NJX 
























F OR E EIGN
REMINISCENCES,
BY
HENRY RIHIIARD
LORD  HOLLAND,
EDITED BY HIS SON,
HENRY EDWARD LORD HOLLAND.
NE W YORK:
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,
FRANKLIN SQUARE.
1855.








TO
JEROME BUONAPARTE,
MARSHAL OF FRANCE,
GOVERNOR OF THE " INVALIDES;"
THE ONLY SURVIVING BROTHER OF TIE EMPEROR NAPOLEON;
~4jj ~nrk
I S RES1ECTFULLY  DEDICATE D,
BY HIS GRATEFUL AND OBLIGED SERVANT,
HOLLAND.
Holland flouse, May 5, 1850.








PREF A C E
THE recent events on the Continent have induced the
Editor to publish the following pages on foreign politics.
The times of which this volume treats have already
acquired the interest of a long past age; and the public
will read with pleasure, and perhaps with profit, the
observations on passing events of a contemporary who,
if not wholly impartial, is acknowledged by all who
knew him to have been as candid as he was benevolent.
The Editor has scrupulously abstained from making
the slightest verbal alteration in the text or notes.  The
omission of four insignificant sentences is all that he has
deemed necessary for the immediate publication of what
was probably written with the intention of not seeing
the light so soon.
PARIS, Sept. 10, 1850.








FOREIGN  REMINISCENCE S
A S[HORT account, however desultory, of such persons,
anecdotes, or political intrigues in foreign countries, as
have fallen within my observation or knowledge, may not
be uninteresting. But as a foreigner, however favorable
his opportunities or sound his judgment, seldom relates
any English event, or describes any English character,
without committing some gross blunder, I check myself
with the reflection that I also must be liable to be misled by false information, or to form an erroneous estimate
of manners, opinions, and transactions out of my own
country. I can only vouch for the anecdotes I record,
by assuring my readers that I believe them; I repeat
them as they were received and understood by me, from
what appeared sufficient authority; and I delineate the
characters either as the result of my own impressions, or
of the opinions conveyed to me by those who were most
capable of drawing them correctly.
In my first short journey abroad in 1791, I was a mere
boy, and too little acquainted with the habits and language
of the people among whom I was traveling to observe
much, yet many interesting events were passing around




14             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
me. I arrived at Paris not long after the death of Mirabeau, and soon after the acceptance of the constitution by
Louis XVI. The designs of Mirabeau to coalesce with
the court party, or at least to check the revolutionary
spirit, were more than suspected before his death. He
was in a constant state of intrigue with all parties, and
particularly with Monsieur (Comte de Provence, and afterward Louis XVIII.) in the business of Favras. The Duke
of Levi was the channel of communication between him
and Monsieur in that mysterious and disgraceful affair.
Yet the solicitude of the people during his illness was
unabated, and stories almost incredible of the attention of
the populace, in preventing the slightest disturbance in the
street where he was lying ill, were related in all societies
with that delight and admiration which dramatic displays
of sentiment never fail to excite in Paris. The shops and
quays were crowded with his portraits and busts.  A
stranger could discern in his physiognomy nothing but
visible marks of debauch, vanity, presumption, and artifice,
which were strong ingredients in his composition; but the
Parisians, yet, stunned by his eloquence, and dazzled by
his splendid talents, seemed to dwell on the representation
of his large features, pock-fretted face, and frizzed hair,
with fond complacency mingled with regret. He was
certainly an extraordinary man. That his powers would
have been equal, as has often been suggested, either to
check or to guide the subsequent course of the French
Revolution, may nevertheless be very questionable. He
was thought to be, and probably was, very corrupt; but
an exemption from that vice was the solitary virtue which
gave individuals, and Robespierre in particular, any as



MIRABEAU.                       15
cendency in the later and more stormy seasons of that
frightful period.,
Mirabeau had the talent, or at least the trick and contrivance, of appropriating the ideas and labors of other
men to his purposes in a very extraordinary degree.  I
have been assured by one who knew him intimately,' and
acted for a short time as his secretary, that not only the
reports he made, but the speeches he delivered, were often
written by others, and read by him in the morning, or even
run through and adopted by him (as I have seen briefs by
our lawyers) while he was actually speaking.  The various imprisonments and embarrassments to which his disorderly life and licentious pen had exposed him  are well
known.  The prosecution against him in England was the
malevolent contrivance of a crazy and faithless servant,
who falsely accused his master of having robbed him.
There was nothing remarkable in that incident, but the
public and warm  testimony of Sir Gilbert Elliot and Mr.
Burke himself in favor of a man whose influence on the
French Revolution was afterward  so conspicuous, and
whlose lax principles and immoral life furnished so fertile
a theme for invectives against it.  The vanity of Mirabeau
exposed him, t it is said, to a droll reproof.  At some im* This is my excellent friend Dumont; but, though he was
veracious and fond of anecdotes, he was, by his own admission, a very
inobservant, and, by my experience of him, a very credulous man.
f Though this anecdote was told me by many, and among them M.
Dumont, I am disposed to question its accuracy; for MI. Talleyrand,
to whom the bon-mot was attributed, quarreled with Mirabeau upon
the publication of the letters from Berlin, and never spoke to him
afterward in private till a few days before his death, when Mirabeau




16              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
portant political crisis, he was descanting in society on the
qualities requisite in a minister to extricate the crown, the
assembly, and the nation from the difficulties in which they
were involved, viz., great knowledge, great genius, acquaintance and perhaps connection with the upper ranks,
some common feelings with-the lower classes, a power of
speaking and of writing eloquently and readily, familiarity
with the world, the popularity of a martyr from recent
prosecution, and many others, which it was obvious enough
that he thought were united in himself.  "All this is true,"
said a friend, 6" but you have omitted one of his qualities."'"No-surely? what do you mean?"  "Should he not,"
replied the same sarcastic friend, "be very much pitted
with the small pox?"'
Mirabeau was not the only revolutionist supposed in
1791 to have been converted, or at least softened, toward
the court.  Barnave, touched (said the Royalists) by the
behavior of the King and his family when he conducted
them  back from  Varennes, disgusted and alarmed (said
the Fayettists and Constitutionalists) by the coarse mansent for him, expressed his remorse at the publication, and prevailed
upon Talleyrand to pronounce a posthumous speech composed by him
(Mirabeau) on some subject then pending in the chamber. Moreover; I have discovered that my excellent friend Dumont, though veracity itself, was often very credulous about anecdotes recounted to
him, and liable to mistakes about the dates, persons, and occasions.
Yet when I asked Talleyrand, he did not entirely disdain the bonmot: probably its excellence made it somewhat tempting to own it.
Possibly he said it of and not to Mirabeau, in which case it is still
good, but not so quick, clever, or striking.
* Et piqu6 de la petite v6role. It was Mirabeau's case to a very
remarkable degree.




LAFAYETTE.                       1;
ners and bloody designs of the Jacobins, secretly seduced
(whispered others) by the ambition of governing both parties in France, lent his very powerful aid to the more
moderate councils, and contributed with Feuillans and
Fayettists to prevent the establishment of a Republic, when
the event seemed, if ever, to justify and recommend such a
step. At the moment of the King's escape, that project
must have occurred to many.  It was checked even then
by individuals among the Feuillans, and more particularly
by D'Andre, a Proven(al merchant, who, in spite of a
strong accent, was a very able debater and popular leader
in the Assembly, and who, through the gradations of a
Feuillant, Fayettist, Constitutionalist, and Emigrant,* became ultimately an agent of the Bourbons, not without suspicion of having, at an earlier period, secretly connected
himself with the designs of that family. He interrupted
and overruled one Ramond, who was speaking to his Feuillant colleagues, the very day of the King's escape, on the
necessity of a Republic, by touching his Proveneal knife
half in joke and half in earnest, and saying that he should
use it against any one who seriously recommended the
abolition of Monarchy.  Lafayette assured me that, at a
meeting of his friends, all present but two t agreed that' He survived the restoration, returned to Paris, and was rewarded
by the Bourbons, under whom he laid out and improved the Bois de
Boulogne with much taste, judgrent, and economy.
f Viz., the Duke de la Rochefoucault and Dupont de Nemours.. Lafayette, in speaking of the transactions of those days, many years
afterward (January, 1826), assured me that he was surprised to find
so many even of the most violent revolutionists concur in the notion
of preserving monarchy after the arrestof the King. Some were for a




18               FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Monarchy must be, for a season at least, preserved; that
France was not ripe for a Republic; and that a constitutional King was still necessary.  The Duke de la Rochefoucault earnestly urged, before the others had spoken, the
immediate declaration of a Republic, though, when it was
otherwise decided, he never courted popularity, nor sought
to distinguish himself from his friends by referring to such
an opinion. On the contrary, he did his utmost to maintaiin the constitutional system, and the King at the-head of
it.  The meeting alluded to occurred after the arrest at
Varennes, and in the hotel of the Duke de la Rochefoucault.  Surely the Duke de la Rochefoucault was in the
right.  The establishment of a Monarchy, with the view
change of dynasty. Wild men talked of the Duke of York, and Duke
of Brunswick, and other foreign princes; perhaps some thought more
than they talked of the Duke of Orleans; but the idea of a Republic
was confined to a very few indeed, and even with republicans considered either as impracticable or premature. He added that many,
and he among the number, were more readily inclined to acquiesce
in the restoration of Louis XVI. from letters written by several English persons and particularly the Duchess of Devonshire and MLr.
Fox, expressing great anxiety for his personal safety and that of the
Queen. These letters they misinterpreted into an opinion of friendly
but impartial spectators in favor of the preservation of monarchy in
the person of Louis XVI. He acknowledged that he afterward learnt
in conversation, that one of the letters at least, viz., that of Mr. Fox,
was written with no such view, but simply from motives of humanity,
and an ardent desire that the cause of the Revolution should not be
sullied by any harsh or cruel proceeding against the individuals of the
Royal Family. In other respects, Mr. Fox doubted of the policy and
even of the justice of continuing Louis XVI. on the throne. I have
heard him say that a separation of some years from the Queen should,
in all prudence, have been stipulated as a condition.




LAFAYETTE.                    19
of ripening it into a Republic, was as mischievous to the
community as unjust to the Monarch; and the notion that
Louis XVI. could become a constitutional King, disposed
to weaken rather than strengthen his own authority, after
his intended flight, and with the Queen for his consort and
adviser, was chimerical and puerile in the extreme. He
had justified his deposal by his flight. It was imprudent in
Constitutionalists, it was madness in Republicans, not to
insist on it. Above all, it was, as the event proved, very
mistaken mercy.
Lafayette and others, however, from very generous motives, were averse to seizing such a moment for the subversion of Monarchy; and they were actively instrumental in discouraging all harshness, severity, or insolence
to the King and his family. I dined frequently with General Lafayette. He kept a sort of open table for officers
of the National Guard, and other persons zealous and forward in the cause of the Revolution. I was pleased with
the unaffected dignity and simplicity of his manners, and
flattered by the openness with which he spoke to me of his
own views, and of the situation of the country..He was
loud in condemning the brutality of Petion, whose cold
and offensive replies to the questions of the royal prisoners
on their journey back from Varennes were very currently
reported; and he was in his professions, and I believe in
his heart, much more confident of the sincerity of the King
than common prudence should have allowed him to be, or
than was justified either by the character of Louis himself,
or by the truth as disclosed by subsequent events. Lafayette was, however, then as always, a pure, disinterested
man, full of private affection and public virtue, and not




20             FOREIGN REMINISOENCES.
devoid of such talents as firmness of purpose, sense of
honor, and earnestness of zeal will, on great occasions,
supply.  He was indeed accessible to flattery, somewhat'too credulous, and apt to mistake the forms, or,
if I may so phrase it, the pedantry of liberty for the
substance; as if men could not enjoy any freedom without
subscribing to certain abstract principles and arbitrary
tests, or as if the profession -and subscription, nay, the
technical observance of such tests and principles, were
not, on the other hand, often compatible with practical
oppression and tyranny. These strictures, however, on
his blemishes are less applicable to the period to which I
am now referring than to most others of his public life;
for with all his love of popularity, he was then knowingly
sacrificing it for the pfirpose of rescuing a court from contumely and injury, and, though a republican in principal,
was active in preserving the name and perhaps too much
of the authority of a King in the new constitution. He
either tickled my youthful vanity, or gained my affections
so much during my- residence at Paris, that I caught his
feelings, and became, for the time, enthusiastically persuaded of the King's sincere attachment to the new constitution. In this prepossession I was fortified by hearing
his speech to the Legislative Assembly, which he delivered
in a clear but tremulous voice, with great appearance of
earnestness. Perhaps the qualified terms in which he
acknowledged his original approbation and acceptance
of the constitution gave greater force to the very positive
assurances which he made that he would adhere to it.
He seemed in his engagements for the future to be under
no constraint, when he could-so manifestly avow his reluct



LOUIS XVI.             -         21
ance to acquiesce in the past.  "Enfin je l'ai accept6e et
je la soutiendrai et dedans et dehors," are words which
still ring on my ear, and which made no small impression
at that time on my mind, not hitherto steeled, by experience of their hollowness, to royal speeches and written
paragraphs.  Louis XVI. was at that very moment, if not
the main instigator, a coadjutor and adviser of the party
soliciting foreign powers to put down that very constitution by force.*  Louis XVI., however, was neither a
bad nor a foolish man, and he certainly was not a cruel
one. But sincerity is no attribute of princes educated
in the expectation of power, and exposed to- the' dangers
of civil disturbance.  As Louis did not inherit, so neither
did he acquire, that virtue by discipline or reflection.
He meant the good of the people whom  he deemed
himself destined'to govern, but he thought to promote
that good more certainly  by  preserving  than by surrendering any part of the authority which his ancestors
possessed.  Yanity,t a weed indigenous in the soil and
* It is just to observe that Lafayette, and some others concerned
in the transactions of those days, even now acquit Louis XVI. of all
participation in the plan of invading France; that I have no private
knowledge on the subject whatever; and that my opinion and statement in the text are founded entirely on public and historical documents accessible to every one.
f I am aware that in imputing this vice to Louis XVI., I contradict
not only a common report and tradition, but the testimony of many
who had opportunities of studying his character. My opinion is
founded on the evidence of facts, on the judgment and representation
of M. de Calonne, confirmed by several traits related to me, without
any view of maintaining any theory on the subject, by emigrants and
courtiers, and by. some circumstances in the Memoirs of Bezenval




22              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
much favored by an elevated state on which flattery is
continually showered, confirmed that notion in his mind
and disinclined him to any real confidence in his ostensible
ministers and advisers.  It made him fondly imagine that
he never could become the tool of secret machinations,
or the instrument of persons -in his judgment so greatly
inferior in intellect and acquirements, as those who surrounded him.  M. de Calonne told me that when he had
ascertained that the Queen and her coterie were hostile to
the plans he had prepared, he waited on the King, respectfully and delicately lamented the Queen's reported disapprobation of his project, earnestly conjuring his Majesty,
if not resolved to go through with the plan, and to silence
all opposition, or cavil at it within the court, to allow him
to suppress it in time; but if, on the other hand, his Majesty
was determined to persevere, suggesting the propriety of
impressing on the Queen his earnest desire and wishes that
nothing should escape her lips which could sanction a doubt
of the excellence of the measures themselves, and still less
of the determination of the court to adopt and enforce them.
Louis at first scouted the notion of the Queen (une femme,
as he called her), forming or hazarding any opinion about
it.  But when M. de Calonne assured him that she spoke
of the project in terms of disparagement and censure, the
King rang the bell, sent for her Majesty to the apartment,
and Madame Camnpan, the latter of which, when divested of the decorum, not to say hypocrisy, with which such subjects must necessarily
be treated by a lady attached to the court, will convince a reader who
has a key to the secret, that Louis was in, her judgment, self-sufficient in his disposition, disobliging, and even coarse and brutal in his
manners.




MARIE ANTOINETTE.                    *23
and after sternly and even coarsely rebuking her for meddling with matters, auxquell     femmes les es n'ont rien aire,
he, to the dismay of De Calonne, took her by the shoulders,
and fairly turned her out of the room like a naughty child.
"Me voila perdu," said De Calonne to himself, and he
was accordingly dismissed, and his scheme abandoned, in
the course of a few days.*
Marie Antoinette did not obtain an ascendant' over her
husband in-consequence of any such complexion in him as
had brought his cousins of the Spanish branch so often
under the dominion of their wives.  Indeed, though the
calumnies against the unhappy Queen were often' atrociously unjust, it is perhaps-fortunfate for her reputation
that the nature of the topic is sufficient to account for the
silence of Madame Campan respecting the causes of that
tardiness of affection in the king alluded to in -her work.
Had that ladyt been released from  the restraints which
* See Appendix, No. I.
f Madame Campan's delicacy and discretion are not only pardonable, but praiseworthy; but they are disingenuous, and-her Memoirs
conceal truths well-known to her, though such -as would have been
unbecoming a lady to reveal. She was, in fact, the confidante of
larie Antoinette's amours. Those amours were not numerous, scandalous, or degrading, but they were amours. Madame Campan, who
lived beyond the restoration, was not so mysterious in conversation on
these subjects as she is in her writings. She acknowledged to persons who have acknowledged it to me, that she was privy to the intercourse between the Queen and the Duc de Coigny. That French
nobleman, from timidity of character and coldness of constitution, was
not sorry to withdraw himself early from so dangerous an intrigue.
Madame Campan confessed a curious fact, namely, that Ferson was
in the Queen's boudoir or bed-chamber, tete-d-tete with her Majesty




24              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
the delicacy of her sex imposed on her relation, she might
have found it difficult to reconcile a true exposition of the
details with her avowed confidence in the virtue of Marie
Antoinette, or at least to have persuaded men of professional experience, that the birth of the royal children
was a proof and a triumph of surgical skill.
As I was not presented at court, I never saw the Queen
but at the play-house.  She was then in affliction, and her
countenance was, no doubt, disfigured by long suffering
and resentment.  I should not, however, suppose that the
habitual expression of it, even in happier seasons, had ever
been very agreeable.  Her beauty, however extolled, consisted, I suspect, exclusively in a fair skin, a straight person,
and a stately air, which her admirers termed dignity, and
her enemies pride and disdain. Her total want of judgment and temper no doubt co.ntributed to the disasters of
the Royal Family, but there was no member of it to whom
the public was uniformly so harsh and unjust, and her trial
and death were among the most revolting parts of the
whole catastrophe.  She was indeed insensible when led
to the scaffold; but the previous persecution which she
underwent was base, unmanly, cruel, and ungenerous to
the last degree.
In 1792, the princes of the blood, with the exception of
on the famous night of the 6th of October. He escaped observation
with considerable difficulty, in a disguise which she (Madame Cam
pan herself) procured for him.
This, M. de Talleyrand, though generally somewhat averse to retailing anecdotes, disparaging of the Royal Family of France, has
twice recounted to me, and assured me that he had it fiom Madame
Campan herself.




DUKE OF ORLEANS.                 25
the Duke of Orleans,~ had left the country. I had known
the Duke of Orleans slightly in England, and some of my
friends and relations were acquainted, and in some senses
were connected with him; but I saw little or nothing of
him at Paris in 1791. He probably overlooked me, or if
he did not, was unwilling to show civility to a stranger who
frequented Lafayette, and who lived in a society particularly
hostile to him. I regret not having seen more of him, because I believe that no man has lived in my time whose
character has been more calumniated, or will be more misrepresented to posterity, and I should have liked to have
confirmed or cori:ected this persuasion of mine by more
personal observation than I had any opportunity of making.
His carriage and countenance, though the latter was disfigured by carbuncles, were prepossessing, and his manners
were perfect. His superiority in those respects, as well
as his command of moneys excited the jealousy of the court.
His popularity at Paris, the Judicium Paridis, was perhaps
sufficient to account for the first estrangement of the Queen,
though some scandalous, but I really believe unfounded
rumors would represent the other hemistich of aTirgil's
verse, the spretce injuriaforme, or neglect of her advances,
among the causes of that strong aversion which marked
her language and conduct long before any political differences could have justified or explained such hatred., Many
womanish artifices were resorted to to vex him, to spoil his
amusements, to interrupt his parties, and to expose him to
those small mortifications which, in all countries, are apt to
awaken the resentment of weak minds as much or more
* The old Prince de Conti was, I believe, still in France, but too
insignificant there and every where to require any notice.
B




26               FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
than serious injuries, and to which an extravagant importance is always annexed in France, even by persons otherwise of some sense and magnanimity. That hostility, however, in which the court, not the Duke of Orleans, was the
aggressor, was by no means confined to petty warfare.
In defiance of decency and truth, the most malignant charges
of cowardice were propagated and countenanced by the
Queen and her party against the Duke of Orleans on his
return fiom the fleet in 1778.* I have heard well-informed
Frenchmen ascribe his visits to England and predilection
for our usages, then termed Anglomanie, to the studious
exclusion of him from both the business and the amusements
of his native court, and to the disgust he felt at the direct
and indirect -slights put upon him. At the same time it
must be acknowledged that his habits were far from  respectable. Those t who had first engaged him in the Rev* This is not only asserted in the printed memoirs of Madame de
Genlis, and by the uniform report of persons connected with the Palais
Royal, but Talleyrand, Lafayette, Lord St. Helen's, Puysegur and
other emigrant royalists, have -admitted it to me in conversation frequently, and even borne their testimony to facts in corroboration of it.
The malignity and falsehood of the charges against him are admitted by
the author of the introduction to his correspondence (whoever he was),
printed and published at Paris in 1800 in 8vo, by Le Rouge, imprimelur, and Debraye, bookseller, which publication confirms much besides in my text.
f Who were the individuals who swayed the politics of the Duke
of Orleans, urged him on this occasion to return, and managed for him
his interests and popularity with the rabble at Paris, is a mystery very
difficult to penetrate.  Madame de Genlis inflam'ed his animosity
against the Queen, and, though she denied it, was certainly instrumental in originally immersing him and afterward maintaining him in




DUKE OF ORLEANS.                      27
olution were dissatisfied at his absence in England, to which
the remonstrances, and some pretend the actual menaces,
of Lafayette, after the 6th of October, had driven him.*
They considered it as a pusillanimous desertion, and incessantly urged him  to quit a retirement which assumed the
political intrigues. Laclos, his secretary, was a man of great talent,
much suspected, but never convicted of " close designs and crooked
counsels." Si6yes, too, had influence with him. Ducrest, the brother
of Madame Genlis, notwithstanding some disputes and lawsuits with
the Duke of Orleans, is said to have had some influence with him, and
to have uniformly exerted all he had against the court.
" Many, and some honorable men, had assured Lafayette that they
actually saw the Duke of Orleans in the mob of the 6th of October.
he afterward believed, and indeed knew, especially from M. Talleyrand that the fact was false, and the persons alleging it mistaken, yet
the weight of the testimony at the time was so great that it, in his
mind, overbalanced the mere improbability, and the representations to
him to take some steps against the Duke of Orleans were so urgent
that he determined to speak to him. They met at MIadame de Coigny's. Lafayette advised him in a decided, perhaps somewhat peremptory tone to quit France, and insisted upon it " in a way (said Lafayette to me many years afterward), that if employed toward myself
might, I must acknowledge, have had the effect of determining me to
stay rather than go, yet it did not amount to a threat. He (Duke of
Orleans) might show, by acting as he did upon it, some want of moral
courage, but I had no right to imply (nor did I nor do I) any want of
personal courage whatever.  On the contrary, I do not believe that
he was at all deficient in that quality, on that or on any other occasion." The ostensible reason of his journey was, as is well known, a
mission on the affairs of Belgium, and he certainly endeavored, though
without success, to render that mission more than a pretext.  In his
letters published at Paris in 1800, see note of 3d of April, 1790, p. 120.
Correspondence de Louis Philippe, Duc d' Orleans, chez Le Rouge
et Debraye, Paris, 1800.




28               FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
appearance of an ignominious, though voluntary exile,
To those remonstrances he reluctantly yielded, though if
the court would have been prevailed upon to appoint him
embassador in London, he distinctly offered to remain.
Admiral Payne, who conducted him in a small boat to his
yacht off Brighton, assured me' that the Duke of Orleans,
on taking leave, grasped his hand with much emotion, and,
with tears in his eyes, said: "If I consulted my inclination
or my safety I should stay in your happy country, but I
am told that I am  bound in honor to return; for that reason, and that reason only, I go.  You, my dear Payne,*
will recollect that I am not blind to my situation, nor to
the scenes I am going to encounter.  I shall do no good
to any body, I shall lead a dreadful life, and I shall probably perish among the first, or, at least, very soon." Before leaving France, he had made some very slight advances to the court, but such.as showed that if he and his
friends had been secured from  persecution and revenge
by being admitted into a due share of power, he was not
unwilling to co-operate in preventing matters fiom coming
to extremities. He renewed these offers when in England,
and before his return.  He proposed and even solicited to
have his pretended mission converted into a real embassy
* Admiral Payne, it must be acknowledged, had not the reputation
of being very correct in his recital of stories, but I see no motive he
could have for inventing this conversation; and the general impression
I received of the Duke of Orleans' feelings at that period from
Francis Duke of Bedford to whom he spoke in a similar strain at
Woburn, as well as his language and conduct afterward, convince me
that in substance this relation is true, and that the words put into the
mouth of that ill-fated Prince on his departure from England contain
an accurate representation of his sentiments.




DUKE OF ORLEANS.                  29
to London, but when refused by M. Montmorin, he seems
to have considered (and surely not very unnaturally) the
exhortation not to return, and the reasons assigned for it,
namely, that his presence might aggravate the turbulence
and difficulty of the times, as an insult rather than an
encouragement. Far from preventing, it provoked his
return to Paris.  He m-net on that, and every other occasion, nothing but repulse, disdain, and insult from  the
courtiers. This might be very fine and magnanimous,
but was very impolitic withal.  If it does not justify,
it at least somewhat palliates, and very satisfactorily
accounts for his -subsequent connection with more violent councils. After the return of the King from Varennes, it is said" that he declined the Presidentship, and
was unwilling to take any forward part.  Some attribute that backwardness to hypocrisy and others to pusillanimity. But if the fact be as it is stated, is' it clear that
delicacy toward the royal prisoners, and an unaffected reluctance to be forced into! a station of power, were not
among the real motives for his forbearance?  Surely that
was the opportunity, which a man of the unprincipled ambition and thirst of vengeance so often imputed to him would
have chosen for activity!  The construction I am  disposed to put upon his conduct is as follows: Popularity
and some triumph over the malignity of the court, especially of the Queen, were naturally enough his objects at
the beginning of the Revolution: he soon grew tired of the
intrigues, then shocked at the excesses, and at last alarmed
at the consequences of that event; and before the time I
am now referring to, 1791, his own ease and safety, and
In various publications, but I do not vouch for the fact.




30               FOREIGN REMINISCENCOES.
the protection of such as had incurred any-enmities on his
account, was all that he expected, or perhaps as much as
he wished to obtain.  Talleyrand, who knew  him  well,
and who in a joint work with Beaumetz, which was never
published, shortly afterward delineated his character, described him  to me as indifferent alike to the pursuits of
pleasure or vanity, ambition or revenge, and solely intent
on enjoying ease and preserving existence. IHe was so
jaded (si blase, un homme si desabuse), that he had outlived even the necessity of emotion (Ib besoin de s'emouvoir).
There is, indeed, reason to suspect that the persons instrumental in creating and preserving his personal influence
in Paris, were active agents in the municipal cabals and
revolutions which preceded and accompanied the 10th' of
August and the 2d of September of 1792; and true it is,
that the only party which-showed the least disposition to
identify itself with his interests, or to concert with him, consisted of a portion of those to whose language and manceuvres the horrors even of that last day are mainly attributed
by well informed authors. Some of them, and Danton in particular,* were not unwilling in concert with the Duke of
* Danton, who is well known to have been an unprincipled, corrupt, and dauntless man, was alternately in communication with all parties, and was employed, if not bribed by the court, to use every means to
impair the popularity of Lafayette and the Constitutionalisis. He received 4000 louis from Montmorin, probably for that purpose. Lafayette, who had ascertained the fact, upbraided Danton with it in one of
the few interviews he had with him, to dissuade him from instigating theo
mob to insults on the Royal Family in 1792. Danton acknowledged the
r eceipt of the money, but called it an indemnity for a place of Avoue,
which he had lost by a decree of the Constituent Assembly. It was
probably on the occasion of that payment, and his subsequent conduct




DUKE OF ORLEANS.                      31
Orleans to save the life of the King, and by a junction with
the Brissotins and moderate Republicans, to put a stop to
the excesses of the populace, provided they could obtain
an oblivion and impunity for all that had hitherto passed.  But Republicans and philosophers were as unreasonablyv- hostile and nearly as blindly improvident wherever
the Duke of Orleans was concerned, as the Royalists
themselves.  Scruples, honorable no  doubt, but highly
unseasonable, and not altogether consistent with their own
conduct before and- during the 10th of August, made the
friends of Roland, Brissot, and Gaudet, levolt at any thing
like coalition with men covered with the blood of their
fellow-citizens, though such a junction was the obvious,
so little in unison with the opinion of those from whom he received it,
that he made the impudent defense imputed to him: "On donne
volontiers 80,000 francs pour une homme comme moi, mais on n'a pas
un homme comme moi pour 80,000 francs."  In the same conversation with Lafayette, he told that General that he was more of a
Royalist than he was, which, as Lafayette observed was not difficult
to be, but no reason for treating Royality with brutality and insult.
The fact, however, is that the more one ascertains of the conduct of
Danton, by far the ablest, though the most corrupt of all the Terrorists of 1792, the more ground one finds for suspecting that he had
some designs, and even some principle, though not favorable to the
monarchy.  He would, no doubt, have preferred fiom obvious and
personal motives (as many honest men would have done for public and
patriotic reasons), *an indirect dynasty in the house of Orleans to a
direct one in that of Louis XVI. or XVII.; all persons who combine
a love of freedom with a sense of the necessity of monarchy, must
acknowledge that in England a Nassau or a Brunswick was preferable
to a Stuart; and that in France a Bonaparte or an Orleans is much
more reconcilable with safe and free government than a prince whose
title is exclusively derived from primogeniture and lineal descent.




32             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and perhaps the solitary, method of preventing the effusion
of more. Danton and his followers, who- had so largely
participated in the crimes of the Terrorists, were compelled to proceed with their associates, when they despaired of obtaining impunity from the triumph of the more
moderate and numerous but less popular party in the Convention.  The Duke of Orleans could not have saved the
King by voting against his death; and he more certainly
than any one man in the assembly would have accelerated
his own by so doing. On the other hand, he was also the
one man in that assembly, on whom, had any counterrevolution occurred, the Royal vengeance would most
unquestionably have fallen without mercy.  Such considerations would not weigh with a Cato, but they were
calculated to shake the constancy of ordinary men. The
Duke of Orleans had, therefore, at least as much excuse
for the vote he gave as the 360 who voted with him; and
those who hold regicide to, be the greatest of possible
crimres, have nevertheless no right to select him  as the
greatest criminal. He was well aware of the peculiarity
of his own situation. Of that I have seen some curious
proofs in a short narrative written by Mrs. Elliott, who
had, I believe, lived with him, and who, on the score of
old acquaintance, prevailed on him to save, through his
garden at Monceaux, and at no small peril to himself, the
younger Chancency,* who was implicated in the affair of
the 10th of August, and who, as was justly observed by
the Duke in his hearing, so far from incurring any risk to
* He took the name of Quintin, together with an estate in Yorkshire; and on the restoration of Louis XVIII. held an office of rankin the Tuileries.




TALLEYRAND.                    33
serve him, would have been among the first to urge his
execution.  He was, to my knowledge, among the last to
relieve the subsequent distresses of his generous benefactress, Mrs. Elliott, or to mitigate the censures with which
it was the fashion in most companies throughout Europe to
visit the name of the Duke of Orleans. That Prince perished soon afterward on the scaffold, and disproved one of
the imputations cast upon him, by the composure with
which he met his fate.*
It was in this visit to Paris in 1791, that I first formed
acquaintance with M. Talleyrand.  I have seen him  in
most of his vicissitudes of fortune; from his conversation
I have derived much of the little knowledge I possess of
the leading characters'in France before and during the
Revolution. He was then still a bishop. He had, I believe, been originally forced into holy orders, in consequence of his lameness, by his family, who, on that account, treated him with an indifference and unkindness
shameful and shocking. He was for some time aumonier
to his uncle, the Archbishop of Rheims; and when Mr.
Pitt-went to that town to learn French, after the peace. of
1782, he lodged him in an apartment in the Abbey of St.
Thierry, where he was then residing with his uncle, and
constantly accompanied him for six weeks, a circumstance
to which, as I have heard M. Talleyrand remark with
some asperity, Mr. Pitt never had the grace to allude
either during his embassy, or his emigration, or in 1794,
when he refused to recall the cruel order by which he was
sent away from England, under the alien bill. Talleyrand
* See Introduction i la Correspondance. Paris, 1800. Page iv.
misprinted vi.
B*




34              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
was initiated into public affairs under M. de Calonne, and
learnt from that lively minister the happy facility of transacting business without effort and without ceremony in the
corner of a drawing-room, or in the recess of a window.
In the exercise of that talent, he equaled the readiness and
surpassed the wit of his model, but he brought to his work
some commodities, which the latter could never supply;
viz., great veracity, discretion, and foresight. He displayed little or no talent for public speaking in the National Assembly.  His reports and papers, especially one
on education, procured him some celebrity, but were, I
suspect, the composition of other men. His abilities were,
however, acknowledged, for they were undeniable, and
his future success foreseen.  Of his joint embassy with
M. Chauvelin, I have spoken elsewhere.  He escaped
from Paris five- days after the 2d of September, with a
passport from  Danton, the grandee of democracy (ce
grand Seigneur de la Sansculotterie, as Garat happily
termed him).  And he acknowledged that the passport
was not only useful to his immediate object, but became
yet more eminently so, when he was anxious to return to
France under the Directory.  It proved he was no emigrant. I had here related the interview between Danton
and Talleyrand, in which the latter had obtained his passport, as I heard it soon after the event from Dumont,~ to
* Dumont, as I have elsewhere remarked, was almost always unobservant and often inaccurate, though honest. My general and long
observation of Talleyrand's veracity in great and small matters makes
me confident his relation is correct. He may, as much or more than
other diplomats, suppress what is true; I am quite satisfied he never
actually says what is false, though he may occasionally imply it.




TALLEYRAND.                   35
whom I thought Talleyrand had told it; but Talleyrand
assured me (in 1830) that the passport did not cost him a
shilling, and that Danton attempted neither to cheat.nor to
bully him; on the contrary, that he was obliging and even
friendly. He gave a very diverting account of the reasons which induced him to be so, and it was manifest from
his manner of recounting the scene that he had written it
down. It forms most probably a passage in his memoirs,
but is in character and complexion very different, and indeed almost the reverse of that which I had heard and
recorded, but have now erased. It is possible that the
circumstances I had attributed to Talleyrand's escape
from  Paris in 1792, had occurred between some other
person and Danton, and that I or my informant had affixed
the wrong name. He lived in England very frugally, in
Kensington-square; he sold his library, and he was on the
point of engaging with a bookseller to publish memoirs in
concert with the ex-President Beaumetz, a gentleman of
some literary acquirements.  They had written a life of
the Duke of Orleans. The facts and remarks were no
doubt chiefly furnished by Talleyrand, but Beaumetz was
said to have contributed the style and method of the
composition. Talleyrand, however, bethought himself of
the possibility of a return to France, and of the disadvantage, to- which a printed work of the kind might expose
him.  Beaumetz consented to suppress the publication,
but the MS. probably remained with Talleyrand. Within
these few years he has spoken to me of his memoirs, and
read portions of them to friends of mine. It is remarkable that the passages and phrases frequently quoted with
praise, are such as relate to the same period as the joint




36                FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
performance of him  and M. Beaumetz in 1793.*  Talleyrand disliked his residence in North America extremely.
A curious paper written or dictated by him in the transactions of the Institute, records his opinion that the United
States must ultimately connect themselves with the country
from  which they sprang, rather than with that to which
they in some measure owe their independence. It is generally thought that he negotiated his return to France
through Madame de Sta6l.  He was on intimate terms
with her, but had abandoned her society for that of Madame Grandt before the peace of 1802. when I saw him
* He has since read some relating to his very early life to me and
Lady Holland and Allen, in which Beaumetz could have no share.
They are admirable in style, as well as in sense. (18'32.)
f "II faut avoir aime Madame de Sta;l pour connoitre-tout le bonheur d'aimer' une b6te," was a saying of his much quoted at Paris at
that time, in explanation of his passion for Madame Grand, who certainly did not win him: or any one else by the fascination of her wit or
conversation. For thirty or forty years, the bon-mots of — M. de Talleyrand were more firequently repeated and more generally admired
than those of any living man. The reason was obvious. Few men
uttered so many, and yet fewer any equally good. By a happy combination of neatness in language and ease and suavity of manner, with
archness and sagacity of thought, his sarcasms assiumed a garb at once
so courtly and so careless, that -they often diverted almost as much as
they could mortify even their immediate objects. His humorous reproof to a gentleman vaunting with self-complacency the extreme
beauty of his mother, and apparently implying that it might account
for advantages in person in' her descendants, is well known: "' C'etait
done," said he, "Monsieur votre pel'e qui n'6tait pas si bien."  The
following is more recent, but the humor of it hardly less arch or less
refined. The celebrity of M. de Chateaubriand, the vainest-ofmortals,
was on the wane. About the same time, it happened to be casually




TALLEYRAND.                     37
again at Paris. It became necessary on the Conclusion of
the Concordat, that he should either revert to the habits
and character of a prelate, or receive a dispensation from
all the duties and obligations of the order.  He chose the
latter.  But Bonaparte,:who affected at that time to restore
great decorum in his consular court, somewhat maliciously
insisted either on the dismissal of Madame Grand or his
public nuptials with that lady. The questionable nature
of her divorce from Mr. Grand created some obstacle to
such a union. It was curious to see Sir Elijah Impey, the
judge who had granted her husband damages in India for
her infidelity, caressed at her little Court at Neuilly. His
testimony was deemed essential, and he was not disposed
to withhold it, because, notwithstanding his denial of riches
in the House of Commons, he was at that very time urging
a claim on the French Government to indemnify him for
his losses in their funds. Mr. (Sir Philip) Francis her
paramour, then at Paris also, did not fail to draw the,attention of Englishmen to the circumstance, though he was
not himself admitted at Neuilly to complete the curious
group with his judicial enemy and quondam mistress.  M.
de Calonne at the same period came to France on the plea
of private affairs; but with equal levity, presumption, and
talent he contrived to ingratiate himself with some of the
most jacobinical ministers of the Consul.  He had -even
concerted a plan with Fouch6 for supplanting Talleyrand
and improving the financial system of Bonaparte.  He introduced me to Fouche, whose countenance, manner, and
mentioned in conversation that Chateaubriand was affected with deafness, and complained bitterly of that infirmity. "Je comprends," said
Talleyrand; "depuis qu'on a cess6 de parler de lui il se croit sourd-"




38               FOREIGN REMIN-ISCENCES.
conversation exhibited at that time the profligacy and ferocity, the energy and restlessness which one might well
expect to find blended in the character of a revolutionist,
and which, though more carefully concealed when he became a courtier, were the chief ingredients in the composition of that vain and unprincipled tool of the Republic, the
Consul, and the Bourbons. Talleyrand baffled his intrigue
with the ex-minister of Louis XVI. The paper on finance
written by Calonne, and delivered by the regicide minister
of police to the Consul, was answered in the next Moniteur
by the Consul himself, and the author, without being actually named, scornfully -designated and bitterly ridiculedand reviled. I heard Talleyrand banter his old friend Calonne on his love of retreat, the night before he was compelled to quit Paris, and when Talleyrand possibly was
aware that the order for his departure was actually signed.*
He was, however, by the clemency of the Consul and the
remembrance of old friendship in Talleyrand, allowed to
return to Paris shortly afterward, and immediately on his
arrival he died of a pleurisy and.a bad physician, to whom
when he could speak no longer, he wrote in pencil these
remarkable words: Tu m'as assassin6, et si tu es honnite
homme, tu renonceras a la medecine pour jamais.  This
* Talleyrand assured me in 1830, that lie did not know of the order
to Calonne to quit Paris till after he had left it; but it is very possible
that he had forgotten so trifling a circumstance; and if he did not, his
expression to Calonne, " comment, Calonne, tu aimes done la retrait?"
which 1 heard, was an odd coincidence. He recollected distinctly
Bonaparte's disgust at Fouch6's protection of Calonne, and his contrasting it with the interest Barthelemy felt and expressed abo-ut Breteuil. "Barthelemy et Breteuil, celt est dans l'ordre- des choses,"
said he, "mais Fouche et Calonne; ah fi done! c'est de l'intrigue."




