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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/3898.txt b/3898.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f65b81c --- /dev/null +++ b/3898.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2445 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Volume 7, +by Lewis Goldsmith + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Volume 7 + Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London + +Author: Lewis Goldsmith + +Release Date: December 4, 2004 [EBook #3898] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COURT OF ST. CLOUD *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +MEMOIRS OF THE COURT OF ST. CLOUD + + +Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London + + +By Lewis Goldsmith + + + +Volume 7 + + + +LETTER XXIV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Though loudly complained of by the Cabinet of St. Cloud, the +Cabinet of St. Petersburg has conducted itself in these critical times +with prudence without weakness, and with firmness without obstinacy. In +its connections with our Government it has never lost sight of its own +dignity, and, therefore, never endured without resentment those +impertinent innovations in the etiquette of our Court, and in the manner +and language of our Emperor to the representatives of legitimate +Sovereigns. Had similar becoming sentiments directed the councils of all +other Princes and the behaviour of their Ambassadors here, spirited +remonstrances might have moderated the pretensions or passions of upstart +vanity, while a forbearance and silence, equally impolitic and shameful, +have augmented insolence by flattering the pride of an insupportable and +outrageous ambition. + +The Emperor of Russia would not have been so well represented here, had +he not been so wisely served and advised in his council chamber at St. +Petersburg. Ignorance and folly commonly select fools for their agents, +while genius and capacity employ men of their own mould, and of their own +cast. It is a remarkable truth that, notwithstanding the frequent +revolutions in Russia, since the death of Peter the First the ministerial +helm has always been in able hands; the progressive and uninterrupted +increase of the real and relative power of the Russian Empire evinces the +reality of this assertion. + +The Russian Chancellor, Count Alexander Woronzoff, may be justly called +the chief of political veterans, whether his talents or long services are +considered. Catherine II., though a voluptuous Princess, was a great +Sovereign, and a competent judge of merit; and it was her unbiased choice +that seated Count Woronzoff, while yet young, in her councils. Though +the intrigues of favourites have sometimes removed him, he always retired +with the esteem of his Sovereign, and was recalled without caballing or +cringing to return. He is admired by all who have the honour of +approaching him, as much for his obliging condescension as for his great +information. No petty views, no petty caprices, no petty vengeances find +room in his generous bosom. He is known to have conferred benefactions, +not only on his enemies, but on those who, at the very time, were +meditating his destruction. His opinion is that a patriotic Minister +should regard no others as his enemies but those conspiring against their +country, and acknowledge no friends or favourites incapable of well +serving the State. Prince de Z-------- waited on him one day, and, after +hesitating some time, began to compliment him on his liberal sentiments, +and concluded by asking the place of a governor for his cousin, with whom +he had reason to suppose the Count much offended. "I am happy," said His +Excellency, "to oblige you, and to do my duty at the same time. Here is +a libel he wrote against me, and presented to the Empress, who graciously +has communicated it to me, in answer to my recommendation of him +yesterday to the place you ask for him to-day. Read what I have written +on the libel, and you will be convinced that it will not be my fault if +he is not to-day a governor." In two hours afterwards the nomination was +announced to Prince de Z--------, who was himself at the head of a cabal +against the Minister. In any country such an act would have been +laudable, but where despotism rules with unopposed sway, it is both +honourable and praiseworthy. + +Prince Adam Czartorinsky, the assistant of Count Woronzoff, and Minister +of the foreign department, unites, with the vigour of youth, the +experience of age. He has travelled in most countries of Europe, not +solely to figure at Courts, to dance at balls, to look at pictures, or to +collect curiosities, but to study the character of the people, the laws +by which they are governed, and their moral or social influence with +regard to their comforts or misery. He therefore brought back with him a +stock of knowledge not to be acquired from books, but only found in the +world by frequenting different and opposite societies with observation, +penetration, and genius. With manners as polished as his mind is well +informed, he not only, possesses the favour, but the friendship of his +Prince, and, what is still more rare, is worthy of both. All Sovereigns +have favourites, few ever had any friends; because it is more easy to +flatter vanity, than to display a liberal disinterestedness; to bow +meanly than to instruct or to guide with delicacy and dignity; to abuse +the confidence of the Prince than to use it to his honour, and to the +advantage of his Government. + +That such a Monarch as an Alexander, and such Ministers as Count +Woronzoff and Prince Czartorinsky, should appoint a Count Markof to a +high and important post, was not unexpected by any one not ignorant of +his merit. + +Count Markof was, early in the reign of Catherine II., employed in the +office of the foreign department at St. Petersburg, and was, whilst +young, entrusted with several important negotiations at the Courts of +Berlin and Vienna., when Prussia had proposed the first partition of +Poland. He afterward went on his travels, from which he was recalled to +fill the place of an Ambassador to the late King of Sweden, Gustavus III. +He was succeeded, in 1784, at Stockholm, by Count Muschin Puschin, after +being appointed a Secretary of State in his own country, a post he +occupied with distinction, until the death of Catherine II., when Paul +the First revenged upon him, as well as on most others of the faithful +servants of this Princess, his discontent with his mother. He was then +exiled to his estates, where he retired with the esteem of all those who +had known him. In 1801, immediately after his accession to the throne, +Alexander invited Count Markof to his Court and Council, and the trusty +but difficult task of representing a legitimate Sovereign at the Court of +our upstart usurper was conferred on him. I imagine that I see the great +surprise of this nobleman, when, for the first time, he entered the +audience-chamber of our little great man, and saw him fretting, staring, +swearing, abusing to right and to left, for one smile conferring twenty +frowns, and for one civil word making use of fifty hard expressions, +marching in the diplomatic audience as at the head of his troops, and +commanding foreign Ambassadors as his French soldiers. I have heard that +the report of Count Markof to his Court, describing this new and rare +show, is a chef-d'oeuvre of wit, equally amusing and instructive. He is +said to have requested of his Cabinet new and particular orders how to +act--whether as the representative of an independent Sovereign, or, as +most of the other members of the foreign diplomatic corps in France, like +a valet of the First Consul; and that, in the latter case, he implored as +a favour, an immediate recall; preferring, had he no other choice left, +sooner to work in the mines at Siberia than to wear, in France the +disgraceful fetters of a Bonaparte. His subsequent dignified conduct +proves the answer of his Court. + +Talleyrand's craft and dissimulation could not delude the sagacity of +Count Markof, who was, therefore, soon less liked by the Minister than by +the First Consul. All kind of low, vulgar, and revolutionary chicanery +was made use of to vex or to provoke the Russian Ambassador. Sometimes +he was reproached with having emigrants in his service; another time +protection was refused to one of his secretaries, under pretence that he +was a Sardinian subject. Russian travellers were insulted, and detained +on the most frivolous pretences. Two Russian noblemen were even arrested +on our side of the Rhine, because Talleyrand had forgotten to sign his +name to their passes, which were otherwise in order. The fact was that +our Minister suspected them of carrying some papers which he wanted to +see, and, therefore, wrote his name with an ink of such a composition +that, after a certain number of days, everything written with it +disappeared. Their effects and papers were strictly searched by an agent +preceding them from this capital, but nothing was found, our Minister +being misinformed by his spies. + +When Count Markof left Sweden, he carried with him an actress of the +French theatre at Stockholm, Madame Hus, an Alsatian by birth, but who +had quitted her country twelve years before the Revolution, and could, +therefore, never be included among emigrants. She had continued as a +mistress with this nobleman, is the mother of several children by him, +and an agreeable companion to him, who has never been married. As I have +often said, Talleyrand is much obliged to any foreign diplomatic agent +who allows him to be the indirect provider or procurer of his mistresses. +After in vain tempting Count Markof with new objects, he introduced to +the acquaintance of Madame Hus some of his female emissaries. Their +manoeuvres, their insinuations, and even their presents were all thrown +away. The lady remained the faithful friend, and therefore refused with +indignation to degrade herself into a spy on her lover. Our Minister +then first discovered that, not only was Madame Hus an emigrant, but had +been a great benefactress and constant companion of emigrants at St. +Petersburg, and, of course, deserved to be watched, if not punished. +Count Markof is reported to have said to Talleyrand on this grave +subject, in the presence of two other foreign Ambassadors: + +"Apropos! what shall I do to prevent my poor Madame Hus from being shot +as an emigrant, and my poor children from becoming prematurely orphans?" + +"Monsieur," said our diplomatic oracle, "she should have petitioned the +First Consul for a permission to return, to France before she entered it; +but out of regard for you, if she is prudent, she will not, I daresay, be +troubled by our Government." + +"I should be sorry if she was not," replied the Count, with a significant +look; and here this grand affair ended, to the great entertainment of +those foreign agents who dared to smile or to laugh. + + + + +LETTER XXV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The Legion of Honour, though only proclaimed upon Bonaparte's +assumption of the Imperial rank, dates from the first year of his +consulate. To prepare the public mind for a progressive elevation of +himself, and for consequential distinctions among all classes of his +subjects, he distributed among the military, arms of honour, to which +were attached precedence and privileges granted by him, and, therefore, +liable to cease with his power or life. The number of these arms +increased in proportion to the approach of the period fixed for the +change of his title and the erection of his throne. When he judged them +numerous enough to support his changes, he made all these wearers of arms +of honour knights. Never before were so many chevaliers created en +masse; they amounted to no less than twenty-two thousand four hundred, +distributed in the different corps of different armies, but principally +in the army of England. To these were afterwards joined five thousand +nine hundred civil functionaries, men of letters, artists, etc. To +remove, however, all ideas of equality, even among the members of the +Legion of Honour, they were divided into four classes--grand officers, +commanders, officers, and simple legionaries. + +Every one who has observed Bonaparte's incessant endeavours to intrude +himself among the Sovereigns of Europe, was convinced that he would +cajole, or force, as many of them as he could into his revolutionary +knighthood; but I heard men, who are not ignorant of the selfishness and +corruption of our times, deny the possibility of any independent Prince +suffering his name to be registered among criminals of every description, +from the thief who picked the pockets of his fellow citizens in the +street, down to the regicide who sat in judgment and condemned his King; +from the plunderers who have laid waste provinces, republics, and +kingdoms, down to the assassins who shot, drowned, or guillotined their +countrymen en masse. For my part, I never had but one opinion, and, +unfortunately, it has turned out a just one. I always was convinced that +those Princes who received other presents from Bonaparte could have no +plausible excuse to decline his ribands, crosses, and stars. But who +could have presumed to think that, in return for these blood-stained +baubles, they would have sacrificed those honourable and dignified +ornaments which, for ages past, have been the exclusive distinction of +what birth had exalted, virtue made eminent, talents conspicuous, honour +illustrious, or valour meritorious? Who would have dared to say that the +Prussian Eagle and the Spanish Golden Fleece should thus be prostituted, +thus polluted? I do not mean by this remark to throw any blame on the +conferring those and other orders on Napoleon Bonaparte, or even on his +brothers; I know it is usual, between legitimate Sovereigns in alliance, +sometimes to exchange their knighthoods; but to debase royal orders so +much as to present them to a Cambaceres, a Talleyrand, a Fouche, a +Bernadotte, a Fesch, and other vile and criminal wretches, I do not deny +to have excited my astonishment as well as my indignation. What +honest--I do not say what noble--subjects of Prussia, or of Spain, will +hereafter think themselves rewarded for their loyalty, industry, +patriotism, or zeal, when they remember that their Sovereigns have +nothing to give but what the rebel has obtained, the robber worn, the +murderer vilified, and the regicide debased? + +The number of grand officers of the Legion of Honour does not yet amount +to more than eighty, according to a list circulated at Milan last spring, +of which I have seen a copy. Of these grand officers, three had been +shoemakers, two tailors, four bakers, four barbers, six friars, eight +abbes, six officers, three pedlers, three chandlers, seven drummers, +sixteen soldiers, and eight regicides; four were lawful Kings, and the +six others, Electors or Princes of the most ancient houses in Europe. I +have looked over our, own official list, and, as far as I know, the +calculation is exact, both with regard to the number and to the quality. + +This new institution of knighthood produced a singular effect on my vain +and giddy, countrymen, who, for twelve years before, had scarcely seen a +star or a riband, except those of foreign Ambassadors, who were +frequently insulted when wearing them. It became now the fashion to be a +knight, and those who really were not so, put pinks, or rather blooms, or +flowers of a darker red, in their buttonholes, so as to resemble, and to +be taken at a distance for, the red ribands of the members of the Legion +of Honour. + +A man of the name of Villeaume, an engraver by profession, took advantage +of this knightly fashion and mania, and sold for four louis d'or, not +only the stars, but pretended letters of knighthood, said to be procured +by his connection with persons of the household of the Emperor. In a +month's time, according to a register kept by him, he had made twelve +hundred and fifty knights. When his fraud was discovered, he was already +out of the way, safe with his money; and, notwithstanding the researches +of the police, has not since been taken. + +A person calling himself Baron von Rinken, a subject and an agent of one +of the many Princes of Hohenlohe, according to his own assertion, arrived +here with real letters and patents of knighthood, which he offered for +sale for three hundred livres. The stars of this Order were as large as +the star of the grand officers of the Legion of Honour, and nearly +resembled it; but the ribands were of a different colour. He had already +disposed of a dozen of these stars, when he was taken up by the police +and shut up in the Temple, where he still remains. Four other agents of +inferior petty German Princes have also been arrested for offering the +Orders of their Sovereigns for sale. + +A Captain Rouvais, who received six wounds in his campaign under Pichegru +in 1794, wore the star of the Legion of Honour without being nominated a +knight. He has been tried by a military commission, deprived of his +pension, and condemned to four years' imprisonment in irons. He proved +that he had presented fourteen petitions to Bonaparte for obtaining this +mark of distinction, but in vain; while hundreds of others, who had +hardly seen an enemy, or, at the most, made but one campaign, or been +once wounded, had succeeded in their demands. As soon as sentence had +been pronounced against him, he took a small pistol from his pocket, and +shot himself through the head, saying, "Some one else will soon do the +same for Bonaparte." + +A cobbler, of the name of Matthieu, either in a fit of madness or from +hatred to the new order of things, decorated himself with the large +riband of the Legion of Honour, and had an old star fastened on his coat. +Thus accoutred, he went into the Palais Royal, in the middle of the day, +got upon a chair, and began to speak to his audience of the absurdity of +true republicans not being on a level, even under an Emperor, and putting +on, like him, all his ridiculous ornaments. "We are here," said he, +"either all grand officers, or there exist no grand officers at all; we +have all fought and paid for liberty, and for the Revolution, as much as +Bonaparte, and have, therefore, the same right and claim with him." Here +a police agent and some gendarmes interrupted his eloquence by taking him +into custody. When Fouche asked him what he meant by such rebellious +behaviour, he replied that it was only a trial to see whether destiny had +intended him to become an Emperor or to remain a cobbler. On the next +day he was shot as a conspirator. I saw the unfortunate man in the +Palais Royal; his eyes looked wild, and his words were often incoherent. +He was certainly a subject more deserving a place in a madhouse than in a +tomb. + +Cambaceres has been severely reprimanded by the Emperor for showing too +much partiality for the Royal Prussian Black Eagle, by wearing it in +preference to the Imperial Legion of Honour. He was given to understand +that, except for four days in the year, the Imperial etiquette did not +permit any subjects to display their knighthood of the Prussian Order. In +Madame Bonaparte's last drawing-room, before His Imperial Majesty set out +for the Rhine, he was ornamented with the Spanish, Neapolitan, Prussian, +and Portuguese orders, together with those of the French Legion of Honour +and of the Italian Iron Crown. I have seen the Emperor Paul, who was +also an amateur of ribands and stars, but never with so many at once. I +have just heard that the Grand Master of Malta has presented Napoleon +with the Grand Cross of the Maltese Order. This is certainly a negative +compliment to him, who, in July, 1798, officially declared to his then +sectaries, the Turks and Mussulmans, "that the Grand Master, Commanders, +Knights, and Order of Malta existed no more." + +I have heard it related for a certainty among our fashionable ladies, +that the Empress of the French also intends to institute a new order of +female knighthood, not of honour, but of confidence; of which all our +Court ladies, all the wives of our generals, public functionaries, etc., +are to be members. The Imperial Princesses of the Bonaparte family are +to be hereditary grand officers, together with as many foreign Empresses, +Queens, Princesses, Countesses, and Baronesses as can be bayoneted into +this revolutionary sisterhood. Had the Continent remained tranquil, it +would already have been officially announced by a Senatus Consultum. I +should suppose that Madame Bonaparte, with her splendid Court and +brilliant retinue of German Princes and Electors at Strasburg, need only +say the word to find hundreds of princely recruits for her knighthood in +petto. Her mantle, as a Grand Mistress of the Order of CONFIDENCE, has +been already embroidered at Lyons, and those who have seen it assert that +it is truly superb. The diamonds of the star on the mantle are valued at +six hundred thousand livres. + + + + +LETTER XXVI. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Since Bonaparte's departure for Germany, fifteen individuals +have been brought here, chained, from La Vendee and the--Western +Departments, and are imprisoned in the Temple. Their crime is not +exactly known, but private letters from those countries relate that they +were recruiting for another insurrection, and that some of them were +entrusted as Ambassadors from their discontented countrymen to Louis +XVIII. to ask for his return to France, and for the assistance of Russia, +Sweden, and England to support his claims. + +These are, however, reports to which I do not affix much credit. Had the +prisoners in the Temple been guilty, or only accused of such crimes, they +would long ago have been tortured, tried, and executed, or executed +without a trial. I suppose them mere hostages arrested by our +Government, as security for the tranquillity of the Chouan Departments +during our armies' occupation elsewhere. We have, nevertheless, two +movable columns of six thousand men each in the country, or in its +vicinity, and it would be not only impolitic, but a cruelty, to engage or +allure the unfortunate people of these wretched countries into any plots, +which, situated as affairs now are, would be productive of great and +certain evil to them, without even the probability of any benefit to the +cause of royalty and of the Bourbons. I do not mean to say that there +are not those who rebel against Bonaparte's tyranny, or that the Bourbons +have no friends; on the contrary, the latter are not few, and the former +very numerous. But a kind of apathy, the effect of unavailing resistance +to usurpation and oppression, has seized on most minds, and annihilated +what little remained of our never very great public spirit. We are tired +of everything, even of our existence, and care no more whether we are +governed by a Maximilian Robespierre or by a Napoleon Bonaparte, by a +Barras or by Louis XVIII. Except, perhaps, among the military, or among +some ambitious schemers, remnants of former factions, I do not believe a +Moreau, a Macdonald, a Lucien Bonaparte, or any person exiled by the +Emperor, and formerly popular, could collect fifty trusty conspirators in +all France; at least, as long as our armies are victorious, and organized +in their present formidable manner. Should anything happen to our +present chief, an impulse may be given to the minds now sunk down, and +raise our characters from their present torpid state. But until such an +event, we shall remain as we are, indolent but submissive, sacrificing +our children and treasures for a cause we detest, and for a man we abhor. +I am sorry to say it, but it certainly does, no honour to my nation when +one million desperados of civil and military banditti are suffered to +govern, tyrannize, and pillage, at their ease and undisturbed, thirty +millions of people, to whom their past crimes are known, and who have +every reason to apprehend their future wickedness. + +This astonishing resignation (if I can call it so, and if it does not +deserve a worse name), is so much the more incomprehensible, as the +poverty of the higher and middle classes is as great as the misery of the +people, and, except those employed under Bonaparte, and some few upstart +contractors or army commissaries, the greatest privations must be +submitted to in order to pay the enormous taxes and make a decent +appearance. I know families of five, six, and seven persons, who +formerly were wealthy, and now have for a scanty subsistence an income of +twelve or eighteen hundred livres--per year, with which they are obliged +to live as they can, being deprived of all the resource that elsewhere +labour offers to the industrious, and all the succours compassion bestows +on the necessitous. You know that here all trade and all commerce are at +a stand or destroyed, and the hearts of our modern rich are as unfeeling +as their manners are vulgar and brutal. + +A family of ci-devant nobles of my acquaintance, once possessing a +revenue of one hundred and fifty thousand livres--subsist now on fifteen +hundred livres--per year; and this sum must support six individuals--the +father and mother, with four children! It does so, indeed, by an +arrangement of only one poor meal in the day; a dinner four times, and a +supper three times, in the week. They endure their distress with +tolerable cheerfulness, though in the same street, where they occupy the +garrets of a house, resides, in an elegant hotel, a man who was once +their groom, but who is now a tribune, and has within these last twelve +years, as a conventional deputy, amassed, in his mission to Brabant and +Flanders, twelve millions of livres. He has kindly let my friend +understand that his youngest daughter might be received as a chambermaid +to his wife, being informed that she has a good education. All the four +daughters are good musicians, good drawers, and very able with their +needles. By their talents they supported their parents and themselves +during their emigration in Germany; but here these are of but little use +or advantage. Those upstarts who want instruction or works of this sort +apply to the first, most renowned, and fashionable masters or mistresses; +while others, and those the greatest number, cannot afford even to pay +the inferior ones and the most cheap. This family is one of the many +that regret having returned from their emigration. But, you may ask, why +do they not go back again to Germany? First, it would expose them to +suspicion, and, perhaps, to ruin, were they to demand passes; and if this +danger or difficulty were removed, they have no money for such a long +journey. + +But this sort of penury and wretchedness is also common with the families +of the former wealthy merchants and tradesmen. Paper money, a maximum, +and requisitions, have reduced those that did not share in the crimes and +pillage of the Revolution, as much as the proscribed nobility. And, +contradictory as it may seem, the number of persons employed in +commercial speculations has more than tripled since we experienced a +general stagnation of trade, the consequence of war, of want of capital, +protection, encouragement, and confidence; but one of the magazines of +1789 contained more goods and merchandize than twenty modern magazines +put together. The expenses of these new merchants are, however, much +greater than sixteen years ago, the profit less, and the credit still +less than the profit. Hence numerous bankruptcies, frauds, swindling, +forgeries, and other evils of immorality, extravagance, and misery. The +fair and honest dealers suffer most from the intrusion of these infamous +speculators, who expecting, like other vile men wallowing in wealth under +their eyes, to make rapid fortunes, and to escape detection as well as +punishment--commit crimes to soothe disappointment. Nothing is done but +for ready money, and even bankers' bills, or bills accepted by bankers, +are not taken in payment before the signatures are avowed by the parties +concerned. You can easily conceive what confusion, what expenses, and +what; loss of time these precautions must occasion; but the numerous +forgeries and fabrications have made them absolutely necessary. + +The farmers and landholders are better off, but they also complain of the +heavy taxes, and low price paid for what they bring to the market, which +frequently, for want of ready money, remains long unsold. They take +nothing but cash in payment; for, notwithstanding the endeavours of our +Government, the notes of the Bank of France have never been in +circulation among them. They have also been subject to losses by the +fluctuation of paper money, by extortions, requisitions, and by the +maximum. In this class of my countrymen remains still some little +national spirit and some independence of character; but these are far +from being favourable to Bonaparte, or to the Imperial Government, which +the yearly increase of taxes, and, above all, the conscription, have +rendered extremely odious. You may judge of the great difference in the +taxation of lands and landed property now and under our Kings, when I +inform you that a friend of mine, who, in 1792, possessed, in one of the +Western Departments, twenty-one farms, paid less in contribution for them +all than he does now for the three farms he has recovered from the wreck +of his fortune. + + + + +LETTER XXVII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--In a military empire, ruled by a military despot, it is a +necessary policy that the education of youth should also be military. In +all our public schools or prytanees, a boy, from the moment of entering, +is registered in a company, and regularly drilled, exercised, and +reviewed, punished for neglect or fault according to martial law, and +advanced if displaying genius or application. All our private schools +that wish for the protection of Government are forced to submit to the +same military rules, and, therefore, most of our conscripts, so far from +being recruits, are fit for any service as soon as put into requisition. +The fatal effects to the independence of Europe to be dreaded from this +sole innovation, I apprehend, have been too little considered by other +nations. A great Power, that can, without obstacle, and with but little +expense, in four weeks increase its disposable military force from one +hundred and twenty to one hundred and eighty thousand young men, +accustomed to military duty from their youth, must finally become the +master of all other or rival Powers, and dispose at leisure of empires, +kingdoms, principalities, and republics. NOTHING CAN SAVE THEM BUT THE +ADOPTION OF SIMILAR MEASURES FOR THEIR PRESERVATION AS HAVE BEEN ADOPTED +FOR THEIR SUBJUGATION. + +When l'Etat Militaire for the year 13 (a work containing the official +statement of our military forces) was presented to Bonaparte by Berthier, +the latter said: "Sire, I lay before Your Majesty the book of the destiny +of the world, which your hands direct as the sovereign guide of the +armies of your empire." This compliment is a truth, and therefore no +flattery. It might as justly have been addressed to a Moreau, a +Macdonald, a Le Courbe, or to any other general, as to Bonaparte, because +a superior number of well disciplined troops, let them be well or even +indifferently commanded, will defeat those inferior in number. Three to +one would even overpower an army of giants. Add to it the unity of +plans, of dispositions, and of execution, which Bonaparte enjoys +exclusively over such a great number of troops, while ten, or perhaps +fifty, will direct or contradict every movement of his opponents. I +tremble when I meditate on Berthier's assertion; may I never live to see +it realized, and to see all hitherto independent nations prostrated, +acknowledge that Bonaparte and destiny are the same, and the same +distributor of good and evil. + +One of the bad consequences of this our military education of youth is a +total absence of all religious and moral lessons. Arnaud had, last +August, the courage to complain of this infamous neglect, in the National +Institute. "The youth," said he, "receive no other instruction but +lessons to march, to fire, to bow, to dance, to sit, to lie, and to +impose with a good grace. I do not ask for Spartans or Romans, but we +want Athenians, and our schools are only forming Sybarites." Within +twenty-four hours afterwards, Arnaud was visited by a police agent, +accompanied by two gendarmes, with an order signed by Fouche, which +condemned him to reside at Orleans, and not to return to Paris without +the permission of the Government,--a punishment regarded here as very +moderate for such an indiscreet zeal. + +A schoolmaster at Auteuil, near this capital, of the name of Gouron, had +a private seminary, organized upon the footing of our former colleges. In +some few months he was offered more pupils than he could well attend to, +and his house shortly became very fashionable, even for our upstarts, who +sent their children there in preference. He was ordered before Fouche +last Christmas, and commanded to change the hours hitherto employed in +teaching religion and morals, to a military exercise and instruction, as +both more necessary and more salubrious for French youth. Having replied +that such an alteration was contrary to his plan and agreement with the +parents of his scholars, the Minister stopped him short by telling him +that he must obey what had been prescribed by Government, or stand the +consequences of his refractory spirit. Having consulted with his friends +and patrons, he divided the hours, and gave half of the time usually +allotted to religion or morality to the study of military exercise. His +pupils, however, remained obstinate, broke the drum, and tore and burnt +the colours he had bought. As this was not his fault, he did not expect +any further disturbance, particularly after having reported to the police +both his obedience and the unforeseen result. But last March his house +was suddenly surrounded in the night by gendarmes, and some police agents +entered it. All the boys were ordered to dress and to pack up their +effects, and to follow the gendarmes to several other schools, where the +Government had placed them, and of which their parents would be informed. +Gouron, his wife, four ushers, and six servants, were all arrested and +carried to the police office, where Fouche, after reproaching them for +their fanatical behaviour, as he termed it, told them, as they were so +fond of teaching religious and moral duties, a suitable situation had +been provided for them in Cayenne, where the negroes stood sadly in need +of their early arrival, for which reason they would all set out on that +very morning for Rochefort. When Gouron asked what was to become of his +property, furniture, etc., he was told that his house was intended by +Government for a preparatory school, and would, with its contents, be +purchased, and the amount paid him in lands in Cayenne. It is not +necessary to say that this example of Imperial justice had the desired +effect on all other refractory private schoolmasters. + +The parents of Gouron's pupils were, with a severe reprimand, informed +where their sons had been placed, and where they would be educated in a +manner agreeable to the Emperor, who recommended them not to remove them, +without a previous notice to the police. A hatter, of the name of +Maille, however, ordered his son home, because he had been sent to a +dearer school than the former. In his turn he was carried before the +police, and, after a short examination of a quarter of an hour, was +permitted, with his wife and two children, to join their friend Gouron at +Rochefort, and to settle with him at Cayenne, where lands would also be +given him for his property, in France. These particulars were related to +me by a neighbour whose son had, for two years previous to this, been +under Gouron's care, but who was now among those placed out by our +Government. The boy's present master, he said, was a man of a +notoriously bad and immoral character; but he was intimidated, and weak +enough to remain contented, preferring, no doubt, his personal safety to +the future happiness of his child. In your country, you little +comprehend what a valuable instrument terror has been in the hands of our +rulers since the Revolution, and how often fear has been mistaken abroad +for affection and content. + +All these minutiae and petty vexations, but great oppressions, of petty +tyrants, you may easily guess, take up a great deal of time, and that, +therefore, a Minister of Police, though the most powerful, is also the +most occupied of his colleagues. So he certainly is, but, last year, a +new organization of this Ministry was regulated by Bonaparte; and Fouche +was allowed, as assistants, four Counsellors of State, and an +augmentation of sixty-four police commissaries. The French Empire was +then divided into four arrondissements, with regard to the general +police, not including Paris and its vicinity, inspected by a prefect of +police under the Minister. Of the first of these arrondissements, the +Counsellor of State, Real, is a kind of Deputy Minister; the Counsellor +of State, Miot, is the same of the second; the Counsellor of State, Pelet +de la Lozere, of the third; and the Counsellor of State, Dauchy, of the +fourth. The secret police agents, formerly called spies, were also +considerably increased. + + + + +LETTER XXVIII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Before Bonaparte set out for the Rhine, the Pope's Nuncio was +for the first time publicly rebuked by him in Madame Bonaparte's +drawing-room, and ordered loudly to write to Rome and tell His Holiness +to think himself fortunate in continuing to govern the Ecclesiastical +States, without interfering with the ecclesiastical arrangements that +might be thought necessary or proper by the Government in France. + +Bonaparte's policy is to promote among the first dignitaries of the +Gallican Church the brothers or relatives of his civil or military +supporters; Cambacere's brother is, therefore, an Archbishop and +Cardinal, and one of Lebrun's, and two of Berthier's cousins are Bishops. +As, however, the relatives of these Senators, Ministers, or generals, +have, like themselves, figured in many of the scandalous and blasphemous +scenes of the Revolution, the Pope has sometimes hesitated about +sanctioning their promotions. This was the case last summer, when +General Dessolles's brother was transferred from the Bishopric of Digne +to that of Chambry, and Bonaparte nominated for his successor the brother +of General Miollis, who was a curate of Brignoles, in the diocese of Aix. +This curate had not only been one of the first to throw up his letters of +priesthood at the Jacobin Club at Aix, but had also sacrilegiously denied +the divinity of the Christian religion, and proposed, in imitation of +Parisian atheists, the worship of a Goddess of Reason in a common +prostitute with whom he lived. The notoriety of these abominations made +even his parishioners at Brignoles unwilling to go to church, and to +regard him as their pastor, though several of them had been imprisoned, +fined, and even transported as fanatics, or as refractory. + +During the negotiation with Cardinal Fesch last year, the Pope had been +promised, among other things, that, for the future, his conscience should +not be wounded by having presented to him for the prelacy any persons but +those of the purest morals of the French Empire; and that all his +objections should be attended to, in case of promotions; his scruples +removed, or his refusal submitted to. When Cardinal Fesch demanded His +Holiness's Bull for the curate Miollis, the Cardinal Secretary of State, +Gonsalvi, showed no less than twenty acts of apostasy and blasphemy, +which made him unworthy of such a dignity. To this was replied that, +having obtained an indulgence in toto for what was past, he was a proper +subject; above all, as he had the protection of the Emperor of the +French. The Pope's Nuncio here then addressed himself to our Minister of +the Ecclesiastical Department, Portalis, who advised him not to speak to +Bonaparte of a matter upon which his mind had been made up; he, +nevertheless, demanded an audience, and it was in consequence of this +request that he, in his turn, became acquainted with the new Imperial +etiquette and new Imperial jargon towards the representatives of +Sovereigns. On the same evening the Nuncio expedited a courier to Rome, +and I have heard to-day that the nomination of Miollis is confirmed by +the Pope. + +From this relatively trifling occurrence, His Holiness might judge of the +intention of our Government to adhere to its other engagements; but at +Rome, as well as in most other Continental capitals, the Sovereign is the +dupe of the perversity of his Counsellors and Ministers, who are the +tools, and not seldom the pensioners, of the Cabinet of St. Cloud. + +But in the kingdom of Italy the parishes and dioceses are, if possible, +still worse served than in this country. Some of the Bishops there, +after having done duty in the National Guards, worn the Jacobin cap, and +fought against their lawful Prince, now live in open adultery; and, from +their intrigues, are the terror of all the married part of their flock. +The Bishop of Pavia keeps the wife of a merchant, by whom he has two +children; and, that the public may not be mistaken as to their real +father, the merchant received a sum of money to establish himself at +Brescia, and has not seen his wife for these two years past. General +Gourion, who was last spring in Italy, has assured me that he read the +advertisement of a curate after his concubine, who had eloped with +another curate; and that the Police Minister at Milan openly licensed +women to be the housekeepers of priests. + +A grand vicar, Sarini, at Bologna, was, in 1796, a friar, but +relinquished then the convent for the tent, and exchanged the breviary +for the musket. He married a nun of one cloister, from whom he procured +a divorce in a month, to unite himself with an Abbess of another, +deserted by him in her turn for the wife of an innkeeper, who robbed and +eloped from her husband. Last spring he returned to the bosom of the +Church, and, by making our Empress a present of a valuable diamond cross, +of which he had pillaged the statue of a Madonna, he obtained the dignity +of a grand vicar, to the great edification, no doubt, of all those who +had seen him before the altar or in the camp, at the brothel, or in the +hospital. + +Another grand vicar of the same Bishop, in the same city, of the name of +Rami, has two of his illegitimate children as singing-boys in the same +cathedral where he officiates as a priest. Their mother is dead, but her +daughter, by another priest, is now their father's mistress. This +incestuous commerce is so little concealed that the girl does the honours +of the grand vicar's house, and, with naivete enough, tells the guests +and visitors of her happiness in having succeeded her mother. I have +this anecdote from an officer who heard her make use of that expression. + +In France, our priests, I fear, are equally as debauched and +unprincipled; but, in yielding to their vicious propensities, they take +care to save the appearance of virtue, and, though their guilt is the +same, the scandal is less. Bonaparte pretends to be severe against all +those ecclesiastics who are accused of any irregularities after having +made their peace with the Church. A curate of Picardy, suspected of +gallantry, and another of Normandy, accused of inebriety, were last +month, without further trial or ceremony than the report of the Minister +Portalis, delivered over to Fouche, who transported them to Cayenne, +after they had been stripped of their gowns. At the same time, Cardinal +Cambaceres and Cardinal Fesch, equally notorious for their excesses, were +taken no notice of, except that they were laughed at in our Court +circles. + +I am, almost every day, more and more convinced that our Government is +totally indifferent about what becomes of our religious establishment +when the present race of priests is extinguished; which, in the course of +nature, must happen in less than thirty years. Our military system and +our military education discourage all young men from entering into +orders; while, at the same time, the army is both more honourable and +more profitable than the Church. Already we want curates, though several +have been imported from Germany and Spain, and, in some departments, +four, and even six parishes have only one curate to serve them all. The +Bishops exhort, and the parents advise their children to study theology; +but then the law of conscription obliges the student of theology, as well +as the student of philosophy, to march together; and, when once in the +ranks, and accustomed to the licentiousness of a military life, they are +either unwilling, unfit, or unworthy to return to anything else. The +Pope, with all his entreaties, and with all his prayers, was unable to +procure an exception from the conscription of young men preparing +themselves for priesthood. Bonaparte always answered: "Holy Father, were +I to consent to your demand, I should soon have an army of priests, +instead of an army of soldiers." Our Emperor is not unacquainted with +the real character and spirit of his Volunteers. When the Pope +represented the danger of religion expiring in France, for want of +priests to officiate at the altars, he was answered that Bonaparte, at +the beginning of his consulate, found neither altars nor priests in +France; that if his reign survived the latter, the former would always be +standing, and survive his reign. He trusted that the chief of the Church +would prevent them from being deserted. He assured him that when once he +had restored the liberties of the seas, and an uninterrupted tranquillity +on the Continent, he should attend more, and perhaps entirely, to the +affairs of the Church. He consented, however, that the Pope might +institute, in the Ecclesiastical States, a seminary for two hundred young +Frenchmen, whom he would exempt from military conscription. This is the +stock from which our Church establishment is to be supplied! + + + + +LETTER XXIX. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The short journey of Count von Haugwitz to Vienna, and the long +stay of our Imperial Grand Marshal, Duroc, at Berlin, had already caused +here many speculations, not quite corresponding with the views and, +perhaps, interests of our Court, when our violation of the Prussian +territory made our courtiers exclaim: "This act proves that the Emperor +of the French is in a situation to bid defiance to all the world, and, +therefore, no longer courts the neutrality of a Prince whose power is +merely artificial; who has indemnities to restore, but no delicacy, no +regard to claims." Such was the language of those very men who, a month +before, declared "that His Prussian Majesty held the balance of peace or +war in his hands; that he was in a position in which no Prussian Monarch +ever was before; that while his neutrality preserved the tranquillity of +the North of Germany, the South of Europe would soon be indebted to his +powerful mediation for the return of peace." + +The real cause of this alteration in our courtiers' political jargon has +not yet been known; but I think it may easily be discovered without any +official publication. Bonaparte had the adroitness to cajole the Cabinet +of Berlin into his interest, in the first month of his consulate, +notwithstanding his own critical situation, as well as the critical +situation of France; and he has ever since taken care both to attach it +to his triumphal car and to inculpate it indirectly in his outrages and +violations. Convinced, as he thought, of the selfishness which guided +all its resolutions, all his attacks and invasions against the law of +nations, or independence of States, were either preceded or followed with +some offers of aggrandizement, of indemnity, of subsidy, or of alliance. +His political intriguers were generally more successful in Prussia than +his military heroes in crossing the Rhine or the Elbe, in laying the +Hanse Towns under contribution, or in occupying Hanover; or, rather, all +these acts of violence and injustice were merely the effects of his +ascendency in Prussia. When it is, besides, remembered what provinces +Prussia accepted from his bounty, what exchange of presents, of ribands, +of private letters passed between Napoleon the First and Frederick +William III., between the Empress of the French and the Queen of Prussia, +it is not surprising if the Cabinet of St. Cloud thought itself sure of +the submission of the Cabinet of Berlin, and did not esteem it enough to +fear it, or to think that it would have spirit enough to resent, or even +honour to feel, the numerous Provocations offered. + +Whatever Bonaparte and Talleyrand write or assert to the contrary, their +gifts are only the wages of their contempt, and they despise more that +State they thus reward than those nations at whose expense they are +liberal, and with whose spoil they delude selfishness or meanness into +their snares. The more legitimate Sovereigns descend from their true +dignity, and a liberal policy, the nearer they approach the baseness of +usurpation and the Machiavellism of rebellion. Like other upstarts, they +never suffer an equal. If you do not keep yourself above them, they will +crush you beneath them. If they have no reason to fear you, they will +create some quarrel to destroy you. + +It is said here that Duroc's journey to Berlin was merely to demand a +passage for the French troops through the Prussian territory in +Franconia, and to prevent the Russian troops from passing through the +Prussian territory in Poland. This request is such as might have been +expected from our Emperor and his Minister. Whether, however, the tone +in which this curious negotiation with a neutral power was begun, or +that, at last, the generosity of the Russian Monarch awakened a sense of +duty in the Cabinet of Berlin, the arrival of our pacific envoy was +immediately followed with warlike preparations. Fortunate, indeed, was +it for Prussia to have resorted to her military strength instead of +trusting any longer to our friendly assurances. The disasters that have +since befallen the Austrian armies in Suabia, partly occasioned by our +forced marches through neutral Prussia, would otherwise soon have been +felt in Westphalia, in Brandenburgh, and in Pomerania. But should His +Prussian Majesty not order his troops to act in conjunction with Russia, +Austria, England, and Sweden, and that very soon, all efforts against +Bonaparte will be vain, as those troops which have dispersed the +Austrians and repulsed the Russians will be more than equal to master the +Prussians, and one campaign may be sufficient to convince the Prussian +Ministers of their folly and errors for years, and to punish them for +their ignorance or selfishness. + +Some preparations made in silence by the Marquis of Lucchesini, his +affected absence from some of our late Court circles, and the number of +spies who now are watching his hotel and his steps, seem to indicate that +Prussia is tired of its impolitic neutrality, and inclined to join the +confederacy against France. At the last assembly at our Prince +Cambaceres's, a rumour circulated that preliminary articles for an +offensive alliance with your country had already been signed by the +Prussian Minister, Baron Von Hardenberg, on one side, and by your +Minister to the Court of Berlin on the other; according to which you were +to take sixty thousand Prussians and twelve thousand Hessians into your +pay, for five years certain. A courier from Duroc was said to have +brought this news, which at first made some impression, but it wore away +by degrees; and our Government, to judge from the expressions of persons +in its confidence, seems more to court than to fear a rupture with +Prussia. Indeed, besides all other reasons to carry on a war in the +North of Europe, Bonaparte's numerous and young generals are impatient to +enrich themselves, as Italy, Switzerland, Holland, and the South of +Germany are almost exhausted. + + + + +LETTER XXX. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The provocations of our Government must have been extraordinary +indeed, when they were able to awaken the Cabinet of Berlin from its long +and incomprehensible infatuation of trusting to the friendly intentions +of honest Talleyrand, and to the disinterested policy of our generous +Bonaparte. To judge its intents from its acts, the favour of the Cabinet +of St. Cloud was not only its wish but its want. You must remember that, +last year, besides his ordinary Ambassador, Da Lucchesini, His Prussian +Majesty was so ill advised as to despatch General Knobelsdorff as his +extra representative, to assist at Napoleon's coronation, a degradation +of lawful sovereignty to which even the Court of Naples, though +surrounded with our troops, refused to subscribe; and, so late as last +June, the same Knobelsdorff did, in the name of his Prince, the honours +at the reviews near Magdeburg, to all the generals of our army in Hanover +who chose to attend there. On this occasion the King lodged in a +farmhouse, the Queen in the house of the curate of Koestelith, while our +sans-culotte officers, Bernadotte & Co., were quartered and treated in +style at the castle of Putzbull, fitted up for their accommodation. This +was certainly very hospitable, and very civil, but it was neither prudent +nor politic. Upstarts, experiencing such a reception from Princes, are +convinced that they are dreaded, because they know that they have not +merit to be esteemed. + +Do not confound this Knobelsdorff with the late Field-marshal of that +name, who, in 1796, answered to a request which our then Ambassador at +Berlin (Abbe Sieges) had made to be introduced to him, NON ET SANS +PHRASE, the very words this regicide used when he sat in judgment on his +King, and voted LA MORT ET SANS PHRASE. This Knobelsdorff is a very +different character. He pretends to be equally conspicuous in the +Cabinet as in the field, in the boudoir as in the study. A +demi-philosopher, a demi-savant, a demi-gallant and a demi-politician, +constitute, all taken together, nothing except an insignificant courtier. +I do not know whether he was among those Prussian officers who, in 1798, +CRIED when it was inserted in the public prints that the Grand Bonaparte +had been killed in an insurrection at Cairo, but of this I am certain, +that were Knobelsdorff to survive Napoleon the First, none of His +Imperial Majesty's own dutiful subjects would mourn him more sincerely +than this subject of the King of Prussia. He is said to possess a great +share of the confidence of his King, who has already employed him in +several diplomatic missions. The principal and most requisite qualities +in a negotiator are political information, inviolable fidelity, +penetrating but unbiased judgment, a dignified firmness, and +condescending manners. I have not been often enough in the society of +General Knobelsdorff to assert whether nature and education have destined +him to illumine or to cloud the Prussian monarchy. + +I have already mentioned in a former letter that it was Count von +Haugwitz who, in 1792, as Prussian Ambassador at Vienna, arranged the +treaty which then united the Austrian and Prussian Eagles against the +Jacobin Cap of Liberty. It is now said in our diplomatic circle that his +second mission to the same capital has for an object the renewal of these +ties, which the Treaty of Basle dissolved; and that our Government, to +impede his success, or to occasion his recall, before he could have time +to conclude, had proposed to Prussia an annual subsidy of thirty millions +of liveres--which it intended to exact from Portugal for its neutrality. +The present respectable appearance of Prussia, shows, however, that +whether the mission of Haugwitz had the desired issue or not, His +Prussian Majesty confides in his army in preference to our parchments. + +Some of our politicians pretend that the present Minister of the foreign +department in Prussia, Baron von Hardenberg, is not such a friend of the +system of neutrality as his predecessor. All the transactions of his +administration seem, nevertheless, to proclaim that, if he wished his +country to take an active part in the present conflict, it would not have +been against France, had she not begun the attack with the invasion of +Anspach and Bayreuth. Let it be recollected that, since his Ministry, +Prussia has acknowledged Bonaparte an Emperor of the French, has +exchanged orders with him, and has sent an extraordinary Ambassador to be +present at his coronation,--not common compliments, even between Princes +connected by the nearest ties of friendship and consanguinity. Under his +administration, the Rhine has been passed to seize the Duc d'Enghien, and +the Elbe to capture Sir George Rumbold; the Hanse Towns have been +pillaged, and even Emden blockaded; and the representations against, all +these outrages have neither been followed by public reparation nor a +becoming resentment; and was it not also Baron von Hardenberg, who, on +the 5th of April, 1795, concluded at Basle that treaty to which we owe +all our conquests and Germany and Italy all their disasters? It is not +probable that the parent of pacification will destroy its own progeny, if +self-preservation does not require it. + +Baron von Hardenberg is both a learned nobleman and an enlightened +statesman, and does equal honour both to his own rank and to the choice +of his Prince. The late Frederick William II. nominated him a Minister +of State and a Counsellor of his Cabinet. On the 26th of January, 1792, +as a directorial Minister, he took possession, in the name of the King of +Prussia, of the Margravates of Anspach and Bayreuth, and the inhabitants +swore before him, as their governor, their oaths of allegiance to their +new Sovereign.--He continued to reside as a kind of viceroy, in these +States, until March, 1795, when he replaced Baron von Goltz as negotiator +with our republican plenipotentiary in Switzerland; but after settling +all differences between Prussia and France, he returned to his former +post at Anspach, where no complaints have been heard against his +Government. + +The ambition of Baron von Hardenberg has always been to obtain the place +he now occupies, and the study of his life has been to gain such +information as would enable him to fill it with distinction. I have +heard it said that in most countries he had for years kept and paid +private agents, who regularly corresponded with him and sent him reports +of what they heard or saw of political intrigue or machinations. One of +these his agents I happened to meet with, in 1796, at Basle, and were I +to conclude from what I observed in him, the Minister has not been very +judicious in his selection of private correspondents. Figure to yourself +a bald-headed personage, about forty years of age, near seven feet high, +deaf as a post, stammering and making convulsive efforts to express a +sentence of five words, which, after all, his gibberish made +unintelligible. His dress was as eccentric as his person was singular, +and his manners corresponded with both. He called himself Baron von +Bulow, and I saw him afterwards, in the autumn of 1797, at Paris, with +the same accoutrements and the same jargon, assuming an air of diplomatic +mystery, even while displaying before me, in a coffee-house, his letters +and instructions from his principal. As might be expected, he had the +adroitness to get himself shut up in the Temple, where, I have been told, +the generosity of your Sir Sidney Smith prevented him from starving. + +No member of the foreign diplomatic corps here possesses either more +knowledge, or a longer experience, than the Prussian Ambassador, Marquis +of Lucchesini. He went with several other philosophers of Italy to +admire the late hero of modern philosophy at Berlin, Frederick the Great, +who received him well, caressed him often, but never trusted or employed +him. I suppose it was not at the mention of the Marquis's name for the +place of a governor of some province that this Monarch said, "My subjects +of that province have always been dutiful; a philosopher shall never rule +in my name but over people with whom I am discontented, or whom I intend +to chastise." This Prince was not unacquainted with the morality of his +sectaries. + +During the latter part of the life of this King, the Marquis of +Lucchesini was frequently of his literary and convivial parties; but he +was neither his friend nor his favourite, but his listener. It was first +under Frederick William II. that he began his diplomatic career, with an +appointment as Minister from Prussia to the late King of Poland. His +first act in this post was a treaty signed on the 29th of March, 1790, +with the King and Republic of Poland, which changed an elective monarchy +into an hereditary one; but, notwithstanding the Cabinet of Berlin had +guaranteed this alteration, and the constitution decreed in consequence, +in 1791, three years afterwards Russian and Prussian bayonets annihilated +both, and selfishness banished faith. + +In July, 1790, he assisted as a Prussian plenipotentiary at the +conferences at Reichenback, together with the English and Dutch +Ambassadors, having for object a pacification between Austria and Turkey. +In December of the same year he went with the same Ministers to the +Congress at Sistova, where, in May, 1791, he signed the Treaty of Peace +between the Grand Seignior and the Emperor of Germany. In June, 1792, he +was a second time sent as a Minister to Warsaw, where he remained until +January, 1793, when he was promoted to the post of Ambassador at the +Court of Vienna. He continued, however, to reside with His Prussian +Majesty during the greatest part of the campaign on the Rhine, and +signed, on the 24th of June, 1793, in the camp before Mentz, an offensive +and defensive alliance with your Court; an alliance which Prussian policy +respected not above eighteen months. In October, 1796, he requested his +recall, but this his Sovereign refused, with the most gracious +expressions; and he could not obtain it until March, 1797. Some +disapprobation of the new political plan introduced by Count von Haugwitz +in the Cabinet at Berlin is supposed to have occasioned his determination +to retire from public employment. As he, however, continued to reside in +the capital of Prussia, and, as many believed, secretly intrigued to +appear again upon the scene, the nomination, in 1800, to his present +important post was as much the consequence of his own desire as of the +favour of his King. + +The Marquis of Lucchesini lives here in great style at the beautiful +Hotel de l'Infantado, where his lady's routs, assemblies, and circles are +the resort of our most fashionable gentry. Madame da Lucchesini is more +agreeable than handsome, more fit to shine at Berlin than at Paris; for +though her manners are elegant, they want that ease, that finish which a +German or Italian education cannot teach, nor a German or Italian society +confer. To judge from the number of her admirers, she seems to know that +she is married to a philosopher. Her husband was born at Lucca, in +Italy, and is, therefore, at present a subject of Bonaparte's +brother-in-law, Prince Bacciochi, to whom, when His Serene Highness was a +marker at a billiard-table, I have had the honour of giving many a +shilling, as well as many a box on the ear. + + + + +LETTER XXXI. