Chapter XII: Part 12

That ambassador had solicited an audience of the First Consul, and personal communications. The First Consul, who was himself fond of treating affairs directly, willingly assented. “But this proved for me,” said the Emperor, “a lesson which altered my method for ever. From this moment, I never treated officially of political affairs, but through the intervention of my minister for Foreign affairs. He at any rate could give a positive and formal denial; which the sovereign could not do.

“It is utterly false,” added the Emperor, "that any thing occurred in the course of our personal interview, which was not in conformity with the common rules of decorum. Lord Whitworth himself, after our conference, being in company with other Ambassadors, expressed himself perfectly satisfied, and added that he had no doubt all things would be satisfactorily settled. But what was the surprise of those same Ambassadors, when they read a short time afterwards in the English newspapers the report of Lord Whitworth, in which he charged me with having behaved in the interview with unbecoming violence! We had some warm friends amongst these Ambassadors, and some of them went so far as to express their surprise to the English diplomatist, observing to him that his report was very different from what he had said to them immediately after the conference. Lord Whitworth made the best excuse he could, but persisted in maintaining the assertions of the official document.

“The fact is,” said the Emperor, “that every political agent of Great Britain is in the habit of making two reports on the same subject; one public and false for the ministerial archives, the other confidential and true for the Ministers themselves, and for them alone; and when the responsibility of Ministers is at stake, they produce the first of these documents, which, although false, answers every purpose, and serves to exonerate them. And thus it is,” added the Emperor, "that the best institutions become vicious, when they are no longer founded on morality, and when their agents are only actuated by selfishness, pride, and insolence. Absolute power has no need of disguise; it is silent: responsible governments, being obliged to speak, have recourse to artifice, and lie with effrontery.

"It is, however, a circumstance worthy of remark, that, in my great struggle with England, the government of that country has constantly contrived to attach so much odium to my person and actions; and that they have so impudently exclaimed against my despotism, my selfishness, my ambition, and my perfidy, when they alone were guilty of all they dared to lay to my charge. A very strong prejudice must have existed against me, I must have been indeed very much to be feared, since people could suffer themselves to be thus deceived. I can understand it from Kings and Cabinets, their existence was at stake; but from the people!!...

"The British Ministers spoke incessantly of my duplicity; but could any thing be compared to their Machiavelism, their selfishness, during the existence of disorders and convulsions, which were kept alive by them?

"They sacrificed unfortunate Austria in 1805, merely to escape the invasion with which I threatened them.

"They sacrificed her again in 1809, to be more at liberty to act in the Peninsula.

"They sacrificed Prussia in 1806, in the hopes of recovering Hanover.

"They did not assist Russia in 1807, because they chose rather to seize distant colonies, and because they were attempting to take possession of Egypt.

"They gave to the world the infamous spectacle of bombarding Copenhagen in time of peace, and lying in ambush to steal the Danish fleet. They had already once before exhibited a similar spectacle by seizing, like highway robbers, also in time of peace, four Spanish frigates laden with rich treasures.

"Lastly, during the war in the Peninsula, where they endeavoured to prolong the existence of anarchy and confusion, their principal object was to traffic with the wants and the blood of the Spanish nation, by obliging it to purchase their services and their supplies at the expense of gold and concessions.

"Whilst all Europe, through their intrigues and their subsidies, was bathed in blood, they were only intent upon providing for their own safety, gaining advantages for their trade, and obtaining the sovereignty of the sea and the monopoly of the world. As for myself, I had never done any thing of the kind, and, until the unfortunate business with Spain, which after all is not to be compared with the affair of Copenhagen, I can say that my morality was unimpeachable. My actions had perhaps been dictatorial and peremptory, but never disgraced by perfidy. Who can be surprised, after all this, if, in 1814, although England had really been the deliverer of Europe, not a single Englishman could show himself on the Continent without meeting at every step with maledictions, hatred, and execrations? Who can ask how this happened? Every tree bears its own fruit; we reap only what we have sown; and such was necessarily the infallible result of the misdeeds of the English Government, the tyranny and the insolence of the Ministers in London, and of their agents all over the globe.

"For the last fifty years the administrations of Great Britain have gradually declined in consideration and in public estimation. Formerly, the struggle for power was between great national parties, characterised by grand and distinct systems; but now we see only the bickerings of one and the same oligarchy, having constantly the same object in view, and whose discordant members adjust their differences by compromise and concessions: they have turned the Cabinet of St. James’s into a shop.

"The policy of Lord Chatham was marked by acts of injustice, no doubt; but at least he proclaimed them with boldness and energy; they had a certain air of grandeur. Pitt introduced into the Cabinet a system of hypocrisy and dissimulation. Lord Castlereagh, the self-styled heir of Pitt, has brought into it the extreme of every kind of turpitude and immorality. Chatham gloried in being a merchant; Lord Castlereagh, to the serious injury of his nation, has indulged himself in the satisfaction of acting the _fine gentleman_; he has sacrificed his country to fraternise with the great people of the continent, and from that moment has united in his person the vices of the saloon with the cupidity of the counting-house; the duplicity and obsequiousness of the courtier with the haughtiness and insolence of the upstart. The poor English constitution is in imminent danger. What a difference between such men and the Foxes, the Sheridans, and the Greys, those splendid talents, those noble characters of the Opposition, who have been the objects of the ridicule of a victorious oligarchy!