CALONNE.                    39
agreeable and remarkable man had long ceased to have
any influence on public affairs. He was not only dismissed
from office, and an emigrant from his country, but he was
discarded from the council of the French Princes, to whom
he had unnecessarily sacrificed his own and much of his
wife's fortune before I knew him. I lived much with him
during the last three years of his residence in England.
He is one of the few public men whose character seems to
me to have- been well understood and faithfully drawn by
the writers of the day. Easy, obliging, friendly, sprightly,
and communicative in the intercourse of society, and singularly perspicuous in the statement as well as transaction
of business, he had a levity of character, an imprudence in
conversation and conduct, and I am afraid I must add a
disregard of truth, and not unfrequently an ignorance on
the subjects about which he talked confidently and eloquently, which seemed almost incredible in a person ambitious of acting a part in the affairs of the world, and
actually employed in situations of great importance.
Though exiled before the Revolution, and not insensible to
the ill-treatment he had received from the court, he gallantly and incautiously devoted his time and fortune to the
service of the emigrant Princes. He was commissioned by them to solicit the aid of the various sovereigns
in Europe and particularly of Leopold, who had recently
become Emperor of Germany, and who communicated
through various private and ill-chosen channels with Calonne, traveling under the feigned name of an English
gentleman, at Florence. His private assurances were not
in Calonne's estimation much more encouraging than the
cold, reserved, and ambiguous papers which, during his




40                FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
short reign, issued from  the court of Vienna on the subject
of the French Revolution.  Indeed, according to M. de
Calonne, the royal emigrants had little reason to be satisfied with any of the sovereigns of that period, except the
Kings of Sweden and Prussia,* both of whom  espoused
* The  Mmoires d'un Ioamme d'Etat published at Paris in 1828,
and said to be either written by the Prussian minister Hardenberg,
or made up from papers he had left, agree in many particulars with
the impressions, views, and recollections I have here recorded. I
had written this and other passages relatiiig to the war of Prussia
against France of 1792, before I read the Mgmoires d'un Hrlomme
d'Etat. Of the authenticity of that work I know nothing, but its explanations of events of that day tally singularly with some points of information which I collected from French and Prussian individuals, and
which differ from the common reports of these matters. According to
the author of that work, Gustavus was the only king disposed to. head the
emigrants in a crusade against France, with or without the assistance
of other sovereigns.  Catharine was as earnest in persuading him and
others to undertake it, and Frederick William as sincerely desirous of
engaging his brother sovereigns in the design, without any sinister
views of aggrandizement or dismemberment.  But he was at fiist
cajoled by Leopold, then imperceptibly swayed by his cabinet and generals, and ultimately galled and provoked by the selfish duplicity of
Austria.  Caloine's version of the matter to me did not materially
differ from this. He did not indeed mark the shades between Gustavus and Frederick William, or dwell on the epoch before the death of
the former, when the latter was, from prudence and from deference to
Leopold, comparatively cold to the Princes and emigrants, nor did he
mark so broadly the discrepancy between the secret communication of
the court of Versailles (including the Queen) to the coalesced sovereigns, and those of the Princes and emigrants, as the -author of the
M6moires. But he, in the main, described Leopold as irresolute, selfish, and averse to the cause as well as to the emigrants, and Frederick William as originally earnest, sincere, and disinterested, but afterward a little perverted and much disgusted.




DENMARK AND PRUSSIA.               41
the cause cordially; and from a conviction that it was the
interest of crowned heads to extinguish the revolutionary
principles then prevalent in France. Gustavus III., a man
of more cunning than wisdom, and more ambition than
courage, but not destitute of talents, was soon afterward
murdered. Frederick William, became by a strange fatality of circumstances, the chief deserter and betrayer of
that monarchical confederacy, of which he was originally
the most earnest, and perhaps throughout the least insincere member. I spent the summer and autumn of 1792
in Denmark and Prussia. In both those countries I was
struck with two circumstances in the state of public opinion, which account for many subsequent events in Europe,
though the impression made by those events has obliterated
with many the recollection of former feelings, and produced such changes as may invalidate with posterity
the credibility of my testimony to their existence. - The
first was the universal persuasion that France would be
subdued  the second, the general dissatisfaction and pain
with which the prospect of such success was contemplated by large classes of the people.
Military men, politicians, and all who were styled good
company, treated any resistance to regular German armies
by French' troops, much more by National Guards, raw
levies, volunteers, or peasantry, as an utter impossibility.
The art of war, said they, was reduced to a certainty; the
notion of valor, enthusiasm, or numbers defeating disciplined troops, commanded by an experienced captain like
the Duke of Brunswick, was as chimerical as an attempt
to confute a problem in mathematics by metaphor, fancy,
or ingenuity. Moreover, the moral as well as the scientific




42.            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
superiority of the military powers (for so the German
courts then termed themselves KaT' 5oxypv) over Frenchmen, was equally insisted upon. The battle of Rosbach
was in every mouth. But though such was the expecta7 tion of success, there was not equal joy at the prospect of
it. Many military characters of high name, particularly
in Prussia, deprecated the policy of the war, as tending to
aggrandize Austria; and the people throughout the Protestant countries of the North obviously wished, though they
dared not hope, success to Revolutionary France. Neither
was the great mass of the mercantile and literary world
at much pains to conceal their alarm at the approaching
triumph of royalty, aristocracy, and military authority
over those principles of equality, which in their judgment
tended to promote the industry, improve the faculties, and
better the condition of mankind. Such considerations preserved, for a long period, the little kingdom of Denmark,
under the prudent guidance of the minister Bernstorff, in a
state of perfect neutrality, notwithstanding a childish disposition in the Crown Prince to ape the great King of
Prussia, and notwithstanding the exhortations and menaces
of the various members of the confederacy and the influence which one of them must always possess in the councils of the court of Copenhagen.
The Crown Prince (afterward Frederick VI.), nephew
of our king, was the ostensible head of the government.
The incapacity of his father was acknowledged, and though
he continued to sign the edicts and public instruments, he
was not permitted to take any part in the deliberation
upon them, nor were any of his acts deemed valid, unless
countersigned by his son, whom the council had in truth




KING OF DENMARK.                 43
invested with all the functions of royal authority. In fact
the royal signature was preserved as a medical rather than
political expedient. The object was to humor and soothe
the feelings of the deposed monarch, not to give any validity to acts which, without-reference to such formality, were
recognized by the courts of justice, and obeyed by the
people. When first set aside, he had bitterly wept at being
no longer a king, and adduced as a proof of the misfortune
which had befallen him, that he had no longer any papers
to sign.- To satisfy him, they were afterward offered him
for signature, and he never declined annexing his name to
all that were presented to him, from a fear of losing that,
his sole remaining, but, in his view, distinctive prerogative
of royalty. It happened once or twice,, from some motive
of convenience or accident, that the Crown Prince put his
name to- an instrument, before it was sent to his royal father
for his-signature; the jealous old monarch perceived it, and
when the next paper was brought, he, to the surprise and
consternation of the courtiers, signed "Christian and Conia,"
maliciouslyWobserving,-that he was once sole proprietor of
his firm, but he found it was now a partnership, and would
spare his associates the trouble of adding their names. His
insanity was throughout of a playful rather than a malignant
nature. When it was the policy of the Queen Dowager,
his step-mother; to maintain him in the exercise of his functions, she used to exhibit him at card parties in public. It
is usual in the north of Europe to score with chalk, but
his Majesty on such occasions diverted himself with employing it in a less decorous manner. He would draw the most
obscene figures on the green baize, and wink to the by-standers whenever the Queen Dowager, with an averted face




44             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and affected carelessness, rubbed out the obnoxious representations with her cards, her hands, her hmn:dkerchief, a
napkin, or any thing which she could, with some appearance of absence, pass over them for that purpose. He
continued for many years to dine occasionally in public.
Though the foreign ministers were cautioned neither to
provoke, nor to remark any of his peculiarities, he not unfrequently succeeded in disconcerting them. He would,
for instance, ask them to drink wine, and then throw the
contents of his glass in the face of the page behind him, and
when by this, and the addition of sundry grimaces, gesticulations and antics, he had provoked a smile, he would suddenly assume a grave and solemn countenance, and addressing the minister opposite say, "Monsieur l'envoye parait
fort gai? y a-t-il quelque chose qui l'amuse? —je le prie de
m'en faire part." Such was the innocent nature of the royal
insanity. It is a satire or a commendation on the institution
of monarchy to remark that under this absolute Prince,
whose childishness amounted to imbecility and lunacy, the
commerce, agriculture and prosperity of the kingdom continued to improve, the people were relieved from the ancient feudal burdens which oppressed them, tranquillity was
preserved, justice purely and impartially administered, and
even the foreign policy conducted throughout a period of
unexampled peril and confusion in Europe, in a manner
which, when the insignificant resources of Denmark are
considered, must be acknowledged' to be creditable and
even glorious. Tha't little state of Denmark seems indeed
an exception -to all rules. An arbitrary monarchy established with the consent, nay, at the tumultuous instance of
the people, has continued for more than a century to be




BERNSTORFF.                    45
administered with prudence, wisdom, and moderation.
During a large portion of that time, her prime ministers
have been selected from one and the same family, not only
of foreign birth and extraction, but never identified in interest with the nation they governed, by the purchase or inheritance of any land within its territories. The Bernstorffs
were all Germans, and their estates as well as their purchases were all in Germany. The actual representative of
the family,  himself for some time minister in Denmark,
has returned: to his native country, and presides over foreign affairs at'Berlin. His uncle was in office when I was
in Copenhagen. He was a man of enlightened understanding, agreeable manners,, and benevolent -disposition.
If the language of the diplomatic corps at that court and
at Hamburgh and Berlin in 1792, corresponded with the
real sentiments of their respective governments, the neutral
as well as the belligerent Powers of Europe had as little
pretension to the praise of moderation in views, scruple in
their means, or humanity in their feelings as the French
Revolutionists; and the expression of their principles was
always as unqualified and not unfrequently as coarse, vulgar, and unmannerly as that of the Sansculotte demagogues
at Paris. Count Bernstorff, indeed, never sanctioned or
encouraged any of the extravagant professions of what was
called loyalty and regular government at that period. That
prudence preserved the dignity of his character, and spared
him many mortifications.  Whenever policy or necessity
brought him in contact with the ministers and agents of
the various governments of France, he had neither to retract, explain, nor deny any opinion that he had privately
* 1826.




46             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
or publicly expressed, a humiliation to which almost every
prince or public man throughout Europe was exposed and
submitted, in the course of the ensuing twenty years, thus
betraying a pliancy of principle, for which history will
withhold from their excesses in prosperity the honorable.excuse of fanaticism, and from their sufferings in adversity
the grace. and dignity of- martyrdom. In continuance of
the singular contrast subsisting between the results and the
ingredients of the Danish monarchy, their affairs have been
very prosperously conducted under their present king,
Frederick VI., then Crown Prince. Yet, he was and is
a- person of mediocrity, with few natural advantages, and
generally more known for weaknesses, such as drunkenness
and vanity, than distinguished for any qualifications of a
commanding nature. One anecdote, if true, would seem
to prove that he was not devoid of shrewd observation and
sly humor. He was at Vienna during the Congress of 1814.
Wherever in the treaties there negotiated there had been
a fresh distribution of territories, and in the German and
adjoining States there had been many, the value of each
cession respectively was estimated by the number of inhabitants, and in diplomatic language the cession was' described as that of so many souls, or ames. Now there was
no accession of territory to Denmark, but, on the contrary,
some small diminution. The King was much courted
during the negotiations, and treated with friendly cordiality and personal friendship by the Emperor of Austria.
That high personage, on his taking leave, complimented
him most warmly on his attainments and good conduct, and
the golden'opinion they had acquired.  "Pendant votre
s6jour ici (said he), votre Majeste a'gagne tous les cceurs."




PRUSSIAN COURT.                 47
"Mais pas une seule ame," replied somewhat causticly
the ill-requited sovereign of a well-governed people. Till
then he was never suspected of being alive to the mortifications he had received, and still less of being capable of
recording his sense of them, by so smart and well-merited
a repartee.
As the King of Prussian and his sons were with the
army, I saw nothing of the court, and little of the leading
men at: Berlin, in 1791. Alversleben and the other mlinisters were mere ciphers, or,' at the best, such men of
form and business as are the "common growth of courts."
General Moellendorf, at whose table I dined once or twice,
was remarkable for his personal appearance, which was
that of a frank, bold, and athletic veteran, for being one of
the most distinguished captains of the Great Frederick's
school, and for his undisguised disapprobation of the war
with France. He was the pattern of an old German general; and his dinner, which lasted many hours, a specimen
of the old-fashioned banquets of that country. The Queen
Dowager, widow of Frederick, was superannuated and -unintelligible; and the reigning Queen who mistook me for
Lord Holderness, and asked me if I had not accompanied
the Princess MIary to Hesse Castle in 1746, was nearly
crazy. The courts of Princess Henry and Prince Ferdinand at Bellevue alone contributed to the society of the
place. The Princess Henry was a stiff, uninteresting, but
hospitable personage, who lived separate from her husband, and received in a stately formal manner natives and
foreigners twice during the week.  The etiquette established by Frederick, in consequence of some uncourtly
* Frederick William II.




487            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
repartees from foreign ministers, and, I believe, from Mr.
Hugh Elliot in particular, was still in full force; and, wheneve-r a royal personage sat down to table, all the diplomatic
corps were obliged to retire. The exclusion did not extend to foreigners who had -no employment: it was rather
a whimsical exhibition to observe our minister, and other
diplomats, start like guilty things, and withdraw, as the
organ in the German clock of her Royal Highness's apartment began to summon us with a tune to supper, at eleven.
Prince Henry was at that time at Rheinsberg; where,
some years afterward, I visited him with my family. His
aversion to the war was attributed to predilection for
France and Frenchmen, and to rivalry and jealousy of the
Duke of Brunswick,. to whom the command of the army
had been intrusted by the King. He was so partial to
everything French, that he had not only a troop of French
comedians in his palace, but studiously confined his reading and his conversation to that language. Indeed, he had
either forgotten his native tongue so entirely,-'or affected
to speak it so -ill, that, when with unexpected condescension he directed the postillions by what road to drive me
to Potsdam, they actually-laughed in his face at his defective and foreign pronunciation of the words. But his many
private peculiarities, as well as his military and political
actions, are recorded in various histories and memoirs,
and his character is admirably, though somewhat roughly
drawn, in the celebrated letters of Mirabeau, from Berlin.
He was the ablest- of the three brothers-of Frederick; and,
if inferior to him in the field and in the cabinet, was less
forgetful of his friends, less unforgiving to his enemies, and
in all respects less selfish and unfeeling than that extraor



PRINCE HENRY OF PRUSSIA.              49
dinary but unprincipled man. He had been deeply affected at the treatment of his brother Augustus;* he told me
that he had at one time recorded the truth in his memoirs,
and vindicated the memory of that prince by exposing
the cruelty and injustice of the King; but that the latter,
having either suspected or ascertained his intentions, had
adroitly sealed his mouth, and compelled him to suppress
the passage, by extolling him (Prince Henry), in his "History of the -Seven Years' War," so warmly, and' so much
beyond his deserts, that he should incur the imputation of
the basest ingratitude if he left any memorial of the weakness or Wickedness of his encomiast behind him.  He
raised, however, a monument in his garden, with a long
inscription, to the honor of his less fortunate brother, and
he had the spirit to open and to illuminate it on the festival
which he gave on the occasion of the King's visit to
Rheinsberg.  He left his opinions on the war of 1792 to
be inferred from the language held at Bellevue, the villa of
his brother, Prince Ferdinand. There the campaign was
very freely canvassed, the French generals extolled, and
the conduct even of the Convention, the clubs, and the
Jacobins not unfrequently palliated. The daughter of that
house, Pirincess Louisa (afterward Princess Radzivil), was
a remarkable person: according to rumor, she had been
educated with the hopes of marrying the Prince of Wales.
She had unquestionably studied with success the language
and usages of England. It is said that George III. object* Called, I think, Prince Royal, and father of Frederick William
II. He is supposed to -have died of a broken heart after the battle of
Kolin, in consequence of the cold reception and the unqualified censures with which the King resented his failure in that campaign.
C




50             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
ed to any union with that branch of the house of Brandenburgh, with an observation drawn from the scandalous
chronicle of Berlin, viz., that none of his children should
ally themselves " with the children of Schmettau."'* Frederick, when there was not much prospect of an heir in the
other branches, had placed a distinguished officer of engineers of that name in the family of his brother Ferdinand, in the hope and expectation, and, perhaps, with the
express injunction, that he would supply all deficiencies in
the household. The- Princess, though lofty and decorous
in her demeanor, was not long insensible to the personal
and mental charms of her chamberlain; and Schmettau
annually announced the birth of a prince, and received
some handsome presents for the good news; till, on the
third visit, according to Mirabeau, the King, after giving him
a gold-headed cane, -called him back and said, "Schmettau, trois! c'est assez."  Such anecdotes, very currently
related, raised a smile every where else, but serious scruples in the mind of George III. Had he, however, been
as consistent in them as in most others, he would have objected to another alliance of his family with the house of
Brandenburgh.  The exiled and divorced Queen of Prussiat is much belied, if, on the marriage of her daughter
with the Duke of York, she did not observe to the chamberlain who announced it, that it was a good match enough
for the daughter of Muiller the musician, one whom she
was accused of admitting to criminal familiarities.  Her
* Aux elfans de Schmettau.
t I should have said wife of Frederick William, for I believe he
had divorced her, and ~married again, before he succeeded to the
Crown.




DUCHESS OF YORK.                 51
husband himself, at one time sanctioned the conjecture.
With the view of debauching the young Princess, his reputed daughter, he endeavored, but in vain, to lessen her
abhorrence of any compliance with-his passion, by depriving it of the aggravation of incest, and disclaiming all pretensions of being her father. Such disgusting profligacy
should seldom be recorded: I would not defile this narrative with such impurities if I did not know, from the best
authority, that what I relate is true; and if I did not think
it useful and right to expose the state of manners in those
German courts, which, with an hypocrisy as revolting as
their vices, alleged a dread of the subversion of religion
and morality to be the chief motive of their aggression on
revolutionary and republican France. Justice, as well as
sincere respect for the memory of a most amiable woman,
calls upon me to add that, to the best of my belief, the
Princess, whose name is mixed- up in this disgusting story,
was entirely free from all reproach on that occasion. An
education in such a court as Berlin was not likely to produce, and probably- did not produce, any great austerity
of principle; but the Duchess of York was certainly distinguished through life for the gentleness and frankness of
her disposition, the soundness of her judgment, the constancy and generosity of her attachments to her family,
*her friends, and her dependents. Her understanding was
far superior to the illusions which a station such as hers
generally creates.  She made, indeed, no ostentation of
her philosophy, but she silently exerted it, not only in the
regulation of her own conduct, but in softening and concealing both the political and private errors of those with
whom she was connected. Had her husband lived to be




52              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
king, the country, as  well as he, would have seen fresh
reasons for regretting her untimely end. As Duchess of
York, her unobtrusive, character concealed many of her
good and shining qualities from the eye of the public. A
disdain of popularity in high rank, combined with endowments to command it, has, at least, the merit of-rarity and
self-denial; and I trust it is a pardonable digression in
these notes to bear testimony* to-the virtues of one who
from that motive, or fiom the still more laudable feelings
of tenderness for others, forebore, during her lifetime, to
draw upon the public for her due share of gratitude and
applause.
To return: I have seen, but never was presented to her
father, Frederick William II. However irregular in morals, he was not devoid of superstition.  In 1792. he was
much under the influence of a sect then famous in Germany, and called the Illumines.  Of that association of
visionaries and impostors, his favorite, Mr. Bischoffswerder,
was a member; and he is much belied if he did not resort
to conjuration and apparitions, for the purpose of converting the King to his views of policy, which'were very
versatile and changeable, and not unfrequently as mysterious and unintelligible as his belief in necromacy, magic,
and an immaterial world. Some odious and many ludicrous
instances of the delusions practiced to engage the King in
the war,-and nearly as many of similar artifices to wean
him-from the prosecution of it, were circulated and credit* Lord Lauderdale was requested by the IDuke of York to supply
an epitaph for her monument. He applied to me, and I believe the
lines I wrote are engraved on the tablet in Weybridge or Walton
Church, erected to her memory.




THE ILLUMINIES.                 53
ed throughout Europe. Many, no doubt, were invented;
and most, in all likelihood, considerably heightened by public report; but there could hardly be so much exaggeration without some truth, and the notorious prevalence of
such superstitions in all the courts of Germany rendered
the stories probable enough, though I neither recollect the
details, nor have examined the authorities on which they
rested, sufficiently to justify my recording them as facts.
Some years afterward it became a fashion or an artifice
among the servile apologists of tyranny, to connect the
sect of Illumines, and all their ramifications,_ first with freemasonry, and afterward with the disorganizing and irreligious principles of the revolutionary clubs in France. I
believe -they were entirely distinct in their origin, their
objects, and their progress.  It is, at least, whimsical, that
the only known practical result of such visionary practices
on the events of the political world, was to prevail on many
petty, and one important court of Germany, to inflict the
calamities of war on mankind, for the purpose of rescuing
the institutions of monarchy, popery, and nobility from
destruction. If the.more recent secret societies of Tugenbund in Germany, and Carbonari in Italy, really sprang
out of them (a supposition in itself highly questionable),
even those associationis were formed in an anti-Gallican
spirit, and contrived for the purpose of resisting the power
of Napoleon, in the two quarters of Europe which beCame the theatres of their machinations.
In 1793 I visited Madrid, and my subsequent travels, as
well as some accidental circumstances, have made me better
acquainted with the events and characters connected with
that court than with those of any other on the Continent.




54             FOREI(N REMINISCENCES.
Florida Blanca was not only dismissed and exiled, but
so strictly confined in the citadel of Pampeluna, that I was
not allowed to transmit a common letter of introduction to
him from Lord Lansdown, when I passed through that
town in 1793. He declined seeing me at Murcia in 1803,
and after some correspondence with him on the revolution
of 1808, at which period he became President of the Central Junta, I arrived too late to see him at Seville, where
he died early in 1809. He had been originally promoted
from the Embassy at Rome to be Prime Minrister, by
Charles III., probably at the recommendation of his predecessor; for it was a maxim of that methodical and
tenacious Prince to give his ministers, on their dismissal,
retirement, or death, the nomination of-their successors.
Florida Blanca or Mofiino had the merits of his early profession,: the law-application, accuracy, and perseverance
in business. He improved some branches of the administration, and in foreign negotiations showed- both zeal and
spirit, combined with an adequate knowledge of the real
interests of his country. He had, moreover, the dexterity
to evade, and on occasions even to resist that formidable
power the Church, without provoking its resentment or
scandalizing its fanatical adherents. On the other hand,
he was harsh, vindictive, and unjust, very jealous of his
power, and mischievously active in extending ministerial
authority at the expense and in defiance of the few remaining institutions of the state; all of which he endeavored to humiliate and corrupt. He strove to convert the
grandees into mere appendages to the pageantry of the
court, the magistrates into servile instruments of the minister of the day. He succeeded but too well. Charles




FLORIDA BLANCA.                   55
III. enjoined his son to continue him in office, and Charles
IV. considered the injunction as sacred.  It required time
and intrigue to conquer his repugnance to any change.
Perhaps his scruples would never have yielded, but for an
accident which gave to the resolution the appearance, and
indeed the reality of an act of justice arising out of virtuous indignation at misconduct. Florida Blanca had instigated a prosecution for a libel against a certain Marquis
of Mancas, employed formerly as Spanish envoy at Copenhagen. In his eagerness to procure a sentence against
him, he had the imprudence to dictate it in a letter to the
President or acting President of the Council of Castile,
whom he knew to be subservient to his designs.  While
the courier was on his way from the Escurial to Madrid,
the President died of an apoplexy.  The letter being
directed to the title of office, not to the name of the individual, was delivered to and opened by the next in succession,* to whom  the duty of presiding in the court had
devolved. He happened to be either an upright magistrate, or a man devoted to the party already formed against
the prime minister. He accordingly dispatched a copy of
the letter to the King, who, justly incensed at so indecent
an interference with the course of justice, and urged no
doubt by the Queen, overcame all scruples of breaking his
promise to his father, and first removed and then banished
* The story as here related was told me at Burgos in 1804, by
Mancas, and has been confirmed to me by others. I had inserted it as
a preliminary note to Florida Blanca's statement of his administration
in MS., which I lent to Mr. Cox; and that complier printed my note,
without asking my permission, together with the papers of the minis —
ter, in his History of the House of Bourbon, in Spain.




56             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and imprisoned the premtier. The motives of the Queen were
not so pure as those professed by her party, and really acted upon by her husband, her amorous constitution had been
well known to the old king. It could be no secret to his
Minister. Charles III. used to smile at the simplicity of
his son, who is said frequently to have remarked to him
that princes were exempt from the lot to which too many
husbands were exposed; first, because their wives were
more strictly educated than private women; and, secondly,
because, if viciously inclined, they could seldom find any
royal personages with whom they could indulge such evil
propensities. To such remarks the old man would suddenly but archly reply by bantering the prince* on his simplicity, or by muttering a favorite maxim of his own,t by
no means complimentary to the chastity of the fair sex.
Among the lovers of the Princess of the Asturias, whom
Charles III. had from time to time removed from the court,
was a young Garde du Corps of the name of Godoy, a
native of Badajoz.  His younger brother, Don Manuel,
was in the same service, and undertook to convey the love
letters of his exiled brother to his royal mistress. But her
passion was not of a character to be long satisfied with
expressions of tenderness from an absent lover. Don Manuel perhaps thought that he should promote the interests of
his brother; as he unquestionably did his own, more effectually, by imitating his example than obeying his injunctions. In short, he supplanted him in the affections of his
mistress, and at the accession of her husband to the throne
was known at court to be her established lover. Count
Florida Blanca had too much sagacity not to discover the
* Carlos, Carlos que tonto, que eres.   f Todas, si todas son patas.




GODOY.                     57
character of the young favorite.  He perceived, with
much chagrin, that mere honors and distinctions would not
satisfy him:, that he aimed at a share at least of political
power. But the old minister was too jealous to yield even
to the obvious policy of admitting any partner in that concern.  He -had such plausible grounds in the extreme
ignorance as well as inferior rank of his youthful candidate for office, that he could not but succeed for a time in
excluding him from a seat in Council. The ruin, therefore, of Florida Blanca became necessary to the advancement of Godoy. Hence the eagerness of the Queen to
accumulate charges against him, and to lay the catalogue
of his offenses before the eyes of the King. She did not,
however, venture to elevate Godoy at once to the highest
situation in the state. The Marquis of Aranda, an Arragonese Grandee, was designated, by his reputation and the
choice of the King, as the natural successor of an experienced prime minister. It was, however, suspected that he, on
this occasion, stooped to purchase the nomination by promising to discover in the young Garde du Corps great aptitude for political affairs, and to recommend him to a high
place in the councils of his sovereign. Under his auspices,
Godoy was introduced into the cabinet. Aranda was in
real character an Arragonese, stiff, unbending, and sarcastic; in politics a Frenchman, attached from habit and conviction to a strict alliance between the two countries; in
principle a modern philosopher, well read in Voltaire,
d'Alembert, and Helvetius; jealous of the Church, inveterate against the Jesuits, who had been suppressed during
his first ministry, and not insensible to the somewhat exaggerated praises lavished upon him for that measure by




58  -          FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
those who had rendered infidelity fashionable in Paris,
and afterward connected it in some degree with the cause
of the French Revolution.  In spite, therefore, of his
attachment to the House of Bourbon and his intimacy with
good company at Paris, he was less disposed to an antirevolutionary confederacy than almost any European minister, and certainly than any in the service of a court connected by ties of blood with that of Versailles. Godoy, in
quest of an opportunity for making his importance felt by
differing with the premier, perceived that the instances
of foreign powers, the increasing excesses of the French
democracy, and the national as well as religious feelings
of the Spaniards, would soon make war inevitable. He
recommended it in council, and thus ingratiated himself
with a powerful and increasing party. It is said that
Aranda, heedless of consequences, and forgetful of the
policy which had induced him to acquiesce in the young
favorite's advancement, could not contain his surprise at
his venturing to differ on such topics, and treated both the
advice and adviser with utter scorn and contempt. If so,
he very much miscalculated his strength.- His pacific
system, however reasonable, was easily overthrown. The
fears of th'; great, and the fanaticism of the vulgar, applauded the new councilor for questioning its propriety.
Friend and foe combined.to render it impracticable. The
execution of Louis XVI. seemed to justify and even to
popularize a declaration of war, and English, German, and
emigrant influence was exerted to procure the dismissal of
Aranda. He was accordingly removed, or, as the Spanish
phrase is, indulged or regaled* with his retirement.  The
* Jubilado.




ARANDA.-O'REILLY.                   59
gentleness of his fall seemed to imply that Godoy, now
Duke of Alcudia, was not altogether unmindful of his good
offices, that he was more presumptuous and aspiring than
vindictive or ungrateful in his nature. Aranda lost neither
rank nor emolument by his dismissal; but he had impaired
the dignity and lessened the -weight of his character by
this second short-lived administration, which in truth only
paved the way for an obnoxious upstart and favorite.
Although I visited the lines at Yrun and St. Jean de
Luz, I know little of the events of the war, and less of
the Spanish generals who commanded.  Ricardos- was
reckoned an accomplished officer, the'Count de la Union
a young man of spirit and:enterprise.   General Caro,
whom  I did know, was a rough, bold veteran, whose
notions of war were borrowed, I suspect, from the bullfights, the theatre of the exploits of his youth.  O'Reilly
was once named General-in-chief, but died (some idly said
of poison) in his way to the command.  When a young
Irisht adventurer, and ensign in the Spanish service, he
saved his life in a battle in Italy, by persuading the dragoon who had struck him down, and was about to dispatch him, that he was the Duke of Arcos, the commander of the Spanish forces.  He gained the favor of
* His family name was Richards; he was of English or Irish
extraction, and in the line, if I am not mistaken, of a baronetcy.
f Any one conversant with the modern military history of Spain,
or with good society in that country, must be struck with the large
proportion of their eminent officers who were either born or descended from those who were born in Ireland. The comment which that
circumstance furnishes upon our exclusive and intolerant laws, is obvious enough.




60             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
the court he served by rejecting, when prisoner, all the
offers of Laudon to engage him, in the Imperial service.
His exploits at Algiers were not brilliant, and those in
Louisiana were said to have done little credit to his
humanity. As governor. of Cadiz, he displayed great activity, vigor, and sagacity, and obtained a high reputation
for political wisdom and courage. This and the favor of
Charles III., who was wont to praise him for having, 1like
a large elm which stood inconveniently in the middle of
the road at Aranjuez, but which he would never allow to
be felled, no friend but himself, procured for him twice
the appointment of Prime Minister. In both instances the
nomination was recalled, and another substituted, before
he could arrive at Madrid. His death, on the way to the
command of an army, seemed to complete the fatality
attending the attainment of all his objects of ambition.
He was quick, coarse, and shrewd; thoroughly acquainted
with the court and people with whom he had to deal, and
of parts and courage to avail himself of his knowledge;
but he was not exempt from those failings in taste'and
judgment which are so often objected to his countrymen,
and which not unfrequently mar the fortunes of men,
otherwise best qualified to succeed in the race for power
and distinction. The triumph of the Spaniards in Roussillon was short-lived. The French became the invaders in
the beginning of 1794, and although the abhorrence of
infidelity was in full force throughout Spain, and the adjoining province of Catalonia distinguished for anti-Gallican as well as military spirit, yet the French had great
prospects of success from the jealousy subsisting between
the Catalans and the regular forces, from the imperfect




FRENCH INVASION OF SPAIN.            61
equipment and irregular pay of the troops, from  the
dearth of military talent in the Spanish officers, and from
the propensity to intrigue and cabal in the councils of
Charles IV.  The danger grew manifest, and the war
unpopular.  The Catalans offered to defend their fortresses and frontiers-at their own expense, but annexed
two conditions: first, of naming their own officers; second, of the removal of all Castilian as well as emigrant
troops from the principality. Such a hint that the means
of defense were only to be purchased by a surrender of
some -portion of authority, was well calculated to check
the martial ardor- of an enervated court. It contributed
to dispose the favorite to a peace with the Republic of
France, now  rendered a shade less obnoxious bv the
downfall of Robespierre, and the triumph of a party more
equivocal in its principles, but less revolting and sanguinary in its conduct.  The revolution in France of July,
1794, better known by the name of the 9th of Thermidor,
and the softened tone of the succeeding governments, had,
in the course of a year, together with the military triumphs
of the revolutionary armies, reconciled or compelled some
powers to sue for peace and court the alliance of the Republic. The Great Duke of Tuscany, at the suggestion of
Manfredini (an enlightened pupil of the Emperor Joseph's
school),. who was his preceptor, favorite, and chamberlain,
concluded a treaty with France in February, 1P795., The
King of Prussia followed that example before the summer
was over. Spain had equal motives and greater means
of appeasing the hostility of the fierce democracy.  Her
provinces were defenseless, but she had colonies and
money wherewith to ransom them. That favorite French




62            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
object-a strict union with Spain, or, to speak more correctly, a feverish dread of any permanent alliance between Spain and England-had devolved from the Bourbons to the Demagogues. One of the leaders who had
signalized himself in the overthrow of Robespierre was
likely, through the same propitious influence which had
animated his exertions on that memorable occasion, to
lend a favorable ear to any overture from Spain.  The
lady who bestowed her hand upon Tallien, as the incentive or reward of his glorious conduct on the 9th of
Thermidor,,and who, if she had some of the frailties, had
all the generosity and gentleness, with a double portion of
the beauty and grace which distinguished her countrywomen, was a Spaniard by birth. The noble use which
she made of the influence which her exquisite beauty so
naturally commanded, should have rescued her from that
neglect in which the hypocrisy of the Consular and Imperial, and the ingratitude of the Bourbon governments
have left her for years. She was the daughter of Cabarrus, a -French merchant, whose adventurous spirit and
talents procured him some of the honors and more of the
vicissitudes of a statesman in Spain. He had planned and
founded the Bank of San Carlos, connected himself with
many leading characters in the country, and was banished
and confined on the suppression or failure of that establishment. He was subsequently removed to Madrid, where he
was still under arrest when, at the instance of the Countess of Galvez, the Duke of Alcudia employed him to convey an overture to the Republic by means of the correspondence which subsisted between him and his daughter,
Madame Tallien. He acquitted himself so well of that




PRINCE OF THE PEACE.               63
and subsequent commissions, that the Spanish Ministry
admitted his contested claims on the State, and liquidated
them  to the amount of 6,000,000 of reals. He was no
doubt consulted on the terms of the peace, and his daughter contributed to the completion of the treaty (a work
well suited to her gentle mind), which was signed, to the
surprise of the Austrian and English Governments, on the
22d of July, 1795, at Basle in Switzerland. Popular applauses and court honors lavished on Godoy for this-treaty
made ample amends for the remonstrances of the allies
with which he was harassed, and the invectives of the English press by which he was-assailed. He was created
Prince of the Peace. The vocabulary of titles was exhausted to express the favor of the court, and privileges of
a new and ludicrous nature were invented to mark the
sense entertained by his Sovereign of his wisdom and
success. As a specimen may be selected, the right of
bearing an image of Janus before him on all solemn occasions-an emblem, says the patent, of his knowledge and
foresight, which, like that false divinity, reflects on the
past by regarding what is behind him; and provides
for the future by surveying equally all that is -before
him. He seemed, however, at that time desirous of deserving the unparalleled honors he had -attained, for he
endeavored to confer some, benefits on the community
from which he derived them. At least his administration, from  the conclusion of the treaty of Basle to the
temporary decline of his favor in 1798, showed, notwithstanding the bad policy and worse conduct of a war
with England, more disposition to reform abuses and to
improve the condition of the people of Spain, and; above




64             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
all, to reward, encourage, and promote every kind of useful talent, than is discernible in any other epoch of his long
possession of power. Possibly, some occurrences at court
reminded him that his tenure of authority was precarious,
and that his mistress was neither from his example nor
her own nature likely to prove a model of fidelity. Such
apprehensions might induce him to court popularity, to
gain partisans, and to build his power, if possible, on more
honorable and solid foundations. Symptoms of jealousy
were remarked at a very early period; but the Queen had
taken such pains to ingratiate her lover with the King,
that she then and at many subsequent periods found it difficult to impair, much more to destroy, the work of her own
contrivance.  Through their mysterious connection, the
ascendency of Godoy over the mind of the King seemed as
strong as that he had assumed over his mistress. Yet his
amours, which exasperated the latter as infidelities, might,
he well knew, be employed to shake the confidence of
Charles, who had -been taught to revere the austerity of
his morals as much as to admire the extent of his capacity.
It has, indeed, been asserted that his marriage with the,
daughter of the Infant Don Louis originated in a malicious
trait of jealousy of the Queen. The story goes, that she
brought the King unexpectedly to the apartment of the
favorite, and: surprised him when supping tMte-&-tWte with
Mademoiselle Tudo, a lady of extraordinary beauty~ to
whom he was clandestinely married, though some say by
* She was daughter of an artillery officer of some merit, and had
come with her mother, a widow, to solicit a pension at St. Ildefonso,
where she was introduced by the Baylio Valdez, Minister of Marine,
to the Duke of Alcudia.




PRINCE OF THE PEACE.-TUDO.             65
a contract which the laws would consider as invalid; that
the King was partly shocked and partly diverted at the
discovery; that he shortly afterward, at the suggestion of
the Queen, with a view of providing,- without the peril of
a deadly sin, for the incontinence of his favorite, insisted
on matrimony, and condescended to offer his young and
recently acknowledged cousin for a bride; that the Prince
of the Peace, not daring to acknowledge his union with the
Tudo, and still less to decline the royal alliance- without
alleging some such insurmountable bar, prevailed on the
wife of his affections to suppress the truth, and allowed
Charles, in his zeal to rescue him from more venial and
ordinary vices, to involve him in the heinous and troublesome sin of bigamy. I do not vouch for the truth of the
tale. Well-informed persons believed it, and related it to
me. It is certain that the ostensible marriage with the
Princess, which took place in 1797,' never interrupted his
connection with the Tudo. During his prosperity, she was
generally lodged in a royal palace or in an adjoining apartment. After his exile and adversity, she followed him to
Rome, and has been always treated by him, his friends,
and even the Royal Family, as a personage in some sort
legitimately entitled to the society, tenderness, and protection of the Prince of the Peace. His more splendid alliance did not render him more secure of the countenance
of favor at court, or less disposed to seek for such assistance as talents in office, and an enlightened government
could bestow. He consulted M. Cabarrus on the formation
of a new Ministry nearly at the epoch of his nuptials, and
that judicious and well-informed friend recommended the
Span' ards best qualified to discharge the trust with credit




66              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
to his choice and benefit to the country.  Such were Don
Francisco Saavedra, and Don Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos.  The first, with whom I was afterward slightly acquainted at Seville,* had filled high offices in the colonies,
and enjoyed at: home and abroad great reputation for abilities and integrity.  The French always took a particular
interest in his fate, though his principles led him to concur
in the national resistance to the government which Napoleon endeavored in 1808 to impose upon Spain.
Jovellanos, whom I knew more intimately, and respected most sincerely, was an Asturian of good family, ed-ucated at the Colegios Mayores, patronized, if I mistake not,
by his countryman Campomanes, and distinguished at an
early period of life for his literary productions in verse
and prose, his taste in the arts, his proficiency in the law,
and his extensive knowledge in all branches of political
economy.  Great as were his intellectual endowments, his
moral qualities were in unison with them. The purity of
his taste was of a piece with that of his mind, and the
correctness of his language a picture of his well-regulated
life. In the persuasive smoothness of his eloquence, and
the mild dignity of his demeanor, one seemed to read the
serenity of his temper, and the elevation of his character.
Erant mores qualis facundia.   He had filled' offices in
the magistracy, and sometimes as a reward, sometimes as a
* In 1810. When in 1803, I~ asked General Beurnonville at
Madrid to use his interest in mitigating the imprisonment of Jovellanos, he told me that'he had instructions from his court to exert all
he had in favor of Saavedra, in the filrst instance; and that until he
was liberated, he did not conceive himself authorized in making any
application for his fellow-sufferer.