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The unexampled cruelty of our Government to your countryman, +Captain Wright, I have heard reprobated, even by some of our generals and +public functionaries, as unjust as well as disgraceful. At a future +General Congress, should ever Bonaparte suffer one to be convoked, except +under his auspices and dictature, the distinction and treatment of +prisoners of war require to be again regulated, that the valiant warrior +may not for the future be confounded with, and treated as, a treacherous +spy; nor innocent travellers, provided with regular passes, visiting a +country either for business or for pleasure, be imprisoned, like men +taken while combating with arms in their hands. + +You remember, no doubt, from history, that many of our ships--that, +during the reigns of George I. and II., carried to Ireland and Scotland, +and landed there, the adherents and partisans of the House of Stuart were +captured on their return or on their passage; and that your Government +never seized the commanders of these vessels, to confine them as State +criminals, much less to torture or murder them in the Tower. If I am not +mistaken, the whole squadron which, in 1745, carried the Pretender and +his suite to Scotland, was taken by your cruisers; and the officers and +men experienced no worse or different treatment than their fellow +prisoners of war; though the distance is immense between the crime of +plotting against the lawful Government of the Princes of the House of +Brunswick, and the attempt to disturb the usurpation of an upstart of the +House of Bonaparte. But, even during the last war, how many of our ships +of the line, frigates, and cutters, did you not take, which had landed +rebels in Ireland, emissaries in Scotland, and malefactors in Wales; and +yet your generosity prevented you from retaliating, even at the time when +your Sir Sidney Smith, and this same unfortunate Captain Wright, were +confined in our State prison of the Temple! It is with Governments as +with individuals, they ought to be just before they are generous. Had +you in 1797, or in 1798, not endured our outrages so patiently, you would +not now have to lament, nor we to blush for, the untimely end of Captain +Wright. + +From the last time that this officer had appeared before the criminal +tribunal which condemned Georges and Moreau, his fate was determined on +by our Government. His firmness offended, and his patriotism displeased; +and as he seemed to possess the confidence of his own Government, it was +judged that he was in its secrets; it was, therefore, resolved that, if +he refused to become a traitor, he should perish a victim. Desmarets, +Fouche's private secretary, who is also the secretary of the secret and +haute police, therefore ordered him to another private interrogatory. +Here he was offered a considerable sum of money, and the rank of an +admiral in our service, if he would divulge what he knew of the plans of +his Government, of its connections with the discontented in this country, +and of its means of keeping up a correspondence with them. He replied, +as might have been expected, with indignation, to such offers and to such +proposals, but as they were frequently repeated with new allurements, he +concluded with remaining silent and giving no answers at all. He was +then told that the torture would soon restore him his voice, and some +select gendarmes seized him and laid him on the rack; there he uttered no +complaint, not even a sigh, though instruments the most diabolical were +employed, and pains the most acute must have been endured. When +threatened that he should expire in torments, he said: + +"I do not fear to die, because my country will avenge my murder, while my +God receives my soul." During the two hours of the first day that he was +stretched on the rack, his left arm and right leg were broken, and his +nails torn from the toes of both feet; he then passed into the hands of a +surgeon, and was under his care for five weeks, but, before he was +perfectly cured, he was carried to another private interrogatory, at +which, besides Desmarets, Fouche and Real were present. + +The Minister of Police now informed him that, from the mutilated state of +his body, and from the sufferings he had gone through, he must be +convinced that it was not the intention of the French Government ever to +restore him to his native country, where he might relate occurrences +which the policy of France required to be buried in oblivion; he, +therefore, had no choice between serving the Emperor of the French, or +perishing within the walls of the prison where he was confined. He +replied that he was resigned to his destiny, and would die as he had +lived, faithful to his King and to his country. + +The man in full possession of his mental qualities and corporeal strength +is, in most cases, very different from that unfortunate being whose mind +is, enervated by sufferings and whose body is weakened by wants. For +five months Captain Wright had seen only gaolers, spies, tyrants, +executioners, fetters, racks, and other tortures; and for five weeks his +food had been bread and his drink water. The man who, thus situated and +thus perplexed, preserves his native dignity and innate sentiments, is +more worthy of monuments, statues, or altars than either the legislator, +the victor, or the saint. + +This interrogatory was the last undergone by Captain Wright. He was then +again stretched on the rack, and what is called by our regenerators the +INFERNAL torments, were inflicted on him. After being pinched with +red-hot irons all over his body, brandy, mixed with gunpowder, was +infused in the numerous wounds and set fire to several times until nearly +burned to the bones. In the convulsions, the consequence of these +terrible sufferings, he is said to have bitten off a part of his tongue, +though, as before, no groans were heard. As life still remained, he was +again put under the care of his former surgeon; but, as he was +exceedingly exhausted, a spy, in the dress of a Protestant clergyman, +presented himself as if to read prayers with him. Of this offer he +accepted; but when this man began to ask some insidious questions, he +cast on him a look of contempt and never spoke to him more. At last, +seeing no means to obtain any information from him, a mameluke last week +strangled him in his bed. Thus expired a hero whose fate has excited +more compassion, and whose character has received more admiration here, +than any of our great men who have fallen fighting for our Emperor. +Captain Wright has diffused new rays of renown and glory on the British +name, from his tomb as well as from his dungeon. + +You have certainly a right to call me to an account for all the +particulars I have related of this scandalous and abominable transaction, +and, though I cannot absolutely guarantee the truth of the narration, I +am perfectly satisfied of it myself, and I hope to explain myself to your +satisfaction. Your unfortunate countryman was attended by and under the +care of a surgeon of the name of Vaugeard, who gained his confidence, and +was worthy of it, though employed in that infamous gaol. Either from +disgust of life, or from attachment to Captain Wright, he survived him +only twelve hours, during which he wrote the shocking details I have +given you, and sent them to three of the members of the foreign +diplomatic corps, with a prayer to have them forwarded to Sir Sidney +Smith or to Mr. Windham, that those his friends might be informed that, +to his last moment, Captain Wright was worthy of their protection and +kindness. From one of those Ministers I have obtained the original in +Vaugeard's own handwriting. + +I know that Bonaparte and Talleyrand promised the release of Captain +Wright to the Spanish Ambassador; but, at that time, he had already +suffered once on the rack, and this liberality on their part was merely a +trick to impose upon the credulity of the Spaniard or to get rid of his +importunities. Had it been otherwise, Captain Wright, like Sir George +Rumbold, would himself have been the first to announce in your country +the recovery of his liberty. + + + + +LETTER XXXII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +My LORD:--Should Bonaparte again return here victorious, and a +pacificator, great changes in our internal Government and constitution +are expected, and will certainly occur. Since the legislative corps has +completed the Napoleon code of civil and criminal justice, it is +considered by the Emperor not only as useless, but troublesome and +superfluous. For the same reasons the tribunate will also be laid aside, +and His Majesty will rule the French Empire, with the assistance of his +Senate, and with the advice of his Council of State, exclusively. You +know that the Senators, as well as the Councillors of State, are +nominated by the Emperor; that he changes the latter according to his +whim, and that, though the former, according to the present constitution, +are to hold their offices for life, the alterations which remove entirely +the legislature and the tribunate may also make Senators movable. But as +all members of the Senate are favourites or relatives, he will probably +not think it necessary to resort to such a measure of policy. + +In a former letter I have already mentioned the heterogeneous composition +of the Senate. The tribunate and legislative corps are worthy to figure +by its side; their members are also ci-devant mechanics of all +descriptions, debased attorneys or apostate priests, national spoilers or +rebellious regicides, degraded nobles or dishonoured officers. The nearly +unanimous vote of these corps for a consulate for life, and for an +hereditary Emperor, cannot, therefore, either be expressive of the +national will, or constitute the legality of Bonaparte's sovereignty. + +In the legislature no vote opposed, and no voice declaimed against, +Bonaparte's Imperial dignity; but in the tribunate, Carnot--the +infamously notorious Carnot--'pro forma', and with the permission of the +Emperor 'in petto', spoke against the return of a monarchical form of +Government. This farce of deception and roguery did not impose even on +our good Parisians, otherwise, and so frequently, the dupes of all our +political and revolutionary mountebanks. Had Carnot expressed a +sentiment or used a word not previously approved by Bonaparte, instead of +reposing himself in the tribunate, he would have been wandering in +Cayenne. + +Son of an obscure attorney at Nolay, in Burgundy, he was brought up, like +Bonaparte, in one of those military schools established by the +munificence of the French Monarchs; and had obtained, from the late King, +the commission of a captain of engineers when the Revolution broke out. +He was particularly indebted to the Prince of Conde for his support +during the earlier part of his life, and yet he joined the enemies of his +house, and voted for the death of Louis XVI. A member, with Robespierre +and Barrere, of the Committee of Public Safety, he partook of their +power, as well as of their crimes, though he has been audacious enough to +deny that he had anything to do with other transactions than those of the +armies. Were no other proofs to the contrary collected, a letter of his +own hand to the ferocious Lebon, at Arras, is a written evidence which he +is unable to refute. It is dated November 16th, 1793. "You must take," +says he, "in your energy, all measures of terror commanded or required by +present circumstances. Continue your revolutionary attitude; never mind +the amnesty pronounced with the acceptance of the absurd constitution of +1791; it is a crime which cannot extenuate other crimes. Anti-republicans +can only expiate their folly under the age of the guillotine. The public +Treasury will always pay the journeys and expenses of informers, because +they have deserved well of their country. Let all suspected traitors +expire by the sword or by fire; continue to march upon that revolutionary +line so well delineated by you. The committee applauds all your +undertakings, all your measures of vigour; they are not only all +permitted, but commanded by your mission." Most of the decrees +concerning the establishment of revolutionary tribunals, and particularly +that for the organization of the atrocious military commission at Orange, +were signed by him. + +Carnot, as an officer of engineers, certainly is not without talents; but +his presumption in declaring himself the sole author of those plans of +campaign which, during the years 1794, 1795, and 1796, were so +triumphantly executed by Pichegru, Moreau, and Bonaparte, is impertinent, +as well as unfounded. At the risk of his own life, Pichegru entirely +altered the plan sent him by the Committee of Public Safety; and it was +Moreau's masterly retreat, which no plan of campaign could prescribe, +that made this general so famous. The surprising successes of Bonaparte +in Italy were both unexpected and unforeseen by the Directory; and, +according to Berthier's assertion, obliged the, commander-in-chief, +during the first four months, to change five times his plans of +proceedings and undertakings. + +During his temporary sovereignty as a director, Carnot honestly has made +a fortune of twelve millions of livres; which has enabled him not only to +live in style with his wife, but also to keep in style two sisters, of +the name of Aublin, as his mistresses. He was the friend of the father +of these girls, and promised him, when condemned to the guillotine in +1793, to be their second father; but he debauched and ruined them both +before either was fourteen years of age; and young Aublin, who, in 1796, +reproached him with the infamy of his conduct, was delivered up by him to +a military commission, which condemned him to be shot as an emigrant. He +has two children by each of these unfortunate girls. + +Bonaparte employs Carnot, but despises and mistrusts him; being well +aware that, should another National Convention be convoked, and the +Emperor of the French be arraigned, as the King of France was, he would, +with as great pleasure, vote for the execution of Napoleon the First as +he did for that of Louis XVI. He has waded too far in blood and crime to +retrograde. + +To this sample of a modern tribune I will add a specimen of a modern +legislator. Baptiste Cavaignae was, before the Revolution, an excise +officer, turned out of his place for infidelity; but the department of +Lot electing him, in 1792, a representative of the people to the National +Convention, he there voted for the death of Louis XVI. and remained a +faithful associate of Marat and Robespierre. After the evacuation of +Verdun by the Prussians, in October, 1792, he made a report to the +Convention, according to which eighty-four citizens of that town were +arrested and executed. Among these were twenty-two young girls, under +twenty years of age, whose crime was the having presented nosegays to the +late King of Prussia on his entry after the surrender of Verdun. He was +afterwards a national commissary with the armies on the coast near Brest, +on the Rhine, and in Western Pyrenees, and everywhere he signalized +himself by unheard of ferocities and sanguinary deeds. The following +anecdote, printed and published by our revolutionary annalist, Prudhomme, +will give you some idea of the morality of this our regenerator and +Imperial Solon: "Cavaignac and another deputy, Pinet," writes Prudhomme, +"had ordered a box to be kept for them at the play-house at Bayonne on +the evening they expected to arrive in that town. Entering very late, +they found two soldiers, who had seen the box empty, placed in its front. +These they ordered immediately to be arrested, and condemned them, for +having outraged the national representation, to be guillotined on the +next day, when they both were accordingly executed!" Labarrere, a +provost of the Marechaussee at Dax, was in prison as a suspected person. +His daughter, a very handsome girl of seventeen, lived with an aunt at +Severe. The two pro-consuls passing through that place, she threw +herself at their feet, imploring mercy for her parent. This they not +only promised, but offered her a place in their carriage to Dax, that she +might see him restored to liberty. On the road the monsters insisted on +a ransom for the blood of her father. Waiting, afflicted and ashamed, at +a friend's house at Dag, the accomplishment of a promise so dearly +purchased, she heard the beating of the alarm drum, and looked, from +curiosity, through the window, when she saw her unfortunate parent +ascending the scaffold! After having remained lifeless for half an hour, +she recovered her senses an instant, when she exclaimed: + +"Oh, the barbarians! they violated me while flattering me with the hope +of saving my father!" and then expired. In October, 1795, Cavaignac +assisted Barras and Bonaparte in the destruction of some thousands of +men, women, and children in the streets of this capital, and was, +therefore, in 1796, made by the Directory an inspector-general of the +customs; and, in 1803, nominated by Bonaparte a legislator. His +colleague, Citizen Pinet, is now one of our Emperor's Counsellors of +State, and both are commanders of His Majesty's Legion of Honour; rich, +respected, and frequented by our most fashionable ladies and gentlemen. + + + + +LETTER XXXIII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--I suppose your Government too vigilant and too patriotic not to +be informed of the great and uninterrupted activity which reigns in our +arsenals, dockyards, and seaports. I have seen a plan, according to +which Bonaparte is enabled, and intends, to build twenty ships of the +line and ten frigates, besides cutters, in the year, for ten years to +come. I read the calculation of the expenses, the names of the forests +where the timber is to be cut, of the foreign countries where a part of +the necessary materials are already engaged, and of our own departments +which are to furnish the remainder. The whole has been drawn up in a +precise and clear manner by Bonaparte's Maritime Prefect at Antwerp, M. +Malouet, well known in your country, where he long remained as an +emigrant, and, I believe, was even employed by your Ministers. + +You may, perhaps, smile at this vast naval scheme of Bonaparte; but if +you consider that he is the master of all the forests, mines, and +productions of France, Italy, and of a great part of Germany, with all +the navigable rivers and seaports of these countries and Holland, and +remember also the character of the man, you will, perhaps, think it less +impracticable. The greatest obstacle he has to encounter, and to remove, +is want of experienced naval officers, though even in this he has +advanced greatly since the present war, during which he has added to his +naval forces twenty--nine ships of the line, thirty--four frigates, +twenty-one cutters, three thousand prams, gunboats, pinnaces, etc., with +four thousand naval officers and thirty-seven thousand sailors, according +to the same account, signed by Malouet. It is true that most of our new +naval heroes have never ventured far from our coast, and all their naval +laurels have been gathered under our land batteries; but the impulse is +given to the national spirit, and our conscripts in the maritime +departments prefer, to a man, the navy to the army, which was not +formerly the case. + +It cannot have escaped your observation that the incorporation of Genoa +procured us, in the South of our Empire, a naval station and arsenal, as +a counterpoise to Antwerp, our new naval station in the North, where +twelve ships of the line have been built, or are building, since 1803, +and where timber and other materials are collected for eight more. At +Genoa, two ships of the line and four frigates have lately been launched, +and four ships and two frigates are on the stocks; and the Genoese +Republic has added sixteen thousand seafaring men to our navy. Should +Bonaparte terminate successfully the present war, Naples and Venice will +increase the number of our seaports and resources on the borders of the +Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas. All his courtiers say that he will +conquer Italy in Germany, and determine at Vienna--the fate of London. + +Of all our admirals, however, we have not one to compare with your +Nelson, your Hood, your St. Vincent, and your Cornwallis. By the +appointment of Murat as grand admiral, Bonaparte seems to indicate that +he is inclined to imitate the example of Louis. XVI., in the beginning of +his reign, and entrust the chief command of his fleets and squadrons to +military men of approved capacity and courage, officers of his land +troops. Last June, when he expected a probable junction of the fleet +under Villeneuve with the squadron under Admiral Winter, and the union of +both with Ganteaume at Brest, Murat was to have had the chief command of +the united French, Spanish, and Batavian fleets, and to support the +landing of our troops in your country; but the arrival of Lord Nelson in +the West Indies, and the victory of Admiral Calder, deranged all our +plans and postponed all our designs, which the Continental war has +interrupted; to be commenced, God knows when. + +The best amongst our bad admirals is certainly Truguet; but he was +disgraced last year, and exiled twenty leagues from the coast, for having +declared too publicly "that our flotillas would never be serviceable +before our fleets were superior to yours, when they would become +useless." An intriguer by long habit and by character, having neither +property nor principles, he joined the Revolution, and was the second in +command under Latouche, in the first republican fleet that left our +harbours. He directed the expedition against Sardinia, in January, 1793, +during which he acquired neither honour nor glory, being repulsed with +great loss by the inhabitants. After being imprisoned under Robespierre, +the Directory made him a Minister of the marine, an Ambassador to Spain, +and a Vice-Admiral of France. In this capacity he commanded at Brest, +during the first eighteen months of the present war. He has an +irreconcilable foe in Talleyrand, with whom he quarrelled, when on his +embassy in Spain, about some extortions at Madrid, which he declined to +share with his principal at Paris. Such was our Minister's inveteracy +against him in 1798, that a directorial decree placed him on the list of +emigrants, because he remained in Spain after having been recalled to +France. In 1799, during Talleyrand's disgrace, Truguet returned here, +and, after in vain challenging his enemy to fight, caned him in the +Luxembourg gardens, a chastisement which our premier bore with true +Christian patience. Truguet is not even a member of the Legion of +Honour. + +Villeneuve is supposed not much inferior in talents, experience, and +modesty to Truguet. He was, before the Revolution, a lieutenant of the +royal navy; but his principles did not prevent him from deserting to the +colours of the enemies of royalty, who promoted him first to a captain +and afterwards to an admiral. + +His first command as such was over a division of the Toulon fleet, which, +in the winter of 1797, entered Brest. In the battle at Aboukir he was +the second in command; and, after the death of Admiral Brueys, he rallied +the ships which had escaped, and sailed for Malta, where, two years +afterwards, he signed, with General Vaubois, the capitulation of that +island. When hostilities again broke out, he commanded in the West +Indies, and, leaving his station, escaped your cruisers, and was +appointed first to the chief command of the Rochefort, and afterwards the +Toulon fleet, on the death of Admiral Latouche. Notwithstanding the +gasconade of his report of his negative victory over Admiral Calder, +Villeneuve is not a Gascon by birth, but only, by sentiment. + +Ganteaume does not possess either the intriguing character of Truguet or +the valorous one of Villeneuve. + +Before the Revolution he was a mate of a merchantman, but when most of +the officers of the former royal navy had emigrated or perished, he was, +in 1793, made a captain of the republican navy, and in 1796 an admiral. +During the battle of Aboukir he was the chief of the staff, under Admiral +Brueys, and saved himself by swimming, when l'Orient took fire and blew +up. Bonaparte wrote to him on this occasion: "The picture you have sent +me of the disaster of l'Orient, and of your own dreadful situation, is +horrible; but be assured that, having such a miraculous escape, DESTINY +intends you to avenge one day our navy and our friends." This note was +written in August, 1798, shortly after Bonaparte had professed himself a +Mussulman. + +When, in the summer of 1799, our general-in-chief had determined to leave +his army of Egypt to its destiny, Ganteaume equipped and commanded the +squadron of frigates which brought him to Europe, and was, after his +consulate, appointed a Counsellor of State and commander at Brest. In +1800 he escaped with a division of the Brest fleet to Toulon, and, in the +summer of 1801, when he was ordered to carry succours to Egypt, your ship +Skitsure fell in with him, and was captured. As he did not, however, +succeed in landing in Egypt the troops on board his ships, a temporary +disgrace was incurred, and he was deprived of the command, but made a +maritime prefect. Last year favour was restored him, with the command of +our naval forces at Brest. All officers who have served under Ganteaume +agree that, let his fleet be ever so superior, he will never fight if he +can avoid it, and that, in orderly times, his capacity would, at the +utmost, make him regarded as a good master of a merchantman, and nothing +else. + +Of the present commander of our, flotilla at Boulogne, Lacrosse, I will +also say some few words. A lieutenant before the Revolution, he became, +in 1789, one of the most ardent and violent Jacobins, and in 1792 was +employed by the friend of the Blacks, and our Minister, Monge, as an +emissary in the West Indies, to preach there to the negroes the rights of +man and insurrection against the whites, their masters. In 1800, +Bonaparte advanced him to a captain-general at Guadeloupe, an island +which his plots, eight years before, had involved in all the horrors of +anarchy, and where, when he now attempted to restore order, his former +instruments rose against him and forced him to escape to one of your +islands--I believe Dominico. Of this island, in return for his +hospitable reception, he took plans, according to which our General +Lagrange endeavoured to conquer it last spring. Lacrosse is a perfect +revolutionary fanatic, unprincipled, cruel, unfeeling, and intolerant. +His presumption is great, but his talents are trifling. + + + + +LETTER XXXIV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The defeat of the Austrians has excited great satisfaction +among our courtiers and public functionaries; but the mass of the +inhabitants here are too miserable to feel for anything else but their +own sufferings. They know very well that every victory rivets their +fetters, that no disasters can make them more heavy, and no triumph +lighter. Totally indifferent about external occurrences, as well as +about internal oppressions, they strive to forget both the past and the +present, and to be indifferent as to the future; they would be glad could +they cease to feel that they exist. The police officers were now, with +their gendarmes, bayoneting them into illuminations for Bonaparte's +successes, as they dragooned them last year into rejoicings for his +coronation. I never observed before so much apathy; and in more than one +place I heard the people say, "Oh! how much better we should be with +fewer victories and more tranquillity, with less splendour and more +security, with an honest peace instead of a brilliant war." But in a +country groaning under a military government, the opinions of the people +are counted for nothing. + +At Madame Joseph Bonaparte's circle, however, the countenances were not +so gloomy. There a real or affected joy seemed to enliven the usual +dullness of these parties; some actors were repeating patriotic verses in +honour of the victor; while others were singing airs or vaudevilles, to +inspire our warriors with as much hatred towards your nation as gratitude +towards our Emperor. It is certainly neither philosophical nor +philanthropical not to exclude the vilest of all passions, HATRED, on +such a happy occasion. Martin, in the dress of a conscript, sang six +long couplets against the tyrants of the seas; of which I was only able +to retain the following one: + +Je deteste le peuple anglais, Je deteste son ministere; J'aime l'Empereur +des Francais, J'aime la paix, je hais la guerre; Mais puisqu'il faut la +soutenir Contre une Nation Sauvage, Mon plus doux, mon plus grand desir +Est de montrer tout mon courage. + +But what arrested my attention, more than anything else which occurred in +this circle on that evening, was a printed paper mysteriously handed +about, and of which, thanks to the civility of a Counsellor of State, I +at last got a sight. It was a list of those persons, of different +countries, whom the Emperor of the French has fixed upon, to replace all +the ancient dynasties of Europe within twenty years to come. From the +names of these individuals, some of whom are known to me, I could +perceive that Bonaparte had more difficulty to select proper Emperors, +Kings, and Electors, than he would have had, some years ago, to choose +directors or consuls. Our inconsistency is, however, evident even here; +I did not read a name that is not found in the annals of Jacobinism and +republicanism. We have, at the same time, taken care not to forget +ourselves in this new distribution of supremacy. France is to furnish +the stock of the new dynasties for Austria, England, Spain, Denmark, and +Sweden. What would you think, were you to awake one morning the subject +of King Arthur O'Connor the First? You would, I dare say, be even more +surprised than I am in being the subject of Napoleon Bonaparte the First. +You know, I suppose, that O'Connor is a general of division, and a +commander of the Legion of Honour,--the bosom friend of Talleyrand, and +courting, at this moment, a young lady, a relation of our Empress, whose +portion may one day be an Empire. But I am told that, notwithstanding +Talleyrand's recommendations, and the approbation of Her Majesty, the +lady prefers a colonel, her own countryman, to the Irish general. Should, +however, our Emperor announce his determination, she would be obliged to +marry as he commands, were he even to give her his groom, or his horse, +for a spouse. + +You can form no idea how wretched and despised all the Irish rebels are +here. O'Connor alone is an exception; and this he owes to Talleyrand, to +General Valence, and to Madame de Genlis; but even he is looked on with a +sneer, and, if he ever was respected in England, must endure with +poignancy the contempt to which he is frequently exposed in France. When +I was in your country I often heard it said that the Irish were generally +considered as a debased and perfidious people, extremely addicted to +profligacy and drunkenness, and, when once drunk, more cruelly ferocious +than even our Jacobins. I thought it then, and I still believe it, a +national prejudice, because I am convinced that the vices or virtues of +all civilized nations are relatively the same; but those Irish rebels we +have seen here, and who must be, like our Jacobins, the very dregs of +their country, have conducted themselves so as to inspire not only +mistrust but abhorrence. It is also an undeniable truth that they were +greatly disappointed by our former and present Government. They expected +to enjoy liberty and equality, and a pension for their treachery; but our +police commissaries caught them at their landing, our gendarmes escorted +them as criminals to their place of destination, and there they received +just enough to prevent them from starving. If they complained they were +put in irons, and if they attempted to escape they were sent to the +galleys as malefactors or shot as spies. Despair, therefore, no doubt +induced many to perpetrate acts of which they were accused, and to rob, +swindle, and murder, because they were punished as thieves and assassins. +But, some of them, who have been treated in the most friendly, +hospitable, and generous manner in this capital, have proved themselves +ungrateful, as well as infamous. A lady of my acquaintance, of a once +large fortune, had nothing left but some furniture, and her subsistence +depended upon what she got by letting furnished lodgings. Mischance +brought three young Irishmen to her house, who pretended to be in daily +expectation of remittances from their country, and of a pension from +Bonaparte. During six months she not only lodged and supported them, but +embarrassed herself to procure them linen and a decent apparel. At last +she was informed that each of, them had been allowed sixty livres--in the +month, and that arrears had been paid them for nine months. Their debt +to her was above three thousand livres--but the day after she asked for +payment they decamped, and one of them persuaded her daughter, a girl of +fourteen, to elope with him, and to assist him in robbing her mother of +all her plate.