“Lord Cornwallis,” said the Emperor, "is the first Englishman who gave me, in good earnest, a favourable opinion of his nation; after him Fox, and I might add to these, if it were necessary, our present Admiral (Malcolm).

"Cornwallis was, in every sense of the word, a worthy, good, and honest man. At the time of the treaty of Amiens, the terms having been agreed upon, he had promised to sign the next day at a certain hour; something of consequence detained him at home, but he pledged his word. The evening of that same day, a courier arrived from London proscribing certain articles of the treaty, but he answered that he had signed, and immediately came and actually signed. We understood each other perfectly well; I had placed a regiment at his disposal, and he took pleasure in seeing its manœuvres. I have preserved an agreeable recollection of him in every respect, and it is certain that a request from him would have had more weight with me, perhaps, than one from a crowned head. His family appears to have guessed this to be the case; some requests have been made to me in its name, which have all been granted.

"Fox came to France immediately after the peace of Amiens. He was employed in writing a history of the Stuarts, and asked my permission to search our diplomatic archives. I gave orders that every thing should be placed at his disposal. I received him often. Fame had informed me of his talents, and I soon found that he possessed a noble character, a good heart, liberal, generous, and enlightened views. I considered him an ornament to mankind, and was very much attached to him. We often conversed together upon various topics, without the least prejudice; when I wished to engage in a little controversy, I turned the conversation upon the subject of the infernal machine; and told him that his ministers had attempted to murder me; he would then oppose my opinion with warmth, and invariably ended the conversation by saying, in his bad French, ‘First Consul, pray take that out of your head.’ But he was not convinced of the truth of the cause he undertook to advocate, and there is every reason to believe that he argued more in defence of his country, than of the morality of its ministers."

The Emperor ended the conversation, by saying: “Half a dozen such men as Fox and Cornwallis would be sufficient to establish the moral character of a nation.... With such men I should always have agreed; we should soon have settled our differences, and not only France would have been at peace with a nation at bottom most worthy of esteem, but we should have done great things together.”

HISTORY OF THE CONVENTION BY LACRETELLE.—STATISTICAL NOTICE OF THE OXEN
OF THE ISLAND.—PUNS.—STATISTICS IN GENERAL.

Tuesday, 11th.—This has been one of those days of wind and rain so common here. The Emperor, about three o’clock, took advantage of a short interval to visit the garden. He sent for me; he had just been reading the history of the Convention by Lacretelle. It is, he observed, certainly not ill-written; but it is ill-digested, and makes no impression on the memory; the whole is a smooth surface without a single asperity to arrest attention. He does not thoroughly examine his subject: he has not done justice to many celebrated characters; he gives no adequate colouring to the crimes of several others, &c.

The rain obliged us to return, and we walked alone for a long time in the saloon and the dining room.

We had been informed, that there were four thousand oxen in the island, and that the annual consumption consisted of five hundred, of which number one hundred and fifty were appropriated to us, fifty to the colony, and three hundred to the shipping. It was added, that four years were requisite for the reproduction of the stock, and this formed a subject for our calculations; an employment for which the Emperor’s peculiar taste is well known.

The subsistence and consumption of these oxen are an important affair in the island. A single beast cannot be killed without the previous order of the governor, and it was stated by one of our people, that the owner of one of the houses or huts of the island, speaking to him on the subject, said: “It is reported, that you complain up yonder, and consider yourselves badly off; (he spoke of Longwood) but we are at a loss to make it out; for it is said that you have beef every day, while we cannot get it but three or four times a year, and even then we pay for it at the rate of fifteen or twenty pence a pound.” The Emperor, who laughed heartily at the story, observed, “You ought to have assured him, that it cost us more than a crown.”

I observed some time afterwards, that it was the only pun I had till then heard from the Emperor’s mouth, but the person to whom I made the remark, said he had heard of his having made a similar one, and on the same subject, in the isle of Elba. A mason employed in some buildings, which were to be constructed by the Emperor’s order, had fallen and hurt himself; the Emperor wishing to encourage him, assured him, that it would be of no consequence. “I have had,” said he, “a much worse fall than yours; but look at me, I am on my legs, and hearty, for all that.”

The Emperor’s attention was for a moment directed to political statistics. He highly extolled the progress and utility of that new science, so well adapted, he observed, to point out the path of truth, to establish and confirm opinions. He called it the _budget of things_, and “without budget,” said he gaily, “there is no safety.”

The singular application of the science by an Englishman or German, who had the patience and resolution to ascertain the number of times each letter of the alphabet occurred in the Bible, was then noticed by a person present. He also mentioned another application of it, less dull, but not less singular. It was that made by a German, eighty years of age, who amused himself with calculating what he might have eaten, during his life, in beef, mutton, poultry, vegetables, &c. as well as what he had drunk. The estimate comprehended immense droves, flocks, and accumulations of all sorts. The public market-place was incapable of containing all he had devoured. This minute applicant of the science did not stop there. He had the curiosity to inquire how often he might have again swallowed the same things. For, he judiciously observed, their transmutation in his person ought necessarily to have contributed to their reproduction. The Emperor laughed much at the calculation, and more particularly at the whimsical repetition of the same eatables.

CHARACTERS. BAILLI, LAFAYETTE, MONGES, GRÉGOIRE, &C.—ST. DOMINGO.—SYSTEM
TO BE FOLLOWED.—DICTATIONS ON THE CONVENTION.

