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 MEMOIRS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 PRINCE DE TALLEYRAND 
 
 a
 
 ia.o/e Jt 
 
 e t? t &"/ '&cr*~c> \ / 
 
 FR1NCE TALLEYRAND AS ABBE, FROM AN ORIGINAL PASTEL, IN THE POSSESSION 
 OF MONSIEUR MOREAU-CHASLONS, THE WELL-KNOWN AMATEUR.
 
 MEMOIRS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 PRINCE DE TALLEYRAND 
 
 EDITED, WITH A PREFACE AND NOTES, BY 
 
 THE DUC DE BROGLIE 
 
 Of the French Academy 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 RAPHAEL LEDOS DE BEAUFORT, F.R. Hist. S. 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 
 
 THE HONOURABLE WHITELAW REID 
 
 American Minister in Paris 
 
 VOLUME I 
 
 WITH AN AUTOGRAPH LETTER AND PORTRAITS 
 
 GRIFFITH FARRAN OKEDEN AND WELSH 
 
 NEWBERY HOUSE, CHARING CROSS ROAD, LONDON 
 AND SYDNEY 
 
 189I
 
 
 J 
 
 The Rights of Translation and Reproduction are Reserved.
 
 LIBKAKY 
 UNIVERSITY -OJ CAIJFOR! 
 SANTA i:\Ki{;\|iA 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The Prince de Talleyrand died on the 17th of May 1838. 
 
 On the 10th of January 1834, he had made a will relative to 
 the division of his fortune among his heirs, and to the various 
 bequests he left as remembrances to his relatives, friends or 
 servants. 
 
 Two years after, on October 1, 1836, he added to his will the 
 following declaration, of a very different nature : — 
 
 " This is to be read to my relatives, to my heirs and to my 
 private friends, as a sequel to my will. — In the first place, I 
 declare that I die in the Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Faith. 
 
 " I do not wish to speak here of the share I had in the various 
 decisions and measures taken by the Constituent Assembly, or 
 of my first journeys to England or to America. 
 
 " This portion of my life will be found in the Memoirs, which 
 shall be published some day. But I feel it a duty to furnish my 
 family, and the persons who displayed friendship, or simply 
 kindness towards me, with some explanations concerning the 
 responsibility I had in the events which happened in France 
 after my return from America. 
 
 " I had resigned the bishopric of Autun, and my resignation 
 had been accepted by the Pope, by whom I have since been
 
 viii PREFACE. 
 
 secularized. The instrument of my secularization is annexed to 
 my will. I considered myself free, and my situation required 
 that I should find my way. I did so alone, for I did not wish my 
 future to be linked to any political party, for they none of 
 them tallied with my views. I carefully considered the matter 
 and decided on serving France for her sake alone, in whatever 
 situation she might be placed : some good was to be done in 
 each. Therefore, I do not blame myself for having served 
 all the political parties which ruled France, from the Directory 
 to the government existing at the time of my writing this. 
 After the horrors of the Revolution, all that was calculated to 
 lead, one way or the other, to order and security was useful ; 
 and, at that time, sensible men could wish for nothing more. 
 
 " To restore monarchical institutions was a matter of impos- 
 sibility in the state in which France then was. To do so, inter- 
 mediate forms of government — several of them — were needed. 
 One could not expect even the shadow of royalty in the 
 Directory ; the spirit of the Convention must predominate there, 
 and so it did, in reality, though in a milder form : but, by reason 
 of this spirit, that government was not to last long. It paved 
 the way for the Consulate, which already contained the principle 
 of royalty, though as yet in disguise. Some good was to be 
 done there ; that form of government possessed a remote, it 
 is true, but real resemblance to monarchy. 
 
 " The imperial rule which followed was more like an autocracy 
 than a regular monarchy. This is true, but at the time when 
 Bonaparte put the crown on his head, war with England was 
 raging again ; other wars were imminent ; the spirit of faction 
 was rampant, and the safety of the country might have been 
 jeopardized if its ruler had confined himself to the exercise of
 
 PREFACE. ix 
 
 the sole prerogatives of a simple king. I therefore served the 
 Emperor Napoleon, as I had done the Consul Bonaparte : I 
 served him with loyalty, so long as I could believe him exclu- 
 sively devoted to France. But, as soon as I saw him enter on 
 the revolutionary path which led him to ruin, I left the cabinet, 
 and for that he never forgave me. 
 
 " In 1 8 14, the Bourbons, with whom, since 1791, 1 had had no 
 relations, were recalled. They were so, for the only reason that 
 their reign was deemed more favourable than any other to the 
 rest so much needed by France and by Europe. I have related, 
 in my Memoirs, the chief part I played in that great event, and 
 the rather bold steps I took in those memorable days. The 
 recall of the princes of the House of Bourbon was not the 
 acknowledgment of pre-existing rights. If they so construed 
 it, it was neither on my advice, nor with my assent ; for here is 
 my opinion on the matter. 
 
 " Monarchs are such only by virtue of public instruments 
 which constitute them the heads of civil society. These instru- 
 ments are, it is true, irrevocable for each monarch and for his 
 posterity so long as the reigning monarch keeps within the 
 limits of his own province ; but if he attempts to go beyond it, 
 he loses all right to a title which his own acts either have 
 belied or would soon belie. Such being my opinion, I have 
 never found it necessary to disclaim it in order to accept the 
 functions which I have discharged under various governments. 
 
 "As I now, in my eighty-second year, call to mind the 
 numerous events of my political life, which has itself been long, 
 and weigh them, on the eve of entering into eternity, I find as 
 the result: — 
 
 " That of all the governments I have served, there is
 
 x PREFACE. 
 
 not one to which I have not given more than I have 
 received. 
 
 "That I have never abandoned any, till it had, first of all, 
 abandoned itself. 
 
 " That I have never considered the interests of any party, my 
 own, or those of my friends, before the true interests of France, 
 which besides are never, in my opinion, contrary to the true 
 interests of Europe. 
 
 " This judgment, for which I am alone responsible, will, I hope, 
 be confirmed by all impartial minds ; and should this justice be 
 refused me. when I am no longer living, the conviction of its 
 truth will yet serve to brighten my last days 
 
 " My wish — and I consign it here, giving it the same force as 
 my will — my wish, I say, is that the writings that I leave 
 behind me, be published only when thirty years, dating from 
 the day of my death, shall have elapsed, in order that those of 
 whom I have had to speak, being no longer alive, may, none of 
 them, have to suffer from what the truth may have compelled 
 me to say to their disadvantage, for I have never written with 
 the intention of hurting any one, whoever he might be. Thus, 
 even thirty years after my death, my Memoirs are only to appear 
 if those of my heirs to whom I leave them, judge that they can 
 be published without inconvenience to any one. 
 
 " I also enjoin the trustee of my papers to neglect no precau- 
 tion that may be necessary, or at least calculated to prevent, or 
 defeat any furtive attempts that may be made against them. 
 
 " Further, as in the times in which we live, we are inundated 
 with spurious memoirs, forged some by starvelings, or covetous 
 characters, others by cowardly and unprincipled scoundrels, 
 who, in order to exercise their party spite without risk to them-
 
 PREFACE. xi 
 
 selves, dare to brand as far as lies in their power, the memory of 
 the great dead, under whose name they spread the grossest lies 
 and most absurd calumnies, — I expressly charge the trustees of 
 my manuscripts to publicly, peremptorily and without delay, 
 disclaim, as I hereby now disclaim, any writing whatever which 
 may chance to be published under my name before the expiration 
 of the thirty years above specified. 
 
 "Valencay, October i, 1836. 
 
 "{Signed) PRINCE DE TALLEYRAND." 
 
 This important paper has, as may be seen, two very 
 different aims in view. 
 
 The first is to make a profession of principle, which M. de 
 Talleyrand only submits to the judgment of his conscience and 
 of posterity, and which therefore necessitates no comment. 
 
 Then follow prescriptions relative to the keeping and 
 publication of his papers. 
 
 It is for these latter only, and for the measures which had 
 to be taken accordingly, that the editors of these Memoii's have 
 to account. 
 
 These prescriptions were repeated and completed in a codicil 
 joined to the will and instrument of 1836, dated March 17, 1838, 
 and couched in the following terms : — 
 
 " I, the undersigned, hereby declare that the Duchesse de 
 Dino, as my universal legatee, has alone the right of collecting 
 all my papers and writings zvithotct exception, in order to do 
 with them what I have enjoined her, and what she already 
 knows ; and I forbid her to divulge in any way the contents 
 of the papers that I shall leave, save after the expiration of
 
 xii PREFACE. 
 
 thirty years after my decease ; nevertheless, M. de Bacourt, the 
 king's minister at Baden, to whom I give and bequeath a 
 diamond of fifty thousand francs in value, which 1 beg him to 
 accept as a token of my esteem and friendship for him, will be 
 so good, in default of the Duchesse de Dino, and in that case 
 only that she departs this life before myself, as to take charge 
 of all my unpublished papers that I have left in England." 
 
 The Duchesse de Dino, who was soon afterwards called upon 
 to assume the title of Duchesse de Talleyrand and Sagan, died 
 on September 29, 1862, six years before the date fixed by 
 M. de Talleyrand for the publication of his papers by his 
 heirs. 
 
 The Duchesse de Talleyrand had none the less taken full 
 and entire possession of all the papers of her uncle, as shown in 
 her will, made September 19, 1862, at Sagan, and which bears, 
 in paragraph 17, the following injunction : — 
 
 " The papers of my late uncle, the Prince de Talleyrand, 
 which have been handed over to me in accordance with the 
 instructions contained in his will, are to be found, for the most 
 part, in the keeping of M. Adolphe de Bacourt ; some of them 
 with the necessary instructions relative to them, are to be 
 found amongst the property disposed of in my will. By this 
 present writing, I order that, after my decease, this part of the 
 papers as well be remitted to M. de Bacourt, who will receive 
 them under the same conditions fixed by my late uncle, as 1 
 myself received them." 
 
 M. de Bacourt, who died April 28, 1865, did not long survive 
 the Duchesse de Talleyrand ; but even during the lifetime of
 
 PREFACE. xiii 
 
 the Duchesse he had, as we have just seen, been associated with 
 her in the keeping of the papers and their classification, with 
 which the illustrious statesman had charged her. He had 
 been instructed by her to collect all the papers that had been 
 left her, those that had been left in England, just as well as 
 those that might yet be found in France. 
 
 Left in sole possession of this mass of papers for three years, 
 M. de Bacourt applied himself with indefatigable zeal to the 
 task of revising them and preparing the publication of the 
 Memoirs, which formed a principal part of them. With this 
 intention, he had arranged numerous notes, complementary or 
 explanatory, bearing on the most important points in the life 
 of the prince, and on those over which the greatest amount of 
 controversy had raged. Finally, he had neglected no means of 
 enlarging the precious trust confided to him, by the acquisition 
 of a number of unpublished documents emanating either from 
 M. de Talleyrand himself, or addressed to him by various people, 
 or which were likely to throw some fresh interest on his life. 
 
 It was assuredly with the design, that this work, to which he 
 had given himself with an almost religious devotion, should be 
 continued after his death in the same spirit in which he had 
 treated it himself, that he thought fit to introduce into his will 
 a number of injunctions, of which the text must be literally 
 reproduced. 
 
 " On account of the arrangements made in the two wills 
 that I have just quoted (those namely of the Prince and of the 
 Duchesse de Talleyrand), I find myself compelled to provide 
 for the consequence that might ensue, if I died before accom- 
 plishing the duty which has been laid upon me with respect to
 
 xiv PREFACE. 
 
 the papers left by the Prince de Talleyrand, which are all in my 
 possession. 
 
 " I thought the best plan was to choose, according to the 
 custom adopted in England, so called Trustees, or persons of 
 trust, who in case of my death, would be charged : ist, To take 
 my place as guardians of the said papers ; 2nd, to provide for 
 the time fixed by me for the publication of those of these 
 papers which are destined to be published. I have therefore 
 appointed for this purpose M. Chatelain, ex-notary, living in 
 Paris, No 17, Rue d'Anjou-Saint-Honore, and M. Paul Andral, 
 a barrister in practice at the imperial courts at Paris, dwelling in 
 that city, No 101, Rue Saint-Lazare, who have both willingly 
 accepted the mission I thus entrust them with. I require and com- 
 mand that these two gentlemen be informed immediately after my 
 death of the place where these papers are deposited, and told 
 that they are there at their disposal ; and that means of taking 
 possession of them, together with all necessary measures of 
 security for so doing be afforded them. ... I impose, as a special 
 injunction, on MM. Chatelain and Andral, that no publication 
 taken from these papers be made, in any case whatever, before 
 the year eighteen hundred and eighty-eight thus adding a term 
 of twenty years to that of thirty fixed by the Prince de Talley- 
 rand." 
 
 M. de Bacourt adding, as we have just seen, a fresh proro- 
 gation of twenty years to that of the thirty fixed by M. de 
 Talleyrand, made use of a power reserved by the prince himself 
 to his heirs. Those who, in their turn, received the legacy of 
 M. de Bacourt had no right to exempt themselves from this 
 restriction.
 
 PREFACE. xv 
 
 Before the expiration of this prorogation, one of them, M. 
 Chatelain, had ceased to live, and had to be replaced by his son ; 
 and when the fixed term had elapsed, his partner, M. Andral, 
 was already attacked by the disease which, in the following year 
 snatched him away from his sorrowing friends. 
 
 It was then only at the beginning of the current year that I 
 was informed of the honour that my ever lamented friend had 
 paid me, by handing on to me the accomplishment of the task 
 which the last will and testament of M. de Bacourt had imposed 
 on him, and which his illness hindered him from carrying out. 
 Nothing had prepared me for it, and no communication on his 
 part had led me even to suspect it. I had understood and 
 shared the impatience which the public had long shown for be- 
 coming acquainted with a work of high value, and one which was 
 a legitimate object for curiosity. But however great may 
 have been the wish of M. Chatelain and my own in this respect, 
 it was yet necessary to take time, in order to neglect no care 
 demanded by the publication of a work of such importance. 
 
 It will have been noticed how careful both the Duchesse 
 de Talleyrand and M. de Bacourt were to state that they were 
 in possession of all the papers of the prince without exception, 
 and that nothing could either have been taken from or escaped 
 them. The fear of seeing, throughout the long years of silence 
 that had been imposed upon them, the name of M. de Talleyrand 
 at the head of fictitious memoirs, and apocryphal documents 
 which would have misrepresented him (as but too often happens 
 in the case of celebrated men), had evidently deeply affected 
 them. It is against all abuse and forgery of this kind that 
 they firmly protested beforehand, remaining faithful in this 
 to the thought that had dictated to M. de Talleyrand himself
 
 xvi PREFACE. 
 
 the injunction he gave his heirs in the instrument of 1836, to 
 preserve his memory from all stealtJiy publication. 
 
 This precaution, very natural in itself, was moreover 
 especially justified by the knowledge of a very serious fact, 
 and one of which the consequences had even before the death 
 of M. de Talleyrand caused an anxiety to himself and his family 
 that may easily be understood. 
 
 A secretary who had enjoyed his confidence throughout the 
 years in which, either as minister or ambassador, he had been 
 charged with the gravest interests of the State, had been dismissed 
 after twenty years of this intimate service for sufficiently serious 
 reasons ; and although the precaution of demanding from him to 
 deliver up any pieces that might be in his hands was by no 
 means neglected, it was not long before it was found that not 
 only had this restitution been far from complete, but that the 
 secretary thus dismissed, boasted of having kept back more 
 than one important document, which he threatened to make 
 use of, without the permission of his old patron, and with 
 the express purpose of doing him harm. 
 
 What made the conduct of this faithless agent as dangerous 
 as reprehensible was, that during these years of familiar inter- 
 course with M. de Talleyrand, he had learnt to counterfeit his 
 handwriting, in such a manner as to deceive those who ought to 
 be best acquainted with it, and it was soon found that he had 
 turned this paltry talent to advantage by circulating as having 
 emanated from M. de Talleyrand, writings, forged or falsified, of 
 such a character as to cause unpleasantness in his relations 
 with his family and friends, and to accredit the most infamous 
 accusations against him. 
 
 Chance allowed M. de Bacourt to get genuine and undeniable
 
 PREFACE. xv ii 
 
 proofs of this fraud ; these he put into a special drawer amongst 
 his papers where they are still. With respect to the original 
 letters of M. de Talleyrand, he has produced facsimiles, found 
 among the papers of the copyist, so closely resembling the 
 originals that they could not be distinguished from them, were it 
 not that certain sentences, manifestly introduced with evil intent, 
 betray the imposture. 
 
 It is thus not difficult to conceive the anxiety which the 
 executors of the will of M. de Talleyrand must have experienced 
 when, three days after his death, May 20, 1838, the English 
 paper, the Ti?nes y published the following : — 
 
 " With regard to the political Memoirs of M. de Talleyrand, 
 it is well known that they were only to see the light thirty years 
 after his death, but his secretary, M. Perrey, being possessed of 
 a large portion of the manuscript, it is believed that the 
 intentions of the deceased will not be realised, except at the cost 
 of a great pecuniary sacrifice. Amongst the papers that M. 
 Perrey is known to possess, are satirical portraits of more than 
 a hundred of our contemporaries." 
 
 Let us add that the Times named as among these con- 
 temporaries all the personal friends of M. de Talleyrand and 
 his family. 
 
 It is true that eight days later, on May 28, M. Perrey 
 himself (the Times being the paper that had mentioned his name 
 in the matter) in a letter addressed to it, denied the allegation, 
 and said that he was ready to bring an action before the courts 
 against " whomsoever should venture to use his name in order to 
 give some appearance of authenticity to these so-called writings 
 of M. de Talleyrand." But what weight did this disclaimer carry, 
 VOL. 1. b
 
 xviii PREFACE. 
 
 a disclaimer which could not be dispensed with, without allowing 
 the shadow of criminal dishonesty to rest upon one's self, and 
 what foundation was there for the allegation of the Times ? Had 
 M. Perrey attempted this process of reproduction, amplifying 
 and altering, at which he was known to be an adept, on some 
 stolen fragments of the Memoirs, or on some notes prepared 
 for their publication ? If he had attempted anything of this 
 kind, what guarantee was there that he had destroyed all trace 
 of it, and was there no risk of its being introduced to the public 
 through some intermediary, to whom he might have given it 
 gratis or for a money consideration ? 
 
 No precaution whatever was thought superfluous by the 
 Duchesse de Talleyrand and M. de Bacourt ; and, in order to 
 render all challenge or confusion impossible, M. de Bacourt 
 undertook to transcribe with his own hand the text of the 
 Memoirs, as he had received it from M. de Talleyrand, with the 
 complementary notes and documents. 
 
 This copy is mentioned in the inventory of the papers of 
 M. de Bacourt, subjoined to his will in the following terms : — 
 
 " Four volumes, bound in leather, which form the only 
 complete and authentic copy of Prince Talleyrand's Memoirs, 
 done by M. de Bacourt from the original manuscripts, dictated 
 documents, and copies whose purpose M. de Talleyrand had 
 indicated to him." 
 
 Furthermore the first of these four volumes bears on its 
 last page the following declaration : — 
 
 " I, the undersigned, testamentary executrix of my late uncle, 
 Charles-Maurice, Prince de Talleyrand, declare and certify that
 
 PREFACE. xix 
 
 the present folio volume, containing five hundred and one hand- 
 written pages, comprises the only original, complete, and faithful 
 copy of the first five parts of his Memoirs, and of a fragment on 
 the Due de Choiseul left by the Prince de Talleyrand-Perigord. 
 " Sagan, May 20, 1858. 
 
 " DOROTHEE DE COURLANUE, 
 " DUCHESSE DE TALLEYRAND ET DE SAGAN." 
 
 A declaration, similar in all respects and bearing the same 
 signature, closes the second volume. 
 
 At the end of the third, it is M. de Bacourt, sole survivor, who 
 thus expresses himself: — 
 
 " I, the undersigned, testamentary executor of the late Prince 
 Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord, and of the Duchesse 
 de Talleyrand and Sagan, Princesse de Courlande, declare and 
 certify that the present folio volume of five hundred and six 
 manuscript pages comprises the sole original, complete, and 
 authentic copy of the eighth, ninth, and tenth parts of the 
 Memoirs left by Prince Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord. 
 
 " Ad. de Bacourt. 
 
 " BADEN, January 20, 1 863." 
 
 No declaration is found at the end of the fourth volume, for 
 the reason that the last part of this volume was to have 
 been completed by subjoined extracts, whose complete tran- 
 scription was not accomplished when death overtook M. de 
 Bacourt. 
 
 It is from the text prepared for press by the very people 
 whom M. de Talleyrand had charged with doing so, and 
 according to the instructions that they held of him, that 
 
 b2
 
 xx PREFACE. 
 
 the present publication is made. Neither suppression, nor 
 even toning down, have in any degree been allowed. Only 
 some of the notes prepared by M. de Bacourt have been 
 omitted, owing to their having, by this time, lost their interest. 
 On the other hand, other notes, a considerable number of them, 
 have been added, containing either biographical information 
 concerning persons mentioned in the Memoirs, or explanation 
 of facts reported in them, of which the reader of to-day might 
 not have retained a sufficiently clear recollection. 
 
 With regard to the writing relative to the ministry of the 
 Due de Choiseul, mentioned in the declaration of the Duchesse 
 de Talleyrand, M. de Bacourt thought that it ought to appear 
 at the head of the first part of the Memoirs, although it 
 would not naturally find a place there, having been composed at 
 a later date. But it has been found more convenient to place 
 this detached document at the end of the last volume, where 
 some other writings of M. de Talleyrand that have been either 
 unpublished hitherto, or forgotten, but which may still be read 
 with interest, will also be relegated. 
 
 II. 
 
 The twelve parts of which the Memoirs are composed will 
 be found to be very far from forming a complete and con- 
 secutive whole. They can be divided into two distinct portions. 
 The first extends from M. de Talleyrand's birth to 1815, being 
 the close of his ministry under Louis XVIII. There are 
 clear indications to show that this portion of the Memoirs was 
 drawn up during the Restoration. The second commences 
 after the revolution of 1830, with the embassy of M. de
 
 PREFACE. xxi 
 
 Talleyrand to London, and contains the account of this 
 mission. It was probably written during the retirement which 
 followed his resignation given in 1834. 
 
 A break of fourteen years, as well as the brevity with which 
 the narrative passes over certain portions of the political career 
 of M. de Talleyrand (among others, the part he played in the 
 Constituent Assembly), witness sufficiently that his intention was 
 by no means to present a complete picture of his whole life in 
 his Memoirs. He himself, in a note put at the head of the first 
 part, warns the reader that Memoirs is an improper expression, 
 and only employed from want of a better one. That which will 
 least be found in them as a matter of fact is that which is gene- 
 rally most sought after in memoirs, viz., revelations of incidents 
 but little known in the life of the writer, or his personal impres- 
 sions on events that he himself witnessed. Apart from a few 
 pages devoted to his childhood and youth, the narrative of M. de 
 Talleyrand is more than reserved as to his private life ; and that 
 of those whom he has known finds still less place there. His 
 criticisms of the society amid which he lived are full of penetra- 
 tion and good taste ; but the reader who expects to find anecdotes, 
 indiscretions, or confidences among them, and who would not 
 object to the spice of a little scandal, will be completely deceived. 
 The tone of the narrative, uniformly earnest, never lends itself 
 to disclosures of this nature. 
 
 M. de Talleyrand also seems to have not the slightest in- 
 tention of replying, by way of explanation or apology, to the 
 various charges that have been brought against him. Save the 
 share that some writers have ascribed to him in the outrage that 
 put an end to the days of the Due d'Enghien, and which he indig- 
 nantly disclaims in a special note, he preserves a silence which
 
 xxii PREFACE. 
 
 does not merely appear to be that of disdain : it is rather a sort 
 of resolution taken to occupy the attention of his readers with 
 nothing that concerns himself alone, but to reserve all their 
 attention for the great political and national interests, whose 
 fate he held, on several occasions, in his own hands, and for 
 which France and posterity have the right to demand account. 
 
 If such has been his object (and everything leads to this 
 conviction), if he has really thought neither of satire, pleading, 
 nor confession of any kind, but merely of showing that the 
 fortune of France had not lost by being entrusted to his care, 
 he could scarcely have found a better way of clearing his 
 memory from the accusations, which, having never been spared 
 him in his lifetime, were not likely to be spared him in the 
 grave. There have been errors and mistakes in the private life 
 of M. de Talleyrand which no one has a right to justify, since 
 some of those he himself, of his own free will, solemnly re- 
 tracted on the point of death. His part in home politics, during 
 the various phases of the Revolution in which he mixed, will 
 always give rise to different judgments ; and as he belonged 
 to none of the parties into which France was at that time 
 divided, there is no one but believes himself justified in 
 severely criticising some of his actions. But when he had to 
 defend, whether as ambassador or minister, the greatness and 
 independence of his country in the face of the foreigner (foe, 
 rival, or ally,) it would be difficult to question, and it will be 
 found that he has not exaggerated, the importance of the 
 service he has rendered. 
 
 To do him full justice in this respect, one must not stay 
 at the recital he gives of the action he was enabled to take as 
 minister of the Directory or of the First Empire. He himself
 
 PREFACE. xxiii 
 
 passes fairly quickly over these first phases of his ministerial 
 career, and however great be the events which follow each other 
 at that time, if he often draws a picture of them with the art 
 of a consummate historian, it is rather as a witness, than as an 
 actor in them that he speaks. He leaves his reader to understand 
 that, whatever high office, he, at that time, held, his power was 
 in reality but nominal. He only carried out decisions that he 
 had, as often as not, first combated. Being unable either 
 to make himself understood by the incapable upstarts of the 
 Revolution, or listened toby an imperious master who only asked 
 counsel of his genius or of his passions, all his ingenuity was 
 employed, after giving advice which was not followed, in 
 repairing the faults which he would never have committed. 
 It is at the Congress of Vienna, after the Restoration, at the 
 embassy at London, after 1830, that, invested with the full con- 
 fidence of the sovereigns whom he represented, he showed 
 himself free to act as he would. 
 
 In these two circumstances, the most brilliant of his long 
 career, and which naturally hold the foremost place in the 
 volumes now submitted to the reader, Talleyrand gave diplo- 
 macy a place such as it perhaps had never before enjoyed, and 
 imparted to the person of an ambassador an importance almost 
 without precedent in history. As a general rule, the most 
 renowned ambassadors have only been the fortunate interpreters 
 of a thought that was not their own, and the clever executors of 
 designs handed to them by those above them in office. What 
 would Father Joseph have been without Richelieu ? Their credit, 
 besides, depends less on their own merits, than on the use they 
 know how to make of the fear or the confidence which the 
 governments that they represent inspire. What would the great
 
 xxiv PREFACE. 
 
 negotiators of the peace of Westphalia, or of that of the Pyrenees 
 have been, without the victories of Conde and Turenne ? No 
 support of this kind came to Talleyrand on the two occasions on 
 which all the interests of our country were entrusted to him. 
 In the one as in the other, he had to rely upon himself alone. 
 
 At Vienna, he presented himself before four victorious 
 powers, closely united, and still under arms ; he spoke in 
 the name of a monarchy restored after twenty-five years of 
 trouble, on a tottering basis, in a country still covered with 
 foreign troops, whose decimated army was not even loyal. 
 Before the congress had finished its work, the sad mishap 
 of the Hundred Days reduced him to the almost ridiculous 
 position of ambassador of an exiled prince. At London, he 
 was the agent of a still budding power, proceeding from a 
 revolution, held for this reason in contempt by all the mon- 
 archies of Europe, and threatened every moment (at least, it 
 was so believed), with destruction by the very popular force that 
 had called it into being. There were days when the voice of the 
 ambassador, bringing assurances of peace to the conferences, was 
 drowned by echoes from Paris bearing shouts of war, and the 
 rumbling of rebellion. 
 
 It cannot however be called into question (and if there did 
 exist any doubts in this respect, the reading of the Memoirs 
 would at once dispel them) that M. de Talleyrand never ceased 
 a single day, either at London or Vienna, to be the soul of the 
 congresses and conferences, and the true inspirer of the resolu- 
 tions of assembled Europe, of which, when all is summed up, 
 and the difficulties of the circumstances allowed for, France has 
 in no way suffered. It is easier to state than to define the 
 sovereign art, which enabled him to supply, by means of his
 
 PREFACE. xxv 
 
 cleverness and intellect alone, that support which, at every 
 moment, failed him from without. In public as in private life, 
 the ascendency which one man knows how to exercise over 
 all those who in any way have dealings with him, is a natural 
 gift for which no species of supremacy will ever adequately 
 account. The unexpected successes which he obtained, are, 
 however, to be explained in a great measure, as may be seen 
 from the Memoirs, by the rare accuracy of glance which enabled 
 him to perceive at once, and before all trial, the resources which 
 could yet be drawn from a situation which any other man 
 would have considered hopeless. 
 
 Thus, in 1814, on entering the European senate, devoid of 
 all means for making himself feared, he discerned at once, that 
 even on the morrow of a victory, material force is not every- 
 thing, and that the course of events which appeared to be most 
 unfavourable to him, had yet put at his service a moral 
 force, which, cleverly managed, could take the place of weapons 
 of a different character, which he lacked. This moral force, 
 superior even to the force which the allied courts against us 
 owed to the number of their soldiers, he sought and found 
 in the principle loudly proclaimed of monarchical legitimacy. 
 The text of the instructions he took to the Congress and 
 which he gave to himself — being at once minister and ambas- 
 sador — will be read ; it is a general scheme for the restoration 
 of legitimate monarchy over the whole surface of Europe, and 
 as a natural consequence the restitution to all sovereigns of 
 whatever lands their forefathers possessed. The project is 
 systematically applied, article by article, state by state, without 
 reserve, without restriction, without embarrassment ; I might 
 almost say, without false pride, without Talleyrand ever sus-
 
 xxvi PREFACE. 
 
 pecting, for a moment, that this monarchical faith will cause 
 some surprise in the mouth of a former minister of the Republic 
 and of the Empire. 
 
 To those who would have expressed this surprise to him, 
 I feel convinced that he would have been ready to reply with 
 his habitual sang-froid, that this contradiction on his part was 
 only one more homage rendered to necessity by experience. 
 But the truth is that, after twenty years of strife, which, 
 saturating the soil of Europe with blood, had mutilated, 
 lacerated, cut up all territories in a thousand different ways, 
 an extreme weariness, and a profound disgust of conquests 
 and revolutions had taken possession of the public mind. The 
 rapid succession of the republics instituted by the Directory, 
 and of the kingdoms created by imperial whim, the speedy 
 passage of these phantasms, that sprung up one day, only to 
 vanish on the next, had fatigued as much as dazzled the gaze 
 of peoples. Subjects and princes alike demanded rest, the one as 
 wearied with passing from hand to hand, and master to master, 
 as the others with being, by turn, crowned and dethroned, 
 according to the chance of the day. Some principle of public 
 law was demanded on all hands, which by regulating the 
 orderly transmission of power, should strengthen the basis 
 of all states, tottering from the effect of so many shocks. It 
 was the credit of Talleyrand to understand the imperious 
 character of this general sentiment, and the influence which 
 the representative of Louis XVIII. could draw from it. The 
 French monarchy restored within its former limits, deprived 
 only of those annexations which had been acquired by but 
 transient success, seemed the first and noblest application of 
 the principle of reparation. In making of Louis XVIII. an
 
 PREFACE. xxv ii 
 
 interpreter of the common wish and a living protest against 
 the barbarity of a regime of usurpation and violence, he assigned 
 to him at once an original and paramount position among 
 his royal peers. Restored by the acts of a war in which he 
 had not concurred, the King of France was under obligations 
 to, and protected by, those who had reopened to him the gates 
 of his country. Re-established by virtue of a right which 
 did not depend on force, he became once more their equal, 
 and considering the antiquity of his race, in a certain measure, 
 even their superior. That which the fear of his arms could 
 not effect, respect for a principle obtained for him, and by 
 restraining the ambition of Napoleon's conquerors, hindered 
 them from imitating his example and appropriating, as he 
 had done, at their own caprice and desire, territories occupied 
 by their armies. 
 
 It has been said, I know, that there were here considerations 
 stamped with a chivalrous loyalty, whose somewhat stilted 
 expression could scarcely have been sincere, or even quite 
 serious on the part of Talleyrand. We are given to understand 
 that, instead of thus following up, from Dresden to Naples, and 
 in fact over all Europe, the restoration of legitimate sovereigns, 
 he could with less trouble, have obtained more solid and 
 substantial advantages. For example, if he had allowed Russia 
 and Prussia to extend as they chose in the north at the expense 
 of their neighbours, it would have been possible (it is thought) to 
 have driven back the German frontier from our own, thus 
 preventing conflicts in the future, and giving us a better place in 
 the new European equilibrium. This judgment, which claims 
 to be essentially useful and practical, has seemed always to 
 me to depend upon a narrow and superficial acquaintance with
 
 xxviii PREFACE. 
 
 facts. I doubt whether it could be maintained in face of the 
 account of M. de Talleyrand's first appearance at the Congress of 
 Vienna. There is nothing more dramatic than the account of this 
 first interview, in which the great powers still allied, declared 
 to him with a haughty coldness, that, even after peace was 
 concluded, they intended to maintain themselves in a close and 
 impenetrable bond, meaning to form a smaller assembly within 
 the great one, in which the fate of Europe would have been 
 decided with closed doors, and whose resolutions France would 
 have had no other alternative but to submit to. Had Talleyrand 
 done nothing else except break this cordo?i sanitaire, by showing 
 himself to be animated with a monarchical sentiment, even more 
 exaggerated than that of those who suspected him ; had this 
 unexpected manoeuvre had no other result than to cause one of 
 his interlocutors to say, with a surprise which but ill-concealed 
 his deception : " In truth, Talleyrand speaks to us like a minister 
 of Louis XIV. ! " those who care for our national dignity, even 
 in the past, ought yet to be grateful to him for it. But it was, 
 at bottom, a very different question from one of mere dignity or 
 even honour. It was (as the event but too soon proved) the 
 very existence of France and its unity which were continually 
 at stake. For by what other title after all than that of his 
 hereditary right, had Louis XVIII. got complete restoration of 
 the territory of his forefathers ? Besides, to allow elsewhere the 
 principle of heredity to be violated at the expense of the weak, 
 without a protest, after having benefited by it one's self, would 
 have been an inconsistency, nay, even a species of moral ingrati- 
 tude which would soon have borne fruit, and the perpetrator of it 
 would soon have had occasion to repent. Ten months had not 
 yet elapsed, when France having met with fresh disasters, saw her
 
 PREFACE. xxix 
 
 fate once more placed at the mercy of her conquerors, in days 
 of inexpressible anguish. One map was already drawn, which 
 took away some of her dearest provinces. Louis XVIII. had 
 once more to proclaim the inviolable nature of his heritage. 
 But how could he have raised his voice and gained a hearing, if 
 he had himself connived by complying through the complacency 
 of his ambassador at Vienna, in other robberies, as little justifiable 
 as those with which he was threatened ? Suppose, for example, 
 that, from motives of self-interest, Talleyrand, instead of 
 defending the patrimony of our old and faithful friend, the 
 King of Saxony, had given it up as a prey to the King of 
 Prussia who coveted it, who could, after Waterloo, have stayed 
 these same appetites whose insatiable greed was already only 
 too well known, from extending beyond the Rhine, as far 
 as the Meuse and the Vosges ? In reality, the position of 
 defender of legitimate rights assumed by Talleyrand, was never 
 better justified than on the day when the shadow of the 
 material power of the sovereign whom he represented had 
 vanished, and there only remained to him this moral power, 
 ideal in appearance, but whose force, the least fanciful man 
 that ever lived well appreciated on that day. 
 
 Fifteen years pass : fifteen years' break in the active life of 
 Talleyrand, fifteen years' silence in the Memoirs. Then he re- 
 emerges, coming to London to demand admission to the 
 councils of Europe, for a new power, created on the morrow of a 
 revolution, whose first act had been to interrupt the regular course 
 of the royal succession. The transition is sudden, it must be 
 admitted, and this change of role as of language takes the 
 reader by surprise. On second thoughts, however, it is seen that, 
 in spite of the difference and even often of the contradiction of
 
 xxx PREFACE. 
 
 words, the man has not changed ; that the end he pursues is the 
 same, and that he displays the same art, and the same talents, 
 whose application alone differs. At Vienna, it was a question of 
 dissolving a coalition, which, maintaining itself in full peace 
 condemned us for ever to powerlessness by isolation. At 
 London, it was necessary to hinder the same coalition from 
 re-forming for a new war ; the danger was not less pressing and 
 everything led to the opinion that it would be more difficult to 
 overcome ; for nothing had changed in the external condition of 
 Europe since 1815 ; the same sentiments apparently animated 
 the same cabinets, presided over by the same men : the same 
 generals were ready to take command of the same armies, and 
 the rumour of a revolution in France was more than sufficient to 
 re-awaken the scarcely-lulled hostilities. By the most singular 
 chance, it was the conqueror of Waterloo himself who presided 
 over the council of the ministers of England. It seems that he 
 had only one word to pronounce, one order to give, to set in 
 motion all that mass of men whom he had led to victory. 
 
 And yet all is not the same, for, during these fifteen years 
 " this large slice of mortal life," as Tacitus says, time has done 
 its work, and underneath the apparently unchanged surface, a 
 great change has taken place in the heart of public opinion, and 
 nowhere more profoundly than in that land of Britain, where 
 M. de Talleyrand, a refugee and proscribed, has already passed 
 a part of his youth. That old England which he knew at that 
 time, the England of Pitt and Castlereagh, the England which 
 had been the soul of the European coalition, which had breathed 
 into it the inspiration of its hate, and paid for it with its cash ; 
 that England whose aristocratic pride and moral instincts Burke 
 had excited against the revolutionary excesses, that England was
 
 PREFACE. xxxi 
 
 no longer recognizable. A breath of democratic reforms had 
 crossed the Channel and penetrated even the Gothic vaults of 
 Westminster, and when the rising of July 1830 broke out at 
 Paris, no voice was raised to curse the new revolution. On the 
 contrary, England remembered complacently that she had 
 herself had her revolution, and passed the crown from one 
 branch to another of the reigning family. The new French 
 monarchy was formed after the model of the English monarchy 
 of 1688, and gave signs of remaining faithful to it ; this 
 resemblance pleased British pride, which was flattered that 
 any one should copy her example. M. de Talleyrand had no 
 sooner set foot upon English ground, than he was warned of 
 this change by every current of political atmosphere that 
 surrounded him, and divined at once new means of action that 
 a new situation had given him. His plan was made ; to the 
 coalition of the monarchies of the Continent which were fright- 
 ened by all revolutions, he opposed the alliance of two liberal 
 monarchies, both founded on national will ; and, in the speech 
 he addressed to the King of England, the first time he was 
 received in solemn audience, he did not hesitate to offer to 
 the heir of the House of Brunswick the friendship of the 
 King of the French in the name of a community of principles, 
 and of a common origin. 
 
 From this moment his course was safe. The accession of 
 a liberal ministry, whose coming into office he had foreseen, 
 only served to remove all obstacles. He took a lever that 
 he knew how to use. The threatening coalition was crushed 
 in the bud, as soon as England retired from it. The English 
 alliance even became the pivot of a long negotiation, which was 
 to end in substituting on our frontiers, an amicable neutrality
 
 xxxii PREFACE. 
 
 for a very inconvenient neighbour, by creating, at Brussels, one 
 more kingdom which, like that of France, was the result of 
 the national choice. 
 
 Here we are, and we must acknowledge it, far from Vienna, 
 and the absolute principle of legitimacy. It could of course 
 no longer be appealed to, at least with the same authority. It 
 is the respect due to the national will that has replaced it. 
 There are certainly many objections to make to that supple- 
 ness of mind which permitted political principles to be 
 considered not as ultimate truths compelling assent, but as 
 instruments of a practical utility, which could be made use of 
 according to the convenience of their application. Do we not, 
 however, see in that the almost inevitable result of frequent 
 revolutions ? Talleyrand, assuredly, is not the only man of that 
 generation of 1789, who, having entered life with noble illusions, 
 after several unsuccessful attempts, followed by as many dis- 
 appointments, conceived a contempt for theory, and acquired a 
 stock of political scepticism. Allowing full weight to this 
 reservation, it is difficult not to be sensible of the suppleness 
 and richness of that mind which, proceeding from most dis- 
 similar cases, from entirely opposite sources, could draw to the 
 service of the same cause an inexhaustible variety of arguments 
 and resources : and it is only fair to acknowledge, besides the 
 flexibility of his form, the perseverance of his patriotism, and 
 that he never lost sight of the fact that, whatever might be the 
 internal condition of France, whether she be preparing revolu- 
 tions or restorations, it was still France, and that she had a right 
 to be served with equal care for her present security and future 
 greatness. 
 
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 PREFACE. xxxv 
 
 the side of the personal share taken by Talleyrand in the happy 
 results of the negotiations he conducted, the honour of which 
 accrues to him, we failed to attribute an honour as great, or 
 almost so, to the firm and intelligent support rendered him by 
 the two sovereigns whom he served. The Memoirs have the 
 merit of acknowledging this share, and of rendering to both 
 representatives of the House of France the exalted position 
 which is their due. 
 
 The letters of Louis XVIII. that have been already pub- 
 lished will not be read without emotion, letters which compel 
 admiration for the nobleness of the language which is only 
 equalled by the sublimity of the sentiments it expresses, and the 
 unmistakable royal tone that pervades them. Certain papers, 
 not yet published, will but serve to confirm and increase this 
 impression. 1 In the negotiation relative to the creation of the 
 kingdom of Belgium, the correspondence of Louis Philippe, 
 presents a character, different indeed, but which does him no 
 less honour. They are the counsels of perfected experience, of 
 a restless vigilance, noting the most minute details, and giving 
 the preference consistently, to every public interest, as against 
 
 1 There will be found, worthy of special note, in the third volume of the Memoirs, 
 a letter from King Louis XVIII. which is of such keen interest that I feel that I 
 ought to give it at once. It is addressed to M. de Talleyrand in 1815, at the time of 
 the second occupation of Paris by the allies, on receipt of the news that the Prussians 
 were proposing to destroy the " Bridge of Jena," whose name aroused painful mem- 
 ories. The following is the tenor of it : — 
 
 "I have just been informed that the Prussians have undermined the bridge of 
 Jena, and that they will probably blow it up to-night. The Due d'Otrante carries 
 instructions to General Maison to prevent this by every means in his power. But, as 
 you know, he has none at all. So do all you possibly can, by means of the Duke (of 
 Wellington) and Lord Castlereagh. As to myself, I will, if necessary, go to the 
 bridge in person ; they may then blow me up, if they like. 
 
 " Louis. 
 " Saturday, 10 a.m." 
 
 This document, signed by the king himself, is to be found in the papers of M. de 
 Talleyrand, who took the more care to preserve it that this generous trait of Louis 
 XVIII., already mentioned, though it is in the writings of the time, has often been 
 questioned. 
 
 C 2
 
 xxxvi PREFACE. 
 
 those of dynasty, or family, while, on critical occasions, his 
 decision is always manly and sensible. Both of them, in a 
 word, have been the faithful guardians of the powerful French 
 unity created by their ancestors, and which they have had the 
 good fortune to leave intact to their successors, whose blunders 
 and follies have since compromised it. If the lamentable 
 mutilation that this unity has undergone were irreparable, 
 history would say that it perished on the day on which the 
 race that founded it left the throne.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The appearance of these memoirs has been long awaited 
 with much curiosity and some alarm. Their author was believed 
 to possess more dangerous secrets of high importance than any- 
 other man of his time ; and whether or not he had friends to 
 reward it was known that he had many enemies to punish. 
 When it was found that he had forbidden the publication of his 
 manuscripts until thirty years after his death, the belief in their 
 compromising and dangerous character was confirmed ; and 
 when, after the lapse of the required time, they were still 
 withheld, they began to be looked upon as a species of historical 
 dynamite, only to be exploded after everybody in danger had 
 been removed from the field of human activity. But if this 
 anticipation were disappointed — if it were found that the old 
 diplomatist had been thinking, as was his wont, of himself 
 rather even than of his enemies, and if his memoirs should not 
 teem with scandalous revelations concerning great personages, 
 it was still thought certain that they would undertake to vindi- 
 cate what had been portrayed by French writers and statesmen 
 as well nigh the most scandalous career of the two centuries to 
 which it belonged ; and such a vindication, whether successful 
 or not, would necessarily shed a flood of light on some of the 
 greatest transactions and some of the most extraordinary men 
 of modern times. 
 
 Whatever effect the memoirs may now have, the place of their 
 author in history has not hitherto been materially changed in 
 the fifty-two years that have elapsed since his death. No reve- 
 lations affecting French annals, from the days preceding the
 
 xxxviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Revolution of '89 down to the reign of the Citizen King, have 
 diminished Talleyrand's share in events or modified the accepted 
 estimates of his work and character. His career was — and it 
 remains — unparalleled in modern Europe, for length and variety 
 of distinguished service. Beginning with Louis XVI., from 
 whom he received his first appointment, and from whom he 
 went, later, with a letter to the King of England, he served in 
 all eight known masters, not to reckon a great number of others 
 who were, at one time or another, said to have him secretly in 
 their pay. He was President of the Constituent Assembly 
 which organized the French Revolution. He was sent to 
 London on a secret mission with a passport from Danton. He 
 was Minister of Foreign Affairs under the Directory, under the 
 Consulate, under the Empire, under Louis XVIII., and under 
 Louis-Philippe. In diplomatic skill and success contemporary 
 public opinion held him the first man of his period ; that is to 
 say, for half a century the first man in Europe. As to real 
 influence on affairs, it is doubtful if any minister since can be 
 said to have exerted more, with the exceptions only of 
 Bismarck and Cavour. Even they did not cover so wide a 
 range or deal with such a bewildering variety of negotiations, 
 extending over so great a time and furthering the views of so 
 many masters. 
 
 Sir Henry Bulwer has a phrase that, in a way, measures him. 
 " He was the most important man in the Constituent Assembly 
 after Mirabeau ; and the most important man in the Empire 
 after Napoleon." But to gauge fairly his extraordinary public 
 life, it must be remembered that he held place and gained in 
 power for forty years after Mirabeau's death ; and that having 
 been one of the leading men of France before Napoleon was 
 heard of, he remained a minister and an ambassador of France 
 long after Napoleon had eaten out his heart at St. Helena. 
 
 Yet in spite of this amazing career, his countrymen have not 
 been generally disposed to speak well of him. Napoleon said 
 of him, and to him, that he was a silk stocking filled with filth. 
 Carnot said, " He brings with him all the vices of the old regime, 
 without having been able to acquire any of the virtues of the 
 new one. He has no fixed principles ; he changes them as he
 
 INTRODUCTION. xxxix 
 
 does his linen, and takes them according to the wind of the day 
 — a philosopher, when philosophy is the mode ; a republican 
 now, because that is necessary in order to become anything. To- 
 morrow he will declare for an absolute monarchy, if he can make 
 anything out of it. I don't want him at any price." Mirabeau 
 called him " this vile, base trickster," and again wrote, " It is 
 dirt and money that he wants. For money he has sold his 
 honour and his friend. For money he would sell his soul — and 
 he would be right, for he would be trading muck for gold." The 
 very member of the Assembly who secured his recall from exile, 
 Chenier, wrote of him, " This letter of the Abbe Maurice proves 
 to me that after having been Anarchist and Orleanist, and not 
 having been Robespierrist only because Robespierre wouldn't 
 have him, he has now become a partisan of the Directory. This 
 limp-foot, without respect for his bishopric, is like a sponge, 
 which sucks up every liquid into which it is dropped, but, unlike 
 the sponge, he never gives anything back. Here he is, recalled 
 from exile yesterday, and proposing proscriptions for to-morrow. 
 If the Directory wants blood, look out for your head ; — Maurice 
 will not refuse it." 
 
 Modern French writers, while of course less passionate, have 
 been apt to agree in admitting his extraordinary venality, his 
 treachery to his chiefs, and his lack of veracity. Lamartine 
 admired him, but Louis Blanc was as severe as the bitterest of 
 his contemporaries. Chateaubriand wrote of him, " When 
 Monsieur Talleyrand is not conspiring, he is making corrupt 
 bargains." x Guizot said he was a man of the court and of diplo- 
 macy, — not of government ; that he was indifferent to means and 
 almost indifferent to the end, provided he found in it a personal 
 success. And, to quote but one opinion not coming from his 
 countrymen, Gouverneur Morris said of him, " This man appears 
 to me polished, cold, tricky, ambitious and bad." 
 
 Few men, indeed, spoke well of him. Towards the close of 
 his life, when he was ambassador in London, an attack was made 
 upon him in the House of Lords by the Marquis of London- 
 derry. The Duke of Wellington offered a spirited defence. He 
 had held official relations with M. de Talleyrand in most critical 
 1 " Quand Monsieur Talleyrand ne conspire pas, il trafique."
 
 xl INTRODUCTION. 
 
 periods. Never had he encountered a man more vigorous and 
 skilful in protecting the interests of his own country, or one 
 more upright and honourable in his attitude towards other 
 countries. Talleyrand was found the next day reading the report 
 of this debate with tears in his eyes ; and he said to his visitor, 
 " I am all the more grateful to the Duke, since he is the one 
 statesman in the world who has ever spoken well of me." 
 
 Later, while the diplomatist, now a very old man, was still 
 in office, in the reign of Louis-Philippe, Alexandre Salle published 
 in Paris a volume undertaking to give an " impartial history of 
 Talleyrand's political life." It bore upon its title-page as a 
 motto, a verse by Barthelemy, which may be roughly rendered 
 thus : " The incarnate lie, the living perjury, Prince de Benevent ; 
 impenitent Judas, anointed with the sacred oil, he opens his 
 career by betraying God himself. Alike at the altar and at the 
 Court, the double apostate treats the State as he treated the 
 Church." The introduction to this same work concludes with 
 the story that Louis XVIII. when asked to express his opinion 
 about his famous Foreign Minister, replied by quoting some 
 lines of Corneille regarding Richelieu, of which this is the 
 substance : " He has done me too much good that I should 
 speak ill of him, and too much harm that I should speak well of 
 him." 1 
 
 The evil in a public man's life is apt to attract wider attention 
 than the good, and certainly his countrymen have made no 
 exception to this rule in Talleyrand's favour. Taking his career 
 from their records, what an extraordinary portrait is presented ! 
 Here are a few of the lines in it : — 
 
 A profligate priest, who owed his start in life to an ill- 
 flavoured joke about the immorality of Paris, made in the 
 drawing-room of Madame du Barry, the king's favourite. 
 
 A bishop who was forced into the public journals to explain 
 that the money he had recently made in gambling was not won 
 in gambling houses, but in clubs ; and that it was not so much 
 as reported — being only 30,000 francs, instead of six or seven 
 hundred thousand. 
 
 1 " U m'a fait trop de bien pour en dire du mal, 
 11 m'a fait trop de mal pour en dire du bien."
 
 INTRODUCTION. xli 
 
 A confidential friend of Mirabeau, yet accused of poisoning 
 him. 
 
 A minister, and for years the intimate of Napoleon, yet 
 suspected of a plot to assassinate him. 
 
 A great statesman whose enormous and continuous receipt 
 of bribes from the beginning to the end of his long career is 
 unquestioned. 
 
 A trusted Minister of Foreign Affairs, who, while in office 
 under the Directory, thwarted their measures and plotted for 
 the coup d'etat of Napoleon ; who, while in office under Napoleon, 
 conspired with the Emperors of Russia and Austria to defeat 
 his plans, and plotted for the return of the Bourbons ; who, while 
 in office under Louis XVIII. schemed for his overthrow, and for 
 the accession of Louis Philippe. 
 
 The Constituent Assembly forbade his return to France. 
 Pitt expelled him from England. Washington refused to receive 
 him in America. The Pope excommunicated him. 
 
 And yet he lived to be summoned back to France and 
 appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs for the revolutionary 
 government ; lived to return to England as ambassador from 
 France, with the prestige of the most distinguished living diplo- 
 matist, to meet with a reception which could scarcely have been 
 more respectful if he had been a crowned head ; lived to give 
 notice to the American Ministers Plenipotentiary in Paris that 
 they must buy peace or leave the country ; lived to have the 
 Pope's excommunication withdrawn, and died in the odour of 
 sanctity, with his king at his bedside, and the blessings of the 
 Cardinal of Paris. 
 
 Many of the lineaments in this strange portrait drawn by 
 the French historians are not to be much changed. There is 
 little chance to erase the licentiousness, the treachery, the deceit, 
 the monstrous venality. In recalling them, however, it must 
 always be remembered that he can be only fairly judged by the 
 standard of his time, which was lax to a degree we can hardly 
 comprehend, especially with reference to the first of these vices 
 and the last. When the American Commissioners resented 
 Talleyrand's demand for a bribe of 250,000 dollars for himself, 
 and a bigger one called a loan, for the Directory, his representa-
 
 xlii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 tive said naively, " Don't you know that everything is bought in 
 Paris ? Do you dream that you can get on with this Govern- 
 ment without paying your way ? " 
 
 It must be further remembered, and to his honour, that while 
 he may be said to have betrayed her rulers, he never betrayed 
 France. On the contrary, when he was secretly thwarting his 
 masters, he was often helping his country. On notable occa- 
 sions he rendered her service of incomparable value, and almost 
 saved her from destruction as a first-class European power. 
 
