By a treaty of 2 August 1815, the European powers, including France, were invited to send commissioners to the place to be chosen for Napoleon's detention, which the British had already decided was to be St Helena. The Royal Court of France, the Imperial Courts of Austria and of Russia, and the Royal Court of Prussia, were 'to appoint Commissioners to proceed to and abide at the place which the Government of his Britannic Majesty shall have assigned for the residence of Napoleon Bonaparte, and who without being responsible for his custody will assure themselves of his presence'. It was the function of the commissioners to watch and report on the English jailers quite as much as on the French prisoners. The reports of Count Balmain are infinitely superior in value and interest to those from France and Austria, they are very witty and interesting - witty, perhaps, because Balmain took vast pains to make them so, because he knew his emperor would read them carefully! Count Balmain never met Napoleon, and all of his reports in this respect are all second-hand, but notwithstanding this, Balmain sent a vast amount of information back to Russia, much of it of interest from the social and gossipy nature of his narration. This book contains a wealth of information regarding life on St Helena, the British, the garrison the inhabitants, and of course the small French community surrounding Napoleon.
