He expected to be shot.
As the escort which was conducting him passed the Morgue on Quai-Saint-Michel, musket-shots were heard in the Cite.

The sergent-de-ville at the head of the escort said to the soldiers: 'Go back to your guard-house; I will take care of the prisoner,' As soon as the soldiers were gone, he cut the cords with which the prisoner's hands were fastened, and said to him: 'Go, I spare your life; don't forget that it was I who set you at liberty.

Look at me well, so that you may know me again.' "The principal military accomplices held a council.

The question was discussed whether it was not necessary for Louis Bonaparte to quit Faubourg Saint-Honore immediately, and remove either to the Invalides or to the Palais du Luxembourg, two strategic points more easy to defend against a _coup de main_ than the Elysee.

Some preferred the Invalides, others the Luxembourg; the subject gave rise to an altercation between two generals.
"It was at this moment that the ex-King of Westphalia, Jerome Bonaparte, seeing that the _coup d'etat_ was tottering to its fall, and having some care for the morrow, wrote his nephew the following significant letter:-- * * * * "My dear Nephew,--The blood of Frenchmen has been spilt; stop its effusion by a serious appeal to the people.