Part 12 (1/2)
July, 1844.
A few days ago the King said to Marshal Soult (in presence of others):
”Marshal, do you remember the siege of Cadiz?”
”Rather, sire, I should think so. I swore enough before that cursed Cadiz. I invested the place and was forced to go away as I had come.”
”Marshal, while you were before it, I was inside it.”
”I know, sire.”
”The Cortes and the English Cabinet offered me the command of the Spanish army.”
”I remember it.”
”The offer was a grave one. I hesitated long. Bear arms against France!
For my family, it is possible; but against my country! I was greatly perplexed. At this juncture you asked me, through a trusty person, for a secret interview in a little house situated on the Cortadura, between the city and your camp. Do you remember the fact, Monsieur the Marshal?”
”Perfectly, sire; the day was fixed and the interview arranged.”
”And I did not turn up.”
”That is so.”
”Do you know why?”
”I never knew.”
”I will tell you. As I was preparing to go to meet you, the commander of the English squadron, apprised of the matter, I know not how, dropped upon me brusquely and warned me that I was about to fall into a trap; that Cadiz being impregnable, they despaired of seizing me, but that at the Cortadura I should be arrested by you; that the Emperor wished to make of the Duke d'Orleans a second volume of the Duke d'Enghien, and that you would have me shot immediately. There, really,” added the King with a smile, ”your hand on your conscience, were you going to shoot me?”
The Marshal remained silent for a moment, then replied, with a smile not less inexpressible than that of the King:
”No, sire; I wanted to compromise you.”
The subject of conversation was changed. A few minutes later the Marshal took leave of the King, and the King, as he watched him go, said with a smile to the person who heard this conversation:
”Compromise! compromise! To-day it is called compromise. In reality, he would have shot me!”
August 4, 1844.
Yesterday the King said to me:
”One of my embarra.s.sments at present, in all this affair of the University and the clergy, is M. Affre.” *
* Archbishop Affre was shot and killed in the Faubourg Saint Antoine on September 25, 1848, while trying to stop the fighting between the troops and insurgents.