THE PRINCE OF THE PEACE.-JOVELLANOS.       67
contrivance for removing him, the superintendence of public institutions in the provinces had been confided to his
care. He discharged these various duties with great zeal
and intelligence, and had in all given general satisfaction;
for the complacency with which he contemplated the success of a member of his family, a student of his college, or
a native of his province, never degenerated into partiality.
It was a proof of the amiable affections of his nature,
which disposed him to rejoice at the merit and reward of
such as he was directly or remotely connected with. If
such feelings ever biased his choice of a public servant,
interest certainly never had that effect. He offended the
Queen by -his uncourtly austerity on such points.  His
refusal to promote her creatures passed with her for intolerable rudeness; and when he asked in what school some
ignorant man whom she recommended for the magistracy,
had acquired the elements of his profession, she tartly answered, "In the same college where you studied politeness."'The sarcasm  was unmerited.  None could reproach Jovellanos with want of urbanity or courtesy but
such as exacted under those names an obsequiousness in
manner and a subserviency in action to which no -honorable nature will submit.  He has been somewhat more
plausibly accused of overstrained scruples and ill-timed
remonstrances on the licentious conduct of the Prince of
the Peace. He has even been taxed with ingratitude, for
not protecting from the displeasure of the court a man to
whose interference he, in some measure, owed his elevation in it. He no doubt saw the influence of the favorite
decline with some indifference,  Perhaps he was more
observant of the private vices which lowered the charac



6fi8           FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
ier of his government, than mindful of that capricious exertion of public virtue which had raised'him arid Saavedra
to a seat in it. But he was never suspected of accelerating what was then considered as the fall of the favorite, nor did it depend on him to prevent it. He did not
sacrifice his place, or his hopes of doing his country some
service, to one to whom he had some obligations, but for
whom he could not feel much respect. Such is the sum
and front of his offending, even if the facts alleged, which
are disputable, were granted.  It was natural for the
Prince of the Peace to resent his neglect, but the offense,
consisting entirely of omissions, was surely not of a magnitude to justify, to palliate, or even to account for, the
persecutions to which Jovellanos was exposed on the
return of the Prince to power. As it must be acknowledged that the Prince was seldom guilty of any act approaching to cruelty, I am inclined to attribute the imprisonment of Jovellanos in Majorca, and the contumely and
insult to which he was there subjected, chiefly to the
Queen..Saavedra told his friend, when they -were once
more united in the councils of their country at Seville, in
1809, that the Queen was unaccountably persuaded that
he (Jovellanos) was the author or the patron of an obscene libel printed at Paris and quite unknown to him
which was entitled Les trois Reines, and contained a slanderous description of the private and political vices of the
Queens of France, Naples, and Spain. She hardly concealed her aversion to him,~ even while he was Minister.
in truth, the purity of his private life was not likely to
reconcile her to the inflexibility of his public principles.
He-was, if not in creed, in character and political austerity,




THE PRINCE  OF THE PEACE.-MALLO.        o9
a Jansenist, and connected with many of that sect, who,
in Spain, as in other Roman Catholic countries, have
always been found the least corruptible and most consistent party in the state.  What were the causes of that
estrangement between the Prince of the Peace and the
Queen may not be easy to ascertain. The effects became
obvious early in 1798.  There were good grounds for
jealousy on both sides.  The Prince, after his marriage
with the Princess, still remained attached to the- Tudo, as
the wife of his choice was called; and the Queen, before
his separation from the court, had become enamored -of an
officer of the name of Mallo, whose gallantry, to use the
most delicate term, had nothing:moral or intellectual to
recommend it.  She is said to have lavished sums of
money on her new favorite. A story was current at Madrid which, if true, would at once prove that the Prince of
the Peace was aware of her infidelities to him, and disposed to revenge himself in a way no woman could easily
submit to or forgive. The King, the Queen, and the
Prince of the Peace, said this tale, were at a window in
the palace of Aranjuez, when Mallo drove by in his curricle.  Charles IV.- expressed some surprise at a young
officer of low rank and narrow fortune possessing so brilliant an equipage; on which the Prince assured his Majesty that it was easily, though somewhat ludicrously, to be
accounted for. "An old, rich, and toothless woman" (for
he knew the Queen had a set of teeth from Paris)-" had
fallen madly in love with that Mallo, and she furnished
him with many equipages, horses, and- every luxury in
which he had a mind to indulge."  Charles laughed immoderately at the storv, and whenever the name of the




70             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
gallant occurred, was eager to circulate the amusing piece
of scandal, which- diverted him exceedingly, but he little
knew or suspected concerned him and his so nearly.
The anecdote is, perhaps, too dramatic to deserve implicit
credit.- It was believed by many well-informed persons,
and I repeat it as I received it. Whether from resentment,
jealousy, or fear, the Queen was supposed at that period
to labor hard to dispel the charm she had been at such
pains to form, and to infuse into the mind of the King
distrust of the man whom she had -recommended so successfully to his confidence, and who was now allied by
marriage to the Royal Family. She so far prevailed that
Charles IV. disparaged in conversation those talents and
services he had formerly prized so highly and extolled so
extravagantly. He is represented as having once expressed a wish that some one would throw the favorite out
of the window, and rid him of so troublesome a connection. He did indeed in fact, though not in form, forbid his
appearance, at the Sitios, except upon special permission
or invitation. Yet when the harsh measures usual on a
change of ministry in Spain are considered and compared
with the treatment experienced by the Prince of the Peace
on this occasion, it must be acknowledged that some mysterious link of love or fear seems, even during an ostensible separation of the parties, to have subsisted between
him and the court.*
In the meanwhile the Queen was more capricious and
licentious in her conduct. Urquijo who, on the rupture
with England in 1796, had returned from that country and
become, in virtue of his rank in the public office, chief
* See Appendix, No. II.




URQUIJO.                    71
clerk, acted as secretary during the illness of his principal,
Don Francisco Saavedra. That minister continued ill for
some time, and it was necessary that some one conversant
with the routine of office should, according to usage, read
the dispatches to their Majesties.  To give Urquijo the
requisite rank for such an honor, he was nominally appointed embassador to the Batavian Republic, and attended
standing before a table at which the King and Queen were
seated to read the official correspondence. Urquijo was
young, handsome, and well made. Her Majesty was more
struck by the reader than edified by the dispatches.. In
defiance of etiquette, if not of propriety, she bade him take
a chair and read the papers at his ease. Such condescension was the forerunner of greater favors. He was soon
Minister of Foreign Affairs.  Saavedra and Jovellanos
were removed and banished; but as the removal of both,
especially of Saavedra, was preceded by illness, many
who hated the Queen, and some who hated the Prince of
the Peace, ascribed their maladies to poison, administered,
according to the version of the former, with a view of
facilitating the promotion of Urquijo, and, according to the
equally improbable surmises of the latter, to revenge the
ingratitude and elude the enmity of those two ministers
toward the discarded favorite. Stories of poison are easily
invented and readily believed; but not only the atrocity
of the crime, but the difficulty of the perpetration, especially in the cases of persons surrounded with pomp and
ceremony, should dispel all suspicion of such guilt, unless
it be substantiated by testimony, and corroborated by undeniable circumstances. The Queen of Spain could ruin
a minister without such difficult practices. If the Prince




72             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
had any prospect of resuming his favor at court, he knew
that court too well to apprehend that the remonstrances
of grave and austere ministers would be any bar to his
resumption of power. Whatever, therefore, might be the
animosity either of the Queen or Prince against those two
ministers, they had prospects of gratifying it without resorting to so heinous, and, above all, so dangerous. yet so
uncertain a crime.*  I am satisfied, therefore, that the
rumor, was groundless in the instance of these ministers;
and I am equally inclined to disbelieve many other tales of
similar practices of the Queen. I must, however, acknowledge that a Sicilian of the name of Carappa, suspected, in
1804, of gallantries with the Princess of Asturias, was himself persuaded that his health had been impaired at thattime by potions administered to him by the contrivances
of the Queen of Spain. He adduced what he called his
proofs to me at Rome, ten years afterward, but they were
not convincing to my mind, though I believe they were so
to his. The administration of Urquijo, with whom I was
never personally acquainted, lasted longer than, according
to the strange stories reported of him, could have appeared
probable to any reasonable man. He was ignorant, rash,
and presumptuous in the extreme. Averse to every institution of the country and every opinion of the people he
was called upon to govern, he determined, nevertheless,
to slight the individuals, as well as to overlook the precautions, most- necessary to the execution of his arduous undertakings. So fanatically hostile was he to the Church of
* Those who believe in the story must acknowledge the difficulty
and uncertainty of an attempt to poison any one, inasmuch as neither
Saavedra nor Jovellanos died.




URQU1JO.                      73
Rome, that when, being charge d'affaires in London, he
first heard that General Bonaparte, by the peace of Tolentino, and at the intervention of the Spanish embassador
Azara, had spared the Papal government, he ran like a
maniac from his house for more than a mie -on the Uxbridge road, and threw himself in despair into a pond.
Mr. Carlisle  the surgeon, who told me the story, happened to pass by when he was dragged out in a state of
insensibility, and superintended his recovery by the means
recommended by the Humane Society. When our Secretary of State called on him, he made a point of receiving
him with Paine's Age of Reason, magnificently bound, on
the table; and Lord Grenville has more than- once accounted to me for the low opinion he entertains of Spanish
politicians, by the circumstance of Urquijo, the wildest and
most incapable man he ever transacted business with,
being elevated to the station of First Minister.  Recommended to the Queen by his personal beauty alone, he is
said to have slighted her advances, and throughout his
administration, to have preferred, even to ostentation, the
Princess Branciaforte, sister of the Prince of the Peace,
his most dangerous rival.  Intent on various reformssuch as the suppression of the Inquisition and of several
monastic institutions, the appointment of a patriarch, and
the transferrence of all Spanish causes from the Dataria at.A This is a strange, almost an incredible story, but I give my authority. I made Mr.- Carlisle repeat it to me above once, and he mentioned many circumstances attending the event, and assured me that
he had maintained an intimacy and correspondence with Urquijo ever
after. I met Mr. Carlisle at the house of Mr. P. Knight, in Sohosquare.
D




74             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Rome to national tribunals-he began by removing from
office and from court those men whose talents, gravity, and
principles, by shedding some lustre on his measures, might
have softened the odium to which such daring innovations
must obviously have been exposed. He seemed to look
for support from the foreign ministers exclusively.  He
was much connected with Valcknaer, the minister from the
Batavian Republic, and Borel, the Saxon envoy, At the
instance of the latter, he engaged in a negotiation to effect
a marriage between the Prince of Asturias and a princess
of Saxony, with whom he expected a considerable dowry.
The King and Queen were brought to acquiesce in the
design, but the old Elector had scruples in sending his
daughter to so immoral a court. He was reconciled to
the measure by the notable expedient of marrying his
sister, a woman of fifty, to the King of Spain's brother, the
Infant Don Antonio, who had never hitherto been allowed
the solace of a wife, or indeed any other, but that of
cooking and eating his own dinner, and killing some half
tame rabbits for it, in a small island of the Tagus, in
Aranjuez, set apart for his princely diversion,- inasmuch
as both his father and his elder brother had always been
too selfish to let him partake of their sport. The scheme
of the Saxon marriages, if it did not contribute in some
degree to the downfall of Urquijo, shared the fate of
that minister.  It was abandoned on his disgrace, and
the Saxon minister, after being unjustly accused of purloining minerals from the Museum, and exposed to many
other unmanly and ungenerous persecutions, went mad,
and died of vexation and chagrin. Urquijo, from self-sufficiency, was always confident of his own favor at court,




URQUIJO.-THE PRINCE'OF THE PEACE.'75
and of the weakness of his adversaries, especially the
Prince of the- Peace. Though warned even by his sister
of the imprudence of such a step, he allowed him to
re-appear at the Sitios. A cabal was formed between
the formidable favorite, the Nuncio, and the dignified
clergy who dreaded the design of appointing a patriarch
and withdrawing all submission to the Dataria at Rome.'
They alarmed- Charles IV. with the prospect of a schism
in the church; and it is said that a remonstrance against
the plans of the reforming minister, and a labored statement of the consequences to be apprehended, were presented by the Nuncio to the King himself at St. Ildefonso, when Urquijo had proceeded to Madrid. Whether
the Queen was a party to this intrigue or not, I do not
know. From returning love for the Prince, or from fear,
she acquiesced; for it is certain that Urquijo was dismissed, banished, and imprisoned in the citadel of Pampeluna in 1800,*and that from that period the Prince of the
Peace, who recommended his cousin Don Pedro Cevallos
to the Foreign Office, and was himself ever after recognized
in the privacy of the Royal Family by the endearing name
of Manuelito, recovered all his pristine power. - He seemed
less desirous to exert it in a manner creditable to himself
and useful to the country. He had been recently indebted
to. the clergy,, and was more subservient to the court and
Church of Rome than his principles or temper had formerly
led him to be. His resentment at what he considered to
be the ingratitude of Jovellanos, estranged him from persons enlightened by literature and philosophy, as well as
from that austere party or sect in Spain who may be designated as Jansenists. Jovellanos was torn from his re



76             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
treat at Gijon, and immured in the dungeons or convents
of Majorca, with the contumelious addition to the Sentence
itself (pronounced without trial, and even charge),, that he
should study his Catechism under the superintendence of
the ignorant inmates of a monastery. Persons obnoxious to
the favorite or to the Queen were denounced to the Inquisition as Jansenists, and exposed to all the terrific forms
and proceedings of that merciless establishment. It must
be acknowledged, that in the instance of two brothers of
the name of La Cuesta, canons, I think, of Palencia, tha't
odious but independent tribunal disdained to become the
servile instrument of ministerial injustice, and manfully
acquitted, released, and indemnified the prisonors. Truth
is, the Prince of the Peace was never in his heart a friend
of the Church of Rome, nor a patron of the Inquisition.
Still less was he a partisan-of the French, though his cowardice and vanity occasionally rendered him subservient
to their designs. It was no doubt at their instigation that
he made war upon Portugal.  So elated was he at the
petty conquest of Olivenza, that-he not only indulged his
ostentation by sending a branch of orange to the Queen, but
with ludicrous self-complacency compared himself publicly
to the great King. of Prussia, accepted the extravagant
compliments of the French as sincere marks of admiration,
and verily persuaded himself, for some time, that his military character rendered Spain formidable to France and to
the Chief Consul. His conduct with respect to his allies,
from the Portuguese campaign, and still more from the
peace of Amiens, was a'medley of inconsistency, presumption, temerity, perfidy, and irresolution almost unequaled
in history.  He at one time assumed a tone of menace




THE PRINCE OF THE PEACE.             77
and hostility,. which in the circumstances of the two countries was quite preposterous; insisting on some. impracticable or unreasonable concession, and instructing the embassador to declare war against the Republic or Empire-;
at others, he connived, I much fear with the' approbation of
English agents, at the introduction of assassins, the accomplices of Georges, into France; and sometimes he truckled
to the most exorbitant pretensions-of the French Government, and solicited firom their power and partiality some
unreasonable personal favor for himself. He had hardly
embroiled his country in a second war with England, by
an unseasonable compliance with the humor rather than
the policy of Napoleon, before he wantonly affronted
that great prince by a public proclamation, and yet more
sensibly offended him  by a proposal of a confederacy
against France with a Northern Power. The French
detected that design, in a correspondence which they
found at Berlin, soon after their armies had taken possession of it, though Napoleon,-very unaccountably, never
assigned that fact in public or in private as an exculpation
of his subsequent aggressions on Spain.
In the meanwhile the attention of the Prince of the
Peace was absorbed by occupations more congenial to
his taste and perhaps better suited to his talents, viz., the
squabbles, jealousies, and intrigues of the Palace.  He
soon perceived that the Prince of Asturias, however inexperienced and apparently insensible, entertained a strong
aversion and suspicion of him. He probably conjectured,
perhaps he ascertained, that such hostile feelings were
fomented by secret and occasional communications with
the grandees. Some of that class plumed themselves on




78             FOREIGN. REMINISCENCES.
marking a distinction,-immense in their estimation, between
newly acquired and ancient hereditary honors, although
their own titles were in all likelihood originally derived
from sources as impure; they studiously conferred on the
Prince of the Peace, in all intercourse by letter or conversation, these ceremonious terms of respect to which a
Grandee -is entitled from all, and generally receives from
an inferior, but'they carefully abstained from all those of
familiarity and fellowship which is the usage, though not
the legal etiquette, in Spain for persons equal in quality to
exchange between one another. He was with them Seiior
Duque, Seiior Principe, Ussencia or Alteza; and never
"tU" or any other word implying intimacy and equality. Among these the most distinguished was the Duke
of Infantado, He had the advantages of youth, birth, a
princely fortune, a good education, and an agreeable
address. His pursuits were rational and manly; he had
some ambition, and till called upon to take an active
part in affairs, was thought to possess great capacity
for them, combined with principles that would direct
it to the benefit of his country. Perhaps it was unfortunate for the formation of his political character, that he
was initiated in business of importance by a confidential
intercourse with Ferdinand. The false, cowardly, and
vindictive disposition of that prince was calculated to
render all who dealt with him suspicious and irresolute
ever afterward. At the period of his marriage in 1802,
there was nothing but a sinister countenance in the Prince
of Asturias to announce those odious qualities which have
caused so much misery to his subjects. He showed little
inclination to study, and still less to sports or amusements.




FERDINAND VII.                 79
He seldom marked the slightest preference or affection to
such as were admitted to his company. Some little aptitude
to mathematics was observed in him, and he was said to
take interest in the scientific part of fortification; but it was
generally believed that he was weak both in character and
intellect, and such a persuasion was encouraged at court.
I have been, indeed, assured that even before his marriage,
and during an illness of Charles IV. at St., Ildefonso, a plot
was matured for setting him aside, or at least postponinghis succession, on the score of incapacity, in case of the
death, of his father. According to the same information,
Ferdinand had intimation of the design, and found means
to convey it to the French Government, and the Chief
Consul was on the point of interfering in his behalf, when
the recovery of the King disconcerted the projects of
both parties for a time. This circumstance was related
to me more than twenty years afterward, and I think
my informant must have mistaken the date, or confounded the occurrences of that day with many subsequent
events.
For some months after the marriage, which was celebrated at Barcelona in 1802, it was apprehended that no
issue could be expected. The Queen of Naples upbraided
her embassador, the Duke of St. Theodore (from whom I
derive my information), for having delivered over her
favorite daughter to a joyless and barren bed. That minister, however, adroitly ascertained that ignorance and
innocence, and no natural defect or coldness of constitution, had retarded the completion of their union. He found
means ere long of enlightening the royal pupils, and even
of satisfying his more experienced mistress that he had




80             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
not been unsuccessful in his instructions. The details
related to me would make a figure in a modern Brantome,
but I do not aspire to be such, and I leave them to the
imaginations of Jews or Christians, who may read these
pages; with an assurance that their fancy can hardly make
them more ludicrous or indelicate than reality. The bride
was a palsicky.l uy young womanwith-a         le expression of countenance and _reat propriety of manner.
She soon lost, or never possessed the affections -of   er
mother-in-law. Soon after her pregnacy was announced,
a miscarriage ensued; and it was ascribed by common
report to ill-usage or yet more criminal practices of the
Queen.- It was not long ere the court suspected or affected to suspect the young Princess of gallantry. She was
more than once confined to her apartment by an order
from  the King. Importance and mystery were attached
to the arrest and dismissal of a young Sicilian in the Garde
du Corps, of the name of Carappa. To his story and illness I have before alluded. I think it was at the same
time hinted to the Duchess of St. Theodore that her presence at Madrid would for some time be dispensed with.
Pains were certainly taken to imply that both an amour, and
a political intrigue to give the Neapolitans an ascendency
in the court of the heir-apparent, had been detected or
defeated. -It was much believed at this period (1804), that
the Council of Castile had been consulted on the practicability and propriety of setting Ferdinand aside, and that it
had answered, " that there was no known authority which
could deprive of his right of succession a Prince of Asturias
duly sworn, married, and honored."*  If such a proceeding
* Jurado, casado, y honrado.




FERDINAND VII.                    81
actually took place, which I never could ascertain,* the answer was more in unison with the ancient maxims of Castile and Arragon, than suited to the ears of a Prince of the
House of Bourbon.  It derived the right to the Crown
from  an oath administered in Cortes, or in deputations
thereof, and confined the enjoyment even of that right to
such as were "married" and subsequently "honored" in thecountry; thereby implying an authority vested sornewhere
to divest even a sworn Prince who was either unmarried,
or not respected in the nation, of his right of succession.
The Princess of Asturias did not long survive these discussions and reports.  Public hatred of the Queen and of
the favorite attributed her death without scruple, but also
without proof or even inquiry, to poison. She had always
the appearance of bad health, and died no doubt a natural
death. The period of it might, indeed, be accelerated by
ill-treatment, vexation, and chagrin. The dissensions at
court were not buried with her.  On the contrary, the
enmity between the Prince of Asturias and the favorite
became more virulent, or at least more notorious. Fer-'dinand communicated his grievances first to his former
preceptor Escoiquiz, and then through him  to various
Spaniards, and some foreigners. At their suggestion, or
from his own reflections, he conceived the project of concerting with the French Embassy the means of ruining the
W* Vhen I say I could never ascertain it, I mean the details and
form of the proceeding; but of transactions and practices having an
equivalent object in view, I have heard and seen many proofs, and
among them a justificatory memoir of Caballero, then Minister of
Grace and Justice, which distinctly showed that he was tampered
with, though without effect, to concur in a design for setting aside the
Prince of Asturias.
D



82              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Prince of the Peace, and placing himself or his creatures
at the head of the Spanish councils, and he added a proposal of allying himself by marriage with the House of
Bonaparte,* an expedient to which he more than once reverted in the course of his life.   Napoleon, whatever were
his ultimate plans, was not averse to maintaining such a
correspondence with the heir-apparent.- He knew  well
that the predilections of the Prince of the Peace leaned to
England rather than France.  His ill-will had been manifested in public, and his more secret manceuvres had not
escaped the vigilance of the French diplomacy. Beauharnais probably obeyed the spirit, though he may have exceeded the letter of his instructions, in encouraging the
cabals of the Prince of Asturias and the Duke of Infantado, and in his subsequent communications with that party.
He was certainly closely connected with them, and Murat
afterward suspected him of sacrificing the interests of his
country, and betraying the secrets of his court, from corrupt motives, to the adherents of Ferdinand; but it is pos* Stanislaus Girardin, a man of'veracity and intimate with Joseph
while King of Spain, assured me that Ferdinand wrote with his own
hand to Napoleon or Joseph to congratulate them on the victory of
Tudela!!! and at the same time repeated his solicitation for a matrimonial alliance with the House of Bonaparte. Many of the imperial
councilors were for printing the letter in the Moniteur, with the hope
of disgusting the enthusiastic partisans of Ferdinand with the baseness
of their chief, but the Emperor observed not only that the knowledge
of the transaction might hereafter be inconvenient, but the immediate
object of the publication would be defeated by the very baseness
which they hoped to expose. It was so bad that it would be disbelieved, and imputed as a forgery to him, the Emperor. He suppressed it.




FERDINAND VII.                  83
sible and probable that Napoleon concealed from Murat
much of the secret transactions and negotiations in Spain,
when it suited his views to alter the course that had been
pursued by his embassador. It is an undeniable fact that
the party of Ferdinand was founded on an intimate alliance
with France, and that all such interest in the Spanish
councils as could be termed -with any plausibility "English" depended entirely on the Prince of the Peace. That
favorite had not, unfortunately, the spirit to avow, or the
steadiness to execute, the system of policy he would have
liked to pursue, even after he had detected the existence
of the cabals and correspondence between the French
agents and the Prince of Asturias. Ferdinand was, however, arrested. A guard was placed at his door in the
Escurial, and his papers, portfolios, and furniture seized
and conveyed to the King's apartment. His first step was
to write a submissive letter to his mother. She answered
that as he had suspected her as well as his father's ministers of designs against his interests and even his person,
and as such suspicion was the cause or pretext of any improper proceedings in which he might be involved, delicacy and honor precluded her. from interfering while the
matter was under examination. She had determined to
ask no question, and to deliver no opinion till the King
was in full possession of all the evidence of which he was
in search, and had formed -an unbiased-judgment on its
nature and tendency. That then, if his anger continued,
she might intercede to appease it, or at least to rescue her
child from its consequences, but that she would not expose
herself to misinterpretations by advice to either party, or
by any comment on the causes or extent of his estrange



84             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
ment from- her and his father's government. After two or
three days' confinement,- during which no intercourse was
allowed, Ferdinand was brought before his father and
mother. The seals which, if I mistake not, he had placed
on his portfolios and boxes when they were taken from
him, were broken in his presence. The papers found
therein were read before him to the King. He once or
twice in the course of the perusal of them entreated the
Queen by looks or words to interpose; but she told him
that she had wished to withdraw, and now repeated her
application to Charles IV., who insisted on her remaining,
and bade his son, with much passion, listen without interruption to what was read, and to what would afterward be
alleged against him, and give him such answers and explanations as consistently with truth he was enabled to do.
The whole contents- of the papers have never, I believe,
been divulged. Many were insignificant; some mere
matters of form; others somewhat suspicious and unintelligible, but among them was the draft of a letter to
Napoleon, soliciting a Princess of his Imperial House in
marriage; and -another of a very equivocal nature which
both the Queen and the Duke of Infantado have described
to me as written I think, and signed I am sure, in Ferdinand's own handwriting, Yo El Rey. It appointed some
person (whose name did not appear in that draft or copy)
Captain-General of Castile, and commanded him- to arrest
and imprison without delay the Prince of the Peace. The
paper was long, probably in due form, and certainly containing the enumeration of titles and offices of the persons
named therein, according to the usage of Spanish official
documents.  Charles IV. asked Ferdinand, with some




FERDINAND VII.                    85
vehemence, how he dared to draw such a paper,-and annex such a signature?  He said his head might answer it.
It amounted to treason in law, and to parricide in intention.  He threatened him, with much vociferation, with all
the consequences, unless he instantly discovered at whose
instigation he had taken so dangerous a step.  Ferdinand,
with more surprise than dismay, assured his father that he
was laboring under a mistake, and converting a very harmless, though perhaps indecorous amusement, into a matter
of state, swelling a childish impropriety into an act of premeditated guilt.  The paper, he said, was a jeu d'esprit
written for his diversion one evening in the Christmas
holidays, with his late wife, and intended for a parody of
official instruments, or at worst, a specimen of the power
they should possess when it pleased Providence to deprive them of their father, the King of Spain. The Queen,
who at Rome, in 1814, described this Curious scene to me
in the presence of her husband, assured me that Ferdinand
gave this account so readily, and so naturally, that without acquitting him in her own mind of many other offenses, she was yet satisfied, as. he told the story, that
the paper formed no part of the conspiracy of which they
were seeking the clew, but was, -in truth, some childishness (quelque enfantillage) of her son and the late Princess
of Asturias.  But the King, more attentive than she to
matters of rank, precedence, and promotion, quickly perceived that Godoy was designated by a title * conferred
" I think it was High Admiral or some such title. But I, like the
Queen of Spain, am somewhat inobservant of matters of that sort, and
am afraid of discrediting the substance of my narrative by trusting to
my inaccurate memory as to form and detail.




86             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
upon him since the death of that Princess.  Half choking
with rage and clenching his fist, Charles exclaimed-: "Ti
mientes,c Fernando, tfu mientes; y td me lo pagaras, si, me
lo pagaras."  His fury alarmed the Queen, and might
well terrify the Prince. But then ensued a scene which
the Queen most truly characterized as the climax of baseness, cowardice, and perfidy. Ferdinand fell on his knees,
burst into tears, acknowledged the charge, but, with strong
promises of amendment, exculpated himself by casting the
blame on all those with whom he had at any time conversed on such subjects. He exaggerated their hatred of
the Prince of the Peace, described their designs as going
far beyond his own, and spontaneously denounced the
names of every one of then, offering every document in
his power, and even his oral testimony, to convict them of
the guilt in which, for his sake, they had involved themselves. The Queen assured me that she shuddered at the
unfeeling baseness of his disclosures; she added, that the
King was too much absorbed in his rage at the conspiracy, and too much bent on the punishment of the offenders,
to view in its true light the treachery of his son, more disgusting if possible than any plot of which he could be sus-i
pected. Such was the account I received in 1814 from the
Queen herself at Rome in the palace Barbarini.  The
King, who was present and attentive to her narrative,
confirmed the greater part by his gestures, and acquiesced
inthe rest by his silence. It is corroborated by e -tproceedings which ensued. At the same time I should observe
that the object of her Majesty's conversation with me was
to justify her indignation against her son. Her narrative
consequently ended here. The subsequent events I derive




FERDINAND VII.                 87
from less direct, but yet credible sources, and in many
particulars from the Duke of Infantado.  An order was
dispatched to- Madrid to convey that Duke, on the verynight of this confession, to the Escurial; and there a commission was appointed to try him for high treason.  He
probably would have been executed immediately had he
been brought thither according to orders; but the muleteers purposely missed the turn to the Escurial, and conveyed him as far as St. Ildefonso, before they acknowledged their pretended mistake. They had, it is supposed,
been bribed by agents of the French Embassy to do so.
In the mean -while, Beauharnais bestirred himself to soften
the anger of the King, to awaken the fears of the favorite,
and, if he could not procure the liberation of Infantado and
nis associates, to save them from the fatal consequences
of a criminal proceeding instituted in the moment of resentment. Infantado, after some weeks' close confinement,
was banished to Ecija. Ferdinand had on his first arrest
contrived to apprise him; and he had prudently concealed
the original paper signed Yo El Rey, and conferring on
him the appointment of Captain-General of Castile, in a tin
box which was buried in his mother's garden at Chamartin,
and remained there when that villa became, in 1809, the
head-quarters of Napoleon.* A proclamation was issued,
stating the existence of a conspiracy, and the fiscal was
employed to draw up an accusation against the conspirators; but the non-appearance of the original paper, which
was searched for in vain, and the scandal, rather than the
* Napoleon placed his chair on the very spot on the morning before
he entered Madrid, and spread the maps and plans before him in the
garden.




88             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
reluctance of Ferdinand, the heir apparent, exhibiting himself in the characters of accomplice, informer, and witness,
probably deterred the court from any further proceedingagainst the prisoners; for the circumstance on which in
conversation the Duke of Infantado rested his main defense
of the paper, would not, I presume, have been considered
as conclusive evidence of his innocence. It was sealed
with black wax, said the Duke, to prevent any use. being
made thereof till Charles IV. was actually dead.  Thus
the truth (added he) would have been inferred by any
reasonable man, and it would have appeared, as it was,
a mere measure of precaution to take effect, in case any
thing should happen to his father, for the purpose of -securing the successor to the Crown from intimidation fiom
those in possession of the palace. It was a device by.
which any act forced upon him, and merely colored with
his name, would have been annulled in the eyes of the
public.
From this period, notwithstanding outward appearances
of reconciliation between all the members of the Royal
Family, and notwithstanding the subsistence of treaties,
and a constant intercourse between France and Spain, the
palace was a scene of cabal, enmity, and conspiracy, and
the two allied -governments in a state of ill-disguised distrust and hostility.  Ferdinand looked to Napoleon'and
to French agents and armies exclusively for protection
against the favorite, while the favorite wavered between
the policy of defying, eluding, or propitiating the power of
France.  Another party was in. the mean while formed
among Spaniards of enlightened views, of which O'Farril
and Asanza were in some sense the leaders.  They in



FERDINAND VII.                  89
tended to avail themselves of the approaching crisis tO
overturn, together with the power of Godoy,:the tyranny
both in Church and State; and they hoped through the
ascendency of the Prince of the Asturias, and the revival
or establishment of institutions really national, to provide
against all future abuses, and to raise Spain in the scale
of European States. Some of these persons had, indeed,
strong predilections for France, and persuaded themselves
that Napoleon would favor their designs, and even assist
in laying the foundations of Spanish prosperity in the principles of a free government, as long as they continued to
direct the resources resulting therefrom to the furtherance
of his own projects against England. Napoleon, however,
clearly perceived (whatever were his ulterior objects), that
to secure his own interests utpon the triumph of any party.
or on the downfall of all, the presence of a French force
was indispensable.  He adroitly availed himself of the
secret invitations of Ferdinand, on one side, and the hollow
professions and irresolution of the Prince of the Peace, on
the other, to advance his troops toward. the capital, and to
introduce French garrisons in the chief fortresses of the
kingdom.  Orders for their reception were procured by
contrivance or intimidation from the Prince of the Peace
himself, and it is said that in some instances they were
forged, in others accompanied with private letters fiom
Ferdinand or some military man of his party. It was only
where those in command were the reputed enemies of the
Prince of the Peace, that such orders were obeyed with
any alacrity, and the French received as deliverers and
friends.  Though no resistance was offered any where,
great reluctance, distrust,-and ill-humor were shown by




90             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
those commanders who enjoyed the confidence of the
favorite. Murat, Duke of Berg, had indeed secret instructions to take by force any place where admittance was
positively refused, and to march as speedily as -he could,
without spreading great alarm, to Madrid. Not a syllable
had been communicated to him of the object of his expedition. When he solicited some explanations for his own
guidance upon it, the Emperor wrote a few lines in his
own hand to this purpose: "Have I not bid you be at
such and such a place by such a day? and reach Madrid
before such a time? and what more can a general of my
armies require?"
Neither the Emperor nor his agents could have foreseen
the events of Aranjuez. They might have supposed that
Charles IV. and his court would, like the Prince Regent
of Portugal, fly to South America, or that Ferdinand, determined to prevent such a step, would call in French
assistance, and fly for protection to the head-quarters of his
allies; but it could never be in their contemplation, and
still less in their wishes, that the downfall of the Prince of
the Peace, the abdication of Charles IV., and the accession
of Ferdinand should be effected exclusively by Spaniards.
Whether, as some suppose, the subsequent conduct of
Napoleon sprang from apprehensions, then first presented
to his mind, of a strong national and popular government
in Spain, or whether, as more generally conjectured, it was
in pursuance of a Machiavelian scheme long conceived and
matured, may remain problematical to the biographer and
historian. It is certain that the unexpected embarrassment of Beauharnais and the refusal of the- Duke of Berg
to recognize the new King, disconcerted and disappointed




THE PRINCE OF THE PEACE.             91
Ferdinand and his advisers, while the interest taken by
the Duke of Berg in the fate of the Prince of the Peace,
and the respect shown by him to Charles IV., agreeably
surprised the old court. Murat assured me, in 1814, that
he had no instructions, and that he suspected Beauharnais
of having exceeded his, in the countenance which he gave
to the party of Ferdinand both before and after the events
at Aranjuez. Nor did any subsequent discoveries change
this impression of Murait. On the contrary, his adherents
long after that-period continued, perhaps from hostility to
the name and family of Beauharnais, to profess suspicions
of a yet graver nature against the embassador, and to
imply that he was actually betraying the interests of the
French government to Ferdinand and his party. Charles
IV., on the evening of the day on which he abdicated,
spoke cheerfully of the step he had taken. He told the
diplomatic corps* "that he was tired of business, grown
old, and that it was fair his son should take the burden of
affairs upon him." But the next morning his' tone was
entirely altered,t and forty-eight hours had not elapsed
before he conveyed his thanks to Muratj: for withholding
his recognition of Ferdinand, and requested him to assure
Napoleon that nothing but the dread of confusion and
bloodshed would have induced him to acquiesce in the
usurpation of his son. The Prince of the Peace had been
dragged by the populace of Aranjuez from a hiding hole to
which he had somewhat ignominiously retreated. He was
* From MIr. de Bourke, the Danish minister, present.
f De Bourke.: From Count Mosbourg, the confidential friend of Murat, and a
clear-headed and accurate man.




92             FOREIGN REMINISOENCES.
insulted, and I believe wounded by one of the rabble, but
saved from the more fatal effects of their fury by the intervention of Ferdinand, who exhibited upon that occ'asion
the only trait of talent, spirit, and generosity which relieves the hideous uniformity of his base, cowardly, and
perfidious career. "If there be any man here," said he,
"who has more reason to be offended with Manuel Godoy
than myself, let him take justice into his own hands; but
if not, leave me to act as my honor and promise require,
and abstain from  all violence whatever."  With such
promptitude did he execute the promise he had given
his mother, who, on hearing that her favorite was seized
by the populace, conjured her son to fly to his rescue,
while his father assured him that he would acquiesce in
any thing to prevent bloodshed, and, above all, the murder
of the Prince of the Peace. That favorite was conveyed
as a, prisoner to Madrid, and consigned either there or
at the Escurial (I think at the request of Ferdinand himself) to the custody of a French guard. He was afterward removed to Bayonne.  Murat, to protect him from
insult, conveyed him part of the way in his own carriage,
and was shocked, as he told me, at the fear he betrayed,
hiding his head, and creeping to the bottom of the carriage whenever they met on the road any body of Spanish
soldiers or peasantry. I can believe the story. In truth,
the irresolution, vanity, and, above all, the ignorance of
Don Manuel Godoy would have incapacitated him for
Prime Minister in most countries, and he must have
possessed some good and counteracting qualities, both
of head and heart, to have retained power so long
even in Spain. His ignorance was such that the Charge




THE PRINCE OF TtHE PEACE.              b,
d'Affaires* of the Hanseatic Towns, told me that the States
he represented were often designated in the superscription
or the body of the notes, which he received from  the
Duke of Alcudia's t office, Islas Asiaticas, instead of Villas Hanseaticas, and t-he same person assured me that
Godoy was some time Minister of Foreign Affairs before
he discovered Prussia and Russia to be two distinct countries; Mr. Sandoz, the Minister from  Berlin, being at
that time and during the absence of a' Russian envoy,
the agent for the court of St. Petersburgh at Madrid.
As I neither extenuate the vices nor soften the ridicules of
this powerful favorite, but recount them  as they have
been described to me, it is at least fair to record the
more favorable imnpressions which my slight personal intercourse and unimportant transactions with him  left of
his character on my mind.  His manner, though somewhat indolenit, or what the French term nonchalant, was
graceful and attractive.  Though he had neither education nor reading, his language was at once elegant and
peculiar; and, notwithstanding his humble origin, his whole
deportment announced, more than that of any untraveled
Spaniard I ever met with, that mixture of dignity, politeness, propriety, and ease, which the habits of good company are supposed exclusively to confer.  He seemed
born for a high station.  Without any effort he would
have passed, wherever he was, for the first man in the
* Andreoli, a Venetian by birth, who was also secretary to the
Austrian Embassy at Madrid, and himself, though an entertaining
mixture of shrewdness and simplicity, very ignorant both of history
and geography.
t The Prince of the P eace's title, when Minister of Foreign Affairs




94            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
society. I never conversed with him sufficiently to form
any judgment of his understanding. Our interviews were
mere interchanges of civility. But a transaction of no importance to the public, but of great importance to the
parties concerned, took place between us, and he not only
behaved with great courtesy to me, but showed both humanity and magnanimity. A young English gentleman
of the name of Powell had, before the war between England and Spain, engaged either with General Miranda,
or some other South American adventurer, in an expedition to liberate the Spanish colonies. He was taken.
By law his life was forfeited, but he was condemned, by a
sentence nearly equivalent, to perpetual imprisonment in
the unwholesome fortress of Omoa.  His father, Chief
Justice of Canada, on hearing the sad tidings hastened to
England. Unfortunately, hostilities had commenced, under circumstances calculated to exasperate the government and people. of Spain. The Chief Justice was, however, determined to try the efficacy of a personal application to alleviate the sufferings of his son, by a change of
prison, since he despaired of obtaining his release. Having procured passports, he proceeded to Spain, furnished
with a letter of introduction to the Prince of the Peace
from me, to whom he applied as recently arrived from
thence, and not involved in the angry feelings or discussions which had led to the rupture between the two countries. The Prince received him at Aranjuez, and immediately on reading the letter, and hearing the story, bade the
anxious'father remain till he had seen the King, and left
the room for that purpose without ceremony or delay.
He soon returned with an order, not for the change of




THE PRINCE OF THE>PEACE.            95
prison, but for the immediate liberation of the voung man.
Nor was he satisfied with this act of humanity, but added,
with a smile of benevolence, that a parent who had come
so far to render a service to his child would like probably
to be the bearer of good intelligence himself, and accordingly he furnished him with a passport and permission to
sail in a -Spanish frigate then preparing to leave Cadiz for
the West Indies. When I saw the Prince of the Peace
many years afterward at Verona, he lamented to me that
his situation would be very precarious if Charles IV. were
to die, and he was desirous of ascertaining if he could find
an asylum in England. The moment I heard of the event
I apprehended, in 1819, I related all the above particulars
to Lord Liverpool, and solicited a passport for the Prince
of the Peace. Lord Liverpool said, that an English passport to a foreigner implied an invitation, and the government were not prepared to invite the Prince of the
Peace to England; but he authorized and -urged me to
assure him that he would be unmolested if he arrived
there, and enjoy every protection for his person and property that a, foreigner was entitled to. The answer of
the Prince of the Peace to my communication of this
assurance was concise, and to the following purpose: "He
had, for many years, disposed of the resources of one of
the richest kingdoms in Europe, he had made the fortune of
thousands and thousands, but I was the only mortal who,
since his fall, had expressed any sense or shown any
recollection of any service, great or small, received frogr
him. I might therefore judge of the pleasure my letter hac
given him." He did not however come to England.*
* See Appendix, No. II.