June 12th.—We have had three days of horrible weather, when a moment that promised to continue fine, induced the Emperor to take an airing in his carriage. He had just finished reading the History of the Constituent Assembly, by Rabeau de St. Etienne. He entertained very nearly the same opinion of this writer as of Lacretelle. He then took occasion to notice several characters.

“Bailli,” he said, “was not a bad man, but unquestionably a miserable politician. Lafayette was another simpleton, and by no means formed for the eminent character he wished to represent. His political simplicity was such, that he could not avoid being the constant dupe of men and things. His breaking up of the chambers on my return from Waterloo, was my ruin. Who could have persuaded him, that I had arrived merely for the purpose of dissolving them;—I, whose only safety was centred in them?”

One of the party saying, by way of excuse or extenuation; “It was, however, sire, the same man, who, treating afterwards with the allies, was filled with indignation at their proposal of delivering up your Majesty, and eagerly asked, if it was to the prisoner of Olmutz they dared to address themselves?”—"But, sir," replied the Emperor, “you run from one subject to another, or rather, you concur with, instead of opposing, my opinion. I have not attacked the sentiments or intentions of M. de Lafayette; I have only complained of their fatal results.”

The Emperor then continued, in the same way, to review the leading men of that period. He dwelt at considerable length on the affair of Favras, &c.

“For the rest,” observed the Emperor, "nothing was more common than to find men of that epoch quite the reverse in character of that which their words and actions seemed to establish. Monges, for instance, might be considered a terrible man. When war was resolved upon, he declared from the tribune of the Jacobins, that he would give his two daughters in marriage to the two first soldiers who might be wounded by the enemy. This he was at liberty to do, in the strict sense of the gift, as far as it respected himself; but he maintained, that others should be compelled to follow his example, and that all the nobility should be put to death, &c. Yet Monges was one of the mildest and weakest men living, and would not have suffered a chicken to be killed, if he had been obliged to do it himself or to see it done. This furious republican, as he believed himself, cherished, however, a kind of worship for me, which he pushed to adoration. He loved me, as a man loves his mistress.

"Grégoire, whose animosity to the clergy, whom he wished to bring back to their original simplicity, was so great that he might have passed for a champion of irreligion, may be mentioned as another instance; yet Grégoire, when the revolutionists were denying their God, and abolishing the priesthood, was very near being massacred in mounting the tribune, for the purpose of boldly declaring his religious sentiments, and protesting that he would die a priest. At the very moment when the work of destruction was going on in all the churches against the altars, Grégoire erected one in his own apartment, and said mass there every day. This man’s lot, however, is decidedly cast. If he be driven from France, he must take refuge in St. Domingo. The friend, the advocate, the eulogist of the negroes will be a god, or a saint, among them."

St. Domingo naturally became the next subject of our conversation. I had, in my younger days, seen that colony in its most flourishing state. The Emperor put many questions to me, and made himself acquainted with all the circumstances relating to that remote period. When his enquiries were over, he said, “I shall, no doubt, astonish you: but I am convinced, even from your own statements, that the island has not, at this moment, lost a third, certainly not one half of its value, and that, in a short time, it will recover all its former prosperity.”

I should not, in reality, be surprised at it; for all the absurd stories, circulated in Europe respecting France, ought to put us on our guard against those which might be safely told with regard to St. Domingo.

The Emperor said that, after the restoration, the French government had sent out emissaries and proposals which were laughed at by the negroes. “As to myself,” he added, “on my return from Elba, I would have settled all differences with them; I would have recognized their independence, contented myself with some factories, like those on the coast of Africa, endeavoured to draw them closer to the mother country, and to establish a kind of family intercourse with them, which might, in my opinion, have been easily accomplished.”

“I have to reproach myself with the attempt made upon the colony during the consulship. The design of reducing it by force was a great error. I ought to have been satisfied with governing it through the medium of Toussaint. Peace with England was not sufficiently consolidated, and the territorial wealth I should have acquired by its reduction would have served but to enrich our enemies.” He had, he observed, the greater reason to reproach himself with this fault, because he had foreseen its failure, and it was executed against his inclination. He had solely yielded to the opinion of the council of state and his ministers, hurried along, as they were by the clamours of the colonists, who formed a considerable party at Paris, and were, besides, he said, either nearly all royalists or in the pay of the English faction.

The Emperor assured us, that the army which had been sent out consisted but of sixteen thousand men, and was quite sufficient. The failure of the expedition was solely to be attributed to accidental circumstances, such as the yellow fever, the death of the Commander-in-chief, but above all to his blunders, a new war, &c.

“The arrival of the Captain General Leclere,” said the Emperor, "was followed by complete success, but he had not the skill to ensure its continuance. Had he followed the secret instructions which I drew up for him myself, he would have saved many lives and spared himself great mortifications. I ordered him, among other things, to associate with himself men of colour, that he might the better keep the Blacks in subjection; and, as soon as he had reduced the Colony, to send to France all the black Generals and superior officers, to be placed at the disposal of the minister at war, who would have employed them in their respective ranks. This measure, which would have deprived the Negro population of its chiefs and its leaders, would have been a decisive stroke, without wounding in their persons the military laws and regulations. But Leclere did just the contrary: he kept down the people of colour, and bestowed his confidence on the black Generals. In consequence, as it might naturally be expected, he was duped by the latter, found himself beset with difficulties, and the Colony was lost. At first, he would not send to France Toussaint, who had filled a distinguished post there; but after some time he found himself obliged to order his apprehension and to send him prisoner to us. Malevolence did not fail to paint this act under the odious colours of tyranny and perfidy, representing Toussaint as an innocent victim deserving of the deepest interest; and yet he was eminently criminal.