 It was a touching eulogy pronounced on him at his death in 
 varying phrases by both Thiers and Mignet, that he had always 
 shown an aversion to persecutions and violence, and that he had 
 never done harm to anybody. In the main this praise is 
 deserved. " But," exclaims St. Beuve, in protest, " there are 
 three points in his life which raise terrible doubts — the death of 
 Mirabeau, the affair of the Due d'Enghien, the affair of Mem- 
 breuil." This last was the plot for the assassination of Napoleon. 
 
 Talleyrand was perfectly aware of the shocking charges 
 against himself in connection with the death of Mirabeau, but 
 he makes no reference whatever to them in the portion of his 
 memoirs treating of that period. The fact that they were 
 believed at the time only shows the estimate then placed on him 
 by some of his contemporaries. On the other hand, it must be 
 said that many things make the story improbable, and that the 
 so-called evidence is circumstantial and trivial. Napoleon, 
 repeatedly, in conversation and in writing, charged the murder 
 of the Due d'Enghien to him. Talleyrand devotes one chapter 
 to repelling the accusation, and fixing the responsibility for the 
 crime on Napoleon himself. As to the plot to have Napoleon 
 assassinated, even Talleyrand's enemies must admit that, while 
 some circumstances were certainly suspicious, the proof of his 
 complicity is fragmentary and not convincing. 
 
 No portrait of the man can be just which does not relieve by 
 many light touches the sombre colours in which he has generally 
 been depicted. He had the uniform courtesy and dignity of the 
 old regi))ie. He was the most accomplished of courtiers ; the 
 most correct of masters of ceremonies. He spoke well, and he 
 wrote better — his few appearances at the Academy being really
 
 IN TROD UCTION. xl i i i 
 
 events. In the brilliant salons of the Court circles before the 
 Revolution, he was a social lion. Women always liked and 
 helped him. His witty sayings were the talk of Paris. In 
 prosperity he was not arrogant ; in times of trouble he bore 
 himself with unruffled dignity and composure. When Napoleon 
 denounced him in the presence of others, for treachery and 
 venality, he merely said, as he went down the staircase, " What 
 a pity that so great a man should have been so badly brought 
 up." At another time, when Napoleon, then First Consul, asked 
 him how he had become so rich (he was said to be already worth 
 thirty millions of francs), he replied, " Nothing could be more 
 simple, General ; I bought Rentes the day before the iSth Brumaire 
 (the day on which Napoleon seized power), and I sold them the 
 day after." He had taken office under Louis XVIII., and was 
 representing France at the Congress of Vienna, when Napoleon 
 suddenly came back from Elba. He merely discovered that his 
 liver was a little out of order, and he must go to Carlsbad. 
 " The first duty of a diplomat," he observed, " after a Congress, 
 is to take care of his liver." A few months later, after Waterloo, 
 there were fresh symptoms of trouble with the same organ, while 
 Louis XVIII. regarded him askance ; but the moment he was 
 reappointed Minister of Foreign Affairs all was well. 
 
 The evil Talleyrand did was chiefly to individuals. The 
 good he did was to France. His public action in the Constituent 
 Assembly was most important, and in the main most judicious. 
 The French writers of that period, and even down to the day of 
 his death, habitually ascribed sinister motives to every act, and 
 professed to find his hidden hand in many excesses of the 
 Revolutionary party. But he can only be fairly judged now by 
 what he is known to have done ; and by that standard there is 
 no Frenchman who might not be proud of his record in the 
 Constituent Assembly. He was the pioneer in the establish- 
 ment of the metric system. He opposed the issue of the assignats, 
 and accurately foretold their end. He presented an elaborate 
 and well-considered plan for the reform of the finances, and the 
 establishment of a sinking fund. He urged the suppression of 
 lotteries. He presented in a comprehensive report and bill, a 
 judicious system of national education, including a plan for the
 
 xliv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 secularization of the schools. He favoured the policy of peace 
 and alliance with England. Bishop as he still was, he presented 
 the measure for selling the property of the clergy, and thus 
 secured for the almost bankrupt treasury of Louis XVI. two 
 milliards of francs. He carried the measure for abolishing the 
 oppressive tithes of the clergy. In effect this representative of 
 the old nobility of France showed himself among the earliest to 
 recognize the inevitable changes, and loyally endeavoured to 
 introduce reforms which would enable the monarchy to adapt 
 itself to them without too violent a wrench. As time went on, 
 he became convinced of the incapacity of the king to meet the 
 crisis. Thenceforward he went with the tide, but strove rather 
 to moderate and restrain it. The address to the people of France 
 which the Assembly chose him to prepare, breathed throughout 
 a spirit of genuine and almost republican devotion to the rights 
 of man as we now understand them. 
 
 In other and widely differing occasions his influence was 
 exerted to promote peace, and to discourage wars of mere am- 
 bition. He faithfully warned Napoleon against his Spanish 
 policy, and fell into disgrace for a time through efforts to thwart 
 it. With that Spanish policy, the downfall of Napoleon began. 
 At Erfurt he protested against the schemes of wanton attack 
 upon Austria, and even maintained private relations, and had 
 nightly interviews with the Czar Alexander to keep him from 
 being led into them by Napoleon's importunities. At another 
 stage in Napoleon's extraordinary aggressions he protested, " I 
 do not want to be the torment of Europe." He lost his place 
 in the cabinet of Louis XVIII. because that king would not 
 tolerate his plans for an alliance with England. Later on, he 
 went to England as the ambassador of Louis-Philippe, and 
 there negotiated the treaty of 1834, which secured his country 
 many years of peace and prosperity. He rendered useful ser- 
 vice at the peace of Amiens. At the Congress of Vienna his 
 efforts were directed to an English rather than to a Russian 
 alliance ; and for this Thiers and others have criticized him, but 
 the memoirs make an end of that criticism. In the negotiations 
 before and after the" Hundred Days " Talleyrand is now seen to 
 have rendered his country one of the greatest services, perhaps
 
 INTRODUCTION. xlv 
 
 the greatest service, of his life. He may be said perhaps to 
 have saved her from dismemberment, and certainly to have 
 preserved her great place in Europe. 
 
 Two other acts of Talleyrand's in widely different fields, 
 may here be cited, out of many which this generation should not 
 allow to be forgotten. 
 
 He proposed under the Consulate a practical system of 
 Civil Service for the Department of Foreign Affairs. He was 
 only permitted to introduce it in part, but his remarkable memo- 
 randum on the subject can be read with profit to this day. 
 
 He defended the liberty of the press under Louis XVIII. 
 against the tendency of the king and the court. Twice, in the 
 Chamber of Peers, in successive years, he faced the reaction on 
 this subject, and exposed the fatal path on which the court party 
 wished to enter. 
 
 " Let us take for granted," he once said, " that what has been 
 held good and useful by all the enlightened men of a country, 
 without variation, during a succession of years of various govern- 
 ments, is a necessity of the time. Such, gentlemen, is the liberty 
 of the press. . . I do not say that governments ought to hasten 
 to recognize these new necessities. But when they have been 
 recognized, to take back what was given, or — which comes to 
 the same thing — to suspend it indefinitely, that is a rashness 
 which I, more than any one else, hope may not bring a sad re- 
 pentance to those who have conceived the convenient but pitiful 
 thought. You must never compromise the good faith of a 
 government. In our days it is not easy to deceive for a long 
 time. There is some one who has more sense than Voltaire, 
 more sense than Bonaparte, more than any Director, more than 
 any Minister, past, present, or to come. That is everybody. To 
 undertake or even to persist in a controversy, where all the 
 world is interested against you, is a fault ; and to-day all political 
 faults are dangerous." Students of current American politics 
 are accustomed to the phrase, " Everybody is wiser than any- 
 body." It may interest some of them to note that Talleyrand 
 said so, before the American politicians. 
 
 The memoirs have been expected to clear up some of the 
 dark charges against him, and to do much towards clarifying 
 our views of that extraordinary epoch. They are sure to leave
 
 xlvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 a better impression as to the work of Talleyrand himself. One 
 of his most merciless critics, St. Beuve, writing in 1867, as to 
 the anticipations then felt concerning the present publication, 
 judiciously says : " I am persuaded that everything to be found 
 in the letters and other writings of Talleyrand will give one a 
 more favourable idea of him. People of genius like his never 
 put the worst of their thoughts or of their lives on paper." 
 
 What we now find that he did put on paper proves to be, and 
 was intended by its author to be, as the French say, a " serious 
 book," — meaning thereby that whatever its variety of subjects or 
 interest in treatment, it is written throughout with a constant 
 view to a serious purpose. Whoever comes to it for the enter- 
 tainment which a man with such a well-grounded reputation for 
 wit and repartee might easily have furnished — for anecdotes, 
 amusing reminiscences of court incidents, and in general, for the 
 table-talk of the ruling classes during the momentous periods of 
 which it treats, will be disappointed. W T hoever seeks details 
 even of the author's own life will be disappointed. The memoirs 
 are obviously meant to be the elaborate vindication of a great 
 career ; not an autobiography, nor a lively account of the author's 
 times, not a collection of scandalous anecdotes, nor even a series 
 of malicious revelations of state secrets to the hurt of old enemies. 
 Incidentally, some state secrets may be revealed ; as a means of 
 vindication some of the highest reputations are mercilessly 
 assailed, and certainly some of the most important occurrences 
 in the history of modern Europe are set in a new light. But the 
 one controlling aim of Prince Talleyrand was to elucidate and 
 vindicate his own large part in the events of his time. 
 
 He does it with a certain haughty dignity. He apologizes 
 for nothing. He conceives that he gave to every government he 
 served as much as he received from it, and he goes far towards 
 adducing the proof. He narrates without passion, and reasons 
 generally on the high plane of the real interests of his country, 
 and the real interests of Europe, which he declares were not 
 antagonistic. 
 
 He has been well served by those to whom he committed his 
 memoirs. They have been able to secure the admirable execu- 
 tion of his wishes, even after they have followed him to the grave. 
 The author himself could not fail to be content with the admir-
 
 INTRODUCTION. xlvii 
 
 able editing which it finally fell to the Due de Broglie to give to 
 his work ; and the eminent abilities of that French statesman 
 have never accomplished more skilfully a more difficult task than 
 in his prefatory analysis and appreciation of Talleyrand's career. 
 The memoirs are written in a pure and admirable French style, 
 the charm of which defies translation ; but in M. de Beaufort the 
 publishers have found a translator whose previous rendering 
 of the memoirs of the late Due de Broglie, and of Prince Jerome's 
 Napoleon and his Detractors, gave every guarantee of accuracy, 
 while his scholarship and familiarity with the subject lend value 
 to the notes he has added. 
 
 The great periods in Talleyrand's career were the Constituent 
 Assembly ; the first years of his co-operation with Napoleon ; 
 the later years when he resisted but was still able to influence 
 Napoleon's aggressions ; the Congress of Vienna and the last 
 mission to England. On the first of these, for reasons hereafter 
 suggested, the memoirs give less new information than was to be 
 expected. Their account of the resistance to Napoleon enhances 
 the estimate of Talleyrand's work at that epoch ; and in their 
 story of the transactions at Vienna we see for the first time in 
 an adequate light, the great diplomatist at the height of his 
 powers, and winning his worthiest triumphs. He went to Vienna 
 the representative of a prostrate nation, and of a throne propped 
 up by the bayonets of the army that had conquered it. He 
 found the victors apportioning the spoil without reference to him, 
 and without even admitting him to their conferences. He had 
 neither physical power nor moral prestige behind him ; no great 
 army, no established institutions ; hardly even a country ; and 
 the very instructions he bore he had written himself. He stood 
 alone against Europe. And yet in a few months, by sheer force 
 of intellect and skill, he had divided the allies, had secured the 
 territorial integrity of his country, had negotiated most useful 
 alliances, had greatly strengthened the French throne, had done 
 something towards preventing the wanton partition of other 
 nationalities, and had put France again in her leading position 
 in Europe. 
 
 The popular idea was (in accordance with the hint which he 
 himself threw out), that he forbade the publication of his manu- 
 scripts for so long a period after his death because they com-
 
 xlviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 promised too many reputations. It is quite as probable that his 
 sense of the generally hostile judgment of his contemporaries 
 and particularly of his countrymen, was so keen that he wished 
 to make his final appeal on behalf of his own reputation to 
 another generation. 
 
 On this theory of the purpose with which they were written, 
 these memoirs have an interest from the points on which they 
 are silent, as well as from those they elucidate. What he could 
 not defend, or what he despised too much to care to defend, he 
 ignores. 
 
 On the subject of his early and constant receipt of bribes, 
 there is a profound silence. Yet his venality was so notorious 
 and so monstrous that Napoleon denounced him for it again 
 and again ; details had repeatedly appeared in specific cases, 
 and statements had been published during his lifetime, under- 
 taking to show the various items and sources for his receipts 
 of some thirty millions of francs, acquired in a few years of 
 official life before the proclamation of the Empire. 1 It was a 
 
 1 In the life of Talleyrand by Louis Bastide, published in 1838, a few months only 
 after Talleyrand's death, the following table is given of his receipts for three years : 
 
 Francs. 
 
 From Portugal 1,200,000 
 
 From Austria for the secret articles in the Convention of 
 
 Campo Formio in 1797 1,000,000 
 
 From Prussia, for having advised it of these articles, and pre- 
 vented their execution 1,000,000 
 
 From the Elector of Bavaria 500,000 
 
 From the King of Naples, as the price of recognizing his 
 
 neutrality 500,000 
 
 From the Pope 150,000 
 
 From the King of Sardinia 300,000 
 
 From the Grand Duke of Tuscany in order that the French 
 
 troops should respect his territory 500,000 
 
 From the Cis-Alpine Republic, in order to obtain a new 
 
 agreement 1,000,000 
 
 From the Batavian Republic, for the same object 1,200,000 
 
 During the first six months of the Congress of Rastadt . . . 1,800,000 
 For his share in the prizes made by French privateers on 
 
 neutral vessels 2,000,000 
 
 From the Prince de la Paix 1,000,000 
 
 From the Grand Vizier 500,000 
 
 From the Hanseatic cities 500,000 
 
 Net profits from speculations in French and foreign funds 
 
 during the negotiations of Lord Mai mesbury at Lille . 1,500.000 
 
 14,650,000 
 
 To which should be added the enormous profits which he realized by his operations on 
 the Stock Exchange on the 18th Brumaire. The author adds that all these details had
 
 INTRODUCTION. xlix 
 
 subject on which there was nothing to be said, and the sagacious 
 diplomat knew when to say nothing. 
 
 But aside from Napoleon's charges, oral and written, as well 
 as from those of French politicians and journals which he 
 perhaps thought he could afford to ignore, there was one 
 arraignment against him for blackmail, so direct, detailed, and 
 authoritative, that he might have been expected to offer either 
 an explanation, a denial, or a counter-attack. This was the 
 case set forth by the three American Commissioners and Minis- 
 ters Plenipotentiary, Messrs. Charles C. Pinckney, John Marshall, 
 and Elbridge Gerry, in a series of official despatches to the Secre- 
 tary of State of the United States, transmitted to Congress in 
 special messages by John Adams, then the President. In effect, 
 Talleyrand, as Minister of Foreign Affairs under the Directory, 
 refused the commissioners official recognition unless he could 
 be assured that they would give him personally a "gratification " 
 of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and make a loan to 
 the Directory of thirty-two millions of Dutch florins. He kept 
 them dancing attendance for months, and long declined to take 
 up their business at all, the demand for the money being mean- 
 time often repeated. Mr. Bellamy of Hamburg and Mr. Hautval, 
 with one or two others whose names have been preserved in the 
 State department at Washington, but never disclosed, acted at 
 first as intermediaries. 1 They presented the demands, orally 
 and in writing, and persistently argued the necessity for com- 
 pliance. They bore messages from Talleyrand, arranged for 
 meetings with him, and some of them accompanied the commis- 
 sioners to these meetings. Talleyrand himself repeated the 
 demand for the loan, exactly as they had presented it, and 
 urged it with the same arguments. He even put it in writing, 
 permitted one of the commissioners to read it, and then with- 
 drew and burnt the manuscript. He did not personally demand 
 the " gratification " of a quarter of a million dollars, but merely 
 said, in reply to Mr. Elbridge Gerry's remark that these seemed 
 much the same financial views Mr. Bellamy had been urging, "that 
 
 been published in various works, and that M. Talleyrand had never dared to refute or 
 correct these figures. 
 
 1 Treaties and Conventions between the United States and other Powers, with Notes 
 on the Negotiations. Government edition, p. 998. 
 
 VOL. I. d
 
 1 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the information Mr. Bellamy had given him was just, and might 
 always be relied on." 1 Mr. Bellamy was the one who had been 
 most pertinacious and explicit about the " gratification," and he 
 was present at this conversation. The American commissioners, 
 through months of solicitation, sturdily refused the demands, 
 and diplomatic relations between the two countries were finally 
 broken off. The President, in communicating the last of the 
 correspondence to Congress, said, " I will never send another 
 minister to France without assurances that he will be received, 
 respected, and honoured as the representative of a great, free, 
 powerful, and independent nation." 2 The documents leave no 
 moral doubt of the story; they were printed in the volumes 
 comprising the President's official communications to Congress, 
 and had been before the world for a quarter of a century when 
 these memoirs were completed. The absence of a line of refer- 
 ence to them is as interesting in its way as anything Prince 
 Talleyrand could have said on the subject. 
 
 He spent many months in the United States soon after the 
 establishment of their independence, in which France had aided, 
 and while a revolution, stimulated in part by the American 
 example, was in progress in his own land ; but he found, in his 
 recollections of his American visit, almost nothing suggested by 
 either event, and nothing concerning the great man then Chief 
 Magistrate of the country which gave him hospitality. His 
 lack of sympathy with republicanism, whether in the United 
 States or in France, explains the one ; and General Washington's 
 refusal to receive him explains the other. Lord Lansdowne 
 had given him a warm letter of introduction to Washington, 
 setting forth that Talleyrand was really in exile because, 
 although a bishop, he had desired to promote the general 
 freedom of worship, and eulogizing him for having sacrificed his 
 ambition in the Church to his devotion to principle. Washington 
 possibly had his own views as to the extent to which Talley- 
 rand's exile was due to his high religious principles. Hamilton's 
 influence, always great — was joined to Lord Lansdowne's 
 eulogy ; but both were unavailing. The refusal to receive the 
 French exile, however, was quietly put upon political grounds. 
 1 American State Papers, 1798-1803, vol. iv. p. 25. - Ibid. p. 137.
 
 INTRODUCTION. li 
 
 To men of this time it seems that no part of Talleyrand's 
 life was more creditable or useful than that spent in the Con- 
 stituent Assembly. But this scion of the old nobility of France 
 had never changed his real political views. He was always a 
 monarchist — in the Assembly, under the Directory, under 
 Napoleon. He wished to assist Louis XVI., until he became 
 convinced that the constitutional feebleness and obstinacy of 
 that monarch were beyond help. " The ministers," he says, 
 " did not know that arbitrary power has no right to punish with 
 moderation those who resist it, and that by its very nature it is 
 required either to ignore or to crush its enemies." When he 
 found that the king would not attempt in season to act upon 
 such principles, Talleyrand abandoned the monarchy, and took 
 care of himself. But while he went with the Republican 
 current, he was never republican. He found, therefore, little 
 satisfaction in his honourable and brilliant record in the Con- 
 stituent Assembly, and his account of it, in view of its real 
 importance, is meagre. 
 
 So he touches very lightly his extraordinary relations to the 
 Church. But he takes pains to make it clear that he was forced 
 into the priesthood, and that he never felt any real calling for 
 his sacred vocation. He is equally careful to show that in 
 critical emergencies he had been able to do Rome service, and 
 that the feelings of the Pope towards him were friendly. 
 
 The scandals of his private life as priest and bishop receive 
 only sufficient allusion to indicate his contempt for the subject. 
 Thus his relations to the Countess Flahaut were known, and a 
 letter to her had been published, in which, describing his exercise 
 of his sacred functions at the great ceremony of the National 
 Oath, in the Champ de Mars, he first hints at his own lack of 
 religious faith, and then says : " I hope you feel to what divinity 
 I yesterday addressed my prayers and my oath of fidelity. You 
 alone are the Supreme Being whom I adore, and always will 
 adore." The husband of the Countess afterwards lost his head 
 on the guillotine ; and the widow in exile at Hamburg, was 
 about to contract another marriage, as Talleyrand, returning 
 from his exile, came to the same place. When she heard of his 
 purpose she requested him not to come, since she feared that his 
 
 d 2
 
 Hi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 presence, coupled with the stones of their former relations, might 
 embarrass her approaching marriage. The old man of eighty 
 puts this in his memoirs as an amusing instance of feminine 
 simplicity, and says that, of course, he paid no attention to the 
 request. He goes on then to tell of meeting Madame de Genlis 
 again, and of finding her unchanged — the same Madame de 
 Genlis of whom in relation to the Due d'Orleans he had taken 
 occasion to say in his merciless portrait of that prince, " Madame 
 de Genlis always surrendered early, to avoid scandal." 
 
 Talleyrand evidently cherished bitter memories of his ex- 
 pulsion from England by Pitt, but he finds it well to pass the 
 subject with the slightest possible mention. Nor does he refer 
 at all to the strange letters he had previously sent his Govern- 
 ment, reporting that England was practically on the verge of a 
 revolution like that of France, analyzing the inadequate military 
 resources at hand to meet it, and proposing a plan for a French 
 invasion and capture of Ireland. Eight days, he said, were 
 sufficient to land 60,000 men at twenty or thirty different points. 
 As a matter of prudence, they might perhaps go in the character 
 of emigres, so as to avoid arousing the suspicions of the Govern- 
 ment. <: Once masters of the principal ports," he continued, 
 " once with the English fleet in our power, we can easily bring 
 from France such reinforcements as are needed ; and besides, 
 as the march of our troops will have been preceded by a 
 proclamation in the name of the sovereign people of France, 
 addressed to the sovereign people of Great Britain and Ireland, 
 as their faithful allies, no doubt this country will be thrown into 
 a revolution more prompt and more happy than that of 1688. 
 The elements for a republic are riper in England than they 
 were in France four years ago, and it may take fewer weeks for 
 England to accomplish this great and salutary change, than we 
 spent years." 1 
 
 With the gravest charge affecting his reputation as a pub- 
 lic man, Talleyrand does deal at length, but after his own 
 fashion. He makes not the slightest concealment of his efforts 
 to thwart the plans of his masters. He narrates them often in 
 detail, with entire simplicity and the utmost directness. But 
 
 1 Letter of Talleyrand to Lebrun, dated October 10, 1792.
 
 INTRODUCTION. liii 
 
 the narrative always tends to show that the course he pursued 
 was in the interest of France, and that the rulers he thwarted 
 either did not know that interest or wished to sacrifice it for 
 their own. Thus, after telling how he had secretly laboured 
 with the Czar Alexander, at the Erfurt Conference, to defeat 
 Napoleon's plan for an alliance. against Austria, and had suc- 
 ceeded, he calmly says, " It is the last service I was able to 
 render to Europe while Napoleon continued to reign, and that 
 was, in my opinion, a service rendered also to him." There is 
 nowhere a hint that in his mind private and surreptitious 
 conferences with the sovereigns of other countries to defeat the 
 plans of the sovereign whose representative and confidential 
 adviser he was, had the slightest immoral quality. 
 
 But he takes care to show Napoleon in a light that must 
 make the world rather rejoice at seeing such a man betrayed. 
 The memoirs scarcely touch a critical point in the emperor's 
 career without dealing him a stab. They make him paltry in 
 the business of the divorce. They picture him as an ignorant 
 blusterer in the affairs of the Concordat. They detail his cheap 
 devices to gain the admiration of men of letters. They show 
 with malicious precision how he laboriously copied out the draft 
 of a treaty which Talleyrand had prepared for him, that the 
 Czar, finding it in the emperor's handwriting, might think it 
 was his own work. They preserve his letter, complaining that 
 the heir to the Spanish throne wrote him as " My Cousin," and 
 requiring the minister to instruct this prince of ancient royal 
 lineage that the only word proper for him to use in addressing 
 Napoleon was " Sire." They stoop even to such trifles as his 
 fretting on the evening of Austerlitz, over some gossip of a 
 fancied slight to him by the society of the Faubourg St. 
 Germain. Everywhere they paint him as heartless, vain, vulgar, 
 wanton in attack, ungenerous and pitiless to the defeated, un- 
 truthful, proud of his ability to deceive, wholly without prin- 
 ciple and without gratitude. And they do this, not so much 
 by ascribing to him these qualities, as by the careful and precise 
 narration of incidents that exhibit them. 
 
 The inference which Prince Talleyrand expects his readers 
 to draw from all this is plain. It was right, when in power, under
 
 1 i v IN TROD UCTION. 
 
 such a man, to thwart him when it seemed needful in the interest 
 of France. When this could no longer be done, it was rio-ht to 
 prepare the way for a Bourbon successor — in the interest of 
 France. When the restored Bourbons did not meet his views, it 
 was right to plot for their displacement by the son of that Due 
 d'Orleans whom he had painted as a brainless and heartless 
 monster— in the interest of France. In other cases the suggested 
 defence is always the same ; wherever he deceived her rulers he 
 did it all for the good of France. 
 
 No doubt the plea will have force, especially with his country- 
 men. Moralists indeed will regard with surprise the claim that 
 a minister, though holding on to his office, no longer owes personal 
 loyalty to his sovereign, when in his judgment the sovereign is 
 sacrificing the interests of his country to his own. They will 
 ask whether, even in such great emergencies, the end can be 
 admitted to justify the means. Whatever the answer, French- 
 men, at any rate, and very possibly the world at large, will have 
 a kindlier feeling for the veteran public servant who is able to show 
 that, even at such cost, he did in great crises serve his country. 
 The memoirs will not change the world's verdict on the profligate 
 Abbe of Perigord and Bishop of Autun. They will not lighten 
 the censure on the Foreign Minister who made merchandise of 
 his treaties, and became a millionaire on bribes. They will not 
 make the world think it honourable in him to have deceived or 
 betrayed in turn almost every man under whom he held office. 
 Nevertheless, they will heighten and broaden his fame. The 
 old man was wise, as usual, in making his appeal to a later 
 generation. He played a great part ; and as its proportions are 
 here revealed, the space for him in the history of his times must 
 be materially enlarged.
 
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 H
 
 I DO not know what title to give to this writing. It is not 
 a literary work : it is full of repetitions. I can scarcely call 
 it My Memoirs, for my life and relations will be found 
 mentioned in it as seldom as I could help. To give this large 
 work the title of: My Opinion on the Affairs of my Time, 
 would be a term, perhaps justified, but also too decided to be 
 at the head of the production of a man who has doubted as 
 much as I have in my life. A philosophical title would be 
 incomplete or exaggerated. I therefore begin without title, 
 and without a dedication, for I recognize in the Duchesse de 
 Dino alone the obligation of defending my memory.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 
 
 I754—I79I- 
 
 Talleyrand's birth — His parents — Early years— Is trained for the Church — 
 Sent to Rheims — Coronation of Louis XVI. — Appointed Agent-general 
 to the clergy — French society before the Revolution — Comte de Choiseul- 
 GoufHer — American War of Independence — Relations between Eng- 
 land and France — Turgot — de Vergennes — Calonne — Necker — The 
 deficit — The Assembly of the Notables — The meeting of the States- 
 General — Public opinion and the clergy — The French aristocracy on the 
 eve of the Revolution — Talleyrand appointed deputy of the clergy to 
 the States-General — Premonitory symptoms of the Revolution — The 
 Comte d'Artois — The emigration of the nobles — The Constituent 
 Assembly — Restriction of the royal prerogatives — Civil constitution of 
 the clergy — Talleyrand consecrates the first constitutional bishops — 
 Resigns the bishopric of Autun — Interview between Talleyrand and the 
 Comte dArtois — Baron de Vitrolles' letter to M. de Bacourt. 
 
 Pages 1 — 108 
 
 PART II. 
 
 THE DUC D'ORLEANS. 
 
 General considerations on the importance of private Memoirs and reliable 
 biographies to history — Lineage of Louis-Philippe-Joseph, fifth Due 
 d'Orle'ans — His early years and dispositions — His education — His 
 frivolity and dryness of heart — His marriage with Mademoiselle de 
 Penthievre — Associates of the Due d'Orleans — M. de Voyer— Abbe Yvon 
 — M. de Lille — M. de Voyer's philosophy — M. de Voyer and M. de 
 Maurepas — The Prince de Lamballe — The Marquis de Conflans — Cruel 
 indifference of the Due d'Orleans — M. de Biron— The liaisons of the 
 Due d'Orleans — The Princesse de Bouillon — The Marquis de Fleury — 
 The Princesse de Lamballe — Madame de Sillery, Comtesse de Genlis —
 
 lviii CONTENTS. 
 
 Her influence over the Due de Chartres — Her literary productions — 
 Count de Cagliostro— The Chevalier de Luxemburg— Speculations of 
 the Due d'Orleans — Outrageous proceedings of this prince towards his 
 treasurer, Seguin — The Due d'Orleans wishes to become grand-admiral 
 ■ — He is appointed colonel-general of hussars — Mademoiselle Arnould, 
 the famous actress — Journey of the Due d'Orleans to England and to 
 Italy — He falls seriously ill — Grand-master of the freemasons — De- 
 bauchery and depravity of the Due d'Orleans — Agitation in France — 
 Forebodings of the Revolution — The deficit — M. de Calonne summons 
 an assembly of the Notables — Intrigues of the Due d'Orleans against 
 the king — The Marquis Ducrest — Ambition of the Due d'Orleans — 
 Measures taken by the Archbishop of Toulouse against the parlements 
 — M. and Mdme. de Semonville — A loan of ,£16,000,000 — General dis- 
 content of the people — Louis XVI. refuses to allow the Due d'Orleans 
 to go on a visit to England — Differences between the Queen and the 
 Due d'Orleans — Trianon — The Due d'Orleans becomes the head of all 
 malcontents — M. de Limon's ability — Abbe Sabatier de Cabre — The lits 
 de justice — The Marquis de Lamoignon — The edict of 1787 and the 
 Protestants — The sitting of November 19, 1787 — M. d'Espresmenil — 
 Public protest of the Due d'Orleans against the king's orders — Lepelletier 
 de St.-Fargeau — Imprisonment of the Abbes Freteau and Sabatier — 
 Exile of the Due d'Orleans — Popular outburst of sympathy on this 
 measure being known — Intervention of the parlement of Paris — Ener- 
 getic attitude of Louis XVI. — The Due d'Orleans forgiven by the king — 
 Struggle between M. de Brienne and the parlements — Stringent measures 
 of the government — Premonitory symptoms of the Revolution — Riot in 
 the Faubourg St.-Antoine — M. de Laclos — Abbe Sieyes — Project of 
 reforms drawn up by the Due d'Orleans for the States-General — Judg- 
 ment of Prince Talleyrand on the political part played by the Due 
 d'Orleans — The origin and causes of the Revolution . Pages 109 — 164 
 
 PART III. 
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE, THE EARLY 
 
 YEARS OF THE EMPIRE. 
 
 I79I — 1808. 
 
 Dangers threatening the royal family — Talleyrand goes to London with a 
 letter of Louis XVI. to the King of England — Defeat of the French 
 troops under the Due de Biron — August 10 — Abolition of royalty — 
 Could the royal family have been saved in 1792 ? — Talleyrand entrusted 
 with a scientific mission to England — The Marquis of Lansdowne — The 
 Marquis of Hastings — Doctors Price and Priestley — George Canning — 
 Samuel Romilly — Jeremy Bentham — Lord Henry Petty — Charles Fox 
 — The responsible authors of the Revolution— The Alien Bill — Lord 
 Melville — William Pitt— Talleyrand expelled from England— Starts for
 
 CONTENTS. lix 
 
 America — Nearly shipwrecked — Stay at Falmouth — General Arnold — 
 Lands at Philadelphia — M. de Beaumetz — William Penn — The Mor- 
 avian brethren — The spirit of enterprise in America — General Hamilton 
 — American commercial competition and its results — Talleyrand at 
 Chdnier's request is authorized to return to France — Starts for Ham- 
 burg — Madame de Flahaut and Talleyrand — Returns to Paris — Elected 
 a member of the Institut — Madame de Stael — Talleyrand and Barras — 
 Talleyrand appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs — Why he accepted 
 office — Carnot and Barras — Talleyrand's first letter to Bonaparte — 
 Treaty of Campo-Formio — Lord Malmesbury — Fructidor 18 — First 
 interview between Bonaparte and Talleyrand — Catherine of Russia and 
 the French Revolution — The Directory and Europe — Moreau — Talley- 
 rand retires from the Cabinet — Sidyes and the Directory — Bonaparte in 
 Egypt — Brumaire 18 — Bonaparte appointed First Consul — Talleyrand 
 takes office again — Paul I. and Bonaparte — Marengo — Treaty of Lune- 
 ville — The United States and the French Republic — Lord Cornwallis 
 and Joseph Bonaparte — Treaty of Amiens — The Concordat — Talley- 
 rand's secularization — Bonaparte's blunder — Annexation of Piedmont 
 to France — England declares war — Pichegru's death — Assassination of 
 the Due d'Enghien — Proclamation of the Empire — Napoleon emperor 
 and king — The camp at Boulogne — The Austrian campaign — Napoleon 
 at Schcenbrunn — Austerlitz — Napoleon and the Faubourg St. Germain 
 — Talleyrand created Prince de Be"ne"vent — Treaty of Presburg — Count 
 von Haugwitz — Fox and Talleyrand — Lord Yarmouth and Lord Lauder- 
 dale — Prussia and Hanover — Battle of Jena — Treaty of Tilsit — Napoleon 
 and Poland —War with Russia — Battle of Eylau — Battle of Friedland — 
 The interview of the three emperors — Napoleon and the Queen of 
 Prussia — Napoleon's return to Paris — Talleyrand appointed Vice Grand 
 Elector — Retires from the Ministry — His apology for doing so — Napo- 
 leon's designs on Spain — Defeat of Junot — Capitulation of Baylen — The 
 Erfurt interview — Talleyrand and the Czar Alexander — Failure of 
 Napoleon's projects against Austria .... Pages 165 — 242 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 
 
 1807. 
 
 Napoleon at Finkenstein — His love of deceit — Situation of France at the 
 close of the year 1807 — Napoleon's designs on Spain — The pretext 
 he chose to carry them out — Talleyrand endeavours to dissuade the 
 emperor from wronging the old ally of France — Treaty of Fontainebleau 
 — Napoleon's shameful breach of faith towards Charles IV. of Spain — 
 Don Juan de Escoiquiz, Canon of Toledo, and the Prince of the Asturias 
 — The intrigues of Godoy, Prince of the Peace — Don Escoiquiz' plan to 
 thwart them — The French ambassador and Don Escoiquiz — Napoleon's 
 ruse — Letter of the Prince of the Asturias to Napoleon — Letter of the
 
 Ix CONTENTS. 
 
 Prince of the Peace to the Emperor — Provisions of the treaty of 
 Fontainebleau — Projected dismemberment of Portugal — Secret Conven- 
 tion aimed at Spain, though ostensibly at Portugal — The French troops 
 in Spain — Arrest of the Prince of the Asturias — He is put on his trial- 
 Declared not guilty — Occupation of Navarra, Catalonia, and Guipuzcoa 
 by the French — Fears of the Prince of the Peace — Projected flight of 
 the royal family — Indignation of the people — General discontent against 
 Godoy, Prince of the Peace — The Aranjuez riots — Popular hatred 
 against Godoy — Loyalty of the people towards the royal family — Arrest 
 of Godoy — He is put on his trial — Abdication of King Charles IV. in 
 favour of Ferdinand, Prince of the Asturias — Arrival of Ferdinand VII. 
 at Madrid — The Grand Due de Berg (Murat) and King Ferdinand — 
 Change of the people's disposition towards the French — Negotiations 
 between Don Escoiquiz and the Grand Due de Berg — Murat insists on 
 the suspension of Godoy's trial — Murat demands the release of the latter, 
 in Napoleon's name — Ferdinand VII. sends his brother Don Carlos to 
 meet Napoleon on his way to Spain — Charles IV.'s protest — Retracts 
 his abdication — Don Antonio appointed Regent — Ferdinand VII. leaves 
 Madrid, on his way to Bayonne — Free for eight hours — Lasciate ogni 
 speranza — Arrival at Bayonne — Ferdinand and the Infante Antonio 
 practically prisoners — Napoleon unmasks his designs — Offers to Ferdi- 
 nand the kingdom of Etruria, in exchange for the cession of the rights of 
 the latter to the Crown of Spain — Refusal of Ferdinand — Noble reply of 
 the Marquis de Labrador to M. de Champagny — Napoleon and Don 
 Escoiquiz — It is too late ! — Charles IV. at Bayonne — Ferdinand's re- 
 nunciation of the crown — Murat appointed lieutenant-general of Spain — 
 The royal princes of Spain at the chateau of Valengay — Prince Talleyrand 
 welcomes them — Inaptitude of the princes for study — Everyday life at 
 Valengay — Talleyrand summoned to Nantes — Napoleon's bluster — 
 Scathing retort of Talleyrand — Rupture between Napoleon and Talley- 
 rand — Talleyrand summoned to Erfurt — Takes leave of the Spanish 
 princes — Their gratitude — By the grace of God — The Emperor of Russia 
 recognizes Joseph Bonaparte as King of Spain — Treaty of Valengay — 
 Failure of Napoleon's designs on Spain — The result of Napoleon's 
 threats against England — Want of dignity of Ferdinand VII. — His 
 return to Madrid — His cruel proceedings towards his faithful supporters 
 — England's fault in Spain Pages 243 — 292 
 
 PART V. 
 
 THE ERFURT INTERVIEW. 
 1808. 
 
 Napoleon holds out a bait to Russia — The prospective partition of Turkey 
 — Silesia to France as compensation for Wallachia and Moldavia to 
 Russia — Alexander incensed — N apoleon's letter to the Czar,desisting from 
 all pretensions to Silesia and proposing to meet him in order to arrange
 
 CONTENTS. 1> 
 
 XI 
 
 the best means of carrying war into India — Reply of Alexander accept- 
 ing to meet Napoleon — Count Romanzoff and Turkey — Russia wants 
 Constantinople — The Turks must be driven back to Asia — France and 
 the Porte — Russia and Sweden — Conquest of Finland — Talleyrand 
 receives orders to accompany Napoleon to Erfurt, the emperors' meeting- 
 place — Confidence displayed by Napoleon towards Talleyrand — A 
 brilliant journey — Napoleon wishes to dazzle the Germans — Invites 
 Talleyrand to induce the kings and princes to come to Erfurt — 
 Napoleon and Dazincourt — Choice of plays — Ci?ma — The actors of the 
 Comedie Franqaise ordered to repair to Erfurt — The military retinue of 
 Napoleon — Napoleon discloses to Talleyrand his projects for Erfurt — 
 Orders Talleyrand to draw up a convention aimed against England — ■ 
 Text of that convention — Napoleon objects to certain expressions — 
 Austria, Napoleon's enemy — Napoleon insists on inserting in the 
 convention a clause directed against Austria — Rebukes Talleyrand — 
 Vons etes toujours Autrichien ! — Final instructions of Napoleon to 
 Talleyrand — Talleyrand's arrival at Erfurt — M. de Caulaincourt and 
 Talleyrand— List of the crowned heads and eminent personages present 
 at Erfurt — Arrival of the Emperor Napoleon at Erfurt — General 
 enthusiasm — The attendant kings and princes humble themselves in the 
 presence of their victor — Arrival of the Czar Alexander — His friendly 
 meeting with Napoleon — The latter introduces changes into the projected 
 convention — Austria's fear — M. de Vincent and Talleyrand — Interview 
 between Napoleon and Goethe — Napoleon's judgment on Schiller's 
 Thirty Years' War — The play at Erfurt — The impressions of the kings 
 and princes — Delight of the Czar — Private interview between Napoleon 
 and the latter — Uneasiness of the Austrian envoy — The Princess of 
 Tour and Taxis — Napoleon invites Goethe and Wieland to lunch — 
 Napoleon's judgment as to the influence of Christianity on the develop- 
 ment of civilization — Conversation of Napoleon with Wieland — Inter- 
 view between the Czar and Talleyrand — The latter endeavours to defeat 
 the projects of Napoleon — Induces the Czar to write to the Emperor 
 of Austria, in order to soothe his apprehensions — Napoleon fails to 
 persuade the Czar — He lets out his secret — Fete at Weimar — Napoleon's 
 opinion on Tacitus — Wieland's defence of the great Roman historian — 
 Return to Erfurt — Confidential interview between Napoleon and the 
 Czar — Conversation with Talleyrand — Napoleon wants to divorce — 
 Judgment of the Czar on Napoleon — Napoleon and the Czar before a 
 pitful of kings at Erfurt — Napoleon's opinion of ideologists — Christianity 
 the best system of philosophy — Napoleon starts for Spain — The Erfurt 
 convention. Pages 293 — 342
 
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 MEMOIRS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 PRINCE DE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 
 
 J 754— i79i- 
 
 Talleyrand's birth — His parents — Early years — Is trained for the Church — 
 Sent to Rheims — Coronation of Louis XVI. — Appointed Agent-general 
 to the clergy — French society before the Revolution — Comte de Choiseul- 
 Gouffier — American War of Independence — Relations between Eng- 
 land and France — Turgot — de Vergennes — Calonne — Necker — The 
 deficit — The Assembly of the Notables — The meeting of the States- 
 General — Public opinion and the clergy — The French aristocracy on the 
 eve of the Revolution — Talleyrand appointed deputy of the clergy to 
 the States-General — Premonitory symptoms of the Revolution — The 
 Comte dArtois — The emigration of the nobles — The Constituent 
 Assembly— Restriction of the royal prerogatives — Civil constitution of 
 the clergy — Talleyrand consecrates the first constitutional bishops — 
 Resigns the bishopric of Autun — Interview between Talleyrand and the 
 Comte dArtois — Baron de Vitrolles' letter to M. de Bacourt. 
 
 I WAS born in 1754 x ; my parents had a very small fortune 
 but held at court a position which, if properly taken advantage 
 of, could secure for themselves and their children the highest 
 offices. 
 
 1 Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, the author of these memoirs, was the son of 
 Charles-Daniel de Talleyrand-Perigord (1734 — 1788), lieutenant-general and ?nenin* 
 to the Dauphin ; and the grandson of Daniel-Marie de Talleyrand, Comte de Grignols, 
 brigadier-general of the king's armies. Alexandrine de Damas, daughter of Joseph 
 de Damas, Marquis d'Antigny, was his mother. Marie-Elisabeth Chamillard, 
 daughter of Michel Chamillard, Marquis de Cany, was his grandmother. 
 
 * The name given, under the old monarchy, to a nobleman attached to the person of the Dauphin. 
 • — ( Translator.) 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 2 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 For a long time, the chief families of France, though not 
 actually disdaining to hold offices attaching them to the person 
 of the sovereign, displayed little anxiety to obtain them. They 
 were satisfied with believing, or affecting to believe, themselves 
 in the foremost rank in the nation. Thus the descendants of the 
 old chief vassals of the Crown had less occasion to be personally 
 known to the king than the descendants of some minor barons 
 of the duchy of France, holding, for this reason, higher offices 
 about the sovereign's person. 
 
 The pride which induced most families of high lineage to 
 keep aloof from court, caused the king to view them with less 
 favour. 
 
 In order to enhance the royal power, Cardinal Richelieu sum- 
 moned the heads of chief families before the king. They settled 
 at court, forewent their independence, and, by a more profound 
 devotion, endeavoured to make up for the disadvantage of having 
 come last. 
 
 The glory of Louis XIV. was one of the reasons why, under 
 his reign and subsequently, all men's ideas were centred within 
 the limits of the chateau of Versailles. 
 
 The Regency was, so to speak, an interregnum, undisturbed 
 either by financial disasters or by the depravation of morals, the 
 premonitory symptoms of which had been so severely checked 
 at the close of the former reign. 
 
 Louis XV. was then enjoying universal respect, the first 
 subjects of the Crown still considered obedience to the sovereign 
 as glorious ; they did not conceive any other power or lustre 
 than those proceeding from the king's majesty. 
 
 The queen 1 was reverenced, but the very melancholy of her 
 virtues did not prepossess people in her favour. She was wanting 
 in those outward charms that caused the nation to be so proud 
 of the fine features of Louis XV. Hence the mixed feeling of 
 justice and indulgence which on one hand led people to pity the 
 queen, and, on the other, induced them to excuse the inclination 
 shown by the king towards Madame de Pompadour. 2 M. de 
 
 1 Maria Leczinska, Queen of France, daughter of Stanislas, King of Poland, and 
 of Catherine Opalinska. She was horn in 1703 ; in 1725 she became the wife of 
 Louis XV., by whom she had two sons and eight daughters. She died in 1768. 
 
 2 Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour, born in Paris in 1721,
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 3 
 
 Penthievre, 1 the MarecJiale de Duras, 2 Madame de Luynes, 3 
 Madame de Marsan, 4 Madame de Perigord, 5 the Duchesse de 
 Fleury, 6 M. de Sourches, 7 Madame de Villars, 8 M. de Tavatmes, 9 
 Madame d'Estissac, 10 doubtless grieved at the fact, yet were 
 afraid of disclosing by open reproach what was looked upon as 
 one of those known family secrets, which nobody dares to deny, 
 but hopes to palliate by hushing them up and behaving as 
 though one were not aware of their existence. All the persons 
 I have just mentioned would have considered that they were 
 
 died in 1 764. She was the daughter of an army contractor, and when quite young 
 married Lenormand d'Etioles, a fermier-gcncral. In 1744, she left her husband to 
 become the mistress of the king, who in the following year created her Marquise de 
 Pompadour, with a yearly income of 200,000 livres (about ^"S,ooo). In 1756, she 
 was appointed lady of the queen's household. Madame de Pompadour was as re- 
 markable for her taste as for her beauty ; she was long the queen of fashion. She 
 preserved her influence until her death. The memoirs and letters published under 
 her name in 1785 are apocryphal. — {Translator.) 
 
 1 Louis de Bourbon, Due de Penthievre, born in 1725, was the son of the Comte 
 de Toulouse, illegitimate son of Louis XIV. and of Madame de Montespan. He 
 married Mademoiselle d'Este. The Prince of Lamballe was one of his sons ; the Due 
 d'Orleans married one of his daughters. The Due de Penthievre was appointed 
 grand-admiral in 1734, and lieutenant-general in 1744. In 1787, he was president of 
 one of the committees of the assemblee des notables (a deliberative body whose 
 members were chosen by the king, chiefly from the Third Estate [Translator] ). lie 
 lived on his estates until his death, which occurred in 1793. 
 
 2 Angelique de Bournonville, daughter of the Prince de Bournonville, Comte 
 d'Heim, became in 1706 the wife of Jean-Baptiste de Durfort, Due de Duras, 
 Marshal of France. She was lady in waiting to Jlfesdames the daughters of Louis XV., 
 and died in 1764. 
 
 3 Marie Brulart de la Borde, daughter of a chief judge in the parlanent of 
 Dijon, was the second wife of Philippe d'Albert, Due de Luynes, whom she married 
 in 1732. She was lady in waiting to the queen and died in 1763. 
 
 4 Marie-Louise de Rohan- Soubise, a relation of the marshal of this name, was 
 born in 1720. In 1736, she married Gaston de Lorraine, Comte de Marsan. She was 
 governess to the en/ants de France (the graceful name given to the royal children 
 under the old regime [Translator]). 
 
 5 Marguerite de Talleyrand, daughter of Louis de Talleyrand, Prince de Chalais, 
 was the grand-aunt of the author. She was born in 1727, and married Gabriel de 
 Talleyrand, Comte de Perigord, in 1743. 
 
 6 Anne d'Auxy de Monceaux, born in 1721, married in 1736, Andre de Rosset, 
 Due de Fleury, a relation of the cardinal of this name. In 1739, she was appointed 
 lady of the queen's household. 
 
 7 Louis Francois du Bouchet, Comte de Sourches, Marquis de Tourzel, knight of 
 Malta, grand provost of France, was born in 1744. In 1764, he married Louise de 
 Croy d' Havre. 
 
 8 Gabrielle de Noailles, daughter of the Marshal Due de Noailles, was born in 
 1706. In 1721, she became the wife of Armand, Due de Villars, son of the marshal of 
 this name. She was successively lady of the queen's household and lady of the bed- 
 chamber, and died in 1771. 
 
 9 Charles, Comte de Saulx-Tavannes, was born in 1713. In 1758, he was lieutenant- 
 general and Knight of Honour (equerry) to the queen. 
 
 10 Marie de la Rochefoucauld (known as Mademoiselle de la Roche-Guyon), was 
 born in 1718. In 1737, she was married to Louis de la Rochefoucauld de Roye, 
 Due d'Estissac, grand master of the wardrobe. 
 
 B 2
 
 4 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 forfeiting their honour by admitting too openly the failings of 
 the king. 
 
 My relatives held various situations with the royal family. 
 My grandmother was lady of the queen's household, and was 
 treated with especial regard by the king ; she always resided at 
 Versailles and kept no house in Paris. 
 
 She had five children. Like that of all persons connected 
 with the court, their early tuition was rather neglected, or, at 
 least, devoted to few important branches of knowledge. As to 
 their subsequent education, it was to consist merely in imparting 
 to them what was termed the usages of society. Their outward 
 appearance was prepossessing. 
 
 My grandmother had noble, refined and reserved manners. 
 Her piety won universal respect for her, and the fact of her 
 numerous family caused the frequent steps she took towards 
 securing and promoting the future of her children to be regarded 
 as quite natural. 
 
 My father held the same views as his mother concerning 
 the education befitting children whose parents enjoyed a 
 position at court. Thus mine was rather left to take care 
 of itself : not through any indifference towards me, but owing 
 to the special disposition of the mind which leads some 
 people to consider that the best plan is to do or to be like 
 everybody else. 
 
 Too much care would have seemed pedantry ; affection too 
 openly expressed would have been regarded as quite unusual and 
 therefore ridiculous. Children, at that time, inherited their 
 father's name and coat of arms. Parents considered they had 
 done enough for their progeny by opening a career to them 
 and securing for them advantageous posts ; by marrying them 
 and increasing their allowance. 
 
 Paternal care had not yet come into fashion ; the fashion was 
 indeed the very reverse, when I was a child ; thus my early years 
 were cheerlessly spent in an outlying district of Paris. At the 
 age of four, I was still there, when I accidentally fell from the 
 top of a cupboard, and dislocated my foot. The woman to whose 
 care I was entrusted only informed my family of this several 
 months afterwards. The truth became known only when my
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 5 
 
 parents sent for me to go to Perigord to visit Madame de Chalais, 1 
 my grandmother, who had expressed a wish to see me. Although 
 Madame de Chalais was my great-grandmother, I always called 
 her grandma, very likely, I think, because this name implied a 
 closer relationship. The dislocation of my foot was already too 
 old to be remedied ; even my other foot having had to bear 
 alone the whole weight of my body, had grown weaker, and thus 
 I remained lame for life. 
 
 This accident had a great influence on my after-life. It 
 indeed led my parents to think I was unfit for a military career, 
 or at least, that, in such, I should labour under great disadvan- 
 tages ; they were thus induced to seek for me some other 
 profession, which, in their eyes, would be best calculated to serve 
 the interests of the family. For, in great families, the family was 
 far more cared for than its members individually, especially than 
 those young members who were still unknown. These considera- 
 tions are rather painful to my mind ... so I will not dwell further 
 on them. 
 
 In the Bordeaux coach, I was entrusted to the care of a 
 kindly woman named Mademoiselle Charlemagne, and after a 
 journey, which lasted seventeen days, I reached Chalais. 2 
 
 Madame de Chalais was a most refined and distinguished 
 lady ; her mind, her language, the dignity of her manners, the 
 sound of her voice, were most winning. She still retained what 
 was termed the wit of the Mortemarts, being indeed a Mortemart 
 by birth. 
 
 My appearance pleased her ; she acquainted me with feelings 
 hitherto unknown to me. She was the first member of my 
 family who displayed any affection towards me, and also the first 
 who taught me the sweetness of filial love. God bless her for 
 it ! . . . For I was really fondly attached to her ! To this day, 
 her memory is dear to me. Many a time have I regretted her ! 
 Many a time have I bitterly understood how priceless is the 
 
 1 Marie-Francoise de Rochechouart, daughter of Louis de Rochechouart, Due de 
 Mortemart, married Michel Chamillart, Marquis de Cany, by whom she had a daughter 
 — the author's grandmother. After the death of the marquis, Marie-Francoise, his 
 widow, became the wife of Louis Charles de Talleyrand, Prince de Chalais, Spanish 
 grandee, who died in 1757. 
 
 2 Chalais, chief town of the canton (administrative district) of Charente, near 
 Barbezieux.
 
 6 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 sincere affection of some member of one's own family. Such 
 affection affords immense comfort through the trials and troubles 
 of life, when those who inspire it are near to us. When they 
 are away, it soothes both the heart and the mind, and enables 
 us calmly to collect our thoughts. 
 
