XIII
The proclamation with some slight alterations was published, and M. de Talleyrand finally carried his point, and formed his ministry. It is difficult to place oneself so completely in the troubled scene of Paris at this time, amidst the confused society composed of a defeated army, disappointed Republicans, triumphant Royalists, all uneasy and agitated in their actual position, and without the possibility of a common attachment to what was to be their government—it is difficult, I say, to take into a comprehensive glance the confused and troubled state of the French capital, disturbed by a thousand plots which might at any moment concentrate into one—and, therefore, it is difficult to appreciate the possible necessity of employing an able and dexterous adventurer, who had pulled many of the cords of the machine which had now to be brought into harmonious working. Still, I venture to consider that the Duke of Wellington committed an error in recommending, and M. de Talleyrand an error in accepting, M. Fouché as a member of the cabinet about to be formed.
The late minister of police was, in fact, at this time, an acknowledged scoundrel; he had gained our favour by betraying his master’s secrets to our general; he had gained the favour of the extreme Royalists by concealing their plots, and keeping safe their persons when he was serving the government they were attempting to overthrow. He had betrayed the Republicans of France to the Emperor of France, and he had subsequently betrayed the Emperor of France to the foreigner; and he had voted for the death of the brother of the monarch who was now to sit upon the throne. It was impossible for a man of this sort, whatever his abilities, not to bring ultimate disgrace on the government that enrolled him in its ranks; and, in fact, by his successive efforts, first to gain one party, and then to gain the other, by his personal ambition, by his constant intrigues, and by the general distrust he inspired, he deprived his colleagues of the consideration of all honest men, and exposed them consequently to the attacks of all violent factions.
But if England committed a fault in approving of the appointment of the Duc d’Otrante, she committed another fault still more important.
In designating M. de Talleyrand as the man best calculated to establish a government in France, and to consolidate an alliance between France and England, we ought to have been prepared to render the position of that minister tenable and honourable. Whether rightly or wrongly, we, in common with the other four powers, had made war, for a second time, on precisely the same principles on which we had made it for the first; since we had made it with the same declaration, that our conflict was with a man, and not with a nation. Our second peace, therefore, ought to have been in strict conformity with our first, or, rather, our first treaty of peace should have been maintained. We were dealing with the same monarch under the same circumstances, and we ought to have done so, preserving the same conditions.
If new circumstances of importance,—circumstances we had not foreseen,—rendered a change of policy necessary, that change should have been a large one, based on large considerations, and its necessity should have been clearly explained.
To take a few strips of territory, and a few pictures and statues, was the spite of the pigmy, not the anger of the giant.
Unfortunately, the power which rendered itself conspicuous for its animosity, was one which had been conspicuous for its valour. The descendant of all the Capets was insulted by the dirty linen of the Prussian soldier hung up to dry on the railing of his palace; and the intention of the Prussian army to blow up the bridge of Jena was only averted by M. de Talleyrand’s timely precautions.
The story is recounted in rather an amusing manner by a gentleman I have frequently cited, and is characteristic of the subject of this memoir.
M. de Talleyrand, on hearing what the Prussians were about to do, and knowing in these occasions no time was to be lost, ordered M. de Beugnot to find Marshal Blücher wherever he might be, and to use the strongest language in his vocabulary on the part of the King and his government in order to induce the marshal to give such peremptory orders as would prevent the threatened outrage. “Shall I say,” said M. de Beugnot, “that the King will have himself carried to the bridge, and be blown up with it?” “Not precisely; people will not believe us quite so heroic, but say something strong, very strong.”
Off went M. de Beugnot to discover the marshal, who was easily to be found in a certain gambling house in the Palais Royal. Though by no means delighted at being disturbed in his only amusement, the marshal, on being assured that the name of the bridge was to be altered, gave the orders for stopping its destruction.
When M. de Beugnot returned, and gave an account of his mission, M. de Talleyrand said, good-humouredly, “Well, now I think that we may profit by your idea of this morning. You remember the King threatened to be carried to the bridge, and was prepared to be blown up with it. It will make a good newspaper article.” “I profited,” says Beugnot, “by the hint.” The anecdote appeared in all the papers, and the King received the compliments made to him upon it with his accustomed affability and assurance.71
But this was not all. The violent seizure of the works of art which France had till then retained, and which might justifiably have been taken away at the first capture of Paris, was this time an unwarranted robbery, against which the King and his ministers could only protest in a manner which seemed offensive to the conquerors and feeble to the French people.
The payment of a large indemnity, the maintenance of a large foreign army, to be supported by France for seven years for the suppression of its own action and independence, were conditions that no French minister could sign with dignity, and least of all the minister who had taken so active a part with the coalition.
Having assisted at the appointment of a French government which was friendly to good relations with England, and it being our predominant interest to be on good terms with the French nation, we should have firmly resisted the imposition of such disgraceful conditions.
The natural consequence of our not doing so was that the Emperor Alexander, who had never forgiven M. de Talleyrand for his conduct at the recent congress, did not now disguise his personal antipathy to him, and told Louis XVIII. that he had nothing to expect from the cabinet of St. Petersburg as long as M. de Talleyrand was at the head of that of the Tuileries; but that, if his Majesty gave M. de Talleyrand’s place to M. de Richelieu, he (the Emperor) would then do what he could to mitigate the severity of the conditions that all the allies now peremptorily demanded.