"Toussaint was not a man destitute of merit; though certainly he was not what people attempted to describe him at the time. His character, besides, was ill calculated to inspire real confidence; he had given us serious causes of complaint. We must always have distrusted him.[23] He was chiefly guided by an officer of engineers or artillery, director of the fortifications of St. Domingo. (Colonel Vincent). That officer had come to France before Leclere’s expedition, and conferences were, for a long time, held with him. He exerted himself very much to prevent the attempt, and described with great precision, all its difficulties, without pretending, however, that it was impossible." The Emperor thought that the Bourbons might succeed in reducing St. Domingo if they employed force; but on that subject the result of arms was not to be calculated upon; it was rather the result of commerce and of grand political views. Three or four hundred millions of capital transferred from France to a remote country; an indefinite period for reaping the fruits of such a sacrifice; the very great certainty of seeing them engrossed by the English, or swallowed up by revolutions, &c.: those were the points for consideration. The Emperor concluded with saying, "The colonial system, which we have witnessed, is closed for us, as well as for the whole continent of Europe; we must give it up, and henceforth confine ourselves to the free navigation of the seas, and the complete liberty of universal exchange.”

Footnote 23:

The “Memoires de Napoleon” (published at Paris by Bossange, in 1823)
contain notes by the Emperor on a history of St. Domingo, which
furnish precise and curious particulars respecting the expedition
against that colony, the causes which led to the undertaking, to its
failure, &c.

The History of the Convention, of which Napoleon had already expressed his disapprobation, again presented itself to his thoughts; he was far from being satisfied with Lacretelle. “Sentences in abundance,” he repeated, “and but little colouring, no depth: he is an academician, but in no respect a historian.” He made me call my son, and dictated the two following notes, of which I give a literal copy, however imperfect they may be, for he never read them a second time. Every thing that comes from him is, in my opinion, valuable.

NOTE I.

"The Convention, called by a law of the Legislative Assembly to give a new constitution to France, decreed the Republic; not that the most enlightened did not think the republican system incompatible with the existing state of manners in France, but because the Monarchy could not be continued without placing the Duke of Orleans on the throne, which would have alienated a great part of the nation.

"An executive power, consisting of five ministers, was established by the Convention for conducting the affairs of the republic.

"Two parties contended for the ascendancy in the National Convention: that of the _Girondists_, composed of men who had influenced the Legislative Assembly, and that of the _Mountain_, formed by the Commune of Paris, which had directed the atrocities of the 10th of August and the 2d of September, and commanded the population of the capital.

"Vergniaud, Brissot, Condorcet, Guadet, and Roland, were the leaders of the Girondists; Danton, Robespierre, Marat, Collot d’Herbois, and Billaud-Varennes, headed the Mountain. These two parties were alike indebted for their rise to the principles of the revolution. Their conductors sprang out of the popular societies which they had successively rendered subservient to their views.

"The party of the Girondists was more powerful in talents, and was eminently popular in the great provincial towns, particularly at Bourdeaux, Montpellier, Marseilles, Caen, Lyons, &:c.

"The party of the Mountain possessed more energy and enthusiasm, and was not less popular in the capital and among the clubs of the departments.

"The Girondist party, which, in the Legislative Assembly, had been the most ardent for the Revolution, became, in the Convention, the most moderate; because it had to contend there with a faction much more violent than itself, which had not found its way into the Assembly.

"The Girondists called their adversaries the faction of September, and constantly reproached them with the horrible massacre of which they were guilty. They accused them of being hostile to a national assembly, and of endeavouring to transfer the government of France to the Commune of Paris; but by these means the Girondists only excited against themselves the Jacobins of all the departments.

"On its side, the Commune of Paris (the Mountaineers) stigmatized the Girondists by the name of the federalists, and charged them with the design of establishing a federative system in France similar to that of Switzerland. They also accused them of endeavouring to stir up the provinces against the capital, and thus held them up to the detestation of the people of Paris, which could maintain its splendour only by the union and unity of the whole of the territory. When the Girondists inveighed against the Mountaineers for the massacres of the 2nd of September, the latter reproached the former with having, during the Legislative Assembly, rashly and without cause, declared war against all Europe.

"The Girondists, at first, appeared to have the upper hand in the Convention, and they directed that Marat should be brought to trial, and that proceedings should be instituted against the assassins of September. But Marat, supported by the Jacobins and the Commune of Paris, was acquitted by the revolutionary tribunal, and returned in triumph to the bosom of the assembly.

"The trial of the King had been another apple of discord. The two parties seemed to proceed in unison, and voted, it is true, for his death; but the greater part of the Girondists also voted for an appeal to the people; and here it is difficult to comprehend the reason of their conduct during that crisis. If they wished to save the king, they were at liberty to do so; they had only to vote for deportation, exile, or the adjournment of the question; but to sentence him to death and make his fate depend upon the will of the people, was, in the highest degree, absurd and impolitic. They seemed to be desirous, that after the extinction of the monarchy, France should be torn to pieces by civil war.