96             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
The events -at Bayonne are very copiously, but sonmlewhat variously related by many Spaniards and Frenchmen, eye-witnesses or actors in those scenes. I had no
particular opportunity of hearing details -not otherwise
known.  "Indeed, I have dwelt on the previous events
in Spain (on which I had collected information from the
Duke of Infantado in England, from the King and Queen
at Rome, and King Joachim at Naples, as well as from
one or two intelligent but indifferent spectators) with
some prolixity, because the state of factions at that time
has either been grossly misunderstood, or artfully misrepresented by sundry English writers and speakers of
apparent authority; and because a more accurate knowledge of them is necessary to enable the future historian
of the Spanish war and revolutions to trace the causes
and ascertain the bearings of many transactions in the
progress of those memorable struggles. A singular -circumstance affecting the character of Napoleon, in one of
the most questionable passages of his career, is worthy
of observation. He knew that the government of Charles
IV. had defied him in an open- proclamation, he ascertained, on the occupation of Berlin in 1806, that it was
promoting a confederacy against France, and he was well
aware that -as early as 1803 it had secretly fomented -a
conspiracy against his person, by furnishing the accomplices of Georges with passports to cross the Pyrenees.
Yet, in no public paper, nor so far as I know in any private conversation, did he ever allege such facts as motives
or excuses for his invasion of Spain, and dethronement
of the Bourbon dynasty there. Charles IV. in conversation with me mentioned Bonaparte and his own personal




CHARLES IV.                     97
dislike to him more than once. It was whimsical ~ to hear
a man who had lost a crown, descant on the manners,
talents, and attainments of the greatest man of the age,
who had obtained one, in terms of scorn and disparagement.  He could, he said neither talk nor write any language correctly, and he chuckled at his own superiority,
by observing, that at Bayonne and elsewhere he, Charles,
had kept a diary, an effort of industry and genius, of which
he was confident Napoleon was incapable.  If the notes
of the Royal Exile could be recovered, I suspect they
would not raise the literary reputation of the Spanish
branch of the House of Bourbon; but as he had been exposed to many vicissitudes, and must have known the secret
of many mysterious occurrences, and, as moreover, though
unfeeling, brutal, silly, and credulous, he was nevertheless
a man of veracity, it is a matter of regret that the MS. on
which he plumed himself so greatly, should have fallen
into the hands of the Spanish or Roman government, who
have in all probability destroyed it. Perhaps the memoirs
of the Chevalier Azara, many years embassador at Rome
and Paris, and a man of wit, judgment, and sarcasm, shared
the same fate.  His papers were still at Paris when he
died, six months after retiring from office, at Burgos. The
French government endeavored to'detain them, but some,
and among them a History of Italy during his time, were
saved by his brother and taken to Spain. If extant, they
* Perhaps not much more so than to hear great princes and kings
who have never seen, or, at least, gained a battle, speak in a tone of authority of the mistakes made and the incapacity betrayed by the captain
of our age, who has gained the greatest. Some of my contemporaries
and countrymen have had, and, perhaps, enjoyed such a diversion.




98             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
must be valuable. He was in the habit of recounting with
great humor and great accuracy a variety of anecdotes,
and he had had access to many of the secrets of the Papal
Government.  No man was less disposed by temper or
opinion to democracy or to France, but the anti-revolutionary war and the conduct of the old governments in Europe,
and of England in particular, compelled him to become subservient to both. "Your Mr. Pitt," said he to me in 1802,
"'resolved, I know not why, that every foreigner should
be either a French Jacobin, or a monk of the tenth century.
I made my choice with some difficulty and with great concern; and so, you see me, a knight of Malta, a servant of
his Most Catholic Majesty, embassador and confidential
adviser- of his Holiness the Pope, covered with Bourbon
orders and titles-you see me, I say, here at the age of
sixty and upward, the Chevalier Azara of Arragon, a
French Jacobin! courting an adventurer at the head of
the Republic, and inviting you to dine at the nuptials of his
aid-de-camp (Duroc), and all this is because the minister
of a Protestant state and parliamentary king determined
that any Catholic or Spaniard, who would not submit to be
a fanatic, a bigot, a mere friar, or monk, should be considered an. enemy of social order, regular government,
religion, and what not!I"  There was surely much humor
in the picture he drew, and there was truth and philosophy
in the lesson it conveyed.
After the battle of Baylen, and the formation of the Central Junta in Spain, I again visited that country, with my
family.  The Junta had been hastily chosen, and was
composed of materials not happily assorted to one another.
The members were driven from Aranjuez before they




CENTRAL JUNTA.                    99
-were well installed in their, seats, before they had clearly defined their authority, and before they had traced
the system  of government they intended to establish.  I
saw them at Seville; they were too much occupied with
the ceremonies, forms, and patronage of their new government.  They had, indeed, among them  some ex-ministers
and magistrates of great integrity, enlightened views, and
distinguished talents.  Among these, Don Gaspar Melchor
de Jovellanos was the most eminent; but even they, from
the caution of their time of life, and from the habits of
magistracy, were somewhat too scrupulousiy observant of
technical rules inapplicable to the exigency of circumstances, and too readily alarmed at those vigorous measures of innovation which a state of revolution and civil
war demands.  Their choice of ministers did them credit.
The venerable Saavedra was among them, and Hermida,
a still older man, who was Minister of Grace and Justice,
though both prejudiced and capricious, was a man of
knowledge, courage, and capacity. Garay, who, though
member of the Junta, presided over their foreign affairs,
combined zeal and discernment with more knowledge of
the world and-amenity of manner than is usual in Spanish
politicians. His office in the Alcazar was the resort of a
small society or club, called la Junta Chica,* which direct* The Duke of Altamira,. Marquis of Astorga, was the least man 1
ever saw in society, and smaller than many dwarfs exhibited for
money. He was President of the Junta, and drove about with guards
like a royal personage. They called him the Rey Chico, a name
formerly given to a king of Grenada, and it was in allusion to that
nickname that the small club or knot of men I have mentioned, gave
themselves that of Junta Chica.




100            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
ed the insurrectionary press, and was active, both in public
and in private, in promoting a convocation of Cortes, the
promulgation of liberal and tolerant laws, and the establishment of a popular government.  It was composed of
young men of more ardor and imagination than experience
or prudence, who had imbibed their notions of freedom
fiom the encyclopedists of France, rather than from the
history of their ancient institutions, or from the immediate
wants of their own country. They were, perhaps, more
competent to exhibit their own contempt of superstition
and disdain of abuses, than to reconcile either the Church
or the nobility to a rational correction of them, and to
render those powerful bodies' instrumental, first in the recovery of independence, and afterward in the establishment of the freedom of their country.  The crude projects
of'this rising party, on one hand, and equally impolitic, and,
perhaps, less honest irresolution of the Junta in convoking
the Cortes, on the other, contributed to widen the breach
between those who had concurred in resisting the French
from different and even opposite motives. Hence, when
the Cortes did meet, some deputies were more intent on
destroying the power-of the Church, and suppressing the
privileges of the nobility, than on resisting the common
enemy; and others were more jealous of such designs, as
aiming at a revolution in the internal government, than
averse to the abuses, or-even to the foreigners, who threatened their national independence.  The popular orators,
mistaking the applause of Cadiz, that least aristocratical
and least devout city in Spain, for the opinion of the nation,
naturally caressed the former rather that the latter party.
Hence their proceedings, and even the constitution they




AGUSTIN ARGUELLES.                101
framed assumed a character little congenial to the wishes
or wants of the people they represented, though exempt
from many of those errors of extravagant democracy and
anti-monarchical contrivances, which, some years afterward, were ignorantly and maliciously urged against them
throughout Europe.  The most prominent were Don
Agustin Arguelles and the Marquis of Matarrosa, both
natives and deputies of the Asturies.  I knew Arguelles
when a very young man, at Oviedo, in 1793.  He came
afterward to England, in 1806, on some secret mission,
which the events * of that year prevented him from executing or avowing.  He remained in a state of ill health in
London till the Spanish revolution; and when about to
embark at Portsmouth for Lisbon, he met and returned
with Don Andres de la Vega and Matarrosa, who had suddenly arrived from the Asturies, charged with a mission
for the English government from the spirited insurgents of
the little town of Oviedo. He was a man of reading and
reflection, and had studied our literature and our history
with great success during his residence in London, though
accidental circustances gave him a very false and unfavorable impression of the foreign policy of England.  On the
very first opening of the Cortes he acquired a great ascendant over his colleagues; he soon became the leader
of the popular party in that assembly.  The passion for
applause so dangerous and so seductive to every orator,
* Particularly the battle of Jena; for I suspect (though I do not
know), that his mission was connected with the plan of a confederacy
with the Northern Powers against France; that plan was discomfited
by the defeat of the Russians, but the participation of Spain therein
was detected, as I have hbefore observed, by the French at Berlin.




102            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and a propensity to suspicion, unfortunately prevalent in
the mind of most Spaniards wherever foreigners are concerned, led him, perhaps, to commit many errors -as a
legislator and a statesman. In every impartial history of
those times, Arguelles must bear his share of the blame
which attaches to the mistakes in the constitution, to-the
ill-timed distrust of Lord Wellington and the English, and
to the unjust and impolitic treatment of the American colonies; yet his unblemished integrity, and the dignified earnestness of his eloquence, were even then acknowledged,
and raised the Cortes in the estimation of Europe. He
was afterward exposed to the severer trials of adversity;
and, notwithstanding his delicate health, he bore the sufferings which the inhuman and ungrateful Ferdinand inflicted
on his benefactors and supporters, with equanimity and
fortitude. For eighteen months was he immured in the
unwholesome atmosphere of a prison, within the guardhouse of Madrid, deprived of books, pen and ink, and nearly
of light, and debarred from all intercourse but with his
jailers; unconscious of all that was passing about him except the riot and drunkenness of the soldiery, the occasional remonstrances of his fellow-sufferers, Martinez de la
Rosa and Manuel Quintana, who were the tenants of similar adjoining rooms, and on one occasion the festivities of
the King himself, who had the brutality to give a banquet
over the dungeons, or at least within the hearing of the
victims of his cruelty. Arguelles was afterward removed
to a fortress on the coast of Africa, Melilla. The comparative mildness of his treatment there was to be attributed
to the sympathy of the garrison, the humanity of the governor, and the intercession of his friends, not to any re



MATARROSA.                    103
morse in Ferdinand. The subsequent career of Arguelles
is well known. During his ministry, and while the Cortes
continued, Ferdinand distinguished him from his associates
by marked dislike, thereby manifesting his discernment in
discovering the qualities most formidable to tyranny; viz.,
consistency of principle, firmness of spirit, and austerity of
virtue in public and private.
Matarrosa was hardly twenty years old, when he
brought the news of the Tmassacre of the 2d of May at
Madrid to the little capital of the Asturies; with unexampled rapidity prevailed on the people of the principality to
revolt, and conveyed the intelligence, together with an application for assistance, to England.  He was thus early
initiated in public affairs. His youth and services combined with considerable natural -endowments to make him
a favorite with the first Cortes at Cadiz. He was surely
more pardonable than many of his colleagues, if he was as
inconsiderate as any in courting popularity, and if he preferred for a season the warm applauses of the people to
the more sober approbation of his judicous countryman,
Andres de la Vega. - On the return of Ferdinand, he escaped from Spain, and was in his absence condemned to
death. He resided in France till the re-establishment of
the Spanish Constitution in 1820, when he became first a
minister, and afterward an active and useful member of
the Cortes. Experiencer had improved his talents, and
moderated without changing his principles; but his habits
at Paris, and his frequent visits to that city, somewhat injured his popularity. Moreover, the fortune which he-had
inherited, and which he, perhaps, improved during his administration, rendered him, like the soldier of Lucullus, less
eager to mount the breach than he had been at the outset




104             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
of his career.  He had, indeed, retired some time before
the war of 1823 was apprehended, and was consulted by
the Duke of-Wellington when he passed through Paris, in
1822, to Verona.  On that occasion he acknowledged the
defects of the ConstitutiOn, but deprecated the notion of
rectifying them  by foreign intimidation.  When the war
broke out he withdrew to England; and, since its fatal
conclusion, has returned to Paris, where, if somewhat
more of an Atticus than a Cato,.he is exempt from the reproach of changing any principles, or truckling to any
enemy in power.
The celebrity of the Spanish generals in the revolutionary war is not sufficient to excite much curiosity about
their personal qualifications and- history, nor would my
opportunities enable me to satisfy it. I knew  little of
them.  The Marquis of Romana, more of a soldier than a
general, was a good scholar, and had some originality of
character.  After a good education at Sorreze, he had
distinguished himself by his courage during war, and by
strange adventures with gipsies in company with Lord
Mount Stuart during peace. He had a strong predilection
for every thing English; he rescued his army from Denmark with great address, and was always a favorite with
the soldiery, because he cheerfully shared all their hardships, and sincerely partook of their antipathy to the
French.  General Blake, the most ill-starred-* of commanders, was. highly accomplished in his profession, and
*In more than one of his well-written dispatches, he speaks of his
Mala Estrella. I am in possession of his MS. of his first calnpaign
in Old Castile and Biscay, and General Foy who read it at Holland
House, when intending to write a history of the Spanish war, assured me that it was the work of an accomplished officer.




BLAKE.-, —CASTANOS.-ABLBUQUERQUE.      105
remarkable for retaining, in spite of uniform disaster, great
influence over the officers of the Spanish army. His wife,
when Coruiia was taken, took refuge in -Plymouth..She
thought herself neglected by our Government; and that
circumstance confirmed the prejudices against England
which an Irish extraction had entailed on General Blake.
He fomented in Spaniards the ill-timed jealousy of their
allies, which long impeded, and nearly counteracted, all
success against the common enemy.
General Castafios had grown old in a court, and was
more adapted for it than for a camp. -- Hot weather, the
plunder and baggage with which the French had encumbered themselves, and the self-sufficiency of their commander, gained for him the victory of Baylen. He had
the good sense and modesty to ascribe his success to those
circumstances. The French general, Dupont, had the bad
taste to preserve his vanity even in his chagrin. When
he delivered his sword to Castalos he said: "You may
well, General, be proud of this day; it is remarkable that
I have never lost a pitched battle till now-I, who have
been in more than twenty, and gained them all."  "It is
the more remarkable," replied dryly the sarcastic Spaniard, "because I never was in one before in my life."
Albuquerque was reckoned to have capacity in the field.
Off it, he certainly had none. The strictures on his conduct agitated him so much that he sat up three nights,
without food or sleep, framing an answer to them, and
died, with the assistance -of Pere Elisee, a French physician, in a paroxysm of fever and despair.
I never saw  La Cuesta, Ballesteros, or O'Donnel.*
* Abisbal.




106              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
The first was described as a curious and almost ludicrous
specimen of an impracticable Spaniard.  He was eighty
years old when he was appointed -to the commandhaughty, suspicious, ignorant, and obstinate, but patient
of fatigue, alike incapable of artifice or fear, and so pedantically observant of the forms of honor, that he would
sacrifice to punctilio his own interests and glory and the
cause in which he was engaged, deeming it a less disgrace to lose ten battles, than to alter dispositions once
approved, or to yield the smallest tittle in etiquette to an
inferior officer or a foreign ally. Ballesteros, though he
had originally risen from the ranks of-an irregular force,
partook of the same spirit, but he was of a more active, or
at least docile age, and proved himself an able partisan;
and, notwithstanding subsequent appearances to the contrary, was, I believe, sincerely zealous in the service of
his country.  Not so O'Donnel: he retained- more of the
nation from  which he sprang, than of that in which he
was born, and educated to arms.  He showed, indeed,
greater talent, and had more success than all the other
Spanish generals; but he was unsteady, intemperate, and
unreasonable, and regardless of truth and character.
Among the chiefs of guerillas, Lord Wellington had the
highest opinion of Mina, who justified that preference by
his subsequent conduct.  He had inll truth a great fund of
mother wit in all things,- as well as courage, activity, and
the coup d'ceil in war.
The most judicious choice, or rather the most fortunate
* What the Spaniards call strangely enough Gramatica Parda,
tawnygra.mmar, knowledge and tact without reading. I have heard
it applied to Mina; and I translate it mother wit.




ALAVA.                     107
accident for the confederate war in the Peninsula, was the
appointment of Don Miguel Alava, as the channel of communication between the English head-quarters and the
Spanish government.  He had the advantage, no small
one in Spain, of a naval education. He had seen service,
and yet was conversant with the manners and character
of the court. His gallantry, openness, and good nature
soon ingratiated him with the English army; and gained
him the confidence and friendship of Lord Wellington.
He had some of the prejudices, but none of the suspicions
of his countrymen. Impetuous in temper, and heedless in
conversation, he was yet so honest, so natural, so cheerful
and so affectionate. that the most reserved man could
scarcely have given less offense than he who commanded
the respect and won the affections of so many by his
intrepid openness and sincerity. He was imprisoned on
the first return of Ferdinand to Spain, and released only
at the personal intercession of Lord Wellington. He was
then named embassador to the Netherlands, but had returned and was living in retirement at Yittoria when the
Constitution was for a second time adopted in Spain. Itwvas a great oversight in the governments which succeeded not to send him embassador to London. At one
time the pedantry of not employing a deputy, at another
the wish of rewarding the Duke of Frias (a strange little
man, not devoid of spirit, but quite unfit for such a place),
induced them to neglect so obvious and so useful a choice.
Alava would, I am persuaded, have convinced the Duke
of Wellington of the propriety and practicability of preventing a French invasion of Spain. He would possibly
have rescued his country from the calamities, and, what




108            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
is worse, the dishonor which has ensued. Fully aware of
the defects of-the Constitution, General Alava felt the ignominy of altering it at the menace of foreigners, and nobly
adhered to the cause of his country. Ferdinand, when
conveyed by him to Port Sta. Maria, invited him earnestly to stay, but Alava judiciously distrusted his sincerity,
and somewhat bluntly reminded him that he had been
thrown in prison in consequence of relying on his moderation before. He escaped to Gibraltar, and sailed from
thence to England. The Duke of Wellington received
him cordially and generously. The same qualities which
had endeared him to our- officers, rendered him popular
with London society.  He was welcome every where
except at court. George IV., who wears his crown in
virtue of the exclusion of the Stuarts, affected not to
forgive a Spaniard for concurring in a moment of national
danger in the temporary dethronement of a king more unwarlike than James I., more perfidious than either Charles,
and more arbitrary and cruel than James II.
I know little of Portugal or Portuguese that would have
the interest of novelty to English readers. The king and
queen, very opposite in principle, character, and conduct,
have a natural abhorrence of one another.  They, in
truth, have nothing in common but a revolting ugliness
of person and a great- awkwardness of manner. He
is well meaning, but weak and cowardly, and so apprehensive of being governed by his ostensible ministers,
that he -becomes the victim of low and obscure cabals,
and renders his councils at all times unsteady, irresolute, and uncertain.  The Queen's outrageous zeal in the
cause of despotism, miscalled legitimacy, is supposed




ARAUJO.-FUNCHAL.                 109
to hiave softened his aversion to a representative Assembly and a constitutional form  of government.  The
Queen is vindictive, ambitious, and selfish, and-has strong
propensities to every species of intrigue, political or
amorous.
In general, the leading men in Portugal are not deficient in talents or knowledge. Vanity in them  often
acts the part of more enlightened patriotism; but they aire
full of little jealousies and artifices, and more cunning in
their negotiations with powerful states than wise in the
management of their own. Araujo, a man of capacity,
hoped by cajoling England and France, to elude the
designs of both, and thus ended by leaving Portugal in
the possession of one, and his sovereign and the Brazils
entirely at the mercy of the other. Souza, Count Funchal,
anxious to assimilate the institutions of his country to
those of England, and sincerely attached to the House of
Braganza, contrived to'pass his life in squabbling with
and persecuting the Reformers, and to lose the favor of his
sovereign by' declining the office which alone could enable
him to execute his designs. Yet his notions were just
and enlightened; but with good abilities he took injudicious and indirect ways to enforce them. He consequently failed, and had need of that cheerfulness of temper
and pleasantry in conversation in which he abounded; to
console him for the many political and personal disappointments to which he was exposed.
I never was in Russia, and I merely passed through
Austria in the spring of 1796. Their governments and
leading, men are nearly unknown to me.
It has been the fashion to describe the Emperor Francis




110               FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
II.* as a mild, benevolent nian, who, without shining parts,
had sound notions of justice, and great disposition to exercise it impartially and mercifully.  It may be so.  But to
all appearance, in all relations of life he has acted like a
person of a character directly the reverse.  As he received
an education unusually philosophical for- a prince, his mistakes can not be ascribed to that ignorance and prejudice
which are so often but so strangely urged as palliations of'
the crimes of royalty.  At the commencement of his reign
he imprisoned, like felonious subjects, in contempt of the
law, or at least the usage of civilized nations, his enemies,
* 1837. Since writing these'strictures on the character of Francis
II. of Austria, I have seen Federico Confalonieri.  He was illegally
arrested and condemned to death by an iniquitous sentence, about
1823. The punishment was commuted, by a mockery of mercy
(itself wrung with some difficulty from the Emperor by the Empress
and other ladies of fashion), into close and for the most part solitary
imprisonment of fifteen years in a Moravian fortress! Confalonieri
ascribes his persecution, and, above all, the unusual and relentless
severity of his imprisonment to the cruelty of two persons, Metternich and the Emperor himself. But he justly remarks, that the
greater portion' of the crime (and such horrid acts of power are
crimes) must, in all presumptive reasoning, be charged on the Emperor.
Prince Metternich's power survived his master; and yet on the death
of that sovereign, Confalonieri was immediately released from his
prison, and allowed to. seek safety in banishment. In this mitigation,
Metternich not only acquiesced, but was disposed to relax, and did
afterward concur in relaxing, even some remaining parts of the sentence. Let not the princes of unlimited monarchy take the benefit
of maxims applicable only to constitutional kings. Acts of baseness
and cruelty perpetrated under them are their own and not their advisers'-the fruit of that selfishness and obduracy which their station
naturally engenders, and which it generally produces in abundance.




FRANCIS II. OF AUSTRIA.               111
civil or military, whether found with or without arms in
their hands, and whether taken on neutral or hostile territory.  Witness Semonville, Malet,* Beurnonville, Lafayette, and his companions. At the age of twenty-two, he
had the heart to tell the wife of the latter, a woman of
unblemished virtue, in the discharge of an heroic duty,
that he would allow her to join her husband, but on the
condition that she was never to quit the prison in which
she visited him. He received the papers of the French
deputies at Rastadt, murdered within his lines, without
insisting on the detection and punishment of the murderers.  He either consented to sacrifice his daughter to the
cowardly policy of propitiating an usurper and a tyrant,
or he basely abandoned and dethroned the prince whom
he had selected for his son-in-law.  He separated  his
daughter from  her husband, and helped to disinherit his
grandson, the issue of a marriage he had certainly sanctioned, and I believe earnestly solicited. With a view of
estranging the same daughter from her exiled and deposed
husband, whose conduct to her was irreproachable, he is
said to have encouraged, and even contrived her infidelities.
Unlike his uncle and father, he' checks the genius and
restrains the liberties of his Italian subjects.  Yet his
* The two first, employed on a diplomatic mission, were seized on
neutral territory, and during their captivity of twenty-two months
were treated frequently more like malefactors than prisoners of war,
though, in truth, they were neither. They had actually fetters. It
should always be recollected that these crimes were committed, not in
countries in a state of revolution or civil war, but in regular hereditary monarchies, professedly fighting for the cause of religion, social
order, law, and subordination!




112             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
alternate usurpation and abandonment, barter and resumption of those territories must have taught them  to consider allegiance as a mere question of convenience; and
the Emperor must be satisfied that he has himself been
instrumental in dispelling those illusions which he has of
late endeavored to impose by severity on mankind.  Prince
Metternich bears, no doubt, a share of the odium attached
to such measures; but it is unjust to acquit the principal
in order to load the accessory.-  That.-m inister, originally
a partisan of the French faction, and then a tool of Napoleon, has, no doubt, since the fall of that great prince, supported the system which succeeded him. He seems hardly
qualified by any superior genius to assume the ascendency
in the councils of his own and neighboring nations, which
common rumor has for some years attributed to him. He
appeared to me, in the very short intercourse I had with
him, little superior to the common run of continental politicians and courtiers, and clearly inferior to the Emperor
of Russia in those qualities which secure an influence in
great affairs.  Some who admit the degrading, but too
prevalent opinion that a disregard of truth is useful and
necessary in the government of mankind, have, on that
score, maintained the contrary proposition. His manners
are reckoned insinuating, In my slight acquaintance with
him in London, I was not struck with them; they seemed
such as might have been expected from  a German who
had studied French vivacity in the fashionable novels
" I have heard it observed, and I believe justly, that the Emperor
passed, during his long reign, for a weak, foolish, but good sort of man;
but that he deserved none of these epithets. He was a man of some
understanding, little feeling, and no justice.




ALEXANDER OF RUSSIA.                   113
of the day.  I saw  little of a sagacious and observant
statesman, or of a courtier accustomed to very refined and
enlightened society."
The address of Alexander himself, the Emperor of
Russia, was, perhaps, liable to a similar criticism.  But he
was obviously well educated, and had a desire to please,
founded not merely on vanity, but on a higher sense of
duty, and a real good nature in his disposition.  Napoleon,
who had trusted too far to the ascendency he had at one
time assumed over his mind, accused him, when emancipated from  his control, of matchless artifice and duplicity,t
"C'est un v6ritable caractere  Grec" (said he to Lord
Ebrington at Elba), words which, in the mouth of a Corsican, imply the summit of treachery and deceit.  But
unsteadiness and inconsistency are riot necessary proofs of
insincerity.  Alexander was placed by birth in a station,
and received from Laharpe an education infinitely beyond
the scope of intellect with which nature had endowed him.
His'dispatches and public papers of late years (I write this note
in 1837,) have assumed the character of elaborate and subtle dissertations on public law, or rhetorical exercises even to pedantry.
f Pozzo di Borgo, though far from stigmatizing such conduct as
Greek duplicity,- as did Bonaparte, concurred, however, with his
countryman in representing Alexander as acting a part throughout.
He was never, he said, the dupe of Bonaparte, he always distrusted
and always meant to subvert his power. Notwithstanding this testimony, I adhere to my opinion, and think Alexander's admiration and
devotion were, for a time, unfeigned. Subsequent events in his career
show he was susceptible of such feelings, and it was not unnatural
on his revival of intimacy with Napoleon's bitter enemy to disclaim
the weakness of having ever been his dupe. It was what a weak
man, in such circumstances, would naturally do.




114             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Such disproportion between the natural capacity and accidental contents of a man's mind might well create some
confusion and irregularity.  Moreover,-the Emperor had a
dash of romance, and some constitutional predisposition to
mental derangement, which unlimited power and the vicissitude of great affairs are particularly apt to bring into
action.  I have little doubt that his admiration for Napoleon was unfeigned, and blended in his mind with some
mysterious notion that Providence had created him as his
coadjutor and guide.  When, therefore, at the' theatre
at Erfurt* he roused him, and seized his hand with enthusiasm, on hearing from the stage that
"L'amiti6 d'un grand homme est un bienfait des cieux,"
he was not vying with the talents of the great actor who
uttered the sentiment, but honestly and unaffectedly giving
way to what was then his own. It was, however, during
that memorable interview, that Alexander began to be
somewhat alarmed at the projects and even nettled at the
behavior of Napoleon.  Talleyrand,t from a questionable
preference of the interests of peace to the official duties
of his confidential station, ventured secretly to apprise the
Emperor of Russia that the object of the interview was to
engage him  in a confederacy against Austria, and even
went so far as to advise him to avoid corning to Erfurt,
or, if he did, to- resist firmly the instances of Napoleon
-  Marshal Soult, who was in the theatre, and witnessed the scenes
told me that Napoleon was half asleep or dozing, when Alexander
seized his hand with emotion, and observed, that that fine line seemed
to be addressed to himself, he felt the application of it,. &e.
f From a sincere and correct,-but indiscreet friend of Talleyrand's.




ALEXANDER OF RUSSIA.                t15
to make war upon Austria.  On his arrival there; he had,
no doubt, frequent opportunities of communicating with
Talleyrand, and that minister's sentiments, highly flattering to Alexander,"  were not calculated, nor perhaps intended, to rivet or to perpetuate his confidence in Napoleon. Some differences; amounting to altercations, took
place; and though Alexander probably did not alter his
opinion, and certainly did not openly change his policy,
he yet left Erfurt less satisfied with his great ally, and less
confidently attached to his system, then he had been at his
arrival there.  Still his predilections continued, and it was
not till irresistible necessity separated him from the policy
enjoined by Napoleon, that the rupture between France
and Russia occurred.  Had Napoleon been less unreasonable in his projects, or less peremptory in exacting
every onerous condition of the treaties he had imposed
upon Russia, he would probably have retained the ascendency he had assumed over the councils and mind
of Alexander; and had Alexander been really and literally as powerful as his title of "Autocrat" supposes, he
would not certainly have reverted to the same state of
dependence after the capture of Moscow as that he had
submitted to ever since the conferences of Tilsit.
The remonstrances of his allies, and of Bernadotte in
particular, the resolution of the army t not to acquiesce
* When the conferences at Erfurt had closed, and the two carriages were drawn up to the door in different directions to convey the
two Emperors to their respective dominions, Talleyrand whispered
to Alexander, as he went down stairs, " Ah, si Votre Majeste' pouvoit
se tromper de voiture!"
f Sir Robert Wilson; confirmed by other testimony and many




116              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
in any peace he should sign, manifested in no equivocal
manner, and the concurring murmurs of the nobility, and
even of his own family, together with numberless uncontrollable circumstances, overruled his inclination, rescued
him  from  the councils of pusillanimity, and converted
him, in spite of his will and his nature, into a conqueror
and a hero.  But I have explained the occurrences of
that time elsewhere.~  The rapid turn of fortune which
ensued, must have convinced  him  that no unalterable
destiny had enchained Victory to the car of the French
Emperor.  It was pardonable and even amiable in him
to be dazzled with the popularity which rewarded the
affability of his manners and the comparative forbearance
of his councils on his first occupation of Paris in 1814.
It required at that time all the persuasion and art of Pozzo
di Borgo (and few men ever possessed a larger share of
both those commodities), as well as a coincidence of fortuitous circumstances, to prevail on him  to acquiesce in
the forced restoration of the Bourbons. When I saw
him in England, and for many months afterward, he was
much taken with what he called "Idles liberales." t  He
circumstances. One might add, that about and from this time that
lively, dexterous, and able man, Pozzo di Borgo, was active in rendering Alexander, through the means of persuasion and intrigue, irreconcilable with Napoleon.
" Vide Chap. vii. Part i. A of my MS. Memoirs.
f He not only talked "liberal language," but courted the "Liberal
party," at that time in a way which, if it did not prove great levity
and great unsteadiness, must have proceeded from yet worse qualities
in his disposition, and such as are described in Rulhiere's History of
Poland as the chief ingredients in Russian policy. Lafayette told me
that he met Alexander at Madame de Stael's; he took him aside, and




ALEXANDER OF RUSSIA.                  ti,
had not indeed reduced them  to'"Idles nettes," either in
his conversation  or his understanding, but they-gavehim  a notion of imposing representative constitutions on
other countries, and even of preparing his own for the
reception of some reforms tending that way.  The atmosphere of Vienna, and the discussions about Poland,
soon afterward damped his ardor for popularity. Surprise, indignation, and fear at the sudden return of Napoleon in 1815, placed him at the head of the opposite
party in the ensuing war and  subsequent treaties.  A
mixture of policy and superstition suggested the Holy
Alliance.  Alexander blended some mysterious notions
of duty toward God with schemes of worldly policy,
tyranny, and amWtion.  He was at that time in some
measure under the dominion of a Livonian lady, Madame
Krudner, who after some celebrity acquired in her earlier
years by the beauty of her person and the freedom of her
pen, had become a visionary and devotee, and either pretended or imagined that she could divine the intentions of
complained of the narrow prejudices and bad conduct of "veos Bourbons." Lafayette observed they were not his, but hoped that misfortune and experience might have corrected their errors. "'Du tout,"
replied the Muscovite philosopher and Emperor; " ils ne sont ni corriges, ni corrigibles."' Lafayette, though somewhat unwilling to prorong such a conversation, could not resist asking him why, with such
in impression of their incapacity, he had bestowed them on France.
"Ce n'6toit pas moi," replied Alexander, 1" ils sont venus comme une
inondcation, l'un deo Nancy, l'autre de l'Angleterre." The. last assertion was false in fact. It has certainly the -appearance of a design in
Alexander to take merit with the Liberals for what he knew he'did
not deserve; and favors Napoleon's view of the duplicity of his
character.




118              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Providence. Alexander, it is true, was soon prevailed
upon to remove her from  his presence, but he continued
liable to, and was perhaps never entirely exempt from,
illusions of supernatural agency*  on the events of the
world, and on his conduct in particular.  He, for instance,
wrote in his own hand a letter of invitation to an ignorant
visionary womant in the Pyrenees, who had pretended
to the gift of prophecy. Other traits of credulity and
superstition have been related,to me by persons. well.ac
quainted with the secrets of his court.  A morbid rever
ence for Napoleon had made him long adhere to a policy,
which, under the name of the Continental System, was at
variance with the wishes and interests of his subjects: an
honest, but perhaps equally morbid sedge of duty led him
latterly to espouse a principle,- which, under the name of
legitimacy, required  the sacrifice of the  national prejudices, and the surrender of the favorite project of the
Russian cabinet to the  preservation  of the Turk, that
* Talleyrand told me (18th Oct. 1830), that Louis XVIII. refused
his consent to a marriage between the Duke of Berry and a sister of
Alexander, from a persuasion that in the Imperial family of Russia the
malady of insanity was hereditary.
t Her name was- M-adame Bouche. She pretended to have seen
the Archangel Michael. She was conveyed to St. Petersburgh, and
remained there some time, lodged and boarded at the Emperor's expense. I am not quite sure of the fact of his writing to her in his own
hand, though it was so related to me. I have been since informed
that some agent or embassador was instructed to write to her, and
furnish her with the means of proceeding to St. Petersburgh.  Such
particulars are immaterial, the main part of the story is true —he consulted her. She was past fifty years old, and he had never seen her
till he sent for her.




ALEXANDER OF RUSSIA.                 119
natural enemy of his country, and  persecutor of his
religion.
In the internal government of his vast empire, if not uniformly consistent and judicious, he was at least free from all
taint of injustice, cruelty, or revenge-no slight commendation of a man in possession of unlimited power for nearly a
quarter of a century over many millions of his fellow-creatures, and in a country inured and familiarized to iniquities
and atrocities of every kind in their rulers. That he was
an accomplice in the murder of his father has not been
proved, and probably is not literally true. That according
to the s'trict maxims-of political morality, which he affected
to impose upon others, he was a sort of accessory after the
fact can not well be disputed. He not only accepted the
crown, which devolved on him in consequence of a crime,
but he left the criminals unquestioned and unpunished.
He even admitted some of them, such as Bennigsen, the
actual assassin, to commands of great trust and importance.
Pahlen his chief adviser, certainly knew,* and in all likelihood communicated to him that a project was on foot to
compel Paul to abdicate or to submit to great restraints on
his authority. If they were not both aware of particulars,
it was prudence, delicacy, and choice alone that kept them
in ignorance. The names of the, conspirators were known
to them.  Alexander, though young, was not so unversed
in the history or so ignorant of the manners of his country,
* I had proof of this from a man of integrity in the confidence of
Pahlen; and from the same authority, I heard many particulars of the
conspiracy, the assassination, and the effects of it, which I have preserved among my papers, and which have been since confirmed by
other testimony.




