Two accounts of Napoleon’s work ethic
Left: Mollien by Robert Lefèvre (1806), Right: Gaudin by Joseph-Marie Vien (1806)
This is from Le prix de la gloire: Napoléon et l’argent by Pierre Branda.
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The director of the Caisse d'amortissement, Mollien, appreciated Bonaparte’s incredible capacity for work under the Consulate. Finance was one of his favorite fields. He wanted to know everything about everything, and very quickly. Mollien left a striking account of it in his Memoirs.
He asked each minister to account for the smallest details; he even addressed himself to the chief clerks when the ministers did not clarify all his doubts, often with the dual intention of inspiring them with the feeling of his superiority, and of attaching the hopes of these cooperators more directly to his person.
It was not uncommon to see the ministers come out of these councils overwhelmed by the fatigue of the long interrogations they had undergone, and the First Consul, who disliked to notice it, speaking of the use of his day only as a relaxation that had barely exercised his mind. And, I repeat, the same ministers often found ten letters from the First Consul when they returned home, asking for immediate answers to which all the use of the night could scarcely suffice. But, as was customary, these ministers were hardly pitied, and the First Consul made it known, and allowed it to be said of himself, that he was the only man who was not tired by any work, and who was not a stranger to any work, which was true.
Gaudin, in a more vivid way, also testifies to the ‘relentlessness’ at work of Napoleon Bonaparte.
He [Napoleon] had asked the Minister of the Navy for one of the holy days, for a ball which he had promised to attend with his family. On the morning of that day, he said to me: “Come this evening, at eight o'clock. We will begin to prepare our figures for the next budget: we will have two hours to spare. It will be time for us to go, at ten o’clock, to the Minister of the Navy’s ball.”
[In the evening, at the appointed time], we set to work and I attest that, for almost seven hours, he did not have a moment of distraction. Around midnight, there was a knock on the office door. It was a page sent by Josephine who told him that the ball was charming and that she was impatiently waiting for him.
“In a moment,” he replied out loud. “Tell her that I’m working with the Minister of Finance. We’re going.”
An hour later, new message, same response. We still continue. Finally the clock strikes. “What time is it?” he said to me. “Three o’clock. Oh, good God! It’s too late to go to the ball!” - “What do you think?” - “That's absolutely my opinion.” - “Let's each earn a bed note.”