--He has, indeed, been since arrested and sentenced to the +galleys for eight years; but this punishment neither restored the +daughter her virtue nor the mother her property. The other two denied +their debts, and, as she had no other evidence but her own scraps of +accounts, they could not be forced to pay; their obdurate effrontery and +infamy, however, excited such an indignation in the judges, that they +delivered them over as swindlers to the Tribunal Correctional; and the +Minister of Police ordered them to be transported as rogues and vagabonds +to the colonies. The daughter died shortly after, in consequence of a +miscarriage, and the mother did not survive her more than a month, and +ended her days in the Hotel Dieu, one of our common hospitals. Thus, +these depraved young men ruined and murdered their benefactress and her +child; and displayed, before they were thirty, such a consummate villainy +as few wretches grown hoary in vice have perpetrated. This act of +scandalous notoriety injured the Irish reputation very much in this +country; for here, as in many other places, inconsiderate people are apt +to judge a whole nation according to the behaviour of some few of its +outcasts. + + + + +LETTER XXXV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The plan of the campaign of the Austrians is incomprehensible +to all our military men--not on account of its profundity, but on account +of its absurdity or incoherency. In the present circumstances, +half-measures must always be destructive, and it is better to strike +strongly and firmly than justly. To invade Bavaria without disarming the +Bavarian army, and to enter Suabia and yet acknowledge the neutrality of +Switzerland, are such political and military errors as require long +successes to repair, but which such an enemy as Bonaparte always takes +care not to leave unpunished. + +The long inactivity of the army under the Archduke Charles has as much +surprised us as the defeat of the army under General von Mack; but from +what I know of the former, I am persuaded that he would long since have +pushed forward had not his movements been unfortunately combined with +those of the latter. The House of Lorraine never produced a more valiant +warrior, nor Austria a more liberal or better instructed statesman, than +this Prince. Heir to the talents of his ancestors, he has commanded, +with glory, against France during the revolutionary war; and, although he +sometimes experienced defeats, he has rendered invaluable services to the +chief of his House by his courage, by his activity, by his constancy, and +by that salutary firmness which, in calling the generals and superior +officers to their duty, has often reanimated the confidence and the +ardour of the soldier. + +The Archduke Charles began, in 1793, his military career under the Prince +of Coburg, the commander-in-chief of the Austrian armies in Brabant, +where he commanded the advanced guard, and distinguished himself by a +valour sometimes bordering on temerity, but which, by degrees, acquired +him that esteem and popularity, among the troops often very advantageous +to him afterwards. He was, in 1794, appointed governor and +captain-general of the Low Countries, and a Field-marshal lieutenant of +the army of the German Empire. In April, 1796, he took the +command-in-chief of the armies of Austria and of the Empire, and, in the +following June, engaged in several combats with General Moreau, in which +he was repulsed, but in a manner that did equal honour to the victor and +to the vanquished. + +The Austrian army on the Lower Rhine, under General Wartensleben, having, +about this time, been nearly dispersed by General Jourdan, the Archduke +left some divisions of his forces under General Latour, to impede the +progress of Moreau, and went with the remainder into Franconia, where he +defeated Jourdan near Amberg and Wurzburg, routed his army entirely, and +forced him to repass the Rhine in the greatest confusion, and with +immense loss. The retreat of Moreau was the consequence of the victories +of this Prince. After the capture of Kehl, in January, 1797, he assumed +the command of the army of Italy, where he in vain employed all his +efforts to put a stop to the victorious progress of Bonaparte, with whom, +at last, he signed the preliminaries of peace at Leoben. In the spring +of 1799, he again defeated Jourdan in Suabia, as he had done two years +before in Franconia; but in Switzerland he met with an abler adversary in +General Massena; still, I am inclined to think that he displayed there +more real talents than anywhere else; and that this part of his campaign +of 1799 was the most interesting, in a military point of view. + +The most implacable enemies of the politics of the House of Austria +render justice to the plans, to the frankness, to the morality of +Archduke Charles; and, what is remarkable, of all the chiefs who have +commanded against revolutionary France, he alone has seized the true +manner of combating enthusiasts or slaves; at least, his proclamations +are the only ones composed with adroitness, and are what they ought to +be, because in them an appeal is made to the public opinion at a time +when opinion almost constitutes half the strength of armies. + +The present opposer of this Prince in Italy is one of our best, as well +as most fortunate, generals. A Sardinian subject, and a deserter from +the Sardinian troops, he assisted, in 1792, our commander, General +Anselm, in the conquest of the county of Nice, rather as a spy than as a +soldier. His knowledge of the Maritime Alps obtained, in 1793, a place +on our staff, where, from the services he rendered, the rank of a general +of brigade was soon conferred on him. In 1796 he was promoted to serve +as a general of division under Bonaparte in Italy, where he distinguished +himself so much that when, in 1798, General Berthier was ordered to +accompany the army of the East to Egypt, he succeeded him as +commander-in-chief of our troops in the temporary Roman Republic. But +his merciless pillage, and, perhaps, the idea of his being a foreigner, +brought on a mutiny, and the Directory was obliged to recall him. It was +his campaign in Switzerland of 1799, and his defence of Genoa in 1800, +that principally ranked him high as a military chief. After the battle +of Marengo he received the command of the army of Italy; but his +extortions produced a revolt among the inhabitants, and he lived for some +time in retreat and disgrace, after a violent quarrel with Bonaparte, +during which many severe truths were said and heard on both sides. + +After the Peace of Luneville, he seemed inclined to join Moreau, and +other discontented generals; but observing, no doubt, their want of views +and union, he retired to an estate he has bought near Paris, where +Bonaparte visited him, after the rupture with your country, and made him, +we may conclude, such offers as tempted him to leave his retreat. Last +year he was nominated one of our Emperor's Field-marshals, and as such he +relieved Jourdan of the command in the kingdom of Italy. He has +purchased with a part of his spoil, for fifteen millions of +livres--property in France and Italy; and is considered worth double that +sum in jewels, money, and other valuables. + +Massena is called, in France, the spoiled child of fortune; and as +Bonaparte, like our former Cardinal Mazarin, has more confidence in +fortune than in merit, he is, perhaps, more indebted to the former than +to the latter for his present situation; his familiarity has made him +disliked at our Imperial Court, where he never addresses Napoleon and +Madame Bonaparte as an Emperor or an Empress without smiling. + +General St. Cyr, our second in command of the army of Italy, is also an +officer of great talents and distinctions. He was, in 1791, only a +cornet, but in 1795, he headed, as a general, a division of the army of +the Rhine. In his report to the Directory, during the famous retreat of +1796, Moreau speaks highly of this general, and admits that his. +achievements, in part, saved the republican army. During 1799 he served +in Italy, and in 1800 he commanded the centre of the army of the Rhine, +and assisted in gaining the victory of Hohenlinden. After the Peace of +Lundville, he was appointed a Counsellor of State of the military +section, a place he still occupies, notwithstanding his present +employment. Though under forty years of age, he is rather infirm, from +the fatigues he has undergone and the wounds he has received. Although +he has never combated as a general-in-chief, there is no doubt but that +he would fill such a place with honour to himself and advantage to his +country. + +Of the general officers who command under Archduke Charles, Comte de +Bellegarde is already known by his exploits during the last war. He had +distinguished himself already in 1793, particularly when Valenciennes and +Maubeuge were besieged by the united Austrian and English forces; and, in +1794, he commanded the column at the head of which the Emperor marched, +when Landrecy was invested. In 1796, he was one of the members of the +Council of the Archduke Charles, when this Prince commanded for the first +time as a general-in-chief, on which occasion he was promoted to a +Field-marshal lieutenant. + +He displayed again great talents during the campaign of 1799, when he +headed a small corps, placed between General Suwarow in Italy, and +Archduke Charles in Switzerland; and in this delicate post he contributed +equally to the success of both. After the Peace of Luneville he was +appointed a commander-in-chief for the Emperor in the ci-devant Venetian +States, where the troops composing the army under the Archduke Charles +were, last summer, received and inspected by him, before the arrival of +the Prince. He is considered by military men as greatly superior to most +of the generals now employed by the Emperor of Germany. + + + + +LETTER XXXVI. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--"I would give my brother, the Emperor of Germany, one further +piece of advice. Let him hasten to make peace. This is the crisis when, +he must recollect, all States must have an end. The idea of the +approaching extinction of the, dynasty of Lorraine must impress him with +horror." When Bonaparte ordered this paragraph to be inserted in the +Moniteur, he discovered an 'arriere pensee', long suspected by +politicians, but never before avowed by himself, or by his Ministers. +"That he has determined on the universal change of dynasties, because a +usurper can never reign with safety or honour as long as any legitimate +Prince may disturb his power, or reproach him for his rank." Elevated +with prosperity, or infatuated with vanity and pride, he spoke a language +which his placemen, courtiers, and even his brother Joseph at first +thought premature, if not indiscreet. If all lawful Sovereigns do not +read in these words their proscription, and the fate which the most +powerful usurper that ever desolated mankind has destined for them, it +may be ascribed to that blindness with which Providence, in its wrath, +sometimes strikes those doomed to be grand examples of the vicissitudes +of human life. + +"Had Talleyrand," said Louis Bonaparte, in his wife's drawing-room, "been +by my brother's side, he would not have unnecessarily alarmed or awakened +those whom it should have been his policy to keep in a soft slumber, +until his blows had laid them down to rise no more; but his soldier-like +frankness frequently injures his political views." This I myself heard +Louis say to Abbe Sieyes, though several foreign Ambassadors were in the +saloon, near enough not to miss a word. If it was really meant as a +reflection on Napoleon, it was imprudent; if designed as a defiance to +other Princes, it was unbecoming and impertinent. I am inclined to +believe it, considering the individual to whom it was addressed, a +premeditated declaration that our Emperor expected a universal war, was +prepared for it, and was certain of its fortunate issue. + +When this Sieyes is often consulted, and publicly flattered, our +politicians say, "Woe to the happiness of Sovereigns and to the +tranquillity of subjects; the fiend of mankind is busy, and at work," +and, in fact, ever since 1789, the infamous ex-Abbe has figured, either +as a plotter or as an actor, in all our dreadful and sanguinary +revolutionary epochas. The accomplice of La Fayette in 1789, of Brissot +in 1791, of Marat in 1792, of Robespierre in 1793, of Tallien in 1794, of +Barras in 1795, of Rewbel in 1797, and of Bonaparte in 1799, he has +hitherto planned, served, betrayed, or deserted all factions. He is one +of the few of our grand criminals, who, after enticing and sacrificing +his associates, has been fortunate enough to survive them. Bonaparte has +heaped upon him presents, places, and pensions; national property, +senatories, knighthoods, and palaces; but he is, nevertheless, not +supposed one of our Emperor's most dutiful subjects, because many of the +late changes have differed from his metaphysical schemes of innovation, +of regeneration, and of overthrow. He has too high an opinion of his own +deserts not to consider it beneath his philosophical dignity to be a +contented subject of a fellow-subject, elevated into supremacy by his +labours and dangers. His modesty has, for these sixteen years past, +ascribed to his talents all the glory and prosperity of France, and all +her misery and misfortunes to the disregard of his counsels, and to the +neglect of his advice. Bonaparte knows it; and that he is one of those +crafty, sly, and dark conspirators, more dangerous than the bold +assassin, who, by sophistry, art, and perseverance insinuate into the +minds of the unwary and daring the ideas of their plots, in such an +insidious manner that they take them and foster them as the production of +their own genius; he is, therefore, watched by our Imperial spies, and +never consulted but when any great blow is intended to be struck, or some +enormous atrocities perpetrated. A month before the seizure of the Duc +d'Enghien, and the murder of Pichegru, he was every day shut up for some +hours with Napoleon Bonaparte at St. Cloud, or in the Tuileries; where he +has hardly been seen since, except after our Emperor's return from his +coronation as a King of Italy. + +Sieyes never was a republican, and it was cowardice alone that made him +vote for the death of his King and benefactor; although he is very fond +of his own metaphysical notions, he always has preferred the preservation +of his life to the profession or adherence to his systems. He will not +think the Revolution complete, or the constitution of his country a good +one, until some Napoleon, or some Louis, writes himself an Emperor or +King of France, by the grace of Sieyes. He would expose the lives of +thousands to obtain such a compliment to his hateful vanity and excessive +pride; but he would not take a step that endangered his personal safety, +though it might eventually lead him to the possession of a crown. + +From the bounty of his King, Sieyes had, before the Revolution, an income +of fifteen thousand livres--per annum; his places, pensions, and landed +estates produce now yearly five hundred thousand livres--not including +the interest of his money in the French and foreign funds. + +Two years ago he was exiled, for some time, to an estate of his in +Touraine, and Bonaparte even deliberated about transporting him to +Cayenne, when Talleyrand observed "that such a condemnation would +endanger that colony of France, as he would certainly organize there a +focus of revolutions, which might also involve Surinam and the Brazils, +the colonies of our allies, in one common ruin. In the present +circumstances," added the Minister, "if Sieyes is to be transported, I +wish we could land him in England, Scotland, or Ireland, or even in +Russia." + +I have just heard from a general officer the following anecdote, which he +read to me from a letter of another general, dated Ulm, the 25th instant, +and, if true, it explains in part Bonaparte's apparent indiscretion in +the threat thrown out against all ancient dynasties. + +Among his confidential generals (and hitherto the most irreproachable of +all our military commanders), Marmont is particularly distinguished. +Before Napoleon left this capital to head his armies in Germany, he is +stated to have sent despatches to all those traitors dispersed in +different countries whom he has selected to commence the new dynasties, +under the protection of the Bonaparte Dynasty. They were, no doubt, +advised of this being the crisis when they had to begin their +machinations against thrones. A courier from Talleyrand at Strasburg to +Bonaparte at Ulm was ordered to pass by the corps under the command of +Marmont, to whom, in case the Emperor had advanced too far into Germany, +he was to deliver his papers. This courier was surprised and interrupted +by some Austrian light troops; and, as it was only some few hours after +being informed of this capture that Bonaparte expressed himself frankly, +as related above, it was supposed by his army that the Austrian +Government had already in its power despatches which made our schemes of +improvement at Paris no longer any secrets at Vienna. The writer of this +letter added that General Marmont was highly distressed on account of +this accident, which might retard the prospect of restoring to Europe its +long lost peace and tranquillity. + +This officer made his first campaign under Pichegru in 1794, and was, in +1796, appointed by Bonaparte one of his aides-de-camp. His education had +been entirely military, and in the practice the war afforded him he soon +evinced how well he remembered the lessons of theory. In the year 1796, +at the battle of Saint-Georges, before Mantua, he charged at the head of +the eighth battalion of grenadiers, and contributed much to its fortunate +issue. In October of the same year, Bonaparte, as a mark of his +satisfaction, sent him to present to the Directory the numerous colours +which the army of Italy had conquered; from whom he received in return a +pair of pistols, with a fraternal hug from Carnot. On his return to +Italy he was, for the first time, employed by his chief in a political +capacity. A republic, and nothing but a republic, being then the order +of the day, some Italian patriots were convoked at Reggio to arrange a +plan for a Cisalpine Republic, and for the incorporation with it of +Modena, Bologna, and other neutral States; Marmont was nominated a French +republican plenipotentiary, and assisted as such in the organization of a +Commonwealth, which since has been by turns a province of Austria or a +tributary State of France. + +Marmont, though combating for a bad cause, is an honest man; his hands +are neither soiled with plunder, nor stained with blood. Bonaparte, +among his other good qualities, wishes to see every one about him rich; +and those who have been too delicate to accumulate wealth by pillage, he +generally provides for, by putting into requisition some great heiress. +After the Peace of Campo Formio, Bonaparte arrived at Paris, where he +demanded in marriage for his aide-de-camp Marmont, Mademoiselle +Perregeaux, the sole child of the first banker in France, a well-educated +and accomplished young lady, who would be much more agreeable did not her +continual smiles and laughing indicate a degree of self-satisfaction and +complacency which may be felt, but ought never to be published. + +The banker, Perregeaux, is one of those fortunate beings who, by drudgery +and assiduity, has succeeded in some few years to make an ample fortune. +A Swiss by birth, like Necker, he also, like him, after gratifying the +passion of avidity, showed an ambition to shine in other places than in +the counting-house and upon the exchange. Under La Fayette, in 1790, he +was the chief of a battalion of the Parisian National Guards; under +Robespierre, a commissioner for purchasing provisions; and under +Bonaparte he is become a Senator and a commander of the Legion of Honour. +I am told that he has made all his money by his connection with your +country; but I know that the favourite of Napoleon can never be the +friend of Great Britain. He is a widower; but Mademoiselle Mars, of the +Emperor's theatre, consoles him for the loss of his wife. + +General Marmont accompanied Bonaparte to Egypt, and distinguished himself +at the capture of Malta, and when, in the following year, the siege of +St. Jean d'Acre was undertaken, he was ordered to extend the +fortifications of Alexandria; and if, in 1801, they retarded your +progress, it was owing to his abilities, being an officer of engineers as +well as of the artillery. He returned with Bonaparte to Europe, and was, +after his usurpation, made a Counsellor of State. At the battle of +Marengo he commanded the artillery, and signed afterwards, with the +Austrian general, Count Hohenzollern, the Armistice of Treviso, which +preceded shortly the Peace of Luneville. Nothing has abated Bonaparte's +attachment to this officer, whom he appointed a commander-in-chief in +Holland, when a change of Government was intended there, and whom he will +entrust everywhere else, where sovereignty is to be abolished, or thrones +and dynasties subverted. + + + + +LETTER XXXVII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Many wise people are of the opinion that the revolution of +another great Empire is necessary to combat or oppose the great impulse +occasioned by the Revolution of France, before Europe can recover its +long-lost order and repose. Had the subjects of Austria been as +disaffected as they are loyal, the world might have witnessed such a +terrible event, and been enabled to judge whether the hypothesis was the +production of an ingenious schemer or of a profound statesman. Our +armies under Bonaparte have never before penetrated into the heart of a +country where subversion was not prepared, and where subversion did not +follow. + +How relatively insignificant, in the eyes of Providence, must be the +independence of States and the liberties of nations, when such a +relatively insignificant personage as General von Mack can shake them? +Have, then, the Austrian heroes--a Prince Eugene, a Laudon, a Lasci, a +Beaulieu, a Haddick, a Bender, a Clairfayt, and numerous other valiant +and great warriors--left no posterity behind them; or has the presumption +of General von Mack imposed upon the judgment of the Counsellors of his +Prince? This latter must have been the case; how otherwise could the +welfare of their Sovereign have been entrusted to a military quack, whose +want of energy and bad disposition had, in 1799, delivered up the capital +of another Sovereign to his enemies. How many reputations are gained by +an impudent assurance, and lost when the man of talents is called upon to +act and the fool presents himself. + +Baron von Mack served as an aide-de-camp under Field-marshal Laudon, +during the last war between Austria and Turkey, and displayed some +intrepidity, particularly before Lissa. The Austrian army was encamped +eight leagues from that place, and the commander-in-chief hesitated to +attack it, believing it to be defended by thirty thousand men. To decide +him upon making this attack, Baron von Mack left him at nine o'clock at +night, crossed the Danube, accompanied only by a single Uhlan, and +penetrated into the suburb of Lissa, where he made prisoner a Turkish +officer, whom, on the next morning at seven o'clock, he presented to his +general, and from whom it was learnt that the garrison contained only six +thousand, men. This personal temerity, and the applause of Field-marshal +Laudon, procured him then a kind of reputation, which he has not since +been able to support. Some theoretical knowledge of the art of war, and +a great facility of conversing on military topics, made even the Emperor +Joseph conceive a high opinion of this officer; but it has long been +proved, and experience confirms it every day, that the difference is +immense between the speculator and the operator, and that the generals of +Cabinets are often indifferent captains when in the camp or in the field. + +Preceded by a certain celebrity, Baron von Mack served, in 1793, under +the Prince of Coburg, as an adjutant-general, and was called to assist at +the Congress at Antwerp, where the operations of the campaign were +regulated. Everywhere he displayed activity and bravery; was wounded +twice in the month of May; but he left the army without having performed +anything that evinced the talents which fame had bestowed on him. In +February, 1794, the Emperor sent him to London to arrange, in concert +with your Government, the plans of the campaign then on the eve of being +opened; and when he returned to the Low Countries he was advanced to a +quartermaster-general of the army of Flanders, and terminated also this +unfortunate campaign without having done anything to justify the +reputation he had before acquired or usurped. His Sovereign continued, +nevertheless, to employ him in different armies; and in January, 1797, he +was appointed a Field-marshal lieutenant and a quartermaster-general of +the army of the Rhine. In February he conducted fifteen thousand of the +troops of this army to reinforce the army of Italy; but when Bonaparte in +April penetrated into Styria and Carinthia, he was ordered to Vienna as a +second in command of the levy 'en masse'. + +Real military characters had already formed their opinion of this +officer, and saw a presumptuous charlatan where others had admired an +able warrior. His own conduct soon convinced them that they neither had +been rash nor mistaken. The King of Naples demanding, in 1798, from his +son-in-law, the Emperor of Germany, a general to organize and head his +troops, Baron von Mack was presented to him. After war had been declared +against France he obtained some success in partial engagements, but was +defeated in a general battle by an enemy inferior in number. In the +Kingdom of Naples, as well as in the Empire of Germany, the fury of +negotiation seized him when he should have fought, and when he should +have remembered that no compacts can ever be entered into with political +and military earthquakes, more than with physical ones. This imprudence, +particularly as he was a foreigner, excited suspicion among his troops, +whom, instead of leading to battle, he deserted, under the pretence that +his life was in danger, and surrendered himself and his staff to our +commander, Championnet. + +A general who is too fond of his life ought never to enter a camp, much +less to command armies; and a military chief who does not consider the +happiness and honour of the State as his first passion and his first +duty, and prefers existence to glory, deserves to be shot as a traitor, +or drummed out of the army as a dastardly coward. Without mentioning the +numerous military faults committed by General von Mack during this +campaign, it is impossible to deny that, with respect to his own troops, +he conducted himself in the most pusillanimous manner. It has often been +repeated that martial valour does not always combine with it that courage +and that necessary presence of mind which knows how to direct or repress +multitudes, how to command obedience and obtain popularity; but when a +man is entrusted with the safety of an Empire, and assumes such a +brilliant situation, he must be weak-minded and despicable indeed, if he +does not show himself worthy of it by endeavouring to succeed, or perish +in the attempt. The French emigrant, General Dumas, evinced what might +have been done, even with the dispirited Neapolitan troops, whom he +neither deserted, nor with whom he offered to capitulate. + +Baron von Mack is in a very infirm state of health, and is often under +the necessity of being carried on a litter; and his bodily complaints +have certainly not increased the vigour of his mind. His love of life +seems to augment in proportion as its real value diminishes. As to the +report here of his having betrayed his trust in exchanging honour for +gold, I believe it totally unfounded. Our intriguers may have deluded +his understanding, but our traitors would never have been able to seduce +or shake his fidelity. His head is weak, but his heart is honest. +Unfortunately, it is too true that, in turbulent times, irresolution and +weakness in a commander or a Minister operate the same, and are as +dangerous as, treason. + + + + +ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: + +Complacency which may be felt, but ought never to be published +General who is too fond of his life ought never to enter a camp +Generals of Cabinets are often indifferent captains in the field +How many reputations are gained by an impudent assurance +Irresolution and weakness in a commander operate the same +Love of life increase in proportion as its real value diminishes +Opinion almost constitutes half the strength of armies +Presumptuous charlatan +Pretensions or passions of upstart vanity +Pride of an insupportable and outrageous ambition +Prudence without weakness, and with firmness without obstinacy +They ought to be just before they are generous +They will create some quarrel to destroy you +Vices or virtues of all civilized nations are relatively the same +We are tired of everything, even of our existence + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, +Volume 7, by Lewis Goldsmith + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COURT OF ST. 