12.0           FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
nor so deficient in common sagacity as not to conjecture
what must be the termination of a successful conspiracy
against an Autocrat. He foresaw the tendency, and winked at the progress of the plot; he knew the violence, but
consented to reap the fruits of the catastrophe. On the
other hand, before we condemn him, we must weigh' well
many circumstances in excuse or palliation of the degree
of connivance which can be fixed upon him. In the first
place, he had reasons to entertain apprehensions not only
for his own immediate safety, but for that of his mother,
whom he tenderly loved. He witnessed every day the
misery inflicted by the frenzy of Paul on individuals, and
he could not be ignorant that it threatened to involve the
empire in confusion and ruin. Justice and humanity called
for the extinction of a nuisance of such vast and increasing
magnitude. There is no mitigation of the excesses of despotism; violence alone can remove them. Those, therefore, who are in contact with such disorders must, both in
principle and practice, be more familiarized with forcible
remedies, and more pardonable for applying them, than
persons who never have to deal with symptoms so outrageous.  The assassination of an emperor, even by
members of his own family, is -no uncommon occurrence
in Russia or Turkey. It can not, perhaps it ought not, to
excite the same horror there as in more refined and civilized societies. Acquiescence, or even participation in plots
of assassination, is not a crime of'the same dye in despotic
countries as in those where the force of law and the mildness of manners render such bloody expedients unusual and
unnecessary. Had Alexander denounced the plot, or even
merely defeated the execution of it, he would, in truth, only




ALEXANDER OF RUSSIA.               121
have postponed an event which was inevitable, and in all
probability he mlst either have fallen in the interval a victim to his father's suspicion, or ultimately have shared his
fate in order to secure the impunity of the conspirators.
Such scenes justly excite the abhorrence of good men;
but it is not against the actors, but against the system
which creates and in some sort requires such guilt, that
their indignation should be directed. It has been a fashion
of late years, and one much sanctioned by the prince in
question, to consider legitimacy and hereditary right to
power as nearly synonymous. But legitimacy, if it means
any:thing, implies a respect and honor for law. No~w there
is no scheme of government in which the laws of God and
nature are so necessarily violated, and in which, practically, those of mankind are so frequently subverted, as in
hereditary despotism. In the early part of his reign Count
Pahlen had great influence *with Alexander; but Count
Woronzow betrayed to the young sovereign the low opinion which-that minister had formed of his master's talents,
and which, in the confidence of old friendship, he had
imprudently communicated to his countryman in London.
Pahlen was dismissed. Whispers, that his suspected, participation in the plot which deprived Paul of his throne and
his life, made his ostensible power indelicate and offensive,
served to conceal the real reason of his retirement. Czartorinsky, who succeeded him, was equally distinguished for
abilities and for pure and lofty disinterestedness of character.  His ministry was not fortunate, but he contributed in
no slight degree to infuse into the minds of the Emperor and
Empress, and indeed of the whole court, more elevated and
enlightened notions for the government both of Poland and
F




122             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Russia than had hitherto found their way into the cabinet
of St. Petersburgh. To-him, after Laharpe, Russia and the
world are chiefly indebted for such benefits as they have
derived from the prevalence of humane principles in the
mind of Alexander.  But Czartorinsky was a Pole, exposed
to the jealousy and suspicion of the Russians, and perhaps
too much occupied, for a prudent man, in providing for the
welfare, and redressing the grievances of his native country. - He lost his influence in the councils, but not his hold
on the affections'of Alexander, on the failure of the confederacy in 1805.  After the peace of Tilsit, he retired from
public employment, and he probably did not ingratiate
himself with the court of St. Petersburgh by the earnestness. and zeal with which he urged the restoration of Poland, upon the resettlement of Europe in 1814. Alexander,
)endeavoring to imitate Napoleon, vainly imagined that he
could administer every branch of public affairs throughout
his vast dominions.- His intentions were pure, his impartiality unquestionable, but he had neither sagacity norknowledge enough to secure him from the consequences
of misrepresentation, or the errors of ignorance. His assiduity was indeed sufficient to injure his health and impair
his mind, but quite inadequate-to the pressure of business.
Delays, amounting to denial of justice, often ensued. Real
grievances were accumulating, and murmurs and comDlaintss were increasing at the time of his death.  If his
accession proves how little security princes derive from
-' Alexanfder was perhaps at no period of his reign either so popular or so secure in Russia, as the apparent glory of his achievements
seemed to denote, or as foreigners imagined. Marshal Soult told me
that when at Tilsit, he (Soult) was apprised of a very extensive con



NAPOLEON.                       123
unlimited power, his administration showed that the best
and rarest qualities of a sovereign are insufficient to insure
the welfare of his people under the preposterous system
which invests. him, in right of his-birth, with the whole,power of the state.
Such prodigious intellects as those of Cesar or Napoleon seem at first sight to offer exceptions to the remark.
But when or where have CUesars or Napoleons been born
or bred in a palace?  Is it clear that both those miraculous men, with minds adequate to the stupendous task of
governing vast masses of their fellow  creatures by their
sole will and pleasure, had not other qualities necessarily
associated  with such active spirits and  ardent genius,
which, if uncontrolled by law, would counteract and overbalance the benefits their vigilance and discernment were
capable of conferring on mankind?
Those who peruse the following pages, traced. certainly
by no hostile pen, will probably discover the features of
such a- character, even in the outlines that I am enabled to
preserve of the greatest prodigy of the times to which my
notices relate-Napoleon Bonaparte.
spiracy against him, in which Bennigsen, the assassin of his father, and
the commander of his army, was concerned. Soult, before he had
consulted his own government on the matter, disclosed the whole in a
private letter to Alexander, and mentioned the names of the conspirators. He showed me the answer of Alexander, in his own handwriting. He thanks Soult in it very warmly for the information, for he
says it will be of great use to him, though he does not believe that the
matter is quite so important (tout-a-fait si consequent) as the Marshal
supposes. Soult added to me with some bitterness, that the letter
should some day appear, together with that in which the same Alexander refused him an asylum in his dominions.




124            FOREIGN REMlNISCENCES.
I proceed to transcribe some hasty and rambling notes
taken when the news of his death reached me at Paris
in 1821. They contain a faithful picture of impressions
made upon my mind at that time. The reader will indeed
remark that I had little personal intercourse with Napoleon; but he will estimate the opportunities I had of conversing with those most capable of giving me information
more easily than if I had reduced my notes to a more
regular and methodical narrative. I have, however, omitted such- facts as I have subsequently had reason to believe
untrue, and also such, on the other hand, as have appeared
in print on as good or better authority than my own.
The Emperor Napoleon died at St.,HIelena on the 5th
of May, 1821. Some hours before the news was generally
known in Paris, a note in pencil was left at my door, without signature or date, directed to Lady Holland, and apprising her shortly," but with concern, of the event.  The
intelligence had been conveyed fiom Calais by telegraph.
Few days elapsed before Lady Holland received the two
following letters from Sir Hudson Lowe:
" DEAR MADAM,            L "St. Helena, 6th May, 1821.
"The compassionate interest which your Ladyship has
so constantly and in so generous a manner shown toward
the remarkable person who had been so long under my
charge, imposes it as a duty on me to take the earliest
opportunity of informing you that he breathed his last
yesterday evening at about ten minutes before six o'clock.
* I think the words were:
"Le grand homme est mort."
See Appendix, No. IV.




NAPOLEON.                    125
The public accounts render it unnecessary for me to enter
into any particular details as to the causes of his death.
His father died of the same complaint, a scirrhous cancer
of the stomach, near what is called the pylorus. It was
beyond the power of medicine to have saved him. Every
assistance which the means of this island could afford was
tendered to him. He appeared conscious of his approaching fate, and would receive the visits of only one English
medical person in addition to his own medical attendant,
Professor Antommarchi. He died without appearing to
suffer much pain. Praying my best respects to Lord Holland, I remain,
" Your Ladyship's most obliged
"and faithful servant,
(Signed)          "H. LowEs."
" To the Rt. Hon. The Lady Holland."
" DEAR MADAM,.         L "St. Helena, 15th May, 1821.
"On looking over the effects left by Bonaparte, in company with Count Montholon and MIarchand, his valet de
chambre, I observed two snuff-boxes of wrought gold, one
of them with a cameo of very large size set in the cover
of it, representing a goat with a fawn riding upon it, nibbling at some grapes on a vine stalk. Count Montholon
informed me it had been a present from Pope Pius VII.*
to Bonaparte at the peace of Tolentino. The other box
was of a plainer kind, and had simply an N engraved or
rather cut in with the point of some sharp instrument on
the top of it. After some time had passed in looking at
various other things in the apartment, I returned to the spot' Sic in MS., a mistake for Pius the Sixth.




126             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
where the boxes lay, and taking up the first of them  to
admire the beauty of the cameo, I afterward opened the
lid of it, when I observed a card at the bottom of the box
exactly cut to its size, and the following words in Bonaparte's own hand written upon it:'"L'Empereur Napoleon
a Lady Holland, t6moignage de satisfaction et d'estime."
On the back of the card was written in another hand:
Donne par le Pape Pius VII.-* a Tolentino, 1797." Counts
Montholon and Marchand both expressed their surprise at
the discovery t I had made, and said they had not known
of such a card being within the box, but Count Montholon
added he had been charged to present the box to your
Ladyship. The other gold box which had the N cut upon
the top of it, Count Montholon told me he had been directed to present to Dr. Arnott.  It was half full of snuff,
being the last box Bonaparte had in use, and the N upon it
had been cut by himself. He had directed also a "'somme
d'argent" to be delivered to Dr. Arnott. I have acquainted
Lord Bathurst of these bequests.
"Praying my best respects to Lord Holland, I remain,
"Your Ladyship's most obliged
"and most faithful Servant,
(Signed)       "H. LOWE."
f It should be VI.
f I am not sure that Sir Hudson Lowe did not mean to. imply by
this expression that but for his discovery the box would never have
reached its destination. At least; observations of his nearly to that
purport have been repeated to me. But the legacy is bequeathed and
described in the will.- Indeed it is the first, or nearly the first article
in it. Any insinuation of a wish or a design any where to defraud
Lady Holland of the box would be as groundless as it would be malicious.




NAPOLEON.                     127
The legacy announced in the preceeding letter, and
which was some months afterward delivered in great
form" to Lady Holland at Holland House by the Counts
Montholon and Bertrand, was mentioned in the public
newspapers very soon after the intelligence of the death
of Napoleon had reached Paris.  That circumstance and
the notoriety of the attention shown by Lady Holland to
the illustrious prisoner during his exile, introduced us to
the society of Those who openly professed or sincerely
felt most veneration for the memory of Napoleon in
France.  From  their conversation the substance of the
following notes is derived; but as the reader may be
desirous to know how far I was qualified either to correct
or estimate the representations I heard, by any previous
personal observation, it may be necessary to state the extent and nature of such little intercourse as subsisted between
Napoleon and us, either before or after his captivity.
Both Lady Holland and mys'elf were presented to him
in 1802, when he was First Consul.  He saw  her only
once, and addressed some usual questions and compliments to her, but had no conversation; though I have
reason to believe that he was aware of the admiration
she entertained and avowed for his military and political
genius. I stood -next to him  in the circle when he received and answered, in a short written speech (hastily
and somewhat awkwardly delivered), the deputation head@ The two gentlemen came in the Imperial uniform! Strange
and mortifying reflection to human pride that those who had devoted
themselves to a man of great intellect, should imagine that they
honored his memory by aping the absurd forms of other sovereigms
or pretenders.




128            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
ed by Barthelemi, which came to confer upon-him the
consulship for life. He spoke very civilly, but very little
to me on that occasion; and scarcely more when I dined
and passed the evening at his court, in company with
Mr. Fox, with whom he conversed at considerable length
on various matters, and more particularly on the Concordat. These were the only opportunities I ever had
of observing his countenance or hearing his voice. The
former, though composed of regular features, and both
penetrating and good-humored, was neither so dignified
nor so animated as I had expected; but the latter was
sweet, spirited, and persuasive in the highest degree, and
gave a favorable impression of his disposition as well as
of his understanding. His manner was neither affected
nor assuming, but certainly wanted that ease and attraction which the early habits of good company are supposed
exclusively to confer.  We traveled through France to
Spain that year (1802), and received from the prefects
and public officers of every town we passed through,
every possible mark of attention. We attributed this toits real cause, the disposition of the Consul to cultivate
the good-will of the friends of peace in England, and of
all connections of Mr. Fox in particular, and my old
friendship with Talleyrand, who was at that time his
confidential minister, and not disinclined to give full effect
to the general policy of the Consular government in the
shape- of particular acts of kindness and judicious hospitality to us.
After the first abdication, and the retreat of the Emperor to Elba in 1814, Lady Holland conveyed from
Florence and from Rome some messages of civility, and




NAPOLEON.                      129
furnished him with one or two packets of English newspapers, which she was informed he had been anxious to
peruse, and unable to procure. In acknowledgement of
these little acts of attention, I think that he sent her, before
he left Elba, some small but curious specimens of the
iron ore of that island.  It is remarkable that in one of
those papers so sent by Lady Holland, was a paragraph
hinting a project among the confederates of transporting
him to St. Helena. True. it is, that such an idea, however inconsistent with honor or good faith, was started
and discussed,* though probably never committed to paper
at the Congress of Vienna, before Napoleon left Elba.
It is just to add, that it was discountenanced and rejected
by Austria. In confirmation of so base a design having
been entertained, it is observable that a negotiation with
the East India Company to place St. Helenat under the
control of Government, with no other probable or ostensible object for such a measure, was actually commenced
in March, 1815, and discontinued on the landing of Napoleon in that month.  Any well-grounded suspicion of such
a proceeding was surely sufficient to release. the exiled
Emperor from the obligations of his treaty and abdication
of Fontainebleau, and to justify his attempt to recover
the Empire he had so recently lost. We were at Rome
* I stated this fact in the House of Lords in the debate on the
treatment of General Bonaparte, and I was not contradicted: I had
it in truth from an Englishman of veracity employed at the Congress
of Vienna, who told it me after Napoleon's arrival at Paris, but before
the battle of Waterloo.
f From Admiral Fleming, nephew of the East Indian Director
Elphinston, both men of honor, veracity, and intelligence.
FIt




130            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
when he reached Paris, and at the suggestion, I believe,
of his brother Louis, he sent us a passport, which reached
us on our journey between Radicofani and Sienna. We
never endeavored to avail ourselves of it.  The rapid
termination of the war rendered it unnecessary. If we
had, we should, in all likelihood, have found it useless,
for the jealousy of the allies had rigorously closed all cornmunication or intercourse whatever with France.  We
arrived at Dover nearly at the same time that Napoleon
was brought to England in the Bellerophon by -Captain
Frederick Maitland.  That high-spirited officer's scruples
in promising nothing but what he knew he could perform,
his steadfast adherence to what he did promise, and his
conduct throughout both to his illustrious prisoner and
his own government, were highly honorable to the character of the service and himself; but generosity to a fallen
enemy, neither in his case nor in that of Captain Usher,
who had conveyed Napoleon to Elba, recommended those
who displayed it -to the favor of the Admiralty.  The
headstrong zeal of Napoleon's adherents has often injured
his cause, and exposed him to the imputation of indirectness and perfidy, which he- sometimes but very rarely
deserved. Some of them most injudiciously as well as
falsely accused Captain Maitland of artifice in inveigling
the Emperor on board, and of equivocation in interpreting
the conditions on which he received him.  To neither
of these most unfounded charges was Napoleon himself
directly or indirectly a party; and the falsehood contained in them, as well as in many other writings of
is eager partisans, can not in equity reflect on his personal or political character.




NAPOLEON.                       131
When the ungenerous decision  by which this great
prisoner was to be conveyed to St. Helena was known,
Lady Holland hastened to apply to government for permission to send such articles as in her judgment were
likely to contribute to his comfort or amusement in that
distant exile.  She improved her slight acquaintance with
Sir Hudson Lowe, and by every civility-in her power
endeavored to obtain from him all the facilities consistent
with his duty and instructions for carrying her intentions
into execution.  She failed in both these attempts.  Lord
Bathurst informed her that no present could be sent to
General Bonaparte, but that government would willingly
purchase and convey to him  any thing which could be
suggested as conducive to his comfort.  Lady Holland
happened to know  that the Emperor liked even in less
sultry climates to drink both.water and wine extremely
cold. She had been on the point of buying, at a considerable price, a newly invented machine for making ice; and
in answer to Lord Bathurst's message, she gave him the
direction of the maker, and suggested the purchase.
The machine, however, was neither purchased nor sent.
Lady Holland nevertheless persisted, and contrived to send
* With whom that decision originated, I am not sure. Nothing
could be less liberal or dignified than the subsequent conduct and language of George IV. respecting -Napoleon and his family. It was a
contrast, not a copy, of the Black Prince to King John. Yet the first
impression produced on his mind by Napoleon's celebrated letter, if,
not very creditable to the taste or judgment of the Prince Regent,
was not unfavorable to the writer. He remarked that the words with
which it began, "Altesse Royale," were quite correct and proper,," more correct, I must say," added he, " than any I ever received
from Louis XVIII."




'32.         FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
together with new publications and trifling presents to
Sir Hudson, similar marks of remembrance to Napoleon.
They were often delayed, from excessive scruple or from
less pardonable -motives, at the Government House; yet
the innocent nature of the memorials themselves secured
their ultimately reaching their destination. Various obstacles however, presented themselves to this insignificant intercourse. A natural and pardonable pride deterred
Napoleon from applying for any thing; a more mistaken,
and in my judgment contemptible punctilio, led him to reject any communication in which his title of Emperor was
not preserved. Advantage was taken of such circumstances to withhold many convenient and necessary supplies, and to straiten his intercourse with the inhabitants of
the island, or with such strangers as accidentally visited it.
The privations and petty vexations to which the inhabitants, of Longwood were exposed, are probably misrepresented or exaggerated by the vulgarity and ignorance
of the author, in the publication of Santini in 1817; but
there was undeniably a shameful want of attention to their
wishes and interests, and occasionally unmannerly harshness in the Governor toward the illustrious prisoner and his
companions. There was little or no tenderness to his
feelings, or to those of his family, in the Secretary of
State's office at home. If letters from his relations were
not actually intercepted, no facility was afforded for conveying them. One from his mother was not only read but
mislaid for a considerable'time among the inferior clerks
of the office. As Napoleon prudently declined drawing
on the funds he possessed in Europe, because the drafts
and consequently the depositaries of such sums must have




NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA.               133
been in that case communicated to his jailers and enemies,
and as much required by himself and his suite was not furnished to them by the English Government, he was compelled to borrow from the private fortunes of his companions, or to raise money in the island by the sale of his
plate and other superfluities. The notoriety of such' circumstances, possibly the sensation excited by the publication above alluded to, and the effect, I flatter myself, of my
motion* in the House of Lords, produced sonie little relaxation.  At least letters from the Emperor's family intrusted
to the Secretary of State were henceforward more regularly transmitted. Provisions, clothing, and books purchased by them and sent to the same office, were also forwarded; and Lord Bathurst, some time afterward, not
only consented to convey articles from Lady Holland to
Napoleon and Sir Hudson Lowe, but apprised her regularly of ships that sailed for St. Helena, and after due experience of her scrupulous adherence to the rules he imposed, allowed all parcels, books, and cases indorsed with
her handwriting and name to proceed without further inspection to their destination.  Lady Holland had the satisfaction of knowing that many of those articles were received and approved of.  Napoleon never wrote, but he
mentioned her name and her attentions more than once to
persons who repeated his acknowledgments to her. The
legacy was, however, a gratifying, and by her an unex* The motion referred to some facts in common with the statement
of Santini, but it was in nowise connected with that pamphlet or its
author, nor did the information on which I grounded it rest in any
degree on his authority and representations, as Lord Bathurst in his
answer, with some dexterity, affected to think it did.




134            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
pected proof, that such endeavors to express her admiration of his great qualities, and even to soothe his afflictions
had not been altogether unsuccessful.  The testimony of
his own handwriting, the words so judiciously chosen, even
the pains taken to fit the card- to the box, enhanced the
value of the bequest, for they proved that Napoleon understood her motives, and that they had occupied for some
little space of time the thoughts, as well as excited the
good-will of that extraordinary man.  The whole was in
good taste. Had the gift been greater, she could not have
accepted it; had the expressions been stronger, they would
not have appeared sincere.  Surely to have. afforded satisfaction to a man so calumniated, so persecuted, and so illtreated, and to have excited the esteem of a mind so capacious and so penetrating, is no slight distinction.  Lady
Holland found in the knowledge of it an ample reward for
her constant, unremitting, and unostentatious compassion
and generosity.  There was a disposition in the people of
Paris to disbelieve in the death of Napoleon, there was
more in the middling classes to attribute it to poison, and
there was some in the court to affect the magnanimity of
stifling all resentment toward the departed hero.
" Caesar could weep, the crocodile could weep,
To see his rival of the universe
Lie still and peaceful there."
It was easier to imritate the hypocrisy than the other
qualities of a Casar.*
Mourning was worn by many, especially on the 15th
August, the festival of St. Napoleon. Publications on his
" See the documents in Appendix V.




NAPOLEON'S FAMILY.                135
character, life, and death' were numerous, and generally
more full of commendation than of censure.  Portraits,
engravings, and prints in allusion to his exile and death
were bought up with an avidity which alarmed the police,
and led to a temporary suppression of the exhibition of
such articles in the shops.
The substance of the conversation of those best informed
on such subjects in Paris, 1821, may be collected from the
following notes of what I heard; I do not vouch for the
correctness of every particular. Where, however, I do
not mention the relater, I consider the source from which
I derive the facts to be authentic, or I have heard them so
frequently asserted without contradiction, that I believe
them. Where I do mention the relater, the reader may
judge of the value of the evidence I adduce.
Enough is known, from  his own testimony or others'
researches, to satisfy the curiosity of the public about his
descent, and to prove, in refutation of the vulgar calumnies of the day, that if neither illustrious nor extraordinary,
it was such as, according to the usual way of estimating
such matters in France and Italy, would entitle his family
to the appellation of noble."  His father was on some
occasion chosen as deputy of that class, and both he and
one, of his sisters were educated at schools in France.,
where proofs of their belonging to a gentleman's family
were exacted. By the concurrent testimony of more than
one of his relations, his uncle Ramolino,t a Canon of
- Serra, Pozzo di Borgo, Louis Bonaparte, Napoleon's own conversations, and many other persons as well as documents confirm this fact.
t Pozzo di Borgo thought, when I related this circumstance to him,
which I had heard from Fesch and Louis Bonaparte, that it must




136   -          FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Ajaccio, was a man remarkable for his sense and attainments, and of sagacity sufficient to discern the superiority
of his nephew, and to recommend on his death-bed all the
young men of the family to defer in the most important
concerns of their lives to the judgment and advice of their
second brother, Napoleon.
Napoleon was born at Ajaccio in 1769. It was affirmed
by many that he was at least a year older, and concealed
his real age from an unwillingness to acknowledge his birth
in Corsica, at a period when that island formed no part of
the French dominions. The story is an idle one. A yet
more idle one was circulated that-he had been baptized
by the name of Nicholas,* but from  apprehension  of
have been his paternal uncle, Lucien Bonaparte, not his maternal
uncle Ramolino, of whom it was related. I think I read in the MS.
memoirs of Louis Bonaparte which he lent me at Rome in 1815, but
which I must allow were almost illegible from the badness of the
writing, all that is here related in the text.
* It is said, probably with as little foundation, that when Marshal
Soult wished to be proclaimed King of Portugal, his name of Nicholas
was urged as an unsurmountable objection. I do not vouch for his
having ever entertained such a wish, am satisfied no such objection
defeated it, and believe his name to be John. General Sebastiani told
me in conversation a curious anecdote about this general, King
Joseph, and Napoleon. The latter, when at Madrid, signed a decree
annexing Spain to France, and Sebastiani found King Joseph, to whom
it had been communicated, in despair, and actually in tears: he earnestly entreated Sebastiani to go to his brother and intercede with him.
Napoleon said it was true the decree had been signed, but the news
from Salamanca (where I think the English had advanced upon Soult)
had induced the Emperor to revoke the decree, and to postpone his
brother's dethronement for some months. "You may tell him the
revocation of the decree (said he), but not a word of my future inten



NAPOLEON AT BRIENNE.                   137
ridicule  converted  it, when  he  rose -to celebrity, into
Napoleon.  The printed exercises of the military school
of Brienne,* of the years 1780, 1781, 1783, preserved in
the Biblioth6que at Paris, represent him  as proficient in
history, algebra, geography, and dancing, under the name
of Buona-Parte de l'Isle de Corse; sometimes d'Ajaccio
en Corse.  Many traits of his aspiring  and  ambitious
character, even in early youth, have been related, and
Pozzo di Borgo quoted (1826) a conversation with him
when 18 years of age, in which, after inquiring and learning the state of Italy, he exclaimed, "Then I have not
been deceived, -and with two thousand soldiers a mar
might make himself king (Principe) of that country."
The ascendency he acquired over his family and companions, long before his great talents had emerged from
obscurity, were formerly described to me by Cardinal
tions."  Sebastiani some months afterward commanded at Grenada;
and he was sounded by a confidential agent of Joseph's and Soult's to
co-operate in opening a negotiation for a separate peace between
Spain and England, unknown to Napoleon and the French government. So that the Imperial councils were far from being a scene of
harmony and union at that period.
* These books are as follows:
That of 1780, in which he is twice mentioned; printed at Troyes,
and unbound.
That of 1781, in which he is mentioned three times; printed by
Didot l'aine, a Paris, and bound.,That of 1782, in which he is mentioned three times; printed at
Troyes, and unbound.
N.B. They were all three lent to me in February, 1826, from the
Bibliotheque Royale. His name is uniformly written Buona-Parte.
He is once described as d'Ajaccio en Corse, and twice de l'Isle de
Corse.




138            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Fesch and Louis Bonaparte, and have been confirmed
since by the uniform  testimony' of such as knew  him
during his residence in Corsica, or before his acquaintance with Barras, the Director. When' at home he was
extremely studious, ardent in some pursuit, either literary
or scientific, which he communicated to no one. At his
meals, which he devoured rapidly, he was silent, and
apparently absorbed in his own thoughts. Yet he was
generally consulted on all questions affecting the interests
of any branch of his family, and on all such occasions was
attentive, friendly, decisive, and judicious. He wrote at
a very early period of his life a -Iistory of Corsica, and
sent the manuscript to the Abbe Raynal with a flourishing
letter, soliciting the honor of his acquaintance, and requesting his opinion of the work. The Abb6e acknowledged the letter and praised the performance, but Napoleon never printed it.* Persons who have dined-with him
at taverns and coffee-houses when it was convenient to
him  not to pay his reckoning, have assured me, that
though the youngest and poorest, he always obtained,
without exacting it, a sort of deference or even submission
from the rest of the company. Though never parsimonious, he was at that period of his life extremely attentive
to the details of expense, the price of provisions, and of
other necessary articles, and in short to every branch of
domestic economy.  The knowledge thus early acquired
in such matters was useful to him  in a more exalted
station. He cultivated and even made a parade of his
information in subsequent periods of his career, and thus
* See Appendix No. VI.




NAPOLEON'S ATTENTION TO DETAILS.       139
sometimes detected and frequently prevented embezzlement in the administration of public accounts. Nothing
could exceed the order and regularity with which his
household, both as Consul and Emperor, was conducted.
The great things he accomplished, and the savings he'
made, without even the imputation of avarice or meanness, with the sum comparatively inconsiderable of 15
millions of francs a year, are marvelous; and expose his
successors, and indeed all European Princes to the reproach of negligence or incapacity. In this branch of his
government, he owed much to Duroc. It is-said, that
they often visited the markets of Paris (les halles) dressed
in plain clothes, and early in the *morning. When any
great accounts were to be submitted to the Emperor,
Duroc would apprise him in secret of some of the minuteest details. By an adroit allusion to them. or a careless
remark on the points upon which he had received such
recent and accurate information, Napoleon contrived to
impress his audience with a notion that the master's eye
was every where. For instance, when the Tuilleries
were furnished, the upholsterer's charges, though not very
exorbitant, were suspected by the Emperor to be higher
than the usual profit of that trade would have warranted.
He suddenly asked some minister who was with him how
much the egg at the end of the bell-rope should cost?
"J'ignore," was the answer.-" Eh bien! nous verrons,"
said he, and then cutoff the ivory handle, called for a
valet, and bidding him dress himself in plain and ordinary
clothes, and neither divulge his immediate commission or
general employment to any living soul, directed him to
inquire the price of such articles at several shops in Paris,




140            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and to order a dozen as for himself. They were onethird less dear than those fumished to the palace. The
Emperor, inferring that the same advantage had been
taken in the other articles, struck a third off the whole
charge, and directed the tradesman to be informed that it
was done at his express command,. because on inspection
he had himself discovered the charges to be by one4third
too exorbitant. When afterward, in the height of his
glory, he visited Caen with the Empress Maria Louisa
and a train of crowned heads and princes, his old friend
M. Mechin, the Prefect, aware of his taste for detail,
waited upon him with five statistical tables of the expenditure, revenue, prices, produce, and commerce of the department. "C'est bon," said he, when he received them
the evening of his arrival, "vous et moi nous ferons -bien
de l'esprit sur tout cela demain au Conseil."  Accordingly,
he astonished all the leading proprietors of the department
at the meeting next day, by his minute knowledge of the
prices of good and bad cider, and of the produce and
other circumstances of the various districts of the department. Even the Royalist gentry were impressed-with a
respect for his person, which gratitude for the restitution
of their lands had failed to inspire, and which, it must be
acknowledged, the first faint hope of vengeance against
their enemies entirely obliterated in almost every member
of that intolerant faction.
Other princes have shown an equal fondness for minute
details with Napoleon, but here is the difference. -The
use they- made of their knowledge was to torment their
inferiors and weary their company: the purpose to which
Napoleon applied it was to confine the expenses of the




NAPOLEON AND THE JACOBINS.           141
State to the objects and interests of the community. I
return to the. earlier period of his life. His compliances
with the ruling party of the Jacobins have been, greatly
exaggerated. Some indecorous language and behavior in
the churches of Toulon or Marseilles, after the surrender
of those towns td the Republicans, constitute the amount
of the charges which can be substantiated against him on
that score. From all participation in their cruelties he
was entirely free.  He did not even at that dangerous
period conceal from  his intimates his contempt for the
prevalent absurdities, and his serious disapprobation of the
means by which the system of terror was so long kept in
vigor. The horrors of the revolution made a deep impression on his mind. The dread of their revival led him
at subsequent periods of his life, not only to treat the antirevolutionists with improvident and dangerous indulgence,
but even to assimilate'his own government in too many
particulars to the ancient order of things. He was apt
to listen with complacency to any reasoning which could
be devised to ground his authority on a basis the very
reverse of that on which he well knew it really, or at least
more naturally rested. His favor with Barras (which I
believe is correctly stated by all his biographers to have
been the chief cause of his employment on the 13th and
14th, of Yendemiaire (4th and 5th October, 1795), and
his subsequent appointment to the command of the army
of Italy) was the fair fruits of his distinguished services
at Toulon, and of the genius and energy which, on intimate acquaintance with him, were discernible in his
conversation and character.  On his first nomination to
the army of Italy, the Directory is said to have been




142             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
unable or unwilling to supply him with the money necessary for the journey of himself and his aid-de-camps to
the spot, and their suitable appearance at the head-quarters of a considerable force. -In this emergency, after
collecting all that his resources, the contribution of his
friends, and his credit could muster,'he is reported to
have applied to Junot; a young officer whom he knew
to be in the habit of frequenting the gaming tables, and
confiding to him all the money he had been able to raise,
in itself no great sum,*.to have directed him  either to
lose the whole or to increase it to a considerable amount
before the morning, as on his success that night at play
depended the possibility of his taking the command of
the army and appointing Junot his aid-de-camp. Junot,
after succeeding beyond his expectations in winning to
an amount in his judgment equal to the exigencies of his
employer, hastened to inform  General, Bonaparte, but
he was not satisfied, and resolving to try his fortune to
the utmost, bade his friend return, risk all that lihe had
gained, and not quit the table till he had lost the last
penny, or doubled the sum he had brought back to him.
In this also, after some fluctuation, the chances favored
him, and Napoleon set out to his head-quarters furnished
with sufficient to take upon him the command with no
little personal splendor and 6clat.t i The above anecdote
* Junot, say others, sold his silver-hilted sword, and added the produce to the stake.
t I have repeated it as, after refreshing my memory by references
to others who heard it at the same time, I believe it to have been
told to me. I do not venture to mention the sums, but what was ulti
mately won, seems to me to have been 300,000 francs. The story,




NAPOLEON AND HOCHE.                143
was first: related to me by the Chevalier Serra, Minister
of the Ligurian Republic at Madrid, a man of veracity,
learning, and discernment; who was intimately acquainted with Napoleon during his Italian campaigns. By the
same authority I was assured that at that early period
of his career, though he acknowledged  the military
prowess of the French, he spoke of them  to Salicetti
and other Italians as foreigners, undervalued their political talents, and treated them  as a nation devoid of
public principle and moral courage. It is to be remarked
that this language was held to Italians, who he well knew
would be pleased and flattered by the expression of opinions congenial with thei; own, and from  which they
might infer the superiority of their own countrymen over
those who in appearance had subdued them.  He had
married Josephine, the widow of Viscount Beauharnois
before he took the command of the army of Italy. During his love for that lady, General Hoche was there, as
elsewhere, his rival.  Hoche had the advantage of person, higher rank, and a longer established reputation
in the army. Josephine with good manners, some beauty,
and more sweetness of disposition, had some tincture
of romance and superstition in her character.  Half in
joke, and half in earnest, she was a great promoter of
that spurious offspring of astrology and witchcraft which
consists in telling fortunes by games of cards, caballistic
with some variation of circumstances, has often been recounted to me,
or alluded to in conversation with well-informed Frenchmen. Serra
was afterward employed in a diplomatic character by Napoleon at
Dresden. He wrote and printed an account of that great prince's
German and Polish campaigns in Latin, and died at Dresden in 1813.




L44           FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
numbers, lotteries, palmistry, and other devices, which
those who encourage them are compelled to laugh at
and term mere pastime, but which those who laugh at
them and find diversion in them are apt in'some little
measure to consider, and even to.credit. Napoleon, to
amuse his mistress and torment his rival, affected to be
an adept in palmistry. He told the fortunes of most of
the company in a way which, never having been mentioned since, turned out probably ill-founded conjecture,
but on inspecting the hand of Hoche he predicted that
his rival would deprive him of his mistress, and that he
would die in his bed. As both these events occurred,
the credulous and malignant enemies of Napoleon did-not
fail to impute the second as well as the first to his machinations. The premature death of the young and brilliant
General:Hoche in Germany was gravely accounted for
by poison administered to him by his successful rival in
Italy, who forsooth, to avoid suspicion and detection, had
in a moment of gayety unnecessarily predicted the death
he was secretly and wickedly contriving!
Among the various fortunes foretold to Josephine before
her second marriage, she often mentioned that of a gipsy,
who had informed her that "she would be greater than a
queen, and yet die in a hospital."  The latter part of that
silly prophecy, say the credulous, has been verified to the
letter, though not in the spirit, by the name of Malmaison,
the place of her decease, which in its original meaning,
and probably destination, was a receptacle for the sick. I
must acknowledge that I heard the prediction very currently reported as early as 1802, and, therefore, before her
death or elevation to the title of Empress, when it might




NAPOLEON AND JOSEPHINE..145
have: been matter of dispute whether, as wife of the Ili'st
Consul, she had literally fulfilled even the first clause of
the oracle. His marriage was the,york of Barras, and
contracted about the time of his promotion. Napoleon's
love'for Josephine was ardent and sincere; it continued
for some time, and his esteem and good-will"toward fher
never ceased. Upon first assuming the title of Emperor,
he began, however, to listen to suggestions, and, perhaps,
to harbor the design of another marriage, calculated to insure his admittance into the college of legitimate sovereigns, and better suited to the foundation of an hereditary
empire, by affording some prospect of issue. A lady who
knew Josephine well, but who, though correct in her recollections and accurate in her language, is apt somewhat
to dramatize her narratives, assured me that, on first assuming his new title, the Emperor told Madame Bonaparte
in her cabinet that his family, his ministers, his council,
enfin tout le monde, had represented to him the necessity
of a divorce and a new marriage; and that while she was
leaning on her arm, with tears in her eyes, he walked
backward and forward in a hurried and agitated manner,
frequently repeating, "Qu'en dis-tu done? Cela sera-t-il?
Qu'en dis-tu?" She replied, "Que veux-tu que j'en dise?
Si tes freres, tes ministres, tout le monde est contre'moi, et
il n'y a que toi pour me defendre!" "' Tu n'as que moi
pour te d6fendre!" exclaimed he with emotion, " Eh bien,
tu l'emporteras."  Josephine, in recounting the story, added that he never could withstand tears, and least of all
the tears of a woman. According to her, whenever he
thought it necessary to be firm, he assumed a short, harsh,
and decisive tone, for the purpose of preventing those ap
G




FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
peals which he was unable directly to resist.  Others have
concurred in assuring me that the unmannerly speeches
in which he too often indulged were the result of system
rather than temper, and adopted to disconcert designs and
elude importunity; that his so much dreaded bursts of passion were the cloak of an easy and good-humored, not the
ebullitions of a hasty or ungovernable disposition.  This
may be so; but many will think he acted his part too well,
and habit too often becomes second nature.
On one melancholy occasion he certainly exhibited great
obduracy.  Whatever were the motives, whoever were
the advisers of the arrest and execution of the Duke of
Enghien, Napoleon was besieged both in public and private by the tears of his wife, the intercession of his family,
and the remonstrances of more than one public man, for
mercy, and in vain.  The whole is a mystery; those who
were in the secret, and have written on the subject, without succeeding in vindicating themselves from all suspicion
of participation in the guilt, have thrown little light on the
subject. One of them, Savary, had at one time committed
to paper the following explanation of the motives for
arresting the Duke of Enghien.*  Those intrusted with the
* The manuscript of his memoirs containing this story, was offered
for sale to a bookseller in London in 1815 or 1816, by Savary himself.
The bookseller, to form a judgment of its value, confided it to the perusal of Mr. Allen, who, though he abstained, from a scruple of honor,
from copying a line, recollected the account of this interesting and
painful transaction. The memoir was neither purchased by the bookseller nor printed, and in the pamphlet afterward published by Savary,
in Paris, some of the details were repeated verbatim, others were
altered, and others entirely suppressed.




NAPOLEON AND THE DUKE OF ENGHIEN.        147
police had informnation of the private meetings of Georges
Cadoudal and hig accomplices at Paris. Their numbers,
their plot, the means they possessed of executing it; and
the period destined for their enterprise, even much of their
private conversation, had been detected. But in those
secret juntos there occasionally appeared a person whose
name and character were never accurately ascertained.
He was treated with marks of unusual outward respect,
and seemed to be considered among the Royalist assassins
to be a personage of great rank and importance. Though
he afterward turned out to have been Pichegru, he was
conjectured by the Chief Consul and his government to -be
no other than the Duke of Enghien. That Prince was
known to have been recently hovering on the confines of
Germany and France, and to have absented himself somewhat mysteriously from his usual residence in the former
country for a fortnight, during which time the appearance
of the distinguished conspirator at Paris had occurred.
The orders for his seizure were accordingly issued under
the persuasion that he was the man. Supposing the story
to be true, the motives for the execution of that unfortunate
Prince, once brought to Paris, even though the mistake
were cleared up, would be more intelligible, though perhaps
not much more excusable than a wanton outrage of neutral
territory for the purpose of seizing an innocent and interesting young man. Such a view of the transaction would
be consistent with a speech imputed by Napoleon, in his
conversation with Lord Elvington, to Talleyrand. "Le
vin est tire, il faut le boire."  His regret, too, at not having
seen the Duke, and the inference he left to be drawn that,
had he seen him, he must have pardoned him, would tally




148            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
well with this explanation of the transaction.* On the other
hand, is it probable that Napoleon, aware of the reproaches
to which this incident of his life had exposed him, and not
averse to hear or even to discuss the sensation it had produced, should never, either at Elba, or at Paris during the
100 days, on the voyage, or at St. Helena, have urged such
circumstances in palliation of the judicial murder, which,
unless some false impression on his mind at the time can be
proved, or some unknown provocation be adduced, hQ must
be allowed to have perpetrated?  A crime is not to be
palliated, much less to be justified by its consequences.
What though the terror inspired by the death of a Bourbon
Prince enabled Napoleon to spare many conspirators of
that party, who had forfeited their lives to the law-what
though he availed himself largely of that power, exhibiting
in the case of the Polignacs, the Marquis de Rivi6re, and
many others, a clemency almost unexampled in any government similarly circumstanced, still the unprovoked sacrifice
of a man whom position and birth alone made an enemy,
and against whom no crime was even alleged, will and
ought to remain a blot upon his memory. Future disclosures may soften the dye, but none that I can conjecture
can entirely efface the stain which that guilt has- left on
his government. It is just to add that having read the
official orders and correspondence relating to the seizure
* Our Edward I. refused an interview with David, Prince of Wales,
when resolved to execute him. James II saw Monmnouth, and had
the heart to refuse a pardon. I believe Napoleon, like Edward,
thought an interview and pardon almost synonymous, and condemnation of an equal with,.whom he had recently conversed not only
severity but brutality.