"The general opinion ever since the commencement of the revolution, that the most audacious and unreasonable faction would always predominate, was from that moment verified. The Girondists, however, maintained the contest with courage, and very often had majorities in the assembly during all the months of March, April, and May. But the party of the Mountaineers had recourse, in these circumstances, to an expedient which it had constantly employed. On the 31st of May, the fate of the Girondists was decided by an insurrection of the sections of Paris. Twenty-seven were arrested, brought before the revolutionary tribunal, and sentenced to death; seventy-three were thrown into prison, and from that period the triumphant Mountain had no obstacles to encounter in the Convention. Several Girondist deputies took refuge, however, at Caen, and there raised the standard of insurrection. Lyons, Marseilles, Bordeaux, Montpellier, and several towns of Brittany, embraced cause of this party, and also took up arms against the the Convention.

"All these unconnected efforts were of no avail against the capital, and the Mountain remained in tranquil possession of the national tribune. A circumstance altogether singular contributed to confirm the preponderance of Paris. It was the assignats, then the only resource for supplying the treasury; not a single tax was then paid.

"The provinces learnt with considerable emotion the event of the 31st of May, and the death of the most celebrated of the Girondist party. The armies were not agitated by these results; they took no share in the insurrections of some provinces, and remained all attached to the Convention and the dominant party at Paris.

"When the partial insurrection of certain towns in favour of the Girondists was known, all the armies had already taken the oath and testified their adhesion to the Mountain; besides, in the eyes of Frenchmen, Paris was France. Neither did the departments of Alsace, la Moselle, Flanders, Franche Comté, and Dauphiné, where the principal forces of the republic were quartered, sympathize in the feelings of the federalist towns.

“The 31st of May deprived France of men of great talents, zealously attached to liberty, and the principles of the revolution. The catastrophe might afflict the well disposed, but could not surprise them. It was impossible for an assembly, which had extricated France from the critical situation to which she was reduced, to carry on public business with two parties so inveterately and irreconcileably opposed. It was necessary for the safety of the republic that one should extinguish the other, and there can be no doubt that, had the Girondists obtained the victory, they would have consigned their adversaries to the scaffold.”

Here the Emperor, who had dictated in his usual way, from memory alone, without any research, whether he was dissatisfied with the task he had executed, or for some other reason, stopped short, for the purpose, as he said, of recommencing a new dictation on the same subject.

NOTE II.

"The Convention was established in September, 1792, and terminated in October, 1795, Its reign, which lasted nearly three years, presents four eras.

"The 1st, from its commencement to the 31st of May 1793—epoch of the destruction of the Girondists.

"The 2nd, to March 1794—overthrow of the Commune of Paris.

"The 3rd, to July, 1794—fall of Robespierre.

"The 4th to the 14th Vendémiaire (4th October, 1795)—installation of the Government of the Directory.

"Its _first era_ consisted of eight months, its second of ten, its third of four, its fourth of fourteen. Total, three years.

"During its first era the Convention was constantly divided between the parties of the Mountain and the Gironde.

"Danton, Robespierre, Marat, Collot-d’Herbois, Billaud-Varennes, Carnot, Heraut de Sechelles, were the leaders of the party of the Mountain.

"Brissot, Condorcet, Vergniaud, Gaudet, Gensonnè, Péthion, Lasource, Barbaroux, headed the party of the Gironde.

"The two parties were equally hostile to the Bourbons and the royalists.

"The men of the first were distinguished for superior energy, those of the second for superior talents. They were both the partisans of a republican establishment. The Mountaineers were desirous of a Republic, for the purpose of destroying what was in existence before the Revolution, both men and things. The Girondists were animated by the infatuation of youthful feeling, which presented at once Athens and Rome to their view, and revived recollections of sublime antiquity.

"The existence of the mountaineers may be dated from the time of the Constituent Assembly. They were the firebrands of the clubs so generally known by the name of Jacobin. The insurrection of the Field of Mars was planned by them.

"This party did not obtain admission into the Constituent and Legislative Assemblies.

"The Girondists, who predominated in the legislative, were hostile to the Constitution of 1794 and to the King. They would not undertake his defence, and suffered him to be sacrificed to the efforts of the Mountain, which, however, was also their enemy. It was the Mountaineers who caused the atrocities of the 20th of June, of the 10th of August, and of the 2nd of September; they had then no party in the assembly; but they compelled the Girondists to join them after their victory.

"The _first era_ of the Convention presents the struggle of the Girondists and Mountaineers; the Girondists prevailed at that time in consequence of their superior talents, their eloquence, and their already acquired reputation. The presidents were nearly all Girondists; they charged the Mountain with the design of destroying the National Assembly, and substituting in its place a Parisian Dictatorship. They also reproached it with the massacre of September.

"The Mountain, in its turn, charged them with wishing for a federative republic like Switzerland, with being hostile to the capital, and with having, without cause, placed the republic in a state of warfare with the whole of Europe.

"The Mountain had at its command the Jacobins of Paris, and the greatest part of the popular societies of the republic; the commune of Paris, the sections, the revolutionary tribunal, and the lower classes of the people of the capital were devoted to its interests.