 The time spent at Chalais left a deep impression on my mind. 
 The dispositions of children and their after-life inclinations 
 are often determined by the objects which first impressed their 
 eyes and minds. 
 
 In the provinces distant from the capital, a certain care paid 
 to dignity and position, ruled the relations existing between the 
 members of the old aristocracy still residing on their estates, and 
 the lesser nobility and the tenants on the said estates. The 
 chief nobleman of a province would have considered it beneath 
 him not to have been kind and polite. His more distinguished 
 neighbours would have considered it a want of self-respect 
 to fail in displaying towards the bearers of ancient names 
 that regard and respect, which, expressed, as it was, freely and 
 without emphasis, seemed but the homage of the heart. As to 
 the peasantry, their lord only visited them to assist and address 
 to them some kind and comforting words, the influence of which 
 was felt in the neighbourhood, for the minor nobility endeavoured 
 to follow the example set them by the leading aristocracy of 
 their province. 
 
 The manners of the Perigord nobility resembled their old 
 castles ; they were imposing and firmly based ; the light of modern 
 refinement only came subdued. People were moving slowly but 
 wisely towards a more enlightened stage of civilization. 
 
 The tyranny of petty lords no longer existed ; it had been 
 stamped out by the spirit of chivalry, by the gallant and 
 courteous feelings the latter gave rise to amongst Southern 
 nations, and chiefly by the growth of royal power based on the 
 emancipation of peoples. 
 
 Those whose career at court was over, were fond of retiring 
 to the provinces that had witnessed the greatness of their 
 families. Once back on their estates, they there enjoyed the 
 affectionate and respectful consideration of all around them — a 
 consideration enhanced by the traditions of the province and the
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 7 
 
 recollection of the past might of their ancestors. This regard 
 reflected a certain credit on the persons composing the entourage 
 of the descendants of the families which were formerly the sole 
 dispensers of lordly favours in the district. The Revolution itself 
 failed to tarnish the lustre of, or to break the spell possessed by, 
 these ancient seats of sovereign power. The castles of provincial 
 lords are like those old deserted shrines from which the faithful 
 have fled, but whose traditions still enforce respect. 
 
 Chalais Castle was one of the relics of those revered and dear 
 old times. My grandmother there held, as it were, a court com- 
 posed of several gentlemen of ancient families, very different from 
 the vassals of the thirteenth century, but whose deference and 
 refined manners were mingled with the loftiest feelings. M. de 
 Benac, M. de Verteuil, M. d'Absac, M. de Gourville, M. de 
 Chauveron, M. de Chamillard, delighted in accompanying her 
 every Sunday to the parish mass, each of them discharging 
 towards her duties dignified by exquisite politeness. A little 
 chair close to my grandmother's prie-dieu was reserved for me. 
 
 On returning from mass, everybody met in a spacious hall in 
 the castle called the ApotJiicairerie} This room contained various 
 large jars carefully disposed on shelves and kept with scrupulous 
 cleanliness ; they were filled with ointments, the recipes of which 
 had always been faithfully preserved at the castle. Every year 
 they were prepared with the greatest care by the village surgeon 
 and vicar. There were besides a few bottles of elixirs and 
 syrups, as well as boxes containing other medicaments. In the 
 cupboards was stored a considerable stock of lint and of very 
 fine old linen bands of various widths. 
 
 All the sick persons who required assistance were assembled 
 in the preceding room. We greeted them as we passed through. 
 Mademoiselle Saunier, a chambermaid who had been longest in 
 my grandmother's service, introduced them in turn. My grand- 
 mother was seated on a velvet armchair ; in front of her was 
 placed an old black lacquered table. She wore a silk dress, 
 trimmed with lace, with a riband collarette and sleeve-knots 
 suited to the season. She also wore triple cuffs with large 
 designs ; a tippet, a head-dress adorned with a butterfly, and a 
 
 1 The surgery.
 
 8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 black mantilla tied under the chin. Such was her Sunday attire, 
 more elegant than that she wore on week-days. 
 
 The red velvet bag trimmed with gold lace, containing my 
 grandmother's books of devotion, was carried by M. de Benac, 
 who, on his great-grandmother's side, was distantly related 
 to us. 
 
 My close relationship secured for me a seat next to the old 
 lady. Two sisters of mercy, having questioned each patient as 
 to the nature of his disease or sore, mentioned the special oint- 
 ment likely to heal or relieve him. My grandmother pointed 
 out where the remedy was kept ; one of the gentlemen who had 
 waited on her at church fetched it, whilst another brought the 
 drawer containing the linen : of this I took a piece, from which 
 my grandmother herself cut the quantity required for bandages. 
 Each patient then received some plants for his potion, some wine, 
 the medicine prescribed, and always some other substantial relief, 
 but that which most touched his heart, were the kind and 
 considerate words from the good lady who endeavoured to 
 alleviate his sufferings. 
 
 More learned and elaborate drugs, even if distributed as 
 gratuitously by famous doctors, would have failed to attract as 
 many poor people, and especially, to do them as much good. 
 Carefulness, respect, faith, and gratitude, the chief means of cure 
 for the lower classes, would have been absent. 
 
 Man is a compound of a body and soul, which latter rules 
 the former. Wounded men to whose sores the balm of conso- 
 lation has been applied, patients to whom words of hope have 
 been spoken, are on the high road to recovery ; their blood flows 
 more freely, their humours get purified, their nerves are invigo- 
 rated, sleep returns to them, and their bodies regain strength. 
 Confidence is the most efficient of all remedies, and it is strongest 
 when it proceeds from the solicitude of a lady of rank with whom 
 all ideas of power and protection are connected. 
 
 I am perhaps dwelling too long on these details, but I am not 
 writing a book, I am only noting my impressions. The recollec- 
 tion of what I saw and heard during these early years of my life is 
 extremely pleasant to my mind. " Your name," I was daily told, 
 " was always held in veneration in our province." — " Our family,"
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 9 
 
 people affectionately said to me, " was at all times serving some 
 member of yours. . . . This piece of ground we received from 
 your grandfather ... he it was who built our church . . . my 
 mother's cross is a gift from your grandmother ... he who 
 comes from a good stock cannot degenerate ! You will be kind 
 too, will you not ? "... I am very likely indebted to these early 
 years for the general spirit of my conduct in life. If I displayed 
 affectionate and even tender feelings without too much familiarity ; 
 if, in various circumstances, I showed pride without haughtiness ; 
 if I love and respect old people, it is at Chalais, by the side of 
 my grandmother, that I imbibed all the good feelings which 
 surrounded my relatives in that district, and which they enjoyed 
 with delight. For, there are feelings which increase from 
 generation to generation. For a long time to come, people, 
 whose fame or fortune are of recent origin will be unable to 
 appreciate their sweetness. 1 The best of them are always too 
 much inclined to act the part of protectors. Let the wife of 
 Marshal Lefebvre 2 say to the head of some noble Alsatian family, 
 devoid of resources and just returned from emigration : " What 
 shall we do with your eldest son ? ... In what regiment shall 
 we place his brother ? . . . Have we got some living in view for 
 the abbe ? . . . When shall we marry Henrietta ? . . . I know a 
 convent where we ought to send the little girl . . ." Though 
 wishing really to be kind, she will simply appear ridiculous. 
 Inward feelings will cause him to decline her kindness, and 
 the pride of poverty will even experience a certain satisfaction at 
 such a refusal. But, I am quite forgetting that I am but eight 
 years old ; and as yet incapable of foreseeing that present 
 manners bear evident signs that these inherited feelings will 
 gradually dwindle away. 
 
 I learned at Chalais all that could possibly be learned in the 
 
 1 The article in the Charter * stating that the old and new titles are preserved has no 
 more sense than the motion made by M. Mathieu de Montmorency to the Constituent 
 Assembly, to abolish all titles. In our government, the political nobility resides 
 wholly in the House of Peers ; and there, it is individual. Outside of it, some people 
 bear names connected with some historical facts, but which confer no legal rights, and 
 which it is impossible either to over- or underrate. — {Prince Talleyrand.) 
 
 2 When but a private, Marshal Lefebvre, Due de Dantzig, had married the laundress 
 of his regiment. 
 
 * The Charter of liberties granted to France by Louis XVIII. on his return from Mittau.— (7Yii«.r/.)
 
 io THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 place, that is, to read, write and to a certain extent, to speak 
 the patois of the province. My studies had been limited to 
 this when I had to return to Paris. On taking leave of my 
 grandmother I shed tears, and so did she, so great was her 
 affection for me. As on coming down, so on returning, the 
 Bordeaux coach was seventeen days on the way. 
 
 At eleven o'clock on the morning of the seventeenth day, I 
 reached Paris. An old valet of my family was waiting for me 
 at the station in the Rue d'Enfer, and took me direct to the 
 College d'Harcourt, 1 where, at twelve o'clock, I was seated at 
 dinner by the side of a charming boy of my age who shared, 
 and still shares, all the cares, pleasures, and dreams of my 
 life. This was M. de Choiseul, known ever since his marriage 
 under the name of de Choiseul-Gouffier. 2 I had been pain- 
 fully impressed by having been so hurriedly despatched to 
 college without having been previously taken to my father 
 and mother. I was then eight years old, and the eyes of 
 my parents had not yet rested on me. I was told, and believed 
 it, that all this hurried arrangement was due to some unforeseen 
 and unavoidable circumstance : so I followed my path. 
 
 On arriving at college, I was led to the apartment of M. de 
 la Suze, 3 a cousin of mine, and entrusted to the care of his own 
 tutor. 4 
 
 If I succeeded at all in my studies, that result cannot be 
 ascribed either to the example of my cousin, or to the talents 
 of my teacher. 
 
 1 This college, which had been founded for the benefit of twenty-four poor students 
 from Normandy, in 1280, by Raoul d'Harcourt, canon of the Paris clergy, was, at 
 the time of the Revolution, the oldest educational establishment in Paris. It was 
 turned into a prison during the Reign of Terror, and afterwards became the quarters 
 of the Ecole normale. It resumed its first character only in 1820, when it took the 
 name of Lycee Saint-Louis, which it preserves to this day. 
 
 2 The Comte Auguste de Choiseul-Beaupre, born in 1752, married Marie de 
 Goufner, whose name he added to his own. He was at first captain in the 
 Cuirassiers, but gave way to his taste for travelling, and visited all the East. In 
 1784, he was appointed ambassador at Constantinople. In 1789, he retired to Russia, 
 returned to France in 1802, was appointed peer of France, State Minister, and 
 member of the Privy Council by Louis XVIII., and died in 1817. 
 
 a Son of Louis-Michel Chamillard, Comte de la Suze, who was born in 1709, and 
 became in 1748 Grand Marshal of the King's Household, and lieutenant-general 
 (1748). His mother having become a widow at an early age, married Daniel Marie, 
 Prince de Talleyrand, and became the grandmother of the author of these memoirs. 
 Youn£ de la Suze, who is mentioned here, was therefore the cousin of Prince de 
 Talleyrand. 
 
 4 The Abbe Hardi.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. n 
 
 Once a week, the Abbe Hardi called with me on my 
 parents, and we dined with them. On rising from table, 
 I went back to college always hearing the same injunction : 
 u Be a good boy, and give satisfaction to the Abbe." I got 
 on pretty well ; my schoolfellows liked me and I cheerfully 
 submitted to my new position. I had been living that life 
 for three years when I caught the small-pox ; the latter 
 being contagious, I had to leave college. My family, having 
 been informed of my illness by my tutor, my parents sent me a 
 sedan-chair to take me to the Rue Saint-Jacques, to the house of 
 Madame Lerond, a nurse employed by M. Lehoc, the college 
 physician. In these days, small-pox patients slept in beds 
 surrounded by double curtains ; the windows of their room were 
 made proof against draughts, a blazing fire was kept up in it, 
 and fever excited by means of suitable beverages. In spite of 
 this murderous treatment, which killed many people, I got over 
 the disease, and was not even marked. 
 
 I was then twelve years old ; during the time of my con- 
 valescence the peculiarity of my position struck me. My heart 
 was full at the little interest aroused by my illness, the fact of 
 my having been sent to college without having seen my parents, 
 and some other grievous recollections. I felt myself isolated, 
 helpless and always shut up in myself : I do not complain of it, for 
 I believe that my early meditations developed and strengthened 
 my thinking powers. My sad and cheerless childhood is the cause 
 of my having exercised these powers at an early age, and of 
 having accustomed myself to think more deeply, perhaps, than 
 I should have done, had my early life been filled with happi- 
 ness and joy. It may also be that these first trials of my 
 life taught me to bear misfortune and disappointment with 
 indifference, and to meet the latter with the resources which my 
 self-confidence showed me I possessed. 
 
 There is a sort of pleasant pride in these recollections of my 
 youth. 
 
 In after-life, it has struck me that my parents, having decided, 
 in consequence of what they regarded as the interest of the 
 family that I should be trained to a profession for which I 
 showed no aptitude, were afraid that they might fail to carry
 
 12 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 out their object, if they saw me too often. That fear is a proof 
 of affection, for which I ought to feel indebted to them. 
 
 When M. de la Suze's education was finished, or, rather, 
 when he was sixteen years old, the Abbe Hardi, his tutor, 
 retired. For a few months, I was entrusted to the care of a 
 gentleman named Hullot, who soon after went mad. My new 
 tutor was M. Langlois, with whom I remained until I left college, 
 and who brought up my brothers afterwards. He was a perfect 
 gentleman, but versed in nothing but French history, and who 
 had devoted too much attention to the perusal of the Court 
 Directory. In books of that kind he had learned that the post 
 of cape-bearer to princes^ conferred nobility, and that such a post 
 was given on the introduction of the Grand-Marshal. The 
 Grand-Marshal being my uncle, 2 we secured for M. Langlois the 
 post he was so eager to obtain. In 1790, my former tutor had his 
 court-dress made and emigrated, so that his letters of nobility 
 might bear a good date. He, however, was in too great a hurry 
 to enjoy his new privilege, and, having returned to France during 
 the revolutionary period, was sent to prison. So that now, having 
 a twofold fame, by emigration and imprisonment, he calmly 
 spends the rest of his life in the noble company of the Faubourg 
 Saint-Germain. From this, it may be judged that if I have, 
 since these days, given way to the temptation of playing a 
 part in public affairs, M. Langlois is in no wise responsible 
 for it. 
 
 I might have been a successful scholar : my natural bent 
 leads me to think so, and I notice that this opinion is almost uni- 
 versally shared by my schoolfellows. The little encouragement 
 given me, for fear lest I should become too clever a young man, is 
 the cause that the first years of my life were spent in a rather 
 dull and insignificant manner. 
 
 When the time of what is termed the conclusion of studies 
 arrived, the complete silence of my father as to my future, and 
 a few conversations held in my hearing, were the first inti- 
 mation I had of the career intended for me. 
 
 In order to give me a high and even tempting idea of the 
 profession marked out for me, it was thought advisable to send 
 
 1 Portc-manteait chez les princes. 2 The Comte de la Suze.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 13 
 
 me to Rheims, the chief archbishopric of France, to the 
 titular of which one of my uncles was coadjutor. 1 As, for my 
 family's sake, it was not becoming for me to alight from the 
 coach at the archbishop's residence, my journey to Rheims was 
 more comfortable than that to Chalais had been. A post-chaise 
 called for me at the College d'Harcourt, and drove me to my 
 destination in a couple of days. 
 
 My parents did not send for me before I left. I repeat this 
 here, and hope never to think of it again. I am, perhaps, 
 the only man of distinguished birth and belonging to a numerous 
 and esteemed family, who did not, for one week in his life, enjoy 
 the sweetness of being under his father's roof. 
 
 The disposition of my mind led me to consider my new 
 abode as but an ill-disguised exile, notwithstanding all the 
 precautions taken to render it attractive. 
 
 The opulence, the consideration, the very pleasures of the 
 Archbishop of Rheims and of his coadjutor were to me indifferent. 
 A life full of formalities was unbearable to me. At the age of 
 fifteen, when all our impulses are still natural, we can scarcely 
 conceive that circumspection, that is, the art of disclosing only a 
 portion of one's actions, thoughts, feelings, and impressions, 
 should be the foremost of all qualities. In my opinion, all the 
 wealth and pomp of Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon, 2 did not 
 deserve the complete sacrifice of my sincerity, which was asked 
 from me. 
 
 All the care and attention paid me only tended to impress 
 me deeply with the idea that, my lame foot rendering me in- 
 capable of serving in the army, I must necessarily enter holy 
 orders, as no other career was open to a man of my name. . . . 
 Yet what was to become of the lively imagination and wit with 
 
 1 Alexandre de Talleyrand was born in 1736. He was successively coadjutor of 
 the Archbishop of Rheims (1766), Archbishop in partibus of Trajanopolis, Arch- 
 bishop-Duc of Rheims (1777), and deputy of the clergy to the States-General (1789). 
 In 1801, he declined to resign, was called to Mittau by Louis XVIII., in 1803, and 
 became Grand-Chaplain of France in 1808. Peer of France in 18x4, Cardinal in 
 181 7, and finally Archbishop of Paris, he died in 1821. He was the paternal uncle 
 of the author. 
 
 2 Charles- Antoine, Comte de la Roche-Aymon, was born in 1697. He was Vicar- 
 General of Limoges and Bishop in partibus of Sarepta in 1725. Bishop of Tarbes, 
 Archbishop of Toulouse in 1740, and of Narbonne in 1752, he became Grand-Chaplain 
 of France in 1760, Archbishop- Due of Rheims in 1762, Cardinal in 1771, and died 
 in 1777-
 
 H THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 which I was credited ? The only plan then was to hold out to 
 me the attraction of public life, and to picture to me the advan- 
 tages to be obtained from it. They sought to avail themselves 
 of the characteristics I might happen to possess. 
 
 With this object, I was induced to read the Memoirs of 
 Cardinal de Retz, the life of Cardinal Richelieu, that of Cardinal 
 Ximenes, and that of Hincmard, a former Cardinal of Rheims. 
 . . . Whatever might be the path I entered upon, my parents 
 were disposed to agree to it, provided I crossed the threshold of 
 the Church. 
 
 The constant pressure brought to bear on me did not fix my 
 resolution, but rather unsettled it. Youth is the time in life 
 when we are most honest. I did not then understand what it 
 was to embrace one profession with the intention of following 
 another, to assume a part of constant self-denial in order the 
 better to succeed in an ambitious career ; to join the Church 
 in order to become Minister of Finances. It required too great 
 a knowledge of the society which I was entering, and of the 
 times in which I was living, to regard this as a matter of course. 
 
 But, being alone, I was defenceless ; all the persons who 
 surrounded me spoke a conventional language, and carefully 
 concealed from me all means of avoiding the carrying out of the 
 plan my parents had formed respecting my future. 
 
 I spent a year at Rheims, at the expiration of which, seeing 
 that my fate could not be avoided, my wearied mind submitted : 
 I allowed myself to be taken to Saint-Sulpice College. 1 
 
 More thoughtful than is usual at the age I was then, rebellious, 
 but powerless, indignant, without either daring to, or being justi- 
 fied in, displaying my indignation, there are few instances of a 
 lad of sixteen being as despondent and cheerless as I was on 
 entering that college. I formed no intimacy. I did everything 
 in cross-temper. I had a grudge against my masters, my 
 parents, institutions generally, but chiefly against the sway of 
 social propriety to which I saw myself obliged to give way. 
 
 1 Saint-Sulpice College was founded in 1542 by M. Jean-Jacques Oilier, cure of 
 the parish ; it was at first situated at Vaugirard. It soon acquired considerable 
 importance, owing to the excellence of its tuition and to its strict ecclesiastical 
 discipline. The present building was erected by M. Le Ragon de Bretonvilliers, cure 
 of Saint-Sulpice parish. It contains a magnificent ceiling painted by Charles Le 
 Brun, the famous artist. — {Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 15 
 
 I spent three years at Saint-Sulpice College, and hardly 
 spoke at all during the whole time ; people thought I was super- 
 cilious and often reproached me with being so. This seemed to 
 me so to point out how little they knew me, that I deigned no 
 reply ; they then said that my arrogance was beyond all 
 endurance. Good Heavens ! I was neither arrogant nor 
 proud : I was merely a harmless young man, extremely 
 miserable and inwardly irritated. People say, I often thought 
 
 to myself, that I am fit for nothing. .... Fit for nothing 
 
 After giving way to despondency, for a few moments, a strong 
 and comforting feeling cheered me, and I discovered that I 
 %vas fit for something, even for good and noble deeds. What fore- 
 bodings, a thousand times dispelled, did not then cross my mind, 
 always placing me under a spell which I was unable to explain ! 
 The library of Saint-Sulpice College had been enriched by 
 gifts from Cardinal de Fleury ; its works were numerous and 
 carefully selected. I spent my days there reading the produc- 
 tions of great historians, the private lives of statesmen and 
 moralists, and a few poets. I was particularly fond of books of 
 travels. A new land, the dangers of a storm, the picture of a 
 wreck, the description of a country bearing traces of great 
 changes, sometimes of upheavals, all this had deep interest for 
 me. Sometimes, when I considered these voyages to distant 
 lands, these dreadful scenes described so vividly in the writings 
 of modern explorers, it seemed to me that my lot was not so 
 hopeless as I had thought. A good library affords true comfort 
 to all the dispositions of the soul. 
 
 My third and really useful education dates from this time, it 
 was self-taught in lonely silence ; as I was always face to face with 
 the author whose work I was reading, and could only use my own 
 judgment, it nearly always happened that, when my opinions 
 differed from those of another, I thought mine the right one. 
 My ideas thus remained personally my own : the books I read 
 enlightened my mind, but never enslaved it. I do not pretend 
 to say that in so acting I was right or wrong, I merely state 
 what I was. Such lonely self-tuition must have some value. 
 If injustice, whilst developing our faculties, has not embittered 
 our hearts too much, we derive greater comfort from lofty
 
 1 6 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 thoughts and noble impulses, we feel stronger in confronting life's 
 trials. A feeling of hope, vague and indescribable, like all 
 youthful passions, excited my mind : I never allowed it to rest. 
 
 By the merest chance, I met a person who had some 
 influence in modifying the disposition in which I then was. I 
 recollect this meeting with pleasure, because I am most likely 
 indebted to it for having been spared all the effects of melancholy 
 brought to its most intense degree. I had reached the age of 
 the mysterious revelations of the soul and of the passions, the 
 moment in life when all our faculties break forth in super- 
 abundant and full activity. I had several times noticed, in 
 one of the lateral shrines of Saint-Sulpice church, a hand- 
 some young lady whose simple and modest look pleased me 
 extremely. At eighteen, this is an attraction for any young 
 man who is not depraved : I attended the chief services more 
 assiduously. One day, as she left the church, a severe shower 
 set in which emboldened me to propose to her to see her home, 
 provided she did not live too far. She agreed to share my 
 umbrella. I accompanied her to Rue Ferou, where she was 
 lodging ; she allowed me to see her to her apartments ; and, 
 quite naturally, like a very pure young lady, she proposed that 
 I should come again. At first, I availed myself of her offer about 
 twice a week, and afterwards more often. Her parents had sent 
 her on the stage against her wish ; I was a clerical student against 
 mine. This sway of interest in her case, and of ambition in 
 mine, brought about mutual unreserved confidence between us. 
 All the troubles of my life, all my fits of ill-humour, her own 
 trials and disappointments, occupied all our conversations. I 
 have since been told that she had not much sense : although I 
 saw her almost daily for two years, I never noticed it. 
 
 Thanks to her, I became even in college more amiable, or at 
 least better-tempered. My superiors cannot have failed to have 
 had some suspicion of what had reconciled me to my position and 
 even made me somewhat cheerful. But the Abbe Couturier * had 
 taught them the art of being blind when necessary ; he had told 
 
 1 The Abbe Couturier was born in 1688. He was a friend of Cardinal de Fleury, 
 who appointed him Abbot of Chaumes, and afterwards head of Saint-Sulpice College, 
 lie died in 1770.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 17 
 
 them never to find fault with a young student whom they regarded 
 as destined to fill high posts, to become coadjutor to the 
 archbishop of Rheims, perhaps a cardinal, perhaps even Ministre 
 de la feuille} How could any one tell ? 
 
 I left college 2 some time before the coronation of the king. 3 
 My parents sent me to Rheims in order to attend this ceremony. 
 The power of the clergy was then at its height ; the bishop 
 suffragan of Rheims was to officiate, in case the old age of 
 Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon should, as it was feared, prevent 
 him from attending this solemn ceremony. . . What a glorious 
 time ! . . . 
 
 A young king, scrupulously moral and uncommonly modest ; 
 ministers, well known for their ability and uprightness ; a 
 queen whose affableness, grace and kindness tempered the 
 austere virtues of her consort ; everybody filled with respect ! 
 the heart of every subject overflowing with affection for the 
 young sovereigns ! joy was everywhere ! . . Never did such a 
 bright spring precede such a stormy autumn, such a dismal 
 winter. 
 
 My acquaintance with several women remarkable in different 
 ways, and whose friendship never ceased to give a charm to my 
 life, dates from the coronation of Louis XVI. These ladies 
 were the Duchesse de Luynes, 4 the Duchesse de Fitz-James, 5 and 
 the Vicomtesse de Laval. 6 
 
 1 Literally, Minister of the Roll (of benefices). The feuille was a book in which 
 were inscribed all the vacant benefices in the gift of the Crown. This book was kept 
 by a prelate, to whom, in fact, the power of nomination was delegated by the king. 
 All the bishoprics or abbeys in the gift of the Crown were thus conferred by the 
 Ministre de la feuille. 
 
 2 It may be noticed that M. de Talleyrand does not mention here either the exact 
 date of his ordination, or the circumstances attending this ceremony. The Comte de 
 Choiseul-Gouffier, speaking on this subject, related that, having called on M. de 
 Talleyrand on the evening preceding his ordination, he found him in a state of violent 
 inward struggle, all in tears, and giving way to despair. M. de Choiseul then endea- 
 voured to persuade his friend not to consummate the sacrifice ; but the fear of his 
 mother, of a tardy scandal, a certain false pride, held him back, and he exclaimed, 
 " It is too late, there is no retreating now." — {M. de Bacourt.) 
 
 3 nth June, 1775. 
 
 4 Elisabeth de Montmorency-Laval, daughter of the Marshal Due de Montmorency 
 Laval, married in 1768 Louis d : Albert, Due de Luynes, who was Brigadier-General, 
 Deputy to the States-General, and Senator under the Empire. 
 
 5 Probably Marie de Thiard, daughter of Henry de Thiard, Comte de Bissy, who 
 married in 1768 the Due de Fitz-James, Brigadier-General. 
 
 6 Catherine Tavernier de Boullongne, who, in 1765 married Mathieu de Mont- 
 morency-Laval, known under the name of Vicomte de Laval. 
 
 VOL. I. C
 
 18 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The assembly of the clergy x was about to sit, I was elected 
 by the province of Rheims to be a member of this assembly. I 
 carefully watched how business was conducted in this important 
 body. Ambition was there represented in various disguises. 
 Religion, humanity, patriotism, philosophy, each of these had its 
 so-called supporters ! Whenever the pecuniary interests of the 
 clergy were threatened, all the members rose in defence of these 
 interests, though they did not all resort to the same arguments. 
 The most pious bishops expressed the fear that the proposed 
 reforms would diminish the share of the poor ; those who be- 
 longed to the high aristocracy, were afraid of any innovation ; 
 those whose ambition was an open secret, claimed that the clergy, 
 being the most enlightened body of the kingdom, should be at 
 the head of all government administrations, and, in order not 
 to be a burden on the State, should find, in the wealth bequeathed 
 them by our pious forefathers, the means of facing the expenses 
 necessarily involved in the tenure of high State offices. Thus, in 
 the management of their temporal affairs, the clergy of the 
 eighteenth century made no concessions to the spirit of the times. 
 When M. de Machault, 2 Minister of Finances, proposed to tax the 
 property of the clergy like that of all other subjects, the whole 
 clergy rose to oppose the motion, and declared that they would 
 not submit to this measure. Property given to the Church, 
 they said, belongs to God and is consecrated to Him. This 
 consecration has the effect of imparting to such property a 
 peculiar destination, and the ministers of religion are its sole dis- 
 
 1 These assemblies or general meetings of the clergy dated from the sixteenth 
 century. Since 1567, they were held every five years. Their object was to determine 
 and portion out the amount of supplies (free gift) to be paid to the king. They also 
 dealt with religious matters. They were divided into ordinary and extraordinary or 
 plenary assemblies, which sat alternately. The session of the latter lasted six months, 
 and comprised two deputies of the first order, and two of the second, for each ecclesias- 
 tical province ; the ordinary or minor assemblies only lasted three months, and were 
 only composed of a single deputy of each order for each province. 
 
 - Jean-Baptiste de Machault, Comte d'Arnouville, was born in 1701, from an old 
 family of magistrates. He became successively Counsellor of parlement* (1721), 
 Comptroller-General (1745-1754), Keeper of the Seals (1750), and Secretary of State 
 to the Marine Department. He was dismissed from all his posts in 1757, and lived 
 in retirement until the Revolution. Having been arrested in 1794, he died in prison 
 a few weeks later. 
 
 * The parlcnieitts were but courts of law established in the chief cities of old France. They had 
 no political character : the parlement of Paris, however, assumed this character on several 
 occasions, and refused to register certain royal edicts, which registration constituted its exclusive 
 privilege, and gave the edicts the force of law. — {Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 19 
 
 pensers and managers ; the immunity of Church property is a 
 principle of French public law. The interference of conscience 
 in all these financial quarrels enabled the clergy to display, in 
 the discussion of this important matter, a degree of eloquence 
 which they alone possess. M. de Montauset, 1 M. de Breteuil, 2 
 and M. de Nicolai', 3 having attracted attention by their brilliant 
 speeches, took up a prominent position in the assembly, and 
 enjoyed all the importance given them by M. de Machault's 
 resignation. 
 
 The government gave way on the subject of possession, but 
 mooted another point, which referred to the mode by which the 
 clergy had obtained possession of their property, and might lead 
 to the shaking of the very principle of possession. The question 
 was, to decide whether the clergy were subjected to fealty and 
 homage, to avowal and enumeration, in short, to feudal duties 
 towards the king. It had been discussed several times since the 
 beginning of the seventeenth century, and, on every occasion, the 
 clergy had obtained a favourable decision ; but, as they could 
 not produce any documentary evidence in support of their claims, 
 they had been subjected to renewed attacks. In 1725, the clergy 
 having refused to admit the tax of the fiftieth, the government 
 enforced the execution of a previous declaration, according to 
 which the clergy's pretension that they were excused from dis- 
 charging their feudal duties, was pronounced null and erroneous. 
 Since then, on various pretexts, the clergy had obtained at each 
 subsequent assembly, orders, which, without deciding the case, 
 suspended the application of the law of 1674. 
 
 Some difficulties and some delays in the engrossing of the 
 order of suspension 4 of 1775, induced the clergy to make fresh 
 efforts. The works of Dom Bouquet 5 were consulted ; and, in 
 
 1 No person of this name existed at that time. The author probably means 
 M. de Montazet, born in 1713, chaplain to the king in 1742, Bishop of Autun in 1748, 
 Archbishop of Lyons in 1759, and who died in 1788. 
 
 2 Francois- Victor le Tonnelier de Breteuil, born in 1724, Bishop of Montauban in 
 1762. 
 
 3 There were at this time, two prelates belonging to the Nicolai family : Louis- 
 Marie, born in 1729, Bishop of Cahors in 1777 ; Aimar-Claude, born in 1738, Bishop 
 of Beziers in 1771, who emigrated in 1792, and died in Florence in 18 14. 
 
 4 Arret de stir seance. 
 
 5 Dom Martin Bouquet, a learned Benedictine monk, born at Amiens (1685— 1754). 
 Chief Librarian of the Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Pres. He is the author of a work 
 
 C 2
 
 20 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 numerous memoirs, of one of which, I believe, I am the author, 
 the clergy set forth that seeing that they held their immunity 
 from the munificence of the kings of France, their case was 
 ruled by the general legislation of the kingdom, which protects 
 equally the rights of all the orders l and the property of all 
 citizens. Going further into the details of the case, they 
 pretended that all the property they possessed previous to the 
 year 1700, proceeded from tithes, allodium, or free gifts. 2 So 
 that no feudal service being due for tithes, allodium, or free gifts, 
 the conclusion was that all the property of the clergy should be 
 free from feudal duties. I do not recollect how they got over 
 the difficulty arising from spiritual peerages. 3 The Archbishops 
 of Narbonne, 4 of Aix, 5 of Bordeaux, 6 and the Bishop of 
 Nevers, 7 displayed great ability in the course of this great 
 debate. But the explanations obtained from the Chamber of 
 Accounts 8 in pursuance of an Order in Council, and furnished 
 
 entitled Recueil des Historiens de la Gaide (" Collection of the Historians of Gaul "). 
 Another Bouquet, a renowned jurist and a nephew of the latter, died in 1781 ; he 
 published various works on ecclesiastical law. There may have been some confusion 
 between the two, and the works of the nephew may thus have been erroneously 
 ascribed to his uncle. 
 
 1 The nation, as is known, was divided into three orders : the clergy, the nobility, 
 and the third estate. — (Translator.) 
 
 2 Tranches aumones was the name given to free gifts made to churches or hos- 
 pitals. — ( Translator. ) 
 
 3 The spiritual or temporal peers of the kingdom owed fealty and homage to the 
 king, and had to discharge all the feudal duties towards him. 
 
 4 Arthur de Dillon, born in 1721, Bishop of Evreux(i753), Archbishop of Toulouse 
 (1758), of Narbonne (1762), President of the States of Languedoc, and of the assembly 
 of the clergy held in 1780. 
 
 6 Jean-de-Dieu Raymond de Boisgelin, born at Rennes in 1732, Bishop of Lavaur 
 (1765), Archbishop of Aix (1770), President of the States of Provence, deputy of the 
 clergy to the States-General, President of the Constituent Assembly (1790). He 
 emigrated, returned to France in 1802, was appointed Archbishop of Tours and 
 Cardinal, and died in 1804. 
 
 6 Ferdinand Meriadec, Prince de Rohan-Guemenee, born in 1738, Archbishop of 
 Bordeaux (1769), and of Cambrai (1781). He emigrated in 1792, returned to France 
 in 1802, and was appointed chaplain to the Empress Josephine. 
 
 7 Jean Antoine Tinseau, born at Besancon (1697), Bishop of Nevers (1751). 
 
 8 The Chambre des Comptcs was a supreme court from whose decisions there was 
 no appeal. It was instituted for the hearing and verification of the accounts of all 
 officials entrusted with public money. It had also to take all necessary measures for 
 the preservation of the Crown estates and property. Besides the Chamber of 
 Accounts of Paris, there were similar courts in the chief towns of the kingdom. The 
 Chamber of Accounts of Paris was founded by Philip the Fair. The Chamber of 
 Paris verified and registered all the ordinances concerning estates, revenues, or ex- 
 penditure of the Crown, the letters of nobility, the deeds of recognition or legitimiza- 
 tion of natural children, the deeds relating to the sinking of debts, the deeds of 
 appanage, &c. It received the oaths of allegiance and homage to the king from his 
 vassals, and registered all Crown leases and generally all matters concerning the 
 finances of the State. — (Translator.')
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 21 
 
 by M. de Saint-Genis, 1 were on the point of bringing about a 
 decision exactly in opposition to the pretensions of the clergy, 
 when the States-General dispersed everybody. 
 
 Some philosophical views shared, as already mentioned, 
 by the most ambitious portion of the clergy, had induced 
 several prominent bishops to solicit the carrying out of the 
 Order in Council of 1766, according to which the king was to 
 appoint a commission to deal with reforms to be introduced 
 in a few regular religious orders. 2 A particular reform such as 
 this, so much in keeping with the ideas of the time, must neces- 
 sarily lead to a general attack upon these illustrious bodies. 
 Having once dispersed all that learned staff, it became easier 
 to approach the whole ecclesiastical edifice, which, being thus 
 deprived of what constitutes its leading spirit and strength, could 
 not long defend itself with the weapons afforded by the external 
 ceremonies of religion alone. 
 
 M. de Brienne, 3 Archbishop of Toulouse, who sought support 
 in the new ideas, was chairman of the Commission in 1776. 
 The religious orders of Sainte-Croix and of Grandmont, the 
 Camaldules, the Servites, the Celestines, had already been 
 abolished. The order of Saint-Rufus had just shared a similar 
 fate. 4 The commissioners, in the reports in which they proposed 
 
 1 Nicolas de Saint-Genis, born in 1741, died in 1808 ; Commissaire des guerres 
 (an officer in the Commissariat) (1762), auditor in the Court of Accounts (1769). He 
 is the author of a valuable work on ecclesiastical law. 
 
 2 The reform of religious orders was urged in 1765 by the assembly of the clergy 
 itself. In consequence, the King's Council, in an order dated May 26, 1766, 
 appointed a commission to examine the reforms which it was proper to apply to con- 
 ventual life. This commission was composed of five prelates and five councillors of 
 state ; it drew up the ordinance of March 24, 1768, which set forth — 1st, that the age 
 at which vows should be valid was henceforth to be twenty for men, and eighteen 
 for women ; 2nd, that members of religious orders of either sex should be French ; 
 3rd, that no town should have more than two convents of the same order ; 4th, that 
 each monastery should comprise at least fifteen monks or nuns. 
 
 3 Etienne de Lomenie, Comte de Brienne, born in 1727, Bishop of Condom ( 1 760), 
 Archbishop of Toulouse (1763), chairman of the Board of Finances (1787), Prime 
 Minister, Archbishop of Sens (1788), Cardinal in December, 1788 ; he took the oath 
 to the civil constitution (of the clergy), and gave up his dignity of cardinal. He was 
 arrested in 1793, and died suddenly. 
 
 4 The regular canons of Sainte-Croix, whose head convent was at Liege, only 
 possessed in France twelve establishments numbering forty-seven members ; their 
 congregation was abolished October 14, 1769. — The order of Grandmont, founded in 
 1 124 by Saint-Stephen at Murat (Limousin), only numbered 108 members, occupying 
 seven convents, in the eighteenth century. It was abolished by an edict of March 3, 
 1770, confirmed by a papal bull of August 6, 1772. — The Camaldules, whose order 
 dated from the tenth century, comprised eight monasteries of monks (the most im-
 
 22 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 these measures of destruction, and the royal orders which enjoined 
 the closing of these convents, alluded with regret to the necessity 
 of having recourse to such extreme steps ; but it was then wished 
 to consider them as indispensable in order to strengthen the 
 discipline of the Church, and to preserve from corruption those 
 orders which it was hoped could still be allowed to exist. 
 
 I am far from thinking that the bishops who had drafted the 
 project of that permanent commission, were aware of all the 
 danger its adoption was to present for the clergy. They surely 
 believed that they would be able to direct its application, and, 
 if needed, even to suspend it. But the time had already come 
 when people had ceased to be moderate in all questions relative 
 to religious orders. Hardly a day passed without some work 
 being published concerning the abusive practices of one order, 
 the uselessness of another ; and I do not recollect that, during 
 the twenty years that preceded the French Revolution, a 
 single clever pen was raised in defence of religious orders. 
 The historians no longer even dared to say that convents and 
 monasteries, more than any other cause, imparted a peculiar 
 character to the great European civilization and made it dis- 
 tinctly unlike any other. It has often occurred to me that the 
 celibacy of priests powerfully contributed to preserve Europe 
 from the spirit of caste ; and it is but necessary to refer to 
 history to see that this spirit tends generally to check the 
 progress of civilization. M. de Bonald could find in this the 
 text of a paper much in keeping with his own ideas. 
 
 The peculiarity of the period I am now reaching, was that 
 everybody was anxious to be noted for talents or aptitudes 
 foreign to his pursuit. The formation of the provincial as- 
 semblies 1 furnished the occasion of calling public attention to 
 
 portant of which was on Mont Valerien *) and twelve convents of nuns. It was the 
 wealthiest order in France. — The order of Servitcs was founded at Florence in the 
 thirteenth century by seven merchants. Their chief establishment was the convent of 
 the Annunciade in Florence ; they had spread to France, where they were known under 
 the name of Blancs-Mantcaux t on account of their dress. — The order of Saint-Rufus 
 dated from the sixth century. At the time of its abolition, it only possessed fifty-seven 
 monasteries, numbering 200 monks. At their request, Pope Clement XIV. secularised 
 them, and incorporated them in the military order of Saint-Lazarus (July, 1771). 
 1 The provincial assemblies were collective administrations instituted under 
 
 * A well-known hill near Paris. The fort erected on it caused much trouble to the Germans in 
 1870-71.— (7 ranslator.) t Literally, "White-cloaks."
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 23 
 
 the persons elected to preside over them. M. Necker, 1 who was 
 always afraid of being reproached for being a Calvinist, thought 
 he could shield himself by appointing to the different posts of his 
 department all bishops endowed with some talent ; thus it was 
 that within a few years, all the provincial administrations were 
 managed by the most distinguished bishop of each province. Is 
 it not remarkable that a clergy, composed of men, some of whom 
 were most pious, others specially good administrators, others, 
 again, worldly, and, like the Archbishop of Narbonne, taking a 
 certain pride in relinquishing for a while the grave and severe 
 duties of their avocation to lead the life of a nobleman 2 — is it 
 not remarkable, I say, that being composed of so many different 
 elements, this clergy should, nevertheless, preserve the same 
 spirit ? Yet, it is an undeniable fact, and more than substantiated 
 by an incident which I could scarcely credit, had I not witnessed 
 it personally. A few days after the opening of the States-General, 
 I attended with the chief members of the clergy a conference 
 held in Versailles at Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld's 3 ; there, 
 M. Dulau, 4 Archbishop of Aries, earnestly proposed to seize so 
 
 Louis XVI. in the twenty-six generalites Selections * of the kingdom. Turgot was 
 the first to think of this institution ; it was however reserved to Necker to apply the 
 idea. Those assemblies were formed of members of the three orders, the Third Estate 
 sending twice the number of the other two. They held their session once in two 
 years, and only sat for a month ; they were entrusted with the levying and distribu- 
 tion of taxes, and possessed besides, nearly all the attributes of the present General 
 Councils in France. Half the members were appointed by the king, and these elected 
 the other half. 
 
 1 Jacques Necker belonged to a family of English origin, which emigrated to 
 Germany in the sixteenth century. In 1724, his father took up his residence in 
 Geneva, where he became professor of law. Jacques was born in 1732, came to Paris 
 in 1750, and founded a banking concern there. He became Director of the Treasury in 
 1776, and afterwards General Director of Finances, with all the power of a Minister 
 of State — a title which could not be conferred upon him for the twofold reason of his 
 being a Protestant and a foreigner. He retired to private life in 1780, was exiled in 
 1787, resumed office in 1788, was exiled again on July 11, 1789, and called again to 
 power by the Assembly ten days later. His popularity, however, did not last long : 
 he resigned on September 18, 1790. He retired to Coppet, where he died in 1804. 
 
 2 M. de Dillon, Archbishop of Narbonne, possessed an estate near Soissons, where 
 he hunted large game six months in the year. Haute- Fontaine was the name of this 
 estate. — {Prince Talleyrand.) 
 
 3 Dominique de la Rochefoucauld, Comte de Saint Elpis, born in 171 3, Arch- 
 bishop of Albi (1747), of Rouen (1759), Cardinal (1778), Deputy of the Clergy to the 
 States-General. He emigrated in 1792, and died in 1800. 
 
 4 Jean-Marie Dulau, born near Perigueux in 1738 ; Archbishop of Aries in 1775, 
 
 * The financial jurisdictions of old France ; each of them was administered by an official named 
 intendant. The generalites of the pays d'etats were those where the province still enjoyed the privi- 
 lege of fixing its own taxation. In the pays d' election, the taxes were fixed by royal delegates called 
 elus. — ( Translator.)
 
 24 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 favourable an occasion (these were his own expressions) to get the 
 nation to pay the debts of the clergy. This motion, like that of 
 M. de Themines 1 when he advised the clergy to solicit the meeting 
 of the States-General, met with no opposition. The Archbishop 
 of Aries, in whose ability and wisdom everybody placed confi- 
 dence, was appointed to second the motion of M. Dulau, and 
 press its adoption by the States-General, whenever he thought 
 the moment opportune. It required the lapse of many months and 
 all the ominous events that happened in the meantime, to enable 
 the good sense of M. de Boisgelin, Archbishop of Aix, to persuade 
 the clergy, not only to waive this absurd motion, but even to 
 make a considerable sacrifice in order to cover the famous deficit 
 which had been the pretext for all that was going on for a year ; 
 it'was too late ; it is true, the pretext was forgotten ; besides there 
 was no longer any need of it, since the States-General had 
 become the National Assembly. 
 
 I notice that while speaking of the clergy, I do not observe 
 chronological order ; I am compelled to do so. A work on any 
 given subject, confined to studying the progress of events year 
 after year, must needs often be obscure and always devoid of 
 interest. I think it preferable for clearness of exposition to 
 mention at once that naturally belongs to the subject one is 
 dwelling upon. Besides, it has the invaluable advantage of being 
 much easier, and when people do not pretend to write a book, 
 they may be allowed to take it easy. 
 
 Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon, by appointing me promoter of 
 the assembly of 1775, 2 gave me the opportunity of attracting 
 notice, and from that moment, I was destined to become agent- 
 general of the clergy. 3 
 
 deputy of the clergy to the States-General. Arrested after August 10, he was im- 
 prisoned at the " Carmes," * and fell a victim to the September massacres. 
 
 1 Alexandre de Lauzieres de Themines (1742-1829), chaplain to the king, Bishop 
 of Blois (1776). He emigrated in 1 791, refused to resign his see in 1801, never 
 acknowledged the Concordat, and died in Brussels in 1829 without having ever 
 returned to France. 
 
 2 The duties of the promoter were to plead the defence of public interests. His 
 functions were equivalent to those of the public prosecutor in criminal courts. He 
 had to expose faulty ecclesiastics, and to see that the rights, liberties, and discipline 
 of the Church were not infringed. 
 
 3 There were two agents-general of the clergy. Their duties consisted in repre- 
 senting the interests of the clergy with the government, in all that related to the 
 
 * The convent ofa religious order of this name used as a prison during the Revolution. — (Translator.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 25 
 
 When the session of the assembly of 1775 was over, I entered 
 the Sorbonne. I spent two years there, engaged with anything 
 but theology, for pleasures occupy most of the time of a young 
 graduate. Ambition also takes up a portion of one's time, and 
 the memory of Cardinal Richelieu, whose fine mausoleum was in 
 the Sorbonne church, was not unsuggestive in this respect. At 
 that time, I only knew ambition in its noble acceptation, I was 
 anxious to undertake all that in which I thought I could succeed. 
 The five years of exasperation, silence and reading which, at 
 Saint-Sulpice college, seemed so long and dismal to me, were not 
 altogether lost. The trials of youth are profitable ; it is a good 
 thing to have been steeped in the waters of the Styx, and, for 
 many reasons, I am thankful to have undergone the trials of 
 those days. 
 
 On leaving the Sorbonne, I found myself at last entirely free 
 to do as I pleased. 
 
 I took up my residence at Bellechasse, 1 in a comfortable little 
 house. My first care was to form a library, which became valu- 
 able eventually by the care with which the works composing it 
 were selected, the rarity of the editions, and its choice and elegant 
 bindings. I sought to make the acquaintance of the men most 
 renowned for their past life, their works, their ambition, or the 
 prospects held out to them by their birth, their friends or their 
 talents. Being thus placed by my own action in the wide circle 
 where so many brilliant and superior minds were shining in 
 various ways, I enjoyed the proud pleasure of being indebted to 
 myself alone for my position in life. I even had a very sweet 
 moment when, having been appointed by His Majesty to the 
 benefice of the abbey of Saint Denis at Rheims, the first income 
 I derived from it enabled me to pay to the principal of Harcourt 
 College a considerable portion of the fees still due for my 
 education, and to recompense M. Langlois for the care he had 
 taken of me in my youth. 
 
 revenue and expenditure of the Church, and the maintenance of her privileges. They 
 were elected for five years by the assemblies of the clergy. 
 
 1 The Hotel Bellechasse was situated in the Faubourg St. Germain, Rue de 
 Verneuil, near the Rue de Bellechasse. The Bellechasse inclosure has given its name 
 to the convent of the Canonesses of the Holy Sepulchre, whose property it was ; 
 it was situated near the Rue St. Dominique. — {Translator.)
 
 26 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Saint-Sulpice and the Sorbonne had separated me from 
 M. de Choiseul-Gouffier. Of all the young men with whom I 
 had been brought up, he was the first whom I sought to meet 
 again. Since I had missed him, he had married, and had one or 
 two children ; besides, he had made a dangerous and interesting 
 journey which had brought him into notice in society, begun his 
 reputation, and determined his choice of a career. 
 
 I shall so often have to speak of M. de Choiseul, in the course 
 of these memoirs that I must indulge in the pleasure of acquaint- 
 ing my readers with him. Nature has endowed M. de Choiseul 
 with imagination and talent ; he is cultivated ; he converses and 
 speaks well ; his delivery is fluent and unaffected. If in his 
 youth he had less admired the fine sentences of M. de Buffon, 1 
 he might have achieved a certain reputation as a writer. People 
 say he gesticulates too much ; it is also my opinion ; it helps 
 him when speaking ; and, like all speakers who make many 
 gestures, he feels amused with what he says and repeats him- 
 self a little. His old age will be irksome to those who may 
 have to nurse him, for the old age of persons who only possess 
 mediocre talent is generally over-punctilious, and preserves 
 merely the outward forms of urbanity. Wit alone can make 
 old age amiable, because it gives an air of novelty to ex- 
 perience, and invests it almost with the charm of a discovery. 
 M. de Choiseul is naturally noble-minded, kind, full of 
 confidence and sincerity. He is affectionate, easily to get on 
 with and forgetful. That is why he is a very good father and 
 an excellent husband, although he seldom visits his wife or his 
 children. He has friends, is fond of them, wishes them happy 
 and would fain do them a good turn, but he gets on very well 
 without seeing them. He devoted but a small part of his life 
 to public affairs ; he found occupations which took up all his 
 time. The exquisite taste and erudition which he displayed 
 in Art rank him among the most useful and distinguished 
 of amateurs. 
 
 M. de Choiseul is the man I have most loved. Although, in 
 society, the names of M. de Choiseul, M. de Narbonne, 2 and 
 
 1 The Comte Georges Louis Leclerc de Buffon, the famous French naturalist and 
 writer. — ( Translator. ) 
 
 • The Comte Louis de Narbonne-Laru, born in 1755 at Colorno (Duchy of Parma)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 27 
 
 Abbe de Perigord l were often associated, our intimacy with M. 
 de Narbonne had less the character of friendship. M. de Nar- 
 bonne possesses a kind of mind which aims only at effect, which 
 is either brilliant or insignificant, which exhausts itself in a note 
 or in a sally. He is uniformly polite ; his mirth often runs 
 foul of good taste, and his character does not inspire the 
 confidence required by intimate relations. His company is 
 entertaining, but one seldom feels at ease with him. A sort of 
 grace that, better than any one else, he knows how to give to his 
 companionship, has gained him much success, chiefly among 
 witty and somewhat vulgar men. He is less to the taste of 
 men who appreciate what, in our youth, was termed good 
 breeding. If any one spoke of the hjen who had supped on 
 a certain day at the house of the Marechale de Luxem- 
 bourg, 2 and he had been there, the names of twenty persons 
 would have been mentioned before his own ; at Julie's he would 
 have been named first. 
 
 My room, where we gathered every morning, and where my 
 friends shared my frugal meals, presented a singular medley : 
 the Due de Lauzun, 3 Panchaud, 4 Barthes, 5 Abbe Delille, 6 Mira- 
 
 of a very ancient family from Spain. Having come to France in 1760, he served in 
 the artillery, after which he entered the Foreign Office. He was brigadier-general in 
 1791, Minister of War from December, 1791, to March, 1792. A writ of accusation 
 being issued against him after August 10, he managed to escape, and resided abroad. 
 In 1805, he was re-instated in his grade, and appointed Governor of Raab, and after- 
 wards of Trieste ; minister to Bavaria, aide-de-camp to the emperor, ambassador at 
 Vienna (1813). He died soon after at Torgau. M. de Narbonne married Mademoi- 
 selle de Montholon, by whom he had two daughters. 
 
 1 It was under this name that M. de Talleyrand was known in his youth. 
 
 2 Madeleine Angelique de Neufville-Villeroi, grand-daughter of the Marshal Due 
 de Villeroi, born in 1707, married at first to the Due de Boufflers, who died in 1747. 
 In 1750, she married the Marshal Due de Luxembourg, and died in 1787. 
 
 3 Armand de Gontaut, Comte de Biron, then Due de Lauzun, born in 1747, entered 
 the army, fought in Corsica, then in America ; deputy of the nobility of Quercy to 
 the States-General, he joined the party of the Due d'Orleans. General-in-Chief of 
 the army of the Rhine in 1792, then of the army of Vendee, he was accused of 
 treason, arrested, and guillotined in 1793. 
 