NAPOLEON AND THE DUKE OF ENGHIEN.        149
of the Duke of Enghien, I am satisfied that Caulincourt,
Duke of Vicence, had no participation in the guilt, and
very remotely any, if indeed he had any, in the measures
for seizing that unfortunate Prince.  The orders were
given from Paris through the regular- channels. Berthier
wrote and forwarded the military instructions; Talleyrand, as Minister of Foreign Affairs, the justification of
that breach of neutrality. General Ordener, not General
Caulincourt, received those orders; an inferior officer of
the name of Charlotte, under the immediate orders of the
same General Ordener, and not of General Caulincourt,
executed them.  I presume that, had Caulincourt, or any
other general on service, received such orders, he would
have executed them without scruple. The civil, and not
the military authorities, if the latter act under orders,
are, both in law and sense, alone responsible for such infraction of neutrality. But, in this instance, General Caulincourt was not the military authority who received the
orders or executed them. It is equally clear from  undeniable documents, that he was at Nancy, a distance too
great from Paris to communicate with the government-in
the interval between the arrival of the Duke of Enghien
and his execution. He could, therefore, have had no influence on the- fate of the Prince. His friends assert that
he would have exerted any he had in his favor; and
they add, that on his arrival at Paris, two days afterward,
he fainted away at the recital of his death; a degree of
emotion, it must be acknowledged, somewhat unaccountable in a person so utterly unconnected with the victim,
and so very remotely and innocently, if at all, implicated
in any part of the transaction.   his solicitation to be




150             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
employed in it, his journey to Strasburgh for that purpose,
his presence at the court-martial and execution, together
with many imputations on his character, are manifestly
the invention of libelists.  His relations assure me that the
dependence of his father or family on the late Prince of
Conde, so confidently reported, and so vehemently urged
in aggravation of his supposed guilt, is equally void of
foundation.  Napoleon, in the 100 days, when apprised
on inquiry that the grounds of the enmity felt toward
Caulincourt by the Bourbon princes was his supposed
participation in the arrest and execution of their relation,
observed to -Count Mole —" Mais il n'a rien eu a y faire,
pas plus que vous."
On the first breaking out of the war in 1803, Napoleon
had some design of changing his title and assuming the
crown.  He had indeed been inclined to do: so before,
but had been prevented by his generals, and especially by
Lannes.~  He in truth always treated the latter with
great forbearance and affection, allowed him  to cross
his designs, and even overlooked his deviations from important duties. This conduct arose from a grateful recollection of his early services, and from  an unvarying,
perhaps a systematic predilection for all his first military
comrades and connections.  The epithets of ungrateful
and vindictive seem necessary appendages to the titles
of usurper and tyrant, which were so liberally conferred
on our formidable enemy by the English. Yet successful
* Afterward Duke of Monte Bello, and always a generous, frank,
gallant, and fearless soldier, with strong republican predilections, and
liable to no reproaches, but such as a disregard of decorum and indelicacy on subjects relating to public money exposed him to.




NAPOLEON AND GALLOIS.                151
ambition has rarely been so free from the reproach of
ingratitude or revenge as in the instance of Napoleon.
He made the treaty of Amiens as an experiment, and
the scurrility of our newspapers, the coldness, jealousy,
and obvious estrangement of our cabinet, convinced him
that the experiment had failed.', He employed one of the
best pens in France, M. Gallois, to draw up the report
on the peace of Amiens, in which the articles were justified, and the advantages of the peace earnestly impressed
on the legislature.  When Lord Whitworth left Paris
on the rupture, Napoleon sent again for Gallois and
exclaimed, "Eh bien! l'Angleterre veut absolument la
guerre.  Elle la veut."  He then laid before M. Gallois
the whole negotiation, and pressed him to give his opinion.  "England," said Gallois, " might have done more to
preserve peace, but France has not done all she might to
obtain -it." To that remark, the Chief Consul answered
that he had already  dispatched another messenger to
catch-Lord Whitworth, and "de faire cette derniere tentative.* But after vaunting and proving his efforts for
peace, and after acknowledging that peace, or at least the
utmost endeavors to preserve it had been necessary for
France, he added with emphasis but with gayety: " Mais
enfin, je vous dis, l'Angleterre veut la guerre.  Elle l'aura,
at quant a moi, j'en suis ravi.t  Pressed to explain a feel" This was to leave England in possession of Malta, but to stipulate
that she should employ her mediation with the King of Sicily for the
cession of Tarento, Otranto, and one other port to France. A Genevan,
named Hubert, was the bearer of this ultimatum. It was rejected.
f The precise sentiment expressed in other language by Mr: Pitt
in his speech on the rupture of the negotiations at Lisle. The coin
cidence is curious.




152            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES..
ing apparently so inconsistent with his professions, he entered into a long, curious, and luminous exposition of his
policy. "If," said he, "the Powers of Europe had been
willing to let France and her new institutions subside into
a tranquil and free government, if they could have borne de
bonne foi to cultivate the relations of amity with her and
her dependencies in Holland and Italy, she might have
cherished the arts of peace, improved her internal condition, and sat down contented with the prospects of liberty
and prosperity before her; but experience of peace for one
year with England, and for more with the other powers,
has confirmed my apprehensions and proved it to be -hopeless.  They never meant to leave France unmolested.
But France who would be hereafter unequal, is just now
fully equal to contend with them all to advantage."
"How  so," said M. Gallois; "will not some years of
peace add to the resources of France? Will not the beneficial effects of those changes, of which we have hitherto
perceived little but the shock, be gradually sensible in
the increasing riches and power of this great people?"
"Granted," replied Bonaparte, "but riches and prosperity,
for the purposes I am contemplating, may not be altogether the instruments best adapted to the end: d'ailleurs,
l'arme! les ge6nraux!" He described the latter at that
moment, flushed with success, inured to fatigue, with fortunes half made, in all the vigor of life, and ardor of aspiring ambition. A few years' repose, during which they
must be courted and enriched by the government, would
damp their ardor and impair their capacity for war, and
yet leave them, their descendants, representatives, or
favorites, with pretensions to influence and command,
difficult and perhaps unjust to elude. In such a state, the




NAPOLEON'S DIVORCE.              153
country would be -unequal to the s6rt of contest he was
then contemplating; for-the great powers of the Continent must not merely be humbled-they must be broken,
shattered, and dismembered.  In their present condition,
they had the will, and they would, after a short peace,
have the power to combine to wrest from France the
fruits of her victories, and, possibly, to blast all her -prospects by a counter-revolution. 
Napoleon then developed his whole system  at great
length and in detail. To Gallois it seemed vast and well
combined-his views comprehensive, if not just, his argument ingenious and striking, and his knowledge almost
miraculous.  He pursued the system  he then described
with little variation, till his marriage with the Archduchess
of Austria.
That connection (which, in my humble opinion, degraded him, not her) altered his designs both at home and
abroad, tempted him to assimilate his government more
and more to other monarchies, and deluded him with the
hope that the princes of Europe might, in consideration
of his foreign alliances and domestic authority, overlook
the faults of his escutcheon, and be reconciled, in the
form of an hereditary monarchy, to a title derived from
the people. The Empress Josephine very naturally saw,
or affected to see, that policy in an opposite light. In
addition to her tears and reproaches, she endeavored
to deter him from his resolution by predicting that his
good fortune would abandon him when he abandoned
her; for with their connection, she artfully or superstitiously had always maintained that it was mysteriously
interwoven. When he first conceived the design is very




154            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
difficult to ascertain, especially as all his designs were
the offspring of his own inventive mind, and seldom, if
ever, suggested to him by others. Talleyrand told me
that the Council, and he among them, were strangely
embarrassed by the abruptness of the proposal. They
were sitting round the table, discussing official matters,
when the Emperor suddenly cut them short and said there
were three points. on which they should deliberate immediately, and decide without any unnecessary loss of
time: 1st. Whether it was essential to the interests of
the state that he should divorce Josephine for the purpose
of insuring succession; 2d. Whether, on so doing, he
should marry a princess allied to some ancient dynasty
in Europe; 3dly. Whether a Russian or an Austrian would
be the most eligible match. To courtiers the question
was perplexing.  Talleyrand, in recounting it to me,
showed, by his countenance, the impression it-had made
on him at the time. He was not sorry that Cambace'res
had the precedence of him and was to speak first. By
his own acknowledgment he evaded any direct answer,
and suggested that the inclinations of the Empress Josephine to lend herself tq such a measure, and the means
of accomplishing it with or-without her consent, should
be duly weighed before it was possible to give any answer
to the first, much more to the other two questions. But
although Talleyrand had not been sounded, others of the
Council possibly had been; more than one courtier had
discovered that such topics might be canvassed in conversation before and even with Napoleon, without scruple
or danger. One strange and obscure man of the name
of Nisas pretended that Josephine herself would feel the




NAPOLEON AND MARIA LOUISA.           155
propriety of some such step, and when reproached by
her for giving such advice to the Emperor, openly avowed it, saying, that if she were a good Frenchwoman she
would not only submit: and contribute to the divorce,
but actually urge her husband to accomplish it.  It is
difficult to believe that any man, however wild, would
have ventured to hold such language to the Empress
Josephine, unless he- had received a hint to do so from
Napoleon. The Bonaparte family, either at the suggestion of the Emperor himself, or firom jealousy of the
Beauharnois (a motive which often- swayed' their conduct), were active in promoting the design, and maintaining the propriety, justice, and necessity of it.  Talleyrand assured me positively, that neither the Emperor
Alexander nor the Emperor Francis showed the slightest
repugnance to the alliance.  The Empress-mother and
the Grand Duchess herself were alone averse to it in
Russia.  Austria in a manner solicited the honor, and
one Dumoutier (afterward an ultra-courtier and minister
under the Bourbons) was authorized to convey to Napoleon* that his offer would not be unacceptable to the
court of Vienna. Both those Imperial cabinets by secret
communications at the time, and by subsequent representations, contrived to deceive (no very hard task, I presume) Lord Liverpool and his colleagues, for his Lordship assured me that as to the Archduchess,
"Ne'er was woman in that humor woo'd,
And ne'er was woman in that humor won;"
* Or rather to Narbonne, through whom it was communicated to
Napoleon.




156             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
that it was an assault rather than a courtship, and that
if the lady was somewhat less averse to the match than
those about her, her father and family.bewailed it as a
signal misfortune, and that as to the Russian court,* it
would never have submitted to the indignity. Napoleon
seemed actually.-in love with Maria Louisa for the first
year; he always treated her' well, but she was not of a
character to inspire much confidence, or of an understanding to afford much resource.  She grew, latterly,
more tired of the constraint of his court, and he was more
reserved and ceremonious, possibly from  suspicions of
the designs or resentment at the perfidy of the court of
Vienna.
How far the previous elevation of Napoleon at various
prominent epochs of his eventful career was the result
of address and decision at fortunate and critical periods,
or the gradual produce and natural fruit of a well-matured
foresight and industry, it will be the province of the future
biographer and historian to conjecture. That at the peace
of Campo-Formio he was aware of the precarious character of the government he then served, or rather disobeyed, is clear, from remarks he made to the Austrians,
with whom  he negotiated. They offered him  a retreat,
nay, a small principality, in Germany.t  He declined it;
but in alleging his reasons for so doing,'admitted the
instability of the Directory, and unsatisfactory state of
* Perhaps as far as the Empress-mother and the Grand Duchess
of Oldenburgh (afterward Princess of Wurtemberg) were concerned,
this may be true; but it was not true of Alexander or his ministers.
t I had this fact from Murveldt, who negotiated that treaty with
him.




NAPOLEON AND THE DIRECTORY.            157
France. Indeed, unless convinced of the weakness of the
Directory, he would hardly have ventured to disobey
their instructions by signing that peace. On his return
to Paris, he studied the individuals who composed the
Directory and administration.  He exposed their foibles
with infinite wit, detected their defects, and censured
their measures with wonderful sagacity, and little reserve.
The society of Paris, which had hitherto contemplated
him only as a successful general, perceived that his discernment of character, his quickness of perception, and
his comprehensive views of public affairs, qualified him
for political command.  "Ceci ne peut durer," said he;
"ces directeurs ne sqavent rienfa'ire pour l'imagination
de la nation;" an expression which illustrates not only
his contempt of the government then established, but the
general view of French character on which he founded
much of his subsequent policy.  His language was so
indiscreet, that the Directory had thoughts of arresting
him. Some say they applied to Fouche for that purpose,
and that that wily and profligate man answered; "Ce
n'est pas 1a un homme'a arr6ter; encore ne suis-je pas
i'homme qui l'arretera."  Whatever be the truth of that
anecdote, the jealousy of the Directory did not escape the
vigilance of Napoleon. He perceived with some uneasiness that his brilliant victories, his no less brilliant peace,
and his popularity in the circles of Paris were insufficient
to insure him that ascendency in the army and the government to which he aspired, and that a disclosure of his
designs might expose him to danger, notwithstanding all
* Query. Was Fouch6 Minister of Police before Egypt? [He
was appointed July 31st, 1799.]




158           FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
his services and splendid qualities.  From  these considerations, though he had granted peace to Austria and
to Rome, he became averse to any general pacification,
and ardent for employment either in the invasion of England or some other great undertaking. In the mean while,
he paid assiduous court to the men of science and literature, attended the Institute constantly, affected to consult
the members on matters connected with Government,
and to advise or converse with them  on those relating
to science.  All those circumstances contributed to the
Egyptian expedition. It was devised partly to get rid
of him, partly to gratify him, and partly to dazzle and
delight that portion of Parisian society, who through the
press and the institutions for education had considerable
influence on public opinion. Napoleon also accepted the
command from mixed motives, from ambition, fiom love
of glory, and from a consciousness that his indiscreet language had rendered his situation at home somewhat precarious.  His good for-tune in escaping our fleet under
the command of Nelson is well known.  His attention
to every thing connected with navigation and the management of a ship and a fleet, during the voyage, was remarkable.  The army at first landing was disconcerted at the
appearance of the country, the towns, villages, and people,
and the strange masks of the women. The soldiers and
officers were yet more perplexed at the little accommodation for conveyance of themselves or their baggage in
their ensuing march, which they were commanded to
undertake immediately. The horses-were small and few,
the camels were not numerous, and -even the asses, of
which there were abundance. were not fine animals of




NAPOLEON IN EGYPT.                 159
their sort, but a weak and diminutive as well as ignominious species of cavalry. The indignation against the men
of science, who were supposed to be the instigators of the
expedition, was loud, and it was at one time apprehended
that it might lead to- consequences very injurious to their
safety.  When, however, nothing but asses were allotted
to them  for their conveyance, their forlorn appearance
made them objects of derision rather then anger, and by
affording food for the pleasantry of the soldiers, they
escaped all serious injury or insult.  They and the humble
animals they bestrode soon became synonymous terms.
"Voila un sqavant," said the soldier when he saw  a
donkey; and "voici la bete. d'ane" when he described
a philosopher.  Caffarelli, the one-legged general under
whose care they were specially placed, and who preceded them seated also on an ass, was occasionally greeted in the same tone: "Le voila," they would say, "il
s'en moque bien celui-la; qu'est ce que cela lui fait? il a
un pied en France."  General Bonaparte connived at, if
he did not encourage such jokes, glad to substitute them'for more serious murmurs, which he knew the state of his
army was but too well calculated to excite.
In the first actions* the detachments of Mamelukes
charged the infantry with the greatest confidence.  They
* The particulars of the Egyptian expedition which follow, though
of no great importance, *ere related to me in so lively and natural a
manner by General Bertrand, on his first return from St. Helena,
that I thought them worth preserving; and as Napoleon was, at all
periods of his life, especially during his exile, particularly.fond of
dwelling on all his adventures in Egypt, there is little doubt, but the
recollection of General Bertrand had been recently refreshed at St.
Helena by conversation on that topic with the Emperor himself.




160            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
were utterly astonished at finding themselves repulsed
by a compact body of men whom taken separately they
despised, not less for their diminutive stature, than for
the wretched state of their accoutrements. Murad Bey
thought nothing but cowardice could have led to the
discomfiture of the first troops he had sent against the
invaders.  HIe was near strangling the officer who had
commanded them for flying -before such "Christian dogs."
"A.s to myself," said he, "I will ride through them  and
sever their heads from their bodies: like water-melons."
He did engage them, and at the head of a considerable
force, but with no better success. He was thereupon yet
more amazed and indignant.  So enraged was he, that
it was apprehended he would kill himself.  When he
afterward heard that the French commanders, and especially General Bonaparte and General Desaix, were little
men, he imagined the Franch soldiers were fixed together
in a machine, and turned by some mechanical contrivance
in the centre of each column. He could in no other way
account for the steadiness of the phalanx and the regularity of their: movements.  An interview with General
Kleber somewhat consoled him, for General Kleber was
tall and handsome. Murad Bey said, on seeing him, that
he- was glad to find there were at least some men in the
army with which he had submitted to make a truce.
But whatever his impressions or those of other Mamelukes or Egyptians might be on the outward appearance
of the French generals, they soon discerned the superiority of Napoleon in moral and intellectual qualities.
Some grew to love, others to fear, all to respect him. On
suppressing the insurrection of the Cheiks, he executed




NAPOLEON IN EGYPT.               161
sixty without delay, and surprised their comrades who
came to intercede for them the next morning with the
sad intelligence that they had all perished over night.
He related this story with an indifference and even with
a gayety, to Mr. Fozakerby and others, many years afterward at Elba, which seemed very unfeeling; and though
he carelessly observed that he did it to show that sa
maniere de gouverner n'6toitf pas molle, he neglected to
relate the circumstances which accounted for, and in
some sort justified his extraordinary severity to what he
called des abbes de ce pays-la, nor did he mention the
many acts of clemency and of judicious encouragement
to the same order of people with which he accompanied
and followed that rigorous proceeding.  The Cheiks had
plotted a massacre of the French soldiers in Cairo.  Thev
had actually armed and raised the people in pursuance
of that design. The French were exasperated to the
highest degree. They had taken sixty Cheiks flagrante
delicto, but they were with difficulty restrained from
sacking the town and murdering such inhabitants as they
deemed',partisans of the Cheiks. So general in all ranks
was such a disposition, that officers of high rank, with
Kleber at their head, remonstrated loudly with Napoleon
on his supineness, and urged him to punish the natives
and extirpate the Cheiks. General Kleber, on finding the
chief Cheik, the secret instigator and director of the insurrection, closeted some days afterward with General Bonaparte, was' with difficulty prevented from  striking and
cutting him down with his sabre; he could not refrain
from insulting him with opprobrious language mixed with
reproaches and menaces. But such was not the policy of




162            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Bonaparte. He, on the contrary, told the old conspirator
himself in private, and the body of Cheiks who waited
upon him in public, that he was fully aware of their
machinations, that he had punished those that were most
prominent, and was advised to proceed with the same
severity toward those whose guilt (for so of course he
called it) was equal and as satisfactorily proved; but he
added, he was willing to believe they had repented-of
their offense, and were aware of the consequences of
repeating it; that as they knew he did not fear them, he
hoped they would see how much it was their mutual interest to be friends; that he respected their moral qualities and their religion; that from  them  alone he could
learn what- were the wants of the people,- and through
them alone he could hope to administer justice and redress
the grievances of the inhabitants.  Language, so unlike
that of their real masters, the Mamelukes, or their pretended sovereigns, the Turks, did not fail to have some
effect, especially as it was followed up with actual proofs
of confidence, and a certain participation of power in the
villages and smaller towns of the country.  Napoleon
took pains to ingratiate himself with the Cheiks and the
Copts, i.e., the mass of the inhabitants, on the following
principles.  The Mamelukes, even if propitiated, could
never, under a French government, be supplied or renovated. However useful their submission or their assistance
might be at first, they could give him no permanent hold
on the country, and on some nation or caste he clearly
foresaw that the French must ultimately lean for the maintenance of their empire in Egypt. He, indeed, and the
French government had been misled by their agents into




NAPOLEON IN EGYPT.               163
a belief that the Sublime Porte would hail the rescue of
Egypt from the Mamelukes as a favor, and might be induced to invest their ancient allies the French, whether
Christians or not, with all the authority that the sanction
of their distant sovereignty and of their religion could
bestow.  But such idle hopes were soon dispelled.  The
inveterate nature of Turkish hostility was soon apparent
to Bonaparte, and he was by no means disposed to undervalue their courage or their resources. Their infantry
was indeed easily dispersed, and' their cavalry far less
formidable than that of the Mamelukes; but he was too
wise to overlook the advantages which in a protracted
contest an enormous empire, the nominal sovereignty of
the faithful, and a fearless people at its command, would
give the Sublime Porte.  The only counterpoise was to
be found in the opinions and attachment of the natives.
The former depended chiefly on the Cheiks, and the latter
was only to be inspired by good treatment and just government. He endeavored, therefore, to.improve the condition, to humor'the superstitions, and to supply the wants
of the Copts, and he strove to court, gratify, and instruct
the Cheiks. It is not true that he embraced Islamism,
but he complied with many ceremonies, salutations, and
usages, and he maintained all the observances exacted by
the Cheiks from Frenchmen as well as from Copts. The
Porte, the Vizier, or some Turkish authority dispatched
more than one assassin to murder him; but the Cheiks,
won by his measures, always gave him timely notice of
the design, and sometimes secretly and silently, but effectually assisted him in defeating it.  In his endeavors to
better the condition and improve the industry of the




164            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
natives, he turned his men of science to some account.
He had been anxious.on the march to Cairo to provide
for their security, and when there he was not inattentive
to their comforts.  To reconcile them to their hardships
and dangers, and to counteract the derision to which they
had been exposed, he tickled their vanity, by occasional
compliments to their courage as well as their knowledge
in his bulletins and dispatches. They were employed in
instructing the natives in various arts of life, and superintending the introduction of various inventions and implements, such as windmills, wheelbarrows, hand-saws, etc.,
with which they had hitherto been unacquainted. Napoleon's departure from Egypt was at the time represented
as a desertion of his army,- but it is now well known that
he had received a letter from his government officially
authorizing and practically urging his return to France.
When Kleber had succeeded to the command, the Cheiks
imagined that the same good-will to them did not prevail
at the head-quarters of the French army. They ceased
to watch over the safety of the Commander with any
solicitude. An emissary of the Turks passed the frontiers,
and traveled through the Egyptian villages unmolested.
He lurked in the neighborhood of the head-quarters, and
having at length succeeded in finding the general separated from his troops, stabbed him to the heart. Officers*
who had the best means of forming a judgment have.
assured me that there was no conspiracy in the country,
but they were of opinion that the vigilance of the Cheiks
would have protected General Bonaparte firom the intrusion of any such assassin.
* Belliard, Sebastiani, Bertrand.




NAPOLEON AND THE REVOLUTION.          lbo
According to the account of Napoleon himself, it was in
Egypt that he weaned his mind from all those Republican
illusions in which his early growth in fame had been
nursed. It is certain that after his elevation to the consulship he seldom if ever betrayed any such propensities.
But those who knew him early and well have assured me
that the scenes of the Revolution had estranged and even
disgusted him with Democracy; that exclusive of that
repugnance to all popular interference with authority,
which the possession of power breeds, he conscientiously
checked every tendency to revive in France, or to produce elsewhere,* any excesses of that nature, from  a
conviction that the evil created by them is immediate and
certain, the ultimate good to be derived from them uncertain and problematical. He knew, indeed, that his glory
and power were the offspring of the Revolution. He felt,
perhaps he regretted too much, that the enemies of that
great change hated "the Child" and supposed "6 Champion
of Jacobinism."  He was not even without apprehension that the prosperity and stability of his- government,
whether called Consular, Regal, or Imperial, would depend
on the prevalence of those principles on which great
national changes are founded and justified. Yet he was
nevertheless disposed to endanger some of his personal
security, rather than foment -a spirit which he deemed
incompatible with tranquil government and a due administration of justice. Like our Elizabeth, his principles and
(though not to an equal degree) his temper, too, were at
variance with his position.  I mention these things in
* In Ireland; in Poland; in Spain.




166            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
honor of truth, not of Napoleon. The partisans of authority, of pomp, and perhaps of superstition in government,
have a right to the sanction of this great man's opinion,
though his endeavors to purchase their assistance were'only successful while he stood in no need of it. Much,
however, of his conduct toward Royalists and Republicans, Emigrants and Jacobins, especially during his Consulship, sprang from  a laudable desire of healing the
wounds of the Revolution, and from a sincere, patriotic,
and well-suggested design of blending all classes and
parties in France, and uniting them in support of a common government and in defense of the country.  Soon
after his elevation, he began indeed, systematically to disparage the genius of those whose writings were supposed
to have produced that alteration of sentiment on politics
and religion, which had given direction, if not existence,
to the French Revolution. He must in his heart have
admired Voltaire. His own manner of seeing many things
showed that he had read and studied him too. -If not, it
proves how the genius and style of that lively yet diligent
and profound writer have pervaded the age which succeeds him, and indirectly influence the thoughts and dispositions of the greatest statesmen of our time. I have
been confirmed in my conjectures, of the secret admiration of Napoleon for Voltaire, by learning that he frequently read his plays aloud to his little society at St. Helena. He criticised, he censured, he ridiculed, but he read
the same play over and over again, and his thoughts were
much occupied with the subject. But whether his own
satirical turn and quick perception of folly and falsehood
were borrowed from Voltaire or not, he certainly was at




NAPOLEON'S OPINION OF VOLTAIRE.       167
some pains to decry that great writer's philosophy. He
employed Geoffroy and Fontanes to write down the Encyclopedists, and extol the authors of the age of Louis XIV.
Under color of vindicating the purity of language, the
simplicity of composition, and'the- classical character of
the French drama and poetry, many covert attacks were
directed against the political and religious maxims of
more recent authors, and yet more undisguised assaults
encouraged against the moral character and intellectual
attainments of the philosophers. Yet, while under the
immediate protection of the Consular and Imperial government this warfare against public opinion was carried
on, Napoleon himself, from some private predilection, from
remorse, from candor, or from caprice, indulged in some
acts of infidelity too his unnatural idols. He liked much,
saw frequently, and gave both money and advice to Talma, whose style of acting, adapted to vigorous sallies of
passion, and sudden vicissitudes of fortune, seemed connected with the new  school, and was accordingly the
object of Geoffroy's virulent and incessant abuse.  Napoeon procured, if he did not write, some bitter answers to
Geoffroy's diatribes on the theatre; and when that servile critic had in his invectives against Voltaire outstripped
the bounds of his employer's policy, he secretly atoned
for the outrage on departed genius by silently erecting
in a church at Paris a marble monument to the great
and calumniated Philosopher of Ferney. To Rousseau,
he made no such atonement. He always spoke of his
works with asperity and contempt, and in one instance
took a very ungracious occasion of doing so. "C'etait un
rnauvais homme, un mechant homme," said he, at Erme



168            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
nonville, - to Stanislas Girardin, who had been educated
under the auspices, and whose place was decorated with
various monuments in memory of Rousseau. M. Girardin
urged the beauty of his style and composition, and palliated
the faults of his character by ascribing to him great purity
of intention and universal philanthropy. "Non, c'etait un
mechant homme, sans lui la France n'auroit pas -eu de
revolution."  Girardin, smiling, observed that he, was not
aware that the First Consul considered the Revolution
such an unmixed evil. "Ah!" he exclaimed, "vous voulez
dire que sans la revolution vous ne m'auriez pas eu moi?
Peut-etre pas; je le crois; mais aussi la France n'en serait-elle que plus heureuse." When invited to see the
hermitage, the cap, table, great chair, etc., of Jean
Jacques, he said, " Ah bah! non, je n'ai aucun gout pour
ces niaiseries-la, montrez-les a mon frere Louis; il en est
bien digne."  He happened, however, to be unusually
cross on that day. Josephine had offended him in more
ways than one. He was even little enough to be nettled
at her sitting down with the rest of the company without
waiting for him; for even before he assumed the title of
Emperor, he grew somewhat tenacious of outward ceremony, and thought, perhaps, that by exacting it as Consul,
he prepared and familiarized men's minds to the etiquette
of a court. He was moreover sore at a hint, thrown out
half in jest and half in earnest, that his success in shooting
had been in consequence of some contrivance to lame the
game, or to turn out tame animals, without his knowledge,
for himn to fire upon. He was a bad shot, but he was
above once, in his life indignant at discovering such a
practice, which he justly remarked was childish and de



NAPOLEON AND THE PRESS.             169
grading adulation. He was perhaps at all times, and certainly during the first years of his elevation, more liable
to unbecoming anger at the abuse and calumnies of the
public journals. His irritation at our newspapers contributed to estrange him from England after the Peace of
Amiens, and to accelerate and embitter the rupture between the two countries. Yet he was much struck with a
remark of M. Gallois, to whom  he complained of the
licentiousness of the English press. M. Gallois very pertinently observed, that he had volumes and volumes of
libel equal in malignity against Louis XIV., but that
nothing now was-remembered of them but the fretful sensibility which that monarch betrayed about them, and the
false steps in- policy which more than once they had provoked him to take. Gallois wrote the report on the Peace
of Amiens, but he declined composing that on the rupture,
which was written by Daru from the same materials as
had been furnished to Gallois by the First Consul. Not
very long afterward, the name of Gallois was presented in
a list for the Legion of Honor; Napoleon unhandsomely
erased it, saying with a smile, "Quand on sait bien parler pour la paix, il faut aussi sqavoir bien parler pour la
guerre." He continued, however, to converse with Gallois
occasionally, in a friendly and even confidential manner;
but though favored and even caressed, that independent
and modest man observed his growing impatience of contradiction, his propensity to war, and, above all, his determination as well as capacity of governing every thing
himself; and he resolved not to place himself in a situation where he could not both with honor and comfort
express and follow his own opinion of right or wrong. He
H




170            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
therefore declined the prefecture of Besan9on, avoided
other public employments, and voted silently but uniformly in those assemblies of which he was a member; in
favor of that party and those principles which were not
hostile to the,establishment or revival of any arbitrary
power in the state.. He ceased to visit the Tuileries, but
he never experienced from the Consular or Imperial government, the slightest vexation or persecution. Napoleon,
even in the plenitude of his power, seldom  gratified his
revenge by resorting to any-act either illegal or unjust,
though he frequently indulged his ill-humor by speaking
both of'and to those who had displeased him in a manner
mortifying to their feelings and their pride. The instances
of his love of vengeance are very few:'they are generally
of an insolent rather than a sanguinary charcter, more
discreditable to his head than his heart, and a proof of his
want of manners, taste, and possibly feeling, but not of a
dye to affett his humanity.  Of what man possessed of
such extended, yet such disputed authority, can so much
be said?  Of Washington? of Cromwell?  But Washington if he had ever equal provocation and motives for
revenge, certainly never possessed such power to gratify
it. His glory, greater in truth than that of Cesar, Cromwell, and Bonaparte, was that he never aspired; hut he
disdained such power;*- he never had it, and can not
therefore deserve immoderate praise for not exerting what
~ "He.might have been a king
But that he understood
How much it was a meaner thing
To be unjustly great than honorably good."
(Verses on Lord Fairfax, by Villiers, Duke of Buckingham.)




NAPOLEON'S LOVE OF JUSTICE.          171
he did not possess. In the affair of General Lee, he did
not, if I recollect, show much inclination to forgive. Even
Cromwell did not possess the power of revenge to the
same extent as Napoleon. There is reason, however, to
infer from his-moderation and forbearance that he would
have used it as sparingly. But Cromwell is less irreproachable on the score of another vice, viz., ingratitude.
Napoleon not only never forgot a favor, but unlike most
ambitious characters never allowed subsequent injuries to:
cancel his recollection of services.  He was uniformly
indulgent to the faults of those whom he had once distinguished.  He saw them, he sometimes exposed and rectified, but he never punished or revenged them. Many have
blamed him for this on the score of policy; but if it was
not sense and calculation, it should be ascribed to goodnature. None, I presume, will impute it to weaklness or
want of discernment. He described himself, however, as
a just, not an easy man. "Je ne suis pas bon, non, je ne
suis pa~ bon, je ne l'ai jamais Wt6, mais je suis sat."  True
it is, as I have before remarked, that his dislike and even
his displeasure seldom led to any persecution, or even
permanent exclusion of the objects of it from promotion;
though it exposed them to asperity of language and other
petty mortifications. He not only preserved in high employment, but advanced to higher, some persons whose
opinions were most hostile to his system of government, as
well as others of whom he spoke with anger and contempt.
In repressing the injustice of all authorities inferior to his
own, he was impartial, severe, and inflexible. Neither
minister, prefect, officer, nor military authority, could venture to exceed the letter of the law. Never was govern



172.           FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
ment, in France at least, so little military as that of Napoleon, never was justice more steadily and equally administered between men, and even between government and its
subjects. There was indeed at the latter period of his reign
no security whatever against abuse but the knowledge,
vigilance, and will of one man;rl  but scarcely in an instance, save  the conscriptions when the Empire was
pressed for supplies of men, did that dependence on the
ubiquity of the Emperor's protection and the inflexible
impartiality of his administration, fail any of his subjects.
Had any prefect or military man interfered with the election of deputies, nomination of juries, or common transactions of life in the way since practiced in every department,
such illegal and vexatious interference would, without
even the- necessity of a remonstance, have been immediately punished and remedied under the Imperial government. The principles of freedom, which can alone secure
good institutions from abuse, were nearly extinguished
under his absolute rule, and have revived and attained
some vigor since his downfall; but equality t before the
law, impartiality in the administration of justice, and certainty of redress in case of any injury, either from  individuals or from  civil and military authorities, have not
been greater or even so great under the succeeding gov~ The following picture of Napoleon's government is taken chiefly
fiom M. Gallois, who has frequently, and nearly in the terms of the
text, given me such a representation of the justice, policy, and vigilance of his administration as I have here endeavored to preserve.
1t "Le Francais aime l'6galit6, il ne se soucie pas beaucoup de la
libert6," was -the remark of Napoleon to Lord Ebrington in Elba;
and if it was well founded, he certainly gave the French the government they liked.




NAPOLEON'S POWERS OF MEMORY.             173
ernments during peace, as they were under Napoleon
at war with half the world. I received this remarkable
testimony to the character of the Imperial government*
from an unbiased and unsuspected quarter, from M. Gallois, who had refused employment under him, and was
too sincere and enlightened a friend of freedom not to
abhor a system which depended exclusively on the character of an individual. It was the result of observation
and -reflection, not of personal attachment, much less of
habitual reverence for power. He admitted that the allpenetrating sagacity of Napoleon, his indefatigable diligence, his extraordinary knowledge of men and things,
and his stern, inflexible impartiality, were, during his life,
efficacious substitutes for much better institutions; but he
justly observed that the inherent vices would, in all certainty, have been felt, as they, in fact, were, the moment
that the wonderful genius which corrected them, ceased
to be at the head of the state.  "Je n'aime pas beaucoup
les femmes, ni le jeu," said he once to my informant, "enfin
rien; je suis tout-a-fait un etre politique."   His powers
of application and memory seemed almost preternatural.
There was scarcely a man in France, and nofde in employment, with whose private history, characters, and qualifications, he was not acquainted. He had, when Emperor,
notes and tables, which he called the moral statistics of
his Empire.  He revised and corrected them  by ministerial reports, private conversation, and correspondence.
He received all letters himself, and what seems incredible,
* It was confirmed in many particulars by other sober-minded and
credible men who lived under his government, and had access to him
or to his ministers.




174            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
he read and recollected all that he received.  He slept
little, and was never idle one instant when awake. When
he had an hour for diversion, he not unfrequently employed it in looking over a book of logarithms, which he acknowledged, with some surprise, was at all seasons of his
life a recreation to him. So retentive was his memory
of numbers, that sums over which he had once glanced
his eye were in his mind ever after. He recollected the
respective produce of all taxes through every year of his
administration, and could, at any time, repeat any one of
them, even to the centimes.  Thus his detection of errors
in accounts appeared marvelous, and he often indulged in
the pardonable artifice of displaying these faculties in a
way to create a persuasion that his vigilance was almost
supernatural. In running over an account of expenditure,
he perceived the rations of a battalion charged on a. certain day at Besangon. "Mais le bataillon n'etait pas la,"
said he,,"il y a erreur."  The minister, recollecting that
the Emperor had been at the time out of France, and
confiding in the regularity of his subordinate agents, persisted that the battalion must have been at Besangon.
Napoleon insisted on further inquiry. It turned out to be
a fraud and not a mistake.  The peculating accountant
was dismissed, and the scrutinizing spirit of the Emperor
circulated with the anecdote through every branch of the
public service, in a way to deter every clerk from'committing the slightest error, from fear of immediate detection.  His knowledge, in'other matters, was often as
accurate and nearly as surprising.  Not only were the
Swiss deputies in 1801 astonished at his familiar acquaintance with the history, laws, and usages of their country,




-NAPOLEON'S NAVAL KNOWLEDGE.          175
which seemed the result of a life of research, but even
the envoys from the insignificant republic of San Marino*
were astonished at finding that he knew the families and
feuds of that small community, and discoursed on the
respective views, conditions and interests of parties and
individuals, as if he had been educated in the petty squabbles and local politics of that diminutive society. I remember a simple native of that place told me in 1814, that
the phenomenon was accounted for by the Saint of the
town-appearing to him over-night, in order to assist his
deliberations.  Some anecdotes related to me by the distinguished officer who conveyed him in the Undaunted to
Elba in, 1814, prove the extent, variety, and accuracy of
knowledge of Napoleon. On his first arrival on the coast,
in company with Sir Neil Campbell, an Austrian and a
Russian commissioner, Captain Usher waited upon him,
and was invited to dinner. He conversed much on naval
affairs, and explained the plan he had once conceived of
forming a vast fleet of 160 ships of the line. He asked
Captain Usher if he did not think it would have been,practicable; and Usher answered, that with the immense
means he then commanded, he saw no impossibility in
building and manning any number of ships, but his difficulty would have consisted in forming thorough seamen,
as distinguished from what we call smooth-water sailors.
Napoleon replied that he had provided for that also; he
had organized exercises for them afloat, not only in harbor, but in smaller vessels near the coast, by which they
might have been trained to go through, even in rough
They waited upon him at Bologna.




176            FOREIGN- REMINISCENCES.
weather, the most arduous manceuvres of seamanship
which he enumerated; and he mentioned among them
the keeping a ship clear of her anchors in a heavy sea.
The Austrian, who suspected Napoleon of talking in general upon subjects he imperfectly understood, acknowledging his own ignorance, asked him the meaning of the
term, the nature of the difficulty, and the method of surmounting it. On this the Emperor took up two forks, and
explained the problem  in seamanship, which is not an
easy one, in so short, scientific, and practical a way, that
Captain Usher assured me he knew none but professional
men, and very few of them, who could off-hand have
given a so perspicuous, seamanlike, and satisfactory solution
of the question. Any board of officers would have inferred, from such an exposition, that the person making it
had received a naval education, and was a practical seaman. Yet hdw different were the objects on which the
mind of Napoleon must have been long, as well as recently, employed!
On the same voyage, when the propriety of putting into
a harbor* of Corsica was under discussion, and the want
of a pilot urged as an objection, Napoleon described the
depth of water, shoals, currents, bearings,- and anchorage,
with a minuteness which seemed as if he had himself
acted in that capacity; and which, on reference to the
charts, was found scrupulously accurate.  When his cavalry and baggage arrived at Porto Farajo, the commander
of the transports said that he had been on the point of putting into a creek near Genoa (which he named, but I have
* I think Bastia.




NAPOLEON'S ATTENTION TO DETAILS.        177
forgotten); upon hearing which Napoleon exclaimed, " It
is well you did not; it is the worst place in the Mediterranean; you would not have got to sea again for a month
or six weeks."  He then proceeded to allege reasons for
the difficulty, which were quite- sufficient, if the peculiarities of the little bay were really such as he described; but
Captain Usher, having never heard of them during his
service in the Mediterranean, suspected that the Emperor
was mistaken, or had confounded some report he had
heard from  mariners in his youth. When, however, he
mentioned the circumstance, many years afterward, to
Captain Dundas, who had recently cruised in the Gulf of
Genoa, that officer confirmed the report of Napoleon in all
its particulars, and expressed astonishment at its correctness. "For" (said he) "I thought it a discovery of my
own, having ascertained all you have just told me about
that creek, by observation and experience."   Great as
was his appetite for knowledge, his.memory in retaining,
and his quickness in applying it, his labor both in acquiring and using it was equal to them. In application to
business he could wear out the men most inured to study.
In the deliberations on the Code Civil, many of which
lasted ten, twelve or fifteen hours without intermission, he
was always the last whose attention flagged; and he was
so little disposed to spare himself trouble, that even in the
Moscow campaign he sent regularly to every branch of
administration in Paris directions in detail, which in every
government but his would, both from usage and convenience, have been left to the discretion of the super* Related to me by Captain Usher at Paris, 1826.
H:X:




178            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
intending minister, or to the common routine of business.
This and other instances of his diligence are more wonderful than- praiseworthy.  He had established an office with
twelve clerks and Mounier at their head, whose sole duty
it was to extract, translate, abridge, and arrange under
heads the contents of our English newspapers.   He
charged Mounier to omit no abuse of him, however coarse
or virulent; no charge, however injurious or malignant.
As, however, he did not specify the Empress, Mounier,
who reluctantly'complied with his orders, ventured to suppress, or at least to soften, any phrases about her; but
Napoleon questioned others on the contents of the English
papers; detected Mounier and his committee in their mutilations of the articles, and forbade them to withold any
intelligence or any censure they met with in the publications which they were appointed to examine. Yet'with
all this industry, and with the multiplicity of topics which
engaged his attention, he found time for private and various reading. His librarian was employed for some time
every morning in replacing maps and books which his
unwearied and insatiable curiosity had consulted before
breakfast. He read all letters whatever addressed to-himself, whether. in his private or public capacity; and it
must, I, believe, be acknowledged that he often took the.same liberty with those directed to other people. He had
indulged in that unjustifiable practice* before his elevation, and such was his impatience to open both parcels
and letters that,. however employed, he could seldom
defer the gratification of his curiosity an instant after
* Denon, Mechin, and others.