"The Girondists possessed great influence over the departments in general and the enlightened part of the nation; their partizans were more numerous among the upper class of society. The Girondists, who had occupied the left side in the Legislative Assembly, and had shewn such animosity against the King, the ministers, and the right side, or moderate party, were forced to shift places, and become in their turn the right side or moderate party, opposed to the vehement and overbearing Mountain, which henceforth formed the left side.

"The Mountaineers, working on the plan they had adopted under the Constituent Assembly, enlisted all the passions in their service, and demanded, with loud cries, the death of the King. The Girondists might, by openly defending him, have preserved his life; they had recourse to the singular system of condemning him, and, after having thus destroyed the monarchy, they wished the sentence to be confirmed by an appeal to the people: in other words, they wished to destroy France by the horrors of a civil war. This false combination ruined them.—Vergniaud, one of the pillars of their party, proclaimed the sentence of death passed upon the King.

"The Girondists were so powerful in the Assembly, that several months’ labour and several days’ insurrection were necessary to destroy their influence in the Convention.

"This party would have governed the Convention and crushed the Mountain, had its system of conduct been more direct and candid. The metaphysicians had too weighty a preponderance in it.

"The _second era_ of the Convention is the reign of the Mountain. Twenty-two of the principal Girondists perished on the scaffold, or fell by their own hands; seventy-three were thrown into prison. The Mountain, ruled with absolute power; it created the revolutionary government, and the Convention in a mass placed itself, of its own accord, under the yoke of the Committee of Public Safety and of the Revolutionary Tribunal.

"In this second era, the sittings of the Convention no longer resembled those of the first; there was an end of discussion and of liberty; it was the despotism of the Decemvirs. Some of the Deputies governed the Committees of General Security, of Finance, &c. Others were dispatched by the Committee of Public Safety to the Armies and the Departments, and became real Pro-consuls.

"Every month, every week, every day, the government became more ferocious and sanguinary. All those, in the higher classes of society who had not emigrated were crowded together in the prisons, as objects of suspicion, and sent by hundreds to the scaffold.

"After treating in this way every one who was of a noble family, a priest, a merchant, or a considerable proprietor, the excesses of the party recoiling upon itself, it ruled the Jacobins and the Commune of Paris with an iron hand: it enslaved the Convention, and threatened it with absolute annihilation; it preached up Atheism, and proscribed the arts, the sciences, and every species of talent. The artists and men of science were thrown into prison, as objects of suspicion, and there was a time when the National Library and the Garden of Plants were on the point of being burnt and laid waste.

"Robespierre and Danton, filled with indignation at these outrages, united their efforts to put a stop to the frightful progress of the popular madness. The capuchin Chabot, Bazire, Fabre d’Eglantine, Hebert, Chaumet, Vincent, and all their associates perished on the scaffold.

"For the first time since the commencement of the Revolution, the people saw persons put to death as ultra-revolutionary, and no longer as having wished to stop the Revolution. Their ideas were turned up-side down, and underwent a real revolution.

"The prisons were filled with sans-culottes, and with all that was basest in society. It was remarked, that the apostate priests were numerous in that class.

"The people beheld, without surprise and with joy, the punishment of those who had until then governed them, and that feeling was a revolution, which escaped the observation of Robespierre and Danton, and which they knew not how to convert to their advantage.

"The _third era_ presents a spectacle different from the other two. Danton and Robespierre had without effort stopped the Revolution, and put a period to the power of the Commune of Paris; but after their success they fell out between themselves.

"Danton, Camille des Moulins, Heraut de Sechelles, and Lacroix, were desirous of going a step farther, and putting an end to the assassinations of the Revolutionary Tribunal. Danton and Lacroix had enriched themselves in their mission to Belgium. Camille des Moulins, who, from the beginning of the Revolution had given himself the title of the Attorney-General of the Lantern, was captivated and softened down by a young wife. They had the boldness to demand, that the blow which had been just struck against Hebert, or the rest of Marat’s party, should be turned to the benefit of the whole Republic—that no innocent person should in future be condemned—that the system of terror should be abolished—and that a Committee of Clemency should be established.

"Billaud-Varennes and Collot-d’Herbois, who took the lead in the Committee of Public Safety and among the great body of Jacobins, rejected these demands with indignation and fury; and Robespierre, after some hesitation, did not dare to support Danton, and made a sacrifice of him. Danton, Camille des Moulins, Heraut de Sechelles, &c. perished on the scaffold, to which they were dragged by the whole Committee of Public Safety, and by the enraged Jacobins. The people were struck with consternation, and for the first time expressed no sign of satisfaction.

"What Robespierre, however, had not dared to do, and what he could have easily effected had he supported Danton, he had the presumption to undertake after the death of Danton. In order to put a period to Atheism, he caused the existence of God to be proclaimed, and he endeavoured to reinstate the virtues, the sciences, and the arts. Billaud-Varennes, Collot-d’Herbois, and Barrere, were struck with horror at seeing the termination of the revolutionary government. They formed a coalition with all the representatives, who, in their missions, had caused the effusion of human blood, and with all the numerous friends whom Danton had in the Convention, such as Tallien, Fréron, Legendre; and when Robespierre was bold enough to give a glimpse of his plan for suppressing the administration of the pro-consuls, and for the necessity of bringing to justice the base characters, who had rendered the Revolution odious in the provinces, he was consigned to the scaffold.

