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Pilfering Snuffboxes. All but invincible in the saddle, Napoleon was all too vulnerable at home. He hated to get up in the morning, indulged in two-hour-long hot baths, delighted in being rubbed down with Eau de Cologne by his valet. At work he tipped back in his chair, whittled away with a penknife on the arm of a chair. In council meetings he made such a habit of pilfering snuffboxes that his ministers resorted to bringing their snuff in cardboard boxes. Worried about becoming fat, Napoleon stoked himself through the day with licorice flavored with anisette. He bolted his breakfast, wolfed dinner in only 15 to 20 minutes.
Even Napoleon's amorous after-hours relaxation has been meticulously recorded, once because a reigning actress, Mlle George, was so frightened by what she described as Bonaparte's epileptic seizure that she brought the whole palace running to their bed. An endless procession of soubrettes glided through Napoleon's boudoir (and left with bodices stuffed with bank notes). Scholar Savant is ready to take the word of contemporaries that the procession included the Emperor's sisters and stepdaughter.
At Josephine's château at Malmaison, Napoleon (a very bad shot) delighted in shooting at the Empress' swans to torment her. When in good spirits, he would slap Josephine on the shoulders while she begged, "Do stop it, do stop it, Bonaparte." Josephine's maid, Mlle. Avrillon, recalled, "We could estimate the degree of his good humor by how much he hurt us. One day when he was obviously better pleased than usual, he pinched my cheek so hard I could not repress a scream."
Getting the Goods. Just before going to Notre Dame to crown himself Emperor, he could not resist dragging his older brother to a looking glass, gloating, "Joseph, if our father could see us!" In the field he dressed plainly, had to be told by his sister to wear, suspenders because "your breeches always seem to be on the point of falling down." Léger, his tailor, reported indignantly turning down the Emperor's request to patch a pair of hunting breeches. And though Napoleon ennobled all his brothers, behind the scenes he ranted like any Corsican bourgeois, broke up one family council by musing aloud: "Suppose we sum up. Lucien is an ingrate. Joseph a Sardanapalus. Louis a paralytic. Jerome a scamp. As for you, ladies, you know what you are." Thanks to Author Jean Savant, the reader also gets all the goods on Napoleon Bonaparte.