NAPOLEON'S IMPATIENT CURIOSITY.         179
either came under his notice or his reach. Josephine, and
others, well acquainted with his habits, very pardonably
took some advantage of this propensity. Matters which
she feared to mention to him were written and directed to
her, and the letters unopened left in his way. He often
complied with wishes which he thought he had detected
by an artifice, more readily than had they been presented
in the form of claim, petition, or request. He liked to
know every thing; but he liked all he did to have the appearance of springing entirely from himself, feeling, like
many others in power, an unwillingness to encourage even
those they love in an opinion that they have an influence
over them, or that there is any certain channel to their
favor.  His childish eagerness about cases, led in one
instance to a gracious act of playful munificence.  He
received notice of the arrival of a present from Constantinople, in society with the Empress and other ladies. He
ordered the parcel  to be brought up, and instantly tore it
open with his own hand. It contained a large aigrette of
diamonds, which he broke into various pieces, and he then
threw  the largest into her Imperial Majesty's lap, and
some into that of every lady in the circle.
With the temper and habits I have described, he was
not likely to be scrupulous in furnishing his police with
much vexatious authority. It was accordingly most active and most odious; but such has always been and is
still the practice in France. Napoleon's agents were for
the most part restored emigrants, ex-nobles, and pretended
Royalists. Many, after the restoration, were indiscreet
* Mechin.




180            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
enough to acknowledge or at least to prove by their complaints of the niggardly boons which they received from
Louis XVIII., that the profit derived from betraying the
cause of legitimacy under the Usurper had exceeded what
they earned by their support of it under a Bourbon prince.
Napoleon restored, with the exception of forests, all lands
that were not sold before his accession to power.  He
gave the proprietors of such restored land their full share
of office, favor, and power under his government, and he
left the few who were unwilling to serve him unmolested
in the enjoyment of their estates.  Extensive as the confiscations during the Revolution were, the barbarous law
of corruption of blood was unknown in France, and the
rights of those relations who had neither -emigrated nor
been condemned by any tribunal remained inviolate. This
circumstance, together with the restitutions of lands under
the Directory and Napoleon, and of the forests under
the Bourbons, has rendered the change in real property*
much less extensive in France than is generally supposed.
Much, indeed, has been divided by the operation of the
law of-inheritance; but in those cases it still remains in
branches of the family of the original possessor.  The
richest proprietors of France are still to be found among
the nobles who bore arms against their country, or their
descendants and relations; and the whole mass of confiscated land not now in possession of the families to whom
it belonged in 1793, or of those to whom those families
* My observation is of course confined to real property of a private
nature. All church and many corporation lands were sold or otherwise alienated, and none, I presume, have been directly or indirectly
restored.




NAPOLEON AND THE OLD NOBILITY.          181
have sold it, would not amount to the value of property
lost by confiscation in Ireland by the single family of
Fitzgerald. Napoleon, especially during the first years of
his Imperial government, hazarded more from his disposition to reconcile the old nobility to his dynasty, than from
any other partiality.  A large portion of what he gave
privately fell to their share, sometimes as objects of munificence and charity, sometimes as spies and secret agents
both abroad and at home. Meanwhile, the Jacobins, excluded by him from all ostensible office, remained (with the
exception of Barere, and one or two other names polluted
by corruption as well as stained with blood) in the poverty which, it must be acknowledged, their. possession of
power never had altered. Many leading men during the
reign of Terror, and several of the Directors and their
ministers, lived, long after their retreat, in obscurity and
penury, without having contracted the habits of expense
or acquired the means of indulging it, from the possession
of a large share of the government of a rich and extensive
empire.-*  Truth should be told even of demons.  The
Jacobins, sanguinary as. they were, are calumniated when
a love of rapine is added to the catalogue of their iniquities. Even the cowardly and cruel Robespierre was pure
about money; and the general character of that disorganizing party was a disdain of luxury and wealth. The,
fortunes of Napoleon's ministers and marshals have been
in like mannler grossly exaggerated by his detractors.
Some turned out small after their death, and the largest
were derived almost exclusively from foreign plunder or
The concluding words of Mr. Pitt's epitaph are applicable to
nearly all of them: " They died poor."




182             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
foreign servility.  The Princes of the Continent, when
stooping to solicit a share of that spoil of dominion which
Napoleon's victories had procured him, resorted to those
means which they knew to be most prevalent and most
efficacious in their own legitimate and unprincipled courts.
They furthered or hoped to further their selfish designs
by presents, bribes, and flattery to the ministers and favorites of that man whom they have since spoken of as an
upstart and usurper, unfit to be admitted into their princely
society! He possibly connived at the practice.  He most
justly and cordially despised the pusillanimous creatures
who resorted to it.  Re sometimes treated the.m* with
rudeness and insolence. He on one occasion dined with
his hat on, when three kings and several sovereign princes
sat uncovered at table.  Returning from the chase with
the Kings of Sax6ny, Wurtemberig, and Bavaria in the
carriage, he stopped at the Malmaison to pay a private
visit to his divorced wife, Josephine, and kept the monarchs waiting at least an hour at the door.  The King of
Bavaria who recounted the story to my informant was
more diverted than affronted at the incident, and said,
"Puisqu'on nous traite comme des lacquais, il faut nous
divertir comme tels," and asking for bread, cheese, fruit
and wine, regaled himself with that homely cheer in the
* "Have we not seen his morning chamber fill'd
With sceptred slaves who waited to salute him?
Menial Kings
Ran coursing up and down his palace yard,
Stood silent in his presence, watched his eyes,
And at his -least command all started out
Like racers to the goal."   All for Love.




NAPOLEON'S COURT.                183
carriage or in the hall, with admirable good-humor and
excellent appetite.  Such or similar improprieties were
not unusual at his Imperial court.  The ill-breeding generated in camps and in clubs, and the dry, undignified
formality which often disfigures the manners of official
men, were discernible in his drawing-room and ante-chamber; but there was no appearance and very little reality
in the dissoluteness of manners attributed by our ignorant
libelists to his family and favorites. I have heard of his
amours. They were neither frequent nor scandalous.  A
Polish lady and Mademoiselle George, the actress, have
been mentioned. He had a son by the former, and some
pretend that he left two natural children by some other
woman. But on the whole, his'court, if not the most
refined or agreeable, was the least immoral and dissipated
known in France for three centuries., He encouraged his
marshals, generals, and ministers to marry, and was desirous they should form  alliances with the families of the
ancient nobility.  On the other hand, he set his face
against ill-assorted marriages in age, fortune, or station.
There was a story that he had collected the names of all
the heiresses in his dominions, with the intention of bestowing them, even against their will, on his favorite officers or dependents.
But many projects that passed through his inventive
mind were more abruptly started in conversation by him,
and afterward repeated as deliberate designs by his courtiers and injudicious admirers. If liable to strong objections in principle, they were, after his downfall, confidently
stated by his calumniators to have been measures in contemplation or in the course of completion by the Imperial




184             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Government.  Thus, an idea of confining the study of all
schools, universities, and public institutions to a regulated
number of books printed and published by authority, and
an intention to burn all others, and reduce the Bibliotheque Imperiale and every public library to the legal
number, was gravely imputed to him by writers, orators,*
and flatterers, who found their interest in propagating
calumnies against fallen greatness.  His conversation, in
truth, was full of projects, sometimes merely fanciful for
the exercise of his unwearied understanding, sometimes for
the purpose of sounding the opinions of others on schemes
for which he had an inclination, and sometimes for that of
really organizing and promoting the gigantic designs he
had conceived.  " II produisait beaucoup," said -M. de Talleyrand to me. "C'est incalculable ce qu'il produisait, plus
qu'aucun homme, oui, plus qu'aucun quatre hommes que
j'aie jamais connus.  Son genie etait inconcevable.  Rien
n'egalait son energie, son imagination, son esprit, sa capacite de travail, sa facilite de produire.  I1 avait de la sagacite aussi.  Du cote du jugement il n'etait pas si fort; mais
encore quand il vouloit se donner le temps il savoit profiter
du jugement des autres.  Ce n'dtait que rarement que son
mauvais jugement l'emportait, et c'6tait toujours lorsqu'il
ne s'etoit pas donne le temps de consulter celui d'autres
personnes."
Among his projects were many connected with the arts
and with literature. They were all, perhaps, subservient
to political purposes, generally gigantic, abruptly prepared,
* Even Lord Liverpool condescended to allude to this foolish imputation, and gravely stated in the House that the interests of literature
required the downfall of Napoleon




NAPOLEON'S TASTE FOR THE ARTS.            185
and in all likelihood as suddenly conceived.  Many were
topics of conversation and subjects for speculation, not
serious, practical, or digested designs.  Though not insensible to the arts or to literature, he was'suspected latterly
of considering them  rather as political engines or embellishments than as sources of enjoyment.  M. de Talleyrand,
and several artists, concurred in saying that "il avait le
sentiment du Grand, mais non pas celui du Beau."  He
had written "bon sujet d'un tableau," opposite to some
passage in Letourneur's translation of' Ossian, and he had
certainly a passion for that poem.  His censure on David,
for choosing the battle at the Straits of Thermopyle as
a subject for a picture, was that of a general rather than
connoisseur: it smelt, if I. may say so, of his shop; though
perhaps the real motive for it was dislike to the republican
artist, and distaste to an act of national resistance against a
great military invader.  "A bad subject," said he; "after
all, Leonidas was turned."  He had the littleness to expect
too be prominent in every picture of national victories of
his time, and was displeased at a painting of an action in
Egypt for Madame Murat, in which her wounded husband'was the principal figure.  Power made him impatient of
contradiction,* even in trifles; and latterly he did not like
his taste in music, for which he had no turn, to be disputed.
His proficiency in literature has been variously stated.
* He was not so, however, either in deliberation or discussion, at
least when the latter was invited by himself. He allowed his ministers
to comment upon, and even to object to measures in contemplation (provided they acquiesced in them when adopted) in firee and even strong
terms, and he liked those he questioned on facts or opinions to answer
without compliment or reserve.




186            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES
He had read much, but had written little. In the mechanical part he was certainly no adept; his handwriting was
nearly illegible. Some-would fain persuade -me that that
fault was intentional, and merely an artifice to conceal his
bad spelling; that he could form his letters well if he chose,
but was unwilling to let his readers know too exactly the
use he made of them. His orthography was certainly
not correct; that of few Frenchmen, not professed authors,
was so, thirty years ago: but his brothers Lucien and
Louis, both literary men, and both correct in their orthography, write a similar hand, and nearly as bad a one as he
did, probably for the same reason; viz., that they can not
write a better without great pains and loss of time.
Napoleon, when Consul and Emperor, seldom wrote, but
he dictated much. It was difficult to follow him, and he
often objected to any revision of what he had dictated.
When a word had escaped his amanuensis, and he was
asked what it was, he would answer somewhat pettishly,*
"Je ne r6peterai pas le mot. R6flchissez, rappelez vo.us
du mot que j'ai dicte, et ecrivez-le, car pour moi je ne le
rep6terai pas."  Talleyrand, interested possibly in discrediting any posthumous writings, was very earnest, soon
after the news of his death arrived, in inculcating on me
and others the persuasion that Napoleon never did and
never could dictate. " I disait, il ne dictait pas; on ne
pouvait ecrire sous sa dictee. I1 ne sqavait ni dieter ni
ecrire."  But, excepting Talleyrand and Charles IV. of
Spain, I never heard any one express a doubt of his powers of composition, or his habits of dictating. It was,
* General Bertrand and Cambaceres.




NAPOLEON'S STYLE AND DICTION.           187
indeed, difficult to follow, and yet more difficult to satisfy
him in the discharge of that office; but M. Bignon and
others* inured themselves to his manner.  In matters of
importance he would look over and correct what had been
written from his dictation, and would afterward repeat
word for word the sentences he had composed and revised.
His style was clear.  " Soyez clair, tout le reste viendra,"
was a maxim of his. In matters of business he very justly
ridiculed and defied that absurd canon of French criticism
which forbids the recurrence of a word twice in the same
sentence or even page. He had several volumes of his
correspondence copied out and bound in folio. There is
some mystery attending the fate of those books. From
them, however, the " lettres inedites" were published. M.
de Talleyrand pretends that his copies sometimes varied,
and that purposely, from the originals, for according to
him  Napoleon would not s}cruple, even in transcribing
treaties, to substitute one word for another. The notes on
the life of the Duke of Marlborough, which was printed at
his expense, and by his desire, were, it is said, composed
by him, and paragraphs of his writing were occasionally
inserted in the newspaper. He wrote and printed when a
young man, at Avignon, in 1793 or 1794, a small political
pamphlet, called "Dejeuner de trois Militaires," and I
have already mentioned that he sent a manuscript history
of Corsica, written before that period, to Abbe Raynal.
But whatever were his own writings, his criticism on the
works of others was generally just, and always striking
and acute.  Le Mercier read, him a play on the subject of
* My authorities are numerous: Cambace6rs, Barb6-Marbois,
I)aru, Las Casas, Bertrand, and many more.
El *




188             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Peter the Cruel.  At the moment of his fall, that discomfited tyrant was made to say something like this:
" De tout moon vaste empire, il me reste un rocher."
Napoleon observed, " it will never do. You mean to rouse
us to indignation against the man, and you put in his
mouth a pathetic remark on the contrast between his
former elevation and present ruin, that can not fail to excite the compassion of every well-regulated mind." The
remark was -subtle, and considering subsequent events
curious and singular. It is possible, however, that this latter circumstance produced it, for the relator, though a
worthy man, was a dramatic author.  In reading, Napoleon leant to skepticism and paradox; as, -for instance, he
ridiculed as improbable the story of Cesar's escape in the
boat, and his speech to the boatman, and was much inclined to disparage the talents and more particularly the
military skill of that extraordinary man.
I have seen the official correspondence with Caulincourt
when he was employed at Chatillon in 1814. It gave me
the highest opinion of the abilities, integrity, and pacific
principles of that negotiator.  It did not, I confess, raise
my opinion of the Emperor Napoleon. It was full of subterfuge and artifice on the part of the government.  There
seemed an intention not only of violating faith with the
confederates, but in case ofneed, of disavowing and sacrificing the honor of the negotiator, who was serving his
country with zeal, talent, and fidelity. Caulincourt reasonably and honestly endeavored to work on the predilections of Austria to procure good terms of peace for Napoleon, but that prince and his immediate advisers were




INTRIGUES AT CHATILLON.                1S b
more disposed to avail themselves of any favorable disposition in Austria to sow dissensions.*  They were obviously anxious to obtain credit with France for wishing
and promoting peace, but not much disposed either to obtain, or if obtained, to preserve it. In the mean while, the
partisans of peace at Paris were not only prepared, but
much disposed to sacrifice Napoleon himself to that object,
which his negotiator, Caulincourt, was equally determined
not to do. M. de Talleyrand and the Duke.Dalberg fixed
on M. de Vitrollest- (a bad man, long in emigration, and
the author of the note secrete in 1818) to convey to the
Austrians their desire to learn what conditions would be
imposed on France, if France were to agree to dethrone
and abandon Napoleon.  Neither M. de Talleyrand nor his
coadjutors were aware that the man they employed in this
delicate mission was already the agent of Monsieur and the
Bourbons. They had from caution refrained from writing,e
* Of these Maret, Duke of Bassano, a well meaning and intelligent,
but time-serving and obsequious man, and Savary, one of the vilest
instruments of Napoleon, were, I believe, the chiefs.
f I have related the same story nearly in the same words in Chap.
vii. Part ii. B. of MS. Memoirs. That relation was taken firom
notes written in 1821, and the text here is transcribed, with such
emendations or additions as subsequent information has supplied in
Paris, in 1826, from the original notes.
1 Some say he had a ring which Talleyrand had received fiom
Sletternich. Pozzo di Borgo told me he had also two or three' insignificant words in the Duke Dalberg's handuwriting, with which
Metternich or Nesselrode was acquainted, which words were concealed in a button, and Lord Goderich told me (in January, 1833),
that Vitrolles brought with him a note of invitation or civility in Lord
Castlereagh's handwriting to the Princesse de Vaudemont, as part of




190             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and Talleyrand only gave him some trifles which Prince
Metternich would recognize, and which would serve for a
proof of his being the bearer of a message. When he
arrived at Chatillon, the Allies were exasperated at the bad
faith of Napoleon, and determined to' exact some change
as the price o.f peace from  France, but not determined
what that revolution  or counter-revolution  should. be.
Austria, who had been the most backward in sacrificing
Napoleon, was still averse to restoring a family which
would exclude Maria Louisa and her son from all hopes
of the succession.  In these dispositions she was strengthened by observing the silence of all parts of France, with
the solitary exception of Bordeaux, and the oblivion and
contempt into which the cause and name of the Bourbons
had obviously fallen. But Vitrolles had the address to
remove such objections.  He  converted his mission of
inquiry into one of communication, and having produced
his credentials of handwriting or trinkets, assured the Allies
that M. de Talleyrand and others had formed their plot,
were determined to restore the Bourbons, and anxiously
expecting the armies at Paris, and a declaration in favor
of the exiled family.  When the armies arrived, the Allies'
the proof of his being confidentially intrusted by persons connected
with Talleyrand and his party in Paris. Any or all of these specific
signs may have been adopted, but it is unquestionable that they or
some such were resorted to.
* Pozzo di Borgo and others have confirmed this and some other parts
of the narrative. The whole comes to me indirectly from the Duke
Dalberg. I believe I have related it elsewhere in these papers, but stet.
Alexander had some inclination to place Bernadotte on the throne
of France: several persons better acquainted with the dispositions of
Frenchmen leaned to the Duke of Orleans; but Austria considered




NAPOLEON AT ELBA.                   191
were much surprised to find no such conspiracy organized,
and Taileyrand no less so that his name had been instrumental in restoring the Bourbons.  He was, however, too
quick-sighted not to make a virtue of necessity. The restoration was inevitable, and he was too adroit not to father
the spurious child which had been unexpectedly sworn to
him by the prostitute who had conceived it.
At Elba, Napoleon seemed absorbed in domestic details,
the arrangement of the petty concerns of the place, and the
reception of his English visitors. To several of the latter
he spoke with earnestness and freedom of passing and past
events. The short printed narrative of Lord Ebrington is
one of the happiest and most authentic representations of
the spirit, character, and interest of his conversation.  Sir
Neil Campbell was strangely deceived in his estimate of
his general character, as in his view  of his immediate.
designs.  I heard him  myself declare that his talents did
not seem to him superior to those which would be required
in a sous-prefet! Some imagine that he lulled that officer into security by purposely concealing~ his intellectual
qualifications as well as his actual designs. It is notorious
that Sir Neil was overwhelmed with surprise at his departure from Porto Ferraio. The ridicule to which his want
Napoleon or Louis XVIII. as the sole alternative, and our Regent,
though not his ministers, were invariably for Louis. See Appendix
No. VII., respecting the elevation of Louis-Philppe to the throne
in 1830.
* I suspect Sir Neil was misled by his own simplicity, by the preconceived opinions which newspapers and libels had created in his
mind, and by that propensity so common in official men to believe and
to circulate whatever tends to gratify the prejudice or the malignity
of their employers.




.19"2          FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
of vigilance exposed him had a pernicious effect afterward
on the nerves of Sir Hudson Lowe, and contributed to
induce that more ostensible jailer to adopt a system more
irksome to his great prisoner, and more discreditable to
England than even the narrow policy of our councils had
intended.
There can be little doubt that a conspiracy was forming
in the French army at the beginning of the year 1815 for
expelling the House of Bourbon. The leaders, however,
neither invited nor intended to invite Napoleon to put himself at the head of their party. He probably ascertained
the existence of the plot, and was aware that there was no
wish to concert it with him. But encouraged by the respect his name still inspired in the soldiery, alarmed at his
own precarious situation, and of reports of the designs at
the Congress of Vienna, and urged by the natural impatience and ambition of his character, he certainly landed
before any such conspiracy was ripe, and seized prematurely, and for his own use, the greater part of-the materials of which any successful conspiracy could be formed.
He soon perceived that the strength of his cause lay both
in a party and in principles more republican than he had
ever favored or encouraged.  How far he wavered between his former system of government and the establishment of one more popular in its spirit as well as form, and
how far such fluctuation of counsel, so unlike all his former
conduct, was produced by change of situation and character, and ultimately overwhelmed him in ruin, are interestingfnquiries for the historian. They would lead me too
far.. He felt his embarrassment during the hundred days.
Count Mole, who is no tribune of the people, told me that




NAPOLEON DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS.        193
Napoleon expressed great apprehensions that the republican party would prevail; that he spoke of scenes he had
witnessed in the revolution with disgust and emotion; that
he drew with great sagacity,-but with some bitterness,
the characters of the marshals, ministers, and demagogues
who surrounded him; lamented the impossibility of raising
France to resistance against the confederates without resorting to means which he had always reprobated; and
acknowledged that had he foreseen how much compliance
with the democratic party was necessary to his support,
he would never have left the Island of Elba. He added
that his chief hopes of extricating France from her internal
and external dangers depended on the cordial co-operation
of such sober-minded men as my informant. From such a
moral in the conclusion, some of my shrewder readers may
infer, and possibly be right in inferring, that the whole
conversation proved Napoleon's knowledge of individual
character much more than.his fears of democracy generally, or at that epoch in particular. Whatever was his
object, he unquestionably held this language; for the person to whom he addressed it is too distinct to forget, and
too correctly honorable to be capable of misrepresentation.
His life, occupations, health, and conversation in his
exile at St. Helena have been so minutely and so frequently described in print, that, in preserving notes of what has
been told me by his inmates at Longwood, I may be
repeating- what is well known and undisputed. He occasionally played at chess and at billiards, at the first with
tolerable skill, but intolerable rapidity; at the latter, neither with mace nor cue, but with his hand. Before he had
* Qu'il avait toujours desapprouv6s.




194            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
regulated the distribution of his time, he was very anxious
not to be left between dinner and the hour of retiring to
rest.  To prevent the ladies from retiring, he would sit
long at table, exert himself to keep up conversation, and
sometimes send for books to read aloud to the company.
He read well, but he read the same poems and same plays
too fi'equently. Among the latter, Zaire was his favorite
lecture. He slept himself when read to, but he was very
observant and jealous if others slept while he read. He
watched his audience vigilantly, and "Madame Montholon, vous dormez," was a frequent ejaculation in the
course of reading. He was animated with all that he read,
especially poetry; enthusiastic at beautiful passages, impatient and observant of faults, and full of ingenious and
lively remarks on style, composition, and story. He read
through the Odyssey, I presume in Dacier's translation,
and the Bible.: He could hardly get through the first for
the comments it excited, and, as he had not been very conversant with the Old Testament, he was alternately surprised and delighted, provoked and diverted, at the sublimity and beauty of some passages, and what appeared to
him the extravagance and absurdity of others. He expressed all these emotions with great freedom and eagerness; and the manner as well as matter of his remarks
awakened and fixed the attention of his audience. In the
long evenings passed thus in conversation, reading, criticism, and narrative, he not only took a prominent part,
but was so luminous and earnest, and yet so philosophical,
calm, and above resentment in describing-the events of his
life, and drawing the portraits of those with whom he had
passed it, that Madame Montholon, with great felicity, com



NAPOLEON'S ENGLISH READING.          195
pared the sensations of the company to those of a future
state, in which they were taking a dispassionate view of
the transactions of the world in which they had been engaged. Napoleon was curious about all new books which
arrived at St. Helena. -Without understanding English
well, or speaking it at all, he could make out histories and
read newspapers and- reviews in our language. He grew
so conversant in the latter, that on the arrival of the Edinburgh and Quarterly, he made very plausible conjectures
about the authors of the articles in each publication. That
on Warden's books puzzled and perplexed him exceedingly, but did not displease him. The anecdotes of his
early life, derived through me from  Cardinal Fesch and
Louis Bonaparte, quite astonished him.'" Where on earth
have they been to hunt out that? but I recollect it.
Where on earth could those English fellows get at it?"
His indefatigable mind, which found matter for inquiry
and speculation in every thing, was not exempt fromn the
failing to which such active spirits are liable, of discovering more than exists, of working upon plain materials not
susceptible of such refinement, in short, to use the homely
proverb, of seeing too far into a mill-stone. Lady Holland
had prevailed on the Duke of Bedford to send Napoleon a
book.' He left the choice of it to her, and she delayed it
till the day before the ship was to sail. She consequently
requested a friend to purchase the first well-bound book
that came to hand in the bookseller's shop, and as it was a
Scotch hand that it came to, Robertson's History of Scotland was naturally enough the book selected. "Why does
the Duke of Bedford send me the History of Scotland?
* It was written by Mr. Allen.




196            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
He must know that I have read it. Oh, Espq7xa, he means
to hint to me never to acknowledge, like Mary, Queen
of Scots, the jurisdiction of England."   Another book,
Coxe's life of the Duke of Marlborough, sent to him by
Lord Robert Spenser, a descendant of that great man,
delighted him much. He wished in his last moments to
convey it as no unappropriate memorial to an English
regiment in the island, whose officers possessed a library,
and had been remarkably civil to him. He requested Dr.
Arnott, their surgeon, who had attended him, to present
it; but Dr. Arnott was ordered by his superiors to return
the book, first, because it had not been transmitted through
the Government House; secondly, because it was in the
name of the Emperor Napoleon, not of General Bonaparte.
Pitiful, narrow-minded malignity, disgraceful alike to the
government and its agents!
General Bertrand had applied to our Government for
Folard's Polybius, but it was not furnished.  Napoleon
was somewhat impatient for its arrival, but it was only
during the latter months of his life that he obtained it, I
believe, from Lady Holland. He read it incessantly, and
spoke of the ancient author with great admiration.  His
habits and regimen during his whole life, and more particularly in his exile at St. Helena, were singular; he ate
little and rapidly, dined early, and not unfrequently neglected breakfast altogether; he drank, when well, light
French wines, and especially Lunel, but never to excess.
In his illness, and for some time before, he lost his appetite
entirely, though Lady Holland had the satisfaction of
learning that the confectionery she had sent him was
much approved. Indeed, some preserves which he called
"pruneaux de Madame Holland," were nearly the last arti



NAPOLEON'S LAST ILLNESS.             197
cle of food he ever asked for.  At St. Helena, he rose at
four, and throughout his life was accustomed to get up for
an hour, if not two, in the course of the night; and, as
he had always two beds in the room, was very frequently
found to have changed them before morning.  The habit
of interrupting his rest with an interval of watchfulness
was probably contracted during his campaigns, and it was
of great use to him when on service. He explained and
directed, with a clear head, after his first sleep, all the
general arrangements of the ensuing day; and then, after
a second and refreshing repose, superintended the execution
of them, without the possibility of the more' ordinary business interrupting the last orders necessary to be given.
Many curious details of the decline of -his health, the
nature of his disease, and his own sagacious and characteristic remarks on the cause and treatment of it, may be collected from the publications of his various medical attendants, among whom it became, unfortunately, a subject of
much painful controversy. His father had died of a scirrhus in the pylorus; his sister, the Princess Borghese, has
more recently fallen a victim to a similar disease. It- is
not likely that the climate could cause the disorder;
but the dampness of that. part of the island which he
inhabited, the vexation occasioned by exile and confinement, and the absence of his family, and of such assistance as he could have commanded in Europe,- may have
accelerated his death, and unquestionably aggravated his
sufferings.  He was at all times disposed to converse
If it be granted. that his disease was incurable, it can not be
denied that any officer on service, in the state of health under which
he labored for two years, would have had leave to return to Europe
for medical advice.




198             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
on metaphysical subjects, and curious in questioning wellinformed priests on the foundation and nature of their
faith. He was consequently disappointed on finding that
the two ecclesiastics sent out to St. Helenathough selected by Cardinal Fesch, were men of limited understandings,
and no reading at all.  The old man, Buonavita, though
his adventures in Spain, Mexico, and New  York, might
afford some amusement, was grossly ignorant. He told
Napoleon that he resembled the most able and fortunate of
all Roman generals, namely Alexander the Great.  Whether it be true or not that the Emperor condemned him for
that historical blunder to read ten pages of Rollin every
morning, and to repeat the substance of his lesson to him,+
he was certainly indignant that so uninteresting a companion had been appointed to attend him.
Whatever were the- religious sentiments of this extraordinary man, such companions were likely neither to fix
nor to shake, to sway nor to alter them.  I have been at
some pains to ascertain the little that can be known of his
thoughts on such subjects; and though it is not very satisfactory, it appears to me worth recording.
In the-early periods of the revolution, he, in common
with many of his conntrymen, conformed to the fashion of
treating all such matters, both in conversation and action,
with levity and even derision. In his subsequent career,
like most men exposed to wonderful vicissitudes, he professed, half in jest and half in earnest, a sort of confidence
in fatalism and predestination. But on some solemn pub* I believe this story'to be a perversion of another fact. eNapoleon liked his younger chaplain, and finding that his education had
been neglected, recommended books to him, and in some sort superintended his course of study.




NAPOLEON'S RELIGIOUS SENTIMENTS.           199
lie occasions, and yet more in private and sober discussion, he not only gravely disclaimed and reproved infidelity, but both by actions and words implied his conviction that a conversion to religious enthusiasm might befall
himself or any other man.  He had more than tolerancehe had indulgence and respect-for extravagant ascetic notions of religious duty.  He grounded that feeling not on
their soundness or their truth, but on the uncertainty of
what our minds may be reserved for, on the possibility of
our being prevailed upon to admit and even to devote ourselves to tenets which at first excite our derision. It has
been observed that there was a tincture - of Italian superstition in his character, a sort of conviction from reason
that the doctrines of revelation were not true, and yet a
persuasion, or at least an apprehension, that he might live
to think them so. He was satisfied that the seeds of belief
were deeply sown in the human heart.  It was on that
principle that he permitted and justified, though he did not
dare to authorize the revival of La Trappe t and other austere orders.  He contended that they might operate as a
safety-valve for the fanatical and visionary ferment which
would otherwise burst forth and disturb society. In his
remarks on the death of Duroc~ and in the reasons he
alleged against suicide, both in calm and speculative —discussion and in moments of strong emotion (such as occurred at Fontainebleau~ in 1814), he implied a belief both in
fatality and providence.
* Pasquier, Stan. Girardin, and others.       f Mole.: See Lord Ebrington's narrative.
~ General Sebastiani and Comte Flahault: aussi ne suis-je pas
tout-a-fait eitranger d ces idles religieuses, added he, after assigning
worldly reasons for not killing himself.




200            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
In the programme of his coronation, a part of the ceremony was to consist in his taking the communion.  But
when the plan was submitted to him, he, to the surprise
of those who had drawn it, was absolutely indignant* at
the suggestion.  "No man," he said, "had the means of
knowing, or had the right to say, when or where he would
take the Sacrament, or whether he would or not."  On
this occasion, he added that he would not, t nor did he!
There is some mystery about his conduct in similar respects at St. Helena, and during the last days of his life.
He certainly had mass celebrated in his chapel while -he
was well, and in his bedroom when ill. But though I
have reason to believe that the last Sacraments were
actually administered to him privately, a few days before
his death, and probably after confession, yet Count Montholon, from whom I derive indirectly my information,
also stated that he received Napoleon's earnest and distinct directions to conceal all the preliminary preparations for that melancholy ceremony from all his other
companions, and even to enjoin the priest, if questioned,
to say he acted by Count Montholon's orders, but had no
knowledge of the Emperor's wishes.
It seems as if he had some desire for such assurance as
the Church could give, but yet was ashamed to own it.
He knew that some at St. Helena, and more in France,
would deem his recourse to such consolation infirmity;
perhaps he deemed it so himself. Religion may sing her
triumph, Philosophy exclaim, "pauvre humanite," more
* Gallois, confirmed by many others.
f'Some attributed this repugnance to conform, to his fear of the
army, others to a secret and conscientious aversion to what lie deemed in his heart a profanation.




NAPOLEON'S RELIGIOUS SENTIMENTS.          201
impartial skepticism despair of discovering the motive, but
truth and history must, I believe, acknowledge the fact.
M. de Talleyrand, who, on hearing of his death, spoke of
his mental endowments, as has been related above,* added
the following remarks:
" His career is the most extraordinary that has occurred
for one thousand years.  He committed three capital
faults, and to them his fall, scarce less extraordinary than
his elevation, is to be- ascribed-Spain, Russia, and the
Pope.  I say the Pope; for his coronation, the acknowledgment by the spiritual head of Christendom  that he, a
little lieutenant of Corsica, was the chief sovereign of
Europe, from whatever motive it proceeded, was the most
striking consummation of glory that could happen to an
individual. After adopting that mode of displaying his
greatness and crowning his achievements, he should never,
for -objects comparatively insignificant, have stooped to
vex and persecute the same Pontiff. He thereby outraged
the feelings of the very persons whose enmity had been
softened, and whose imagination had been dazzled by that
brilliant event.  Such were his capital errors.  Those
three apart, he committed few others in policy, wonderfully few, considering the multiplicity of interests he had
to manage, and the extent, importance, and rapidity of the
events in which he was engaged. He was certainly a
great, an extraordinary man, nearly as extraordinary in
his qualities as in his career; at least, so upon reflection I,
who have seen him near and much, am disposed to con@ On one occasion, Talleyrand said of him to me emphatically "il
6toit mal 1leve6 " and he more than once repeated and maintained, what
I fear is but too well founded, that he had very little regard for truth.




,0 2            FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
sider him.  He was clearly the most extraordinary man I
ever saw, and I believe the most extraordinary man that
has lived in our age, or for many ages."
Another and perhaps a more fatal fault than any of the
three so justly imputed to him  by Talleyrand was acknowledged* by Napoleon himself in his conversations at
Elba.  This was the neglecting to make peace after the
victories of Lutzen and Bautzen, in 1813. Those successes
would have enabled him to sue for peace, much more to
accept or to grant it with honor and a good grace. He
might even-then have obtained and almost commanded
terms which would have left him the greatest potentate in
Europe, and one of the most successful conquerors modern
history can record.- But he thought himself stronger than
he was; and found himself, as he admitted, wrong in his
calculations.  Such mistakes and such admissions-of them
perhaps make him yet more extraordinary, as unquestionably the opportunity which his reverses and his exile in
Elba and in St. Helena gave him of reviewing and discussing his whole conduct, of which he so amply availed
himself, must and will render his life more interesting and
more instructive to posterity than that of any great military
prince since Julius Cuesar.
* To Mr. Fazakerley, a man of strict veracity and accurate memory
who saw him in Elba, in 1814, and who has often related this part
of his conversation to me. Fazakerley, on being pressed by him to
make free criticisms on his conduct, expressed his surprise that he had
not made peace at that epoch. " Mais je me croyais assez fort (said
he) pour ne pas la faire, etje me suis trompe, sans cela c'6tait assur6ment le moment de faire la paix."




A P P E  ID I X.
No. I.
(See page 23.)
LADY HOLLAND and Mr. Allen saw in 1825 the original of
this will, in the King's own hand, at the Hotel Soubise, where
it was kept together with other archives, and the celebrated iron
closet found in the Tuileries in August, 1792.
The authenticity of the will has sometimes been disputed, but
there seems no doubt that it is genuine. Indeed it was published immediately on that Prince's execution by his enemies
and accusers, not by his friends and partisans.  I remember
Talleyrand explained this fact to me in much detail, and made
a very just remark thereupon, that it was a strong proof of the
blindness and zeal of the Jacobin party, or of the state of exaltation and republican fanaticism of the public mind at the
time, when such a document, entirely in the power of the
municipality, was eagerly published instead of being suppressed, from a notion that the circulation of it would injure the
cause of Royalty, and expose the memory and principles of the
King to the derision of his readers. Strange indeed must have
been the infatuation of those who deemed such sentiments discreditable to the writer!
The expression attributed to Abbe Edgeworth of" Fils de St.
Louis, montez au ciel," when the unfortunate Prince hesitated
in mounting the scaffold, was an entire fiction. Abbe Edgeworth openly and honestly acknowledged he never remembered
using it, and it was invented at a supper that very evening.