"The transactions of the 9th Thermidor constituted, in reality, the triumph of Collot-d’Herbois and Billaud-Varennes, men more horrible and bloodthirsty than Robespierre; but that victory could not be obtained over the Jacobins and the commune, without calling into action the whole of the citizens; so that, with respect to the middling classes and the people, the death of Robespierre was the death of the revolutionary government; and after various oscillations, those who wished to continue the system of terror and had sacrificed Robespierre, as he had sacrificed Danton, because he was desirous of softening down and moderating the revolution, found themselves drawn along with, and overpowered by, the public opinion.

“During the last ten months, Robespierre frequently complained that he was rendered odious by having all the massacres, which were perpetrated, attributed to him. The men who caused his destruction were more sanguinary and dreadful than he, but the whole nation, which had for a long time imputed all the assassinations to Robespierre, exclaimed that it was a triumph over tyranny, and that belief put an end to it.”

Here the dictation ended; the Emperor joined in common conversation, and as he never resumed it, we are deprived of the fourth era.

THE MONITEUR AND LIBERTY OF THE PRESS.

June 13th.—The Emperor had just run over a great many numbers of the Moniteur. “These Moniteurs,” said he, “so terrible and dangerous to so many reputations, are uniformly useful and favourable to me alone. It is with official documents that men of sense and real talents will write history; now, these documents are full of the spirit of my government, and to them I make an earnest and solemn appeal.” He added, that he had made the Moniteur the soul and life-blood of his government, and that it was the intermediate instrument of his communications with public opinion, both abroad and at home. Every government had since followed his example more or less in that respect.

“Whatever serious fault might be committed by any of the high functionaries employed in the interior, immediately,” said the Emperor, "an enquiry was set on foot by three Councillors of State. They made their report to me, confirmed the facts and discussed the principles. For my own part, I had nothing more to do than to write at the bottom—‘_Dispatched for execution according to the laws of the republic, or of the empire._’ My interference was at an end, the public result accomplished, and popular opinion did justice to the transaction. It was the most formidable and dreadful of my tribunals. Did any question arise abroad respecting certain grand political combinations or some delicate points of diplomacy? The objects were indirectly hinted at in the Moniteur. They instantly attracted universal attention and became the topics of general investigation. This conduct was at once the orderly signal for the adherents of the throne, and at the same time an appeal to the opinion of all. The Moniteur has been reproached for the acrimony and virulence of its notes against the enemy. But before we condemn them, we are bound to take into consideration the benefits they may have produced, the anxiety with which they occasionally gave the enemy, the terror with which they struck a hesitating cabinet, the stimulus which they imparted to our allies, the confidence and audacity with which they inspired our troops," &c.

The conversation next turned upon the liberty of the press, and the Emperor asked our opinions. We talked for a long time very idly on the subject, and threw out a great number of common-place ideas. Some were hostile to it. “Nothing,” said they, “can resist the liberty of the press. It is capable of overthrowing every government, of agitating every society, of destroying every reputation.” “It is only,” observed others, “its prohibition that is dangerous. If it be restricted, it becomes a mine that must explode, but if left to itself it is merely an unbent bow, that can inflict no wound.” Here the Emperor observed, that he was far from being convinced with regard to that point, but that it was no longer the question for consideration; that there were institutions at present, and the liberty of the press was among the number, on the excellence of which we were no longer called upon to decide, but solely to determine the possibility of withholding them from the overbearing influence of popular opinion. He declared, that the prohibition under a representative government was a gross anachronism, a downright absurdity. He had, therefore, on his return from the Isle of Elba, abandoned the press to all its excesses, and he was well assured, that they had, in no respect, contributed to his recent downfall. When it was proposed in council, in his presence, to discuss the means of sheltering the authority of the State from its attacks, he jocosely remarked, “Gentlemen, it is probably yourselves you wish to protect, for, with respect to me, I shall henceforth continue a stranger to all such proceedings. The press has exhausted itself upon me during my absence, and I now defy it to produce any thing new or provoking against me.”

THE WAR, AND ROYAL FAMILY OF SPAIN.—FERDINAND AT VALENCEY.—ERRORS IN THE
AFFAIRS OF SPAIN.—HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THESE EVENTS, &C.—NAPOLEON’S
ADMIRABLE LETTER TO MURAT.

June 14th.—The Emperor had been ill the whole of the night, and continued so during the day; he had a foot-bath, and was not inclined to go out; he dined alone in his apartment, and sent for me towards the evening.

The Emperor began the conversation, of which the constant subject was the Spanish war. It has been seen in the notice which I have already taken of it, that the Emperor took upon himself the whole blame of the measure. I wish to avoid repetitions as much as possible, and shall, therefore, allude to those topics only which appeared new to me.

“The old King and Queen,” said the Emperor, "at the moment of the event, were the objects of the hatred and contempt of their subjects. The Prince of Asturias conspired against them, forced them to abdicate, and at once united in his own person the love and hopes of the nation. That nation was, however, ripe for great changes and demanded them with energy. I enjoyed vast popularity in the country, and it was in that state of things that all these personages met at Bayonne; the old king calling upon me for vengeance against his son, and the young prince soliciting my protection against his father, and imploring a wife at my hands. I resolved to convert this singular occasion to my advantage, with the view of delivering myself from that branch of the Bourbons, of continuing in my own dynasty the family system of Louis XIV. and of binding Spain to the destinies of France. Ferdinand was sent to Valencey, the old king to Marseilles, as he wished, and my brother Joseph went to reign at Madrid with a liberal constitution, adopted by a junta of the Spanish nation, which had come to receive it at Bayonne.

