Part 5 (1/2)
When his present Prussian Majesty succeeded to the throne, Count von Haugwitz continued in office, with increased influence; but he soned, in consequence, it is said, of a difference of opinion with the other Prussian Ministers on the subject of a family alliance, which Bonaparte had the modesty to propose, between the illustrious house of Napoleon the First and the royal line of Brandenburgh
On this occasion his King, to evince his satisfaction with his past conduct, bestowed on hie pension, but an estate in Silesia, where he before possessed soret at his retreat, proclaiion of Honour
Talleyrand insolently calls the several cordons, or ribands, distributed by Bonaparte as” It is to be hoped that Frederick Willias froh dynasty
LETTER XVI
PARIS, August, 1805
MY LORD:--Upwards of two months after my visit to General Murat, I was surprised at the appearance of M Darjuson, the chamberlain of Princesse Louis Bonaparte He told me that he came on the part of Prince Louis, who honoured me with an invitation to dine with him the day after Upon my inquiry whether he knew if the party would be very numerous, he answered, between forty and fifty; and that it was a kind of farewell dinner, because the Prince intended shortly to set out for Cone to assume the cooons and other light troops of the ares present at this dinner were Joseph Bonaparte and his wife, General and Madame Murat, the Ministers Berthier, Talleyrand, Fouche, Chaptal, and Portalis The conversation was entirely military, and chiefly related to the probable conquest or subjugation of Great Britain, and the probable consequence to reat event No difference of opinion was heard with regard to its iradual utility to all other nations; but Berthier seeanize this valuable conquest, she would be obliged to support another ith a forue, perhaps, of all other European nations
The issue, however, he said, would be glorious to France, who, by her achievee her their mother country; and then, first, Europe would constitute but one family
Chaptal was as certain as everybody else of the destruction of the tyrants of the seas; but he thought France would never be secure against the treachery of e until she followed the exae; and therefore, after reducing London to ashes, it would be proper to disperse round the universe all the inhabitants of the British Islands, and to re-people them with nations less evil-disposed and less corrupted Portalis observed that it was more easy to conceive than to execute such a vast plan It would not be an undertaking of five, of ten, nor of twenty years, to transplant these nations; that e and obstinacy, but desperation
”No people,” continued he, ”are more attached to their custoh British subjects are the greatest travellers, and found everywhere, they all suppose their country the best, and alish to return to it and finish their days as and smoke Neither the Saxons, nor the Danes, nor Nor the the vanquished, and in soenerations were but one people It is asserted by all persons who have lately visited Great Britain, that, though the civilization of the lower classes is her orders, the rich and the fashi+onable, are, with regard to their, ht easily be cajoled into obedience and subjection to the sovereignty of a nation whose customs, by free choice, they have adopted in preference to their own, and whose language forms a necessary part of their education, and, indeed, of the education of almost every class in the British Ee is the best ally France has in assisting her to conquer a universal dominion He wished, therefore, that ere in a situation to dictate in England, instead of proscribing Englishe, and advance and reward, in preference, all those parents whose children were sent to be educated in France, and all those families who voluntarily adopted in their houses and societies exclusively the French language”
Murat was afraid that if France did not transplant thethem French colonies, when once their military and commercial navy was annihilated, they would turn pirates, and, perhaps, within half a century, lay all other nations as much under contribution by their piracies as they now do by their industry; and that, like the pirates on the coast of Barbary, the instant they had no connections with other civilized nations, cut the throats of each other, and agree in nothing but in plundering, and considering all other people in the, world their natural enemies and purveyors
To this opinion Talleyrand, by nodding assent, seeenerally dreaded as destructive; but such a convulsion of nature as would s up the British Islands, with all their inhabitants, would be the greatest blessing Providence ever conferred on mankind”
Louis Bonaparte then addressed himself to me and to the Marquis de F----
”Gentleland; what is your opinion of the character of these islanders, and of the probability of their subjugation?”
I answered that, during the fifteen months I resided in London I was too , toelse; that my stomach was my sole meditation as well as anxiety That, however, I believed that in England, as everywhere else, a ood and bad qualities was to be found; but which prevailed, it would be presumption in me, from my position, to decide But I did not doubt that if we cordially hated the English they returned us the compliment with interest, and, therefore, the contest with them would be a severe one
The Marquis de F---- imprudently attempted to convince the company that it was difficult, if not iland, much more to conquer it, until ere masters of the seas by a superior navy He would, perhaps, have been still iven another turn to the conversation by inquiring about the fair sex in England, and if it was true that handsoain the Marquis, instead of paying her a compliment, as she perhaps expected, roundly assured her that for one beauty in France, hundreds entlemen were, therefore, not so easily satisfied; and that a woarded by them only as an ordinary person would pass for a first-rate beauty areat scarcity of them here
”You must excuse the Marquis, ladies,” said I, in land There, perhaps, he found the belles less cruel than in France, where, for the cruelty of one lady, or for her insensibility of his es himself on the whole sex:
”I apply to M de Talleyrand,” answered the Marquis; ”he has been longer in England than e,” retorted the Minister; ”Mada a Frenchworee witha dozen of ladies, has he counted reater accomplishments or more perfection”
To this the Marquis bowed assent, saying that in all his general remarks the party present, of course, was not included All the ladies, ell acquainted with his absent and blundering conversation, very good-huhed, and Madaive her the address of the belle in France who had transforallant Frenchman into a chevalier of British beauty, she would attempt to make up their difference ”She is no uillotined two days before----” the father of Mada to say, when Talleyrand interrupted hinificant look, and said, ”Before the fall of Robespierre, you mean”
From these and other traits of the Marquis's character, you may see that he erred ive offence He received, however, the next , a lettre de cachet from Fouche, which exiled him to Blois, and forbade him to return to Paris without further orders froh authority, that to the interference of Princesse Louis alone is he indebted for not being shut up in the Te depreciated the power and land I am perfectly convinced that none of those who spoke on the subject of the invasion expressed anything but what they really thought; and that, of the whole party, none, except Talleyrand, the Marquis, and myself, entertained the least doubt of the success of the expedition; so firmly did they rely on the fors, and his assurance
After dinner I had an opportunity of conversing for ten minutes with Madame Louis Bonaparte, whom I found extremely ah the most stupid, is, however, the best tempered of the Bonapartes, and seemed very attentive and attached to her She was far advanced in her pregnancy, and looked, notwithstanding, uncommonly well I have heard that Louis is inclined to inebriation, and when in that situation is very brutal to his wife, and very indelicate with other woues with her own servants and the nuitimate children is said to be as many as his years She asked General Murat to present reat politeness; and the Minister assured lad to see me at his hotel, which Iiven her by her brother-in-law, Napoleon, were, ”Alas! grandeur is not always happiness, nor the most elevated the ust, 1805
My LORD:--The arrival of the Pope in this country was certainly a grand epoch, not only in the history of the Revolution, but in the annals of Europe The debates in the Sacred College for and against this journey, and for and against his coronation of Bonaparte, are said to have been long as well as violent, and arranged according to the desires of Cardinal Fesch only by theits pious nani, Maury, Pignatelli, Roverella, So, and Galefli, are said to have shared the greatest part; and from the most violent anti-Bonapartists, they instantly became the strenuous adherents of Napoleon the First, who, of course, cannot be ignorant of their real worth
The person entrusted by Bonaparte and Talleyrand to carry on at Roue which sent Pius VII to cross the Alps was Cardinal Fesch, brother of Madame Letitia Bonaparte by the side of her e, chose a pedlar of the name of Nicolo Fesch, for her husband