 4 Panchaud was a Geneva banker established in Paris. He has published on the 
 finances of his time an interesting work entitled, Considerations on the Present State 
 of the Credit of England and of France. ( Paris, 1 78 1 . ) * 
 
 5 Joseph Barthes (1734-1806). Physician and philosopher of great reputation. 
 
 6 Abbe Delille, born at Aigues-Perse (Auvergne) (1738-1813), one of the 
 most agreeable poets of the eighteenth century. He was a member of the 
 Academy. 
 
 * " Reflexions sur l'etat actuel du Credit de l'Angleterre et de la France." (Paris, 1781.)
 
 28 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 beau, 1 Chamfort, 2 Lauraguais, 3 Dupont de Nemours, 4 Rulhiere, 5 
 Choiseul-Gouffier, Louis de Narbonne met there habitually and 
 always with pleasure. We touched upon every subject and 
 with the greatest liberty. It was the spirit and fashion of the 
 time. These conversations were both pleasant and instructive, 
 and besides, they held out some more or less remote prospect of 
 gratifying our ambition. It was a delightful way of spending 
 our mornings and I should enjoy doing so still. 
 
 The news of the day, political, commercial, administrative, 
 and financial questions all in succession furnished topics of 
 conversation. One of the matters with which the mind of the 
 public was most engrossed at that time, was the commercial 
 treaty just concluded between France and England. 6 The 
 details of that great transaction were of special interest to 
 educated men such as Panchaud, Dupont de Nemours and 
 others. As for us ignorant ones, Lauzun, Barthes, Choiseul and 
 myself, though anxious to learn, we confined ourselves to gener- 
 
 1 Honore-Gabriel Riquetti de Mirabeau, the grand orator of the Constituent 
 Assembly (1749-1791), son of the Marquis de Mirabeau, the well-known economist 
 and agriculturist. 
 
 2 Sebastien Chamfort (1 741-1794), born near Clermont-Ferrand. He wrote 
 several tragedies and poems, which obtained for him the favour of the public. He 
 was acquainted with the leading personages of the Revolution, and collaborated in 
 the works of Sieves and Mirabeau. A writ of accusation having been issued against 
 him in 1794, he killed himself as they came to arrest him. 
 
 3 Leon de Lauraguais, Due de Brancas (1 733-1824). He secluded himself all his 
 life for the study of letters and scientific works. He was appointed a member of the 
 Chamber of Peers in 1814. 
 
 4 Pierre Dupont de Nemours (1739-1817), one of the most fervent adepts of the 
 physiocratic school. He was a Councillor of State and Commissary-General of Com- 
 merce under Calonne ; deputy to the States-General. Imprisoned during the Reign 
 of Terror, he was saved by the coup d'etat of the 9th Thermidor. Member of the 
 Conseildes Cinq-cents* He lived in retirement under the Empire, emigrated in 1815, 
 and died in America. 
 
 5 Claude Rulhiere, born at Bondy, near Paris, in 1735, was aide-de-camp to 
 Marshal de Richelieu. Later, M. de Breteuil took him to St. Petersburg as private 
 secretary (1760). He witnessed the Revolution of 1762, and undertook to write an 
 account of it. This work — Les Revolutions de Russie — had such a success that its 
 author was commanded to write a history of Poland, intended for the instruction of 
 the Dauphin. Member of the Academy in 1787, he died three years later. 
 
 6 The Treaty of September 26, 1786, signed under the ministry of Vergennes, in 
 accordance with Article 18th of the Treaty of Versailles of 1763. It raised numerous 
 criticisms ; Vergennes was accused of having sacrificed our manufactures. 
 
 * The Conseil des Cinq-cents (Council of the Five Hundred), thus named because of its bein? com- 
 posed of five hundred members, was instituted by the constitution of the year III. It had legislative 
 powers. Its members were elected from among citizens of more than twenty-five years of age. The 
 functions of the Conseil des Cinq-cents were similar to that of the House of Commons in England, or 
 of the present Chamber of Deputies in France, with the difference that the upper chamber or Conseil 
 des A neiens (Council of Elders) had the power to accept or reject, as they pleased, the decisions of the 
 Council of the Five Hundred, and was thus omnipotent. — (Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 29 
 
 alities. I am anxious to record here what I recollect of these 
 discussions, because they belong to an order of ideas so different 
 from those I have heard people express since, that I think it 
 useful to state them. With this object I will give a rapid sketch of 
 the various events and negotiations which took several years to 
 bring about that great result. 
 
 The cabinets of Versailles and of London were convinced of 
 the reciprocal advantage which would accrue from the official 
 recognition and protection of commercial relations between the 
 two countries. No previous period of history had ever offered so 
 favourable an occasion for a commercial treaty between England 
 and France. Since the peace of 1763, 1 national antipathies 
 seemed to have died out, and immediately after the recognition 
 of the independence of America by England, frequent communi- 
 cation between France and Great Britain had destroyed, in great 
 measure, many repugnances. Mutual inclination was becoming 
 evident ; the point now was how to make it lasting and mutually 
 advantageous to both nations. The two governments named 
 plenipotentiaries to discuss this important question. 
 
 In England, they recollected that Lord Bolingbroke 2 after 
 concluding the treaty of Utrecht, had some intention of proposing 
 a commercial treaty with France. This project, which he had 
 failed to carry out, had been one of the motives, or one of the 
 pretexts, for the persecution he had experienced on the part of 
 the Whigs. The reasons alleged then against a commercial 
 treaty with France may have been plausible. English customs 
 were still frightened at French luxury ; too close relations might 
 arouse the fears of English manufacturers with regard to the 
 competition of French goods in which the English had not 
 yet attained a standard of superiority. The advantage that 
 the productions of French soil might take over those of 
 Portugal was also a course of apprehension. The Treaty of 
 
 1 The Treaty of Paris, which put an end to the War of Seven Years. 
 
 2 Henry Paulet de Saint-Jean, Viscount Bolingbroke, born in 1672 at Battersea 
 (Surrey). Member of the House of Commons (1700), Secretary of State (1704), 
 Minister of Foreign Affairs (1713) ; he was one of the signatories of the Peace of 
 Utrecht. Exiled after the death of Queen Anne (1714), he took refuge in France, 
 returned to England in 1723, and was for ten years the most redoubtable adversary of 
 Walpole. He died in 1750, without having been able to regain power. He married 
 as second wife the Marquise de Villette, niece of Madame de Maintenon.
 
 30 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Methuen l was yet too recent to make it prudent to compromise 
 its advantages by setting up a rivalry between the productions 
 of France and Portugal. These arguments, which were not devoid 
 of force, either no longer existed, or had lost their weight. 
 England was in a state of commercial prosperity which was 
 rendered incalculable by the invention of its machines and the 
 immensity of its capital ; fashion took upon itself to destroy the 
 objections resulting from the increase of luxury. The influence 
 of the ministry and the interests of manufacturers met other 
 objections victoriously, and the treaty was received in England 
 with almost universal approbation. 
 
 Public opinion in France took an entirely different view 01 
 the treaty. The interests of her maritime population were, in this 
 case, in direct opposition with those of the inhabitants of her 
 manufacturing districts. The treaty was therefore received at 
 first with some astonishment. Its first results were not favour- 
 able to us. The English, being better prepared than we were, 
 derived large profits from it. The city of Bordeaux, the 
 provinces of Guyenne, Aunis and Poitou, found indeed a few 
 more outlets for their wines, their brandies and the other products 
 of their soil ; but it was argued that, in the general evaluation, 
 these local advantages could not compensate for the inconveni- 
 ences of the consumption of twenty-five million inhabitants, 
 anxious to purchase goods superior in quality, and which England 
 could provide at a figure much lower than that of the French 
 market. 
 
 Normandy, so skilful in the defence of her own interests, so 
 important by her wealth and population, was the first to express 
 her discontent. She published a long manifesto against the 
 treaty. The cause she pleaded soon found supporters through- 
 out the land ; all the old prejudices, all the former motives of 
 hate and animosity re-appeared. The voice of the consumers 
 was stifled, and the government soon incurred general blame for 
 having signed the treaty. 
 
 1 The Treaty of Methuen between England and Portugal, so-called after the name 
 of the English ambassador, Lord Methuen, who negotiated it, was signed in 1703. 
 It was a treaty of alliance and of commerce, by which England reserved to herself the 
 monopoly of importation into Portugal. The latter submitted to this commercial 
 vassalage up to the beginning of the nineteenth century.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 31 
 
 And yet the spirit that inspired that great transaction was 
 dictated by the best principles. M. de Vergennes x and M. de 
 Calonne, 2 who were instrumental in its adoption, will each some 
 day derive some credit from it. The object of the treaty was to 
 put an end to the smuggling that was going on between the 
 two countries, and to furnish the public treasury with a revenue 
 founded on duties moderate enough to leave no margin for 
 fraud. This advantage was evident and reciprocal for the 
 two countries. If it increased for France the facility of 
 gratifying the taste and fancy her wealthy people showed for 
 English goods, it enabled England to enjoy more luxuries, for 
 which she paid France, by a reduction of duty on the wines of 
 Champagne and Bordeaux, a reduction which must increase their 
 consumption in England. 
 
 The result of this reduction of duties both on the neces- 
 saries of life and on luxuries, must have been, for consumers, 
 to balance more equitably the taxes levied on them, and to 
 facilitate their payment ; as for the public treasury, the result of 
 the treaty would have been to increase the revenue in proportion 
 as the consumption was augmented. 
 
 It may also be mentioned that the spirit of the treaty pro- 
 vided that all classes of industries should be divided between the 
 two nations, each being awarded the class of industry for which 
 
 1 Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes, was the second son of a President d 
 Mortier* of the parlement of Dijon. Born at Dijon in 1717, he entered the diplomatic 
 service. In 1750 he was appointed minister, and sent in that capacity to the Elector 
 of Treves. About that time he was initiated into the secrets of the king, of whom he 
 became one of the most devoted agents. Ambassador at Constantinople (1754) 5 re " 
 called by Choiseul in 1768, he lived in retirement until the fall of that minister, when 
 he was (1771) sent as ambassador to Sweden. Louis XVI. appointed him Minister 
 of Foreign Affairs (1774). He signed the Treaty of Versailles and the Treaties of 
 Commerce with England and Russia. He became President of the Council of 
 Finances (1783), and died in 17S7. 
 
 2 Charles Alexandre de Calonne was the son of a distinguished Artesian family ; 
 he was born January 20, 1743, at Douai, where his father was first president of 
 parlement. He was attorney-general to the parlement of Douai, intendant of 
 Metz (1768), of Lille, where his reputation as a skilful administrator led to his being 
 appointed comptroller-general by Louis XVI. After the meeting of the Assembly 
 of the Notables, which he had suggested, he was dismissed from his post and exiled 
 to Lorraine (1787). Thence he went to England, returned to France in 1789 in the 
 hope of securing his election to the States-General. He however failed, went back 
 to England, where he played an active part amongst the emigres, and died in 1802. 
 
 * This was the official appellation of the chief-judge of the Grand' Chambre of the parlements, 
 that is to say, the tribunal appointed to take cognizance of verbal appeals against the decisions of the 
 " presidiaux" (minor judges), bailliages, and other inferior courts. They were so named from the 
 shape of their caps, somewhat resembling a mDrtar (mortier).— {Translator.)
 
 32 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 nature seemed to have fitted it best, and from which it was 
 likely to derive most advantages. 
 
 This latter provision might, in the course of a few years, have 
 brought about the triumph of the principle of free-trade, but 
 prejudices decided otherwise. They have too deeply rooted a 
 hold upon men, for it to be prudent to endeavour to destroy 
 them too suddenly. I refused for a long time to acknowledge 
 this sad truth, but seeing that the philosophers of the eighteenth 
 century, with all the good and bad arguments they employed, did 
 fail in that undertaking, I shall henceforth follow the example of 
 the philosophers of the nineteenth century, who are indeed of a 
 very different stamp from that of their predecessors, and allow 
 it to trouble me no longer. 
 
 A public career being open to me, I, rather cleverly, took advan- 
 tage of the position of agent-general of the clergy, which had been 
 promised me, to extend my relations. Early in life, I made the 
 acquaintance of M. de Maurepas, 1 M. Turgot, 2 M. de Malesherbes, 3 
 
 1 Jean Phelypeaux, Comte de Maurepas, and of Pontchartrain, was born in 1709. 
 His father, his grandfather, his great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather had 
 been, like himself, Secretaries of State, so that from 1610 to 1749 the Phelypeaux 
 family was represented in the councils of the king. As early as 1715, Maurepas ob- 
 tained the reversion of the post of Secretary of State, which his father had resigned. 
 The Marquis de la Vrilliere was selected to discharge the duties of that office in the 
 place of his relation, who soon became his son-in-law. In 1725, Maurepas took the 
 direction of his department in hand, and was appointed Secretary of Paris and of 
 Marine. He fell into disgrace in 1749, was exiled to Bourges, and afterwards to 
 his estate of Pontchartrain, near Versailles. His father-in-law had replaced him. He 
 took office again under Louis XVI., who appointed him Minister of State and Presi- 
 dent of the Council of Finances (1774). Up to his death (1781) he had in reality all 
 the power of a prime minister. 
 
 " Jacques Turgot, Baron de l'Aulne, belonged to an old family which came 
 originally from Brittany, and had settled in Normandy. He was born in 1727. He 
 was counsellor of parlement, then, in 1762, intendant of Limoges, where his en- 
 lightened and benevolent administration made his name famous. Secretary of State 
 for the Department of Marine (1774), comptroller-general in the same year, dismissed 
 from office in 1776, he died five years later. Closely associated with the economist 
 party, he left several works on political economy and on administration. 
 
 a Chretien-Guillaume de Lamoignon de Malesherbes, of an illustrious family of 
 Nivernais, which during two centuries occupied the highest posts in the magistracy. 
 He was born in 1721, was counsellor of parle7)ient (1744), chief president of the 
 Cour des Aides* (1750), dismissed, and exiled in 1771. Re-instated in his office by 
 Louis XVI, in 1774, he resigned in the following year. Secretary of State to the 
 King's Household (1775-1776), Minister of State (1787-1788). He lived abroad 
 until 1792, when he returned to France to offer his services to the king, whose defence 
 
 * The Cours des Aides were tribunals charged with judging and deciding as a final court of appeal 
 all civil and criminal cases concerning taxes, Gaiellesi and Tallies. X That of Paris dated from 1355. 
 This tribunal was the only one that had the right of interpreting the royal ordinances concerning the 
 levying of taxes. — Translator. 
 
 t Salt tax. X Villain-tax. — (Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 33 
 
 M. de Castries, 1 M. de Calonne, a few Councillors of State, 
 and several heads of administration. About the same time, I 
 was introduced to the Due de Choiseul, 2 Madame de Brionne, 3 
 Madame de Montesson, 4 Madame de Bouffiers, 5 Madame de la 
 Reyniere ; 6 on certain days, the best society in Paris met at the 
 houses of these people. 
 
 My cold manners and apparent reserve, had induced some 
 persons to say I was witty. Madame de Gramont, 7 who did not 
 like the reputations which she had not made herself, was of service 
 to me by seeking to embarrass me, at the time I first went into 
 society. I was supping for the first time at Auteuil at Madame de 
 Bouffiers', and was seated at one end of the table, hardly speaking 
 to my neighbour. Madame de Gramont, in a loud, harsh voice, 
 
 he pleaded before the Convention. Arrested in December, 1792, he mounted the 
 scaffold with his daughter and his son-in-law (M. de Chateaubriand, the brother of 
 the illustrious writer). 
 
 1 Charles de la Croix, Marquis de Castries, belonged to an old family of Langue- 
 doc. Born in 1727, he became lieutenant-general, Governor of Montpellier and of 
 Cette (1758), Governor of Flanders and of Hainaut, Secretary of State to the Depart- 
 ment of Marine (1780), Marshal of France (1783). He emigrated during the Revolu- 
 tion, commanded a division of the army of Conde, and died in 1801. 
 
 2 Etienne Francois, Due de Choiseul-Stainville (1719-1785), ambassador, then 
 Minister- Secretary of State (1758-1770). 
 
 3 Louise de Rohan, Canoness of Remiremont, daughter of Prince Charles de 
 Rohan-Montauban, lieutenant-general. She became the wife of Charles de Lorraine, 
 Comte de Brionne, Grand-Equerry of France. 
 
 4 Charlotte Beraud de la Haie de Riou, Marquise de Montesson, born in 1737. 
 She married, in 1754, the Marquis de Montesson, lieutenant-general. Widowed in 
 1769, she married secretly the Due d'Orleans (1773). After the death of the Due 
 (1785), she lived in retirement. Arrested under the Terror, she was saved by the 
 9th Thermidor. She was very intimate with Madame de Beauharnais, aftenvards 
 Empress Josephine. She died in February, 1806. Madame de Montesson had 
 written much, and has left numerous comedies and novels. 
 
 5 The Comtesse Marie de Boufflers-Rouvrel, nee de Campar-Saujon, was lady in 
 waiting to the Duchesse d'Orleans. She became a widow in 1764. Imprisoned under 
 the Terror, but more fortunate than her daughter-in-law, the Duchesse de Lauzun, she 
 escaped the scaffold, and died in 1800. 
 
 6 Suzanne de Jarente, daughter of Alexandre de Jarente, Marquis d'Orgeval, 
 married on February 1, 1763, Alexandre Grimod de la Reyniere, who from being a 
 simple pork-butcher had risen to the post of Fermier- general. * He made a con- 
 siderable fortune, and built the superb hotel which now stands at the corner of the 
 Rue Boissy-d'Anglas and of the Avenue Gabriel. This hotel, which served as the 
 residence of the Russian, and afterwards of the Turkish, embassies, belongs to-day to 
 the Cercle de V Union Artistique. It is known that La Reyniere had acquired the 
 reputation of an epicure of the first order. The dinners given by him and his wife 
 have remained famous. 
 
 7 Beatrix de Choiseul-Stainville, daughter of the Due de Choiseul, canoness of 
 Remiremont. In 1759, she married Antoine, Due de Gramont, Governor of Navarre. 
 She mounted the scaffold in 1794 with her friend, the Duchesse du Chatelet. 
 
 * Fermier General. The custom existed under the old Monarchy of conferring the farming of the 
 taxes on financiers who paid a fixed sum for it. — (Translator.) 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 asked me, calling me by my name, what had so much struck me 
 on entering the drawing-room, whither I followed her, to say : 
 " Ah ! ah ! " " Your grace," I replied, " did not exactly hear what 
 I said ; my words were not ' Ah ! ah ! ' but ' Oh ! oh ! ' " That 
 wretched reply caused general hilarity ; I continued to sup, and 
 did not say another word. On leaving the table, a few persons 
 came up to me, and I received for the following days several 
 invitations which enabled me to make the acquaintance of the 
 persons whom I was most anxious to meet. 
 
 I had no occasion to do so at the house of my parents ; for 
 they saw but few people, and especially few of those who shone 
 on the scene where ministerial appointments were disputed. I 
 preferred to go to my mother at the hours when she was alone : 
 I could then better enjoy the graces of her mind. No one ever 
 seemed to me to possess such fascinating conversation. She 
 had no pretension. She spoke only by shades ; she never made 
 a pun : that would have been too pointed ; puns are remembered ; 
 she merely wished what she said to please — to please her 
 hearers for the time being and be forgotten. A richness of easy 
 expressions, new and always delicate, supplied the various needs 
 of her mind. From her I have inherited a great aversion for 
 persons who, in order to speak with more accuracy, use only 
 technical terms. I have faith neither in the wit nor in the 
 knowledge of those who do not know equivalent terms and are 
 always describing : they are indebted only to their memory 
 for what they know, their knowledge can therefore be only 
 superficial. I am sorry that such a thought should have 
 occurred to me whilst M. von Humboldt, 1 is in Paris, but it is 
 written. 
 
 I spent my time in a very pleasant manner and did not waste 
 it too much ; the circle of my acquaintances was widening. 
 The relations which it was then considered good style to have with 
 the wits of the day, came to me through a good lady named 
 
 1 The two brothers, William and Alexander von Humboldt, both made their names 
 famous— the former in literature and politics, the latter in science. The author here 
 refers to Alexander. Born in 1769, he travelled a long time in America and in Asia, 
 and published an account of his travels ; he is also the author of numerous scientific 
 works and treatises, notably the Cosmos. Thanks to him, physical geography and 
 botany made remarkable progress. He died in 1859.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 35 
 
 Madame d'Hericourt, 1 whose husband had held the post of 
 naval commissary at Marseilles. She loved wit, young people, 
 and good cheer. Every week we had dinner at her house, and 
 a most enjoyable one it was. The guests were M. de Choiseul, 
 M. de Narbonne, Abbe Delille, de Chamfort, de Rulhiere, de 
 Marmontel, 2 who took turns with Abbe Arnaud, 3 Abbe Ber- 
 trand, 4 and myself. The gaiety that reigned there kept the 
 pretentious in check, and I must state that in that company, 
 where so much gaiety and presumption was brought together, 
 jeering or slandering were never indulged in, in the space of five 
 years. 
 
 Count von Creutz, 5 Minister of Sweden, who thought to 
 please his master by pretending to be considered a wit in France, 
 took great pains to have once a week at his table, the same 
 persons who composed the dinner-party of Madame d'Hericourt. 
 We went there three or four times, but Marmontel read so 
 many tragedies that he drove away all the guests. As for me 
 I held firm until he came to Numitor. 
 
 Readings after dinner were then the reigning fashion ; 
 they imparted special importance, and were reputed to 
 give a select tone, to some houses. One seldom dined 
 at the houses of M. de Vaudreuil, 6 M. de Lian- 
 
 1 Louise Duche, daughter of a chief advocate-general in the Cour des Aides of 
 Montpellier. She married, in 1 741, Benigne du Trousset d'Hericourt, a former 
 naval commissary. 
 
 2 Jean-Francois Marmontel, born at Bort (Limousin) in 1723. On the advice of 
 Voltaire, his master and friend, he wrote for the stage, but failed completely. He 
 found his vein only in moral tales, which had a prodigious success, and procured him 
 the congratulations of nearly all the sovereigns of Europe. He was appointed Historio- 
 grapher of France, and entered the Academy. He died in 1799. 
 
 3 Abbe Francois Arnaud, born in 1721, at Aubignon (Vaucluse). He was one 
 of the warmest supporters of the philosophical impulse of the eighteenth century, 
 and acquired a certain celebrity by his works. He was a member of the French 
 Academy. He died in 1784. 
 
 4 Abbe Bertrand, born in 1755, at Autun. He studied astronomy, and was 
 appointed Professor of Physics at Dijon. He was admitted to the academy of this 
 city. He undertook with d'Entrecasteaux a voyage round the world, but he died on 
 the way at the Cape of Good Hope (1792). He left various scientific treatises. 
 
 5 Count Gustavus von Creutz was born in Sweden in 1736. Minister from Sweden 
 to Madrid in 1753, and then to Paris, where he remained twenty years. His salon 
 became one of the circles of society most sought by philosophers and literary men. 
 In 1783, King Gustavus III. recalled him to Stockholm, and appointed him Senator 
 and Minister of Foreign Affairs. He died two years after. 
 
 6 Joseph de Rigaud, Comte de Vaudreuil, belonged to a very old family of 
 Languedoc ; he was born in 1740. He lived for a long while at Versailles, frequent- 
 ing the salon of Madame de Polignac and the society of the queen. He was intimate 
 with the Comte d'Artois, whom he accompanied in 1782 to the siege of Gibraltar. 
 
 D 2
 
 36 THE MEMOIRS OF PRIXCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 court, 1 Madame de Vaines, 2 M. d'Anzely, without being obliged 
 to hear either Le Mariage de Figaro, the poem known as Les 
 Javelins? or Le Connetable de Bourbon? or some tales by Cham- 
 fort, or what was then called La Revolution de Russie* It 
 was an obligation rather strictly enforced on all the persons 
 invited ; but then, the fact of being a guest at any of these 
 houses, ranked one among the distinguished men of the day. 
 I might say that many people whom I did not know spoke of 
 me in good terms, simply because they had met me at some 
 of these dinner-parties to which the right of making people's 
 reputation had been granted. In this respect, I was like the man 
 spoken of by the Chevalier de Chastellux : 6 " He is doubtless a 
 very witty man," remarked the Chevalier to some one ; " L do not 
 know him, but lie goes to Madame Geoffriris." 
 
 I had also noticed that when one was anxious not to be classed 
 among the habitue's of open houses and thus to rank with the 
 crowd, some advantage could be derived by affecting estrange- 
 ment from, and even aversion for, some prominent member of 
 society. My choice fell on M. Necker. I persistently refused to 
 go to his house. I said, rather boldly, that he was neither a good 
 
 He kept open house at his residence of Gennevilliers, and often received M. de Talley- 
 rand there. He emigrated with the Comte d'Artois, took up his residence in London 
 in 1799, returned to Paris at the Restoration, was created peer of France in 18 14, and 
 died in 18 1 7. His correspondence with the Comte d'Artois was published in Paris, 
 1889 (2 vols. 8vo. L. Pingaud). 
 
 1 Francois de la Rochefoucauld, Due de Liancourt, bom in 1747, was brigadier 
 of dragoons ; Grand Master of the Wardrobe (1783), deputy of the nobility of Cler- 
 mont to the States-General, lieutenant-general ( 1 792). He emigrated after August 10 ; 
 he lived in retirement under the Empire. At the Restoration he was created a peer, 
 but his liberal opinions precluded him from obtaining public functions. He died in 
 1827. His funeral gave rise to tumultuous incidents. 
 
 2 This was probably the wife of M. J. de Vaines, Receiver-General, Commissary 
 of the Treasury (1733- 1803). He was often seen at the house of Marshal de Beauvau, 
 and at that of Madame Geoffrin. 
 
 3 " The Marriage of Figaro," a poem of Abbe Delille on the gardens of the Due 
 d'Orleans at Monceau. 
 
 4 Tragedy of the Comte Jacques de Guibert (1743-1790), lieutenant-general. His 
 name will remain known, not by his tragedies, but by an Essay on Tactics, of which 
 Napoleon said "that it was fitted to make great men." 
 
 5 "The Revolutions of Russia" — a work by Ruhliere. 
 
 6 Talleyrand doubtless means here Francois-Jean, Marquis de Chastellux, born in 
 Paris in 1734 ; he took service in Germany from 1756 to 1763, and, in 1780, went to 
 America as major-general, and there formed an intimacy with Washington. He was 
 a friend of Voltaire and of the encyclopaedists. He wrote various works and was 
 elected a member of the Academie Francaise. His essay entitled De la Felicite 
 Pi(bHque{\Tj2), was praised by Voltaire. He is the author of another essay entitled 
 Eloge a" Helvitius (1774), and of an account of travels in North America (1780-1782). 
 He died in 1788.— {Translator.^
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 37 
 
 minister of finances nor a statesman ; that he had few ideas, no 
 administrative system of his own, that his loans were badly con- 
 ducted, onerous and injurious to public morals ; badly conducted, 
 because they provided no sinking-fund ; onerous, because the 
 rates of public bills of exchange neither required so high an 
 interest as that paid for his loan, nor such delays as those, which, 
 in order to make the fortune of Girardot's and of Germani's firms, 
 were granted to thirty Geneva bankers ; injurious to public 
 morals, because his loans based on life-interest fostered and 
 developed a kind of selfishness unknown to French manners 
 before the days of M. Necker. I said that he talked badly, that 
 he did not know how to argue, that he was always affected ; I 
 said that the weakness of his constitution, which kept him in a 
 continual state of fear, reflected upon all the faculties of his 
 mind. I said that his pride did not come from his nature, but 
 rather from his crooked mind, and want of taste ; I said that 
 with his fantastic hat, his long head, his big body, burly and ill- 
 shaped, his inattentive airs, his scornful demeanour, his constant 
 use of maxims, painfully drawn from the laboratory of his mind, 
 he had all the appearance of a charlatan. I said, I believe, a 
 thousand other things that it would be useless to repeat, because 
 to-day they are on everybody's lips. 
 
 Madame de Montesson's house, which was kept just on the 
 verge of decency, was particularly agreeable. To amuse the Due 
 d'Orleans, Madame de Montesson had pieces played by her 
 visitors, which she knew would please him ; and, in order not 
 merely to amuse, but to interest him as well, she wrote several 
 of these pieces herself. In the theatre, a special box was 
 placed at the disposal of the mundane members of the clergy ; 
 to which the Archbishop of Toulouse, 1 the Bishop of Rodez, 2 
 the Archbishop of Narbonne, 3 and the Bishop of Comminges, 4 
 had secured my admission. 
 
 1 M. de Brienne. 
 
 2 Jerome Champion de Cice, born at Rennes in 1735. General-agent of the 
 clergy (1765), Bishop of Rodez (1770), Archbishop of Bordeaux (1781), member of 
 the Assembly of Notables (1787), deputy of the clergy to the States- General (1789), 
 Keeper of the Seals (1789). He refused to take the oath to the civil constitution of 
 the clergy, and emigrated (1791). Archbishop of Aix in 1802, he died in 1810. 
 
 3 M. de Dillon. 
 
 4 Charles d'Osmond de Medavy, born in 1723; Bishop of Comminges (1764- 
 1785).
 
 38 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Curiosity, much more than a decided taste for music, took me 
 also to all the learned and wearisome concerts that were given 
 then, sometimes at the house of the Comte de Rochechouart, 
 sometimes at M. de Albaret's, sometimes at Madame Lebrun's. 1 
 I was careful not to have an opinion on French music, or Italian 
 music, or on that of Gluck. I was too young to reason as to 
 the proportionate value of what fashion forced me to regard 
 as a pleasure. If, however, I had been obliged to pass an 
 opinion, I would have felt inclined to say that music being, in 
 general, only a language which expresses, in an ideal manner, the 
 sensations and even the sentiments that we experience, each 
 country must have a style of music peculiar to itself, and which 
 the taste of its inhabitants induces them to prefer to all others. 
 But my ignorance saved me, and I never had, on this important 
 subject, any quarrel with any one. 
 
 The position I had taken in society gave a sort of pre-emin- 
 ence to my agency ; I performed its duties almost alone, because, 
 a few months after our taking office, a rather too public adven- 
 ture had deprived Abbe de Boisgelin, 2 my colleague, of the 
 confidence of the clergy. The natural indolence of M. de Bois- 
 gelin and his passion for Madame de Cavanac (famous under the 
 name of Mademoiselle de Romans, and also because she was 
 the mother of Abbe de Bourbon 3 ) had easily induced him to 
 countenance my doing his work as well as my own. 
 
 I had surrounded myself with persons of learned and sound 
 views : M. de Maunay, 4 afterwards Bishop of Treves ; M. Bourlier, 5 
 
 1 Marie-Louise Vigee-Lebrun, born in 1755, was one of the most celebrated 
 painters of the eighteenth century. She left France in 1789, and was received with 
 distinction at most foreign courts. She died in 1842. She has left very interesting 
 Memoirs. 
 
 2 Abbe de Boisgelin was a cousin of the cardinal-archbishop. He perished in 
 1792, in the course of the massacres of September. 
 
 3 Mademoiselle de Romans had, by Louis XV., a son who was christened under 
 the name of Bourbon, a favour not accorded to any other natural son of the king. 
 She however failed to obtain his legitimization. He was known afterwards under 
 the name of Abbe de Bourbon, and died in the reign of Louis XVI. Mademoiselle 
 de Romans married later M. de Cavanac (see the Memoirs of Madame Campan, 
 vol. iii.). 
 
 4 Charles Maunay, born at Champoix (Puy-de-D6me) in 1745 ; Bishop of Treves 
 in 1802. 
 
 6 Jean-Baptiste, Comte Bourlier, born at Dijon in 1731. He took orders, and 
 the oath of allegiance to the civil constitution of the clergy. Bishop of Evreux 
 in 1802, deputy to the Corps legislatif, senator in 1812, peer of France under the 
 Restoration, he died in 182 1.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 39 
 
 afterwards Bishop of Evreux ; M. Duvoisin, 1 who became 
 Bishop of Nantes, and M. Des Renaudes, 2 who was not socially 
 the equal of the former. I am happy to acknowledge here 
 all the marks of friendship displayed towards me by MM. 
 Maunay, Bourlier, and Duvoisin, whom I have always been 
 pleased to meet at all periods of my life. M. Des Renaudes 
 left me to enter the house of Secretary of State, Maret 3 ; his 
 style of talent finding permanent employment in his new 
 duties might have led him promptly to fortune ■ he was a man 
 who excelled in making use of other people's ideas. 
 
 I was anxious not to keep for ever my post of agent-general 
 of the clergy, but took all necessary precautions not to let any 
 one suspect my ambition ; thus, in order to attract notice, I was 
 busily engaged on works, which, without belonging exactly to my 
 province, were not altogether foreign to the duties I discharged. 
 
 The abolition of the lotteries was one of my favourite ideas ; 
 I had investigated all the chances and all the consequences of 
 that baneful institution. At the same time, I noticed that the 
 clergy, being attacked and scoffed at by philosophers, were daily 
 
 1 Jean-Baptiste, Baron Duvoisin, born at Langres in 1744, was a professor in the 
 Sorbonne, a promoter of the Officialite* of Paris, chief- vicar of Laon. In 1792, he 
 was exiled for refusing to submit to the civil constitution of the clergy. In 1802, he 
 was appointed Bishop of Nantes, and took a part in the differences that arose between 
 the emperor and the Holy See. He died in 1813. 
 
 2 Martial Borge des Renaudes, born at Tulle in 1755, was chief- vicar to M. de 
 Talleyrand at Autun, whom he assisted in the capacity of under-deacon at the Mass 
 of the Federation. He was the confidential man of Talleyrand, who, it is said, 
 entrusted him with the task of writing his speeches. Talleyrand's report on public 
 instruction is entirely Des Renaudes' work. Under the Consulate, Des Renaudes 
 was named Tribune. His name was struck out of the list of the Tribunate in 1802. 
 Later on he was appointed Censetir\ — a post which he preserved under the 
 Restoration. He died in 1825. 
 
 3 Hugues Maret, born at Dijon in 1763, advocate to the parlement of Burgundy. 
 Sent to Naples in 1792, he was seized by the Austrians, and only set at liberty in 
 1795, being exchanged for the Duchesse d'Angouleme. Minister-Secretary of State 
 in 1804, he was Minister of Foreign Affairs in 181 1, and created Due de Bassano ; 
 Minister of War (1813). He was exiled in 1815 ; peer of France in 1831, he was for 
 a while President of the Council (November, 1834). He died in 1839. 
 
 * The Officialite of Paris was the tribunal of bishops and archbishops. All students came 
 under the jurisdiction of this court, which judged certain lay cases as well (tithes, marriage cases, 
 heresy, and simony). The official only pronounced canonical penalties ; for cases requiring corporal 
 punishment he sent the culprit to the secular courts. The promoteur fulfilled the functions of public 
 accuser. M. P. Fournier has published a very interesting volume on the officialite. Paris. Plon. 
 One 8° vol. — (Translator.') 
 
 t The censorship had been abolished in 1791 for the press as well as for books. Re-established, as a 
 matter of fact, under the Directory, it was legally organized under the Consulate. A censorship was 
 imposed by the Empire over each daily paper. The Restoration in proclaiming the liberty of the 
 press re-established the censorship. Among the papers of which Des Renaudes was censor, L' A mi de 
 la Religion et du Roi must be mentioned. In 1808, Des Renaudes was appointed councillor of the 
 University for life. — {Translator.)
 
 40 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 losing public regard. My object was that they should regain the 
 esteem of the people, and for this purpose, I was anxious to hold 
 them up to the eyes of the nation, as the protectors of strict 
 morality. By inducing the clergy to submit to some pecuniary 
 sacrifices in support of that principle, I should have served, not 
 only public morals, but also the very order I had consented to 
 join. 
 
 I was anxious that the clergy should propose to buy from the 
 government the royal lottery, in order to suppress it ; that is to 
 say, that they should engage to furnish regularly every year, 
 a gratuitous present representing as much revenue as the lottery 
 produced for the royal treasury. The memorial to be addressed 
 to the king to ask him to proscribe this baneful institution, might 
 have been superb ; I should have been most happy to have 
 drafted it. 1 
 
 The members of the clergy, upon whom I most depended to 
 second my motion, declined to do so. It may be observed that 
 my first political campaign was not very fortunate, a result 
 which I dare to attribute to the fact that my proposals were 
 far too radical for the men with whom I purposed to make use 
 of them. 
 
 The amelioration of the condition of the clergy, as determined 
 by the edict of 1768, appeared to me far from sufficient. 2 It was 
 necessary to induce the clergy to propose an increase of salary ; 
 but in order to respect the interests of the chief tithe-owners as far 
 
 1 For a long time, lotteries in France constituted a revenue for the State. The 
 government collected the fees paid by the persons licensed to organize lotteries, and 
 organized some official ones besides. The Order in Council of June 30, 1776, created 
 the royal lottery of France. This was suppressed in the year II., re-established in 
 the year VI., and not definitely abolished until 1836, in execution of the Law of 
 Finances of 1832. 
 
 2 The lower clergy had always been complaining of having hardly anything to live 
 upon, while, on the contrary, the bishops and the commendatory abbots were enjoying 
 considerable incomes. At different times the government had intervened to better 
 their condition. An edcit of 1768 insured a minimum salary of 500 livres * to a curate, 
 and of 200 to a vicar. In 1778, the former received 700 livres, and the latter 250, 
 increased afterwards to 350 livres (1785). This was the settled allowance, in contrast 
 with which it is as well to cite the amount of income derived by certain chief tithe- 
 owners, who often retained for themselves half, sometimes even three-quarters, of the 
 total amount of the tithes. The Abbe of Clairvaux received thus 400,000 livres a 
 year ; the Cardinal de Rohan, 1,000,000 ; the Benedictines of Cluny, 1,800,000 ; the 
 Benedictines of Saint-Maur, 1,672 in number, 8,000,000, and these were not 
 exceptions. 
 
 * A French coin in use before the Revolution, and amounting to about tenpence. — {Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 41 
 
 as was consistent with my objects, I followed the plan employed 
 by M. de Malesherbes and M. de Ruhliere, when they pleaded 
 the cause of the Protestants. In order to reach their end, they 
 both maintained that the intentions of Louis XIV. had not been 
 carried out. I maintained, even, that the principle which had 
 served to establish the new rate of State allowance for the lower 
 clergy, had been violated in deciding that the said allowance 
 should, in no case, exceed five hundred francs. I had confined my- 
 self to requesting the redress of an error, of which, as I said, the 
 higher clergy would surely have been glad to be informed. 
 According to the value of the silver mark, of which I pointed out 
 the growing depreciation and its low proportion to the price 
 of commodities, the increase, to be fair, ought to reach seven 
 hundred and fifty francs. To-day a thousand francs would be 
 required to obtain what these seven hundred and fifty francs 
 would then have easily procured. However, I did not succeed. 
 The State allowance remained fixed at five hundred francs, 
 and to-day, I believe, it still stands at about the same rate. 
 
 Another attempt on my part was no more successful. 
 During a journey I made to Brittany I noticed that, in this 
 country, many women were neither maids, wives, nor widows. 
 They had, at some time or other, been married to sailors who 
 had not returned home, but whose death had never been 
 properly ascertained. The law forbade their marrying again. 
 I employed all the arguments of theology, which, when 
 handled with a little judgment, are elastic enough to serve 
 any purpose, to show that it was desirable that, after a 
 certain number of years, sufficient to prevent social scandal, 
 these poor women should be allowed to marry again. My 
 memoir was committed to M. de Castries, who thought it 
 necessary to consult his friend, the Bishop of Arras, on the 
 subject. 1 The latter saw, as a theologian, that my suggestion 
 could be of no use to him, and, therefore, denounced it in the 
 strongest terms. My memoir was thrown into the fire, and it 
 
 1 Louis de Conzie, born in 1732, entered the army at first, and was officer of 
 dragoons. Having embraced the ecclesiastical career, he was appointed Bishop of 
 St. Omer in 1766, and of Arras in 1769. A violent adversary of the Revolution, he 
 refused a seat in the States-General, and went over to England. He died in 1804, in 
 London.
 
 42 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 required no less an event than the Revolution to enable all these 
 Breton women — who I should think, were no longer young — 
 to marry again, if they chose. 
 
 The care I bestowed upon the private affairs of the clergy 
 and the success of some of my reports to the Conseil des Parties' 1 
 caused my superiors to overlook all the little reforms of general 
 utility which I endeavoured to rank with my duties. They said : 
 " It is the result of his youth ; with a little experience that will 
 soon pass off." Emboldened by the benevolent disposition 
 manifested towards me, I launched myself into an undertaking 
 which I managed to connect with the interests of the clergy, 
 although in point of fact, it was quite foreign to them. M. 
 d'Ormesson, 2 a very honest man, but one of the most wretched 
 comptroller-generals of the last century, had undertaken such 
 a series of unfortunate speculations that the government was left 
 without either money or credit. The uneasiness was general : 
 people anxious to withdraw their deposits, rushed in crowds to 
 the Bank of Discount, 3 the directors of which, in the interest 
 of a few bankers, preferred to solicit authorization to suspend 
 payment rather than diminish their rate of discount. M. 
 d'Ormesson having granted the authorization requested by the 
 directors, bank-notes obtained a forced currency, which ne- 
 cessarily caused them to fall in value. 4 The clergy possessed a 
 
 1 The Conseil des Parties was a section of the Council of State or Council of the 
 King, the great administrative body of the kingdom. It decided the conflicts of 
 jurisdiction, interpreted the laws and ordinances, and pronounced on the cases which 
 the king " thought fit to bring before his council." It was composed of the chan- 
 cellor, president, twenty-six counsellors-in-ordinary, and sixteen counsellors appointed 
 every six months. 
 
 2 Henri Lefevre d'Ormesson belonged to an old and illustrious family of magis- 
 trates. He was born in 1751, was Counsellor of parlement and Intendant of 
 Finances. Raised to be Comptroller-General in 1783, he failed completely in this 
 office, and was replaced by Calonne. He was elected Mayor of Paris in 1792, but 
 declined the post. He was afterwards Administrator of the Department of the Seine, 
 and died in 1807. 
 
 3 Caisse a" Escompte. It was instituted by Turgot, with royal license in 1776; 
 its object was to discount at four per cent, all bills of exchange, and to bring general 
 interest in all transactions to the same rate. A sum of seventy millions (about 
 .£2,800,000) having been exacted from its governors by Comptroller-General de 
 Calonne as reserve fund, seriously shook its credit. It was abolished on August 
 24, 1793, by decree of the National Convention. — {Translator.) 
 
 4 The ordinance of March 24, 1776, authorized the creation of a bank named the 
 Caisse d' Esco/npte, which, without exclusive privilege, loaned money to the trade at 
 four per cent. In 1783, the Treasury being in a most critical situation, M. d'Ormesson 
 secretly borrowed six millions from this bank. The secret got abroad. Holders of
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 43 
 
 large number of them. Having alleged the necessity for watch- 
 ing the proceedings of the bank, I was enabled to attend the 
 first meetings of the shareholders. Enlightened men thought 
 with reason that the old regulations did not offer sufficient 
 security. A commission was named to examine them ; new 
 regulations were agreed to, and I was selected to draw up the 
 report to be read at the general assembly. 
 
 This was the first time that I was, strictly speaking, con- 
 nected with public affairs. I prefaced my report by a speech in 
 which I had applied myself to set forth all the advantages of 
 public credit ; I laid stress on its importance ; I established the 
 fact that all was possible to one who possessed a large credit ; 
 that credit alone suffices for all the needs of commerce, of large 
 trading establishments, of manufactures, and so on. After 
 having set forth all the advantages of credit, I spoke of the 
 means of obtaining and of preserving it. I remember that, in this 
 paper, I was so pleased to make known all the various uses of 
 which credit is susceptible, that I made use of a host of expres- 
 sions which are only employed to depict the most timid and 
 delicate sentiments. An old banker, named Rillet, a regular 
 Genevese, who listened to me with attention, learned with 
 extreme pleasure, which he expressed by the roughest gestures, 
 that, in paying exactly his bills of exchange, he did something 
 so very fine that it could only be expressed in the language of 
 imagination. He came to me, and begged me as he pressed my 
 hands to allow him to copy that part of my speech. His en- 
 thusiasm became useful, for he repeated so badly what I had just 
 said, that I deemed it quite out of place, and left it out in the 
 printed text. 
 
 From the advantages of credit, and the means of obtaining 
 it, I turned at last to the special institutions which facilitate, 
 accelerate, and simplify all its transactions while hastening and 
 ensuring its progress. 
 
 notes became uneasy, and insisted on their deposits being returned to them. D'Or- 
 messon authorized the bank to suspend for three months the payment in cash of notes 
 of more than 300 livres, and gave forced currency to bank notes. The panic increased ; 
 the payment of arrears was to be suspended. Calonne suppressed the forced currency ; 
 the bankers advanced to the bank the sums necessary for its payments ; its credit was 
 re-established, and it regained the greatest prestige.
 
 44 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 The most important of these institutions was a bank, whose 
 first object must be to maintain the low price of money, and to 
 furnish it in abundance for all the needs of circulation. The 
 crisis which the Bank of Discount had just passed through 
 required that great changes should be introduced into its govern- 
 ment ; the changes I proposed were all adopted. The only 
 article that met with any opposition was that in which I suggested 
 that the assembly should not be composed of so many bankers> 
 because their personal interest was opposed to that of the 
 establishment which they were called to manage ; nevertheless 
 as the greater number of shares were in the hands of the bankers 
 of Paris, it was foreseen that the article would be easily evaded, 
 and it was adopted. 
 
 I am rather prolix : but when speaking of our recollections 
 we speak of something dear to us : besides, when I began these 
 memoirs, I fully made up my mind, rightly or wrongly, to disclose 
 frankly my opinion on all that which, either as an act of admin- 
 istration or as a settled project, engaged my attention, or that 
 of the public, for any length of time. 
 
 The different subjects with which I had been occupied had 
 attracted to me the attention of men, who, by profession, were 
 acquainted with all new ambitions. Foulon, 1 Panchaud, Sainte- 
 Foy 2 Favier, 3 Daude sought my acquaintance, and spoke of 
 me as destined some day to direct the affairs of the State. It 
 was indeed somewhat dangerous to be too closely connected 
 with these men ; though also advantageous to be on good 
 terms with them. Yet, to reach his goal with dignity, it was 
 necessary for any' one that the suffrages of polite society should 
 
 1 Joseph Francois Foulon, born at Saumur in 1715. He was Commissioner of 
 War under the ministry of M. de Belle-Isle. Having been appointed Intendant- 
 General of the armies of Marshals de Broglie and de Soubise, he was afterwards 
 Intendant of Finance (1771). In 1789, he was Councillor of State, and was entrusted 
 with the supply of the troops destined to act against Paris. On July 14, fearing for 
 his life, he tried to escape, but was arrested about sixteen miles from Paris, brought 
 back, dragged to the Hotel de Ville, and there assassinated. 
 
 2 Diplomatic agent and secretary of the Comte d'Artois. 
 
 3 Jean Louis Favier, born in 171 1, was Syndic-General of the States of Langue- 
 doc. He afterwards entered diplomacy, and became one of the principal secret 
 agents of Louis XV. Arrested at Hamburg by the order of the Due d'Aiguillon, and 
 conducted to the Bastille, he remained there until the accession of Louis XVI. He 
 died in 1784. Favier has left a number of political writings. The most important — 
 Reflexions contre le Traite de 1756 * — was composed for M. d'Argenson. 
 
 * " Considerations against the Treaty of 1756."
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 45 
 
 appoint him to the posts he wished to gain. As for me, I 
 was in no hurry ; I was instructing myself. I took journeys ; 
 I had done my best to form some idea of the constitution of the 
 pays d'etats} and had easily convinced myself that that of 
 Brittany, where Madame de Girac, 2 sister-in-law of the bishop 
 of Rennes, 3 lived, was likely to procure me most information. I 
 made several journeys thither. I enjoyed a certain reputation, 
 but not being yet sufficiently acquainted with the world, I was 
 happy to think that I had still some years before me during 
 which I might share the life and pleasures of society, without 
 being obliged to arrange any of the deep combinations required 
 to satisfy the aspirations of a serious ambition. 
 
 All who sought office frequented some of the chief 
 families of Paris, whose opinions and language they moulded. 
 The house of Madame de Montesson was visited by the 
 Archbishop of Toulouse, who also shared with M. Necker the 
 sympathies of Madame de Beauvau. 4 It was at the house of 
 
 1 One knows the difference which existed between the pays d'e'tats and the pays 
 d 'election. The former were the provinces which had preserved the right of being 
 taxed by their provincial States (Brittany, Burgundy, Languedoc, Dauphine, Franche- 
 Comte, Lorraine, &c. ). The others were those which, deprived of provincial States, 
 were taxed by the elus (elect), that is, agents so-called, since the States- General had 
 actually elected them, and who still preserved this name, although they had for a long 
 time past been appointed by the king himself. 
 
 2 The name of Madame de Girac reminds me that one day, she being indisposed, 
 the people who had come to see her were making end-rhymes late in the evening, and 
 that these were proposed : jolie, folie, sourit, traces, esprit, grdces. They urged me 
 to fill them out ; I said that I had never made verses. They did not even give me a 
 pencil. The second verse which came to me, and which is almost the history of my 
 life, induced me to write on a card : 
 
 " Et que me fait a moi qu'on soit belle ou jolie, 
 A moi qui, par raison, ai fait une folie ? 
 Je ne puis que gemir lorsque tout me sourit. 
 
 Et 1' austere vertu qui partout suit mes traces, 
 A peine me permet les plaisirs de l'esprit, 
 
 Lorsque mon cceur emu veille au chevet des Graces." * 
 
 (Prince Talleyrand. ) 
 
 3 Francois Bareau de Girac, born at Angouleme (1732), was vicar-general of this 
 city, then Bishop of Saint-Brieuc (1766), and of Rennes (1769). He refused to take 
 the oath in 1791, and exiled himself. He returned to France under the Consulate, 
 and died in 1820, having previously been appointed a canon of Saint-Denis. 
 
 4 Marie Sylvie de Rohan-Chabot was born in 1729. She married Jean Baptiste 
 de Clermont d'Amboise, Marquis de Renel, and, at his death, became the wife of 
 Charles Just, Prince de Beauvau-Craon, grandee of Spain, and Marshal of France. 
 
 * " What do I care if people be beautiful or pretty, 
 I who, out of reason, indulged in folly? 
 I can but lament, when all smiles upon me. 
 And that austere virtue which everywhere follows my steps. 
 Hardly permits me the pleasures of the mind, 
 When my aggrieved heart watches by the pillow of the Graces."
 
 46 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Madame de Polignac, 1 and at the Hotel de Luynes that M. de 
 Calonne found his supporters. The Bishop of Arras was next to 
 M. Necker in the eyes of Madame de Blot, 2 and of M. de Castries. 
 M. de Fleury was backed by Madame de Brionne. The 
 Baron de Breteuil 3 was second in many houses, first in none. M. 
 de Soubise 4 protected Foulon. The Hotel du Chatelet had its 
 own ambition, and formed wishes for the appointment of the 
 Due de Choiseul, for everybody except M. Necker was in favour 
 with Madame de la Reyniere. Les Noailles spoke kindly of 
 M. de Meilhan, 5 but did not place him in the foremost rank. 
 
 I went almost everywhere, and to a mind somewhat accustomed 
 to observe, the sight offered by the upper classes of society, during 
 
 1 Gabrielle de Polastron was married in 1749, to the Comte Jules de Polignac, 
 who was raised to the dukedom in 1 780. She was long the friend of Marie- Antoinette. 
 Her salon was the centre of "the Queen's party" ; she became governess of the 
 Enfants de France* She emigrated after the 14th of July, and died shortly after 
 at Vienna, leaving two sons, one of whom became the minister of Charles X. 
 
 2 Pauline Charpentier d'Ennery, born about 1733, married in 1719 Gilbert de 
 Chauvigny, Comte de Blot, a brigadier-general. She was lady-in-waiting to the 
 Duchesse d'Orleans. 
 
 3 Louis Auguste Le Tonnellier, Baron de Breteuil, born in 1738 at Preuilly 
 (Touraine) ; entered the Foreign Office when still quite a youth. When minister at 
 Cologne, he was initiated in the secret diplomacy of the king. Ambassador at St. 
 Petersburg (1760). Having returned to France, he was appointed State Minister of the 
 king's household and of Paris (1783). He re-assumed for a while the direction of 
 affairs in 1780. He emigrated in 1790, with powers from the king to negotiate with 
 foreign sovereigns ; he returned to France in 1802, and died in 1807. 
 
 4 Charles de Rohan, Prince de Soubise, born in 1715, lieutenant-general in 1748, 
 Marshal of France and Minister of State (1758). He died in 1787. He was married 
 three times — 1st, to Anne de la Tour d'Auvergne, Princesse de Bouillon, who died in 
 1 739, leaving a daughter, who married the Prince de Conde ; 2nd, to the Princesse 
 Therese de Savoie-Carignan ; 3rd, to the Princess Christine de Hesse- Rhinfeld. 
 
 5 Gabriel Senac de Meilhan, born in 1736, was first Maitre des Requt>tcs,\ then 
 Intendant of Aunis, of Provence (where the il allies de Meilhan" at Marseilles still 
 preserve his memory), and finally of Hainaut. He was commissary-general of the 
 "War Department in 1775 ; he emigrated in 1791, resided in Russia on the invitation 
 of the Empress Catherine, and died at Vienna in 1803. Senac de Meilhan wrote 
 many works, two of which have established his reputation as a writer : Les Considera- 
 tions stir V Esprit et les Mceurs (1787), and Du Gouvernement, des Mosurs, et des Con- 
 ditions en France avant la Revolution J (1795). 
 