“It seems to me,” continued he, "that Europe, and even France, has never had a just idea of Ferdinand’s situation at Valencey. There is a strange misunderstanding in the world with respect to the treatment he experienced, and still more so, with respect to his wishes and personal opinions as to that situation. The fact is, that he was scarcely guarded at Valencey, and that he did not wish to escape. If any plots were contrived to favour his evasion, he was the first to make them known. An Irishman (Baron de Colli) gained access to his person, and offered, in the name of George the Third, to carry him off; but Ferdinand, so far from embracing the offer, instantly communicated it to the proper authority.

“His applications to me for a wife at my hands were incessant. He spontaneously wrote to me letters of congratulation upon every event that occurred in my favour. He had addressed proclamations to the Spaniards recommending their submission; he had recognized Joseph. All these were circumstances which might, indeed, have been considered as forced upon him; but he requested from him the insignia of his grand order; he tendered to me the services of his brother, Don Carlos, to take the command of the Spanish regiments, which were marching to Russia,—proceedings to which he was, in no respect, obliged. To sum up all, he earnestly solicited my permission to visit my court at Paris, and if I did not lend myself to a spectacle, which would have astonished Europe, by displaying the full consolidation of my power, it was because the important circumstances which called me abroad, and my frequent absence from the capital, deprived me of the proper opportunity.”

About the beginning of a year, at one of the Emperor’s levees, I happened to be next to the Chamberlain, Count d’Arberg, who had been doing duty at Valencey, near the persons of the princes of Spain. When the Emperor approached, he enquired if these princes conducted themselves with propriety, and added; “You have brought me a very pretty letter; but between ourselves, it was you who wrote it for them.” D’Arberg assured him, that he was altogether unacquainted even with the nature of its contents. “Well,” said the Emperor, “a son could not write more cordially to his father.”

“When our situation in Spain,” observed the Emperor, “proved dangerous, I more than once proposed to Ferdinand to return and reign over his people; that we should openly carry on war against each other: and that the contest should be decided by the fate of arms.” “No,” answered the prince, who seems to have been well advised, and never deviated from that way of thinking. “My country is agitated by political disturbances; I should but multiply its embarrassments: I might become their victim, and lose my head upon the scaffold. I remain; but, if you will choose a wife for me, if you will grant me your protection and the support of your arms, I shall set out and prove a faithful ally.”

"At a later period, during our disasters, and towards the end of 1813, I yielded to that proposal, and Ferdinand’s marriage with Joseph’s eldest daughter was decided; but circumstances were then no longer the same, and Ferdinand was desirous that the marriage should be deferred. “You can no longer,” he observed, support me with your arms, and I ought not to make my wife a title of exclusion in the eyes of my people." “He left me,” continued the Emperor, “as it seemed, with every intention of good faith, for he adhered to the principles which he avowed on his departure, until the events of Fontainebleau.”

The Emperor declared that, had the affairs of 1814 turned out differently, he would unquestionably have accomplished his marriage with Joseph’s daughter.

The Emperor, in reverting to these affairs, said, that the impolicy of his own conduct was irrevocably decided by the results; but that independently of this kind of proof, depending upon consequences, he had to reproach himself with serious faults in the execution of his plans. One of the greatest was that of considering the dethronement of the dynasty of the Bourbons as a matter of importance, and of maintaining as the basis of this system, for its successor, precisely that man, who from his qualities and character, was certain to cause its failure.

During the meeting at Bayonne, Ferdinand’s former preceptor and his principal counsellor (Escoiquiz) at once perceiving the vast projects entertained by the Emperor, and pleading the cause of his master, said to him: "You wish to create for yourself a kind of Herculean labour, when you have but child’s play in hand. You wish to rid yourselves of the Bourbons of Spain; why should you be apprehensive of them? They have ceased to exist; they are no longer French. You have nothing to fear from them; they are altogether aliens with respect to your nation and your manners. You have here Madame de Montmorency, and some new ladies of your Court; they are not more acquainted with the one than with the other, and view them all with equal indifference." The Emperor unfortunately formed a different resolution.

I took the liberty of telling him, I had been assured by some Spaniards, that, if the national pride had been respected, and the Spanish junta held at Madrid instead of Bayonne, or even, if Charles IV. had been sent off and Ferdinand retained, the revolution would have been popular, and affairs would have taken another turn. The Emperor entertained no doubt of it, and agreed that the enterprize had been imprudently undertaken, and that many circumstances might have been better conducted. “Charles IV.,” said he, "was, however, too stale for the Spaniards. Ferdinand should have been considered in the same light. The plan most worthy of me, and the best suited to my project, would have been a kind of mediation like that of Switzerland. I ought to have given a liberal constitution to the Spanish nation, and charged Ferdinand with its execution. If he had acted with good faith, Spain must have prospered and harmonized with our new manners. The great object would have been obtained, and France would have acquired an intimate ally and an addition of power truly formidable. Had Ferdinand, on the contrary, proved faithless to his new engagements, the Spaniards themselves would not have failed to dismiss him, and would have applied to me for a ruler in his place.