acquaintance with the state of political parties possessed by his predecessor, he knew how to extend the despotism of the system further than was ever dreamed by the other.

A man who had lost his two sons in the Russian campaign, was suspected of not being very heartily attached to the existing government: such indeed was the fact, but he was prudent enough to speak his mind only in presence of his most intimate friends; before the rest of the world he was mute, thereby baffling the efforts of the numerous hired spies whom Savary had placed over him. As he was one day seated in the garden of the Luxembourg, accompanied by a tried friend, the conversation began with the battle of Leipsic, which had recently taken place. In the sequel neither spared the despot, whose downfall they hoped was near at hand. In the midst of this confidential intercourse, a lovely little boy, apparently in his sixth year, came weeping towards them, crying that he had lost his nurse. They endeavoured to comfort him, telling him not to sob, for his nurse would not fail to seek him. During the quarter of an hour which he remained with them, they continued to converse on the same subject. Then a woman was seen to approach, with a child in her arms: no sooner did the boy perceive her, than he cried, there is my nurse! and hastened to rejoin her. The very next morning, both were arrested, and conducted to the Conciergerie. The childless parent was the first interrogated, and his surprise was not little to hear repeated, word for word, a portion of his conversation with his friend. His natural impression was that that friend had betrayed him, but he soon found his mistake. Both were immediately imprisoned, nor were they enlarged before the fall of Napoleon. Children of both sexes were employed in this execrable system of espionage.

But if the severity of Savary was equal to expectation, he soon proved that he was unfit to succeed so extraordinary a man as Fouché. The 23d of October, 1812, while the emperor was absent in Russia, he was seized in his own bed by the soldiers engaged in a conspiracy, and conveyed to prison, even without being allowed to put on his clothes*. [* This was the conspiracy of Mallet, for which see the History of Napoleon Buonaparte, vol. ii. p. 196.] There, however, he did not long remain: the conspiracy was immediately suppressed, and the leaders punished. When all danger was over, the Parisians gave way to their sense of the ludicrous. In every print-shop were caricatures of Savary, naked, in the act of being seized by the conspirators, betraying the utmost terror, and beseeching them not to injure him. Every one expected that he would be dismissed in disgrace: in the first place, the very existence of a conspiracy, unknown to him, was judged sufficient for his removal; and in the next, so was his want of caution in not having the gens-d'armes at hand in case of need. The emperor returned, and the morning following, Savary, with the other ministers, went to the palace with their portfolios. There is something amusing in his own description of the kind of notice he obtained from the courtiers. "They looked as if they feared to speak to me, lest they should afflict me by their condolence. As I made my way through the crowd towards the door of the emperor's cabinet, all gave way as if a funeral were passing." He entered, and remained nearly two hours. Napoleon censured him for want of vigilance, no less than for suffering himself to be conveyed to prison, but did not deprive him of his office. He left the cabinet; and the courtiers endeavoured to read in his eyes whether they ought to address him or not. The length of his interview with the emperor seemed favourable to him; but they were not so imprudent as to make any advances towards renewing their acquaintance before they knew of a certainty that he was pardoned: then, as in honour bound, they hurried to repeat their protestations of respect and attachment. After the first abdication, Savary, as he was not well received by the king, retired to the country. He was deeply implicated in the plot for the emperor's return, yet that event brought him no other advantage beyond a seat in the Chamber of peers, and the inspectorship of the gens-d'armerie. The portfolio of police was given to Fouché. When, after the disasters of Waterloo, Napoleon fled to Rochfort, the Duke of Rovigo accompanied him, and would have proceeded with him to St. Helena, had not the British government opposed his intention, and landed him at Malta. Afraid to return to France, where the fate of Labedoyere and Ney might have awaited him, and not being permitted to reside in England, he proceeded, by the advice of a friend, to Smyrna. There, however, he did not find the repose for which he sighed. Through the French ambassador at the Porte, he was again constrained to depart, and with precipitation. In June, 1819, he landed in England, where he obtained permission to remain a short time. Tired of his wandering, uncertain course of life, he resolved to visit Paris, though he well knew that he had been condemned to death for contumacy by a council of war. He proceeded by way of Dover, Ostend, and Brussels, where he bought a vehicle, and, attended by an English officer, he audaciously passed the frontiers, and reached the capital without being arrested. A council of war was summoned, -- less to punish him, for the day of vengeance and even of justice was past, -- than to revise the former sentence. He was unanimously acquitted, permitted to retain his honours, and to live in retirement.

In 1824, the Duke of Rovigo, anxious to relieve himself of the ignominy attending the part he had taken in the murder of a Condé, put forth a pamphlet in which he endeavoured, as others had done before him, to throw the blame on any shoulders but his own. His protestations of innocence convinced no man; the affair remains as it did; and not all the asseverations in the universe will wash away the guilt of Savary.

Dark as are the traits we have noticed in the life and character of Savary, it would be unjust to withhold our meed of praise to the fidelity with which he served Napoleon. He adhered to that emperor when the world forsook him; and he has ever since shewn great zeal in vindicating his memory; in which, however, policy has doubtless as much to do as gratitude, since the justification of his master necessarily involves his own.

The Duke of Rovigo's Memoirs, recently published, are written with considerable talent; and though, of course, far from meriting implicit credit, will always rank among the necessary materials for the history of Napoleon.