 * The graceful title given to the royal children of France under the old monarchy. — {Translator.') 
 t Maitre des Requetes, to the number of eight till the year 1344, but who were afterwards raised 
 to eighty-eight, had two principal duties. First, they sat in rotation for periods of three months at 
 the King's Court,_ where they drew up reports of the proceedings. Second, they administered justice 
 for three months in rotation at the Tribunal of the Courts. They had the right of jurisdiction over 
 all the officers of the king's household. In the first instance, they examined not only the cases of these 
 officers, but those of all the persons who had the right of coiiimittiii/iis. Appeals from them were 
 made to the fiarlciiients. Sometimes, though very seldom, their decision in the cases sent before 
 them by the Council of State for final trial were without further appeal. These trials were generally 
 for forgery of official seals, or of letters patents, or infringements of the privileges of authors or 
 printers. They were also entrusted with making official inquiries in the provinces, whenever needed, 
 and from amongst ihem the Intendants de province (whose duties resembled somewhat those of a 
 high sheriff) were chosen. — (Translator.) 
 
 X " Considerations on Mind and Manners " (1787). "Government, Manners, Customs, and Social 
 Condition of France before the Revolution " (1795)-
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 47 
 
 the ten years of which I speak, was curious indeed. People's preten- 
 sions had put everybody out of place. Delille dined at the house of 
 Madame de Polignac with the queen; Abbede Baliviere played 
 with the Comte d'Artois ; M. de Vianes pressed the hand of M. 
 de Liancourt ; Chamfort took the arm of M. de Vaudreuil ; La 
 Vaupalliere, Travanet, Chalabre, took a trip to Marly, and had 
 supper at Versailles at the house of Madame de Lamballe. 1 
 Gambling and witty sayings had levelled all ranks. Careers, 
 that great support of hierarchy and of good order, were being 
 destroyed. All young men considered themselves fitted to rule 
 the country. They criticized all the measures adopted by the 
 ministers. The personal acts of the king and queen were 
 brought under discussion, and nearly always incurred the dis- 
 approbation of the salons of Paris. Young women spoke per- 
 tinently of all the branches of the administration. I remember 
 that at a ball, between two dances, Madame de Stael, 2 taught 
 M. de Surgere 3 what was meant by the kingdom of the West ; — 
 Madame de Blot had an opinion upon all the officers of the 
 French Navy ; Madame de Simiane, 4 said that there ought to be 
 no duties on Virginia tobacco. The Chevalier de BoufHers 5 who 
 
 1 Marie Therese Louise de Savoie-Carignan, Princesse de Lamballe, was the 
 daughter of Prince Victor de Savoie-Carignan. Born in 1749, she married in 1767 
 the Prince de Lamballe, son of the Due de Penthievre. Having lost her husband 
 after a year's marriage, she spent a portion of her life near the queen, who appointed 
 her superintendent of her household. Having been arrested after the events of 
 April 10, 1792, she was murdered on September 2. 
 
 2 Anne-Louise Necker, Baronne de Stael, was born at Paris in 1766. She was 
 the daughter of Necker. She found herself early in life in contact with all the most 
 distinguished people and learned men of the time. When twenty years of age, she 
 married the Baron de Stael-Holstein, Swedish Ambassador to Paris. Madame de 
 Stael resided in Paris during the whole of the Revolution, and took an active part in 
 public affairs. Relentless enmity sprang up between her and the First Consul. 
 Having been exiled to Coppet with orders not to leave that place, she managed to 
 escape after eight months of semi-captivity. She visited Vienna, Moscow, St. Peters- 
 burg, Stockholm, and London. Returning to France with the Restoration, she died 
 on July 10, 181 7. 
 
 3 The Vicomte Jean-Francois de la Rochefoucauld, Comte de Surgere, only 
 known under this last name, was the son of the Marquis de Surgere, a lieutenant- 
 general. He published under the title of Ramassis * several moral treatises (3 vol. 
 in 12), 1734-88. 
 
 4 Probably Adelaide de Damas, who married, in 1777, the Comte Charles de 
 Simiane, a colonel in the army, and gentleman-in-waiting to Monsieur, the Comte de 
 Provence, afterwards Louis XVIII., next brother to Louis XVI. 
 
 5 At the age of twenty-four, the Chevalier de Boufflers, born in 1738, was appointed 
 a Knight of Malta. Brigadier-General in 1784, he was, in the following year, appointed 
 Governor of Senegal. Deputy of the States-General in 1789, he was one of themem- 
 
 * Miscellanies.
 
 48 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 possessed some letters from Prince Henry of Prussia x in his 
 pocket-book, said that France could only regain her political 
 preponderance by abandoning the alliance of Austria for that of 
 Prussia. " There is much more learning in the parlement of 
 Rouen than in that of Paris," said Madame d'Henin. 2 "Were I 
 in the king's place, I would do. . . such a thing," said M. de 
 Poix. 3 " Were I the Comte d'Artois, I would say. . . to the 
 king," said St. Blancard, 4 and so on with the others. This state 
 of affairs would have changed in a moment, if the government 
 had been stronger or more skilful ; if serious preoccupations 
 had not totally gone out of fashion ; if the queen, less beautiful 
 and above all less pretty, had not given way to all the whims and 
 fancies of the time. Easy manners in sovereigns inspire more 
 love than respect, and when troubles come, that love itself van- 
 ishes. Then an attempt is made to resort to authority, but it is 
 too plain that this show of authority is only an effort, and a mere 
 effort does not last. The government, not daring to follow up 
 that which they undertake, fall again, of necessity, into a fatal 
 indolence. Then comes the last expedient — a change of min- 
 isters ; that, it is thought, will remedy the situation ; it may con- 
 tent some families, please some persons, but that is all. At that 
 
 bers of the Constitutional Party. He emigrated in 1792, and lived at Berlin near 
 Prince Henry of Prussia. He returned to France in 1800, and died in 18 15. The 
 Chevalier de BoufHers had married in 1768, the Princess Lubomirska. Later, at 
 Berlin, he, having become a widower, married the widow of the Marquis de Sabran. 
 The letters he exchanged with his second wife before his marriage have been 
 published. 
 
 1 Prince Henry of Prussia was a brother of the great Frederick. He obtained 
 brilliant successes during the Seven Years' War. Very French in his tastes and 
 manners, he often came to Paris, where he was received in all the salons. He died 
 in 1802. 
 
 2 Mademoiselle de Monconseil married, in 1766, Charles d'Alsace de Henin- 
 Lietard, born in 1744, known under the name of Prince d'Henin. She was lady-in- 
 waiting to the queen. The Vicomtesse de Noailles has penned a very pretty portrait 
 of her in the Vie de la Princesse de Poix. 
 
 3 Philippe de Noailles-Mouchy, Prince de Poix, peer of France, and grandee of 
 Spain, born in 1752, was brigadier-general in 1788. Deputy of the nobility to the 
 States-General, he adopted the constitutional principles, and was elected Commander 
 of the National Guard at Versailles. He emigrated in 1791, returned to France in 
 1S00, and lived in retirement until the Restoration. Lieutenant-General in 1814, he 
 died in 1819. 
 
 4 Charles de Gontaut, Marquis de Saint-Blancard (born in 1752) was, at the time 
 Prince Talleyrand speaks of, a captain in the Gardes francaises* He emigrated in 
 1792, and commanded a brigade in the army of Conde. Having returned to France, 
 he lived in retirement until the Restoration. 
 
 „ 1 1 > V.V* 111 JLUIVMILIII UIU1I LIU- JIM.OIU1 lUlV'll, 
 
 * A body of French troops under the old monarchy.— (Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 49 
 
 time, France had the appearance of being composed of a certain 
 number of families whose interests the government had to take 
 into account. By such or such a choice they gratified the wishes 
 of one of these families, and secured its influence ; then turning 
 to another, they made use of it in the same manner. How could 
 such a state of affairs endure ? 
 
 The power of what, in France, they call Society, was prodigious 
 during the years which preceded the Revolution, and even during 
 the whole of the last century. The light and varied ways 
 peculiar to it, probably prevented our historians from noticing 
 the origin, and following up the effects, of this strange result 
 of modern civilization ; I have often thought of it : here are 
 my ideas on the subject. 
 
 In countries where the constitution is lost in the clouds of 
 history, the influence of society must be immense. When the 
 origin of that constitution is recent and consequently still 
 before us, this influence amounts to nothing. We see that 
 Athens and Rome in antiquity, England and the United States 
 of America in modern times, have never had, and have no 
 Society. 
 
 The dramatic literature of the ancients, Plutarch, the letters 
 of Cicero, those of Pliny, the chronicles of Suetonius, give us no 
 idea of society circles. If we are to judge of Athens by the 
 comedies of Aristophanes, or by the fragments of those of 
 Menander, which have been preserved in the clever adaptations of 
 Terentius, we see that the women lived in absolute retirement. 
 The love-intrigues related in these comedies only apply to courte- 
 sans, or to young girls stolen from their parents by slave-dealers. 
 
 When every citizen took part in the management of public 
 affairs, the only meeting places were the forum, the tribunal, and 
 the stock-exchange. Ardent imaginations gave a few hours to 
 artists' studios, or to the salons of famous courtesans. But this 
 was not the general custom, it was only the amusement of a 
 few. The Romans, by nature warriors and conquerors, always 
 scorned those customs which make life more quiet and plea- 
 sant. If eloquence itself, which contributed so much to their 
 glory, was not banished from Rome, it was merely because the 
 Senate made use of it when discussing the great interests of the 
 VOL. I. E
 
 So THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 State, and, in the forum, to defend the property and the lives of 
 the citizens. They abandoned even the arts, fruits of their 
 conquests, to slaves or to freedmen. The women of Rome never 
 left the shelter of their homes ; it was indecent for any woman 
 but a courtesan to show any talent. 
 
 The mingling of the two sexes in society was unknown to 
 the ancients, and but a few years since it was still held in scorn 
 by the customs of England and America. 
 
 Permitted in France, it has formed the essential and dis- 
 tinctive character of society : it was under the reign of Francis I. 
 that women began to appear at court. Their presence had an 
 immediate influence on manners, on politeness and on good 
 taste. 
 
 Italy was ahead of us in the progress of social refinement. 
 The courts of Naples, of Ferrara, of Mantua, the palace of the 
 Medici, already presented models of urbanity, of politeness, 
 even of elegance. Literature was in honour, the fine arts were 
 successfully cultivated. But the political situation of Italy, the 
 wars of which she was the seat, her division into small states, 
 arrested the progress that would have been accomplished by the 
 practical arts of life. 
 
 The carousals, the tournaments, that took place in France 
 under Henry II. imparted more brilliancy, more grace, more 
 nobility to gallantry, and made society more attractive than all 
 the inspirations of the poets of Italy had done. 
 
 The court, during the reign of Henry III., degraded itself by 
 adopting the frivolous and shameful habits of the sovereign, and 
 besides, the sad agitations occasioned by the Reformation pre- 
 vented the development of the character of the nation. 
 
 Henry IV., after all the early storms of his life, separated 
 from his first wife, and perpetually quarrelling with the second, 
 had no court. His courage, his vivacity, his happy sallies, his 
 simple language, gay and brilliant, only exercised a personal 
 influence on the customs of the nation. 
 
 Cardinal de Richelieu, after having attracted the heads of the 
 great noble families to the court, was anxious to become its 
 centre of attraction. With this object, he threw open his 
 house at Rueil to the men and women whose intellectual
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 51 
 
 abilities had most struck him. From that time dates the first 
 social circle, apart from that of the court, which made itself 
 famous. But the terrible power of the Cardinal detracted much 
 from its pleasantness. A spark caused the bursting forth of 
 the transient conflagration known as the Fronde ; this burlesque 
 war, which had no other aim than to gratify the love of agitation 
 entertained by its promoters, was hardly more than a social war, 
 that is, a war between rival social circles. 
 
 This chaos ceased with the accession of Louis XIV. He 
 enforced order ; at his voice all classes, all subjects, assumed 
 their proper rank, without effort or violence. To this noble 
 subordination we are indebted for the art of observing propriety 
 — the elegance of manners and the exquisite politeness, which 
 are the main characteristics of that splendid reign. By skilfully 
 combining the aptitudes peculiar to each sex, and causing men 
 and women to display their natural dispositions to mutual 
 advantage, society reached a degree of splendour, the most 
 insignificant details of which Frenchmen will always enjoy to 
 learn. The salon of Madame de Sevigne is one of the monu- 
 ments of our glory. 
 
 Society under Louis XV., had all the weaknesses of his reign ; 
 it opened its sanctuary, a few men of letters slipped in. The 
 effect of this was at first, to improve conversation and literature. 
 
 M. de Fontenelle and M. de Montesquieu, M. de Buffon, 
 President Herault, M. de Mairan, M. de Voltaire, all brought up 
 under the influence of the century of Louis XIV., kept up in 
 society that exquisite sense of propriety, that polite and yet free 
 speech, that noble ease which made the charm and lustre of 
 Paris gatherings. Such was the standard which one had to observe. 
 
 But under the reign of Louis XVI., every class of literature 
 spread in society. Each writer altered his literary manner, 
 confusion thus crept in, pretensions grew bold, and the sanctuary 
 was broken into. As a result of all this, the general spirit of 
 society underwent all manner of modifications. People wanted 
 to know everything, to fathom everything, to judge of everything. 
 Sentiments were replaced by philosophical ideas ; passions, by 
 the analysis of the human heart ; the wish to please, by opinions ; 
 
 amusements, by plans, projects, &c Everything became 
 
 E 2
 
 52 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 unnatural. I pause, for fear I might make you feel too strongly 
 the coming of the French Revolution, from which several years 
 and many events still separate us. 
 
 The quarrel of the English with their colonies had just 
 broken out. 1 Philosophers had sounded the question at issue in 
 all its depths. They weighed the rights of peoples and of 
 sovereigns. Old military men were of opinion that this quarrel 
 was likely to bring war, young men saw something new in it ; 
 women something of an adventure ; the mean, cavilling and 
 thoughtless policy of the government made them responsible for 
 all the excitement caused by these distant events. They had 
 tolerated, or rather countenanced, the departure of M. de la 
 Fayette, 2 of M. de Gouvion, 3 of M. Duportail. 4 Only the first of 
 these names has fame handed down to posterity. When writing a 
 novel, an author will endow the hero with an enlightened mind 
 and noble impulses ; fortune does not take so much trouble : 
 insignificant men often play the leading part in great events, 
 simply because they happened to be on the spot. 
 
 M. de la Fayette comes from a noble family of Auvergne, 
 not yet rendered illustrious until, under Louis XIV., the wit of a 
 woman reflected some lustre on this name. He had married a 
 young lady of the Noailles family, and was himself the owner of 
 
 1 The Declaration of Independence of the United States was made on May 4, 
 1776. The cabinet of Versailles recognized the new republic, and signed a treaty of 
 alliance with it (February, 1778). The rupture with England took place on the 17th 
 of the following June. 
 
 2 Gilbert Motier, Marquis de la Fayette, was born in 1757, at Chavagnac, near 
 Brioude. At twenty years of age he fought for American independence. Member of 
 the Assembly of Notables in 1787 ; deputy to the States-General. On the 15th of 
 July he was elected Commander-General of the National Guards of the Seine. Out- 
 lawed after the 20th June, 1792, he was obliged to take to flight, but was arrested by 
 the Austrians, and remained five years imprisoned at Olmiitz. He played no part 
 under the Empire. Having been elected a deputy in 1814, he voted for the deposi- 
 tion of the emperor. Still a deputy under the Restoration, he always sat with the 
 Opposition. Elected Commander-in-Chief of the National Guards in 1830, he 
 contributed to the accession of Louis-Philippe. He died in 1834. 
 
 3 Jean-Baptiste Gouvion took part in the campaign in America as an officer of 
 engineers. Greatly attached to la Fayette, he was, in 1789, appointed Major-General 
 of the National Guard. Deputy of Paris in 1791, he sent in his resignation in 1792, 
 and died in action near Maubeuge on the nth of the following June. 
 
 4 Duportail took part in the campaign of America as an officer of engineers. He 
 was a colonel in 1783, was promoted to the rank of brigadier-general, and appointed 
 Minister of War in 1790. Violently attacked in the Assembly, a writ of accusation 
 was issued against him on the 10th of August. He remained concealed for two years, 
 at the end of which time he succeeded in reaching America. He was returning to 
 France in 1802, when he died at sea.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 53 
 
 a large fortune. Had not some extraordinary event brought him 
 to the front, he would have been passed by unnoticed. The quali- 
 ties of M. de la Fayette were only such as to permit of his waiting 
 patiently for promotion ; he was beneath the mark at which 
 a man is reputed sensible and witty. His ambition, and his 
 efforts to distinguish himself, did not seem his own, but rather 
 to have been taught him. Whatever he does seems foreign to 
 his nature ; he always acts as though he followed some one else's 
 advice. Unfortunately no one will ever boast of having been his 
 adviser at the most important period of his life. 
 
 The example of M. de la Fayette was followed by all the 
 gilded and dashing youth of the nation. The young members 
 of the French nobility, who had enlisted for the cause of inde- 
 pendence, devoted themselves afterwards to the principles in 
 defence of which they had shed their blood. They had 
 seen the head of a great State rise from a humble private 
 position ; they had seen the simple men who seconded him 
 surrounded by public consideration. From this, it was but 
 a step to the belief that services rendered to the cause of liberty 
 are the only true titles to distinction and glory. These ideas, 
 brought over to France, bore fruit all the quicker because 
 all the prestige of the ruling classes, attacked by inferior men 
 who had obtained an introduction to society, were daily 
 vanishing from sight. 
 
 It is probable that I shall revert several times, in the course 
 of these memoirs, to the considerations upon which, following 
 too closely the order of the times, I allow myself to dwell at 
 this point ; for they will surely present themselves, and with a 
 more direct application, when I shall speak of the first years 
 of the French Revolution. 
 
 Interest in the American cause was kept up in France by 
 the account of all the deliberations of Congress published 
 every week in a paper entitled Le Courrier de V Europe. This 
 paper, the first, I think, of specially political French papers, 
 was edited by a man who belonged to the police : his name 
 was Morande ; he was the author of an infamous libel which 
 bore the title of Le Gazettier Cuirasse. 1 
 
 1 Charles Thevenot de Morande, born in 1748 at Arnay-le-Duc (Cote d'Or), where
 
 54 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Such Frenchmen who had gone to the colonies of America 
 with military expeditions came home with magnificent 
 descriptions of all the wealth that new part of the world 
 contained. America was the sole topic of conversation. The 
 peculiarity of the members of the aristocracy, in the time of 
 my youth, was that everything that was new to them they 
 believed they had discovered, and were, therefore, all the more 
 fond of it. " What should we be without America ? " was on 
 everybody's lips. " It gives us a navy," said M. Malouet j 1 "It 
 extends our commerce," said Abbe Raynal ; 2 "It procures 
 employment for our excess of population," the men in office at 
 the time were wont to say ; " It is the refuge of all restless 
 minds," said the members of the government ; " that of all 
 dissenters," said the philosophers, and so on. . . . No country 
 seemed more profitable, none better fitted to develop the arts 
 of peace. The only subject of conversation was the glory 
 connected with the discovery of America. And yet (for 
 
 his father was an attorney. He came to Paris, where his life of dissipation and intrigue 
 led to his being imprisoned for fifteen months at Fort l'Eveque. * On being set free, ' 
 he went to England, and acquired some celebrity as a pamphleteer. His Gazettier 
 Cuirasse, ou Anecdotes scandaleuses de la Cour de France^ (1772) caused quite a sen- 
 sation. He lived by extorting hush-money from various people, especially from 
 Madame du Barry, who sent Beaumarchais to him to purchase his silence. He edited 
 afterwards, under the name of Cotirrier de I' Europe, a periodical as disgraceful as his 
 pamphlet. Having returned to France, he was imprisoned after August 10, for holding 
 anti-revolutionary views ; he managed to escape, however, and died in 1803. 
 
 1 Pierre- Victor, Baron Malouet, born at Riom in 1740, began life as an attache of 
 embassy at Lisbonne (1758). He afterwards entered the naval commissariat at 
 Rochefort (1763) ; became sub-commissary in 1767, and was sent to San Domingo, 
 and to Guyana after as commissary-general. Deputy of Riom to the States-General, 
 he voted with the constitutional party ; emigrated in 1792, returned to France in 1801, 
 was Prefet maritime at Antwerp (1801-1807), and Councillor of State (1810-1812). 
 He was minister of marine under the provisory government, and died in the same 
 year (1814). Malouet is the author of numerous works on the navy and the colonies. 
 He has left most interesting memoirs, which have been published (2 vols. 8vo). 
 
 2 Guillaume-Thomas Raynal, born at Saint-Geniez (Aveyron) in 171 3 ; took orders, 
 and came to Paris in I747> where he won reputation both as a professor and a preacher. 
 He eventually gave up his ecclesiastic appointments. He was one of the most daring 
 philosophers of his time. L ' Histoire philosophique des Indes,% which made his repu- 
 tation, was burned by the public executioner's hand, and Raynal had to take refuge 
 abroad. He returned to France in 1788, was elected a member of the Institut (1795), 
 and died in 1 796. 
 
 * Le For l'Eveque, which some people wrongly spell Fort l'Eveque, was the prison of the Bishop of 
 Paris. It was situated in the middle of the Rue St. Germain l'Auxerrois, opposite the For du Roi. 
 Louis XIV., having united all the private jurisdictions at the Chatelet in 1674, the For l'Eveque 
 served from that time as a debtors' prison, and was destroyed about 1780. — (Translator.) 
 t "The Unimpeachable-Gazetteer; or. Scandalous Anecdotes of the Court of France." 
 J "A Philosophical History of India." It may be as well to note here that this work excited the 
 enthusiasm of Bonaparte— then but a subaltern officer— who professed the greatest admiration for its 
 author. — (Translator.)
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 55 
 
 let us examine things to the bottom) what has been the 
 result of all our intercourse with the New World ? Do we 
 see less misery about us ? Do subverters of the social order 
 no longer exist ? Have not the glances we cast on distant 
 countries diminished our love for our native land ? Are not wars 
 more frequent, longer, more widely spread, more costly, through 
 the fact of England and France having become sensitive and 
 irritable on other parts of the globe ? The history of mankind 
 furnishes us with the following sad result : that the spirit of de- 
 struction quickly repairs to all places with which intercourse has 
 become easier. When a few Europeans cast themselves upon 
 America, they at once found that vast continent too narrow 
 for their ambition, and their interests clashing continually, they 
 fiercely competed against each other until one of them became 
 the master. To-day, when a discussion arises between the 
 captain of a merchant-vessel and a director of the Hudson's 
 Bay Company, all the States of Europe take up arms in the 
 quarrel. 
 
 I know how much all I have just said is contrary to current 
 ideas. Voyages around the world make the glory of some 
 individuals, and even of the governments who order them. 
 Learned men will not allow any of the discoveries of our 
 great navigators to be attributed merely to chance ; they 
 insist that previous knowledge enabled these bold pioneers to 
 guess, or at least suspect, the existence of the new countries 
 which enrich our maps. However, they must allow us to point 
 out, that in our own days, when gravitation has become the 
 ruling theory, when methods of calculation have reached their 
 greatest perfection, it has been imagined that, in order to 
 preserve the equilibrium of the earth, there must be a con- 
 siderable continent at the antarctic pole ; several expeditions, 
 however, have been directed towards that point, and all their 
 researches have, so far, proved almost useless. The unfortunate 
 Louis XVI. held to that idea, and we ought to think it but 
 natural that he, of all men, should have been induced to seek 
 afar for other men. 
 
 But it seems to me of little interest to us to engage in such 
 enterprises ; if it be absolutely necessary that they should be
 
 56 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 carried out, we should leave this duty to the new rulers of the 
 ocean ; it does not concern us. 
 
 A correspondence which I closely kept up for several years 
 with M. de Choiseul-Gouffier, then ambassador in Constanti- 
 nople, and M. Peissonel, consul in the seaports of the Levant, 
 fully convinced me of the many advantages we might still derive 
 in our days, by turning our political and commercial views 
 towards the old world. 
 
 When we consider the geographical position of this com- 
 pound, solid, compact body which is called France, when we 
 follow its whole coast, we needs must be astonished that it has 
 not always looked upon the Mediterranean Sea as its own 
 domain. This basin, the entrance to which is accessible 
 only through an inlet a few miles wide, is closed in on all 
 sides by countries possessing little or no shipping. Pos- 
 sessing in herself, and in Spain, her ally, all the means 
 afforded by the fine harbours of Toulon and Marseilles, by 
 Carthagena, and numerous other ports, .... France can easily 
 acquire in the Mediterranean whatever degree of superiority she 
 may wish to possess. The immense advantage that might 
 result for her from such superiority has hitherto been over- 
 looked. 
 
 A spirit of imitation and a sentiment of rivalry attracted us 
 to the ocean. It is a remarkable fact that all the schemes for 
 the naval greatness of France always required the spirit of 
 opposition to foster them. It has always required the prospect 
 of having to fight an enemy, or weaken some nation, to excite 
 our pride, rouse our courage, and develop our industry. I am 
 sorry to make the statement, but everything indicates that in 
 man, the power to hate is stronger than that of love to humanity 
 in general, and even than that of our personal interests. The 
 idea of greatness and prosperity without jealousy and rivalry is 
 too abstract for any ordinary mind to grasp it : ordinary minds 
 require some concrete object to which to apply their conceptions, 
 and, so to speak, measure them materially. 
 
 In order to palliate somewhat the sadness of these remarks, 
 let us attempt a compromise. Might not the natural rivalry 
 which exists between what is known of the new world and of
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 57 
 
 the old, afford a sufficiently large field to the men who are 
 inclined to mischief? Generous impulses would thus be left 
 the hope of exciting the industry of the two continents, and of 
 bringing them mutually to promote each other's happiness 
 and prosperity. 
 
 I feel no restraint in discussing this question, for France is 
 almost without colonies ; the ties that bound her to her former 
 possessions are either broken or loosened ; we are thus free to 
 choose the system which may appear most useful to us. 
 
 Have we any greater interest in resuming our former inter- 
 course with the new world than in seeking new relations with 
 the old ? It is important that this political problem be solved. 
 If it could be proved that farming is easier and not so expensive 
 in the old world as it is in the new one ; that the produce is 
 equally good, and that merchant shipping would not surfer by 
 that new state of things, the solution would be complete. 
 
 In the first place, farming is easier, for since the abolition of 
 the slave-trade, pronounced in England, at the Congress of Vienna 
 and in the United States, it seems impossible that any people of 
 Europe should again undertake such infamous traffic, and that 
 planters should much longer be able to get coloured men, 
 whose number is growing less every year, to till the soil of the 
 West Indies and of the equatorial colonies. 1 The instruments of 
 agriculture being no longer the same, the latter must experience 
 changes, and the bases of calculation upon which the riches of the 
 American colonies were founded will necessarily become inexact. 
 The cultivation of the soil in these hot climates being more diffi- 
 cult and costly, the productions must decrease, and their price be 
 
 1 The slave-trade was abolished but very late by modern civilized nations. During 
 all the eighteenth century, England reserved to itself, by the treaty of Utrecht, the 
 monopoly of importing negroes to all the Spanish colonies — that is to say, to nearly 
 all South America. When the English colonies had a proportion of twenty blacks to 
 one white, it occurred to them to be indignant at the immorality of the traffic, and 
 one of the first acts of the Union was the prohibition of the importation (1794), which 
 was even punishable by death (1818). Denmark had preceded them (1792) ; England 
 followed (1806). At the Congress of Vienna, a declaration was signed by all the 
 powers, except Spain and Portugal, stating that the slave-trade tvas repugnant to the 
 principles of universal morals ; that it afflicted humanity and degraded Europe ; that, 
 in consequence, negotiations should be opened between all the States to hasten the moment 
 when it should be abolished everywhere. On his return from the island of Elba, 
 Napoleon suppressed the slave-trade in all the French colonies, a decree which was 
 confirmed by Louis XVIII. For many years after, the slave-trade was to form the 
 subject of delicate transactions between the cabinets of Europe.
 
 5S THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 proportionately increased. None of these inconveniences would 
 be felt in the old world. In Africa, the instruments are there, they 
 are numerous, they support themselves. If the soil requires more 
 cultivation, the unoccupied population is so abundant that it 
 easily supplies this need. We must no longer compare the work 
 of blacks in America with that of blacks in Africa. It is white 
 men in America who will hereafter be employed at labour beyond 
 their endurance ; to obtain the same products a greater number 
 will be necessary, and will they have this number ? In Africa 
 they have them. 
 
 The second point of the problem resolves itself equally in 
 favour of the Mediterranean. All the products of Africa are 
 good. The sugar of Egypt is hard and grained ; in the process 
 of refining it becomes as white as that of San Domingo ; and 
 there is every reason to believe that we could obtain a very fine 
 quality in the central parts of the regencies of Tunis and of 
 Algiers. Abyssinia produces coffee which is superior to that of 
 the West Indies ; if its culture were encouraged by an assured 
 sale, all the kingdoms and islands of southern Asia would 
 furnish it in abundance. The beauty of the cotton cultivated in 
 Africa merely for local needs, proves that it would easily surpass 
 that of Cayenne, of our other colonies and of the United States 
 of America. Indigo is cultivated successfully between the 34th 
 and 35th degrees of latitude, and could be easily obtained in this 
 latitude in Africa. 
 
 It remains then to be seen if it would not be prejudicial to 
 the great art of navigation, to give to commerce a new direction, 
 ^which, at first sight, appears to tend to narrow the domain of 
 science. 
 
 There would be no foundation for any fear in this respect. 
 One cannot seriously believe that France, with the extent of 
 coast which she has on the ocean, and the ports which she pos- 
 sesses, could allow herself to lose or be forbidden her competition 
 in the navigation of the high seas. This supposition needs not 
 even be discussed. The ocean, the seas of America and of 
 India, must always remain open to all nations ; it is the great 
 school where the art must be preserved and perfected. The 
 principles of the great discoveries are fixed ; the development
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 59 
 
 of which they are susceptible will necessarily follow. Except 
 by a frightful revolution of the whole globe, the fruits of so 
 many efforts, of so much work, of so many centuries, could not 
 be lost for France, any more than for the rest of the world. It 
 is not something less than what exists that I demand, it is 
 something more. While England is so placed as to have greater 
 advantages than France upon the ocean, France is so situated 
 as to have greater advantages on the Mediterranean than has 
 England. From this division, there would result even for com- 
 mercial peoples, motives of emulation which would tend to 
 maintain a sort of level between the industries of all civilized 
 countries. 
 
 It is principally to commercial interests that I address myself, 
 because I am disposed to believe that reason or rather lassitude 
 will bring about a state of affairs in which so much attention will 
 no longer be paid to the strength of the navy, and to the means 
 it affords of securing the upper hand in war. I hope that some 
 day this will become a secondary point of view, and that the 
 principal object of a navy will be to foster trade, to increase 
 comfort, and to contribute to the general prosperity. 
 
 However vaguely expressed these ideas may be, and 
 although they only seem confined to a wish, they cannot be 
 regarded as idle fancies, if we put aside what is too absolute and 
 arbitrary in them and confine ourselves to considering them as 
 subject to the obstacles which proceed from those events which 
 always interfere with the progress of human schemes. 
 
 A little good, eagerly grasped, the enjoyment of which 
 is always of short duration, is all human nature can boast of. 
 Thus it suffices that a political view offer some advantage, that 
 it be in principle conformable to nature, that it present little risk, 
 little loss, few sacrifices, for it to be regarded as good, and for 
 men to be able to place hope in it, without fear of being carried 
 away by their own conceptions. 
 
 One would be more encouraged in taking this view, on look- 
 ing back to the preceding epochs of our history. Thus it would 
 be seen that in the time of the Crusades Europe was precisely 
 on the way to these ideas. The commerce of Asia, liberty of 
 communication with this rich part of the old world, were among
 
 60 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the secret motives of war on the part of the Western Powers 
 against the Califs of Arabia, against the Soudans of Egypt, 
 and the Sultans of Nicomedes. Religion served as a pretext for 
 politics, and politics could gain a glimpse already of the advan- 
 tages of an exclusive navigation. With some success, prudently 
 managed, European colonies might soon have been seen forming 
 on the coasts of Egypt and Syria. And in the wars which would 
 have been sustained by the jealousies and rivalries of the 
 confederate princes, France, by her position, would have had 
 immense advantages that later she was not able to regain in the 
 struggle caused by the discovery of America. In our days, the 
 great difficulties of religion having been overcome, commercial 
 arrangements might further the interests of all the powers of the 
 East, which by themselves are not essentially maritime powers. 
 
 That is why, at a time of my life when I had the power to 
 do so, I introduced into the treaty of Amiens — as a mere philo- 
 sophical view, so as to give no umbrage to the powers — a few 
 provisions having for their object the civilization of the coast 01 
 Africa. 1 If the government had followed the matter up ; if, in- 
 stead of sacrificing all that remained of the fine army of Egypt, 
 to the vain hope of reconquering San Domingo, 2 one had 
 directed against the States of Barbary that imposing and 
 already acclimatized force, it is probable that my philosophy 
 would have become practical, and that France, instead of having 
 destroyed in a few months a fine army at San Domingo, would 
 now be firmly established on the African coast of the Mediter- 
 ranean, thus sparing us the gigantic and disastrous continental 
 system. 
 
 I ought still to indicate another strong consideration ; it is 
 
 1 The treaty of Amiens guaranteed the independence of Malta, its neutrality, and 
 opened its ports to vessels of all nations. An article excepted from this latter privilege 
 the ships of the Barbary states, until by means of an arrangement procured by the 
 contracting parties, the system of hostilities existing between the aforesaid Barbary 
 States and the order of St. John, as well as the Christian powers, should have ceased. 
 It is doubtless this latter provision which denoted on the part of its author certain 
 views on the Mediterranean that he mentions above. 
 
 2 Since 1795, the island of San Domingo had been independent under the govern- 
 ment of Toussaint-Louverture. The First Consul wished to re-occupy it ; his brother- 
 in-law, General Leclerc, was charged with the expedition (February, 1802). He was 
 victorious at first, and took possession of nearly all the island, but sickness decimated 
 his troops, and he himself died. After the breach of the peace of Amiens, the English 
 seconded the efforts of the blacks. The remnant of our troops were obliged to evacuate 
 the island, which has since remained independent.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 61 
 
 that America has not yet taken her place in the political order, 
 and that in regard to her, time has not yet furnished its proof. If, 
 some day, she should become powerful enough to dare to consider 
 as hers, all the lands grouped about the new continent, what an 
 advantage would it then be for France to have turned her 
 attention to the old world ! By this means, also, she would have 
 rendered an essential service to humanity, in preventing, 
 or at least, in lessening the movement of emigration which is 
 leading the present generation towards America. The 
 inclination, almost imperceptible, which draws the European 
 population towards the new world would have required perhaps 
 this retrograding force. I am astonished that philosophers have 
 not taken hold of this great question. It touches, in all its 
 points, on their principles ; the slave-trade, of itself, ought not 
 to have led them to it. But since they have neglected it, it 
 is probable that I am mistaken, and that leads me to believe 
 that I do not even understand myself very well when I speak of 
 Philosophers ; I employ this term as some people do Nature when 
 they have something vague to say, and the suitable expression 
 is lacking. But, as I often mention the Philosophers, and as I 
 credit them with and shall credit them with much influence on my 
 time, I ought, in order to be clear, to explain, once for all, what 
 I mean by the philosophers of the eighteenth century. 
 
 If the philosophers of the eighteenth century had formed a 
 sect, their doctrine would be easy to understand ; but modern 
 philosophy has nothing in common with the spirit of a sect. The 
 atheists and deists, to whom alone this qualification could be 
 applied, hardly belong to our times. When one endeavours to 
 fathom the depths of matters, one finds that the secret principle 
 of all sects is political, and that everywhere they are all born 
 from a spirit of independence and liberty, which, finding 
 itself bound by established constitutions, and restricted by 
 prevailing laws, comes out and breaks forth under forms that 
 it tries to legitimatize by religion. It is, beyond doubt, the 
 spirit of opposition to the established government which is the 
 prime mover in all these new doctrines, which are spread 
 afterwards with various modifications. All other causes, physical 
 and moral, are only secondary and accessory.
 
 62 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 In England, where the principle of political liberty is em- 
 bodied in the constitution of the State, sects are innumerable, 
 and little dangerous. 
 
 In Germany, a country divided into various small states, the 
 spirit of reformation has been perpetuated since Luther and 
 Calvin, and might have made great ravages, if the French Revolu- 
 tion had not alarmed all governments and dispersed inno- 
 vators ; those who remain, including Madame von Krudener, 1 
 are only ridiculous. 
 
 I do not name either Spain or Portugal, because in respect 
 of philosophy, letters, and science, these two countries have made 
 no progress since the fifteenth century. 
 
 In France, the genius of the exact sciences, by the pride and 
 the real supremacy it has assumed, has annihilated the spirit of 
 sect by covering all systems with scorn. The introduction of the 
 philosophy of Bacon, of Locke and of Newton, completed by 
 M. de Laplace, 2 subjected all the devices of imagination to a 
 test which permitted it to make discoveries, but not to wander 
 beyond bounds. 
 
 The indecisions of Montaigne, resting his mind on what he 
 calls those two pillows so soft for a well-made head, ignorance 
 and heedlessness, prevented him from joining any of the previous 
 sects, or forming a new one. He discusses all opinions, adopts 
 none, and intrenches himself behind doubt and indifference. 
 
 Almost at the same time, Rabelais, in the attacks of his 
 railing, cynical and droll humour, had insulted all prejudices 
 and attacked all beliefs. 
 
 It appears to me that there is a great difference between 
 this style of philosophy, and that of the founders of sects. By 
 order of date, Montaigne and Rabelais are the oldest of our 
 
 1 Julie de Wietinghoff, daughter of a rich Lavonian nobleman; born in 1764; 
 married at eighteen Baron von Krudener, a Russian diplomatist. Madame von 
 Krudener had a restless youth. After 1804, she seemed entirely changed, devoted 
 to austerities, and to the conversion of sinners. In 1815, she became acquainted with 
 the Emperor Alexander, who grew attached to her, and over whom she had a great 
 ascendency. She wandered afterwards over Switzerland and Germany, disturbed the 
 cities by her predictions, and was often persecuted. She returned to Russia in 1818, 
 and died in 1824. 
 
 2 P. Simon, Marquis de Laplace, born in 1749 at Beaumont-en- Auge (Calvados), 
 was at seventeen years of age Professor of Mathematics. A member of the Institut 
 from its foundation, Minister of the Interior after the 18th Brumaire, Senator (1799), 
 President of the Senate, peer of France (1815). He died in 1827.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 63 
 
 French philosophers, but they are not the founders of schools. 
 Their pyrrhonism threw into ideas a vagueness, an uncertainty, 
 the results of which make them partly responsible for that 
 confusion we have seen in the last century. Thus the writers 
 who have come nearest to them have never pretended to be 
 the exponents of any doctrine whatever. The disposition to 
 doubt, and the spirit of sect are diametrically opposed. 
 
 The spirit of sect has perhaps less of inconvenience, be- 
 cause it is less general in its object, and because it takes 
 possession of but few individuals, and, in France, for a short 
 time only ; for the frivolity of the nation does not permit any 
 opinion of this nature to establish a lasting rule. Doubt, 
 on the contrary, can extend itself to all, and endure a long 
 time ; it is so convenient that it takes possession of all ; for 
 is enlightenment ever sufficiently clear for it ? and its danger 
 lies in this, being the aim to which one tends ; its advan- 
 tage, in this being the point of departure. For then one is 
 afraid of divining too quickly ; one is afraid of simple out- 
 lines ; intelligence contents itself with examining modestly in 
 order to arrive slowly at causes : it thus rises by degrees 
 from one abstract idea to another ; from phenomena to pheno- 
 mena, from discovery to discovery, and finally from truth to 
 truth. 
 
 This method was not fully understood or faithfully followed 
 until the eighteenth century, for up to this time France was wholly 
 Cartesian. The schools, the Academy of Sciences, even Fontenelle 
 and Mairan, were consistently faithful to Descartes. I remember, 
 and perhaps I alone, that M. Duval, 1 my professor of philosophy 
 at the Harcourt College, afterwards Rector of the University, 
 had issued a little pamphlet against Newton ; D'Alembert, 2 
 
 1 Pierre Duval, born in 1730 at Breaute, a village of Normandy, was at twenty- 
 two years of age Professor of Philosophy at the Harcourt College, principal of 
 the same college, and Rector of the University (1777). There are numerous treatises 
 left by him, in which he endeavours to refute the philosophical theories of the time, 
 notably those of Buffon, Rousseau, and Holbach. He died in 1797. 
 
 2 Jean Lerond d'Alembert was the son of Madame de Tencin and of the Chevalier 
 Destouches, officer of artillery. Abandoned at his birth, he was taken and brought up 
 by a family of working people. His name came from the fact that he was found on the 
 steps of the church Saint-Jean Lerond, which is now destroyed. He soon made himself 
 noticed by his love of science, entered the Academy of Sciences in 1744, and the 
 French Academy in 1754. Closely associated with Voltaire and Diderot, he joined 
 with them in the publication of the Encyclopedia. He died in 1783.
 
 64 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 Maupertuis, 1 Clairault, 2 and Voltaire, all four very young, were 
 the first apostles of the new philosophy. Thanks to them, the 
 philosophy of Newton, or rather the system of Nature, has 
 triumphed. Thanks to them once more the philosophy of Bacon 
 was applied to science and shed the brightest light thereon. This 
 was the most brilliant side of the philosophy of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury ; but its glory becomes obscured when one looks upon its 
 moral influence, and, above all, upon its ravages in moral science. 
 
 Voltaire, it seems to me, has perfectly traced the character 
 and mission of true philosophy. 
 
 " Philosophy," said he, " is simple ; she is tranquil, without envy, 
 without ambition ; she meditates in peace, far from the luxury, 
 the tumult and the intrigues of the world ; she is indulgent, she 
 is compassionate ; her pure hand holds the torch which is to 
 enlighten men ; she never makes use of it to kindle a confla- 
 gration in any place on earth ; her voice is feeble, but makes 
 itself heard ; she says, she repeats : ' Worship God, serve kings, 
 love mankind.' " 
 
 The beautiful character of this philosophy is found in all the 
 writings of Locke, of Montesquieu, and of Cavendish. 3 These 
 true sages, always prudent in their boldness, have constantly 
 respected, and often strengthened, the eternal foundations on 
 which the morals of mankind rest. But some of their disciples, 
 less enlightened, and consequently less circumspect, have, by 
 dint of researches, shaken all the bases of the social order. 
 
 When, in the senate of Rome, they were deliberating on the 
 punishment merited by the accomplices of Catiline, Caesar, 
 reasoning in the philosophy of the eighteenth century, and pre- 
 senting abstract principles in order to draw political conclusions 
 
 1 Moreau de Maupertuis, born at Saint-Malo in 1698, died in 1759; officer of 
 cavalry. He soon left the army for the study, and entered the Academy of Sciences 
 in 1723. In 1736, he set out on a scientific expedition to the polar regions. Member 
 of the French Academy in 1743, he left for Berlin in 1745, where King Frederic 
 named him President of the Academy. It was there that he had his famous debates 
 with Voltaire. They were published in 1856, under the name of Life of Maupertuis, 
 by La Beaumelle, in a small volume, very interesting on account of certain letters 
 of Frederick's contained in it. 
 
 2 Alexis Clairault, born in 1713 at Paris, astronomer and mathematician, entered 
 the Academy of Sciences at eighteen years of age. He died in 1765. 
 
 3 Henry Cavendish, illustrious English physician and chemist, born at Nice in 
 1 73 r > belonged to a younger branch of the family of the Dukes of Devonshire. He 
 was admitted in 1760 to the Royal Society of London, and, in 1803, was associate 
 of the Institute of France. He died in 1810.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 65 
 
 from them, descanted at length upon the nature of the soul, and 
 professed the dogmas of the Epicurean philosophy. Cato and 
 Cicero arose indignant, and declared to the senate that Caesar 
 was professing a doctrine dangerous to the republic and to man- 
 kind. Now, this subversive and distressing doctrine that these 
 great statesmen had the wisdom to discard, has been openly 
 taught in the last century. Under the pretext of uprooting 
 superstition, which was falling of itself, and of extinguishing 
 fanaticism, which inflamed no heads but theirs, Helvetius, 1 
 Condorcet, 2 Raynal, Baron von Holbach, 3 sometimes with "the 
 state of nature," sometimes with "perfectibility," ruthlessly broke 
 all the ties of moral and political order. What madness to pretend 
 to govern the world with abstract ideas, with analyses, with incom- 
 plete notions of order and equality, and with a purely metaphysical 
 morality ! We have seen the sad results of these idle fancies. 
 
 If such is the necessary outcome of analysis, I would say with 
 good old La Fontaine to the imprudent philosophers who apply it 
 to everything : Quittez-moi voire serpe, instrument de dommage.^ 
 
 Your analysis may enlighten the mind, but it extinguishes 
 the heat of the soul ; it dries up all sensitiveness, it withers the 
 imagination, it spoils the taste. Has not Condillac, 5 your oracle, 
 himself said, "Not/ting is more opposed to good taste than a philo- 
 
 1 Claude Adrien Helvetius, born in Paris about 1715, obtained at the age of 
 twenty-three a place as fermier-ge'neral. He gave himself entirely to philosophy, 
 and published in 1758 his book V 'Esprit, condemned at the time by the Pope, the 
 Sorbonne, and the parlement. His works — fourteen volumes — were published after 
 his death, which took place in 1771. 
 
 2 M. Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet, born in 1743 at Riblemont, near Saint- 
 Quentin, of a noble family originally from Dauphine. He was received into the 
 Academy of Sciences at the age of twenty-six. Closely connected with the philoso- 
 phers, he embraced with ardour the cause of the Revolution. Deputy to the Legis- 
 lative Assembly and to the Convention, he voted with the Girondists. Proscribed on 
 May 31, I793> he remained concealed for eight months, but, leaving his retreat, was 
 arrested and imprisoned. He poisoned himself a few days after in his prison (March, 
 1794). Condorcet had married Mademoiselle de Grouchy, sister of the Marshal of 
 the Empire. 
 
 3 P. Thiry, Baron von Holbach, celebrated philosopher, was born in 1723 at Hildes- 
 heim, in the Palatinate. He came to Paris in his youth, and embraced the most 
 violent philosophical principles. He preached atheism openly. His best-known 
 work, The System of Nat tire, was condemned even by Voltaire and Frederick II. He 
 died in 1789. 
 
 4 Lay aside your sickle, it is a dangerous tool. 
 
 5 Etienne Bonnot de Condillac, born in 1715 at Grenoble, of a noble family. He 
 took orders, but without exercising ecclesiastical functions ; was preceptor of the child 
 of the Duke of Parma in 1757 ; member of the French Academy in 1768. Condillac 
 has left several works, which have made him the head of the sensualist school. He 
 died in 1780. 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 66 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 sopJiical mind ; this is a truth that I must own." If he had opened 
 his hand wider, perhaps he would have let fall a few others of 
 the same kind, which, to-day, contrary to his opinion, are pro- 
 fessed in our schools. 
 
 All that I have just said leads me to think that the peculiar 
 character of the philosophy of the eighteenth century lies in the 
 use of analysis ; useful, when applied to physical sciences ; incom- 
 plete, when applied to moral sciences ; dangerous, when applied 
 to social order. 
 
 Thus in all I have written and in all I shall write, the object 
 to which the method of analysis shall be applied will point out, 
 without my being obliged to remark it, whether the name of 
 philosopher is to be taken in good or in bad part. 
 
 The importance which economic philosophers have enjoyed 
 for nearly thirty years, demands that I should speak of them in 
 a special manner. 
 
 The economists were a section of philosophers solely occu- 
 pied in drawing from the administration all the means of 
 amelioration of which they believed the social order was suscep- 
 tible. They were divided into two classes : the one looked upon 
 agriculture as the only creator of riches, and treated industrial 
 labour and commerce as sterile, under the plea that they only 
 created new forms and changes in the materials produced and 
 created by agriculture. The doctrine of this first class of 
 economists is called the doctrine of the nett result, and is set 
 forth in the Tableau Economique} The object of this work is to 
 show the distribution of the riches produced by agriculture, and 
 spreading thence into all the arteries of the social body. The 
 consequences of these doctrines following the circulation of 
 wealth, end in the theory of taxation, which eventually saddles 
 agriculture exclusively. 
 
 The liberty of commerce is almost the only point upon which 
 this first class of economists is in harmony with the economists 
 about whom I am going to speak. The latter did not adopt the 
 division of sterile classes ; they did not look upon the Tableau 
 Economique as a strict or even sufficient demonstration of the 
 
 1 The Tableau Economique, in which is set forth the physiocratic doctrine, is the 
 work of the physician Quesnay, 1694-1774, founder and head of that school.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 67 
 
 phenomena of circulation. They restrict themselves in this re- 
 spect to some truths of detail. Their great principle is the general 
 liberty of trade in the most extended sense. As for taxation, 
 they accept modifications — they are not absolute. 
 
 The government rejected the ideas of the economists of 
 any school whatever ; they preferred known and established 
 principles. They feared changes which might interfere with the 
 existing method of taxation, and with the regular flow of the 
 revenue thus obtained into the royal treasury. Their fear of 
 some diminution in the revenues of the State was such as to 
 prevent their risking any means of increasing them. Such short- 
 sighted and narrow views were necessarily prohibitive. 
 
 It was not yet known that a few incontestable principles 
 of political economy, besides a reasonable use of public 
 credit, constitute the whole science of financial administration. 
 Public credit would have diminished the inconvenience which 
 might have resulted from too strict an application of the principles 
 of political economy ; the principles of political economy would 
 have enlightened and moderated the enterprises of public credit. 
 M. Turgot, in establishing the Discount Bank, appears to have 
 foreseen the advantages of this beneficial alliance. He grasped 
 the method which carries the greatest aid to all industries, by 
 maintaining the price of money at a moderate rate ; but he went 
 no farther. The modern art of procuring for the State, without 
 raising taxes, extraordinary levies of money at a low rate, 
 and of distributing the burden over a succession of years, was 
 unknown to him, or, if he knew it, perhaps he perceived, in its 
 application, future difficulties which the French administration, 
 always too lax and inclined to abuse, might some day render 
 dangerous. Besides, to borrow continually while paying debts 
 as constantly, belonged to an order of ideas totally opposed 
 to the pure doctrine of the economists. For, to issue and repay 
 loans, requires the temporary use of moneys for that special object 
 taken from a class of State revenues distinct from the land- 
 taxes which are intended to meet a permanent and special 
 expenditure. But, to attain that end, various articles of con- 
 sumption should be taxed, chiefly those which, belonging to 
 the comforts of life, are only in use among?[men who are in 
 
 F 2
 
 68 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 luxurious, or at least, well-to-do circumstances. In this class, the 
 articles I speak of are measured by the resources of each con- 
 sumer, and if the requirements of the latter become too great, too 
 imperative, there is reason to believe that comfort would become 
 more exacting and find compensation in the perfection of 
 industrial production, the limits of which are unknown ; it is true 
 that if it were limited, those financial administrations which had 
 not foreseen it, would be in danger of finding themselves in 
 trouble. 
 
 This prolific subject might lead me a long way, for it is full 
 of charm for me. It recalls to me all that I learned in the con- 
 versation and in the memoirs of a man whose true value the 
 English have acquainted us with. M. Panchaud has said a 
 thousand times to M. de Calonne, M. de Meilhan, M. Foulon, 
 M.Louis, 1 and myself: "In the present state of Europe, out of 
 the two countries, France and England, that which follows exactly 
 the sinking scheme which I propose will see the end of the other? 
 These were his own words. England adopted his doctrine, and 
 so for thirty years has directed all the movements of Europe. 
 M. Panchaud was an extraordinary man ; he had at once the 
 most ardent, broad, and vigorous mind, and a perfect judgment. 
 He had every kind of eloquence. If an equal and abundant 
 proportion of perceptive and reasoning powers constitute genius, 
 Panchaud was a man of genius. Of his generosity, candour, and 
 gaiety, thousands of instances occur to me which it were pleasant 
 to give here. 
 