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CLOUD + +Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London + + + +BOOK 7 + + +LETTER XXIV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Though loudly complained of by the Cabinet of St. Cloud, the +Cabinet of St. Petersburg has conducted itself in these critical times +with prudence without weakness, and with firmness without obstinacy. +In its connections with our Government it has never lost sight of its +own dignity, and, therefore, never endured without resentment those +impertinent innovations in the etiquette of our Court, and in the manner +and language of our Emperor to the representatives of legitimate +Sovereigns. Had similar becoming sentiments directed the councils of all +other Princes and the behaviour of their Ambassadors here, spirited +remonstrances might have moderated the pretensions or passions of upstart +vanity, while a forbearance and silence, equally impolitic and shameful, +have augmented insolence by flattering the pride of an insupportable and +outrageous ambition. + +The Emperor of Russia would not have been so well represented here, had +he not been so wisely served and advised in his council chamber at St. +Petersburg. Ignorance and folly commonly select fools for their agents, +while genius and capacity employ men of their own mould, and of their own +cast. It is a remarkable truth that, notwithstanding the frequent +revolutions in Russia, since the death of Peter the First the ministerial +helm has always been in able hands; the progressive and uninterrupted +increase of the real and relative power of the Russian Empire evinces the +reality of this assertion. + +The Russian Chancellor, Count Alexander Woronzoff, may be justly called +the chief of political veterans, whether his talents or long services are +considered. Catherine II., though a voluptuous Princess, was a great +Sovereign, and a competent judge of merit; and it was her unbiased choice +that seated Count Woronzoff, while yet young, in her councils. Though +the intrigues of favourites have sometimes removed him, he always retired +with the esteem of his Sovereign, and was recalled without caballing or +cringing to return. He is admired by all who have the honour of +approaching him, as much for his obliging condescension as for his great +information. No petty views, no petty caprices, no petty vengeances find +room in his generous bosom. He is known to have conferred benefactions, +not only on his enemies, but on those who, at the very time, were +meditating his destruction. His opinion is that a patriotic Minister +should regard no others as his enemies but those conspiring against their +country, and acknowledge no friends or favourites incapable of well +serving the State. Prince de Z-------- waited on him one day, and, after +hesitating some time, began to compliment him on his liberal sentiments, +and concluded by asking the place of a governor for his cousin, with whom +he had reason to suppose the Count much offended. "I am happy," said His +Excellency, "to oblige you, and to do my duty at the same time. Here is +a libel he wrote against me, and presented to the Empress, who graciously +has communicated it to me, in answer to my recommendation of him +yesterday to the place you ask for him to-day. Read what I have written +on the libel, and you will be convinced that it will not be my fault if +he is not to-day a governor." In two hours afterwards the nomination was +announced to Prince de Z--------, who was himself at the head of a cabal +against the Minister. In any country such an act would have been +laudable, but where despotism rules with unopposed sway, it is both +honourable and praiseworthy. + +Prince Adam Czartorinsky, the assistant of Count Woronzoff, and Minister +of the foreign department, unites, with the vigour of youth, the +experience of age. He has travelled in most countries of Europe, not +solely to figure at Courts, to dance at balls, to look at pictures, or to +collect curiosities, but to study the character of the people, the laws +by which they are governed, and their moral or social influence with +regard to their comforts or misery. He therefore brought back with him a +stock of knowledge not to be acquired from books, but only found in the +world by frequenting different and opposite societies with observation, +penetration, and genius. With manners as polished as his mind is well +informed, he not only, possesses the favour, but the friendship of his +Prince, and, what is still more rare, is worthy of both. All Sovereigns +have favourites, few ever had any friends; because it is more easy to +flatter vanity, than to display a liberal disinterestedness; to bow +meanly than to instruct or to guide with delicacy and dignity; to abuse +the confidence of the Prince than to use it to his honour, and to the +advantage of his Government. + +That such a Monarch as an Alexander, and such Ministers as Count +Woronzoff and Prince Czartorinsky, should appoint a Count Markof to a +high and important post, was not unexpected by any one not ignorant of +his merit. + +Count Markof was, early in the reign of Catherine II., employed in the +office of the foreign department at St. Petersburg, and was, whilst +young, entrusted with several important negotiations at the Courts of +Berlin and Vienna., when Prussia had proposed the first partition of +Poland. He afterward went on his travels, from which he was recalled to +fill the place of an Ambassador to the late King of Sweden, Gustavus III. +He was succeeded, in 1784, at Stockholm, by Count Muschin Puschin, after +being appointed a Secretary of State in his own country, a post he +occupied with distinction, until the death of Catherine II., when Paul +the First revenged upon him, as well as on most others of the faithful +servants of this Princess, his discontent with his mother. He was then +exiled to his estates, where he retired with the esteem of all those who +had known him. In 1801, immediately after his accession to the throne, +Alexander invited Count Markof to his Court and Council, and the trusty +but difficult task of representing a legitimate Sovereign at the Court of +our upstart usurper was conferred on him. I imagine that I see the great +surprise of this nobleman, when, for the first time, he entered the +audience-chamber of our little great man, and saw him fretting, staring, +swearing, abusing to right and to left, for one smile conferring twenty +frowns, and for one civil word making use of fifty hard expressions, +marching in the diplomatic audience as at the head of his troops, and +commanding foreign Ambassadors as his French soldiers. I have heard that +the report of Count Markof to his Court, describing this new and rare +show, is a chef-d'oeuvre of wit, equally amusing and instructive. He is +said to have requested of his Cabinet new and particular orders how to +act--whether as the representative of an independent Sovereign, or, as +most of the other members of the foreign diplomatic corps in France, like +a valet of the First Consul; and that, in the latter case, he implored as +a favour, an immediate recall; preferring, had he no other choice left, +sooner to work in the mines at Siberia than to wear, in France the +disgraceful fetters of a Bonaparte. His subsequent dignified conduct +proves the answer of his Court. + +Talleyrand's craft and dissimulation could not delude the sagacity of +Count Markof, who was, therefore, soon less liked by the Minister than by +the First Consul. All kind of low, vulgar, and revolutionary chicanery +was made use of to vex or to provoke the Russian Ambassador. Sometimes +he was reproached with having emigrants in his service; another time +protection was refused to one of his secretaries, under pretence that he +was a Sardinian subject. Russian travellers were insulted, and detained +on the most frivolous pretences. Two Russian noblemen were even arrested +on our side of the Rhine, because Talleyrand had forgotten to sign his +name to their passes, which were otherwise in order. The fact was that +our Minister suspected them of carrying some papers which he wanted to +see, and, therefore, wrote his name with an ink of such a composition +that, after a certain number of days, everything written with it +disappeared. Their effects and papers were strictly searched by an agent +preceding them from this capital, but nothing was found, our Minister +being misinformed by his spies. + +When Count Markof left Sweden, he carried with him an actress of the +French theatre at Stockholm, Madame Hus, an Alsatian by birth, but who +had quitted her country twelve years before the Revolution, and could, +therefore, never be included among emigrants. She had continued as a +mistress with this nobleman, is the mother of several children by him, +and an agreeable companion to him, who has never been married. As I have +often said, Talleyrand is much obliged to any foreign diplomatic agent +who allows him to be the indirect provider or procurer of his mistresses. +After in vain tempting Count Markof with new objects, he introduced to +the acquaintance of Madame Hus some of his female emissaries. Their +manoeuvres, their insinuations, and even their presents were all thrown +away. The lady remained the faithful friend, and therefore refused with +indignation to degrade herself into a spy on her lover. Our Minister +then first discovered that, not only was Madame Hus an emigrant, but had +been a great benefactress and constant companion of emigrants at St. +Petersburg, and, of course, deserved to be watched, if not punished. +Count Markof is reported to have said to Talleyrand on this grave +subject, in the presence of two other foreign Ambassadors: + +"Apropos! what shall I do to prevent my poor Madame Hus from being shot +as an emigrant, and my poor children from becoming prematurely orphans?" + +"Monsieur," said our diplomatic oracle, "she should have petitioned the +First Consul for a permission to return, to France before she entered it; +but out of regard for you, if she is prudent, she will not, I daresay, be +troubled by our Government." + +"I should be sorry if she was not," replied the Count, with a significant +look; and here this grand affair ended, to the great entertainment of +those foreign agents who dared to smile or to laugh. + + + + +LETTER XXV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The Legion of Honour, though only proclaimed upon Bonaparte's +assumption of the Imperial rank, dates from the first year of his +consulate. To prepare the public mind for a progressive elevation of +himself, and for consequential distinctions among all classes of his +subjects, he distributed among the military, arms of honour, to which +were attached precedence and privileges granted by him, and, therefore, +liable to cease with his power or life. The number of these arms +increased in proportion to the approach of the period fixed for the +change of his title and the erection of his throne. When he judged them +numerous enough to support his changes, he made all these wearers of arms +of honour knights. Never before were so many chevaliers created en +masse; they amounted to no less than twenty-two thousand four hundred, +distributed in the different corps of different armies, but principally +in the army of England. To these were afterwards joined five thousand +nine hundred civil functionaries, men of letters, artists, etc. To +remove, however, all ideas of equality, even among the members of the +Legion of Honour, they were divided into four classes--grand officers, +commanders, officers, and simple legionaries. + +Every one who has observed Bonaparte's incessant endeavours to intrude +himself among the Sovereigns of Europe, was convinced that he would +cajole, or force, as many of them as he could into his revolutionary +knighthood; but I heard men, who are not ignorant of the selfishness and +corruption of our times, deny the possibility of any independent Prince +suffering his name to be registered among criminals of every description, +from the thief who picked the pockets of his fellow citizens in the +street, down to the regicide who sat in judgment and condemned his King; +from the plunderers who have laid waste provinces, republics, and +kingdoms, down to the assassins who shot, drowned, or guillotined their +countrymen en masse. For my part, I never had but one opinion, and, +unfortunately, it has turned out a just one. I always was convinced that +those Princes who received other presents from Bonaparte could have no +plausible excuse to decline his ribands, crosses, and stars. But who +could have presumed to think that, in return for these blood-stained +baubles, they would have sacrificed those honourable and dignified +ornaments which, for ages past, have been the exclusive distinction of +what birth had exalted, virtue made eminent, talents conspicuous, honour +illustrious, or valour meritorious? Who would have dared to say that the +Prussian Eagle and the Spanish Golden Fleece should thus be prostituted, +thus polluted? I do not mean by this remark to throw any blame on the +conferring those and other orders on Napoleon Bonaparte, or even on his +brothers; I know it is usual, between legitimate Sovereigns in alliance, +sometimes to exchange their knighthoods; but to debase royal orders so +much as to present them to a Cambaceres, a Talleyrand, a Fouche, a +Bernadotte, a Fesch, and other vile and criminal wretches, I do not deny +to have excited my astonishment as well as my indignation. What honest-- +I do not say what noble--subjects of Prussia, or of Spain, will hereafter +think themselves rewarded for their loyalty, industry, patriotism, or +zeal, when they remember that their Sovereigns have nothing to give but +what the rebel has obtained, the robber worn, the murderer vilified, and +the regicide debased? + +The number of grand officers of the Legion of Honour does not yet amount +to more than eighty, according to a list circulated at Milan last spring, +of which I have seen a copy. Of these grand officers, three had been +shoemakers, two tailors, four bakers, four barbers, six friars, eight +abbes, six officers, three pedlers, three chandlers, seven drummers, +sixteen soldiers, and eight regicides; four were lawful Kings, and the +six others, Electors or Princes of the most ancient houses in Europe. +I have looked over our, own official list, and, as far as I know, the +calculation is exact, both with regard to the number and to the quality. + +This new institution of knighthood produced a singular effect on my vain +and giddy, countrymen, who, for twelve years before, had scarcely seen a +star or a riband, except those of foreign Ambassadors, who were +frequently insulted when wearing them. It became now the fashion to be a +knight, and those who really were not so, put pinks, or rather blooms, or +flowers of a darker red, in their buttonholes, so as to resemble, and to +be taken at a distance for, the red ribands of the members of the Legion +of Honour. + +A man of the name of Villeaume, an engraver by profession, took advantage +of this knightly fashion and mania, and sold for four louis d'or, not +only the stars, but pretended letters of knighthood, said to be procured +by his connection with persons of the household of the Emperor. In a +month's time, according to a register kept by him, he had made twelve +hundred and fifty knights. When his fraud was discovered, he was already +out of the way, safe with his money; and, notwithstanding the researches +of the police, has not since been taken. + +A person calling himself Baron von Rinken, a subject and an agent of one +of the many Princes of Hohenlohe, according to his own assertion, arrived +here with real letters and patents of knighthood, which he offered for +sale for three hundred livres. The stars of this Order were as large as +the star of the grand officers of the Legion of Honour, and nearly +resembled it; but the ribands were of a different colour. He had already +disposed of a dozen of these stars, when he was taken up by the police +and shut up in the Temple, where he still remains. Four other agents of +inferior petty German Princes have also been arrested for offering the +Orders of their Sovereigns for sale. + +A Captain Rouvais, who received six wounds in his campaign under Pichegru +in 1794, wore the star of the Legion of Honour without being nominated a +knight. He has been tried by a military commission, deprived of his +pension, and condemned to four years' imprisonment in irons. He proved +that he had presented fourteen petitions to Bonaparte for obtaining this +mark of distinction, but in vain; while hundreds of others, who had +hardly seen an enemy, or, at the most, made but one campaign, or been +once wounded, had succeeded in their demands. As soon as sentence had +been pronounced against him, he took a small pistol from his pocket, and +shot himself through the head, saying, "Some one else will soon do the +same for Bonaparte." + +A cobbler, of the name of Matthieu, either in a fit of madness or from +hatred to the new order of things, decorated himself with the large +riband of the Legion of Honour, and had an old star fastened on his coat. +Thus accoutred, he went into the Palais Royal, in the middle of the day, +got upon a chair, and began to speak to his audience of the absurdity of +true republicans not being on a level, even under an Emperor, and putting +on, like him, all his ridiculous ornaments. "We are here," said he, +"either all grand officers, or there exist no grand officers at all; we +have all fought and paid for liberty, and for the Revolution, as much as +Bonaparte, and have, therefore, the same right and claim with him." Here +a police agent and some gendarmes interrupted his eloquence by taking him +into custody. When Fouche asked him what he meant by such rebellious +behaviour, he replied that it was only a trial to see whether destiny had +intended him to become an Emperor or to remain a cobbler. On the next +day he was shot as a conspirator. I saw the unfortunate man in the +Palais Royal; his eyes looked wild, and his words were often incoherent. +He was certainly a subject more deserving a place in a madhouse than in a +tomb. + +Cambaceres has been severely reprimanded by the Emperor for showing too +much partiality for the Royal Prussian Black Eagle, by wearing it in +preference to the Imperial Legion of Honour. He was given to understand +that, except for four days in the year, the Imperial etiquette did not +permit any subjects to display their knighthood of the Prussian Order. +In Madame Bonaparte's last drawing-room, before His Imperial Majesty set +out for the Rhine, he was ornamented with the Spanish, Neapolitan, +Prussian, and Portuguese orders, together with those of the French Legion +of Honour and of the Italian Iron Crown. I have seen the Emperor Paul, +who was also an amateur of ribands and stars, but never with so many at +once. I have just heard that the Grand Master of Malta has presented +Napoleon with the Grand Cross of the Maltese Order. This is certainly a +negative compliment to him, who, in July, 1798, officially declared to +his then sectaries, the Turks and Mussulmans, "that the Grand Master, +Commanders, Knights, and Order of Malta existed no more." + +I have heard it related for a certainty among our fashionable ladies, +that the Empress of the French also intends to institute a new order of +female knighthood, not of honour, but of confidence; of which all our +Court ladies, all the wives of our generals, public functionaries, etc., +are to be members. The Imperial Princesses of the Bonaparte family are +to be hereditary grand officers, together with as many foreign Empresses, +Queens, Princesses, Countesses, and Baronesses as can be bayoneted into +this revolutionary sisterhood. Had the Continent remained tranquil, it +would already have been officially announced by a Senatus Consultum. I +should suppose that Madame Bonaparte, with her splendid Court and +brilliant retinue of German Princes and Electors at Strasburg, need only +say the word to find hundreds of princely recruits for her knighthood in +petto. Her mantle, as a Grand Mistress of the Order of CONFIDENCE, has +been already embroidered at Lyons, and those who have seen it assert that +it is truly superb. The diamonds of the star on the mantle are valued at +six hundred thousand livres. + + + + +LETTER XXVI. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Since Bonaparte's departure for Germany, fifteen individuals +have been brought here, chained, from La Vendee and the--Western +Departments, and are imprisoned in the Temple. Their crime is not +exactly known, but private letters from those countries relate that they +were recruiting for another insurrection, and that some of them were +entrusted as Ambassadors from their discontented countrymen to Louis +XVIII. to ask for his return to France, and for the assistance of Russia, +Sweden, and England to support his claims. + +These are, however, reports to which I do not affix much credit. Had the +prisoners in the Temple been guilty, or only accused of such crimes, they +would long ago have been tortured, tried, and executed, or executed +without a trial. I suppose them mere hostages arrested by our +Government, as security for the tranquillity of the Chouan Departments +during our armies' occupation elsewhere. We have, nevertheless, two +movable columns of six thousand men each in the country, or in its +vicinity, and it would be not only impolitic, but a cruelty, to engage or +allure the unfortunate people of these wretched countries into any plots, +which, situated as affairs now are, would be productive of great and +certain evil to them, without even the probability of any benefit to the +cause of royalty and of the Bourbons. I do not mean to say that there +are not those who rebel against Bonaparte's tyranny, or that the Bourbons +have no friends; on the contrary, the latter are not few, and the former +very numerous. But a kind of apathy, the effect of unavailing resistance +to usurpation and oppression, has seized on most minds, and annihilated +what little remained of our never very great public spirit. We are tired +of everything, even of our existence, and care no more whether we are +governed by a Maximilian Robespierre or by a Napoleon Bonaparte, by a +Barras or by Louis XVIII. Except, perhaps, among the military, or among +some ambitious schemers, remnants of former factions, I do not believe a +Moreau, a Macdonald, a Lucien Bonaparte, or any person exiled by the +Emperor, and formerly popular, could collect fifty trusty conspirators in +all France; at least, as long as our armies are victorious, and organized +in their present formidable manner. Should anything happen to our +present chief, an impulse may be given to the minds now sunk down, and +raise our characters from their present torpid state. But until such an +event, we shall remain as we are, indolent but submissive, sacrificing +our children and treasures for a cause we detest, and for a man we abhor. +I am sorry to say it, but it certainly does, no honour to my nation when +one million desperados of civil and military banditti are suffered to +govern, tyrannize, and pillage, at their ease and undisturbed, thirty +millions of people, to whom their past crimes are known, and who have +every reason to apprehend their future wickedness. + +This astonishing resignation (if I can call it so, and if it does not +deserve a worse name), is so much the more incomprehensible, as the +poverty of the higher and middle classes is as great as the misery of the +people, and, except those employed under Bonaparte, and some few upstart +contractors or army commissaries, the greatest privations must be +submitted to in order to pay the enormous taxes and make a decent +appearance. I know families of five, six, and seven persons, who +formerly were wealthy, and now have for a scanty subsistence an income of +twelve or eighteen hundred livres--per year, with which they are obliged +to live as they can, being deprived of all the resource that elsewhere +labour offers to the industrious, and all the succours compassion bestows +on the necessitous. You know that here all trade and all commerce are at +a stand or destroyed, and the hearts of our modern rich are as unfeeling +as their manners are vulgar and brutal. + +A family of ci-devant nobles of my acquaintance, once possessing a +revenue of one hundred and fifty thousand livres--subsist now on fifteen +hundred livres--per year; and this sum must support six individuals--the +father and mother, with four children! It does so, indeed, by an +arrangement of only one poor meal in the day; a dinner four times, and a +supper three times, in the week. They endure their distress with +tolerable cheerfulness, though in the same street, where they occupy the +garrets of a house, resides, in an elegant hotel, a man who was once +their groom, but who is now a tribune, and has within these last twelve +years, as a conventional deputy, amassed, in his mission to Brabant and +Flanders, twelve millions of livres. He has kindly let my friend +understand that his youngest daughter might be received as a chambermaid +to his wife, being informed that she has a good education. All the four +daughters are good musicians, good drawers, and very able with their +needles. By their talents they supported their parents and themselves +during their emigration in Germany; but here these are of but little use +or advantage. Those upstarts who want instruction or works of this sort +apply to the first, most renowned, and fashionable masters or mistresses; +while others, and those the greatest number, cannot afford even to pay +the inferior ones and the most cheap. This family is one of the many +that regret having returned from their emigration. But, you may ask, why +do they not go back again to Germany? First, it would expose them to +suspicion, and, perhaps, to ruin, were they to demand passes; and if this +danger or difficulty were removed, they have no money for such a long +journey. + +But this sort of penury and wretchedness is also common with the families +of the former wealthy merchants and tradesmen. Paper money, a maximum, +and requisitions, have reduced those that did not share in the crimes and +pillage of the Revolution, as much as the proscribed nobility. And, +contradictory as it may seem, the number of persons employed in +commercial speculations has more than tripled since we experienced a +general stagnation of trade, the consequence of war, of want of capital, +protection, encouragement, and confidence; but one of the magazines of +1789 contained more goods and merchandize than twenty modern magazines +put together. The expenses of these new merchants are, however, much +greater than sixteen years ago, the profit less, and the credit still +less than the profit. Hence numerous bankruptcies, frauds, swindling, +forgeries, and other evils of immorality, extravagance, and misery. The +fair and honest dealers suffer most from the intrusion of these infamous +speculators, who expecting, like other vile men wallowing in wealth under +their eyes, to make rapid fortunes, and to escape detection as well as +punishment--commit crimes to soothe disappointment. Nothing is done but +for ready money, and even bankers' bills, or bills accepted by bankers, +are not taken in payment before the signatures are avowed by the parties +concerned. You can easily conceive what confusion, what expenses, and +what; loss of time these precautions must occasion; but the numerous +forgeries and fabrications have made them absolutely necessary. + +The farmers and landholders are better off, but they also complain of the +heavy taxes, and low price paid for what they bring to the market, which +frequently, for want of ready money, remains long unsold. They take +nothing but cash in payment; for, notwithstanding the endeavours of our +Government, the notes of the Bank of France have never been in +circulation among them. They have also been subject to losses by the +fluctuation of paper money, by extortions, requisitions, and by the +maximum. In this class of my countrymen remains still some little +national spirit and some independence of character; but these are far +from being favourable to Bonaparte, or to the Imperial Government, which +the yearly increase of taxes, and, above all, the conscription, have +rendered extremely odious. You may judge of the great difference in the +taxation of lands and landed property now and under our Kings, when I +inform you that a friend of mine, who, in 1792, possessed, in one of the +Western Departments, twenty-one farms, paid less in contribution for them +all than he does now for the three farms he has recovered from the wreck +of his fortune. + + + + +LETTER XXVII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--In a military empire, ruled by a military despot, it is a +necessary policy that the education of youth should also be military. +In all our public schools or prytanees, a boy, from the moment of +entering, is registered in a company, and regularly drilled, exercised, +and reviewed, punished for neglect or fault according to martial law, +and advanced if displaying genius or application. All our private +schools that wish for the protection of Government are forced to submit +to the same military rules, and, therefore, most of our conscripts, so +far from being recruits, are fit for any service as soon as put into +requisition. The fatal effects to the independence of Europe to be +dreaded from this sole innovation, I apprehend, have been too little +considered by other nations. A great Power, that can, without obstacle, +and with but little expense, in four weeks increase its disposable +military force from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and eighty +thousand young men, accustomed to military duty from their youth, must +finally become the master of all other or rival Powers, and dispose at +leisure of empires, kingdoms, principalities, and republics. NOTHING CAN +SAVE THEM BUT THE ADOPTION OF SIMILAR MEASURES FOR THEIR PRESERVATION AS +HAVE BEEN ADOPTED FOR THEIR SUBJUGATION. + +When l'Etat Militaire for the year 13 (a work containing the official +statement of our military forces) was presented to Bonaparte by Berthier, +the latter said: "Sire, I lay before Your Majesty the book of the destiny +of the world, which your hands direct as the sovereign guide of the +armies of your empire." This compliment is a truth, and therefore no +flattery. It might as justly have been addressed to a Moreau, +a Macdonald, a Le Courbe, or to any other general, as to Bonaparte, +because a superior number of well disciplined troops, let them be well +or even indifferently commanded, will defeat those inferior in number. +Three to one would even overpower an army of giants. Add to it the unity +of plans, of dispositions, and of execution, which Bonaparte enjoys +exclusively over such a great number of troops, while ten, or perhaps +fifty, will direct or contradict every movement of his opponents. I +tremble when I meditate on Berthier's assertion; may I never live to see +it realized, and to see all hitherto independent nations prostrated, +acknowledge that Bonaparte and destiny are the same, and the same +distributor of good and evil. + +One of the bad consequences of this our military