204             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
No. II.
(Seb page 70.)
19th September, 1838.
I saw the Prince of the Peace much altered in appearance,
but still the same character of countenance. Good-humored,
self-satisfied, somewhat jovial and hearty, in his bad French
and chuckling voice, and an arch expression in his eyes, complained much of the ingratitude of the world, and included,
sonmewhat unreasonably, in his censure that of the French government from which he receives his only subsistence, scanty
indeed, but still a subsistence, 5000 francs   e-200 per annum;
but he contrasted it with the various sums he had in Spain
allowed to the emigrant and exiled princes and noblemen of
France. He complained bitterly of the Tudo, to whom he said
he had been attached from his youth, to whom he had sacrificed every thing, and for whom he had incurred the (I think he
said ludicrous or absurd) imputation of bigamy, and whom all
the world knew he had actually married after the death of his
first wife, for the purpose of legitimating her son. He had settled on her all he had in the world out of Spain, and she had
left him and taken the whole, so that he was reduced to absolute
penury, and lived entirely on the small pension Luis Felipe
allowed him; for as to his estates and encomiendas, they had
been distributed in a strange way. His Soto di Roma, at least
all that was given to him of it by Charles IV., had been bestowed, as a national mark of gratitude and reward on the
Duke of Wellington, who, he said, had earned it or any thing
else; but yet, as he knew of no sentence or judgment of. law
depriving him of it, and of no proofs that disqualified him from
holding it, he could not but consider it as a despojo: with regard to the bienes libres (les biens libres) appertaining to it (by
which I understood some lands and tenements contiguous or in




APPENDIX.                     205
the neighborhood which he had purchased with his own money)
they had been, by some arbitrary, but he believed formal act
of one of the governments, settled on his daughter by the Bourbon wife. As to the Albufera and his encomiendas, those had
been conferred on the Infante Don Francisco; so that whenever
he claimed his lands he found some, one in the enjoyment of
them whom he had little chance of dispossessing. He rather
laughed at this and his own helplessness, but he spoke with
more bitterness of the Tudo's ingratitude, and with some indignation and misplaced vanity of the Liberals depriving him of the,
title Generalisimo, or at least of Captain-General, he being, he
said, in fact the oldest Captain-General of Spain. He said that
in the subsequent volumes of his memoirs, hee should draw a
contrast between Spain under Charles IV., and Spain under
the Liberals. He had no great complaint of Napoleon; he had
always -been -his enemy, and Napoleon had offered him fair
terms of reconciliation, if he had thought it either honorable or,
possible to have accepted of them. In his intercourse with
him at Bayonne, he had indeed, attempted to seduce 6r intirnidate him into a recognition' of Joseph, or either then or subsequently in conversation had told- him,'that from a further knowledge of Spain he had discovered that " l'on l'avoit tromp6 k son
egard;" for that a man could not for near twenty years have
governed by his own authority a country composed of such a
variety of institutions, of passions, of languages, races, habits,
and views as- he now found Spain to be, without being a remarkable man.' He said that Lucien, witll whom he was once
intimate, had somewhat unkindly declined all intercourse with
him, because, as Lucien said, he had not menage (he pronounced it menasse) the Emperor in his memoirs. The Prince of the
Peace observed that it was no business of his to exalt or to censure Napoleon; it was notorious that they had few relations,
but those of hostility rather than friendship, and that in truth he




206             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
had recounted those affecting Napoleon's conduct without passion, and with a greater disposition to soften rather than to
heighten such passages as might lead to unfavorable interpretations. I seized this opportunity of observing that his memoirs
were generally, and I supposed with reference to Bonaparte-as
well as others, more open to the reproach of being either too
laudatory or too scrupulous and official in relating facts injurious
to the memory of the actors, than to that of calumny and asperity, and I ventured to add that they had lost some of the interest
lie might have given to them by his relating rather than explaining public acts and documents; whereas in the Court of Spain
he must have witnessed scenes, such as would have made the
fortune of any memoir writer d la Franpaise. I asked if the
story of the long period between the celebration and consummation of Ferdinand's marriage was true: he nodded an assurance of its authenticity, but did not dwell on the subject, or
even on that of Ferdinand's conspiracy at the Escurial, of which
Charles IV. had given me such curious details. He said that
I was right in supposing that his great delicacy had diminished
the interest taken in his book, and injured the sale; that he
thought he should be less fastidious in the volumes on which he
was now occupied; that he had not come to the insurrection
of Aranjuez, but it would be in the next or following volume.
He spoke with less bitterness of Ferdinand, and with more of
Don Carlos, than I expected. He acquiesced, indeed, in the.somewhat unmeasured epithets with which I stigmatized Ferdinand's character and conduct; but when I said that celui-ci,
meaning Carlos, though a devot and a bigot, was " plus -honnete
homme,." he said, How can any man deserve the title of" honnate," who would be ready,. at the dictation of any silly or
wicked beast of a priest or friar, to stab his- best fiiend, or to
carry a torch to light a pile to burn father, mother, brother,
wife, child, or all his dearest connections? He might not think




APPENDIX.                     207
this dishonest or wrong, but all that the world more justly
dreaded or hated, he had the faculty of thinking right, and to
the utmost of his power of carrying into execution. He said
Spain was in a dreadful condition; that Don Antonio de MI —,
a man of worth and letters, whom I had known at Madrid, had
lately written him word that there was no law, no authority, no
safety in the country; and that though he knew of no prohibition against his (the Prince of Peace's) return, he could not say
that it would either be prudent or according to law that he
should do so, and that even if there were a positive law to say
he might, he did not know how he could avail himself of it with
any security, or what road he would advise him to take. He
said he had been reduced to great distress and degradation;
but I found his spirits less depressed and his conversation more
natural and frank than I expected. I asked if he saw Don
Francisco, and his manner of saying "no" convinced me that
that Prince, who is notoriously his son, had made no advances
to him. for he somewhat earn'estly explained that it did not become him to seek his protection, and enlarged on the opportunities he had of knowing the Infanta before her marriage at
Rome, and talking of the beauty of her mother, Isabella, Queen
of Naples, who was in all senses, I believe, the own sister of
her son-in-law, Francisco.
Soon after he left me, I met on the landing-place of the hotel
stairs a dark and somewhat stately lady, evidently of a southern
climate, carried by two or three servants on a footstool to the
story above our apartment, and, on inquiry, I found it was the
Duchesse de Ineca (at least so called), who is the daughter of
the Prince of the Peace, and issue of his marriage with the
Bourbon Infanta and Princess, and who, as above related,
possesses no inconsiderable portion of his landed property.
But she neither allows him a sixpence out of them, or keeps
up any intercourse with him. She is married to a Roman




208             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
prince; but his royal consort's children and connections seem
to treat him with the same insensibility, harshness, and cruelty
as his mistress and wife, the Tudo, and all that depend on her.
She is living in comparative splendor at Madrid, while her husband is trainling a miserable existence as a pensioner or almost
beggar in Paris, surrounded by relations, acknowledged or unacknowledged children, grandchildren, and what not-Infants,
Princesses, Duchesses, etc., etc., not one of whom condescends
to take the slightest notice of him, or show the least tenderness,
regard, or interest about one to whom some owe their station
and riches, and all, more or less, their very existence!  A
strange name and fate
"To Point a moral or adorn a tale."
No. III.
(See page 95.)
Godoy, in his " Memorias" (tom. iv. p. 431), has inserted both
letters, as follows:
Copia literal de la carta que me dirigio Lord Holland despues
delfallecimiento de Cdrlos IV.
Excelentisimo seiior y muy estimado amigo,
Al punto que supe el triste acontecimiento que nos han comunicado los papeles y recientes noticias de Roma, me acorde
de la conversacion que tuvimos lafiltima vez que tuve el honor
de verle en Verona, y me fui a ver i los ministros'a fin de informarme de si pondrian dificultad en que V. tomase su residencia aqui, en caso de que lo juzgase conveniente. De resultas
tengo la satisfaccion de asegurarle que no pondran impedimento
alguno ni a su desembarque ni a su permanencia aqui. No me
hani dado por escrito esta su determinacion, porque no quieren
que semejante paso pueda mirarse como una especie de convite
hecho'a V., sino como una contestacion sencilla a una pregunta




APPENDIX.                      209
hecha por un amigo, que por tal me hacen el honor de contarme.
Por lo demas, si V. lo juzgase conveniente, puede sin reparo
alguno venirse f Inglaterra, adonde vivira sill sufrir molestia
alguna, como otro cualquier extrangero, aunque bajo una ley
que da poder a nuestros ministros & obligar & cualquiera de
ellos a.salir del reino, si asi lo considerasen necessario a la
quietud pfiblica.. Pero esta ley, puede V. estar cierto que no
sea& usada por ninguna preocupacion nacida de acontecimientos politicos ya pasados. Nuestros ministros tienen empen~o
en manifestar que no la emplean contra ninguno que no se
mezcla en negocios politicos, y como me aseguran que no
p6ndrian ningun impediment'o a su disembarque, estoy certisimo
de que la tal ley no perturbara su quietud cuando se halle en
este pais.
Aunque nada se de sus planes y determinacion de V. para lo
porvenir, me ha parecido que acaso le sera-  V. itil el saber
que en cualquier acontecimiento tiene V. un asilo abierto en
este pais. Ojala. que nada adverso le obligue a V. a ello!
Pero en cualquier caso, tendre la satisfaccion de haber cumplido con un deber de gratitud por las atenciones que he debido
ai V., y especialmente por la generosa clemencia con que, en
1805,' instancia mia, salv6 V. la vida del infeliz Powell. Este
favor esta. tan vivamente impreso en mi memoria, que no puedo
menos de aprovecharme de la primera ocasion que se ofrece,:para mostrar mi agradecimiento. Con sinceros deseos de la
felicidad de V. quedo su obligado y fiel amigo,
Q. S. M. B.
V. HOLLAND.
EN LONDRES, 30 de enero de 1819.
P. D. Una carta dirigida a Holland House, Kensington,
London, me halla siempre.




210             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
Copia literal de mi respuesta.
RoMA7 24 defebrero de 1819.
Milord y mi muy amado amigo,
La carta con que V. me favorece de 30 de enero es la mayor
preuba de su amistad y la mas relevante demonstracion de la grandeza de su alma. Si, amigo mio, puedo con verdad y con razon
querellarme de los hombres, asegurandole que entre el nfimero
inmenso de persoras a quienes he rendido servicios singulares,
una sola no he encontrado qute haya correspondido'. los sentimientos de nobleza que distinguen al hombre honrado del debil;
todos, todos han enmudecido al verme perseguido por la suerte,
y solo han recurrido ia mi los que necesitaban' nuevos socorros
de mi liberalidad; este es el mundo, y tal lo conocia; pero la
prueba ha sido cruel.  Puedo no obstante lisonj6arme de
poseer un bien singular, ya que el respetable milord Holland
me dispensa su amistad; agradezco pues amado amigo, todo
cuando ha ejecutado luego que lleg6 a su noticia la filtima desgracia que me aflige, y si las circunstancias del dia no variaren
mi suerte mejorandola, seguire el camino que mi amigo me ha
fi'anqueado; ser6 feliz si algun dia puedo 6. viva voz demostrarle mi gratitud, y entre tanto concluyo asegurd.ndole la
sincera amistad y respeto de su afectisimo servidor,
Q. L. B. L. M.
El Principe de la- Paz.
No. IV.,See page 124.)
The following is the copy of an anonymous letter addressed.
to Lady Holland, to announce the death of Napoleon:
Bonaparte est mort le 5 Mai d'un abces a' l'estomac; la nouvelle officielle en est arriv~e aujourd'hui.
Ce 5 Juillet, 1821.
Addressed outside I: LADY HOLLAND."




APPENDIX.                      211
No. V.
(See page 134.)
The following nine letters, referring to the, circumstances
connected with the imprisonment of Napoleon at St. Helena,
are here inserted in their order of date.
MY LORD,'C'est vers vous que la justice et l'infortune doivent tourner
leurs regards quand elles ont besoin d'un noble appui; j'6tais
aupres de l'Empereur Napoleon lorsque vous elevates la voix
dans votre Parlement pour r6clamer au nom de l'honneur de
votre nation ce que l'humanite, ce que le droit des gens auroient dui prescrir aux ministres de Sa Majeste Britannique; elle
retentit jusqu'a lui cette voix ge6nreuse, et porta dans son cceur
les plus douces consolations. Puis-je me flatter que ces mgmes;
ministres accueilliront la demande que j'ai e6t charg6 de faire
pour obtenir le remplacement de Monsieur de Montholon, dans,
le cas prevu alors et realis6 depuis, ou sa sante l'obligeroit.a
quitter l'Empereur? La chance la plus favorable pour moi
est de compter suI' votre intervention. Lorsque j'ai quitte Ste
Hele6ne, Monsieur de Montholon 6tait comme moi attaque de
la maladie du foie qui me for9oit a  m'en eloigner.  Son d6vouement pour-]'Empereur l'a seul empech6 de me suivre;
mais ce que je craignois est arrive; il m'ecrit que son mal s'est
accru, et qu'apres avoir fait usage des remedes les plus 6nergiques, son etat est devenu si alarmant que sans un prompt
retour en Europe, ses jours sont dans un imminent peril; mais
comme il lui serait p6nible de quitter celui, a qui il est devenu
necessaire, sans avoir la certitude d'etre remplace par quelqu'un qui fut en 6tat de se livrer aux occupations du cabinet,
il me renouvelle les ordres que j'avais deja recus a cet 6gard.
Parmi les personnes nouvellement arriv6es a Longwood, au



2 12             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
cune n'est en 6tat d'ecrire le Francois qu'elles parlent a-peine;
l'Enpereur a absolument besoin d'un homme qui non seulement ait sa confiance, mais qui sache le comprendre.  C'est la
seule consolation qui lui reste, et il n'est que trop a craindre
que de long temps il ne lui en soit accord6e d'autre.  C'est
afin d'obtenir pour cet homme destine a des titres si delicats, si
importans, les permissions necessaires que je me suis adress6e a Lord Bathurst; je n'ai pas essuye de refus: mais il
ne s'est point expliqu6 sur ma demande que j'avais comprise
dans d'autres objets sur lesquels il m'a repondu.  Si son
silence devait m'annoncer l'intention de l'ecarter, j'ose compter sur vous, My Lord, pour la faire sortir de l'oubli auquel il l'aurait condamn6e.  Dans un pays oi l'autorit6 des
ministres est soumise a l'opinion piblique, ou de respectables
organes de cette opinion peuvent leur demander compte de
leurs actes si le ministlre se tait, il est doux d'avoir la certitude que les amis de la patrie, les honorables soutiens de la
gloire Britannique ne se tairont pas; et sur qui cette confiance peut-elle mieux se reposer que sur Lord Holland!
J'ai l'honneur d'etre, My Lord, votre tr6s humble et tres
obeissante servante,
VASSAL DE MONTHOLON.
BRUIXELLES 31 J3anvier, 1820.
STANHOPE STREET, tIebruar y 15th, 1820.
MY DEAR LORD,
If I thought that Count Montholon's life depended upon his
departure from St. Helena, and his departure on some person
proceeding from Europe to replace him, you will, I hope, do
me the justice.to believe that there must have been avery
cogent reason indeed to have made me doubt of giving my consent. But the fact is, I do not think that his departure depends




APPENDIX.                     21o
on this. There is nothing in the various communications which
have passed on the intended departure of Count Montholon,
which shows it. Even if he had decided not-to leave St. Helena until a secretary should be about the person of Bonaparte, the object is accomplished.  The priest sent out was
selected by Cardinal Fesch, according to the instructions given
to his Eminence by Bonaparte for the selection of his priest,
and these instructions were, as you may imagine, more particular as to his civil, than to his religious qualifications.
I believe this application of Madame Montholon to be
nothing but (to use a very vulgar expression) a mere fetch,
more connected possibly with the opposition between Bertrand
and Montholon (for we two, my dear Lord, are not I hope
half so bitterly opposed to each other) than with any thing
else.
What I- will do, however, will be this: I will write to Sir
Hudson to communicate to Bonaparte that if he shall express
any wish for any person from Europe to replace either of these
gentlemen (for they are both in fact upon the wing, but watching each other), Cardinal Fesch or the Princess Borghese shall
be employed in the business.
I am ever yours, my dear Lord, very sincerely,
(Signed)             BATHURST.
I must leave it to you to give the substance of my letter to
Madame Montholon, in a way not to offend her. She is, I believe, a very clever woman.
LONGWOOD, le 2 Septembre, 1820.
MILORD,
J'ai eu l'honneur de vous 6crire le 25 Juin 1819, pour vous
faire connaitre l'etat de sante de l'Empereur Napoleon, -attaqu6 d'une h6pathie chronique depuis le-mois d'Octobre 1817.




214              FOREIGN, REMINISCENCES.
A la fin de Septembre dernier est arrive le Docteur Antomarchi, qui ln i a donn6 des soins; il en a d'abord 6prouve quelque soulagement; mais, depuis, le docteur a declare, comme
il resulte de son journal et de son bulletin, que le malade est
venu a un etat tel que les remides ne peuvent plus lutter contre la malignite du climat, qu'il a besoin des eaux minerales,
que tout le temps qu'il demeure dans ce s6jour ne sera qu'une
p6nible agonie, qu'il ne peut eprouver de soulagement que par
son retour en Europe, ses forces 6tant epuisees par cinq annees
de sejour dans cet affreux climat, prive de tout, en proie aux
plus mauvais traitemens.
L'Empereur Napoleon me charge de vous demander d'etre
transf6r6 dans un climat europeen, comme le seul moyen de
diminuer les douleurs auxquelles il est en proie. J'ai l'honneur d'etre, Milord, de votre Excellence.
Le tres humble et obeissant serviteur.
Le Compte BERTRAND.
P. S. J'avais eu l'honneur d'envoyer cette lettre a Sir Hudson Lowe sous cachet volant; il me l'a renvoy6e avec la lettre
ci-jointe; ce qui m'engage a vous la faire passer directement.
Je suppose qu'il en aura pris copie, qu'il vous l'aura envoy6e
avec ses observations, et qu'ainsi cette circonstance n'aura occasionne au cun retard.
(Sign6)          Le Compte BERTRAND.
LONoWOOD, le 3 Septembre, 1830
S. E. le Lord Liverpool.
(Inclosure in the foregoing letter.)
PLANTATION HoUSE, 2 Sept., 1820.
SIR,
The Governor's instructions not admitting him to receive
any letter from the persons residing with Napoleon Bonaparte




APPENDIX.                       215
where the title of Emperor is given to him, I am directed in
consequence to return you the inclosed.
The Governor at the same times desires me to observe, that
no letter was ever Ireceived by him frorh you, to the address
of Lord Liverpool, of the date of 25 June, 1819. I have the
honor to be, Sir,
IYour most obedient humble servant,
(SignD)          G.: GORREQUER,
Military Secretary.
Pour copie                         Pour copie conforme,
(Sign6) BERTRAND.                Princesse PAULINE BORGHESE.
PARIS, le 9 Dlecembre, 1820.
MY LORD,
L'interet que vous voulez bien prendre au succBs de mes
d6marches relativement a la demande que je fais au gouvernement Anglais d'envoyer un secretaire a Longwood, me fait
esperer que je puis sans importunite remettre encore entre vos
mains cette cause que je crois juste, et que sans doute le sera a
vos yeux.
J'ai l'honneur de vous adresser ma demande a Lord Bathurst; je sais que je ne puis avoir espoir de succes que dans
i'inte6rt que vous voudrez bien y prendre.  Lord Bathurst
parait avoir pris contre moi des preventions qui lui font croire
que toutes mes derandes cachent quelque mystere inquietant.
Volus serez persuade, My Lord, que ce n'est pas vous que je
voudrais tromper, et que je n'ai qu'un seul but, celui d'apporter
quelque consolation au malheur.
Je n'entre vis-A-vis de Lord Bathurst dans aucun dt~ail sur
les raisons qui me paraissent devoir etre prises en consideration;
Son Excellence sait mieux que moi que l'on a permis A Napoleon d'avoir trois officiers g6n6raux, plus Monsieur de Las Cases




216              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
et son fils. M. de Las Cases a 6t6 enlev6 sans qu'on ait jamais
bien comnpris pourquoi.  Le Ge6nral Gourgaud a quitte Longwood volontairement. I1 ne reste donc plus que deux personnes au lieu de cinq, et je demande d'envoyer M. de Planat
conmme secretaire de Napol6on. Ce serait ce me semble une
barbarie d'exiger qu'il ne partit qu'en remplacement du Comte
Bertrand ou du Comte de Montholon.  M. de Planat m'a e6t
d6sign6 par l'Empereur comme une des personnes qui lui
seraient agr6ables.  On peut meme dire qu'il a deja ete choisi
par lui puisqu'il l'accompagnoit sur le Bell16rophon.  Son pere
etait proprietaire a Paris. I1 est entr6e au service en 1806; il a
e6t aide-de-camp du. Genl. Lariboissiere et du Genl. Drouot; il
avait et6 nomme officier d'ordonnance depuis peu, et n'avait
obtenu le grade de chef d'escadron qu'au moment oui il a suivi
Napoleon; il n'a jou6 aucun role, n'est point exile, et je ne
pense pas qu'il soit suspect au Gouvernement Francais.  De-puis son retour de Malte, il a toujours vecu en Italie, t est sans
fortune, et a recu un asile aupres de la princesse Eliza (Mne Bacciocchi); il est encore a Trieste.
Son depart me donnera I'espoir du retour de Monsieur de
Montholon, espoir auquel je dois renoncer a jamais, si le Gouvernement Anglais refuse la permission d'envoyer un individu
qui puisse le remplader (au moins en partie).  C'est assez vous
dire, My lord, ce que je vous devrai, et je ne saurais vous exprimer la reconnaissance dont je suis p6n6tr6e  pour l'int6r6t
que vous voulez bien me t6moigner, et dont je sens tout le
prix.
Lord Bathurst est tomb6 dans une erreur bizarre sur l'aide
de cuisine P6rasset; cuisinier il'fit, il est, et il sera vraisemblablement.  Ses manieres et son langage n'annoncent; pas une
condition plus relevee.
Je ne veux pas, My Lord, occuper plus longtemps votre attention.




APPENDIX.                       217
J'ai l'honneur d'etre, My Lord, votre tres humble et tres
obeissante servante,
VASSAL DE - MONTHOLON.
A Lord Holland.
VILLA PAOLINA, 29 JTuin, 1821.
MYLADY,
Sachant par Lord Gower que vous et Mylord -etes a Paris,
je profite d'une bonne occasion pour me rappeler a votre souvenir, et vous prier de vouloir bien me donner des nouvelles de
mon bien aim6 frdre, dont l'6tat de sante m'inquidte beaucoup,
par les bruits que l'on fait r6pandre sur son mauvais 6tat.
Nous n'avons requ aucune nouvelle du pr'tre qui est arrive de
Ste Helene; il vous serait peut-etre possible, Mylady, de vous
en informer, et de me donner des nouvelles positives.
J'espere que vous etes satisfaite de votre sante; la mienne a
un peu souffert de la mauvaise saison que nous avons ici. Je
vous prie, Mylady, de me rappeler au souvenir de Mylord, et
de recevoir pour vous l'assurance de mes sentiments d'affection
et de reconnaissance, pour toutes les marques d'affection que
vous n'avez cesse de donner a mon frere.
Princesse PAULINE BORGHESE.
A Lady Holland.
LONDRESa ce 17 Uo0it, 1821.
MIL ORD,
J'ai recu la lettre que vous m'avez fait l'honneur de m'ecrire
le 17 de ce mois. J'ai et6 extremement sensible A cette marque
de votre int6ert. Je regrette beaucoup que vous avez et6 absent de ce pays'i mon arrivee. Ma premiere visite eut e6t
certainement chez vous, vous le seul dont la voix se soit elevie




218              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
dans le S6nat Britannique contre le cruel exil ou a p6ri si malheureusement le grand homme que la France pleurera longtemps. Vous vous etes acquis, Milord, des droits sur tous les
cceurs g6n6reux et a la reconnaissance de tous les amis de
l'Empereur. aVeuillez me compter parmi ceux qui n'en perdront jamais le souvenir.
Permettez que Lady Holland trouve ici l'expression des
sentimens de gratitude que nous devons a la constance de ses
soins et de ses attentions pour le proscrit de St. H6lene.  Elle
a reussi A adoucir les ennuis de son exil; l'arrivee d'une caisse
de livres les lui faisait oublier. Tranquille sur le jugement de
la posterite, il aimait cependant a retrouver dans les bons ouvrages qu'il 6tait appreci6 par ses contemporains, et les libelles
lui fournissaient souvent l'occasion d'eclaircir des faits curieux.
En un mot, les livres nouveaux 6taient pour lui une distraction
agreable et un sujet de conversations int6ressantes.  Le souvenir que l'Empereur a destine A Lady Holland est conserv6
avec soin, et lui sera remis -par le Ge6nral Montholon.
MIa femme se joint a moi pour offrir A Lady Holland ses
remerciement- des cadeaux, livres, attentions de toute espece
dont elle nu ts a combl6 pendant notre s6jour a Ste Heltene.
Elle lui ecrira pour la remercier de sa lettre, et du logement
qu'elle lui destinait'a Holland House; comme elle est dans
un mauvais etat de sant6, elle ne compte pas encore quitter
Londres.
Veuillez agr6er, Milord, les sentimens de haute consideration
avec lesquels j'ai l'honneur d'etre
Votre tres humble
et tres obeissant serviteur,
Le Compte BERTRAND.
The Lord Holland, Paris.




APPENDIX.                     219
LYoNs INN, Friday, 17th January, 1823.
MADAM,
Not being willing to confide altogether in my own recollection of the substance of the MSS. dictated at St. Helena, I wrote
a request to Emmanuel de Las Cases to give me some details
upon the subject, especially concerning the volume just published by Colburn. The following is his reply:
"Vous avez raison de penser que le volume des M6moires'dictes par lui-mtme' est imparfait. Ce sont de simples brouilIons que Gourgaud a arrang6s et qu'il a vendus. Avec le tems
les vrais manuscrits paroitront et feront tomber ce volume. I1
y a meme deux ou trois additions que l'on a mises pour faire
plaisir'i certaines personnes.
" Vous avez raison de penser qu'il y avait quelque dissidence
entre M. et B.; cependant ils sont toujours bien en apparence,
mais ils se facheront serieusement si les m6moires dictated by
himself, paraissent en totalite; ce dont je doute en ce moment."
The volume of Melanges consists of extracts from a manuscript brought home by Countess Montholon, and I believe it
to be authentic, as far as it goes.
When Gourgaud-was on the point of leaving St. Helena, he
was required to give up every thing that he had of the dictation of the Emperor, and to pledge his honor that none of it
remained in his hands. He gave up some papers, and gave
his honor that he had returned all D.; but about three weeks
after his departure, it was discovered that he had clandestinely
carried off several brouillons of Napoleon's dictation, out of
which he composed the account which he published of the battle
of Waterloo, soon after his arrival in England, and the volume
just published.
As I am aware that your Ladyship wishes to obtain authentic
intelligence upon what the great Exile has left for posterity, I
have done myself the honor to submit the above to you, and




220              FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
have the honor to be, Madam, with unfeigned respect, your
Ladyship's very obliged humble servant,
BARRY Q. O'MEARA.
To Lady Holland,
PARIS, 16 Fevrier, 1823.
MILORD,
Quoique l'incluse que vous m'avez fait l'honneulr' de m'annoncer ne se soit -pas trouvee dans votre pli, les explications
que vous avez eu la bont6 de me donner m'ont paru tellement
completes, que je n'ai pas eu a regretter de n'avoir point recu
la lettre de Mr. Fox. Ce que vous me mandez, mon cher
Lord, eclaircit autant qu'il etait possible la question que j'avais
pris la liberte de vous soumettre, et suffit pour temperer le besoin pressant que je croyais avoir d'une copie figuree du Testament de Sainte-Helene. J'ai et6 extremement sensible a la
peine que vous avez prise de m'ecrire entibrement de votre
main, et surtout d'une main souffrante. J'aime a me persuader
que la douleur est a present disparue. Peut-etre la faveur que
vous venez de me faire ne sera pas la derniere que j'aurai a
obtenir de vous.
Je desire que la sante de la tres aimable Milady n'ait pas e6t
alt6ree, comme celle du tres cher Milord son epoux, et je prie
le respectable couple d'agr6er pour la saante de l'un et de ]'autre
les vceux de son devoue serviteur,
BERTRAND.
P.S. Ma femme est un peu souffrante, et me charge de
vous addresser ses compliments affectueux.
Le Lord Holland.




APPENDIX.                       2'21
No. VI.
(See page 138.)
The autograph letter to Raynal mentioned in the text is in
the British Museum  (Egerton MSS. No. xvii.)  As it is, believed to be inedited, it is now published as it stands in the
original.
MONSIEUR,
I1 vous sera difficile de vous ressouvenir parmis le grand
nombre d'etrangers qui vous importunent de' leur admiration,
d'une personne a laquelle vouz avez bien voulu faire des honntet6s.  L'ann6e  derniere, vous vous entreteniez avec plaisir
de la Corse; daignez donc jetter un coup d'ceil sur cette esquise
de son histoire: je vous presente ici les 2 premieres lettres; si
vous les agrees je vous en enverois la fin.
Mon fre're a qui j'ai recommande de ne pas oublier dans sa
commission de deput6s pour recondiuire Paoli dans la patrie de
venir recevoir une lecon de vertu et d'humanite vous les remetteras.
Je suis avec respect
Votre tres humble
et tres obeissant servitour.
BUONAPARTE.
Officier d'Artillerie.
AJACCIO, le 24 Juin, l'an ler de la liberte'.
MV. l'Abb6 Raynal.
In the" M6emoires" of Lucien Bonaparte, Prince of Canino,
Napoleon's brother, occurs the following passage:
"Napoleon, dans un de ses conges qu'il venait passer a
Ajaccio (c'etait, je -crois, en 1790) avait compose une histoire
des r6volutions de la Corse, don't j'6crivis deux copies, et dont
je regrette bien la perte: un de ses manuscrits fut adresse6 A




222             FOREIGN REIMINISCENCES.
l'abbe Raynal, que mon frire avait connu. son passage ja/Marseille. Raynal trouva ccot ouvrage tellement remarquable, qu'il
voulut le communiquer a Mirabeau. Celui-ci, renvoyant le
manuscrit, ecrivit i Raynal que cette petite histoire lui semblait annoncer un genie du premier ordre. La r6ponse de
Raynal s'accordait avec l'opinion du grand orateur, et Napoleon en fut ravi. J'ai fait beaucoup de recherches vaines pour
Iretrover ces pieces qui furent detruites probablement dans
l'incendie de notre maison par -les troupes de Paoli." —Vol. i.
p. 92. The autograph of two chapters of Napoleon's history
of Corsica is in England, and forms part of the collection of the
Earl of Ashburnham.
No. VII.
Letter written to a Lady, in 1832.
DEAR
Why are you so-hard upon Louis Philippe?  He had the
misfortune of being the son of a prince who had little principle
and many vices; and whom, from a variety of circumstances,
which it would be tedious now to explain, it was and still is
the interest and fashion of many factions to blacken and revile
far more than he deserved. With all his imperfections in private life, and with whatever delinquencies may be brought
home against him in public, he was at heart a most affectionate,
indulgent, and judicious father; and that circumstance, combined with his easy and captivating manners, endeared him to
all his children, and to none more than his eldest son (Louis
Philippe).
Educated in the midst of the revolution, that young prince
imbibed popular and even republican principles, distinguished
himself in the battle of Jemmappes, fought against the invaders
of his country, and with the natural ardor of youth conceived a




APPENDIX.                     223
strong affection and admiration for the general who had led
him to victory, and who was in truth no'ordinary man —Dumourier. When that gener:al had, partly from the levity of his
character, partly from the ill-usage uf his employers, deserted
the standard of the Republic, and when Egalite6 the father had,
without any proof of guilt, and without any appearance of fear,
perished on the. scaffold, and his brothers were first imprisoned
and then banished, Louis Philippe found himself, without any
fault of his own, either through the misconduct of his general,
or from the severity of the republican laws, an exile from
France; an exile, too, neither welcomed nor protected by the
Powers of Europe or the Royalist party, who hated his house
and name, and who, moreover, were little disposed to make
common cause with any, who were not prepared to invite and
carry foreign arms into the heart of their country. To such a
line of conduct, which Louis Philippe and his family have uniformly considered as rebellion, he was at this early period of
life firmly resolved never to give his sanction. He accordingly
entered into no foreign service, accepted no foreign succor of
money, except, I believe, some little assistance to his mother,
from those courts with which he was connected by blood, and
he maintained himself by his industry and proficiency in sciences and arts, which he owed to the provident and careful
education, which his father, in the midst of a dissolute life, had
always been earnest to procure for him. Surely, thus far, there
was nothing to blame in his conduct. Well, in the year 1800,
or thereabouts, the state of anarchy in which France was supposed to have wearied out its own partisans, and a notion that
something of a more stable, and possibly monarchical nature
would be resorted to, was generally prevalent in Europe, and
more than whispered in the best informed circles at Paris.
But both principle and interest deterred all Frenchmen, who
had any value for free institutions, or any concern in the large




224             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
and extensive purchases of confiscated land, from harboring a
thought -of bringing back the ancient family, or at least the
lineal successors of the last king. Many important personages,
however, were suspected, and many actually did look to the
House of Orleans, as affording a sort of compromise (not very
dissimilar to that of William and the House of Hanover in our
country), between the bigoted Royalists on one side, and the
lovers of liberty on the other. On this occasion, and while
speculations of his possible succession to the crown began to be
afloat, the Duke of Orleans, at the suggestion of Dumourier,
spontaneously recognized Louis XVIII., and reconciled, as far
as he could,-himself and his family to the exiled dynasty. Ill
taking this step he unquestionably departed in some degree
from the principles in which he had started in life. He softened
those high, popular, stern, and republican notions which, during
the first ardor of the revolution, he, in common with thousands
and thousands of enthusiastic young men, had adopted.
Perhaps he did wrong: I think he did; and he seeined, on
the score of prudence, to act unwisely; but at least his error,
and the season of committing it, bespoke some disinterestedness
and generosity. It was the first moment that any prospects of
ambition had opened before him, and he renounced them all
for the purpose of devoting himself to the cause of persons in
adversity, who were indeed related to him, but who, on no one
occasion, had ever shown any predilection, and seldom  any
tihing like courtesy or common justice, to him or his family.
It is true, his devotion was neither in profession nor in fact
blind or unqualified. He pledged himself to acknowledge no
other sovereign of France; he pledged himself to pay allegiance to the heir of the BHourbons, if restored by Frenchmen
to the throne of his ancestors; bhut he did not pledge himself to
serve or concert with Foreign Powers, for the purpose of
forcibly restoring them, and to that reserve and resolution he




APPENDIX.                      225
adhered then, as he has done ever since. It is rumored (and
perhaps is true), that in Sicily and at Cadiz he engaged in
some intrigues which betrayled the ambition of acquiring political power in Spain, to which his affinity in blood and by
marriage gave him some pretension. But what of that? It
might be foolish, presumptuous, and adventurous to do so; but
it was neither dishonorable, nor unprincipled, nor unjust, nor
inconsistent. On the restoration of Lewis XVIII., he returned,
consistently with his professions, and in conformity to his interests, to France. The vast possessions of his family fortunately, consisting chiefly in buildings and of forests, had not been.sold; they were restored; and they could not on any pretext
be withheld. He was moreover admitted as a Prince of the
Blood, and a Peer of the House of Peers. His conduct on his
return was irreproachable, and in no wise different from that
of:the Duke of Bourbon, and other Princes of the Blood, but
the manner of his reception by the people was very different
indeed. It made a much stronger and more lasting impression
on the jealous, suspicious, and vindictive tempers of the elder
branch of the Bourbons than on his own. HIe was greeted in
the streets and in the Palais Royal with frequent exclamations
of "Vivent les Orl6ans! ah! qu'il ressemble a son bon pere!
Celui-la n'a jamais porte les armes contre la patrie, nous le
scavons bien."  Even before "les cent jours," the Duchess of
Angouleme and the Court had begun to mark in trifles, as her
mother had done before her, her aversion and spite to the
House of Orleans.
It is possible that among the various cabals and intrigues
formed by the disaffected during that year, to get rid of the
dynasty imposed upon them by foreign armies, some may have
directed their views to the obvious and reasonable expedient
of elevating the House of Orleans to the throne; an expedient
analogous to the settlement which had proved so successful in
Ki




226            FOREIGN RE2MINISCENCES.
England. But it was never, I believe, rumored, and certainly
never proved, that the Duke of Orleans had, directly or indirectly, the smallest connection or cognizance of any such pr'ojects, which, whatever they may have been, were absorbed by
the sudden return of Napoleon and his rapid march and occupation of Paris, from whence the House of Bourbon fled as
ignominiously, and much more expeditiously, than they had
arrived at it. The Duke of Orleans left France too; faithful
to his promised allegiance, he did not wait to acknowledge and
submit to Napoleon, though such a course held out many
obvious advantages, but left his fortune and estates at the
mercy of the Imperial government. But though his adherence
to Lewis XVIII. withheld, him from paying his court to the
rival dynasty, it was not sufficient to deter him from his original and laudable resolution of never carrying war into his
country. He did not go to Ghent. He was no party to any
treaty or compact with foreigners, and he retired to Ham, near
Richmond, waiting in patience, and some degree of poverty,
the event of the contest. When it restored the foi'mer order of
things, he on permission and invitation returned, though the
exclusion of the Princes of the Blood from the right of speaking
and voting inthe House of Peers (unless specially permitted to
do so by the king) was evidently leveled at him; and the
whole conduct of the family (the king only excepted) suf
ficiently indicated that the old enmity to his House was revived,
and that nothing but fear and want of power restrained it from
breaking out into persecution, or at least perpetual vexation
and systematic slander and calumny.
Throughout the reign of Lewis XVIII., though there were
many things he disapproved and some he lamented, he never
allowed himself to take any active part, nor even encouraged
any others to do so. He professed to be under some personal
obligation to Lewis XVIII.; and that, and regard to his own




APPENDIX.                     227
honor, utterly prevented him, he said, from any act that could
endanger his government, and indisposed him even to such as
might embarrass or perplex it.
On the accession of Charles X. that monarch paid him some
court, and conferred on him some insignificant favors, but pursued uniformly a system of policy the most adverse to the feelings and principles of the Duke of Orleans, and one which in
his judgment led to the catastrophe we have since witnessed,
and put, consequently, all princes, and indeed all property, in
jeopardy. He concealed his opinions on these matters less,
perhaps, than he had done under Louis XVIII., but he neither
openly opposed, nor secretly conspired against any; but confined his censures to conversation, and to familiar intercourse
with those among the opposition most distinguished for talent
and moderation. The ordinances-came out, and provoked the
resistance and revolution of 1830. In preparing that resistance,
the Duke of Orleans was never even suspected of taking any
share. When the conflict occurred, accidental absence, as well
as inclination, kept him aloof; but all parties, including tihe
King, began to look to him as the man to whom power (though
provisional and temporary) must be delegated for the purpose
of restoring tranquillity. The king declared him lieutenant of
the kingdom, when in truth he had lost all his own power, and
had none to delegate to another; but all the various parties at
length acquiesced in the notion of placing him at the head of
the country; he was offered the Constitutional Crown, and he
accepted it. Could he prudently, could he honestly have done
otherwise. If you look to his own honor and engagements, he
was as unshackled by any, as any other member of the community; and it was quite clear that, to prevent blood, confusion,
and anarchy, some man must be selected. Had he refused,
whom  would he have benefited!  Charles X. and the old
Courtl  Far from it; they would probably have paid the




228             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
forfeits of their crimes in blood, or at least in imprisonment and
confiscation, instead of being allowed, by an act of clemency
almost unexampled, to proceed leisurely out of the country,
which they had by false oaths deceived, attempted to enslave,
and actually deluged in blood, and to withdraw very ample
means- of subsistence for themselves and the wretched remnant
of emigrant rebelsj who chose to follow them. The tenderness,
perhaps improvident, and certainly almost unprecedented, shown
to the exiled family, is mainly to be attributed to the forbearance
of Louis Philippe, and to an implied bargain on that subject,
which accompanied his elevation to the throne.
Since he was placed there, he has been much ridiculed for a
vulgar love of popularity; and yet, whenever the cause of humanity has required it, he has readily and cheerfully risked that
darling object without reserve and hesitation. He has done
more; he has even put to some peril the confidence of. his own
party and of the National Guards, for the sake of rescuing from
the operation of harsh laws and vindictive policy those who
-most assuredly would never have shown the same moderation
toward him. The escape of Polignac and his colleagues could
not but be most unpopular in Paris, where so many parents,
widows, and orphans justly attributed the loss of their children,
husbands, and fathers to his wicked and sanguinary measures.
There can, I think, be little doubt, that, both technically and
morally, they had incurred the penalty of treason. Personally,
they had no claims whatever on the new king, whose advice
they had constantly repudiated, and whose family name and
principles they were known to abhor. And yet, at no small
hazard to his power, and at yet greater injury to his popularity,
he stood forward manfully to screen them from the punishment of
death. His whole reign has been marked by similar lenity to
his rivals and enemies. He has materially shaken his hold on
the country by indulging on all occasions, but especially where




APPENDIX.                     229
the old Royalists are concerned, his natural clemency and goodnature.  Compare the proceedings about the infatuated little
Duchess of Berry either with those of England toward Charles
Edward and the, Stuarts, or the conduct of the Courts of Spain,
Portugal, and Naples to any competitors or princes engaged in
actual hostilities or conspiracies against them. Now, what is
there, I ask, in all this to excite indignation.
I have heard some say they do not detest, they despise Louis
Philippe. Why, and for what l Not surely for want of talent.
If they do, his contemners must be very conceited people, for
in knowledge, eloquence, and quickness of apprehension he has
not many superiors in Europe. It is not, I presume, for want
of courage; for, when in danger, he has displayed much of that
essential quality;; and he has never, like his predecessors, shrunk
from danger, when it in any way became him to encounter it.
In the course of this year, on a most trying occasion of an insurrection in Paris (on the 6th of June), he displayed a spirit
and presence of mind, a confidence in his own courage, and an
intrepidity, which would have done honor to Napoleon himself,
and in which it is thought that great man on one or two occasions lost the opportunity of equaling him.
The only contempt really felt for him is for his virtues, not
his vices; and it is only felt by those who look upon rashness
and cruelty as necessary proofs of military and political greatness, and regard all simple in public matters as weakness and
pusillanimity. That he has not yet gratified the violent passions of his most zealous partisans, and that he has thereby
somewhat deadened their zeal, is most true, and is much to be
lamented; but it surely is no ground for the just and impartial
to depreciate his character.
So much for his public conduct. Take him in his private capacity, and he is, as a son, a brotherl, a husband, a father, a master,
and a friend quite irreproachable. Easy, good-tempered, good



230             FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.
natured, full of kind affections, and almost exempt from any of
the malignant passions, it may be said that with his private
character the judgment of the public has nothing to do; but
surely it would be dealing but hard measure to the House of
Orleans, if the dissolute and unprincipled- habits of the father
should be deemed sufficient to give currency to the most atrocious calumnies against his public conduct and memory, and
yet that the excellent qualities of the son in domestic -life should
not be allowed to raise a presumption in favor of the motives
and principles by which his public actions are regulated.
(Signed) VASSAL HOLLAND.
THE END.