 But, I must refrain, in order not to interrupt too long the order 
 of ideas which I had prescribed to myself, and I fear I have 
 already some cause for reproach for having spoken of the 
 influence of the philosophers and the economists on the brilliant 
 and ambitious portion of the clergy, long before I had explained 
 
 1 Louis Dominique, called the Baron Louis, was born at Paris, November 13, 
 1757. He was destined for the church, and was counsellor-clerk in parlement. He 
 was intimately associated with Talleyrand, whom he assisted as under-deacon at the 
 Mass of the Federation. He was appointed minister to Denmark (1792) ; emigrated 
 in 1793. Returned to France after the Consulate, he was mait7-e des reqtitles to the 
 Council of State (1806), Councillor of State (1811), Minister of Finances in 1814, 
 1815, and, in 1818, Minister of State, member of the Privy Council. In 1822, he was 
 deprived of all his posts. As a deputy, he look his seat in the Liberal party. In 1831, 
 he was again Minister of Finances, was created a peer of France in 1832, and died in 
 1837-
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 69 
 
 what I meant by philosophers and economists ; so I am 
 obliged now to ask my readers to recollect what I have said of the 
 clergy, that it may well be understood what was the kind of spirit 
 with which all orders of the State, all classes of society, were 
 more or less, imbued. My remarks on the clergy apply equally 
 to the magistracy, which, by its great civil prerogatives, has a 
 direct influence upon all minds. It is constantly in operation ; it 
 watches every act of life ; it gives security of property andof person; 
 its power is immense; consequently, those institutions which are 
 assailed by the magistracy are as good as destroyed in the minds 
 of the people. The new ideas took possession of all the youth 
 in the parlement. To defend the royal authority was denounced 
 as servile obedience. The majority which President d'Aligre x 
 preserved for the court was every day diminishing, and was lost 
 on the occasion of the quarrel between M. de Calonne and 
 M. de Breteuil. Although M. d'Aligre could promise to the 
 members of parlement who voted with him, the favour of M. de 
 Miromesnil, 2 Keeper of the Seals ; of M, de Breteuil, Minister of 
 Paris ; of the queen through M. de Mercy, 3 with whom he was 
 intimately acquainted, he saw his majority melt away at the 
 moment that he was at open war with the comptroller-general. 
 The first time it failed him was on a question which 
 concerned the queen personally. The counsellors of this 
 unhappy princess, blinded by their own passion, and wish- 
 ing to serve hers, had carried before the tribunal, and 
 given the greatest publicity to an affair known as that of 
 the necklace, which ought to have been hushed up from the 
 very beginning. 4 The decree passed by the parlement of Paris 
 
 1 Etienne Francois d'Aligre belonged to an old family of magistrates originally 
 from Chartres. President a mortier, then first president of the parlement of Paris 
 (1768). He gave in his resignation in 1780, went to England, then to Brunswick, 
 where he died in 1798. 
 
 2 Armand Hue de Miromesnil was born in 1723. First-President of the parle- 
 ment of Rouen (1755). Keeper of the Seals under Louis XVI., (1774-87). He died 
 in 1766, on his estate of Miromesnil in Normandy. 
 
 3 Francois, Comte de Mercy-Argenteau, belonged to an old family of Lorraine. 
 He was ambassador of the German empire in France, during the whole of the reign 
 of Louis XVI. From 1789, Mercy took an active part in bringing about foreign 
 intervention in favour of the king. He died in 1794. His correspondence with 
 Marie- Antoinette and Marie Therese has been published. 
 
 4 It is well known what this sad affair was, which did irreparable injury to the 
 queen, although she was entirely innocent. The jeweller Boehmer had offered to the 
 queen a magnificent necklace, worth 1,600,000 francs. She refused to accept it. A
 
 jo THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 ought to have made a profound impression on the queen, 
 and to have enlightened her as to the character of the 
 person upon whom she had bestowed her confidence. But 
 fatality prevented this hard lesson from having the effect one 
 might have expected ; she did not change her counsellors ; 
 the Baron de Breteuil and the Archbishop of Toulouse 
 only gained in power ; and the queen, again allowing 
 herself to be carried away by the frivolous excitement which 
 surrounded her, satisfied herself with speaking with scorn of 
 Abbe Georgel, 1 with sharpness of MM. Freteau, 2 Louis, Le 
 Coigneux, 3 de Cabre, 4 and with showing displeasure towards 
 those who were associated with Madame de Brionne and her 
 daughters. This petty revenge was extended even to me, and I 
 experienced some difficulty in obtaining the places to which I 
 was naturally called. The affection of Madame de Brionne and her 
 
 lady of high birth, but of doubtful morality, Madame de la Motte-Valois wished to 
 appropriate it. She succeeded in persuading Cardinal de Rohan, who had recently 
 incurred the displeasure of Marie- Antoinette, that the queen had only refused the 
 necklace in appearance, and in order to avoid the scandal of the excessive expense, 
 but that she would be very grateful if he would secretly facilitate the purchase. The 
 cardinal, convinced, bought the necklace on credit, and gave it to Madame delaMotte 
 to give to the queen. Madame de la Motte hastened to sell it in England. The affair 
 soon got abroad through the complaints of Boehmer who had not been paid. The 
 cardinal and Madame de la Motte were arrested, and denounced to parlement, which 
 acquitted the former and convicted the latter. They worded their veidict in such a 
 manner as to throw a doubt on the innocence of the queen. 
 
 1 Abbe Jean Francois Georgel, born at Bruyeres (Lorraine) in 1731, was at 
 first Professor of Mathematics at Strasbourg. Cardinal de Rohan took him to Vienna 
 as' secretary of the embassy. On his return, he was appointed vicar-general at 
 Strasbourg. In the affair of the necklace, he rendered the greatest service to the 
 cardinal by burning his papers and writing his defence. He was himself exiled to 
 Mortagne ; he emigrated in 1793, returned to France in 1799, refused a bishopric, was 
 named vicar-general of the Vosges. He died in 1813. Abbe Georgel left some 
 memoirs extending from 1760 to 1810 (Paris 1817, 6 vols., in 8vo.). 
 
 2 Emmanuel Freteau de Saint Just, was born in 1745. Counsellor of parlement in 
 1765. In the affair of the necklace he took the part of the cardinal. He was im- 
 prisoned after the session of November 17, 1787. Deputy of the nobility to the States- 
 General, he embraced the cause of the Third Estate ; he was twice President of the 
 Assembly. He retired to the country after August 10. Arrested in 1794, he was 
 guillotined on June 14th. 
 
 3 Marquis Lecoigneux de Belabre was received as Counsellor to parlement in 
 1777. He was a descendant of the first president Lecoigneux, who lived at the 
 commencement of the seventeenth century, and whose son was the celebrated 
 Bachaumont. 
 
 4 AbW Sabatier de Cabre was Secretary of the Embassy at Turin. Minister at 
 Liege (1769). Charge d'affaires at St. Petersburg. Director of the consulates at the 
 Ministry of Marine (1782). He was advisory clerk to the parlement. He embraced 
 with ardour the cause of the Revolution. Arrested under the Reign of Terror, he 
 escaped the scaffold and died in 1816. He must not be confounded with Abbe 
 Sabaiier de Castre, a journalist protected by Vergennes, who also played a certain 
 part in parliamentary affairs (1742- 181 7).
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 71 
 
 daughters, the Princesse de Carignan and the Princesse Charlotte 
 of Lorraine, indemnified me largely for all the opposition I 
 experienced in my career. The beauty of a woman, her noble 
 pride mingled with the prestige of an illustrious and famous race, 
 so often near the throne either as enemy or as support, adds a 
 special charm to the sentiments which she inspires. I thus 
 remember the time of my disfavour at court with more pleasure 
 than many of the fortunate circumstances in which I have been 
 placed in life, and which have left no traces either in my mind 
 or on my heart. I scarcely recollect that the queen prevented 
 my profiting by a great act of kindness of Gustavus III., 1 who 
 had obtained for me a cardinal's hat from Pope Pius VI. 2 She 
 told M. de Mercy to advise the court of Vienna to oppose the 
 nomination of a French cardinal before the promotion of the 
 crown cardinals? Her wishes were fulfilled, the nomination of 
 the Pope suspended, and, it is probable that since that time, 
 my cardinal's hat has passed some years in French fortresses. 
 
 The new spirit introduced into the parlement having sown the 
 seeds of discontent and ambition amongst the members com- 
 posing this ancient body, intrigue penetrated everywhere. M. 
 Necker, M. de Calonne, M. de Breteuil, each had their creatures 
 who defended or attacked the measures of the minister whom 
 they wished to sustain or overthrow. Each day saw the great 
 magistracy farther estranged from the royal authority, to 
 which in the best times of the monarchy, it had been constantly 
 attached. Even esprit de corps no longer existed ; the demand of 
 the States-General, made a little more than a month afterwards, is 
 a proof of this. An alarming number of scattered opinions which 
 
 1 Gustavus III., King of Sweden, son and successor of Adolphus Frederick. Born 
 in 1746, he mounted the throne in 1771. He was assassinated in a conspiracy 
 of the nobility, March 16, 1792. He left the throne to his son, Gustavus IV. 
 
 2 Pope Pius VI. gave a cordial reception to the King of Sweden, Gustavus III., 
 during a visit which the latter paid to Italy. He sought a means of being particularly 
 agreeable to him, and accorded him the promise of a cardinal's hat for the Abbe de 
 Perigord, for whom Gustavus III. had solicited it. It was entirely a favour, and all 
 the more remarkable that it was bestowed upon a Protestant prince. — (M. de Bacourt.) 
 
 3 The Pope has always reserved the exclusive right of naming the cardinals. Some- 
 times certain Catholic sovereigns, the King of France, the Emperor of Germany, the 
 King of Spain, the King of Poland, the Stuarts, had obtained the right of naming, or 
 rather presenting to the nomination of the Pope, who always sanctioned their choice, 
 a certain number of cardinals, who were named, in consequence, the cardinals of the 
 crowns. They were assimilated with the other cardinals, and represented their 
 sovereigns at the papal elections.
 
 72 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 did not always take their stand under the colour of any party, 
 caused anxiety to the ministry on the registering of each law 
 that the needs of the State appeared to require. 
 
 M. de Calonne braved this state of affairs, and insisted on 
 bringing before the parlement a law on a very delicate matter 
 which required a mass of information which he lacked. 
 
 The relative value adopted in gold and silver money in 
 the recoinage of 1726, was no longer in conformity with the 
 marketable value of gold and silver metal. A mark of gold 
 in the ingot, of the same standard as the louis, sold for 
 more than seven hundred and twenty livres, yet the same 
 mark of gold made into louis yielded only thirty such coins, 
 equivalent to seven hundred and twenty livres. It was neces- 
 sary then to give to gold coin, in its relation to silver coin, 
 a proportion more nearly approaching the value it had relatively 
 to silver in the ingot. By the law of 1726, the proportion of 
 gold to silver was from 1 to i4fVW to from 1 to 14$, very 
 nearly. By the law of which I am now speaking, the propor- 
 tion of gold to silver was raised to from 1 to 1 5tVoV> or nearly 
 from 1 to 15I. 
 
 M. de Calonne had adopted with regard to this the 
 opinion of M. de Madinier, a broker, who was better versed in 
 commercial transactions, than in the power of management, 
 which a government ought always to possess when it 
 deals with money. It must be shown to the public, by 
 figures, and a long time in advance, that the recoinage is done 
 in its interests. In important affairs, the reproach of being slow 
 contents everybody ; it gives to those who make it an air of 
 superiority, and to those who receive it an air of prudence. 
 M. de Calonne was right, but his precipitation gave him the 
 appearance of being wrong. Baron de Breteuil, Foulon, little 
 Fornier, hawked about memoir after memoir ; Abbe de Vermond x 
 gave them to the queen who sent them to the king. The 
 parlement, having become an instrument of intrigue, made 
 
 1 The Abbe Mathieu de Vermond was the son of a village surgeon. Born in 1735, 
 he was received as doctor in the Sorbonne in 1757. He attached himself to the 
 fortunes of the Cardinal de Brienne, was in 1769, sent to Vienna by Choiseul as 
 reader to the future dauphiness. He managed to obtain the confidence of the 
 empress and of the archduchess, and gained a great influence over them. He 
 emigrated in 1790, and died soon after at Vienna.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 73 
 
 remonstrances, which showed that there was in this body 
 not so much light on these matters, as a disposition to put 
 obstacles in the way of the comptroller-general. The legal 
 motive for the recoinage was to reduce the quantity of fine 
 gold which entered into the composition of pieces of twenty-four 
 livres Tournois, to a value corresponding to that of a silver 
 ingot, equivalent to four six-livre pieces. 
 
 In the recoinage of 1726, grave faults were committed. 
 They had badly solved the problem of an exact proportion 
 between the value of the two metals of which our money is 
 made (a proportion easy to establish, but difficult to maintain). 
 The valuation had been fixed at about one-sixth above the 
 value of the metal. It is true that the greater number of the 
 Mint directors had lessened this inconvenience, but by means 
 of a grave fraud, by reducing the standard or the weight to 
 such a degree that the remedy had become worse than 
 the evil. Thus, besides the defect of proportion between the 
 two metals, there was a defect of legal identity between louis 
 of the same coinage. A new coinage was thus necessary ; but 
 people did not do M. de Calonne the honour to believe that he 
 meant to be just. They did not understand the diminution 
 of weight which the new gold pieces were to undergo, al- 
 though this was an indispensable condition for the re-estab- 
 lishment of the proportion between gold and silver, and 
 although in the change of coins, compensation was allowed 
 to the owners of the old money. The delivery of the new 
 louis was to be preceded by the deposit of the louis of the 
 previous coinage ; the delays for changing were prolonged far 
 beyond the time necessary for the coinage, and, as a sequel 
 to so many other financial expedients which were no better, it 
 was supposed that the real object of the minister was to obtain 
 the use of funds by a sort of loan from the owners of the old 
 pieces of gold. Thus, although the proportion adopted by 
 M. de Calonne was good, it furnished a pretext for censure 
 which was made use of unscrupulously. He was able to 
 establish the equilibrium (at least for a time) between two metals 
 each intended to be recognized as a standard, but without having 
 acquainted himself with the very intricate calculations which
 
 74 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 justified the reform of the law of 1726, and consequently without 
 having put himself in a position to reply to all the objections 
 raised by sceptical or ignorant persons. He achieved his aim, 
 although he did not deserve all the credit of it. 
 
 Louis XVI., encouraged by the opinion of M. de Vergennes, 
 displayed a very strong will on this occasion. The remonstrances 
 of the parlement were without effect. Madame Adelaide, aunt of 
 the king, to whom Madame de Narbonne 1 had handed a very 
 learned memoir on this subject, was not even able to prevent 
 the exile of Foulon. This unfortunate man was banished to one 
 of his estates in Anjou, and returned a few years afterwards 
 only to be one of the first victims of the Revolution. 
 
 Unremitting firmness was not in the nature of the king, 
 and besides he was necessarily discouraged by the want of 
 harmony existing in his council. Matters became involved ; 
 public opinion gained strength ; it openly censured and pro- 
 tested. Its action was too powerful to be arrested or even 
 directed ; it was nearing the steps of the throne ; people 
 already spoke of the ministers as being popular or unpopular, a 
 new expression which, taken in the revolutionary acceptation, 
 would have degraded in their own eyes the counsellors of Louis 
 XIV., who only desired the esteem and consideration of the 
 king, but which flattered the republican vanity of M. Necker 
 because it gave him an influence of his own. 
 
 Ordinary expedients were exhausted : it was thought that no 
 more reforms could possibly be made, and yet the expenditure 
 exceeded the revenue by an enormous sum. The deficit of 1783 
 was more than eighty millions. M. Necker, whatever he may 
 have said in his official report, left it on retiring at nearly 
 seventy millions. Now that the infatuation he had aroused 
 has subsided, everybody acknowledges this as a fact. The bonds 
 
 1 Mademoiselle de Chalus, married to the Comte de Narbonne- Lara, brigadier- 
 general. She was maid-of-honour to Queen Marie Leczinska, and subsequently to 
 the dauphiness. She was the mother of the Comte de Narbonne, Minister of War in 
 1 79 1, spoken of above. 
 
 2 The financial account handed in by Necker was published in January 1781. It 
 was the first time that "the secret of the finances was placed before the public," which 
 until then, was ignorant as to its payments to the State, and as to that which the 
 State expended. Thus the effect was prodigious. Necker, by this stroke of policy, 
 reconquered public opinion, and regained credit.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 75 
 
 of the Receivers-General, that of the treasurers, of the registrars, 
 which are made use of to make anticipated payments, were 
 only negotiated at a fearful loss. The portions of the loans 
 of M. Necker, which did not bear life-annuities, bore promise 
 of such speedy repayment as to empty the royal treasury. 
 For, in the year 1786, those repayments amounted to nearly 
 fifty-three millions, and they were to increase from year to 
 year until 1790. 
 
 This was no longer a time when the revenues of the State 
 could be increased by abandoning the fiscal laws to the interpre- 
 tation of companies, who knew how to extend their application 
 even to its utmost consequences over property and industry. 
 The four sous per livre levied by M. de Fleury was too great a 
 burden for several provinces and was levied with difficulty. 
 Offices only to be obtained by purchase were declined. The 
 parlement was unwilling to register any more loans. The 
 public funds were falling day by day. The Bourse of Paris 
 received its impetus from speculations made on behalf of private 
 establishments. They bought or sold shares of the Bank of 
 Discount, of the India Company, of the water companies 
 of Paris, of insurance companies, &c. As usual in times of 
 calamity, gambling occupied the attention of all. The govern- 
 ment tried to raise some money by obtaining an Order in 
 Council authorising the creation of lotteries amounting to 
 several millions ; but these weak means had limits, and now 
 they were reached. 
 
 M. de Calonne, thwarted in all his operations, attacked on 
 all sides, sapped by the intrigues of the Archbishop of Tou- 
 louse, but having still M. de Vergennes and the king on his side, 
 believed he would be able to overcome all the difficulties which 
 assailed him by resorting to a new method, the result of which 
 was not to be devoid of success. He formed the project of 
 summoning an Assembly of Notables ; 1 he hoped, by this un- 
 expected appeal, to replace the national sanction, the registra- 
 
 1 The Assembly of the Notables was a compromise imagined by the minister to 
 obviate the necessity of convening the States-General. Calonne wished to impose 
 a land-tax, but, foreseeing the resistance of the parlement and of the clergy, he 
 was anxious to find support in the nation. The Assembly met on February 22, at 
 Versailles, and broke up on the 25th of May.
 
 76 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 tion of the parlement, which had been refused him, and to regain 
 the opinion of the public, before which he was confident he could 
 appear with advantage. 
 
 At the very first sitting of the assembly, he proposed the 
 formation of provincial assemblies throughout the kingdom, the 
 suppression of statute-labour, of provincial customs and of several 
 duties connected with the collection of taxes and disapproved by 
 public opinion, the reduction of the excise duties on salt, and the 
 freedom of the corn trade. 
 
 He boldly resolved to increase the deficit by the sacrifice of 
 ten millions on the product of the salt-duties, of twelve millions 
 on the customs and the duties connected with the collection of 
 taxes, of ten millions on the villein-tax, of seven millions to help 
 the clergy to pay their debts, the principal part of which would be 
 cancelled by the alienation of the sporting rights, and of the 
 honorary rights attached to its possession ; and, in addition, by 
 an expenditure of ten millions to replace the statute-labour, and 
 of six millions for the encouragement of agriculture, the arts and 
 commerce. He flattered himself that, as a compensation for so 
 many advantages, he would easily be allowed to raise or replace 
 a revenue amounting to from one hundred and ten to one 
 hundred and twelve millions. 
 
 He could already reckon on fifty of them in the regular receipt 
 of the two-twentieths of the net revenue of all the landed 
 property in France. The increase of this tax proceeded from 
 the proposal of M. de Calonne to destroy all the privileges of 
 corporations or of orders, all exemptions, all personal favours. 
 He gave to this new tax the name of subvention territoriale ; 
 and said that this would not be a new tax, since the charge for 
 those who were paying exactly the two-twentieths would not be 
 increased, and that it was only a matter of suppression of the 
 abuse of an unjust apportioning and of exemptions which those 
 who enjoyed them were ready to forego. 
 
 He estimated at twenty millions the revenue from the 
 establishment of the stamp duty. 
 
 The infeofTment of domains, and a better administration of 
 the forests was to yield ten millions. 
 
 In order to reimburse these sums at fixed periods, he issued
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 77 
 
 an annual loan of twenty-five millions, which was only to be 
 repaid after fifteen years. 
 
 He also submitted retrenchments amounting to fifteen 
 millions. 
 
 This was indeed a vast plan, but it could not be carried out 
 seeing that the Notables had no power to vote it ; it was im- 
 posing as a whole ; it presented the advantage of soothing 
 the apprehensions of all those who had money invested in 
 the funds, and of adopting by legal means ideas, which, for some 
 time, had been circulating among the educated classes of 
 society, and were beginning to penetrate the mass of the 
 nation. 
 
 But M. de Vergennes was dead, 1 and the king was the only 
 and feeble support for a minister who was openly attacking so 
 many interests. 
 
 The clergy were subjected to a tax from which they had hoped 
 their gratuitous donations had relieved them for ever. They 
 maintained that, if they did not pay the twentieth under the 
 name of twentieth, they paid its equivalent under the name of 
 tenth ; then leaving the question which concerned them, they 
 attacked the subvention from a general point of view. M. de 
 Calonne was unfortunately persuaded that the payment of taxes 
 in kind would prove less difficult than a tax of fifty millions of 
 money. . He has set forth in one of his memoirs that the raising 
 of taxes in kind is the easiest way to make the division propor- 
 tional, to abolish arbitration, and to spare the tax-payers the cruel 
 necessity of paying when there is no harvest. The Archbishop 
 of Narbonne, the Archbishop of Toulouse, the Archbishop of 
 Aix, the Archbishop of Bordeaux, all well-versed in this question, 
 of which their tithes had taught them the weak side, showed 
 that the expenses of this mode of taxation would be very great, 
 that the difficulties to which it led were enormous, and that the 
 time required to make a correct classification of lands would 
 be a loss for the royal treasury. 
 
 The opinion of the higher clergy became that of the Notables 
 and M. de Calonne was beaten upon that point. 
 
 One check leads to another, often indeed, to many. 
 
 1 February 13, 1787.
 
 78 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 M. de Montmorin, 1 the successor of M. de Vergennes, had as 
 yet but little credit ; he had no opinion and was afraid even 
 of being thought to have one. M. de Miromesnil, the Keeper of 
 the Seals, found that the new enterprise was imprudent, and had 
 compromised the royal authority ; — the Baron de Breteuil was be- 
 stirring himself — the Archbishop of Toulouse was still intriguing, 
 and M. de Calonne, whose position the importance of affairs 
 still made tenable, and who, at the conference held at the house of 
 Monsieur? had shown a prodigious talent, left the solid ground 
 on which he had been standing, and no longer sought for means 
 of defence, except in the intrigues of the court. The Comte 
 d'Artois sustained his credit with the king ; Madame de Polignac 
 placed at his disposal all the influence she still enjoyed over 
 the queen. The poet Lebrun, 3 at M. de Vaudreuil's request, 
 addressed him in beautiful verse. 
 
 All this might have had some influence in ordinary times, 
 but it was of very little account in such ominous circum- 
 stances. M. de Calonne no longer spoke to the king with the 
 same assurance. The Assembly of the Notables had been an 
 expedient, and he needed an expedient for the Assembly of the 
 Notables. He had none. When one fears others, and has no 
 longer complete confidence in one's self, one only makes mistakes. 
 What ruined him was the interruption of the session during 
 the Easter vacation. The Notables left Versailles and came 
 to Paris, where they were received by all circles of society ; the 
 spirit of opposition they brought with them, strengthened by that 
 which they found there, seemed to the king to represent the 
 opinion of imposing numbers ; he was frightened at it. Since 
 
 1 The Comte Armand de Montmorin Saint-Herem, issue of a very old family of 
 Auvergne, was born in 1745. He was ambassador at Madrid. Member of the 
 Assembly of Notables, 1787. Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 1787. He was 
 a partisan of the constitutional monarchy. Minister of the Interior adinteritn, 1791, 
 he resigned all his functions in November of the same year. Arrested on August 20, 
 1792, he was summoned before the Assembly, which issued against him a writ of 
 accusation. He perished in the massacres of September. 
 
 2 The title given in France to the king's eldest brother. 
 
 3 Denis Ecouchard-Lebrun, lyric poet, was born in 1729. He has written 
 odes, epigrams and elegies, and made himself such a reputation that he was known 
 under the name of Lebrun Pindar. But his character was not as high as his talent. 
 After having lived for a long time on a pension from the queen, he joined the 
 revolutionary party, incited the violation of the tombs of Saint-Denis, demanded, 
 in another ode, the death of Marie-Antoinette, and ended by being the poet-laureate 
 of the empire. He died in 1807.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 79 
 
 the death of M. de Vergennes no one possessed enough 
 influence over his mind to reassure him. M. de Calonne was 
 dismissed. 
 
 In the long list of the ministers of the eighteenth century, I do 
 not know in what rank, nor by the side of whom, history will 
 place him ; but this is what I saw of him. 
 
 M. de Calonne had a free and brilliant mind, a shrewd and 
 quick intellect. He spoke and wrote well ; his diction was always 
 clear and elegant, he had the talent of embellishing what he knew, 
 and of avoiding the discussion of that which he did not know. The 
 Comte d'Artois, M. de Vaudreuil, Baron de Talleyrand, 1 the Due 
 de Coigny, 2 liked in Calonne the forms he had borrowed from them, 
 and the intellect he made them believe they possessed. M. de 
 Calonne was susceptible of attachment and fidelity to his friends ; 
 but, in selecting these, he followed more the dictates of his mind 
 than of his heart. Dupe of his vanity, he believed in good 
 faith that he loved the men his vanity had sought. He was ugly, 
 tall, nimble and well-shaped ; he had an intellectual counte- 
 nance and a pleasant voice. In order to enter office, he had 
 compromised or, at least, neglected his reputation. He was 
 surrounded by worthless people. The public credited him with 
 sense, but not with morality. When he obtained the post 
 of comptroller-general, he seemed, in most people's eyes, but the 
 clever steward of some ruined spendthrift. Great quickness of 
 mind pleases, but does not inspire confidence ; it is generally 
 thought that people so gifted display little attention and scorn 
 advice. Most men like industry and prudence in their ministers. 
 M. de Calonne was not encouraging in this respect ; in common 
 with all brilliant minds, he displayed thoughtlessness and pre- 
 sumption in all he did. This was the salient characteristic of his 
 nature, or rather of his way of proceeding. I will quote a re- 
 markable instance of this. M. de Calonne had come to Dam- 
 
 1 The Baron Louis de Talleyrand, uncle of the author, born in 1739, was 
 ambassador to the King of the Two Sicilies in 1785, and died in 1799. He had 
 married Mademoiselle Marie-Louise de Saint-Eugene Montigny, niece of de 
 Calonne. 
 
 2 Henri De Franquetot, Due de Coigny, born in 1737. Governor of Choisy (1748), 
 lieutenant-general (1780), first equerry to the king since 177 1. He emigrated in 1791 ; 
 became captain-general in Portugal. Returned to France in 1814, and was appointed 
 Marshal of France and Governor of the Invalides. He died in 1821. 
 
 *y
 
 80 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 pierre, 1 to visit Madame de Luynes, on the day following that 
 on which the king had decided to summon an Assembly of the 
 Notables. He was intoxicated with the success of his report 
 to the council of ministers. He read it to us, enjoining the 
 greatest secrecy. This was at the close of the summer of 1786. 
 A week before February 22, 1787, the very day of the 
 opening of the Assembly, he wrote me a note, in which he 
 pressed me to go and spend the week with him at Versailles, 
 to assist him in revising some of the memorandums which he 
 was to submit to the Assembly. He added that I should find 
 all the material necessary to elucidate the points I should under- 
 take to treat. He had written a similar letter to M. de la 
 Galaiziere, 2 to M. Dupont de Nemours, to M. de Saint-Genis, to 
 M. Gerbier, 3 and to M. de Cormerey. We found ourselves all, 
 on the same morning, in the study of M. Calonne, who handed 
 us bundles of papers relative to each of the questions which we 
 were to treat. From these we were to draft all the memorandums 
 and bills, which were to be printed and submitted to the dis- 
 cussion of the Assembly eight days later. Thus, on February 14. 
 not a line of this work had yet been written. We divided among 
 us this immense labour. I took upon myself the memorandum 
 and bill on corn ; I wrote them both without assistance. I worked 
 with M. de Saint-Genis on the memoir relative to the payment of 
 the debts of the clergy, and with M. de la Galaiziere on that con- 
 cerning statute labour. M. de Cormerey drew up the whole project 
 relative to the abolition of the barriers. 4 Gerbier wrote paragraphs 
 on all questions. My friend Dupont, who believed great good 
 was to be accomplished, applied all his imagination, mind and 
 heart, to the questions which came nearest to his views. We 
 
 1 Dampierre, village of Seine-et-Oise on the Yvette, at some distance from Ram- 
 bouillet. The chateau built by Mansart for the Due de Lorraine, became afterwards 
 the property of the de Luynes family. 
 
 2 The Marquis Chaumont de la Galaiziere, born in 1697, was Intendant of 
 Soissons, and Chancellor of Lorraine (1737). Councillor of State in 1766, mem- 
 ber of the Royal Council of Finances (1776). He died in 1787. 
 
 3 Pierre Gerbier, a celebrated counsel to the parlement of Paris. He was born 
 at Rennes in 1725. He was one of the few counsels who consented to plead before 
 the commission instituted by Maupeou, during the interregnum of the pai-lement. 
 He was nevertheless elected staff-bearer of his order in 1787. He died in the 
 following year. 
 
 4 These were internal customs which Calonne wished to do away with, and to 
 restrict to the frontiers.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. Si 
 
 thus accomplished, in a week, with tolerable success, a task 
 which the presumption and heedlessness of M. de Calonne had 
 led him to neglect for five months. 
 
 The king, compromising with himself, had been weak enough 
 to abandon his minister, but was more desirous than ever to carry- 
 out the projects which had been brought before the Notables, and 
 he sought to find as a successor to M. de Calonne, a man whose 
 own opinion would lead him to follow the plans proposed. 
 
 M. de Fourqueux 1 seemed the most suitable in this respect. 
 His great simplicity, his ideas, his freedom from all intrigue, and 
 his good reputation pleased the king. But his assent had to be 
 obtained. M. de Calonne, who preferred him to any one else, and 
 who feared that the choice of the king might eventually fall on 
 the Archbishop of Toulouse, wrote to M. de Fourqueux. He 
 instructed M. Dupont, who had had, through M. Turgot, M. de 
 Gournay, and M. de Trudaine, 2 former relations with M. de 
 Fourqueux, to carry the letter to him. 
 
 I only mention this insignificant detail because it led to a 
 rather entertaining scene. While M. de Calonne was gathering up 
 all the papers, which he foresaw he might need if his administra- 
 tion were attacked, his particular friends were awaiting him in 
 the large drawing-room of the comptroller-general, where they 
 were meeting perhaps for the last time. They had been there 
 a long while .... no one spoke .... it was eleven o'clock 
 in the evening .... the door opens .... Dupont enters pre- 
 cipitately and shouts in great excitement : " Victory ! victory ! 
 Mesdames . . . ." Everybody rises and surrounds him, whilst he 
 repeats : " Victory ! M. de Fourqueux accepts, and he will follozv oil 
 the plans of M. de Calonne. . . ." The astonishment caused by 
 this kind of victory, on Madame de Chabannes 3 Madame de 
 
 1 Michel Bouvard de Fourqueux, Counsellor of parlement (1738), Attorney- 
 General of the Court of Accounts (1769), Councillor of State (1769), Intendant of 
 Finances. He was for a short time comptroller-general in 1787. 
 
 2 Ch. de Trudaine de Montignv, born in 1733, was Intendant-General of Finances 
 (1763). He declined the office of comptroller-general, and died in 1777. He had 
 by his marriage with Mademoiselle Fourqueux, two sons who were guillotined in 
 1794. 
 
 3 Marie-Elizabeth de Talleyrand, daughter of Daniel-Marie de Talleyrand, and 
 aunt of the author. She married, in 1759, the Comte Charles de Chabannes La 
 Palisse, colonel of grenadiers. She was lady-of-honour to Madame* 
 
 * The title given to the king's sister, to his brother's wife, and to his daughters ; that of 
 Mademoiselle being reserved to the king's grand-daughters.— (Translator.) 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Laval, Madame de Robecq, and Madame d'Harvelay, greatly 
 scandalized Dupont, who loved M. de Calonne on account of the 
 provincial assemblies, and who did not know that these ladies 
 loved the provincial assemblies on account of M. de Calonne. 
 Vesmeranges, 1 who was also waiting, and who cared little, either 
 for the provincial assemblies or for M. de Calonne, but who 
 felt the greatest respect for the comptroller-general, left im- 
 mediately for Paris, in order to prepare, ahead of everybody 
 else, the speculations which the nomination of M. de Fourqueux 
 was likely to render advantageous. 
 
 This new ministry was of short duration. M. de Fourqueux 
 soon grew discouraged, and the queen, at last, obtained the 
 nomination of the Archbishop of Toulouse, whose mind and 
 character were not on a level with the circumstances in which 
 France was now placed. 
 
 On entering office the latter made sacrifices to public opinion, 
 which, encountering only weakness, became each day more 
 exacting. Nothing could be obtained from the Assembly of 
 the Notables, but complaints and the advice to convoke the 
 States- General, and, in truth, I do not see how the Notables 
 could have done otherwise than as they did. All concession 
 on their part would have been useless, because they were really 
 without power to act ; and, had they done so, they would only 
 have made themselves odious to no purpose. 
 
 It was therefore a great mistake to have summoned them 
 without being previously sure of directing their deliberations. 
 For the competence of the parkments having been called into 
 question, or rather their incompetence being implicitly pro- 
 claimed by the mere fact of convening the Notables, they were 
 henceforth powerless. Thus they refused to do what was 
 asked of them, alleging that they had not the right to do so. 
 Their refusal was punished by exile, which made them popu- 
 lar ; they were recalled soon after, which making them 
 feel their importance more, could but induce them to avoid 
 compromising it. All these measures having served only to 
 show the limits of royal authority, without being of any assistance 
 
 1 M. de Vesmeranges was intendant of the stations, relays, and post-houses of 
 France.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 83 
 
 to it, there only remained the alternative of being self- 
 sufficient, asking sacrifices from no one — which the deficit in 
 the treasury rendered it impossible to do — or of convoking the 
 States-General. The struggle of the Archbishop of Toulouse 
 with the parlements was of sufficient interest to induce me to 
 relate it in all its details, in the second part of these recollec- 
 tions, which I have specially devoted to it, and in which the Due 
 d'Orleans, whose political life was closely connected with the 
 parliamentary opposition of this period, plays a leading part. 
 
 None of the operations of the Archbishop of Toulouse suc- 
 ceeded ; the influence which he had used to overthrow M. de 
 Calonne was entirely his own. Although he deprived M. de 
 Calonne of the blue riband ; l although he obtained for himself a 
 cardinal's hat, the archbishopric of Sens, the abbey of Corbie ; 
 although he made his brother Minister of War, 2 neither fear nor 
 favour gave him a single supporter. Home opposition was 
 becoming stronger, the foreign policy of France was annihilated ; 
 Holland, so easy to defend, had just been abandoned. 3 The royal 
 treasury was empty, the throne was deserted ; the diminution of 
 the royal power was the reigning passion of the moment ; every 
 subject considered himself too much governed ; yet, it is probable 
 that at no other period in our history, were people subjected 
 to a milder rule, and never did they, individually and collectively, 
 so much trespass beyond proper bounds. 
 
 The political existence of every nation depends essentially 
 upon the strict observance of the duties imposed upon each 
 individual. If, at the same moment, all these duties cease to 
 be performed, social disorder ensues. This was the position of 
 France when the Archbishop of Sens left the ministry. 
 
 1 That of the order of the Holy Ghost (ordre du Saint- Esprit), the highest order 
 of chivalry under the old monarchy. — (Translator.) 
 
 - Louis Marie de brienne, born in 1730, Lieutenant-General, Minister of War 
 (1787-1788). He was guillotined May 10, 1794, with his two sons and Madame de 
 Canisy, his daughter. 
 
 3 Holland had re-established the stadtholdership in 1747, in the person of the 
 Prince of Orange ; his tyranny irritated all parties, and in 1784, the states deprived 
 him of the greater part of his authority. The prince, supported by a fraction of the 
 nobility and of the populace, called England and Prussia to his aid. The states 
 claimed the intervention of France, which had not failed them in 1785, after their 
 quarrel with the emperor. But the Cardinal de Brienne did not dare to assemble an 
 army on the frontier. The Dutch were crushed by the Prussian army, and delivered 
 to the fury of the victorious faction (September, 1787). 
 
 G 2
 
 84 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 The Protestants were stirring themselves and manifested 
 alarming confidence in M. Necker. 
 
 All classes were ready to embrace enthusiastically the new 
 ideas. All the men who had been to college or to an academy, 
 looked upon the application of what they had learned or read 
 there, as conquests to be made by the human mind. Each 
 state wished to be regenerated. 
 
 The clergy, who ought to be as immovable as dogmas, had 
 been the first to propose great innovations. They had requested 
 the king to convene the States-General. 
 
 The pays d'etats 1 only saw in their treaties of union with 
 France, a means of opposing all the general measures pro- 
 posed by the government. 
 
 The parlements seditiously abdicated the power which they 
 had exercised for centuries, and called from every direction for 
 representatives of the nation. 
 
 The administration itself, which until then had cherished the 
 honour of being appointed by the king to represent him, now 
 found its obedience humiliating, and wished to be independent. 
 
 Thus, all the bodies of the State were diverging from their 
 first destination, each one had broken its bonds, and had entered 
 on a declivity which, deprived as they were of experience, light 
 and support, must necessarily draw them into the precipice ; 
 therefore, from this time everything presents the character of 
 fatality. 
 
 Affairs were in this state when, in spite of his personal re- 
 pugnance, the king felt obliged to recall M. Necker, who, by 
 works flattering prevailing ideas, and published at carefully 
 studied intervals, had managed to keep constantly the attention 
 of the public upon him. 2 He might, perhaps, in ordinary times 
 have worked some good ; I do not know, personally I do not 
 believe it, but I am sure, that, in 1788, the king could not have 
 
 1 Certain pays d'etat s, Brittany for instance, at the time of their union with France 
 had made some formal reservations, and exacted the maintenance of all their rights 
 and privileges. 
 
 2 Necker resumed the direction of public affairs on August 25, 17S8. During his 
 retirement he had published a new report on the finances, which appeared in 1784, 
 under the name of Administration des Finances ^3 vols. 8vo.), of which he sold nearly 
 80,000 copies. He had also published his correspondence with M. de Calonne (1787, 
 4" )•
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 85 
 
 made a worse choice. At the time of a purely national crisis, to 
 put at the head of affairs a foreigner, a commoner from a little 
 republic, professing a religion which was not that of the majority 
 of the nation, only endowed with moderate talents, full of himself, 
 surrounded by flatterers, without personal consistency, and con- 
 sequently needing to please the people, was indeed to place one's 
 trust in a man who could only overcome the difficulties of the 
 situation, and that badly, by summoning a meeting of the 
 States-General. It had been shown in every possible way that 
 the latter were dreaded, yet the only reason which made them 
 dreaded was ignored. The nature of the danger had been mis- 
 understood ; therefore nothing was done to prevent it, and, on 
 the contrary, it was made inevitable. 
 
 The States-General were composed of deputations of the 
 three orders of the State, so that no one was, or could be, a 
 member except by election. All that could be hoped or feared 
 was consequently subject to the result of the elections, which 
 itself depended upon the method according to which they should 
 be carried on. 
 
 It was evident that a coalition of the three orders against the 
 throne was a thing morally impossible ; that if it were attacked 
 it could not be by the first order nor by the second, nor as long 
 as these two existed ; but by the third, after it should have anni- 
 hilated the two others, and that its first blows should be directed 
 against these. It was equally evident that the first and second 
 orders having nothing to gain over the third, had consequently no 
 interest in attacking it, and could have no desire to do so, while 
 the third, being very differently situated with regard to the two 
 others, was naturally the only one to be feared and against 
 which it was necessary to be forearmed. In this state of affairs, 
 the only end to secure was the preservation of legitimate rights, 
 and it was evident this could not be attained except by propor- 
 tioning the force of resistance of the first two orders to the force 
 of aggression of the third, and that it was necessary that the 
 former should be made as great and the latter as feeble as 
 possible. 
 
 There were two methods for this. 
 
 The number of deputies from each order might be so fixed
 
 86 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 that the most important members of this order in rank and 
 fortune should suffice to fill the deputation, and the right to elect 
 or the right of being elected might be so restricted that the choice 
 should, of necessity, fall upon them. In this way, there were 
 reasons to believe that, in the deputations of the first two orders, 
 class-feeling would not be weakened by any opposition ; that the 
 deputation of one would feel as interested in defending that of 
 the other as its own ; that, in case of attack, the aggressors could 
 have no secret intelligence in their ranks nor find there auxili- 
 aries ; and, that in the deputations of the third order, the fear of 
 losing, outweighing the desire of acquisition, would cause the 
 spirit of preservation to prevail over that of domination. 
 
 It still remained (and this would have been the best plan) to 
 substitute for the first two orders a peerage composed of 
 members of the episcopacy and of heads of noble families of 
 the oldest nobility, greatest wealth and lustre, and limit the 
 election to the third order which would have formed a separate 
 assembly. 
 
 Many people, after the Revolution broke out, sought a 
 method by which it might have been averted, and, with 
 this object, they imagined various remedies corresponding with 
 the causes to which they ascribed it ; but, at about the time 
 when the Revolution broke forth, it could only be prevented 
 by one of the two methods I have just indicated. 
 
 M. Necker adopted neither the one nor the other. He fixed 
 the number of deputies in such a manner that each of the first 
 two orders was to elect three hundred members, which was far 
 too many to avoid the necessity of extending the choice to the 
 inferior ranks which it was advisable to exclude. 1 
 
 On the other hand, almost unlimited latitude was left as to 
 the right to elect or to be elected, which put the higher clergy 
 and nobility in the minority, in the deputation of their order ; 
 and caused the third order to be composed .almost exclusively 
 of barristers — a class of men, whose method of thinking, neces- 
 sarily resulting from their profession, render them generally very 
 dangerous. But the greatest of all mistakes was to authorise the 
 
 1 The States-General were composed of 1,145 deputies — 291 for the clergy, 270 for 
 tlie nobility, and 584 for the Third Estate.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 87 
 
 third order to itself elect as many deputies as the other two 
 together. As this concession could only be useful to it in the 
 case of a fusion of the three orders into a single body, it could 
 not have been done without presupposing this fusion, and con- 
 senting implicitly to it. The attempts the third estate would 
 make to obtain the fusion were thus rendered legitimate before- 
 hand, its chances of success increased, and absolute prepon- 
 derance in the body in which the three orders were to be blended 
 was assured to it. 
 
 There was in M. Necker a something which prevented his 
 foreseeing and therefore of fearing the results of his own 
 measures. He persuaded himself that he possessed an all- 
 powerful influence over the States-General, that the members 
 of the third order, above all, would listen to him as to an 
 oracle, would only see with his eyes, would do nothing except 
 by his advice, and would not use, against his will, the weapons 
 he had put into their hands. An illusion which was to be of 
 short duration. Precipitated from the height where his vanity 
 alone had placed him, and from which he flattered himself that 
 he ruled events, he had to lament in retirement the evils he 
 had not wished to cause, and to deplore the excesses which 
 horrified his probity, but which, had he been more skilful and 
 less presumptuous, he might have spared France and the 
 world. 
 
 His presumption rendered him absolutely incapable of seeing 
 that the movement then taking place in France, was the result 
 of a passion, or rather of the errors of a passion, common 
 to all men, vanity. In the majority of nations it exists only in a 
 subordinate form, and only constitutes one shade of the national 
 character, or else it is apparent only in a single object, while 
 with the French, as formerly with the Gauls, their ancestors, it 
 mingles with all, it rules in everything with an individual and 
 collective energy which makes it capable of the greatest ex- 
 cesses. 
 
 In the French Revolution, this passion did not figure alone ; 
 it awakened others which it called to its assistance, but these 
 remained subordinate ; they took its colour and spirit, acted 
 in accordance with it and to further its ends. It so far gave the
 
 88 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 impulse to and directed the movement of the French Revolution, 
 that one may really say this great event was born of vanity. 
 
 Directed towards a certain aim, and confined to certain 
 limits, the passion of which I speak, binds subjects to the 
 State ; it animates and vivifies it ; it then takes the name of 
 patriotism, emulation, love of glory. By itself, and apart from 
 its direction towards a determined end, it is only the desire for 
 pre-eminence. One can desire pre-eminence for his country ; 
 one can desire it for a body of which one is a member, one can 
 desire it for one's self,and,in this case, one may desire to obtain it in 
 a single thing or in several, in the sphere where one is placed or 
 outside of that sphere. One can, in short, but not without mad- 
 ness, desire to have it in everything and over all. If circum- 
 stances are such that, with the generality of the members of 
 a State, this desire bear upon social distinctions, the inevitable 
 consequence will be that the greater number will wish only for 
 those titles of distinction that each of them may flatter himself 
 that he has, or has acquired, to the exclusion of all those 
 which by their nature can only be the privilege of a very small 
 number ; thus from the desire for pre-eminence will proceed 
 the spirit of political equality. This is precisely what happened 
 in France just before the Revolution. As revolutionarily set 
 forth by Abbe Sieyes, 1 in his essay on privileges, it was a 
 natural and necessary consequence of the situation in which 
 France then was. 
 
 1 Emmanuel Joseph Sieyes was born at Frejus in 1748. He took orders, and was 
 vicar-general at Rennes, played a certain part in the philosophical movement, and 
 became acquainted with all the writers of the time. He was a member of the pro- 
 vincial assembly of Orleans. In 1789, he published his celebrated pamphlet, What 
 is the Third Estate ? of which 30,000 copies were sold in a few days. Deputy of 
 Paris, he became one of the most influential members of the Third Estate. He was 
 elected president (June, 1790); member of the administration of the Department of 
 Paris (February, 1791). He declined at that time the archbishopric of Paris. In 
 1792, he was elected to the Convention, of which he became president. He voted for 
 the death of the king. He held aloof during the Reign of Terror, was appointed, 
 in 1795, a member of the Council of the Five Hundred, and sent as minister to 
 Berlin, in 1798. He entered the Directory (1799), and became the head of it. He 
 attached himself to Bonaparte, and prepared with him the coup d'etat of the iSth 
 Brumairc. Provisory consul, he presented his famous constitutional project, was 
 replaced by Cambaceres, and entered the Senate. He was, in 1814, one of the 
 promoters of the downfall of the emperor, was created peer of France during the 
 Hundred Days, and was exiled in 1816. He returned to France in 1830, and died in 
 1836. He had entered the Institut in 1795. Member of the French Academy in 
 1804, his name was cancelled from the list of this learned body in 1S16.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 89 
 
 The State, although nominally divided into three orders, was 
 really so only into two classes — the nobles and the plebeians ; 
 a portion of the clergy belonged to the first, and the rest to 
 the second of these two classes. 
 
 All pre-eminence in social order is founded on one of these 
 four things — power, birth, riches, and personal merit. 
 
 After the ministry of Cardinal de Richelieu and under 
 Louis XIV., all the political power became concentrated in the 
 hands of the monarch, and the orders of the State no longer 
 possessed any. 
 
 Industry and commerce gave riches to the plebeian class, 
 which developed all sorts of merit. 
 
 Only one title of pre-eminence thus remained : birth. 
 
 But, as nobility had been conferred for a long time on the 
 purchasers of venal offices, birth itself could be obtained for 
 money, thus lowering it to the level of riches. 
 
 The nobles themselves lowered it still more, by taking as 
 wives the daughters of enriched parvenus, rather than poor girls 
 of noble blood. Nobility could not fall below riches, without 
 poverty degrading it ; and the greater number of noble families 
 were relatively or absolutely poor. Degraded by poverty, it 
 was still more so by riches, when it had, as it were, sacrificed 
 itself to them by these misalliances. 
 
 In the Church and episcopacy, the most lucrative dignities 
 had become the almost exclusive portion of the aristocracy. 
 In this respect, the principles constantly followed by Louis XIV. 
 had been abandoned. The plebeian, that is to say by far the 
 most numerous section of the clergy, was therefore interested 
 in seeing that, in its order, not only merit should always prevail 
 over birth, but even that birth should count for nothing. In the 
 noble class, there was no fixed hierarchy : the titles which ought 
 to have served to indicate the rank had no constant value. 
 
 Instead of one nobility, there were seven or eight ; that of 
 the sword, and that of the magistracy, of the court, and the pro- 
 vincial nobility, the ancient and the recent nobility, the higher and 
 lesser nobility. Each of these pretended to be superior to the 
 others, which themselves claimed to be its equals. Beside these 
 pretensions, the plebeian raised his own claims, almost equal to
 
 9 o THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 those of the simple gentleman seeing how easily he could obtain 
 this title. Often quite superior to a gentleman in wealth and 
 talents, the plebeian did not believe himself inferior to the nobles 
 whom the simple gentleman considered as his equal. 
 
 The nobles no longer inhabited their feudal towers ; war was 
 no longer their sole occupation. They no longer lived ex- 
 clusively with nobles like themselves, with their men-at-arms, 
 or with the tenants of their estates. Another style of life had 
 given them other tastes, and these tastes other needs. Often 
 unoccupied, and making pleasure their only business, everything 
 which was a resource against weariness, all that added to their 
 enjoyment, became necessary to them. The plebeian, rich and 
 enlightened, being no longer dependent upon them, having indeed 
 no need of them, I have already said so, lived with them as with 
 his equals. 
 
 When I spoke of the upper French society at the time of the 
 Revolution, my object was to make known all the heterogeneous 
 elements of which it was then composed, and to point out the 
 results which such inconsistency of manners must necessarily 
 bring about. I have reached the time when love of equality 
 began to manifest itself without fear and with open face. 
 
 In polished times, the culture of letters, of the sciences, and of 
 the fine arts, constitutes professions followed by men who 
 generally belong, by their personal merit, to all that is most 
 elevated ; and, by their birth or fortune to all that is most inferior 
 in civil society. A secret instinct must induce them to raise the 
 advantages they possess to the level of, if not above, those of 
 which they are deprived. Besides, their aim is, in general, to secure 
 celebrity. The first condition for this is to please and to interest, 
 to succeed in which there is no safer way for them than to flatter 
 the ruling tastes and the prevailing opinions, which they 
 strengthen by flattering. Manners and public opinion tended to 
 equality ; thus these men became its apostles. 
 
 While there were few other riches than landed property, 
 and this was in the hands of the nobility, while industry and 
 commerce were the callings of inferior men, the nobles scorned 
 them, and, because they had once scorned them, they believed it 
 their right and even their duty to scorn them always (even when
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 91 
 
 relating themselves by marriage, which it shocked them to do, 
 with the men who followed those callings), and by this, they 
 incensed the pride of the plebeian class, who felt that one could 
 not scorn their industry without scorning themselves. 
 
 From among the ruins of its former existence, the nobility had 
 preserved certain privileges, which, in their origin, were only a 
 compensation for charges which they alone supported, but 
 which they had ceased to support. When the cause existed no 
 longer, these privileges appeared unjust ; but their injustice was 
 not that which made them most odious, it was rather by reason 
 of the fact that not on the quota but on the form of the tax, they 
 established a distinction in which the plebeian class saw less a 
 favour to the nobles than a slight to itself. 
 
 These sentiments in the plebeian class proceeded from the 
 spirit of equality, and served to encourage it. He who would not 
 be considered as an inferior, either claims or aspires to be treated 
 on a footing of equality. 
 
 I ought to say besides, that that portion of the army so impru- 
 dently sent to the aid of the English colonies struggling against 
 their mother-country, was imbued in the New World with the 
 doctrines of equality. It returned full of admiration for these 
 doctrines and perhaps with the desire also to put them into 
 practice in France ; and, by a sort of fatality, it was even this very 
 time that Marshal de Segur l chose for reserving for the nobles 
 all the officers' promotions in the army. A host of articles ap- 
 peared denouncing the measure which closed to all who were not 
 nobles, a career in which Fabert 2 Chevert, 3 Catinat, 4 and others, 
 
 1 Philippe Henry, Marquis de Segur, belonged to an old family of Guyenne. 
 Born in 1724, he entered the army at fifteen, was badly wounded at Raucoux, and at 
 Lawfeld ; lieutenant-general (1760) ; wounded again at Clostercamp. Governor of 
 Franche-Comte (1775), Minister of War (1 780-1787), Marshal of France (1783). 
 Imprisoned under the Reign of Terror, he escaped death. In 1800, he received a 
 pension from the First Consul, who treated him with all the honours due to his high 
 dignity. He died in 1S01. 
 
 2 Abraham Fabert issued from a Lorraine family. He entered the army, and took 
 part in all the campaigns of his time. He became Marshal of France in 1654, and 
 died in 1662. 
 
 3 Francois de Chevert, born in 1695 at Verdun. He enlisted at nine years of age ; 
 at eleven he was appointed lieutenant in the regiment of Carne, lieutenant-colonel in 
 the campaign of Bohemia, where he made his name illustrious by the taking of Prague, 
 and later, in defending this city. Brigadier-general (1744), lieutenant-general (1748), 
 Grand Cross of the Order of St. Louis. He died in 1769. 
 