education of youth is a +total absence of all religious and moral lessons. Arnaud had, last +August, the courage to complain of this infamous neglect, in the National +Institute. "The youth," said he, "receive no other instruction but +lessons to march, to fire, to bow, to dance, to sit, to lie, and to +impose with a good grace. I do not ask for Spartans or Romans, but we +want Athenians, and our schools are only forming Sybarites." Within +twenty-four hours afterwards, Arnaud was visited by a police agent, +accompanied by two gendarmes, with an order signed by Fouche, which +condemned him to reside at Orleans, and not to return to Paris without +the permission of the Government,--a punishment regarded here as very +moderate for such an indiscreet zeal. + +A schoolmaster at Auteuil, near this capital, of the name of Gouron, had +a private seminary, organized upon the footing of our former colleges. +In some few months he was offered more pupils than he could well attend +to, and his house shortly became very fashionable, even for our upstarts, +who sent their children there in preference. He was ordered before +Fouche last Christmas, and commanded to change the hours hitherto +employed in teaching religion and morals, to a military exercise and +instruction, as both more necessary and more salubrious for French youth. +Having replied that such an alteration was contrary to his plan and +agreement with the parents of his scholars, the Minister stopped him +short by telling him that he must obey what had been prescribed by +Government, or stand the consequences of his refractory spirit. Having +consulted with his friends and patrons, he divided the hours, and gave +half of the time usually allotted to religion or morality to the study of +military exercise. His pupils, however, remained obstinate, broke the +drum, and tore and burnt the colours he had bought. As this was not his +fault, he did not expect any further disturbance, particularly after +having reported to the police both his obedience and the unforeseen +result. But last March his house was suddenly surrounded in the night by +gendarmes, and some police agents entered it. All the boys were ordered +to dress and to pack up their effects, and to follow the gendarmes to +several other schools, where the Government had placed them, and of which +their parents would be informed. Gouron, his wife, four ushers, and six +servants, were all arrested and carried to the police office, where +Fouche, after reproaching them for their fanatical behaviour, as he +termed it, told them, as they were so fond of teaching religious and +moral duties, a suitable situation had been provided for them in Cayenne, +where the negroes stood sadly in need of their early arrival, for which +reason they would all set out on that very morning for Rochefort. When +Gouron asked what was to become of his property, furniture, etc., he was +told that his house was intended by Government for a preparatory school, +and would, with its contents, be purchased, and the amount paid him in +lands in Cayenne. It is not necessary to say that this example of +Imperial justice had the desired effect on all other refractory private +schoolmasters. + +The parents of Gouron's pupils were, with a severe reprimand, informed +where their sons had been placed, and where they would be educated in a +manner agreeable to the Emperor, who recommended them not to remove them, +without a previous notice to the police. A hatter, of the name of +Maille, however, ordered his son home, because he had been sent to a +dearer school than the former. In his turn he was carried before the +police, and, after a short examination of a quarter of an hour, was +permitted, with his wife and two children, to join their friend Gouron at +Rochefort, and to settle with him at Cayenne, where lands would also be +given him for his property, in France. These particulars were related to +me by a neighbour whose son had, for two years previous to this, been +under Gouron's care, but who was now among those placed out by our +Government. The boy's present master, he said, was a man of a +notoriously bad and immoral character; but he was intimidated, and weak +enough to remain contented, preferring, no doubt, his personal safety to +the future happiness of his child. In your country, you little +comprehend what a valuable instrument terror has been in the hands of our +rulers since the Revolution, and how often fear has been mistaken abroad +for affection and content. + +All these minutiae and petty vexations, but great oppressions, of petty +tyrants, you may easily guess, take up a great deal of time, and that, +therefore, a Minister of Police, though the most powerful, is also the +most occupied of his colleagues. So he certainly is, but, last year, a +new organization of this Ministry was regulated by Bonaparte; and Fouche +was allowed, as assistants, four Counsellors of State, and an +augmentation of sixty-four police commissaries. The French Empire was +then divided into four arrondissements, with regard to the general +police, not including Paris and its vicinity, inspected by a prefect of +police under the Minister. Of the first of these arrondissements, the +Counsellor of State, Real, is a kind of Deputy Minister; the Counsellor +of State, Miot, is the same of the second; the Counsellor of State, Pelet +de la Lozere, of the third; and the Counsellor of State, Dauchy, of the +fourth. The secret police agents, formerly called spies, were also +considerably increased. + + + + +LETTER XXVIII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Before Bonaparte set out for the Rhine, the Pope's Nuncio was +for the first time publicly rebuked by him in Madame Bonaparte's drawing- +room, and ordered loudly to write to Rome and tell His Holiness to think +himself fortunate in continuing to govern the Ecclesiastical States, +without interfering with the ecclesiastical arrangements that might be +thought necessary or proper by the Government in France. + +Bonaparte's policy is to promote among the first dignitaries of the +Gallican Church the brothers or relatives of his civil or military +supporters; Cambacere's brother is, therefore, an Archbishop and +Cardinal, and one of Lebrun's, and two of Berthier's cousins are Bishops. +As, however, the relatives of these Senators, Ministers, or generals, +have, like themselves, figured in many of the scandalous and blasphemous +scenes of the Revolution, the Pope has sometimes hesitated about +sanctioning their promotions. This was the case last summer, when +General Dessolles's brother was transferred from the Bishopric of Digne +to that of Chambry, and Bonaparte nominated for his successor the brother +of General Miollis, who was a curate of Brignoles, in the diocese of Aix. +This curate had not only been one of the first to throw up his letters of +priesthood at the Jacobin Club at Aix, but had also sacrilegiously denied +the divinity of the Christian religion, and proposed, in imitation of +Parisian atheists, the worship of a Goddess of Reason in a common +prostitute with whom he lived. The notoriety of these abominations made +even his parishioners at Brignoles unwilling to go to church, and to +regard him as their pastor, though several of them had been imprisoned, +fined, and even transported as fanatics, or as refractory. + +During the negotiation with Cardinal Fesch last year, the Pope had been +promised, among other things, that, for the future, his conscience should +not be wounded by having presented to him for the prelacy any persons but +those of the purest morals of the French Empire; and that all his +objections should be attended to, in case of promotions; his scruples +removed, or his refusal submitted to. When Cardinal Fesch demanded His +Holiness's Bull for the curate Miollis, the Cardinal Secretary of State, +Gonsalvi, showed no less than twenty acts of apostasy and blasphemy, +which made him unworthy of such a dignity. To this was replied that, +having obtained an indulgence in toto for what was past, he was a proper +subject; above all, as he had the protection of the Emperor of the +French. The Pope's Nuncio here then addressed himself to our Minister of +the Ecclesiastical Department, Portalis, who advised him not to speak to +Bonaparte of a matter upon which his mind had been made up; he, +nevertheless, demanded an audience, and it was in consequence of this +request that he, in his turn, became acquainted with the new Imperial +etiquette and new Imperial jargon towards the representatives of +Sovereigns. On the same evening the Nuncio expedited a courier to Rome, +and I have heard to-day that the nomination of Miollis is confirmed by +the Pope. + +From this relatively trifling occurrence, His Holiness might judge of the +intention of our Government to adhere to its other engagements; but at +Rome, as well as in most other Continental capitals, the Sovereign is the +dupe of the perversity of his Counsellors and Ministers, who are the +tools, and not seldom the pensioners, of the Cabinet of St. Cloud. + +But in the kingdom of Italy the parishes and dioceses are, if possible, +still worse served than in this country. Some of the Bishops there, +after having done duty in the National Guards, worn the Jacobin cap, and +fought against their lawful Prince, now live in open adultery; and, from +their intrigues, are the terror of all the married part of their flock. +The Bishop of Pavia keeps the wife of a merchant, by whom he has two +children; and, that the public may not be mistaken as to their real +father, the merchant received a sum of money to establish himself at +Brescia, and has not seen his wife for these two years past. General +Gourion, who was last spring in Italy, has assured me that he read the +advertisement of a curate after his concubine, who had eloped with +another curate; and that the Police Minister at Milan openly licensed +women to be the housekeepers of priests. + +A grand vicar, Sarini, at Bologna, was, in 1796, a friar, but +relinquished then the convent for the tent, and exchanged the breviary +for the musket. He married a nun of one cloister, from whom he procured +a divorce in a month, to unite himself with an Abbess of another, +deserted by him in her turn for the wife of an innkeeper, who robbed and +eloped from her husband. Last spring he returned to the bosom of the +Church, and, by making our Empress a present of a valuable diamond cross, +of which he had pillaged the statue of a Madonna, he obtained the dignity +of a grand vicar, to the great edification, no doubt, of all those who +had seen him before the altar or in the camp, at the brothel, or in the +hospital. + +Another grand vicar of the same Bishop, in the same city, of the name of +Rami, has two of his illegitimate children as singing-boys in the same +cathedral where he officiates as a priest. Their mother is dead, but her +daughter, by another priest, is now their father's mistress. This +incestuous commerce is so little concealed that the girl does the honours +of the grand vicar's house, and, with naivete enough, tells the guests +and visitors of her happiness in having succeeded her mother. I have +this anecdote from an officer who heard her make use of that expression. + +In France, our priests, I fear, are equally as debauched and +unprincipled; but, in yielding to their vicious propensities, they take +care to save the appearance of virtue, and, though their guilt is the +same, the scandal is less. Bonaparte pretends to be severe against all +those ecclesiastics who are accused of any irregularities after having +made their peace with the Church. A curate of Picardy, suspected of +gallantry, and another of Normandy, accused of inebriety, were last +month, without further trial or ceremony than the report of the Minister +Portalis, delivered over to Fouche, who transported them to Cayenne, +after they had been stripped of their gowns. At the same time, Cardinal +Cambaceres and Cardinal Fesch, equally notorious for their excesses, were +taken no notice of, except that they were laughed at in our Court +circles. + +I am, almost every day, more and more convinced that our Government is +totally indifferent about what becomes of our religious establishment +when the present race of priests is extinguished; which, in the course of +nature, must happen in less than thirty years. Our military system and +our military education discourage all young men from entering into +orders; while, at the same time, the army is both more honourable and +more profitable than the Church. Already we want curates, though several +have been imported from Germany and Spain, and, in some departments, +four, and even six parishes have only one curate to serve them all. The +Bishops exhort, and the parents advise their children to study theology; +but then the law of conscription obliges the student of theology, as well +as the student of philosophy, to march together; and, when once in the +ranks, and accustomed to the licentiousness of a military life, they are +either unwilling, unfit, or unworthy to return to anything else. The +Pope, with all his entreaties, and with all his prayers, was unable to +procure an exception from the conscription of young men preparing +themselves for priesthood. Bonaparte always answered: "Holy Father, were +I to consent to your demand, I should soon have an army of priests, +instead of an army of soldiers." Our Emperor is not unacquainted with +the real character and spirit of his Volunteers. When the Pope +represented the danger of religion expiring in France, for want of +priests to officiate at the altars, he was answered that Bonaparte, at +the beginning of his consulate, found neither altars nor priests in +France; that if his reign survived the latter, the former would always be +standing, and survive his reign. He trusted that the chief of the Church +would prevent them from being deserted. He assured him that when once he +had restored the liberties of the seas, and an uninterrupted tranquillity +on the Continent, he should attend more, and perhaps entirely, to the +affairs of the Church. He consented, however, that the Pope might +institute, in the Ecclesiastical States, a seminary for two hundred young +Frenchmen, whom he would exempt from military conscription. This is the +stock from which our Church establishment is to be supplied! + + + + +LETTER XXIX. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The short journey of Count von Haugwitz to Vienna, and the long +stay of our Imperial Grand Marshal, Duroc, at Berlin, had already caused +here many speculations, not quite corresponding with the views and, +perhaps, interests of our Court, when our violation of the Prussian +territory made our courtiers exclaim: "This act proves that the Emperor +of the French is in a situation to bid defiance to all the world, and, +therefore, no longer courts the neutrality of a Prince whose power is +merely artificial; who has indemnities to restore, but no delicacy, no +regard to claims." Such was the language of those very men who, a month +before, declared "that His Prussian Majesty held the balance of peace or +war in his hands; that he was in a position in which no Prussian Monarch +ever was before; that while his neutrality preserved the tranquillity of +the North of Germany, the South of Europe would soon be indebted to his +powerful mediation for the return of peace." + +The real cause of this alteration in our courtiers' political jargon has +not yet been known; but I think it may easily be discovered without any +official publication. Bonaparte had the adroitness to cajole the Cabinet +of Berlin into his interest, in the first month of his consulate, +notwithstanding his own critical situation, as well as the critical +situation of France; and he has ever since taken care both to attach it +to his triumphal car and to inculpate it indirectly in his outrages and +violations. Convinced, as he thought, of the selfishness which guided +all its resolutions, all his attacks and invasions against the law of +nations, or independence of States, were either preceded or followed with +some offers of aggrandizement, of indemnity, of subsidy, or of alliance. +His political intriguers were generally more successful in Prussia than +his military heroes in crossing the Rhine or the Elbe, in laying the +Hanse Towns under contribution, or in occupying Hanover; or, rather, all +these acts of violence and injustice were merely the effects of his +ascendency in Prussia. When it is, besides, remembered what provinces +Prussia accepted from his bounty, what exchange of presents, of ribands, +of private letters passed between Napoleon the First and Frederick +William III., between the Empress of the French and the Queen of Prussia, +it is not surprising if the Cabinet of St. Cloud thought itself sure of +the submission of the Cabinet of Berlin, and did not esteem it enough to +fear it, or to think that it would have spirit enough to resent, or even +honour to feel, the numerous Provocations offered. + +Whatever Bonaparte and Talleyrand write or assert to the contrary, their +gifts are only the wages of their contempt, and they despise more that +State they thus reward than those nations at whose expense they are +liberal, and with whose spoil they delude selfishness or meanness into +their snares. The more legitimate Sovereigns descend from their true +dignity, and a liberal policy, the nearer they approach the baseness of +usurpation and the Machiavellism of rebellion. Like other upstarts, they +never suffer an equal. If you do not keep yourself above them, they will +crush you beneath them. If they have no reason to fear you, they will +create some quarrel to destroy you. + +It is said here that Duroc's journey to Berlin was merely to demand a +passage for the French troops through the Prussian territory in +Franconia, and to prevent the Russian troops from passing through the +Prussian territory in Poland. This request is such as might have been +expected from our Emperor and his Minister. Whether, however, the tone +in which this curious negotiation with a neutral power was begun, or +that, at last, the generosity of the Russian Monarch awakened a sense of +duty in the Cabinet of Berlin, the arrival of our pacific envoy was +immediately followed with warlike preparations. Fortunate, indeed, was +it for Prussia to have resorted to her military strength instead of +trusting any longer to our friendly assurances. The disasters that have +since befallen the Austrian armies in Suabia, partly occasioned by our +forced marches through neutral Prussia, would otherwise soon have been +felt in Westphalia, in Brandenburgh, and in Pomerania. But should His +Prussian Majesty not order his troops to act in conjunction with Russia, +Austria, England, and Sweden, and that very soon, all efforts against +Bonaparte will be vain, as those troops which have dispersed the +Austrians and repulsed the Russians will be more than equal to master the +Prussians, and one campaign may be sufficient to convince the Prussian +Ministers of their folly and errors for years, and to punish them for +their ignorance or selfishness. + +Some preparations made in silence by the Marquis of Lucchesini, his +affected absence from some of our late Court circles, and the number of +spies who now are watching his hotel and his steps, seem to indicate that +Prussia is tired of its impolitic neutrality, and inclined to join the +confederacy against France. At the last assembly at our Prince +Cambaceres's, a rumour circulated that preliminary articles for an +offensive alliance with your country had already been signed by the +Prussian Minister, Baron Von Hardenberg, on one side, and by your +Minister to the Court of Berlin on the other; according to which you were +to take sixty thousand Prussians and twelve thousand Hessians into your +pay, for five years certain. A courier from Duroc was said to have +brought this news, which at first made some impression, but it wore away +by degrees; and our Government, to judge from the expressions of persons +in its confidence, seems more to court than to fear a rupture with +Prussia. Indeed, besides all other reasons to carry on a war in the +North of Europe, Bonaparte's numerous and young generals are impatient to +enrich themselves, as Italy, Switzerland, Holland, and the South of +Germany are almost exhausted. + + + + +LETTER XXX. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The provocations of our Government must have been extraordinary +indeed, when they were able to awaken the Cabinet of Berlin from its long +and incomprehensible infatuation of trusting to the friendly intentions +of honest Talleyrand, and to the disinterested policy of our generous +Bonaparte. To judge its intents from its acts, the favour of the Cabinet +of St. Cloud was not only its wish but its want. You must remember that, +last year, besides his ordinary Ambassador, Da Lucchesini, His Prussian +Majesty was so ill advised as to despatch General Knobelsdorff as his +extra representative, to assist at Napoleon's coronation, a degradation +of lawful sovereignty to which even the Court of Naples, though +surrounded with our troops, refused to subscribe; and, so late as last +June, the same Knobelsdorff did, in the name of his Prince, the honours +at the reviews near Magdeburg, to all the generals of our army in Hanover +who chose to attend there. On this occasion the King lodged in a +farmhouse, the Queen in the house of the curate of Koestelith, while our +sans-culotte officers, Bernadotte & Co., were quartered and treated in +style at the castle of Putzbull, fitted up for their accommodation. This +was certainly very hospitable, and very civil, but it was neither prudent +nor politic. Upstarts, experiencing such a reception from Princes, are +convinced that they are dreaded, because they know that they have not +merit to be esteemed. + +Do not confound this Knobelsdorff with the late Field-marshal of that +name, who, in 1796, answered to a request which our then Ambassador at +Berlin (Abbe Sieges) had made to be introduced to him, NON ET SANS +PHRASE, the very words this regicide used when he sat in judgment on his +King, and voted LA MORT ET SANS PHRASE. This Knobelsdorff is a very +different character. He pretends to be equally conspicuous in the +Cabinet as in the field, in the boudoir as in the study. A demi- +philosopher, a demi-savant, a demi-gallant and a demi-politician, +constitute, all taken together, nothing except an insignificant courtier. +I do not know whether he was among those Prussian officers who, in 1798, +CRIED when it was inserted in the public prints that the Grand Bonaparte +had been killed in an insurrection at Cairo, but of this I am certain, +that were Knobelsdorff to survive Napoleon the First, none of His +Imperial Majesty's own dutiful subjects would mourn him more sincerely +than this subject of the King of Prussia. He is said to possess a great +share of the confidence of his King, who has already employed him in +several diplomatic missions. The principal and most requisite qualities +in a negotiator are political information, inviolable fidelity, +penetrating but unbiased judgment, a dignified firmness, and +condescending manners. I have not been often enough in the society of +General Knobelsdorff to assert whether nature and education have destined +him to illumine or to cloud the Prussian monarchy. + +I have already mentioned in a former letter that it was Count von +Haugwitz who, in 1792, as Prussian Ambassador at Vienna, arranged the +treaty which then united the Austrian and Prussian Eagles against the +Jacobin Cap of Liberty. It is now said in our diplomatic circle that his +second mission to the same capital has for an object the renewal of these +ties, which the Treaty of Basle dissolved; and that our Government, to +impede his success, or to occasion his recall, before he could have time +to conclude, had proposed to Prussia an annual subsidy of thirty millions +of liveres--which it intended to exact from Portugal for its neutrality. +The present respectable appearance of Prussia, shows, however, that +whether the mission of Haugwitz had the desired issue or not, His +Prussian Majesty confides in his army in preference to our parchments. + +Some of our politicians pretend that the present Minister of the foreign +department in Prussia, Baron von Hardenberg, is not such a friend of the +system of neutrality as his predecessor. All the transactions of his +administration seem, nevertheless, to proclaim that, if he wished his +country to take an active part in the present conflict, it would not have +been against France, had she not begun the attack with the invasion of +Anspach and Bayreuth. Let it be recollected that, since his Ministry, +Prussia has acknowledged Bonaparte an Emperor of the French, has +exchanged orders with him, and has sent an extraordinary Ambassador to be +present at his coronation,--not common compliments, even between Princes +connected by the nearest ties of friendship and consanguinity. Under his +administration, the Rhine has been passed to seize the Duc d'Enghien, +and the Elbe to capture Sir George Rumbold; the Hanse Towns have been +pillaged, and even Emden blockaded; and the representations against, +all these outrages have neither been followed by public reparation nor +a becoming resentment; and was it not also Baron von Hardenberg, who, +on the 5th of April, 1795, concluded at Basle that treaty to which we owe +all our conquests and Germany and Italy all their disasters? It is not +probable that the parent of pacification will destroy its own progeny, +if self-preservation does not require it. + +Baron von Hardenberg is both a learned nobleman and an enlightened +statesman, and does equal honour both to his own rank and to the choice +of his Prince. The late Frederick William II. nominated him a Minister +of State and a Counsellor of his Cabinet. On the 26th of January, 1792, +as a directorial Minister, he took possession, in the name of the King of +Prussia, of the Margravates of Anspach and Bayreuth, and the inhabitants +swore before him, as their governor, their oaths of allegiance to their +new Sovereign.--He continued to reside as a kind of viceroy, in these +States, until March, 1795, when he replaced Baron von Goltz as negotiator +with our republican plenipotentiary in Switzerland; but after settling +all differences between Prussia and France, he returned to his former +post at Anspach, where no complaints have been heard against his +Government. + +The ambition of Baron von Hardenberg has always been to obtain the place +he now occupies, and the study of his life has been to gain such +information as would enable him to fill it with distinction. I have +heard it said that in most countries he had for years kept and paid +private agents, who regularly corresponded with him and sent him reports +of what they heard or saw of political intrigue or machinations. One of +these his agents I happened to meet with, in 1796, at Basle, and were I +to conclude from what I observed in him, the Minister has not been very +judicious in his selection of private correspondents. Figure to yourself +a bald-headed personage, about forty years of age, near seven feet high, +deaf as a post, stammering and making convulsive efforts to express a +sentence of five words, which, after all, his gibberish made +unintelligible. His dress was as eccentric as his person was singular, +and his manners corresponded with both. He called himself Baron von +Bulow, and I saw him afterwards, in the autumn of 1797, at Paris, with +the same accoutrements and the same jargon, assuming an air of diplomatic +mystery, even while displaying before me, in a coffee-house, his letters +and instructions from his principal. As might be expected, he had the +adroitness to get himself shut up in the Temple, where, I have been told, +the generosity of your Sir Sidney Smith prevented him from starving. + +No member of the foreign diplomatic corps here possesses either more +knowledge, or a longer experience, than the Prussian Ambassador, Marquis +of Lucchesini. He went with several other philosophers of Italy to +admire the late hero of modern philosophy at Berlin, Frederick the Great, +who received him well, caressed him often, but never trusted or employed +him. I suppose it was not at the mention of the Marquis's name for the +place of a governor of some province that this Monarch said, "My subjects +of that province have always been dutiful; a philosopher shall never rule +in my name but over people with whom I am discontented, or whom I intend +to chastise." This Prince was not unacquainted with the morality of his +sectaries. + +During the latter part of the life of this King, the Marquis of +Lucchesini was frequently of his literary and convivial parties; but he +was neither his friend nor his favourite, but his listener. It was first +under Frederick William II. that he began his diplomatic career, with an +appointment as Minister from Prussia to the late King of Poland. His +first act in this post. was a treaty signed on the 29th of March, 1790, +with the King and Republic of Poland, which changed an elective monarchy +into an hereditary one; but, notwithstanding the Cabinet of Berlin had +guaranteed this alteration, and the constitution decreed in consequence, +in 1791, three years afterwards Russian and Prussian bayonets annihilated +both, and selfishness banished faith. + +In July, 1790, he assisted as a Prussian plenipotentiary at the +conferences at Reichenback, together with the English and Dutch +Ambassadors, having for object a pacification between Austria and Turkey. +In December of the same year he went with the same Ministers to the +Congress at Sistova, where, in May, 1791, he signed the Treaty of Peace +between the Grand Seignior and the Emperor of Germany. In June, 1792, he +was a second time sent as a Minister to Warsaw, where he remained until +January, 1793, when he was promoted to the post of Ambassador at the +Court of Vienna. He continued, however, to reside with His Prussian +Majesty during the greatest part of the campaign on the Rhine, and +signed, on the 24th of June, 1793, in the camp before Mentz, an offensive +and defensive alliance with your Court; an alliance which Prussian policy +respected not above eighteen months. In October, 1796, he requested his +recall, but this his Sovereign refused, with the most gracious +expressions; and he could not obtain it until March, 1797. Some +disapprobation of the new political plan introduced by Count von Haugwitz +in the Cabinet at Berlin is supposed to have occasioned his determination +to retire from public employment. As he, however, continued to reside in +the capital of Prussia, and, as many believed, secretly intrigued to +appear again upon the scene, the nomination, in 1800, to his present +important post was as much the consequence of his own desire as of the +favour of his King. + +The Marquis of Lucchesini lives here in great style at the beautiful +Hotel de l'Infantado, where his lady's routs, assemblies, and circles are +the resort of our most fashionable gentry. Madame da Lucchesini is more +agreeable than handsome, more fit to shine at Berlin than at Paris; for +though her manners are elegant, they want that ease, that finish which a +German or Italian education cannot teach, nor a German or Italian society +confer. To judge from the number of her admirers, she seems to know that +she is married to a philosopher. Her husband was born at Lucca, in +Italy, and is, therefore, at present a subject of Bonaparte's brother-in- +law, Prince Bacciochi, to whom, when His Serene Highness was a marker at +a billiard-table, I have had the honour of giving many a shilling, as +well as many a box on the ear. + + + + +LETTER XXXI. