See how the people prostrate themselves before foreign decorations: they have been surprised by them and accordingly do not fail to wear them....

The French cherish but one sentiment, honor: that sentiment, then, requires nourishing--they must have honors." A very few are satisfied with their own achievements; ordinary men are not even content with the approbation they perceive in the eyes of others: it is too intermittent, too reserved, too mute; they need fame that is brilliant and noisy; they want to hear the constant hum of admiration and respect whenever they appear or whenever their name is mentioned.

Even this does not suffice; they are unwilling that their merit should rest in men's minds in the vague state of undefined greatness, but that it should be publicly estimated, have its current value, enjoy undisputed and measured rank on the scale above all other lesser merits .-- The new institution affords complete satisfaction to all these exigencies of human and French nature.

On the 14th of July, 1804,[3345] the anniversary of the taking of the Bastille, Napoleon administers the oath to the legionaries and, after a solemn mass, distributes the insignia under the dome of the Invalides in the presence of the empress and the court; and again one month later, August 16, 1804, on the anniversary of the Emperor's birth, in the camp at Boulogne, facing the ocean and in full view of the flotilla assembled to conquer England, before one hundred thousand spectators and the entire army, to the roll of eighteen hundred drums.

No ceremony, probably, was ever more exciting.