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The Sheik of Cairo, in making a present to General Bonaparte of a magnificent Arab horse, had given him at the same time Roustan and Ibrahim, another mameluke, who was afterwards attached to the service of Madame Bonaparte, under the name of Ali. It is well known that Roustan became an indispensable accompaniment on all occasions when the Emperor appeared in public.
The Emperor returned at last with Marshal Berthier, and followed by Roustan. I heard nothing. The Prince de Neuchatel wished to approach and shake me that I might awake and resign to his Majesty his seat and table; but the Emperor stopped him, saying, "Let the poor fellow sleep; he has passed many nights with none."
The Emperor came to congratulate the two of us on the courage with which we had undertaken the rescue of the wounded Russian, and calling for his Mameluke, Roustan, whose horse was always loaded with provisions, he poured out for us a tot of rum each, and asked us, laughing, how we had enjoyed the bath.
He will enter the room with his portfolio and remain there an hour, after first bringing to the anteroom the order, in the emperor's name, to make no further reports to him that evening, as he was wearied and therefore wished to go to rest early. The Mameluke Roustan could not be bribed, and therefore the attempt was relinquished.
I was then sure of finding him all the rest of the day in a charming humor, and full of good-will, as I have seen him, so often. Roustan, and even Marshal Berthier, received their due proportion of these imperial tendernesses.
Besides, this favor affected in no wise his domestic relations; for when Roustan, who had married a young and pretty French girl, a certain Mademoiselle Douville, whose father was valet to the Empress Josephine, was reproached by certain journals in 1814 and 1815 with not having followed to the end of his fortunes the man for whom he had always expressed such intense devotion, Roustan replied that the family ties which he had formed prevented his leaving France, and that he could not destroy the happiness of his own household.
The next day at his toilet he summoned the grand marshal for some purpose, and during the conversation said, "I leave you to guess what I ate last night for my supper. The scraps which M. Roustan left. Yes, the wretch took a notion to eat half of my chicken." Roustan entered at that moment.
Roustan, so well known under the name of Mameluke, belonged to a good family of Georgia; carried off at the age of six or seven, and taken to Cairo, he was there brought up among the young slaves who attended upon the mamelukes, until he should be of sufficient age to enter this warlike militia.
Roustan witnessed the occurrence, and it was from him I learned the opening details.
The Emperor returned at last with Marshal Berthier, and followed by Roustan. I heard nothing. The Prince de Neuchatel wished to approach and shake me that I might awake and resign to his Majesty his seat and table; but the Emperor stopped him, saying, "Let the poor fellow sleep; he has passed many nights with none."
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