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The unexampled cruelty of our Government to your countryman, +Captain Wright, I have heard reprobated, even by some of our generals and +public functionaries, as unjust as well as disgraceful. At a future +General Congress, should ever Bonaparte suffer one to be convoked, except +under his auspices and dictature, the distinction and treatment of +prisoners of war require to be again regulated, that the valiant warrior +may not for the future be confounded with, and treated as, a treacherous +spy; nor innocent travellers, provided with regular passes, visiting a +country either for business or for pleasure, be imprisoned, like men +taken while combating with arms in their hands. + +You remember, no doubt, from history, that many of our ships--that, +during the reigns of George I. and II., carried to Ireland and Scotland, +and landed there, the adherents and partisans of the House of Stuart were +captured on their return or on their passage; and that your Government +never seized the commanders of these vessels, to confine them as State +criminals, much less to torture or murder them in the Tower. If I am not +mistaken, the whole squadron which, in 1745, carried the Pretender and +his suite to Scotland, was taken by your cruisers; and the officers and +men experienced no worse or different treatment than their fellow +prisoners of war; though the distance is immense between the crime of +plotting against the lawful Government of the Princes of the House of +Brunswick, and the attempt to disturb the usurpation of an upstart of the +House of Bonaparte. But, even during the last war, how many of our ships +of the line, frigates, and cutters, did you not take, which had landed +rebels in Ireland, emissaries in Scotland, and malefactors in Wales; and +yet your generosity prevented you from retaliating, even at the time when +your Sir Sidney Smith, and this same unfortunate Captain Wright, were +confined in our State prison of the Temple! It is with Governments as +with individuals, they ought to be just before they are generous. Had +you in 1797, or in 1798, not endured our outrages so patiently, you would +not now have to lament, nor we to blush for, the untimely end of Captain +Wright. + +From the last time that this officer had appeared before the criminal +tribunal which condemned Georges and Moreau, his fate was determined on +by our Government. His firmness offended, and his patriotism displeased; +and as he seemed to possess the confidence of his own Government, it was +judged that he was in its secrets; it was, therefore, resolved that, if +he refused to become a traitor, he should perish a victim. Desmarets, +Fouche's private secretary, who is also the secretary of the secret and +haute police, therefore ordered him to another private interrogatory. +Here he was offered a considerable sum of money, and the rank of an +admiral in our service, if he would divulge what he knew of the plans of +his Government, of its connections with the discontented in this country, +and of its means of keeping up a correspondence with them. He replied, +as might have been expected, with indignation, to such offers and to such +proposals, but as they were frequently repeated with new allurements, he +concluded with remaining silent and giving no answers at all. He was +then told that the torture would soon restore him his voice, and some +select gendarmes seized him and laid him on the rack; there he uttered no +complaint, not even a sigh, though instruments the most diabolical were +employed, and pains the most acute must have been endured. When +threatened that he should expire in torments, he said: + +"I do not fear to die, because my country will avenge my murder, while my +God receives my soul." During the two hours of the first day that he was +stretched on the rack, his left arm and right leg were broken, and his +nails torn from the toes of both feet; he then passed into the hands of a +surgeon, and was under his care for five weeks, but, before he was +perfectly cured, he was carried to another private interrogatory, at +which, besides Desmarets, Fouche and Real were present. + +The Minister of Police now informed him that, from the mutilated state of +his body, and from the sufferings he had gone through, he must be +convinced that it was not the intention of the French Government ever to +restore him to his native country, where he might relate occurrences +which the policy of France required to be buried in oblivion; he, +therefore, had no choice between serving the Emperor of the French, or +perishing within the walls of the prison where he was confined. He +replied that he was resigned to his destiny, and would die as he had +lived, faithful to his King and to his country. + +The man in full possession of his mental qualities and corporeal strength +is, in most cases, very different from that unfortunate being whose mind +is, enervated by sufferings and whose body is weakened by wants. For +five months Captain Wright had seen only gaolers, spies, tyrants, +executioners, fetters, racks, and other tortures; and for five weeks his +food had been bread and his drink water. The man who, thus situated and +thus perplexed, preserves his native dignity and innate sentiments, is +more worthy of monuments, statues, or altars than either the legislator, +the victor, or the saint. + +This interrogatory was the last undergone by Captain Wright. He was then +again stretched on the rack, and what is called by our regenerators the +INFERNAL torments, were inflicted on him. After being pinched with red- +hot irons all over his body, brandy, mixed with gunpowder, was infused in +the numerous wounds and set fire to several times until nearly burned to +the bones. In the convulsions, the consequence of these terrible +sufferings, he is said to have bitten off a part of his tongue, though, +as before, no groans were heard. As life still remained, he was again +put under the care of his former surgeon; but, as he was exceedingly +exhausted, a spy, in the dress of a Protestant clergyman, presented +himself as if to read prayers with him. Of this offer he accepted; but +when this man began to ask some insidious questions, he cast on him a +look of contempt and never spoke to him more. At last, seeing no means +to obtain any information from him, a mameluke last week strangled him in +his bed. Thus expired a hero whose fate has excited more compassion, +and whose character has received more admiration here, than any of our +great men who have fallen fighting for our Emperor. Captain Wright has +diffused new rays of renown and glory on the British name, from his tomb +as well as from his dungeon. + +You have certainly a right to call me to an account for all the +particulars I have related of this scandalous and abominable transaction, +and, though I cannot absolutely guarantee the truth of the narration, +I am perfectly satisfied of it myself, and I hope to explain myself to +your satisfaction. Your unfortunate countryman was attended by and under +the care of a surgeon of the name of Vaugeard, who gained his confidence, +and was worthy of it, though employed in that infamous gaol. Either from +disgust of life, or from attachment to Captain Wright, he survived him +only twelve hours, during which he wrote the shocking details I have +given you, and sent them to three of the members of the foreign +diplomatic corps, with a prayer to have them forwarded to Sir Sidney +Smith or to Mr. Windham, that those his friends might be informed that, +to his last moment, Captain Wright was worthy of their protection and +kindness. From one of those Ministers I have obtained the original in +Vaugeard's own handwriting. + +I know that Bonaparte and Talleyrand promised the release of Captain +Wright to the Spanish Ambassador; but, at that time, he had already +suffered once on the rack, and this liberality on their part was merely a +trick to impose upon the credulity of the Spaniard or to get rid of his +importunities. Had it been otherwise, Captain Wright, like Sir George +Rumbold, would himself have been the first to announce in your country +the recovery of his liberty. + + + + +LETTER XXXII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +My LORD:--Should Bonaparte again return here victorious, and a +pacificator, great changes in our internal Government and constitution +are expected, and will certainly occur. Since the legislative corps has +completed the Napoleon code of civil and criminal justice, it is +considered by the Emperor not only as useless, but troublesome and +superfluous. For the same reasons the tribunate will also be laid aside, +and His Majesty will rule the French Empire, with the assistance of his +Senate, and with the advice of his Council of State, exclusively. You +know that the Senators, as well as the Councillors of State, are +nominated by the Emperor; that he changes the latter according to his +whim, and that, though the former, according to the present constitution, +are to hold their offices for life, the alterations which remove entirely +the legislature and the tribunate may also make Senators movable. But as +all members of the Senate are favourites or relatives, he will probably +not think it necessary to resort to such a measure of policy. + +In a former letter I have already mentioned the heterogeneous composition +of the Senate. The tribunate and legislative corps are worthy to figure +by its side; their members are also ci-devant mechanics of all +descriptions, debased attorneys or apostate priests, national spoilers +or rebellious regicides, degraded nobles or dishonoured officers. +The nearly unanimous vote of these corps for a consulate for life, +and for an hereditary Emperor, cannot, therefore, either be expressive of +the national will, or constitute the legality of Bonaparte's sovereignty. + +In the legislature no vote opposed, and no voice declaimed against, +Bonaparte's Imperial dignity; but in the tribunate, Carnot--the +infamously notorious Carnot--'pro forma', and with the permission of the +Emperor 'in petto', spoke against the return of a monarchical form of +Government. This farce of deception and roguery did not impose even on +our good Parisians, otherwise, and so frequently, the dupes of all our +political and revolutionary mountebanks. Had Carnot expressed a +sentiment or used a word not previously approved by Bonaparte, instead of +reposing himself in the tribunate, he would have been wandering in +Cayenne. + +Son of an obscure attorney at Nolay, in Burgundy, he was brought up, like +Bonaparte, in one of those military schools established by the +munificence of the French Monarchs; and had obtained, from the late +King, the commission of a captain of engineers when the Revolution broke +out. He was particularly indebted to the Prince of Conde for his support +during the earlier part of his life, and yet he joined the enemies of his +house, and voted for the death of Louis XVI. A member, with Robespierre +and Barrere, of the Committee of Public Safety, he partook of their +power, as well as of their crimes, though he has been audacious enough to +deny that he had anything to do with other transactions than those of the +armies. Were no other proofs to the contrary collected, a letter of his +own hand to the ferocious Lebon, at Arras, is a written evidence which he +is unable to refute. It is dated November 16th, 1793. "You must take," +says he, "in your energy, all measures of terror commanded or required by +present circumstances. Continue your revolutionary attitude; never mind +the amnesty pronounced with the acceptance of the absurd constitution of +1791; it is a crime which cannot extenuate other crimes. Anti- +republicans can only expiate their folly under the age of the guillotine. +The public Treasury will always pay the journeys and expenses of +informers, because they have deserved well of their country. Let all +suspected traitors expire by the sword or by fire; continue to march upon +that revolutionary line so well delineated by you. The committee +applauds all your undertakings, all your measures of vigour; they are not +only all permitted, but commanded by your mission." Most of the decrees +concerning the establishment of revolutionary tribunals, and particularly +that for the organization of the atrocious military commission at Orange, +were signed by him. + +Carnot, as an officer of engineers, certainly is not without talents; +but his presumption in declaring himself the sole author of those plans +of campaign which, during the years 1794, 1795, and 1796, were so +triumphantly executed by Pichegru, Moreau, and Bonaparte, is impertinent, +as well as unfounded. At the risk of his own life, Pichegru entirely +altered the plan sent him by the Committee of Public Safety; and it was +Moreau's masterly retreat, which no plan of campaign could prescribe, +that made this general so famous. The surprising successes of Bonaparte +in Italy were both unexpected and unforeseen by the Directory; and, +according to Berthier's assertion, obliged the, commander-in-chief, +during the first four months, to change five times his plans of +proceedings and undertakings. + +During his temporary sovereignty as a director, Carnot honestly has made +a fortune of twelve millions of livres; which has enabled him not only to +live in style with his wife, but also to keep in style two sisters, of +the name of Aublin, as his mistresses. He was the friend of the father +of these girls, and promised him, when condemned to the guillotine in +1793, to be their second father; but he debauched and ruined them both +before either was fourteen years of age; and young Aublin, who, in 1796, +reproached him with the infamy of his conduct, was delivered up by him to +a military commission, which condemned him to be shot as an emigrant. +He has two children by each of these unfortunate girls. + +Bonaparte employs Carnot, but despises and mistrusts him; being well +aware that, should another National Convention be convoked, and the +Emperor of the French be arraigned, as the King of France was, he would, +with as great pleasure, vote for the execution of Napoleon the First as +he did for that of Louis XVI. He has waded too far in blood and crime to +retrograde. + +To this sample of a modern tribune I will add a specimen of a modern +legislator. Baptiste Cavaignae was, before the Revolution, an excise +officer, turned out of his place for infidelity; but the department of +Lot electing him, in 1792, a representative of the people to the National +Convention, he there voted for the death of Louis XVI. and remained a +faithful associate of Marat and Robespierre. After the evacuation of +Verdun by the Prussians, in October, 1792, he made a report to the +Convention, according to which eighty-four citizens of that town were +arrested and executed. Among these were twenty-two young girls, under +twenty years of age, whose crime was the having presented nosegays to the +late King of Prussia on his entry after the surrender of Verdun. He was +afterwards a national commissary with the armies on the coast near Brest, +on the Rhine, and in Western Pyrenees, and everywhere he signalized +himself by unheard of ferocities and sanguinary deeds. The following +anecdote, printed and published by our revolutionary annalist, Prudhomme, +will give you some idea of the morality of this our regenerator and +Imperial Solon: "Cavaignac and another deputy, Pinet," writes Prudhomme, +"had ordered a box to be kept for them at the play-house at Bayonne on +the evening they expected to arrive in that town. Entering very late, +they found two soldiers, who had seen the box empty, placed in its front. +These they ordered immediately to be arrested, and condemned them, for +having outraged the national representation, to be guillotined on the +next day, when they both were accordingly executed!" Labarrere, a +provost of the Marechaussee at Dax, was in prison as a suspected person. +His daughter, a very handsome girl of seventeen, lived with an aunt at +Severe. The two pro-consuls passing through that place, she threw +herself at their feet, imploring mercy for her parent. This they not +only promised, but offered her a place in their carriage to Dax, that she +might see him restored to liberty. On the road the monsters insisted on +a ransom for the blood of her father. Waiting, afflicted and ashamed, +at a friend's house at Dag, the accomplishment of a promise so dearly +purchased, she heard the beating of the alarm drum, and looked, from +curiosity, through the window, when she saw her unfortunate parent +ascending the scaffold! After having remained lifeless for half an hour, +she recovered her senses an instant, when she exclaimed: + +"Oh, the barbarians! they violated me while flattering me with the hope +of saving my father!" and then expired. In October, 1795, Cavaignac +assisted Barras and Bonaparte in the destruction of some thousands of +men, women, and children in the streets of this capital, and was, +therefore, in 1796, made by the Directory an inspector-general of the +customs; and, in 1803, nominated by Bonaparte a legislator. His +colleague, Citizen Pinet, is now one of our Emperor's Counsellors of +State, and both are commanders of His Majesty's Legion of Honour; rich, +respected, and frequented by our most fashionable ladies and gentlemen. + + + + +LETTER XXXIII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--I suppose your Government too vigilant and too patriotic not to +be informed of the great and uninterrupted activity which reigns in our +arsenals, dockyards, and seaports. I have seen a plan, according to +which Bonaparte is enabled, and intends, to build twenty ships of the +line and ten frigates, besides cutters, in the year, for ten years to +come. I read the calculation of the expenses, the names of the forests +where the timber is to be cut, of the foreign countries where a part of +the necessary materials are already engaged, and of our own departments +which are to furnish the remainder. The whole has been drawn up in a +precise and clear manner by Bonaparte's Maritime Prefect at Antwerp, +M. Malouet, well known in your country, where he long remained as an +emigrant, and, I believe, was even employed by your Ministers. + +You may, perhaps, smile at this vast naval scheme of Bonaparte; but if +you consider that he is the master of all the forests, mines, and +productions of France, Italy, and of a great part of Germany, with all +the navigable rivers and seaports of these countries and Holland, and +remember also the character of the man, you will, perhaps, think it less +impracticable. The greatest obstacle he has to encounter, and to remove, +is want of experienced naval officers, though even in this he has +advanced greatly since the present war, during which he has added to his +naval forces twenty--nine ships of the line, thirty--four frigates, +twenty-one cutters, three thousand prams, gunboats, pinnaces, etc., with +four thousand naval officers and thirty-seven thousand sailors, according +to the same account, signed by Malouet. It is true that most of our new +naval heroes have never ventured far from our coast, and all their naval +laurels have been gathered under our land batteries; but the impulse is +given to the national spirit, and our conscripts in the maritime +departments prefer, to a man, the navy to the army, which was not +formerly the case. + +It cannot have escaped your observation that the incorporation of Genoa +procured us, in the South of our Empire, a naval station and arsenal, as +a counterpoise to Antwerp, our new naval station in the North, where +twelve ships of the line have been built, or are building, since 1803, +and where timber and other materials are collected for eight more. At +Genoa, two ships of the line and four frigates have lately been launched, +and four ships and two frigates are on the stocks; and the Genoese +Republic has added sixteen thousand seafaring men to our navy. Should +Bonaparte terminate successfully the present war, Naples and Venice will +increase the number of our seaports and resources on the borders of the +Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas. All his courtiers say that he will +conquer Italy in Germany, and determine at Vienna--the fate of London. + +Of all our admirals, however, we have not one to compare with your +Nelson, your Hood, your St. Vincent, and your Cornwallis. By the +appointment of Murat as grand admiral, Bonaparte seems to indicate that +he is inclined to imitate the example of Louis. XVI., in the beginning of +his reign, and entrust the chief command of his fleets and squadrons to +military men of approved capacity and courage, officers of his land +troops. Last June, when he expected a probable junction of the fleet +under Villeneuve with the squadron under Admiral Winter, and the union of +both with Ganteaume at Brest, Murat was to have had the chief command of +the united French, Spanish, and Batavian fleets, and to support the +landing of our troops in your country; but the arrival of Lord Nelson in +the West Indies, and the victory of Admiral Calder, deranged all our +plans and postponed all our designs, which the Continental war has +interrupted; to be commenced, God knows when. + +The best amongst our bad admirals is certainly Truguet; but he was +disgraced last year, and exiled twenty leagues from the coast, for having +declared too publicly "that our flotillas would never be serviceable +before our fleets were superior to yours, when they would become +useless." An intriguer by long habit and by character, having neither +property nor principles, he joined the Revolution, and was the second in +command under Latouche, in the first republican fleet that left our +harbours. He directed the expedition against Sardinia, in January, 1793, +during which he acquired neither honour nor glory, being repulsed with +great loss by the inhabitants. After being imprisoned under Robespierre, +the Directory made him a Minister of the marine, an Ambassador to Spain, +and a Vice-Admiral of France. In this capacity he commanded at Brest, +during the first eighteen months of the present war. He has an +irreconcilable foe in Talleyrand, with whom he quarrelled, when on his +embassy in Spain, about some extortions at Madrid, which he declined to +share with his principal at Paris. Such was our Minister's inveteracy +against him in 1798, that a directorial decree placed him on the list of +emigrants, because he remained in Spain after having been recalled to +France. In 1799, during Talleyrand's disgrace, Truguet returned here, +and, after in vain challenging his enemy to fight, caned him in the +Luxembourg gardens, a chastisement which our premier bore with true +Christian patience. Truguet is not even a member of the Legion of +Honour. + +Villeneuve is supposed not much inferior in talents, experience, and +modesty to Truguet. He was, before the Revolution, a lieutenant of the +royal navy; but his principles did not prevent him from deserting to the +colours of the enemies of royalty, who promoted him first to a captain +and afterwards to an admiral. + +His first command as such was over a division of the Toulon fleet, which, +in the winter of 1797, entered Brest. In the battle at Aboukir he was +the second in command; and, after the death of Admiral Brueys, he rallied +the ships which had escaped, and sailed for Malta, where, two years +afterwards, he signed, with General Vaubois, the capitulation of that +island. When hostilities again broke out, he commanded in the West +Indies, and, leaving his station, escaped your cruisers, and was +appointed first to the chief command of the Rochefort, and afterwards the +Toulon fleet, on the death of Admiral Latouche. Notwithstanding the +gasconade of his report of his negative victory over Admiral Calder, +Villeneuve is not a Gascon by birth, but only, by sentiment. + +Ganteaume does not possess either the intriguing character of Truguet or +the valorous one of Villeneuve. + +Before the Revolution he was a mate of a merchantman, but when most of +the officers of the former royal navy had emigrated or perished, he was, +in 1793, made a captain of the republican navy, and in 1796 an admiral. +During the battle of Aboukir he was the chief of the staff, under Admiral +Brueys, and saved himself by swimming, when l'Orient took fire and blew +up. Bonaparte wrote to him on this occasion: "The picture you have sent +me of the disaster of l'Orient, and of your own dreadful situation, is +horrible; but be assured that, having such a miraculous escape, DESTINY +intends you to avenge one day our navy and our friends." This note was +written in August, 1798, shortly after Bonaparte had professed himself a +Mussulman. + +When, in the summer of 1799, our general-in-chief had determined to leave +his army of Egypt to its destiny, Ganteaume equipped and commanded the +squadron of frigates which brought him to Europe, and was, after his +consulate, appointed a Counsellor of State and commander at Brest. In +1800 he escaped with a division of the Brest fleet to Toulon, and, in the +summer of 1801, when he was ordered to carry succours to Egypt, your ship +Skitsure fell in with him, and was captured. As he did not, however, +succeed in landing in Egypt the troops on board his ships, a temporary +disgrace was incurred, and he was deprived of the command, but made a +maritime prefect. Last year favour was restored him, with the command of +our naval forces at Brest. All officers who have served under Ganteaume +agree that, let his fleet be ever so superior, he will never fight if he +can avoid it, and that, in orderly times, his capacity would, at the +utmost, make him regarded as a good master of a merchantman, and nothing +else. + +Of the present commander of our, flotilla at Boulogne, Lacrosse, I will +also say some few words. A lieutenant before the Revolution, he became, +in 1789, one of the most ardent and violent Jacobins, and in 1792 was +employed by the friend of the Blacks, and our Minister, Monge, as an +emissary in the West Indies, to preach there to the negroes the rights of +man and insurrection against the whites, their masters. In 1800, +Bonaparte advanced him to a captain-general at Guadeloupe, an island +which his plots, eight years before, had involved in all the horrors of +anarchy, and where, when he now attempted to restore order, his former +instruments rose against him and forced him to escape to one of your +islands--I believe Dominico. Of this island, in return for his +hospitable reception, he took plans, according to which our General +Lagrange endeavoured to conquer it last spring. Lacrosse is a perfect +revolutionary fanatic, unprincipled, cruel, unfeeling, and intolerant. +His presumption is great, but his talents are trifling. + + + + +LETTER XXXIV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The defeat of the Austrians has excited great satisfaction +among our courtiers and public functionaries; but the mass of the +inhabitants here are too miserable to feel for anything else but their +own sufferings. They know very well that every victory rivets their +fetters, that no disasters can make them more heavy, and no triumph +lighter. Totally indifferent about external occurrences, as well as +about internal oppressions, they strive to forget both the past and the +present, and to be indifferent as to the future; they would be glad could +they cease to feel that they exist. The police officers were now, with +their gendarmes, bayoneting them into illuminations for Bonaparte's +successes, as they dragooned them last year into rejoicings for his +coronation. I never observed before so much apathy; and in more than one +place I heard the people say, "Oh! how much better we should be with +fewer victories and more tranquillity, with less splendour and more +security, with an honest peace instead of a brilliant war." But in a +country groaning under a military government, the opinions of the people +are counted for nothing. + +At Madame Joseph Bonaparte's circle, however, the countenances were not +so gloomy. There a real or affected joy seemed to enliven the usual +dullness of these parties; some actors were repeating patriotic verses in +honour of the victor; while others were singing airs or vaudevilles, +to inspire our warriors with as much hatred towards your nation as +gratitude towards our Emperor. It is certainly neither philosophical +nor philanthropical not to exclude the vilest of all passions, HATRED, +on such a happy occasion. Martin, in the dress of a conscript, sang six +long couplets against the tyrants of the seas; of which I was only able +to retain the following one: + + Je deteste le peuple anglais, + Je deteste son ministere; + J'aime l'Empereur des Francais, + J'aime la paix, je hais la guerre; + Mais puisqu'il faut la soutenir + Contre une Nation Sauvage, + Mon plus doux, mon plus grand desir + Est de montrer tout mon courage. + +But what arrested my attention, more than anything else which occurred in +this circle on that evening, was a printed paper mysteriously handed +about, and of which, thanks to the civility of a Counsellor of State, +I at last got a sight. It was a list of those persons, of different +countries, whom the Emperor of the French has fixed upon, to replace all +the ancient dynasties of Europe within twenty years to come. From the +names of these individuals, some of whom are known to me, I could +perceive that Bonaparte had more difficulty to select proper Emperors, +Kings, and Electors, than he would have had, some years ago, to choose +directors or consuls. Our inconsistency is, however, evident even here; +I did not read a name that is not found in the annals of Jacobinism and +republicanism. We have, at the same time, taken care not to forget +ourselves in this new distribution of supremacy. France is to furnish +the stock of the new dynasties for Austria, England, Spain, Denmark, and +Sweden. What would you think, were you to awake one morning the subject +of King Arthur O'Connor the First? You would, I dare say, be even more +surprised than I am in being the subject of Napoleon Bonaparte the First. +You know, I suppose, that O'Connor is a general of division, and a +commander of the Legion of Honour,--the bosom friend of Talleyrand, and +courting, at this moment, a young lady, a relation of our Empress, whose +portion may one day be an Empire. But I am told that, notwithstanding +Talleyrand's recommendations, and the approbation of Her Majesty, the +lady prefers a colonel, her own countryman, to the Irish general. +Should, however, our Emperor announce his determination, she would be +obliged to marry as he commands, were he even to give her his groom, or +his horse, for a spouse. + +You can form no idea how wretched and despised all the Irish rebels are +here. O'Connor alone is an exception; and this he owes to Talleyrand, +to General Valence, and to Madame de Genlis; but even he is looked on +with a sneer, and, if he ever was respected in England, must endure with +poignancy the contempt to which he is frequently exposed in France. When +I was in your country I often heard it said that the Irish were generally +considered as a debased and perfidious people, extremely addicted to +profligacy and drunkenness, and, when once drunk, more cruelly ferocious +than even our Jacobins. I thought it then, and I still believe it, +a national prejudice, because I am convinced that the vices or virtues of +all civilized nations are relatively the same; but those Irish rebels we +have seen here, and who must be, like our Jacobins, the very dregs of +their country, have conducted themselves so as to inspire not only +mistrust but abhorrence. It is also an undeniable truth that they were +greatly disappointed by our former and present Government. They expected +to enjoy liberty and equality, and a pension for their treachery; but our +police commissaries caught them at their landing, our gendarmes escorted +them as criminals to their place of destination, and there they received +just enough to prevent them from starving. If they complained they were +put in irons, and if they attempted to escape they were sent to the +galleys as malefactors or shot as spies. Despair, therefore, no doubt +induced many to perpetrate acts of which they were accused, and to rob, +swindle, and murder, because they were punished as thieves and assassins. +But, some of them, who have been treated in the most friendly, +hospitable, and generous manner in this capital, have proved themselves +ungrateful, as well as infamous. A lady of my acquaintance, of a once +large fortune, had nothing left but some furniture, and her subsistence +depended upon what she got by letting furnished lodgings. Mischance +brought three young Irishmen to her house, who pretended to be in daily +expectation of remittances from their country, and of a pension from +Bonaparte. During six months she not only lodged and supported them, but +embarrassed herself to procure them linen and a decent apparel. At last +she was informed that each of, them had been allowed sixty livres--in the +month, and that arrears had been paid them for nine months. Their debt +to her was above three thousand livres--but the day after she asked for +payment they decamped, and one of them persuaded her daughter, a girl of +fourteen, to elope with him, and to assist him in robbing her mother of +all her plate.