 4 Nicolas de Calinat de la Fauconnerie, born in 1637. He left the study of the
 
 92 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 plebeians like themselves, had covered themselves with glory. 
 The lucrative professions being forbidden to the poor nobility, 
 it had been thought advisable to offer them this compensation. 
 Only this side of the question had been considered. But this 
 measure, substituting evidently birth for personal merit, in what 
 was the proper domain of merit, offended both reason and public 
 opinion. For, in order to indemnify the nobles for the loss of 
 advantages which the plebeian class already looked upon as a 
 prejudice humiliating to them, on the latter were inflicted an in- 
 justice and an affront. This measure completed the estrange- 
 ment of the troops already disaffected by the introduction of a 
 foreign discipline which exposed them to a treatment, which, 
 from the earliest times had been considered in France, as 
 ignominious. 1 It seemed as though it were wished not to be able 
 to depend on our brave soldiers at the time of the greatest 
 danger, and, in fact, their assistance failed when it was most 
 needed. 
 
 Thus all tended to injure the noble class : that which had been 
 taken from it, and that which had been left to it, the poverty of 
 some of its members, the wealth of the others, their vices and 
 even their virtues. 
 
 But all this, as I have said before, when speaking of the 
 second ministry of M. Necker, was the work of the government, 
 at least as much as the result of the general evolution of human 
 things. It was not the work of the plebeian class, which 
 merely profited by it. Equality had come, so to say, to meet the 
 plebeians. To resist its advances would have required in the 
 greater mass of men, a moderation and foresight of which but 
 few privileged individuals are capable. 
 
 Equality once established between the two classes by new 
 manners and accepted by public opinion, could not fail to be 
 
 law for the army. He became lieutenant-general in 1688. In the following year he 
 conducted, in Savoy and Piedmont, a campaign which has remained famous (victories 
 of Staffarde and of Marsaille). Marshal of France (1699). Minister Plenipotentiary 
 at Turin (1695). Again at the head of the army of Iialy (1701), he commanded 
 afterwards in Alsace, and died in 171 2. 
 
 1 Lieutenant-General Comtede Saint-Germain, having been called to the Ministry 
 of War, tried to re-establish discipline in the army. But he wished to introduce into 
 France the corporal punishments in vogue with the Germans and the English. Public 
 opinion was aroused against this innovation, and the Comte de Saint-Germain lost all 
 the favour he commanded when he took office (1776).
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 93 
 
 established by law as soon as the occasion should present 
 
 itself. 
 
 At the very opening of the States-General, the deputation 
 of the third order began the attack against the two others. Its 
 leaders were men, who did not belong to the Third Estate, but 
 had joined it out of spite at a disappointed ambition, or from the 
 desire to open, by means of popularity, a road to fortune. They 
 might perhaps have been easily led ; the need of it was not felt 
 until success would no longer have been of any use. 
 
 Whoever is called upon to join any public body, should 
 prove his fitness to become a member of it and produce the 
 titles which justify his appointment. But to whom should he 
 prove it ? Evidently to those whose interest it is that no one 
 should introduce himself into this body by means of sham or 
 incomplete titles, and who have no interests contrary to those of 
 that body, if it be already formed ; and, if it be not, to those 
 of the majority of the members who are appointed to form 
 it, and to none other. Reason says this, and the policy 
 of all peoples has been at all, times consonant with this 
 principle. 
 
 The deputation of the third order, however, claimed that 
 the members of each deputation ought to prove their competency 
 before the three orders, and that to effect this they should as- 
 semble in the same hall ; in other terms, that they should verify 
 their qualifications in common. This pretension once admitted, 
 this order would have said to the other two deputations : By 
 admitting the consequence, you have necessarily admitted the 
 principle, and this verification of powers supposes that the three 
 deputations form but a single body ; a single body admits only 
 of deliberation in common, and of individual vote ; the three 
 deputations forming but a single body, there are no more orders, 
 for orders cannot exist except as separate and distinct bodies : 
 where there are no longer orders, the titles and privileges which 
 constitute them must cease. This is what this deputation wished 
 to achieve, but, not daring to proceed openly, it took a round- 
 about way. 
 
 Without foreseeing, perhaps, all the consequences of its pre- 
 tension, or denying them, it insisted ; and, while discussing and
 
 94 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 deliberating, it proclaimed itself a National Assembly, 1 repre- 
 senting thus, implicitly, the two other deputations as simple 
 conventicles, and pointing them to popular hatred as foreign 
 to the nation and as being its enemies. 
 
 I was a member of the deputation of the order of the clergy. 
 My opinion was that the States-General should be dissolved ; 
 but that, being obliged to take things as they were, they should 
 be convoked anew, according to one of the plans I have indicated 
 above. I submitted this advice to the Comte d'Artois, who was 
 then displaying kindness, and, — if I may dare to quote one of the 
 expressions he made use of, — even friendship towards me. My 
 advice was thought too risky ; it was an act of force, and there 
 was no one about the king to wield force. I had, in the evening, 
 several interviews at Marly, all of which proved useless, and 
 convinced me that I could be of no service, and that, in this 
 case, it would be folly to think of anything but self. 2 
 
 The composition of the States- General evidently reducing 
 the two first orders to mere ciphers, there remained but one 
 reasonable course to take, it was to yield without being forced to 
 do so, and while there would still be some credit in doing it. 
 This might prevent matters being carried to extremes ; it com- 
 pelled the third order to be circumspect, and enabled the other 
 two orders to retain some influence over the common deliber- 
 ations, and to gain time, which often means to gain everything ; 
 and if there was still a chance to recover lost ground, this was 
 the only one. I did not hesitate, therefore, to join the men who 
 set this example. 
 
 The struggle became prolonged, the king intervened as 
 mediator, but failed. He ordered the deputation of the third 
 estate to separate, and is not obeyed ; so as to prevent their 
 meeting, the hall in which they held their sittings is closed. They 
 meet in a tennis hall, and take oath not to separate until they 
 have made a constitution, that is to say until they have destroyed 
 that of the kingdom. 3 Then it occurs to arrest by force the 
 
 1 Sitting of June 17, 1789. The Third Estate proclaimed itself a National 
 Assembly, on the motion of Lcgrand, deputy from Berry, and not on that of Sieyes, 
 as is generally believed. 
 
 2 See the Appendix, page 104, containing M. de Bacourt's account of these inter- 
 views. 
 
 :! June 20, 1789.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 95 
 
 movement which the government had failed to foresee, and the 
 instrument of force escapes from the hands which try to make 
 use of it. On the same day, the whole of France, cities, villages, 
 hamlets, are under arms. The Bastille is attacked, taken or 
 thrown open in a couple of hours, and its governor slaughtered. 1 
 Popular fury is vented on other victims. 2 From this moment the 
 government is powerless, there are no longer any States-General ; 
 they have given place to a single and all-powerful assembly ; and 
 the principle of equality is sanctioned. Those who have advised 
 the employment of force, those who have set it in motion, those 
 who have been its leaders, think only of their own safety. 
 A number of the princes leave the kingdom, and emigration 
 commences. 
 
 The Comte d'Artois had been the first to give the signal for 
 it ; his departure caused me much grief. I loved him ; it needed 
 all the force of my reason to keep me from following him, and to 
 enable me to resist the entreaties made to me on his behalf by 
 Madame de Carignan, to join him at Turin. It would be 
 a great mistake for any one to conclude from my refusal that I 
 blamed those who emigrated ; I did not blame them, but I 
 blamed the emigration. Nearly all the emigres were actuated 
 by a noble sentiment and by a deep devotion to the royal cause ; 
 but emigration was a false step. Whatever may have been its 
 motive, whether the fear of danger, offended self-love, the wish 
 to recover by force of arms what had been lost, or the idea of a 
 duty to fulfil, it appeared to me under all these aspects, but a 
 poor calculation. 
 
 There could have been a necessity for emigrating, only in the 
 case of a personal danger against which France could have offered 
 no refuge, or no sufficiently safe refuge, that is to say, in case of 
 general danger for the nobles. This danger did not exist then ; 
 it might be prevented, while the first effect of emigration was to 
 
 1 Bernard Jourdan de Launay, issued from a noble family of Normandy, born in 
 1740 at the Bastille, of which his father was governor; he also filled this post as 
 successor to M. de jumilhac. The part he played during the attack of July 14 is 
 well known ; how, having been compelled to surrender, he was massacred with several 
 of his officers, in spite of the efforts of Helie and of Hulin, the leaders of the assailants. 
 
 2 Besides the governor de Launay and his soldiers, the people massacred the 
 Prevot des Marchands* Flesselles, and, a few days after, the intendant Foulon and his 
 son-in-law, Bertier de Sauvigny, intendant of Paris. 
 
 * Provost of the Merchants — an office similar to that of Lord Mayor in England.
 
 96 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 create it. Not all the nobles, nor even the majority of them, 
 were able to leave the kingdom. Age, sex, infirmities, lack of 
 money and other causes, not less powerful, were an insuperable 
 obstacle to a large number. Only a portion of them, then, could 
 go abroad, and this absent portion must inevitably compromise 
 those who remained. Objects of suspicion, which soon degenerated 
 into hatred, the nobles who could not leave the country, must, 
 through fear, swell the number of the ruling party, or become 
 its victims. 
 
 The only loss with which as yet the spirit of liberty threatened 
 the nobility, was that of its titles and privileges. By emigration 
 this loss was not prevented, while by it the French aristocracy 
 ran the risk of adding to this loss a still greater one, that of 
 their estates. However painful for the nobility the loss of their 
 titles and privileges may have been, it was incomparably less so 
 than the situation to which they were going to be reduced by the 
 simple forfeiture of their revenues. The loss of titles alone 
 could be softened by the certainty that it was not irreparable, and 
 by the hope that it might even be repaired. In a great and ancient 
 monarchy, the spirit of equality, carried to its utmost conse- 
 quences, is a disease essentially transient, and this disease might 
 have been less severe and of much shorter duration had it been 
 less combated. But property once lost could not be as easily 
 restored as titles ; it might have been transferred, and have passed 
 through so many hands as to make it impossible ever to recover 
 it, and even dangerous to attempt to do so. The loss of property 
 would then be an incurable disease, not only for the nobles, but 
 for the entire State, the natural organization of which could be 
 but imperfectly restored as long as one of its essential elements 
 no longer existed, except partly. For nobility, an essential element 
 of a monarchy, is not a simple element, and birth without wealth, 
 or wealth without birth does not constitute, politically speaking, 
 a perfect nobility. 
 
 One could scarcely delude one's self so far as to believe that 
 what the entire class of the nobles, with the means of action and 
 influence that remained to it, had failed to defend and preserve, 
 could have been recovered with the mere help of that portion of 
 the nobility which had emigrated. All its hope would then
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 97 
 
 reside in the help of foreigners. But was there nothing to be 
 feared from such assistance ? Could it be accepted without 
 suspicion, if it were offered, and could it be implored without 
 scruples ? The greatness of the injury received was not sufficient 
 to excuse those who called to their assistance the help of a foreign 
 force. An act of this nature can be justified only by a concurrence 
 of extraordinary circumstances ; it should have been required by 
 the vital interests of the country itself ; to resort to it, all other 
 means must have previously failed ; the success of such inter- 
 vention must have been certain, and there must have been 
 undeniable proofs that neither the country, its integrity nor its 
 future independence would thereby be injured. But what certainty 
 could there be as to the next action of the foreigners, having 
 once crushed the Revolution ? What certainty was there that they 
 could crush it ? Was there a certainty of receiving real assistance, 
 and was it wise to trust simply in hopes ? Why go to meet 
 assistance which perhaps would not be forthcoming, when, even 
 with the certainty of its coming, reason advised to keep quiet and 
 await its arrival ? And, while waiting for it, one could, if the 
 social need of the country demanded it, co-operate with this 
 assistance in a more efficacious manner ; the chances of success 
 would be thus increased, and nothing be compromised ; while, in 
 going to seek assistance, one compromised all, relations, friends, 
 fortune, and the throne with them ; and not only the throne, but 
 the life of the monarch as well, and that of his family, which, 
 perhaps one day, on the brink of the abyss, or already in the 
 abyss, could only account for its misfortunes, by crying out : 
 " Behold, see where emigration has led us" 1 
 
 Thus, far from deserving to be regarded as the accomplish- 
 ment of a duty, the emigration needed to be excused, which it 
 could be only by the immensity of a personal danger from which 
 
 1 I can say that the positive opinion of Louis XVI. in this respect is found in 
 Memoirs I have read, and of which M. de Clermont-Gallerande is the author. They 
 are written in his hand, and are now in the possession of the Mnrquis de Fontenille. 
 In them, M. de Clermont * gives an account of the mission he had been charged by 
 the king to fulfil at Coblentz. He was instructed to describe to the king's brothers the 
 personal danger in which his life had been placed by the emigration (Prince Talleyrand). 
 
 * Charles, Marquis de Clermont-Gallerande, was the issue of a noble family of Maine. Born in 
 1744, he became brigadier-general, took part in the defence of the Tuileries on August 10, and was 
 long imprisoned under the Terror. It was he who, under the Consulate, delivered to Bonaparte 
 the letter by which Louis XVIII. invited him to re-establish him on the throne. Peer of France in 
 1814, he died in 1823. His Memoirs were published in 1825 at Paris (3 vols. 8vo). 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 there was no other way of escaping. These views, if another 
 order of things should some day be brought about, will, I hope, 
 be generally shared by the men who may perhaps still have to 
 struggle against the revolutionary torrent. 
 
 I resolved, therefore, not to leave France, until constrained to 
 do so by personal danger ; to do nothing to provoke it, not to 
 struggle against a torrent which must be allowed to pass ; but to 
 hold myself in a position enabling me to save those who could 
 be saved, to raise no obstacle between opportunity and myself, 
 and to hold myself in readiness for it. 
 
 The deputies of the third order before triumphing over the 
 two others had been engaged in drawing up a declaration of 
 rights in imitation of that made by the English Colonies, when 
 they proclaimed their independence. They continued to prepare 
 it after the fusion of the orders. This declaration was nothing 
 more than a theory of equality, a theory which may be summed 
 up as follows : 
 
 " There is no real difference, and there ought to be no per- 
 manent distinction, between men, other than that which proceeds 
 from personal merit. The distinctions which are inherent to the 
 tenure of offices are accidental and ought to be temporary, in 
 order that the right which each citizen has to pretend to them, 
 need not be illusory. All political power proceeds from the people 
 and returns to them. To them alone belongs the sovereignty. 
 What they wish is the law, and nothing is law but what they wish. 
 If they cannot exercise the sovereignty themselves, which is the 
 case when their numbers are too great for assembling together, it 
 must be exercised by representatives of their choice, who can do 
 all which they could do themselves, and whose power is therefore 
 without limit." 
 
 The incompatibility of an hereditary monarchy with such a 
 theory was flagrant. However, the Assembly wished, in good 
 faith, to preserve the monarchy and to apply to it the republican 
 theory which found universal support. It did not suspect that it 
 was difficult to conciliate them ; ignorance is so presumptuous, 
 and passions are so blind. By the boldest and most insolent of 
 usurpations, the Assembly arrogates to itself this sovereignty 
 which it attributes to the people; it declares itself constituted, that
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 99 
 
 is to say invested with the right to destroy all that exists, and to 
 substitute in its place all that may please itself. 
 
 It was a sad certainty that if the government wished to dis- 
 solve it, it would not obey, and that no one was in a position to force 
 it to obedience. To argue against it would have served no purpose. 
 In restricting one's self to contesting the power it claimed, one did 
 not prevent its acting ; to protest against its acts was a measure 
 full of danger, and unlikely to have the desired effect. But the 
 king could say to it : 
 
 " You hold as a principle that the sovereignty belongs to the 
 people. You hold in fact that it has delegated to you the ex- 
 ercise of it in its plenitude. I have my doubts upon that, to 
 say the least. It is necessary, above all, before going any further, 
 that this question be decided. I do not pretend to make myself 
 the judge ; neither can you be ; but this people is a judge that 
 you cannot challenge. I will interrogate it ; let its answer be 
 our law." 
 
 All the probabilities are, that if skilfully handled, the people, 
 at a time when revolutionary ideas had not yet tainted the 
 masses, and when what have since been called revolutionary 
 interests did not yet exist, would have disclaimed the doctrines 
 and disapproved the pretensions of the Assembly. Nothing then 
 would have been easier than to dissolve it. Being thus condemned, 
 these doctrines and these pretensions would have been so for 
 ever. If the people, on the contrary, had sanctioned them by 
 their votes, they would then have been subjected to all their 
 consequences, and justly subjected to them, having been able to 
 preserve themselves and not having willed to do so ; and no 
 share of responsibility would have rested on the monarch. From 
 an appeal to the people, there would have followed, it is true, 
 the necessity of recognizing him as sovereign, if he so declared 
 himself ; and this, it will perhaps be said, was a thing to be avoided 
 at any price. But the appeal to the people at the stage 
 which was reached, would not have created this necessity ; it 
 would, on the contrary, have presented the sole chance which 
 still existed, of avoiding it, in rendering it, from being present 
 and absolute as it was, contingent and simply possible. The 
 Assembly attributed to itself a power, ascribing its foundation to 
 
 H 2
 
 ioo THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the sovereignty of the people, and which could have no other. 
 This sovereignty was therefore acknowledged as soon as this 
 power was acknowledged, and there was an absolute necessity 
 for acknowledging it, unless the Assembly could be forced to 
 retract or to dissolve (two things equally impossible), or the 
 people could be led to pronounce against its decisions, which 
 could not be done without making them the judge. In this case, 
 the people, would, as I believe, have fulfilled the hopes placed in 
 them, — or would have betrayed these hopes. In the first sup- 
 position he would have crushed the evil at its birth, and caused 
 the Revolution to prove abortive ; in the second, he would 
 have rendered inevitable that which could only have been pre- 
 vented by his own interference, which would not have extended, 
 but have simply revealed the magnitude of the evil. The 
 advantage of such a course would have been to make it no 
 longer possible to entertain any delusion as to the real nature 
 of this evil ; it would no longer have occurred to anybody to 
 check it by means that were only calculated to aggravate it. It 
 would have been felt that, until it had passed through all its 
 phases of development, there was no remedy to be expected from 
 within ; its contagiousness would have become plain to all, and 
 Europe would not have rocked herself, as she did, in a false and 
 pernicious security. Thus, even by the worst supposition, the 
 appeal to the people would have been a step of the greatest 
 utility, without any admixture of inconvenience. Why then was 
 it not resorted to ? From prejudice, perhaps, or from passion, 
 for indeed prejudices and passions were not all on the one side ; 
 perhaps, also, because this remedy did not occur to any of the 
 men who formed then the councils of the king. 
 
 After a few attempts at force, abandoned almost as soon as 
 conceived, they trusted entirely to intrigue to destroy a power 
 that they had allowed to become too strong to be restrained, 
 or even directed, by so feeble a means. The Assembly was 
 therefore left almost to itself. In the midst of the passions 
 which agitated it, it soon lost sight of all the constituent princi- 
 ples of society. It no longer knew that there is for civil society 
 a necessary mode of organization without which it could not 
 exist.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 101 
 
 Fascinated by the chimerical ideas of equality and of the 
 sovereignty of the people, the Assembly committed endless faults. 
 
 The king was styled first representative, delegate of the 
 people, and chief of the executive power ; none of which titles 
 were his, none of which expressed the functions which he ought 
 to fill as monarch. 
 
 The right to convene, adjourn and dissolve the legislative 
 body was taken from him. 
 
 That body, having risen to be a power, became permanent, 
 and was to be renewed at fixed periods. It was to form but a 
 single house. 
 
 Every Frenchman of age, who was in receipt of wages and 
 who had not been sentenced to penal servitude or other igno- 
 minious punishment, was eligible or an elector, according as he 
 paid fifty francs in yearly taxes, or only three francs. 
 
 The elections had to be carried out by a medley of all 
 professions. 
 
 The nomination of the bishops, judges, and public officials 
 was ascribed to the constituencies. 
 
 The king had only the power of suspending provisionally 
 public officials. The right of dismissing them from public 
 service was vested in the general power of the electors. The 
 judges were only appointed for a time. 
 
 The initiative in making peace or war rested solely with the 
 sovereign ; but the right to declare the latter or to sanction 
 peace was reserved for the legislative power. 
 
 In the army, a scale of promotion by grades was established, 
 which deprived the king of two-thirds of his power of nominating. 
 
 The king could reject the proposals of the legislature, but with 
 this restriction, that what three successive legislatures should 
 adopt, should become law, notwithstanding the refusal of the 
 king to sanction it. 
 
 Such were the constitutional laws imposed upon political 
 and civil society in France by the Assembly ; these laws only 
 left a semblance of what had been royal power. 
 
 The men who had been the most anxious to destroy this 
 royal power perceived at last that they had gone too far, and 
 attempted to retrace their steps ; they succeeded only in losing
 
 102 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 their popularity. The torrent formed by ignorance and passion 
 was so violent that it was impossible to stem it. 
 
 Those who foresaw its ravages most clearly, were compelled 
 to confine themselves as much as prudence allowed, to playing a 
 passive part. 
 
 This I resolved to do on most questions. However, I felt 
 that I ought to speak on several matters relative to State 
 finance. I opposed the creation of paper money, and the reduction 
 of the interest on the national debt. I established, in a rather 
 extensive essay, the principles on which I believed a national 
 bank should be founded. I proposed the establishment of uni- 
 formity in weights and measures. I charged myself, also, with 
 the report of the Constitutional Committee on Public Instruc- 
 tion. 1 To accomplish this great work, I consulted the most learned 
 men, and the most prominent scholars of the time, amongst whom 
 I may mention M. de Lagrange, 2 M. de Lavoisier, 3 M. de la Place, 
 M. Monge, 2 M. de Condorcet, M. Vicq d'Azyr, 3 and M. de la 
 
 1 The following is a brief statement of the part played by Talleyrand at the Con- 
 stituent Assembly : He proposed the nullification of the imperative mandates (July 7, 
 1789) ; was elected member of the Committee appointed to draft a constitution (July 
 1 3) ; urged the suppression of tithes (August 11); caused the adoption of certain articles 
 in the declaration of rights (August 21) ; proposed proper measures to insure a loan 
 (August 27) ; proposed to apply the wealth of the clergy to the needs of the State 
 (October 10) ; presented a police regulation for Paris (November 5) ; proposed to make 
 an inventory of the properties of the clergy (November 7) ; was appointed to examine 
 the state of the Bank of Discount (November 26) ; rendered an account of this exam- 
 ination (December 4) ; proposed to consider the Jews as citizens (January 28, 1790) ; 
 proposed an address to the people to induce calmness (February 9) ; elected President 
 of the Assembly by 373 votes against 125 for Sieyes (February 26) ; proposed a method 
 for the conveyance and sale of the national lands (June 13) ; opposed the issue of 
 2,000,000,000 of francs * of paper money (September 18) ; reported on the rights of 
 registration (November 22) ; speech on the re-coinage of money (December 12) ; 
 caused the adoption of a project of law on the unification of weights and measures 
 (March 26, 1791) ; reported on a decree of the Department of Paris relative to 
 religious freedom (May 7) ; drew up a report on public instruction (September 10). 
 
 ■ Joseph-Louis Lagrange, born at Turin in 1736 of French parents, was at eighteen 
 years of age the first mathematician of Europe. In 1766, Frederick II. called him to 
 Berlin as President of the Academy. He came to Paris in 1786, entered the Institut 
 in 1795, was appointed senator under the Empire, and died in 1813. 
 
 3 Laurent Lavoisier, born at Paris in 1743, entered the Academy of Sciences at 
 twenty-five years of age, and obtained, soon after, the post of fermier-general. He 
 was the first chemist of his time. Arrested under the Terror, he was guillotined on 
 May 8, 1794. 
 
 4 Gaspard Monge, born at Beaune in 1746, was at first professor at the School of 
 Engineers at Mezieres. He entered the Academy of Sciences in 1780. Minister of 
 Marine after August 10, he was appointed a member of the Institut. He accom- 
 panied Napoleon, later, to Egypt, and became President of the Institute of Cairo. 
 Napoleon appointed him senator and Comte de Peluse. He died in 1818. 
 
 6 Felix Vicq d'Azir, born at Valognes in 1748, studied medicine, and opened, in 
 * ,£80,000,000.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 103 
 
 Harpe. 1 All assisted me. The reputation this work has 
 acquired demanded that I should name them. 
 
 A circumstance occurred, in which, in spite of all my repug- 
 nance, I thought it necessary to come to the front. Here are the 
 motives which decided me. 
 
 The Assembly pretended to regulate alone and by civil law 
 that which until then had been regulated only by a concourse 
 of the spiritual and temporal powers and by canonical and civil 
 laws. It made a particular constitution for the clergy, 2 exacting 
 from all the ecclesiastics in function an oath to conform to it, 
 under pain of being considered as resigning. Nearly all the 
 bishops refused to do so, and their seats being considered vacant, 
 the constituents nominated people to fill them. These newly 
 elected bishops were only too ready to dispense with the institu- 
 tion given by the Court of Rome ; but they could not do without 
 the episcopal character which could only be conferred upon them 
 by men who had received it. If no one should be found to confer 
 it upon them, it was greatly to be feared, not that all religion 
 would be proscribed, as came to pass a few years after, but, what 
 seemed to me more dangerous seeing that it might have been 
 more lasting, that the Assembly, by the doctrines it had sanc- 
 tioned, might soon force the country into Presbyterianism, more 
 in accord with the ruling opinions, and that France could not be 
 drawn back to Catholicism, whose hierarchy and forms are in 
 harmony with those of the monarchical system. I lent, there- 
 fore, my services to consecrate one of the newly-elected bishops, 
 who in his turn, consecrated the others. 3 
 
 1773, brilliant lectures on anatomy. Member of the Academy of Sciences (1774), 
 and of the French Academy, where he succeeded Buffon. First physician to the 
 queen (1789). He was the last chancellor of the old Academy (June, 1793), which 
 was suppressed on August 8 following. He died June 20, 1794. 
 
 1 J.-Fr. de la Harpe, born in Paris in 1739, litterateur and critic. The literary 
 lectures he was entrusted with at the establishment that Pilatre des Roziers had just 
 founded under the name of Lycee, made his reputation. La Harpe was arrested under 
 the Terror, and proscribed on Fructidor 18. He died in 1803. 
 
 s The civil constitution was voted by the Assembly on July 12, 1790. It is known 
 that it reduced the number of dioceses, decreed the election by the people of bishops 
 and curates, and suppressed the canonical institution. This was the origin of the 
 schism which divided the Church of France into sworn and unsworn clergy. 
 
 3 Talleyrand had been chosen as consecrating prelate, and with him Gobel, Bishop 
 of Lydda, and Miroudot, Bishop of Babylon. On February 24, 1791, Talleyrand 
 consecrated the first two constitutional bishops — Expilly, Bishop of Finistere, and 
 Marolles, Bishop of Aisne — in the Church of the Oratoire, Rue St. Honore.
 
 104 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 This done, I gave in my resignation of the bishopric of 
 Autun, and I thought only of abandoning the first career I 
 had followed ; I put myself at the disposition of events, and, 
 provided I remained a Frenchman, all else contented me. 
 The Revolution promised new destinies for the nation ; I fol- 
 lowed its course and ran my chances. I devoted to it the best 
 of all my energies, being resolved to serve my country for herself, 
 and I placed all my hopes on the constitutional principles that 
 were believed to be so nearly attained. This explains how and 
 why, at several periods, I entered, and re-entered public life ; 
 it also throws light on the part I have played. 
 
 APPENDIX. 1 
 
 Note of M. de Bacoart on the interviews of Prince Talleyrand 
 
 with the Comte d'A rtois. 
 
 We wish to add to this passage some details which M. de 
 Talleyrand had neglected or perhaps forgotten. 
 
 It is a positive fact that at the time to which this passage 
 relates, M. de Talleyrand had several interviews with the Comte 
 d'Artois, in which he sought to convince the prince of the neces- 
 sity for taking forcible measures, and while maintaining the 
 concessions which the king had already made, to repress with 
 vigour the popular agitation which was manifesting itself daily, 
 and which had already caused bloodshed in the streets of the 
 capital. The most important, and the last of these inter- 
 views, took place at Marly on the night of the 16th to the 17th 
 of July, 1789, that is to say, a few hours before the prince left 
 France. When M. de Talleyrand presented himself at the 
 residence of the Comte d'Artois, this prince had already retired, 
 but nevertheless received him for an interview which lasted more 
 than two hours. M. de Talleyrand exposed anew all the dangers 
 of the situation, and begged the prince to make them known to 
 the king. The Comte d'Artois was much affected, arose and re- 
 paired to the king, and, after quite a prolonged absence, returned 
 to declare to M. de Talleyrand that nothing could be effected 
 with the king, who was resolved to yield rather than to cause a 
 single drop of blood to be shed by resisting the popular outbreaks. 
 "As for me," added the Comte d'Artois, " my decision is made ; 
 
 1 See page 94.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 105 
 
 I depart to-morrow, and I leave France." M. de Talleyrand 
 entreated the prince in vain to renounce this resolution, repre- 
 senting to him the difficulties and dangers it might bring on him 
 in the present, both concerning his rights and those of his children 
 in the future. The Comte d'Artois persisted, and M. de Talley- 
 rand concluded by saying to him : "Then, Monseigneur, it only 
 remains for each of us to think of his own interests, since the 
 king and the princes desert theirs and those of the monarchy." — 
 " Indeed," replied the prince, " that is what I advise you to 
 do ; whatever happens I shall never blame you ; and you may 
 always rely on my friendship." — The Comte d'Artois emigrated 
 on the morrow. 
 
 In the month of April, 18 14, M. de Talleyrand, having be- 
 come President of the Provisory Government, found himself in 
 a position to announce to the Comte d'Artois, who was 
 then at Nancy with his attendants, awaiting the issue of events, 
 that Louis XVIII. was called to the throne, and that the prince 
 himself was invited to return to Paris to take charge of the 
 government as lieutenant-general of the kingdom. He charged 
 the Baron de Vitrolles 1 with this mission, and as the latter was 
 about to leave, and while the despatch for the prince was being 
 sealed, Talleyrand told the baron the story of the interview of 
 the night of July 16, 1789, while walking up and down the 
 entresol of his hotel in the Rue Saint Florentin. After which 
 he said to him, " Do me the favour of asking the Comte d'Artois 
 if he recollects this little incident." 
 
 M. de Vitrolles, after having delivered his important message, 
 did not fail to put to the prince the question as requested by 
 
 1 Eugene d'Amaud, Baron de Vitrolles, was born in 1774 at the chateau of this 
 name in Provence. His family was one of the oldest in the country. He was the 
 grand-nephew of the illustrious bailli de Suffren. He emigrated in 1790, and entered 
 as volunteer in the army of Conde. He returned to France in 1797 after the 18th Bru- 
 rnaire, he was struck off the list of the emigres, thanks to the intervention of General 
 Bernadotte, who, when a sergeant in the regiment of the Royal Marines, had been 
 his fencing master. M. de Vitrolles was mayor and councillor-general under the 
 Empire. In 1812, he was appointed inspector of flocks — a post which had just been 
 created for inspecting and favouring the breeding of merinoes in France. M. de 
 Vitrolles took a leading part in the first Restoration. To his personal action was 
 perhaps due the decision of the allied sovereigns to march on Paris, which brought 
 about the fall of the Empire. Minister of State in 1814, royal commissioner at 
 Toulouse in 181 5, he was arrested by the order of Napoleon, and remained in prison 
 during the period of the Hundred Days. He was a Member of the Chambre 
 introuvable* and deprived in 1818 of his post of minister. In 1827, Charles X. 
 appointed him minister at Florence, and peer of France in July, 1830. M. de Vitrolles 
 did not support the monarchy of July. He died in retirement in 1854. He lett 
 interesting memoirs on the Restoration, which are well known. 
 
 * The Chambre introuvable — This was the name given to the Chamber elected in 1815, on account 
 of the exaggeration of its rovalist opinions. It could scarcely have been anticipated that the imperial 
 constituencies should return such a parliament. On learning the composition of this Chamber, which 
 he was to dissolve ten months later, Louis XVIII. was delighted and said several times: "Chambre 
 introuvable ! Chambre introuvable !" It exceeded indeed his most sanguine hopes. — {Translator.)
 
 106 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 M. de Talleyrand ; to which the Comte d'Artois replied, " I 
 recollect the circumstance perfectly, and M. de Talleyrand's 
 account is exact in every particular." 
 
 Having been informed that M. de Vitrolles had related this 
 anecdote to several persons, we thought it advisable to appeal 
 to his memory and to his loyalty. To justify this expression 
 " loyalty," it must be told that M. de Vitrolles, after the Revolu- 
 tion of July, 1830, had ceased all intercourse with M. de 
 Talleyrand, and expressed himself very severely in regard to 
 him. This will explain the tone of hostility and of bitter- 
 ness which pervades M. de Vitrolles' letter, which we insert here. 
 We think that for the reader, as for us, this hostility will only 
 further confirm the sincerity of M. de Vitrolles' declaration, 
 and the authenticity of the passage in the memoirs of M. 
 de Talleyrand. The slight divergence which will be observed 
 between the account given to us by M. de Talleyrand and that 
 of M. de Vitrolles' letter will explain itself naturally as the 
 effect of the time that had elapsed since the occurrence, and 
 which had modified the recollections of the two narrators. It, 
 nevertheless, remains a fact, that in July, 1789, M. de Talleyrand 
 believed that the progress of revolutionary events might be 
 arrested, that he had the moral courage to say so, and to pro- 
 pose to undertake to check it. He is not the only one, perhaps, 
 who boasted of so doing afterwards ; we think we have proved 
 that his boast, at least, was not unjustified. Here is the letter of 
 M. de Vitrolles :— 
 
 The Baron de Vitrolles to M. de Bacourt. 1 
 
 Paris, April 6tk, 1852. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 You are good enough to consider as of some value the 
 testimony I might furnish respecting a particular incident in the 
 life of Prince de Talleyrand ; I think I cannot better comply 
 with your wishes than in transcribing here what I wrote many 
 years ago, in connection with the events of 18 14. 
 
 When His Majesty the Emperor of Russia and the Prince 
 
 1 Adolphe Fourier de Bacourt, born in 1801. He entered diplomacy in 1822, 
 and was sent in 1830 to London. M. de Talleyrand noticed him there, and 
 attached him to his person. In 1835, he was appointed minister at Carlsruhe, and 
 then at Washington, 1840. Ambassador to Turin in 1842, he resigned in 1848. He 
 had been appointed a peer of France. During the early portion of his career, Bacourt 
 had made, at the Hague, the acquaintance of the Comte de la Marck, who entrusted 
 to him his correspondence with Mirabeau. He published it in 1851. He undertook 
 afterwards the publication of the present memoirs. (It is known that Prince de 
 Talleyrand had left the care of their publication to the Duchesse de Dino, his niece, 
 
 and, in case she died, to M. de Bacourt.) He died in 1865. He left memoirs, 
 
 published since by his niece, the Comtesse de Mirabeau.
 
 THE YEARS PRECEDING THE REVOLUTION. 107 
 
 de Talleyrand were convinced that the presence of the king's 
 brother endowed with the powers of lieutenant-general of the 
 kingdom was necessary, and I was about to leave with the object 
 of inducing Monsieur to return to Paris, I had several con- 
 ferences on this subject with the President of the Provisory 
 Government. In a last interview, at the moment of departure, 
 we had talked of the conditions and ceremonies for the reception 
 of Monseignenr. After a moment's silence, Prince de Talley- 
 rand said, with his wheedling smile, and in a tone which he 
 endeavoured to make careless and almost indifferent : — 
 
 " I beg of you to ask the Comte d'Artois if he recollects 
 " the last occasion on which I saw him ; it was in the month 
 " of July, 1789. The court was at Marly. Three or four of 
 " my friends, struck like myself with the rapidity and the violence 
 " of the agitation which was stirring all minds, resolved with me 
 " to acquaint the king, Louis XVI., with the real situation of 
 " affairs, which the court and the ministers seemed to ignore. 
 " We requested His Majesty to be so kind as to receive us ; 
 " we desired for his good as for our own that this audience 
 " should be kept secret. The reply was that the king had 
 " charged his brother, the Comte d'Artois, to receive us ; the 
 " appointment was made for Marly, in the pavilion occupied by 
 " the Comte d'Artois alone. We arrived there at midnight." 
 
 M. de Talleyrand named to me the precise date, and the 
 names of the friends who accompanied him : they were members 
 of the National Assembly and of that minority of the nobility 
 who were in the Third Estate ; I recollect neither the date nor 
 the names. 
 
 " When we were in the presence of the Comte d'Artois," 
 continued M. de Talleyrand, "we exposed to him in all frank- 
 " ness the situation of affairs, and of the State, as it appeared to 
 " us. We said to him that it was a great mistake to believe that 
 " the agitation which was stirring all minds could easily be 
 " calmed. It was not by delays, caution, and a few concessions, 
 " that the dangers which menaced France, the throne, and the 
 " king could be averted. It was by an energetic display of the 
 " royal authority, wisely and skilfully employed. We know the 
 " ways and the means and the position which would enable us to 
 " undertake this, and guarantee our succeeding, if the con- 
 " fidence of the king should entrust us with it. The Comte 
 " d'Artois listened to us attentively, and fully understood us, 
 " though he was, perhaps, inclined to think that we were exag- 
 " gerating the danger of the situation and our importance in 
 " remedying it. But, as he said to us, he had only been 
 " instructed by the king to hear us, and to report to him what
 
 io8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 " we wished to make known to him ; he had no answer to give 
 " us, and no power to engage the will or the word of the king. 
 " When we had reached this point, we begged of the Comte 
 " d'Artois permission to add, that if the application we now 
 " made conscientiously and in good faith was not appreciated, if 
 " it had no effect and led to no result, Monseigneur must not 
 " be astonished if, not being able to resist the torrent which 
 " threatened to carry all before it, we should support the new 
 " state of affairs. . . . Ask, I pray you, of Monsieur" repeated 
 M. de Talleyrand, " if the conversation of that night has left 
 " any trace in his memory. It was almost at the very time 
 " when he left France." 
 
 I admired the subtilty of this mind, which found, in one of 
 its recollections, an explanation, an excuse, and almost a jus- 
 tification of all his revolutionary life ; he could have found many 
 others to serve him in very different and even contrary circum- 
 stances. In listening to this story, which was related with a sort 
 of indifference and unaffected simplicity, I took the liberty of 
 doubting whether what might remain in the memory of Monsieur 
 would be entirely consonant with the words I had just heard. 
 However, when, at Nancy, I remembered the request of M. de 
 Talleyrand, Monseigneur said to me, without entering into any 
 detail, that he had not forgotten this circumstance, and that all 
 I had repeated to him was the exact truth. 
 
 I hope, Sir, that this testimony will meet with your expecta- 
 tions. I thank you for having offered me this opportunity of 
 giving you the assurance of my highest regard. 
 
 Baron de Vitrolles. 
 
 END OF THE FIRST PART.
 
 PART II. 
 
 THE DUC D'ORLEANS. 1 
 
 General considerations on the importance of private Memoirs and reliable 
 biographies to history — Lineage of Louis-Philippe-Joseph, fifth Due 
 d'Orle'ans — His early years and dispositions — His education — Hisfrivolity 
 and dryness of heart — His marriage with Mademoiselle de Penthievre — 
 Associates of the Due d'Orle'ans — M. de Voyer— Abbe* Yvon — M. de 
 Lille — M. de Voyer's philosophy — M. de Voyer and M. de Maurepas — 
 The Prince de Lamballe — The Marquis de Conflans — Cruel indifference 
 of the Due d'Orle'ans — M. de Biron — The liaisons of the Due d'Orle'ans 
 — The Princesse de Bouillon — The Marquise de Fleury — The Princesse 
 de Lamballe — Madame de Sillery, Comtesse de Genlis — Her influence 
 over the Due de Chartres — Her literary productions — Count de Cagliostro 
 — The Chevalier de Luxembourg — Speculations of the Due d'Orle'ans 
 — Outrageous proceedings of this prince towards his treasurer, Se"guin — 
 The Due d'Orle'ans wishes to become grand-admiral — He is appointed 
 colonel-general of hussars — Mademoiselle Arnould, the famous actress — 
 Journey of the Due d'Orleans to England and to Italy — He falls 
 seriously ill — Grand-master of the freemasons — Debauchery and 
 depravity of the Due d'Orleans — Agitation in France — Forebodings of 
 the Revolution — The deficit — M. de Calonne summons an assembly of 
 the Notables — Intrigues of the Due d'Orleans against the king — The 
 Marquis Ducrest — Ambition of the Due d'Orleans— Measures taken by 
 
 1 The second house of Orleans descends from Philippe I., Due d'Orleans, junior 
 son of Louis XIII- Louis-Philippe-Joseph, of whom we are about to speak here, 
 is the fifth prince of this house. His mother was a Princess de Bourbon-Conti. 
 He was born in 1747. Ail his life he carried on asystematic opposition to the Court, 
 and became, in 1787, the leader of all the malcontents. Exiled in 1787, Deputy to 
 the States-General, he was one of the first to go over to the Third Estate. He became 
 a member of the Jacobin Club. The part he played in the Convention is well known. 
 He died on the scaffold, November 6, 1793. He had married Louise de Bourbon- 
 Penthievre, daughter of the Due de Penthievre and of Marie Therese d'Este, who was 
 one of the most virtuous and most distinguished ladies of her time. Imprisoned in 
 1793, s he was saved by the coup d'etat of Thermidor 9, and exiled to Spain (1797). 
 She returned to Paris in 1814. The Due d'Orleans had three sons : the Due de 
 Chartres, afterwards King Louis Philippe, the Due de Montpensier, and the Comte 
 de Beaujolais.
 
 no THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the Archbishop of Toulouse against the ftarlements — M. and Mdme. de 
 Semonville— A loan of ,£16,000,000— General discontent of the people 
 — Louis XVI. refuses to allow the Due d"Orleans to go on a visit to 
 England — Differences between the Queen and the Due d'Orleans — 
 Trianon — The Due d'Orleans becomes the head of all malcontents — M. 
 de Limon's ability — Abbe Sabatier de Cabre — The lits de justice — The 
 Marquis de Lamognon — The edict of 1787 and the Protestants — The 
 sitting of November 19, 1787 — M. d'Espresmenil — Public protest 
 of the Due d'Orleans against the king's orders — Lepelletier de St.- 
 Fargeau — Imprisonment of the Abbes Freteau and Sabatier — Exile of 
 the Due d'Orleans — Popular outburst of sympathy on this measure being 
 known — Intervention of the parlement of Paris — Energetic attitude of 
 Louis XVI. — The Due d'Orleans forgiven by the king — Struggle between 
 M. de Brienne and the parlements — Stringent measures of the govern- 
 ment — Premonitory symptoms of the Revolution — Riot in the Faubourg 
 St.-Antoine — M. de Laclos — Abbe" Sidyes— Project of reforms drawn up 
 by the Due d'Orleans for the States-General — Judgment of Prince 
 Talleyrand on the political part played by the Due d'Orleans — The 
 origin and causes of the Revolution. 
 
 The private memoirs and lives of celebrated men are the 
 source of true history ; as compared with tradition, which is 
 always credulous and even superstitious, they serve to criticize its 
 accounts or to support them, and help with it to give history 
 the character of authenticity to which it lays claim. 
 
 Bythis means the times of Henry III., Henry IV., Louis XIII., 
 and of Louis XIV., have become well known, and the history of 
 these reigns has been received with more confidence. The follow- 
 ing period, though nearer to the days we live in, has not, up to the 
 present, been so favourably treated ; it has not furnished us with 
 such abundant sources of information. It seems that traditions 
 alone founded the historical facts generally believed with regard 
 to these times. 
 
 The Steele de Louis XIV., by M.de Voltaire, is a production 
 sui generis. It belongs to the style of memoirs by its simple, 
 natural tone, and the mention of a few anecdotes, but it often 
 rises to general views of a lofty and superior order. It is 
 evident that M. de Voltaire did not intend to write the history 
 of the reign of Louis XIV, and that he wished to confine him- 
 self to sketching in broad outline the chief events of that reign. 
 
 A well-written life of M. de Colbert or of M. de Louvois
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 1 1 1 
 
 would give a correct idea of what the government of that great 
 king was. A work of this kind on the ministry of the Due de 
 Choiseul would acquaint us with the spirit which prevailed at 
 court and in the administration under the reign of Louis XV. 
 I have thought that a picture of the life of the Due d'Orleans 
 would give the features and the colour of the weak and transient 
 reign of Louis XVI.; that it would set forth in a tangible manner 
 the general laxity of public and private manners under that 
 reign, as well as the degradation in the form of government and 
 in the habits of the administration; that a work undertaken with 
 this view, would faithfully depict the character of an important 
 period of French history. 
 
 In the lapse of three centuries, at very nearly equal intervals, 
 the form of government in France has been threatened by 
 outbreaks, each of which bore a particular stamp. The first 
 two, the Ligne and the Fronde, hastened the development 
 of national greatness and power ; there was something grand 
 and noble in the audacity and in the methods of the Guises 
 and of Cardinal de Retz : it was the seduction of that time. 
 
 As for the last outbreak, that which we have just witnessed, it 
 has been but a frightful catastrophe. The Due d'Orleans who 
 made himself conspicuous in it, only joined in it from his love of 
 disorder, his contempt for decency, and his self-abandonment ; 
 such were the glory, the taste, and the intrigues of those days. — 
 I now enter upon my subject. 
 
 I cannot say what part the different parties who ruled in France 
 from the beginning of the Revolution will ascribe to the Due 
 d'Orleans, when they depict, each for his own apology, the great 
 scenes of that Revolution. Provided that they attribute to 
 him only wrongs which can result from the most extreme 
 weakness of character, the facts of the case, though not correct, 
 will be at least probable. His entire life would prove it. The 
 circumstances in which he was placed, changed often, but he, as 
 a child, as a young man, or as a man of mature age, was always 
 and invariably the same. 
 
 Although I can furnish the most curious and least known 
 details concerning the life and character of the Due d'Orleans, I 
 would allow all recollection of them to be lost to my memory if
 
 112 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 they were merely meant to gratify curiosity, but it struck me 
 that they might serve some useful end ; I therefore collected 
 them. 
 
 In a country where some elections still take place, it is 
 advisable to furnish the characteristic signs by which the men 
 who ought to be removed from the theatre of affairs may be 
 recognized. The Due d'Orleans is a remarkable instance of this. 
 Any man who, in youth, affects deep contempt for public 
 opinion, and whose habits, besides, are so depraved that he does 
 not respect himself, will, when he advances in years, not know 
 any other limit to his vices than the sterility of his own imagina- 
 tion or of that of the persons who surround him. Were it not 
 important to know exactly the degree of consanguinity which 
 existed between Louis XVI. and the Due d'Orleans, there would 
 be no need for me to say what were the advantages the first 
 prince of the blood of the House of Bourbon could boast. It 
 is by placing the latter in the midst of all the advantages he 
 enjoyed, it is by confronting him with all his obligations, that 
 his character will be better understood. It will be seen what he 
 trampled under foot, what ties he broke, what sentiments he 
 smothered, what position he degraded. 
 
 It was a powerful title to the love of the French to be 
 descended from Henry IV. France was accustomed to revere 
 in the first prince of the blood, the first of subjects, one who 
 was great enough to protect, though not to oppress her, who 
 was more powerful than any other individual, but less powerful 
 than the law, and than the king, who was the living representa- 
 tive of the law. He was one of the most natural channels by 
 which the private beneficence of the king could descend 
 upon the people, and the gratitude of the people ascend to 
 the throne. 1 
 
 It need not be expected that I shall give full details as to the 
 first years of the Due de Chartres. I will not imitate those who 
 endeavour to seek in the babblings of a child the horoscope of his 
 vices and of his virtues. I leave that to persons who write with 
 a system ; I have none. 
 
 1 There is here in Talleyrand's own manuscript a blank of eight leaves, for which 
 we have vainly sought explanation.
 
 THE D UC D' ORLEANS. 1 1 3 
 
 The Due de Chartres, having passed from childhood, entered 
 upon his education, but then his governesses were men, for 
 there was little difference between his nurses and his first 
 teachers, other than the difference of woman's weakness and 
 man's complaisance. Yet when speaking of him, people often 
 remarked, " If he is not very well brought up, he will at least be 
 good. The Orleans are good." That goodness of which 
 people felt so sure, led the prince's tutors to devote as little 
 attention to his character as to his studies. As he had a very 
 elegant figure, they sought to have it developed by physical 
 exercises. Few young people could ride a horse as well and 
 with as much grace as he. He was a good fencer and a good 
 shot ; at the ball he always attracted notice. All the members 
 of the old Court of France who are still alive repent having 
 applauded him as he danced the Bearnaise dressed as Henry IV., 
 or other aristocratic steps in the holiday dress worn by young 
 people at the court of Louis XIV. Although in the defence of his 
 petty interests, and in his intercourse with children of his age, he 
 displayed a certain accuracy of judgment, he learned absolutely 
 nothing. He began to study a few sciences, and a few languages, 
 but never could master even the rules of orthography, with 
 which, to-day, every woman in France is conversant. His 
 master of mathematics told me, however, that he believed the 
 prince had some aptitudes for that science. But he was too 
 changeable for any one to attempt more than to acquaint him 
 very superficially with the different branches of knowledge ; his 
 attention got too easily tired ; he only listened until such time 
 as he began to have a faint grasp of what was being taught him ; 
 from that moment, he made no progress. No salient feature 
 could as yet be detected in his character, it was, however, easy 
 to notice that he found a sort of mischievous pleasure in annoy- 
 ing persons who approached him, a species of gay, meddlesome, 
 naughty wickedness that the benevolent called waggishness. 
 
 It was remarked that, in his early youth, he never showed 
 gratitude either towards his relatives or his masters, and that he 
 never had any attachment for his playfellows. Although these 
 are, in children, purely negative faults which do not characterize 
 any definite propensity, they foretell great coldness of heart. 
 VOL. I. I
 
 H4 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Among the persons who assisted in his education, I only dare to 
 mention the Comte de Pont, M. de Chateaubrun, 1 and M. de 
 Foncemagne ; 2 I only name these gentlemen, because they 
 have, by themselves, just claims to public esteem. 
 
 The Due de Chartres was impatient to reach the age of inde- 
 pendence, and that impatience was not dictated, as is the case 
 with noble-minded young men, by the wish to try for himself the 
 honourable pursuits of life, but simply by that to escape the irk- 
 some eye of his tutors, and follow the impulse of his bad inclina- 
 tions. That moment, which ought to be fixed for each individual 
 according to the disposition of his mind, the stamp of his 
 character, the employment he has made of his time, is, in 
 general, wrongly calculated among the French. They leave 
 almost no interval between childhood, and the instant when a 
 young man enters without guide upon a world of which he is 
 ignorant. This sudden withdrawal of all control is still more 
 harmful for princes. Slaves of the care with which they are 
 surrounded, they remain children up to sixteen years of age, and 
 all at once they are told that they are even more than the rest of 
 men ; they are not yet fit to be free, and already they command. 
 Astonished at their new power, impatient to abuse it in order to 
 ascertain its properties, they find themselves surrounded only by 
 seductions. Their most faithful servants fear to warn them, lest 
 the warning should displease them, and a host of others try to be 
 agreeable to them by all possible means. 
 
 Everything was to be feared from such concurrence of 
 circumstances, with the nature already noticed in the Due 
 de Chartres. If he had been armed with some principle that 
 had made a profound impression upon his heart, there might 
 have been some prospect of discovering its effects in those 
 calm moments when every man communes with himself. 
 He would thus, at least, have given to his tastes the conven- 
 tional limits of public opinion. If he had felt a strong attraction 
 
 1 Jean-Baptiste Vivien de Chateaubrun born at Angouleme in 1686. First maitre 
 (Thdtel of the Due d' Orleans. He wrote several tragedies, which secured his election to 
 the Academy (1753). He was appointed under-governor to the Due de Chartres, and 
 died in 1775. 
 
 2 Etienne de Foncemagne, born at Orleans in 1694. He made himself known by 
 some historical treatises. Under-governor of the Due de Chartres (1752), he died in 
 1775-
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 115 
 
 for any science whatever, his intellect would have sought to 
 extend itself, his attention might have been governed. If only 
 he had been truly in love, his mind, always active to please, 
 would not have been worn out, or depraved by lack of occu- 
 pation ; his heart would have rejected all the defects which are 
 obliged to vanish before a true sentiment. Simple happiness 
 which guards itself against the dangers of a restless imagination, 
 self-abnegation which produces all our generous sentiments, 
 would, without doubt, have developed some solid qualities in the 
 Due de Chartres. 
 
 But his cold heart deprived him of the illusions of youth, 
 while his inattentive mind knew not how to fix itself upon 
 serious matters. Unbridled in his taste, making of his pleasures 
 a rampart around himself, even against love, he began life by 
 the abuse of everything, and displayed constancy only in his 
 excesses. 
 
 In 1769, he married Mademoiselle de Penthievre. She was 
 good, fair, fresh, sweet, and pure ; she pleased him so long as 
 she was for him a new woman. A few days after, on the 
 occasion of the first appearance of the Due and Duchesse de 
 Chartres at the opera the most dashing girls of Paris were 
 able to lay aside the widows' costumes which they affected to 
 wear there. 
 