--He has, indeed, been since arrested and sentenced to the +galleys for eight years; but this punishment neither restored the +daughter her virtue nor the mother her property. The other two denied +their debts, and, as she had no other evidence but her own scraps of +accounts, they could not be forced to pay; their obdurate effrontery and +infamy, however, excited such an indignation in the judges, that they +delivered them over as swindlers to the Tribunal Correctional; and the +Minister of Police ordered them to be transported as rogues and vagabonds +to the colonies. The daughter died shortly after, in consequence of a +miscarriage, and the mother did not survive her more than a month, and +ended her days in the Hotel Dieu, one of our common hospitals. Thus, +these depraved young men ruined and murdered their benefactress and her +child; and displayed, before they were thirty, such a consummate villainy +as few wretches grown hoary in vice have perpetrated. This act of +scandalous notoriety injured the Irish reputation very much in this +country; for here, as in many other places, inconsiderate people are apt +to judge a whole nation according to the behaviour of some few of its +outcasts. + + + + +LETTER XXXV. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--The plan of the campaign of the Austrians is incomprehensible +to all our military men--not on account of its profundity, but on account +of its absurdity or incoherency. In the present circumstances, half- +measures must always be destructive, and it is better to strike strongly +and firmly than justly. To invade Bavaria without disarming the Bavarian +army, and to enter Suabia and yet acknowledge the neutrality of +Switzerland, are such political and military errors as require long +successes to repair, but which such an enemy as Bonaparte always takes +care not to leave unpunished. + +The long inactivity of the army under the Archduke Charles has as much +surprised us as the defeat of the army under General von Mack; but from +what I know of the former, I am persuaded that he would long since have +pushed forward had not his movements been unfortunately combined with +those of the latter. The House of Lorraine never produced a more valiant +warrior, nor Austria a more liberal or better instructed statesman, than +this Prince. Heir to the talents of his ancestors, he has commanded, +with glory, against France during the revolutionary war; and, although he +sometimes experienced defeats, he has rendered invaluable services to the +chief of his House by his courage, by his activity, by his constancy, and +by that salutary firmness which, in calling the generals and superior +officers to their duty, has often reanimated the confidence and the +ardour of the soldier. + +The Archduke Charles began, in 1793, his military career under the Prince +of Coburg, the commander-in-chief of the Austrian armies in Brabant, +where he commanded the advanced guard, and distinguished himself by a +valour sometimes bordering on temerity, but which, by degrees, acquired +him that esteem and popularity, among the troops often very advantageous +to him afterwards. He was, in 1794, appointed governor and captain- +general of the Low Countries, and a Field-marshal lieutenant of the army +of the German Empire. In April, 1796, he took the command-in-chief of +the armies of Austria and of the Empire, and, in the following June, +engaged in several combats with General Moreau, in which he was repulsed, +but in a manner that did equal honour to the victor and to the +vanquished. + +The Austrian army on the Lower Rhine, under General Wartensleben, having, +about this time, been nearly dispersed by General Jourdan, the Archduke +left some divisions of his forces under General Latour, to impede the +progress of Moreau, and went with the remainder into Franconia, where he +defeated Jourdan near Amberg and Wurzburg, routed his army entirely, and +forced him to repass the Rhine in the greatest confusion, and with +immense loss. The retreat of Moreau was the consequence of the victories +of this Prince. After the capture of Kehl, in January, 1797, he assumed +the command of the army of Italy, where he in vain employed all his +efforts to put a stop to the victorious progress of Bonaparte, with whom, +at last, he signed the preliminaries of peace at Leoben. In the spring +of 1799, he again defeated Jourdan in Suabia, as he had done two years +before in Franconia; but in Switzerland he met with an abler adversary in +General Massena; still, I am inclined to think that he displayed there +more real talents than anywhere else; and that this part of his campaign +of 1799 was the most interesting, in a military point of view. + +The most implacable enemies of the politics of the House of Austria +render justice to the plans, to the frankness, to the morality of +Archduke Charles; and, what is remarkable, of all the chiefs who have +commanded against revolutionary France, he alone has seized the true +manner of combating enthusiasts or slaves; at least, his proclamations +are the only ones composed with adroitness, and are what they ought to +be, because in them an appeal is made to the public opinion at a time +when opinion almost constitutes half the strength of armies. + +The present opposer of this Prince in Italy is one of our best, as well +as most fortunate, generals. A Sardinian subject, and a deserter from +the Sardinian troops, he assisted, in 1792, our commander, General +Anselm, in the conquest of the county of Nice, rather as a spy than as a +soldier. His knowledge of the Maritime Alps obtained, in 1793, a place +on our staff, where, from the services he rendered, the rank of a general +of brigade was soon conferred on him. In 1796 he was promoted to serve +as a general of division under Bonaparte in Italy, where he distinguished +himself so much that when, in 1798, General Berthier was ordered to +accompany the army of the East to Egypt, he succeeded him as commander- +in-chief of our troops in the temporary Roman Republic. But his +merciless pillage, and, perhaps, the idea of his being a foreigner, +brought on a mutiny, and the Directory was obliged to recall him. It was +his campaign in Switzerland of 1799, and his defence of Genoa in 1800, +that principally ranked him high as a military chief. After the battle +of Marengo he received the command of the army of Italy; but his +extortions produced a revolt among the inhabitants, and he lived for some +time in retreat and disgrace, after a violent quarrel with Bonaparte, +during which many severe truths were said and heard on both sides. + +After the Peace of Luneville, he seemed inclined to join Moreau, and +other discontented generals; but observing, no doubt, their want of views +and union, he retired to an estate he has bought near Paris, where +Bonaparte visited him, after the rupture with your country, and made him, +we may conclude, such offers as tempted him to leave his retreat. Last +year he was nominated one of our Emperor's Field-marshals, and as such +he relieved Jourdan of the command in the kingdom of Italy. He has +purchased with a part of his spoil, for fifteen millions of livres-- +property in France and Italy; and is considered worth double that sum in +jewels, money, and other valuables. + +Massena is called, in France, the spoiled child of fortune; and as +Bonaparte, like our former Cardinal Mazarin, has more confidence in +fortune than in merit, he is, perhaps, more indebted to the former than +to the latter for his present situation; his familiarity has made him +disliked at our Imperial Court, where he never addresses Napoleon and +Madame Bonaparte as an Emperor or an Empress without smiling. + +General St. Cyr, our second in command of the army of Italy, is also an +officer of great talents and distinctions. He was, in 1791, only a +cornet, but in 1795, he headed, as a general, a division of the army of +the Rhine. In his report to the Directory, during the famous retreat of +1796, Moreau speaks highly of this general, and admits that his. +achievements, in part, saved the republican army. During 1799 he served +in Italy, and in 1800 he commanded the centre of the army of the Rhine, +and assisted in gaining the victory of Hohenlinden. After the Peace of +Lundville, he was appointed a Counsellor of State of the military +section, a place he still occupies, notwithstanding his present +employment. Though under forty years of age, he is rather infirm, from +the fatigues he has undergone and the wounds he has received. Although +he has never combated as a general-in-chief, there is no doubt but that +he would fill such a place with honour to himself and advantage to his +country. + +Of the general officers who command under Archduke Charles, Comte de +Bellegarde is already known by his exploits during the last war. He had +distinguished himself already in 1793, particularly when Valenciennes and +Maubeuge were besieged by the united Austrian and English forces; and, in +1794, he commanded the column at the head of which the Emperor marched, +when Landrecy was invested. In 1796, he was one of the members of the +Council of the Archduke Charles, when this Prince commanded for the first +time as a general-in-chief, on which occasion he was promoted to a Field- +marshal lieutenant. + +He displayed again great talents during the campaign of 1799, when he +headed a small corps, placed between General Suwarow in Italy, and +Archduke Charles in Switzerland; and in this delicate post he contributed +equally to the success of both. After the Peace of Luneville he was +appointed a commander-in-chief for the Emperor in the ci-devant Venetian +States, where the troops composing the army under the Archduke Charles +were, last summer, received and inspected by him, before the arrival of +the Prince. He is considered by military men as greatly superior to most +of the generals now employed by the Emperor of Germany. + + + + +LETTER XXXVI. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--"I would give my brother, the Emperor of Germany, one further +piece of advice. Let him hasten to make peace. This is the crisis when, +he must recollect, all States must have an end. The idea of the +approaching extinction of the, dynasty of Lorraine must impress him with +horror." When Bonaparte ordered this paragraph to be inserted in the +Moniteur, he discovered an 'arriere pensee', long suspected by +politicians, but never before avowed by himself, or by his Ministers. +"That he has determined on the universal change of dynasties, because a +usurper can never reign with safety or honour as long as any legitimate +Prince may disturb his power, or reproach him for his rank." Elevated +with prosperity, or infatuated with vanity and pride, he spoke a language +which his placemen, courtiers, and even his brother Joseph at first +thought premature, if not indiscreet. If all lawful Sovereigns do not +read in these words their proscription, and the fate which the most +powerful usurper that ever desolated mankind has destined for them, it +may be ascribed to that blindness with which Providence, in its wrath, +sometimes strikes those doomed to be grand examples of the vicissitudes +of human life. + +"Had Talleyrand," said Louis Bonaparte, in his wife's drawing-room, "been +by my brother's side, he would not have unnecessarily alarmed or awakened +those whom it should have been his policy to keep in a soft slumber, +until his blows had laid them down to rise no more; but his soldier-like +frankness frequently injures his political views." This I myself heard +Louis say to Abbe Sieyes, though several foreign Ambassadors were in the +saloon, near enough not to miss a word. If it was really meant as a +reflection on Napoleon, it was imprudent; if designed as a defiance to +other Princes, it was unbecoming and impertinent. I am inclined to +believe it, considering the individual to whom it was addressed, a +premeditated declaration that our Emperor expected a universal war, +was prepared for it, and was certain of its fortunate issue. + +When this Sieyes is often consulted, and publicly flattered, our +politicians say, "Woe to the happiness of Sovereigns and to the +tranquillity of subjects; the fiend of mankind is busy, and at work," +and, in fact, ever since 1789, the infamous ex-Abbe has figured, either +as a plotter or as an actor, in all our dreadful and sanguinary +revolutionary epochas. The accomplice of La Fayette in 1789, of Brissot +in 1791, of Marat in 1792, of Robespierre in 1793, of Tallien in 1794, of +Barras in 1795, of Rewbel in 1797, and of Bonaparte in 1799, he has +hitherto planned, served,, betrayed, or deserted all factions. He is one +of the few of our grand criminals, who, after enticing and sacrificing +his associates, has been fortunate enough to survive them. Bonaparte has +heaped upon him presents, places, and pensions; national property, +senatories, knighthoods, and palaces; but he is, nevertheless, not +supposed one of our Emperor's most dutiful subjects, because many of the +late changes have differed from his metaphysical schemes of innovation, +of regeneration, and of overthrow. He has too high an opinion of his own +deserts not to consider it beneath his philosophical dignity to be a +contented subject of a fellow-subject, elevated into supremacy by his +labours and dangers. His modesty has, for these sixteen years past, +ascribed to his talents all the glory and prosperity of France, and all +her misery and misfortunes to the disregard of his counsels, and to the +neglect of his advice. Bonaparte knows it; and that he is one of those +crafty, sly, and dark conspirators, more dangerous than the bold +assassin, who, by sophistry, art, and perseverance insinuate into the +minds of the unwary and daring the ideas of their plots, in such an +insidious manner that they take them and foster them as the production of +their own genius; he is, therefore, watched by our Imperial spies, and +never consulted but when any great blow is intended to be struck, or some +enormous atrocities perpetrated. A month before the seizure of the Duc +d'Enghien, and the murder of Pichegru, he was every day shut up for some +hours with Napoleon Bonaparte at St. Cloud, or in the Tuileries; where he +has hardly been seen since, except after our Emperor's return from his +coronation as a King of Italy. + +Sieyes never was a republican, and it was cowardice alone that made him +vote for the death of his King and benefactor; although he is very fond +of his own metaphysical notions, he always has preferred the preservation +of his life to the profession or adherence to his systems. He will not +think the Revolution complete, or the constitution of his country a good +one, until some Napoleon, or some Louis, writes himself an Emperor or +King of France, by the grace of Sieyes. He would expose the lives of +thousands to obtain such a compliment to his hateful vanity and excessive +pride; but he would not take a step that endangered his personal safety, +though it might eventually lead him to the possession of a crown. + +From the bounty of his King, Sieyes had, before the Revolution, an income +of fifteen thousand livres--per annum; his places, pensions, and landed +estates produce now yearly five hundred thousand livres--not including +the interest of his money in the French and foreign funds. + +Two years ago he was exiled, for some time, to an estate of his in +Touraine, and Bonaparte even deliberated about transporting him to +Cayenne, when Talleyrand observed "that such a condemnation would +endanger that colony of France, as he would certainly organize there a +focus of revolutions, which might also involve Surinam and the Brazils, +the colonies of our allies, in one common ruin. In the present +circumstances," added the Minister, "if Sieyes is to be transported, I +wish we could land him in England, Scotland, or Ireland, or even in +Russia." + +I have just heard from a general officer the following anecdote, which he +read to me from a letter of another general, dated Ulm, the 25th instant, +and, if true, it explains in part Bonaparte's apparent indiscretion in +the threat thrown out against all ancient dynasties. + +Among his confidential generals (and hitherto the most irreproachable of +all our military commanders), Marmont is particularly distinguished. +Before Napoleon left this capital to head his armies in Germany, he is +stated to have sent despatches to all those traitors dispersed in +different countries whom he has selected to commence the new dynasties, +under the protection of the Bonaparte Dynasty. They were, no doubt, +advised of this being the crisis when they had to begin their +machinations against thrones. A courier from Talleyrand at Strasburg to +Bonaparte at Ulm was ordered to pass by the corps under the command of +Marmont, to whom, in case the Emperor had advanced too far into Germany, +he was to deliver his papers. This courier was surprised and interrupted +by some Austrian light troops; and, as it was only some few hours after +being informed of this capture that Bonaparte expressed himself frankly, +as related above, it was supposed by his army that the Austrian +Government had already in its power despatches which made our schemes of +improvement at Paris no longer any secrets at Vienna. The writer of this +letter added that General Marmont was highly distressed on account of +this accident, which might retard the prospect of restoring to Europe its +long lost peace and tranquillity. + +This officer made his first campaign under Pichegru in 1794, and was, in +1796, appointed by Bonaparte one of his aides-de-camp. His education had +been entirely military, and in the practice the war afforded him he soon +evinced how well he remembered the lessons of theory. In the year 1796, +at the battle of Saint-Georges, before Mantua, he charged at the head of +the eighth battalion of grenadiers, and contributed much to its fortunate +issue. In October of the same year, Bonaparte, as a mark of his +satisfaction, sent him to present to the Directory the numerous colours +which the army of Italy had conquered; from whom he received in return a +pair of pistols, with a fraternal hug from Carnot. On his return to +Italy he was, for the first time, employed by his chief in a political +capacity. A republic, and nothing but a republic, being then the order +of the day, some Italian patriots were convoked at Reggio to arrange a +plan for a Cisalpine Republic, and for the incorporation with it of +Modena, Bologna, and other neutral States; Marmont was nominated a French +republican plenipotentiary, and assisted as such in the organization of a +Commonwealth, which since has been by turns a province of Austria or a +tributary State of France. + +Marmont, though combating for a bad cause, is an honest man; his hands +are neither soiled with plunder, nor stained with blood. Bonaparte, +among his other good qualities, wishes to see every one about him rich; +and those who have been too delicate to accumulate wealth by pillage, he +generally provides for, by putting into requisition some great heiress. +After the Peace of Campo Formio, Bonaparte arrived at Paris, where he +demanded in marriage for his aide-de-camp Marmont, Mademoiselle +Perregeaux, the sole child of the first banker in France, a well-educated +and accomplished young lady, who would be much more agreeable did not her +continual smiles and laughing indicate a degree of self-satisfaction and +complacency which may be felt, but ought never to be published. + +The banker, Perregeaux, is one of those fortunate beings who, by drudgery +and assiduity, has succeeded in some few years to make an ample fortune. +A Swiss by birth, like Necker, he also, like him, after gratifying the +passion of avidity, showed an ambition to shine in other places than in +the counting-house and upon the exchange. Under La Fayette, in 1790, he +was the chief of a battalion of the Parisian National Guards; under +Robespierre, a commissioner for purchasing provisions; and under +Bonaparte he is become a Senator and a commander of the Legion of Honour. +I am told that he has made all his money by his connection with your +country; but I know that the favourite of Napoleon can never be the +friend of Great Britain. He is a widower; but Mademoiselle Mars, of the +Emperor's theatre, consoles him for the loss of his wife. + +General Marmont accompanied Bonaparte to Egypt, and distinguished himself +at the capture of Malta, and when, in the following year, the siege of +St. Jean d'Acre was undertaken, he was ordered to extend the +fortifications of Alexandria; and if, in 1801, they retarded your +progress, it was owing to his abilities, being an officer of engineers as +well as of the artillery. He returned with Bonaparte to Europe, and was, +after his usurpation, made a Counsellor of State. At the battle of +Marengo he commanded the artillery, and signed afterwards, with the +Austrian general, Count Hohenzollern, the Armistice of Treviso, which +preceded shortly the Peace of Luneville. Nothing has abated Bonaparte's +attachment to this officer, whom he appointed a commander-in-chief in +Holland, when a change of Government was intended there, and whom he will +entrust everywhere else, where sovereignty is to be abolished, or thrones +and dynasties subverted. + + + + +LETTER XXXVII. + +PARIS, October, 1805. + +MY LORD:--Many wise people are of the opinion that the revolution of +another great Empire is necessary to combat or oppose the great impulse +occasioned by the Revolution of France, before Europe can recover its +long-lost order and repose. Had the subjects of Austria been as +disaffected as they are loyal, the world might have witnessed such a +terrible event, and been enabled to judge whether the hypothesis was the +production of an ingenious schemer or of a profound statesman. Our +armies under Bonaparte have never before penetrated into the heart of a +country where subversion was not prepared, and where subversion did not +follow. + +How relatively insignificant, in the eyes of Providence, must be the +independence of States and the liberties of nations, when such a +relatively insignificant personage as General von Mack can shake them? +Have, then, the Austrian heroes--a Prince Eugene, a Laudon, a Lasci, a +Beaulieu, a Haddick, a Bender, a Clairfayt, and numerous other valiant +and great warriors--left no posterity behind them; or has the presumption +of General von Mack imposed upon the judgment of the Counsellors of his +Prince? This latter must have been the case; how otherwise could the +welfare of their Sovereign have been entrusted to a military quack, whose +want of energy and bad disposition had, in 1799, delivered up the capital +of another Sovereign to his enemies. How many reputations are gained by +an impudent assurance, and lost when the man of talents is called upon to +act and the fool presents himself. + +Baron von Mack served as an aide-de-camp under Field-marshal Laudon, +during the last war between Austria and Turkey, and displayed some +intrepidity, particularly before Lissa. The Austrian army was encamped +eight leagues from that place, and the commander-in-chief hesitated to +attack it, believing it to be defended by thirty thousand men. To decide +him upon making this attack, Baron von Mack left him at nine o'clock at +night, crossed the Danube, accompanied only by a single Uhlan, and +penetrated into the suburb of Lissa, where he made prisoner a Turkish +officer, whom, on the next morning at seven o'clock, he presented to his +general, and from whom it was learnt that the garrison contained only six +thousand, men. This personal temerity, and the applause of Field-marshal +Laudon, procured him then a kind of reputation, which he has not since +been able to support. Some theoretical knowledge of the art of war, +and a great facility of conversing on military topics, made even the +Emperor Joseph conceive a high opinion of this officer; but it has long +been proved, and experience confirms it every day, that the difference is +immense between the speculator and the operator, and that the generals of +Cabinets are often indifferent captains when in the camp or in the field. + +Preceded by a certain celebrity, Baron von Mack served, in 1793, under +the Prince of Coburg, as an adjutant-general, and was called to assist at +the Congress at Antwerp, where the operations of the campaign were +regulated. Everywhere he displayed activity and bravery; was wounded +twice in the month of May; but he left the army without having performed +anything that evinced the talents which fame had bestowed on him. In +February, 1794, the Emperor sent him to London to arrange, in concert +with your Government, the plans of the campaign then on the eve of being +opened; and when he returned to the Low Countries he was advanced to a +quartermaster-general of the army of Flanders, and terminated also this +unfortunate campaign without having done anything to justify the +reputation he had before acquired or usurped. His Sovereign continued, +nevertheless, to employ him in different armies; and in January, 1797, he +was appointed a Field-marshal lieutenant and a quartermaster-general of +the army of the Rhine. In February he conducted fifteen thousand of the +troops of this army to reinforce the army of Italy; but when Bonaparte in +April penetrated into Styria and Carinthia, he was ordered to Vienna as a +second in command of the levy 'en masse'. + +Real military characters had already formed their opinion of this +officer, and saw a presumptuous charlatan where others had admired an +able warrior. His own conduct soon convinced them that they neither had +been rash nor mistaken. The King of Naples demanding, in 1798, from his +son-in-law, the Emperor of Germany, a general to organize and head his +troops, Baron von Mack was presented to him. After war had been declared +against France he obtained some success in partial engagements, but was +defeated in a general battle by an enemy inferior in number. In the +Kingdom of Naples, as well as in the Empire of Germany, the fury of +negotiation seized him when he should have fought, and when he should +have remembered that no compacts can ever be entered into with political +and military earthquakes, more than with physical ones. This imprudence, +particularly as he was a foreigner, excited suspicion among his troops, +whom, instead of leading to battle, he deserted, under the pretence that +his life was in danger, and surrendered himself and his staff to our +commander, Championnet. + +A general who is too fond of his life ought never to enter a camp, much +less to command armies; and a military chief who does not consider the +happiness and honour of the State as his first passion and his first +duty, and prefers existence to glory, deserves to be shot as a traitor, +or drummed out of the army as a dastardly coward. Without mentioning the +numerous military faults committed by General von Mack during this +campaign, it is impossible to deny that, with respect to his own troops, +he conducted himself in the most pusillanimous manner. It has often been +repeated that martial valour does not always combine with it that courage +and that necessary presence of mind which knows how to direct or repress +multitudes, how to command obedience and obtain popularity; but when a +man is entrusted with the safety of an Empire, and assumes such a +brilliant situation, he must be weak-minded and despicable indeed, if he +does not show himself worthy of it by endeavouring to succeed, or perish +in the attempt. The French emigrant, General Dumas, evinced what might +have been done, even with the dispirited Neapolitan troops, whom he +neither deserted, nor with whom he offered to capitulate. + +Baron von Mack is in a very infirm state of health, and is often under +the necessity of being carried on a litter; and his bodily complaints +have certainly not increased the vigour of his mind. His love of life +seems to augment in proportion as its real value diminishes. As to the +report here of his having betrayed his trust in exchanging honour for +gold, I believe it totally unfounded. Our intriguers may have deluded +his understanding, but our traitors would never have been able to seduce +or shake his fidelity. His head is weak, but his heart is honest. +Unfortunately, it is too true that, in turbulent times, irresolution and +weakness in a commander or a Minister operate the same, and are as +dangerous as, treason. + + + + +ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: + +Complacency which may be felt, but ought never to be published +General who is too fond of his life ought never to enter a camp +Generals of Cabinets are often indifferent captains in the field +How many reputations are gained by an impudent assurance +Irresolution and weakness in a commander operate the same +Love of life increase in proportion as its real value diminishes +Opinion almost constitutes half the strength of armies +Presumptuous charlatan +Pretensions or passions of upstart vanity +Pride of an insupportable and outrageous ambition +Prudence without weakness, and with firmness without obstinacy +They ought to be just before they are generous +They will create some quarrel to destroy you +Vices or virtues of all civilized nations are relatively the same +We are tired of everything, even of our existence + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext Memoirs of Court of St. Cloud, v7 +by Stewarton, a Gentleman at Paris, to a Nobleman in London + diff --git a/old/cm61b10.zip b/old/cm61b10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5e05a60 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cm61b10.zip |