 On entering society, the Due de Chartres formed an intimacy 
 with M. de Voyer, 1 the leader of the corrupt men of his time 
 A large fortune, the reputation of possessing some business 
 abilities, a rather brilliant conversation on military subjects, and 
 a very witty mind, gathered around Voyer young men of unruly 
 passions, men whose reputation was lost, bad characters and 
 intriguers of all conditions. Abbe Yvon, 2 better known by the 
 protracted persecution he had to bear than by some articles he 
 
 1 Marc- Rene, Marquis de Voyer, son of the Comte Voyer d'Argenson, .Secretary 
 of State at War. Born in 1722, he became lieutenant-general, Governor of Vincennes, 
 and died in 1782. 
 
 - Abbe Yvon, born in 17 14 at Mamers, never discharged any ecclesiastical func- 
 tion, and was always in open contest with the Sorbonne. He made his first appear- 
 ance in literature in the Encyclopedia, where he wrote the articles : Soul, Atheist, 
 and God. Suspected of having taken part in the thesis sustained by Prades in 
 the Sorbonne, and condemned by that learned body, he fled to Holland. Returning 
 soon after, he was appointed historiographer to the Comte d'Artois, and died in 
 1791. The Abbe Yvon has left a large number of works on theology. 
 
 I 2
 
 n6 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 contributed to the Encyclopedia, especially by the article " Soul," 
 which brought on him that persecution, had initiated Voyer in 
 high metaphysics, whose language he had adopted even for 
 the most familiar conversations. It was always " the soul . . . 
 space , . . the link of beings . . . abstractedness . . . matter . . . 
 composed of points . . . simple . . . without extent . . . indivisible, 
 &c." All these words, never explained, pronounced at intervals, 
 with gestures, reticent and mystic forms, prepared the young 
 adepts to believe. They were then taught that every sentiment 
 is but ridiculous . . . that scruples are but a sign of weakness . . . 
 that justice is a prejudice . . . that our interest, or rather our 
 pleasure only, ought to determine all our actions, &c. . . . They 
 naturally dispensed with proofs. 
 
 One evening, at a supper-party, M. de Lille, 1 an officer in the 
 regiment of M. de Coigny, and a man of sense, strongly attached 
 to his friends, a little susceptible, perhaps too familiar, but, on 
 the whole, a very good lad, not feeling sufficiently convinced that 
 justice was absolutely a prejudice, allowed himself to make some 
 objections. " It is my fault, my dear De Lille," said M. de Voyer, 
 modestly ; " if you still have some doubts, it is because I did not 
 go back far enough. I was wrong, I ought to have taken the 
 question from its origin . . . Listen, it is only a word . . . Every- 
 body knows that existence is for us the idea of the permanence 
 of a certain collection of sensations which (follow me well) in 
 similar or nearly similar circumstances, re-appear constantly the 
 same. . . . You understand, De Lille? If they are not just 
 exactly the same, they only show changes which are subject to 
 certain laws which govern the universe, &c You under- 
 stand me well, do you not ? You see the sequel and the conse- 
 quence of all this for a man like yourself, my dear De Lille, it is 
 not necessary to develop it farther, &c ! ! ! " 
 
 By what means, if he would preserve his self-love, could a 
 young man avow himself incapable of understanding this 
 mysterious language? He must, indeed confess himself con- 
 vinced. M. de Lille was sensible enough not to understand 
 the sophism, but he had not the courage to say it ; and it was 
 
 1 M. de Lille, officer in the regiment of Champagne, born at Saint -Mihiel, is the 
 author of a collection of light poetry.
 
 THE DUC H ORLEANS. 117 
 
 not until ridicule dared to attack the corruption which was 
 the only thing in France that, until then, had been sacred to 
 him, that M. de Lille related this conversation, and some 
 others, which the oddness of the expressions had caused him to 
 remember. 
 
 In the midst of that shapeless rubbish of metaphysics, this 
 new sect only taught a few much truncated maxims, and a few 
 sententious suggestions, with a gilt of seductive learning. 
 
 The fundamental principle of M. de Voyer's doctrine, how- 
 ever, was simple. He denied the existence of morality, sus- 
 taining that to say one must seek sanction in one's conscience 
 was, for men of sense, but a word, with nothing real in it ; and 
 that thus, it did not exist for all those, who, by their mind and 
 nature, were inaccessible to remorse. As a deduction from 
 this, frankness, sincerity, confidence, natural integrity, all the 
 honourable affections, were accused and denounced as silly. 
 
 The source of true pleasures being thus dried up, these must 
 of course be replaced by monstrous propensities. Among the 
 initiated, at twenty, all illusions were already destroyed. Their 
 organs thus depraved had need of strong emotions. Corruption 
 alone could furnish them : and indeed it reigned over all these 
 young, ruined imaginations, and when it reigns, it is with over- 
 ruling authority. Sacrifices do not soften its sway ; the more it 
 obtains, the more it exacts ; candour, fidelity, uprightness, are 
 its first victims. 
 
 When one is but an adept, he is obliged to believe : M. de 
 Voyer, who was an innovator, availed himself of the right of 
 leaders of sects, and did not believe in the doctrine he pro- 
 fessed ; this is proved by a host of details on his life and death. 
 He always expressed the most absolute scorn for public opinion, 
 and the judgments of the public were his torment. — " Good 
 company," he said, one day, " will fall into the contempt it 
 deserves." — And he was distressed to find that the houses of 
 some of the members of that good company, which he thus 
 despised, were closed to him. The total disregard of every kind 
 of feeling enforced on him by the part he affected to play, some- 
 times compelled him to take precautions in order that no one 
 should come to know the assistance he afforded to some unfor-
 
 n8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 tunate families. At " The Elms," x on his estate, chiefly in the 
 most out-of-the-way districts, he did much good. He never 
 spoke of the court except with derision, any more than of the 
 favours it granted and of the vile characters who solicited 
 them, yet he indirectly requested for himself the honour of 
 the blue riband 2 which, of all the rewards accorded by the 
 king, bore the plainest imprint of favour. It was at Marly, 
 the habitual seat of fetes and pleasures, that Louis XVI., 
 with the severity of honest manners and the brusqueness 
 which timidity and probity combined produced in him, re- 
 proached him with his corruption, in the presence of all the 
 court. Astonished at the first moment, M. de Voyer could find 
 no reply. Having, however, collected himself a little he called 
 on M. de Maurepas in order to acquaint him with what had 
 occurred and to beg him to obtain for him some sort of apology. 
 He had little to congratulate himself about the choice of his in- 
 termediate, from whom he could only obtain the following words : 
 " We shall never be able to teach politeness to the king." That 
 insulting word politeness, the refusal of the " blue riband," the 
 harsh expressions of the king, wounded him deeply, and all who 
 knew him intimately, his wife for instance, had no doubt that 
 sorrow was the cause of his death, which occurred soon after. 
 
 The Due de Chartres, who only knew in M. de Voyer that side 
 of his character which he displayed, submitted completely to the 
 yoke imposed upon him by the society of the former. He lost 
 all the natural sentiments by which he might have been able to 
 reclaim himself. And it is from that time, from that second 
 education, given at the age when men are the disciples of all that 
 surrounds them, that really dates the corruption of the Due 
 d'Orleans. Until then, he only had unfortunate tendencies ; then, 
 he was imbued with pernicious apologetic maxims, and contracted 
 habits which he never gave up. If one would explain his entire 
 life, it is necessary to go back to this period. If acquainted with 
 the poison with which he was impregnated, one would no longer 
 be surprised at his fatal errors. Thus, in making known the 
 
 1 Chateau and land belonging to the d'Argenson family, near Tours. 
 
 2 The riband of the order of the Saint Esprit (Holy Ghost), the highest order of 
 the old monarchy. It had been created by Henri III. — {Translator.)
 
 THE D UC D' OR LEA NS. 1 1 9 
 
 doctrine of M. de Voyer, I have pictured the Due d'Orleans 
 completely, I have revealed the secret of his life, and the motive 
 of his actions. However different they seem to be, the same 
 principle reappears in all. There never was a man more com- 
 pletely a slave to his belief. What ravages have been produced 
 in the present generation of Frenchmen by that system, known 
 among the disciples under the name of desabusenient, which, until 
 the eighteenth century, shut up in the hearts of a few depraved 
 men, awaited these days to dare to shine forth as an opinion 
 which could be professed, like a system of philosophy ! This 
 phenomenon of audacity merits attention. 
 
 The history of the French people has paid too little heed 
 to the great faults of the human mind, as if there were not a 
 necessary bond between its errors and its crimes. Has not 
 morality, for example, everything to gain, when it can reconcile 
 the opinions of the Due d'Orleans with the different acts of his 
 life ? He believed there was nothing just but that which was 
 comfortable for him : he was always ignorant of the fact that 
 man depends for his happiness on the happiness of other men ; 
 he failed to recognize this reciprocal need of services, that 
 powerful motive of general and private benevolence. All the 
 pleasant gifts which nature only confers on us for noble purposes, 
 he subjected solely to personal intrigues, directed against credu- 
 lous and inexperienced innocence. Called to an immense 
 fortune, he did not see in the good he wished to do to his fellow- 
 creatures the guarantee of that which he received from them ; 
 his narrow egotism did not permit him to believe that, in this 
 exchange, more would be returned to him than he would give. 
 In early youth, when one calculates sentiments, one does it 
 badly, or rather one only calculates upon them because one 
 has none. In the continual change of inclinations that caprice 
 causes to spring up, and which leads the soul from ardour to 
 indifference, and from indifference to another caprice, there is no 
 place for friendship. Thus the Due d'Orleans loved no one. 
 Some young, indulgent persons, who took this indifference for 
 meekness, had an attachment for him. He made them the 
 companions of his pleasures, comrades of his debauches, but 
 never felt any real friendship for them. One of his first associates
 
 120 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 was the Prince de Lamballe : the latter's constitution was too 
 weak to admit of his bearing long the kind of life led by 
 his brother-in-law. 
 
 The death of young princes is never believed to be natural. 
 This death made the Due d'Orleans so prodigiously rich, and he 
 made so bad a use of his fortune, that, in several works, he has 
 been accused of having contributed to it in a more direct manner 
 than by sharing the orgies of the deceased. But there is nothing 
 to prove this allegation. I ought even to say, as the result of 
 very reliable inquiries, that there is nothing to justify the sus- 
 picion at all. It is quite enough to say that the Prince de 
 Lamballe was the most intimate companion of the Due 
 d'Orleans, that he was corrupted by him, that he died of it, and 
 was not even the object of a regret. 
 
 A much longer intimacy left no more traces on the heart of 
 the Due d'Orleans. In 1788, after twenty-five years of asso- 
 ciation, he showed the most cruel indifference when he lost one 
 of his principal companions, the Marquis de Conflans, 1 a man 
 who always attracted general notice for his beauty, his noble 
 bearing, his figure, his skill, and by his faults when he was in bad 
 company, by his aptitudes when he was with military men, by 
 the shrewdness of his mind when he spoke of serious things, and, 
 at all times of his life, by the freedom of his tastes, his feelings, 
 and his aversions. M. de Conflans was suffering from a disease 
 which was to cause him to die suddenly ; he would not how- 
 ever believe himself to be ill, and went into society as usual. 
 On the day of his death, he was to dine with the Due d'Orleans 
 and a few other noblemen, at the house of M. de Biron - at 
 Montrouge. They were waiting for him, the Due d'Orleans 
 more impatiently than the others, because he wished to go to 
 the theatre. At four o'clock every one was present, when one 
 of M. de Conflans' people brought the message that he had just 
 died. All who were in the room expressed their regrets ac- 
 cording to their close or distant relations with the deceased. 
 The only words uttered by the Due d'Orleans were : " Lauzun, 
 
 1 Louis-Gabriel, Marquis de Conflans d'Armentieres, born in 1735, son of Marshal 
 de Conflans. He was brigadier-general. 
 
 2 The Due de Lauzun who had reassumed his family name at the death of Marshal 
 de Biron, his uncle (1788).
 
 THE DUC D' ORLEANS. 121 
 
 as we do not expect any one now, let us dine, in order to be in 
 time to see the beginning of the opera." 
 
 The study of the human heart does not explain how so 
 barren a soul could Inspire the sentiment of friendship ; and I 
 regard it as incredible that the Due d'Orleans should have been 
 sincerely loved. M. de Biron, from his childhood until his death, 
 had for him the most tender feelings. It is certainly not to 
 the Due d'Orleans that one can attribute the honour of these 
 sentiments ; it is to M. de Biron alone that it belongs. M. de 
 Biron was courageous, romantic, generous, and witty. The simi- 
 larity of their ages, a position almost equally brilliant, mutual 
 sympathy, and a certain analogy of mind had caused an intimacy 
 to spring up between them. It very soon required courage to 
 love the Due d'Orleans, generosity to defend him. The exercise 
 of these two qualities rendered the Due d'Orleans dearer to M. 
 de Biron, and his romantic nature furnished him afterwards with 
 all the fancies which his inward soul needed, to cultivate this 
 sentiment. On the occasions when M. de Biron, reduced by his 
 prodigality to be always in difficulties, was in pressing need of 
 money, he did not believe that the Due d'Orleans, although 
 enormously rich, could lend him any, since he did not offer it ; 
 and it was by this same logic of illusions that he maintained 
 that the Due d'Orleans, having entered on political life, had no 
 secret thoughts, no personal intentions, no part in the Revo- 
 lution, since he had never made any confidence to him on this 
 subject. 
 
 I do not speak of the other intimacies of the Due d'Orleans 
 with the Vicomte de Laval, 1 M. Sheldon, M. de Liancourt, M. 
 Arthur Dillon, 2 M. de Fitz-James, M. de Saint-Blancard, M. de 
 Monville, 3 &c. . . . These acquaintances all vanished at different 
 
 1 Mathieu Paul Louis de Montmorency-Laval, known under the name of Vicomte 
 de Laval, born August 5, 1748. He was at that time colonel of the regiment of 
 Auvergne, and became brigadier-general in 1788. He died in 1809. 
 
 2 Arthur, Comte de Dillon, born in Ireland in 1750. The family had been for a 
 century in the service of France. He took, as colonel, an active part in the American 
 war, became brigadier-general, and Governor of Tabago. Deputy from Martinique 
 to the States-General, general-in- chief of the Army of the North, he was guillotined in 
 1794. Dillon had married the Comtesse de la Touch e, cousin of the Empress 
 Josephine. 
 
 3 The Baron Thomas Boissel de Monville, born in 1763 at the Chateau of Mon- 
 ville (Normandy) of a noble family of this province. Counsellor of tiarlement in 1 785,
 
 122 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 times. Pleasure, which alone had formed them, is not a bond 
 strong enough to last through a whole life. Those transient 
 friendships, lead me, against my will, to speak of the throng of 
 mistresses who occupied a part of the life of the Due d'Orleans ; 
 they were the source of so few incidents, however, that I do not 
 feel bound to add the long list of their names. My task will be 
 only too well filled in saying that all the tastes, all the caprices, all 
 the fantasies of which his senses, at first imperious, afterwards 
 impoverished, had need in order to be gratified or excited, were 
 resorted to by the Due d'Orleans. 
 
 I should like now to dwell here upon sweeter images, 
 in speaking of the women of a more elevated character, who 
 attached themselves to the Due d'Orleans. This prince some- 
 times reappeared in society, but always as in an enemy's 
 country, where he sought victims. The Princesse de Bouillon, 1 the 
 Marquise de Fleury, 2 the Princesse de Lamballe, each believed 
 herself loved by him, and proved to him that they loved him. 
 Their delicacy became, for his depraved mind, a new form of 
 libertinage, which satiated him like all the others. He soon 
 abandoned them, but with a publicity, which, happily, produced 
 a contrary effect to that which the Due d'Orleans expected. 
 The public treated them with indulgence ; it pitied them, and 
 they afterwards made him forget their errors. 
 
 When speaking of the women who only figured for a while 
 in the life of the Due d'Orleans, I could not name Madame de 
 Sillery ; 3 she deserves a special mention. 
 
 he was one of the most active members of the opposition, and embraced with ardour 
 the principles of the Revolution. Under the Empire, he lived in retirement. Peer of 
 France in 1814, he died in 1832. Monville was a distinguished savant. He practised 
 mechanics and manufactured several agricultural machines. 
 
 1 Marie-Christine von Hesse Rheinfelz-Rothenburg, married in 1 766 to Jacques de 
 la Tour d'Auvergne, Prince de Bouillon, born in 1746. 
 
 2 Claudine de Montmorency-Laval, born in 1750, married in 1768 to Andre, 
 Marquis de Fleury. 
 
 3 Felicite Ducrest de Saint- Aubin, Marquise de Sillery, Comtesse de Genlis, born 
 in 1746 near Autun. She married in 1762, Charles Brulart, Comte de Genlis, born in 
 1737, captain in the navy, who took the title of Marquis de Sillery on inheriting 
 his property some years afterwards. M. de Sillery, later Deputy to the States- 
 General, was guillotined with the Girondists, October 31, 1793. His wife, who retained 
 all her life the name of Comtesse de Genlis was appointed lady-of-honour to the 
 Duchesse de Chartres in 1770, governess to Madame Adelaide, and afterwards tutor 
 of the young princes d'Orleans. She emigrated with Madame Adelaide in 1792, and 
 retired to Switzerland and then to Berlin. She returned to France in 1800, where she 
 was very well received at the Consular Court. Madame de Genlis wrote much. She
 
 THE DUC D 'ORLEANS. 123 
 
 When one is a combination of ambition and moderation, 
 of communicativeness and of reserve, of rigidity and com- 
 placency, one is certainly a person whose life and intimacy 
 must offer extraordinary contrasts. It was by opposite means, 
 and which she never separated, that Madame de Genlis suc- 
 ceeded in all that her ambition desired. Being young, pretty, 
 without relations, it was by risking morning calls to men that 
 she found a husband ; later, she affected the height of prudery, 
 in a regular career of gallantries ; with the same pen, she 
 wrote The Knights of the Swan, and Lessons in Morals for 
 Children ; 1 on the same desk, she composed a church book for 
 Mademoiselle de Chartres and a speech to the Jacobins for 
 the Due d'Orleans. All her life presents the same contrasts. 
 Mademoiselle de Saint-Aubin — that was her name — had an 
 elegant figure but devoid of nobleness ; the expression of her 
 face was very lively ; she had little dash in conversation, little 
 charm in the habitual usage of her mind, but possessed at her 
 fingers' ends all the advantages that can be given by instruction, 
 observation, reserve, and the tact of the world. When she had, 
 for better or worse, married the Comte de Genlis, it became 
 necessary for her to make the acquaintance of her husband's 
 family, who, as she knew, were not well-disposed towards her. 
 Talents, affected timidity, and time enabled her, however, to 
 reach her aim. She managed to be invited at Sillery. In a 
 few days, she succeeded in winning the favour of M. de 
 Puysieux, 2 one of the most wearied men of his time, and in 
 disarming the sour old temper of Madame de Puysieux. She 
 felt indeed that she was then truly in society ; and, moving in it, 
 for the first time, consequently brought all her methods into play ; 
 she showed herself caressing, attentive, gay without blundering, 
 and was even able to be continually complacent, with a shade 
 
 left a number of novels, and works on education. Under the Empire, she wrote every 
 other week in different periodicals, at the request of Napoleon himself. She left, 
 besides, interesting memoirs. She died in 1830. 
 
 1 " Les Chevaliers du Cygne" — " Lecons de Morale pour les Enfants." The 
 former is not exactly intended to be placed in the hands of school-girls. {Translator.) 
 
 2 Louis Brulart, Marquis de Puysieux and de Sillery, born in 1702, first entered the 
 army, was afterwards ambassador at Naples (1735), Secretary of State for Foreign 
 Affairs (1747-175 1), Minister of State up to 1756. He died in 1770. He was the 
 great-uncle of the Comte de Genlis and proprietor of the estate of Sillery.
 
 124 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 of compassion. This first success was of great use to her ; a few 
 doors were thrown open to her ; she obtained to be introduced 
 to the Duchesse de Chartres, who, by the protection she accorded 
 her, destroyed in a very short time all the little oppositions of 
 society which still existed. The Due de Chartres found her 
 charming, told her this, and was quickly listened to, for Madame 
 de Genlis, to avoid the scandal of coquetry, always yielded easily. 
 A few years of care, indulgence and retired life, gave her such 
 an ascendency over the Due de Chartres, that it has been supposed 
 that she had a kind of influence over his actions, or rather over 
 the events of his life. So skilful a conduct had its reward ; she 
 succeeded in being appointed governess or rather tutor of his 
 children. One can only see in this choice of the Due de Chartres, 
 the intention to appear peculiar, and to mark plainly his scorn 
 for accepted usages. 
 
 Madame de Genlis, proved, in the first works she published, 
 that she was capable of directing all that part of the education 
 which pertains to the mind. Their exceptional nature made of 
 the eldest son of the Due d'Orleans, and of his daughter 
 Mademoiselle two superior beings. 1 Tried, fortified, instructed 
 and ennobled by misfortune, they showed themselves simple 
 and great when they entered upon their natural destiny. 
 
 The best works of Madame de Genlis, with the exception of 
 Mademoiselle de Clermont > date from this time, and if to-day 
 she has fallen in reputation, and follows, without glory, in her 
 quality of woman of letters, a singular and ill-considered path, it is 
 because, intoxicated by her first successes, she yields to her pride 
 and no longer consults her judgment ; it is because she wishes 
 to manage the jealous independence of the public, as she 
 managed formerly the obedient submission of her pupils ; it is 
 because she cannot soften her morality to subjugate the public, 
 as she has formerly done to subjugate all who were around her. 
 I cannot resist remarking upon two things : one, that to com- 
 mand is so necessary to Madame de Genlis, that when she has 
 no more princes to domineer, she takes by chance the first 
 comer to make a pupil of him ; the other, that, in spite of the 
 rigidity of manners she advocates, and the morality she professes 
 
 1 King Louis-Philippe and Madame Adelaide.
 
 THE D UC U OR LEA NS. 1 2 5 
 
 in her writings, one always meets in her later novels, something 
 of the freedom of her earlier manners ; there is always in them 
 some amours or some illegitimate children. For whom, with 
 what object, does she still write ? It may be, perhaps, only from 
 love of fame ; she was more sensible in her youth. 
 
 All the youth of the Due d'Orleans was spent without plans, 
 without projects, without result, without discretion. All he 
 did bore the stamp of irreflection, frivolity, corruption, and 
 deceit To instruct himself he went to see the experiments of 
 Preval ; he ascended in a balloon ; he assisted Cagliostro 1 and 
 the Chevalier de Luxembourg 2 in their fantasmagoria ; he went to 
 the Newmarket races and to other fashionable places. 
 
 To increase his fortune, which was already immense, he made 
 speculations on the lands of the Palais-Royal, 3 the dwelling of 
 Louis XIII., Anne of Austria, Louis XIV., and finally of Monsieur, 
 by whom it became an appanage of the House of Orleans. 
 
 Later, in a moment of suspicion, after having announced 
 
 1 The history of this celebrated adventurer could form a novel made up of the most 
 curious adventures. Born at Palermo in 1745, his real name was Giuseppe Balsamo. He 
 travelled all over Europe, procuring resources by most disreputable means. He had 
 a certain knowledge of medicine and of chemistry, which enabled him, in working 
 skilfully upon popular credulity, to acquire an universal reputation as a magician 
 and healer. He came to France, where he took the name of Comte de Cagliostro. 
 He found a protector in the person of the Cardinal de Rohan. His house became 
 the meeting-place of all Paris, who ran to witness the prodigies of the skilful charlatan. 
 Compromised in the affair of the necklace,* he was exiled and went over to England ; 
 he then resumed his wandering life, and ended by settling in Rome in 1789. He was 
 arrested by order of the Inquisition, and accused of practising freemasonry. Con- 
 demned to death, his sentenced was commuted, and he died in prison in 1795. 
 
 2 Anne de Montmorency- Luxembourg, known in his youth under the name of 
 Chevalier de Luxembourg, was born in 1742, was named Captain of the Guards (1767), 
 Marshal of Camp (1784). He died in 1790. He had accepted the title of Grand 
 Master of the lodge of Egyptian freemasonry, founded by Cagliostro. 
 
 3 The Palais-Royal was built between the years 1629 and 1636, for the Cardinal de 
 Richelieu, by the architect Lemercier. It was called then the Palais-Cardinal. Richelieu 
 left it by will to Louis XIII. (1643). Under the regency, Anne of Austria came to 
 live there with Louis XIV. It was then that it took the name of Palais-Royal. Louis 
 XIV. gave it, in 1693, to his brother the Due d'Orleans. In 1763, it was burned and 
 re-built by the architect Moreau, who designed it as we see it to-day. Louis- 
 Philippe (grandson of the Regent) increased its dimensions considerably by buying 
 all round a large belt of lands. The Palais-Royal, having become the Palais 
 National under the Revolution, was used as the residence of the members of the 
 Tribunate. In 1814, it was returned to the family of Orleans. Under the Second 
 Empire, it became the dwelling of Prince Napoleon.t It is now devoted to the sittings 
 of the Cour des Comptes and of the Conseil (TEtat. 
 
 * See footnote 4, p. 59, Part I. 
 
 t Prince Jerome Napoleon, son of King Jerome of Westphalia and of Queen Catherine of Wur- 
 temberg. By the death of the " Prince Imperial," he has become the head of the Bonaparte family 
 — (Translate)?:)
 
 126 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 some days beforehand to Seguin, his treasurer, his wish to see 
 for himself the state of his treasury, he had him arrested in 
 his presence, carried away the keys, and seized by this means 
 all the money which Seguin, forewarned, had borrowed from his 
 own friends, in order to replace momentarily that which he had 
 invested in private speculations. 
 
 A spark of ambition made him desirous of appearing in the 
 squadron of M. d'Orvilliers, 1 hoping thereby to acquire a title to 
 the extremely lucrative reversion of grand-admiral that belonged 
 to his father-in-law, the Due de Penthievre. He did not, however 
 have this post, and doubts were raised as to his bravery. 2 To 
 prove his courage, he had himself applauded at some of the 
 theatres and crowned under the windows of Mademoiselle 
 Arnould. 3 Paris amused itself then in a satirical but very unjust 
 song at his expense. 
 
 Some journeys to England, a run to Italy, remarkable only 
 for the rapidity with which it was performed ; the glory of being 
 elected Grand-Master of the freemasons ; 4 after a rather serious 
 illness, a Te Dewn sung by the lodge of the Nine Sisters f some 
 
 1 Louis Guillouet, Comte d'Orvilliers, born at Moulins in 1708. He entered the 
 navy, became vice-admiral in 1764, and lieutenant-general. In 1777, he fought the 
 battle of Ouessant, which, although indecisive, was glorious for French arms. He 
 resigned in 1779, retired to a convent, emigrated in 1789, and died in 1791. 
 
 2 To make up for his disappointment, the king appointed him to the office of colonel- 
 general of Hussars. 
 
 3 Sophie Arnould, a celebrated actress of the Opera (1744 to 1803). 
 
 4 The Due d'Orleans was elected Grand-Master in 1771, in which office he suc- 
 ceeded the Comte de Clermont. It was he who suppressed the Grand Lodge of France, 
 and replaced it by the Grand-Orient. I give here, as a curiosity, the acceptance of 
 the Due : "In the year of great light, 1772, third day of the moon of Jiar, fifth day of 
 the second month of the Masonic year, 5772 ; and since the birth of the Messiah, fifth day 
 of April 1772. In virtue of the proclamation made in the Grand Lodge, assembled on 
 the twenty-fourth day of the fourth month of the Masonic year 5771 by the very hi<*h, 
 very mighty and very excellent prince H.S.H. Louis-Philippe-Joseph d'Orleans, Due 
 de Chartres, prince of the blood, as Grand-Master of all the regular lodges of France. 
 And of that of the sovereign council of the emperors of the East and of the West, sub- 
 lime mother lodge of Scotland, on the twenty-sixth of the moon of EIul 1 77 1 , as sovereign 
 Grand-Master of all the councils, chapters and lodges of the great orb of France ; 
 an office which the aforesaid S. H. has willingly accepted for the love of the royal art, 
 and in order to concentrate under a single authority all the masonic operations. In 
 witness whereof, the aforesaid S. H. has appended his name to the report of acceptance." 
 
 5 The lodge of the Nine Sisters was founded in 1776 by several men of letters and 
 of European fame. This rather profane name (the nine Muses) caused a deal of 
 trouble to the founders. Their lodge was even, for a time, erased from the list of the 
 order. It was nevertheless the most brilliant lodge of the day, Franklin, Helvetius, 
 Roucher, Voltaire himself, being members of it. In 1827, it amalgamated with the 
 lodge of Saint-Louis de France, but kept its original name.
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 127 
 
 pleasures, or rather disorders of all kinds at Mousseaux, 1 filled 
 the following years. 
 
 The Due d'Orleans was approaching the age when, with the 
 greater number of men, the passions of youth begin to weaken 
 and to yield to the sway of a new tyrant. Nevertheless, he did 
 not yet display symptoms of ambition, which latter is, doubtless, 
 more backward in hearts withered by depravity and shrunken by 
 combinations of personal interest. 
 
 An agitation which spread all over France, was, however, be- 
 ginning to manifest itself, and could already be heard in all parts 
 of the kingdom — those dull and distant rumblings, the forerunners 
 of volcanic outbreaks. The French people had been called, by the 
 government itself, to consider the situation of the finances, and 
 to hear the statement of the fortune of the State. A light so new 
 to their eyes had caused a lively sensation and made a profound 
 impression. An entirely new power was created in France, that 
 of public opinion. It was not the clear and firm opinion which 
 is the privilege of nations who have long and peaceably enjoyed 
 their liberties and the knowledge of their affairs, but that of an 
 impetuous and inexperienced people, who are only the more pre- 
 sumptuous in their judgments and more decided in their will. It 
 is this formidable instrument that M. de Calonne dared to under- 
 take to handle, in order to adjust the old springs of the govern- 
 ment. He summoned the Notables ; he divided them into 
 commissions, over each of which presided a prince of the royal 
 family or a prince of the blood. The presidency of the third 
 commission fell to the Due d'Orleans. He only made himself 
 noticed by his indifference and lack of application. Diligence at the 
 sessions would have required the sacrifice of his pleasures or of 
 his habits for a considerable time, and this he was not capable 
 of making. He began by absenting himself from the evening 
 sittings, and ended by neglecting the day meetings, to which he 
 
 1 The hamlet of Mousseaux or Monceau, now a district of Paris, belonged formerly 
 to the parish of Clichy. The fermier-general de la Reynierehad acquired the lordship 
 of Monceau, where he possessed the chateau of Belair. The Due de Chartres became 
 in turn its purchaser. He built on it a country seat called La Folie de Chartres, 
 and designed around it a magnificent park. The Convention declared the Pare 
 Monceau national property. Later, the Emperor gave it to Cambaceres. Louis 
 XVIII. returned it to the Orleans family, which kept it until the passing of the decree 
 of 1852, which made it definitively a national property.
 
 128 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 came very late, and sometimes not at all. He pushed his frivolity 
 to the extent of going, during one of the sessions, to a hunt in 
 the woods of Raincy. The deer which he pursued was captured 
 in the ditches of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, under the eyes, 
 and to the great scandal of, the Parisians. 
 
 His partisans, not very numerous, thought to excuse his conduct 
 by remarking that, at least, he was no party to the intrigues, 
 which, after having scandalised the Assembly of the Notables, 
 had ended in annihilating all the hopes its meeting had given rise 
 to. This negative praise was not flattering ; for was there no 
 other part for the Due d'Orleans to play, on this memorable 
 occasion, but that of an intriguer ? It was more than a century 
 and a half since France had seen her king summon so important 
 a council. The greatest lords, the first magistrates, the wealthiest 
 landowners of France, had met together to give their advice on 
 the principal questions of the administration. It was meant 
 thereby to oppose the power of a stronger and more enlightened 
 opinion to the resistance of the parlement, to attack the Colossus 
 of ecclesiastical privileges, to cause the yield of the public rates and 
 taxes to balance the expenditure of the State by changing the 
 whole system of taxation, to pass long desired uniform laws on 
 the removal of the barrieres, on statute labour, on the freedom of 
 the corn trade, and many other impediments to national pros- 
 perity. It is easily conceived that the men or the organizations 
 threatened by these reforms would have done their utmost to 
 render them impossible, and that the swarms of ambitious men 
 whose aim it was to secure office, took possession of this vast field 
 to carry on their struggle. But that a prince of the blood, so 
 foreign to interests of this nature, should not have experienced 
 the noble temptation to crush all these petty intrigues under the 
 weight of his independence, that he should have viewed with 
 indifference all these symptoms of rebellion, that he should have 
 calmly looked on the dangers of the king, whose weakness was 
 so obvious and was so cruelly relied on, I cannot conceive, nor 
 can I account for it at all. He was bitterly reproached for it by 
 the nation, which took only too much interest in those debates, 
 and which had already lost too much of its former frivolous 
 character, to excuse a prince of the royal blood, scandalously
 
 THE DUC H ORLEANS. 129 
 
 parading his indifference : and the murmurings of the public were 
 not slow in conveying to him all the severity of this judgment. 
 
 To thwart its effect, the advisers of the prince acknowledged 
 the necessity of a prompt proceeding and obtained his assent to it ; 
 but it must be easy of execution and require but little following 
 up : it was necessary that the part to be performed should be in 
 proportion to the person who was to perform it. 
 
 The Due's chancellor was the Marquis Ducrest, 1 one of 
 those adventurers whom the caprice of fortune sometimes raises 
 to the top of the tree, and who think they deserve such 
 favour. This man was venturesome to foolhardiness and confi- 
 dent even to imprudence. He had reached this post through the 
 influence of his sister, Madame de Genlis, and he sustained the 
 importance of his place with the adroitness of a charlatan, rather 
 than with the skill of a business man. The affairs of the Due 
 d'Orleans had the reputation of being well conducted, and this 
 reflected some credit on M. Ducrest. Financial projects were 
 then the mania. M. Ducrest thought fit to draw up a memorial 
 on the finances of the State, in which he proved easily that they 
 had, up to that time, been badly administered, and proposed, in 
 order to re-organize them, to follow the plans he had put into 
 practice in the administration of his master's fortune. It was 
 arranged that the Due d'Orleans should deliver this memorial to 
 the king, and he consented more willingly to doing this than to 
 discussing the arguments set forth in it. It was enough for him 
 that the plan should have publicity and should give him, with 
 little trouble, the appearance of displaying zeal. This scheme 
 was at first successful. The king received the memorial, and did 
 not allow its contents to transpire ; this was a treatment which its 
 author did neither wish nor anticipate. Piqued by this silence, 
 the Due composed a second memorial in which he no longer 
 restricted himself to criticizing the operations of the ministry, but 
 openly attacked the persons of the ministers, and above all, the 
 Archbishop of Toulouse. As to the point in hand, he did not 
 
 1 Charles Louis, Marquis Ducrest, born in 1743. He was the brother of Madame 
 de Genlis. He served first in the navy, then in the army, where he was appointed 
 colonel of grenadiers in 1779. He was for some time chancellor of the Due d'Orleans, 
 with whom he quarrelled later. He emigrated to Holland, and died in 1824. He 
 left some works on political economy and various scientific treatises. 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 130 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 hold himself solely to the restoration of the finances, he went 
 directly to the root of the evil, and expressed the wish of 
 bringing back to the king the hearts of the French, which had 
 been estranged by the faults of the government. He proposed, 
 in order to accomplish both these ends at once, to establish 
 councils at the head of each of the sections of the administration, 
 and by this means to weaken the authority of the ministers. 
 But, at the same time, he wished for a supreme chief, a principal 
 leader at the head of the council, and declared himself ready to 
 consent to play this leading part provided that he was entrusted 
 with unlimited power, and supported by all the means public 
 opinion could devise to strengthen this power. He asked, in 
 consequence, that the title and post of superintendent of 
 finances, an office which had not been conferred since the 
 disgrace of Superintendent Fouquet, under the reign of Louis 
 XIV., should be re-established in his favour. The easy indul- 
 gence of Louis XVI., to whom the Due d'Orleans delivered this 
 second memorial, would only have repaid with scorn this un- 
 warrantable piece of impertinence. Chance did men justice by 
 divulging it. A copy of this document was found on the person 
 of the Comte de Kersalaun, a Breton nobleman whom the 
 governor of Brittany had had arrested in connection with matters 
 relating to his jurisdiction, and the secret thus spread abroad 
 enabled people to appreciate the modest talents of the chan- 
 cellor, and the prudence of his master. 
 
 This discovery exposed both to many jokes in verse and in 
 prose, of which we only cite the following epigram, as it may 
 serve to indicate the ruling tendencies in France, at this period 
 of the life of the Due d'Orleans : — 
 
 " Par tes projets bien entendus, 
 Modeste Ducrest, a t'entendre, 
 A la reine, au roi, tu vas rendre 
 Les cceurs francais qu'ils ont perdus. 
 Sans miracle cela peut etre ; 
 Helas ! ils n'ont qu'a le vouloir. 
 Mais, en preuve de ton savoir, 
 Fais-nous avant aimer ton maitre." ' 
 
 1 " Thanks to your well-concerted plans, 
 
 If we are to believe you, unassuming Ducrest,
 
 THE DUC D 'ORLEANS. 131 
 
 This first attempt to reconquer public favour having proved 
 a failure, the confidants of the Due d'Orleans did not lose 
 courage, and only considered themselves warned to arrange 
 matters better in future. 
 
 Occasions could not be rare at a time when the position of 
 affairs was changing and becoming more intricate every day. 
 The progress of ideas, more rapid even than that of events, was 
 prodigiously accelerated. 
 
 At the beginning of that same year, a meeting of Notables 
 had, as I have already said, surprised everybody, and in the 
 month of July following, the name of States-General was uttered 
 in the parlement of Paris itself with more enthusiasm than 
 surprise. The courts of justice everywhere abdicated their old 
 pretensions, to decide the amount of taxes to be raised. They 
 refused to register the edicts, and sent back the tax-laws to be 
 discussed by the States-General. The court, astonished at this 
 language, tried to intimidate the parlements ; that of Paris was 
 transferred to the city of Troyes, and for other difficulties, the 
 parlement of Bordeaux removed to Libourne. 1 This severity 
 had not been of long duration. The obstinacy of the magistrates 
 had not been inflexible ; half-way measures and intrigues, in 
 which M. and Madame de Semonville 2 (then Madame de 
 
 You will win back to the queen, and the king, 
 
 The French hearts they have lost. 
 
 Without miracle, too, that may be ; 
 
 Alas ! they have only to wish it. 
 
 But first make us love your dear master, 
 
 And your power, perhaps, then we will credit." 
 
 1 The parlement of Paris was exiled to Troyes, August 15, 1787, as a result of the 
 deliberation it had held on August 7 preceding, to protest against the lit de justice, 
 where the edicts on the stamp-duty and on the territorial subsidies had been regis- 
 tered by force. It was recalled on August 19 following ; the ministry had decided to 
 agree to these two edicts. As to the parlement of Bordeaux, it had been exiled to 
 Libourne, at about the same time, for having protested against the creation of pro- 
 vincial assemblies. It had even forbidden the assembly of Limousin to meet again. 
 
 2 Charles Louis Huguet, Marquis de Semonville, born in 1759, was received as 
 counsellor at the parlement of Paris in 1778. In spite of his opposition to the court, 
 he retained the favour of the king, was charged with negotiating the reconciliation of 
 Mirabeau, and later, that of the Girondists. Minister at Geneva in 1791 ; minister 
 at Florence in 1793, where Danton sent him to negotiate the setting at liberty of the 
 royal family, he was arrested with his colleague, Maret (the future Due de Bassano), 
 and suffered thirty months' captivity. On the 1 8th Brumaire he was named minister to 
 Holland. Senator in 1805, he took no part in politics under the Empire. Peer of 
 France in 18 14 ; grand referendary of the court. He kept aloof during the Hundred 
 Days, took up his functions again in 1815, and kept them until 1830. He then made 
 some efforts to save the Bourbon monarchy. Nevertheless, he retained his office under 
 
 K 2
 
 1 32 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Montholon) appear for the first time, in different capacities, had 
 brought about a temporary reconciliation ; but it was only a 
 truce, and even though the measures taken seemed more con- 
 ciliatory, public opinion gradually assumed a more menacing 
 aspect. The ears of the ministers became familiar with the name 
 of States-General ; they entered into new engagements on every 
 occasion ; the efforts of the ministry were directed only to 
 putting off the meeting of this assembly until the year 1792. 
 This delay they must gain, and, in the meantime, face the 
 taxes, pay off the sums about to fall due, or already so, and meet 
 extraordinary expenses ; and for so many needs, the ministry 
 mentioned no other resource than that of a loan open for five 
 successive years, and whose capital was to reach four hundred 
 millions. 
 
 In order to palliate the effect of this enormous demand, they 
 spoke on the one hand of reforms, economies, and ameliorations ; 
 while on the other, they added to the bursal edict a law favour- 
 able to the non-Catholics, a law that the government believed 
 conformable to the prevailing ideas and calculated to rally 
 many supporters. It had certainly never stood in greater need 
 of them. The critical mind prevailed everywhere ; everybody 
 prided himself on being an opponent, it was the general dispo- 
 sition ; it animated all the corporations, it prevailed in all the 
 writings ; all men vied with each other as to who should attack 
 a ministry that no one dared to defend, and which, after all 
 perhaps, had no more dangerous enemy than its own incapacity. 
 So it was easy to win victories over it, and, whatever might be 
 the issue of this contest, to have public opinion in one's favour. 
 
 The friends of the Due d'Orleans pressed him to aspire to 
 that easy success, by which various other interests could be 
 satisfied at the same time. He was not without experiencing 
 some resentment at having been met with a refusal, the last time 
 he had asked to be authorized to go to England ; for the princes 
 of the blood could not go out of France without the permission 
 of the king. Political reasons, easy to be conceived, placed all 
 
 the new government. He died in 1839. Semonville married Mademoiselle de 
 Rostain, widow of the Comte de Montholon. His step-son was General de Montholon, 
 who accompanied Napoleon to Saint Helena. One of hi^ step-daughters married 
 General Joubert, and on her second marriage, Marshal Macdonald.
 
 THE DUC D> ORLEANS. 133 
 
 the members of the reigning house in a sort of dependence on 
 its head for all the important actions of their private life, — a sort 
 of legitimate subjection, inasmuch as it is useful for the public 
 good, and, in truth, very easy to support when so many enjoy- 
 ments make up for it. The Due d'Orleans in vain affected to 
 ignore the cause of that refusal which had so offended him ; it 
 was none the less obvious to observant eyes. Some scandalous 
 reports were circulating in France as to his conduct during his 
 first two journeys, and Louis XVI., as the friend of decency and 
 good manners, wished to spare him a new occasion for indulging 
 his disorderly conduct and parading it before the eyes of a 
 neighbouring nation. 
 
 Perhaps this refusal to the Due d'Orleans was dictated, in 
 some measure, by the dread of the influence of the examples and 
 habits of a free country. Such a fear was puerile at this period 
 of history, and insulting to English liberty, for it would have 
 been a good thing for the Due d'Orleans to acquire a taste for 
 and understand the principles of it. He would thus have learned 
 to know what true liberty is, and have understood that each 
 individual has duties to perform, that the most eminent in the 
 social scale must set the example of respect to the king, and that 
 it is a crime to sacrifice public interest to one's own resentments. 
 Those of the Due d'Orleans were more particularly directed 
 against the queen, and they were kept up by a constantly in- 
 creasing series of society quarrels. Sharp words were bandied 
 about on both sides, and courtiers were not wanting to report 
 them to those at whom they were aimed. 
 
 Such miserable wranglings only had too great an influence 
 on the fate of the unfortunate queen. Why was it, that from the 
 height of this throne where her beauty alone was rivalled by her 
 greatness she should ever have consented to take part in quarrels 
 which she ought to have ignored ? Sovereigns are doomed to 
 reign without relaxing ; they should never permit themselves 
 to forget the importance of their private actions, for they can 
 never cause them to be forgotten by those who surround them, and 
 their negligence simply gives birth to hatred, their least prefer- 
 ence to jealousy, and their slightest offence to implacable 
 resentment.
 
 134 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The Due d'Orleans saw himself each day farther removed 
 from that familiar society of which the queen had given the 
 first example to the court of France, and of which Little Trianon 
 was the ordinary rendezvous. To several fetes in this delightful 
 garden, to that, 1 among others, which the queen gave there for 
 the archduke, her brother, the Due d'Orleans was not invited. 
 It is true that no prince of the blood was favoured on this 
 occasion. Disagreements of another character likewise kept the 
 Prince de Conde 2 and his family away from the parties given at 
 Little Trianon. At the gates of this charming retreat, the 
 queen felt that she could lay aside the chains of her grandeur. 
 Queen at Versailles, she believed she paid there her debt to the 
 august rank she occupied ; privately at Trianon, she wished 
 to be there only the most amiable of women and to know only 
 the sweetnesses of intimacy. Seeing that no one had absolutely 
 a right to the favour of being admitted to these little excursions, 
 it was only the more desirable, and the more calculated to excite 
 the desire of being invited. The Due d'Orleans could not conceal 
 his envy, even under the cloak of indifference. At one of these 
 fetes, he planned with some ladies of the court as little in favour as 
 he was, the means of mingling with the people admitted to look 
 at the illuminations ; and, having thus penetrated into the 
 garden, he avenged himself, for not having been invited, by such 
 loud jeering and noisy gaiety that the queen was informed of it, 
 and keenly hurt. 
 
 These little fits of animosity had so irritated the Due 
 d'Orleans that it was not difficult to lead him on to more serious 
 measures of opposition. The sway of fashion alone would 
 have sufficed to decide him. What was there to be feared in a 
 faction which the pettiest bailiwick of the kingdom joined with 
 impunity, and of which the courtiers professed the principles even 
 in the very antechambers of the king. The Due d'Orleans had 
 
 1 Fete given to Joseph II., at Trianon, on the occasion of his visit to France, 
 June 13, 1777, 
 
 2 Louis-Joseph de Bourbon, Prince de Conde, son of the Due de Bourbon, who 
 was first minister under Louis XV., and fourth descendant of the great Conde. Born 
 in 1736, he took an active part in the Seven Years War, emigrated in 1789, and 
 became the chief of that body of tmigrh, who took from that time the name of Army 
 of Conde. He retired to England in 1801, re-entered France at the Restoration, and 
 died in 1818. He had married the daughter of the Marshal Prince de Soubise.
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 135 
 
 only to present himself, in order to be proclaimed leader of the 
 malcontents at a time when everybody was, or affected to be, 
 one. This position was often presented to his imagination by 
 the men who had succeeded in gaining his confidence. It belongs 
 to my subject to make them known, for what would history be 
 if it painted but the surface alone, without ever penetrating into 
 the inner life of men who have played a prominent part, and 
 without disclosing the motives which caused them to act ? 
 
 I have already sketched the character of Chancellor Ducrest, 
 who held the first place in the house of the Due d'Orleans. M. 
 de Limon, 1 had, under M. Ducrest, the duties and the title 
 of Intendant of Finances. He was a business man, adroit be- 
 yond measure ; he had had the management of the pecuniary 
 interests of Monsieur. The estate of the former Due d'Orleans 
 had just been proved ; it was of enormous value, but involved, 
 and the co-heirs raised all sorts of difficulty. M. de Limon suc- 
 ceeded in clearing this chaos, and making the brother and the 
 sister 2 satisfied with each other and with himself. By this service, 
 he secured the confidence of the Due d'Orleans ; and he was 
 not a man who would not make the most of it for himself. 
 While following the litigation relative to the estate, he had made 
 the acquaintance of the chief members of the parlement of Paris, 
 who, being then engaged in higher politics, had willingly wel- 
 comed the intendant of a prince whose name could give weight 
 to their opinions. As for M. de Limon, he had detected some 
 hope of making himself necessary, and he cultivated carefully 
 his new acquaintances, in order that no one could dispute with 
 him the part of medium between the prince and the parlement. 
 
 M. de Limon found himself powerfully aided by Abbe 
 Sabatier de Cabre, one of the most stirring members of the 
 parlements of that time. A friend of Madame de Sillery, it 
 had been easy for the abbe, who attracted general notice by 
 a rare effrontery, a seducing imagination, a sort of eloquence, 
 abundant, fantastic and fertile of abuse, to gain access to the 
 
 1 The Marquis Geoffroy de Limon was comptroller-general of the Due d'Orleans. 
 Deeply devoted to this prince, he assumed, during the Revolution, a rather equivocal 
 attitude. It is even pretended that he wanted to have the Comte d'Artois poisoned. 
 After having been a fervent patriot, he emigrated, and became a firm royalist. He it 
 was who drew up the manifesto of the Duke of Brunswick. He died in 1779. 
 
 - Madame, the Duchesse de Bourbon.
 
 136 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 intimacy of the Due d'Orleans. He pleased the latter, and 
 soon succeeded in leading him on. Though enjoying no 
 esteem in the par lenient, he possessed some influence there. His 
 fellow counsellors had accused him of having been the spy of the 
 last ministry ; he cleared himself by harassing the new one. It 
 was he who, on July 16, 1787, suggested, in the meeting of the 
 courts, the convocation of the States-General ; and this bold 
 novelty had been greatly instrumental in drawing attention 
 to him. 
 
 What an advantage for a man of this stamp if he could 
 succeed in drawing the Due d'Orleans into a series of under- 
 takings, respecting which his incapacity would each day increase 
 his dependence ! Sabatier understood that he must above all 
 smooth the difficulties before the prince, that he must not hope 
 to conquer his frivolity, but rather confine himself to exacting 
 little from him in order to conciliate all his failings. So the 
 prince had merely to rehearse the part arranged by the abbe 
 for his appearance on the stage of public affairs. The loan of 
 four hundred millions of which I have already spoken furnished 
 the occasion for it. It is from then that the part taken in 
 public affairs by the Due d'Orleans ought really to be dated. 
 
 In order to better understand this incident, it is necessary 
 to make known a few of the forms observed then in France, 
 when the government had need to borrow. The edicts which 
 created the loans, and which determined its conditions, had the 
 character of laws, and, like other laws had to be transcribed 
 on the registers of the parlements of the kingdom. This 
 formality, which sanctioned the engagement of the State, 
 secured the lenders. But to produce such powerful effects, 
 was simple form sufficient ? Could the mere act of a 
 material transcription constitute a public obligation, and 
 mortgage the revenues of the State ? Was not then the regis- 
 tering in the parlements an approval of measures included in 
 the edict ? And does not the right of approval suppose that of 
 disapproval ? Was not the registering a witness of the national 
 consent ; and could this consent be sufficiently expressed by a 
 mechanical operation, blind and perfectly passive ? All these 
 questions recurred without ceasing, and being always eluded,
 
 THE DUC & ORLEANS. * 137 
 
 never made clear, were an inexhaustible source of debates and 
 intrigues. At each new loan, a struggle was necessary against a 
 resistance into which the magistrates were drawn by their natural 
 propensity, for their power being purely negative, they could 
 only exercise it by refusals. Besides, they had not, and could 
 not have, any acquaintance with the needs of the State, nor with 
 its resources. It was only, then, by general reasons that they 
 could be convinced, and to give value to these general reasons, 
 there must be found means of persuasion for each magistrate. 
 This duty was entrusted to the first president ; and when he 
 met with too many difficulties, the king was told he must 
 display his authority. It was then that he summoned a lit de 
 justice. 
 
 This kind of assembly, of which one can form no adequate 
 idea from the name it bears, was, in fact, the annihilation of the 
 remnant of liberty and of justice, which had taken refuge with 
 the resistance offered by the parlements. Thus M. de Fontenelle 
 was justified in saying that a lit de justice was a bed where 
 justice slept. Whether the king came himself to sit in the 
 courts of the parlement, or whether he obliged its members to 
 call personally with the registers at his palace, the ceremony 
 reduced itself to a reprimand pronounced by the monarch and 
 commented upon by the chancellor. The advocate-general of 
 the king arose next to expose and often to blame the motive of 
 the edicts, concluding, nevertheless, that they must receive 
 without delay the character of laws. For, it is to be remarked 
 that the presence of the king did not deprive the advocate- 
 general of the liberty of expressing his opinion, though it 
 imparted a certain direction to his summing-up. When all 
 these speeches were delivered, the king ordered the transcription 
 of the edict on the register of laws, and after this act of authority 
 to which the magistrates had no means of offering resistance, 
 there remained to them no other resource than that of remon- 
 strance, a species of tardy warning having a direct action on 
 public opinion, and often hindering the progress of affairs. 
 
 It is also necessary to bear in mind that the lits de justice 
 were the corruption of an ancient French custom according to 
 which the kings had formerly rendered justice in person, in the
 
 138 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 bosom of the parlement, and in the midst of the princes of their ' 
 blood, and of the peers of their kingdom. At these royal 
 sittings, all the judges gave their opinions ; the king had only 
 his own vote and delivered a verdict as expressed by the majority. 
 But his presence at the trial of private cases gave weight to 
 the measure there adopted — that was the greatest defect of this 
 exercise, otherwise so respectable, of the functions of royalty. 
 It was understood later, that if justice is the debt of kings, this 
 debt is better discharged when they do not discharge it personally. 
 Thus the king no longer attended the trial of cases ; but he had 
 retained his right of sitting in the midst of the judges. He only 
 made use of it, as a rule, to enjoin personally the registering 
 of some laws, and to overcome any opposition to it : this 
 visit was named a lit de justice; the direct result of this insti- 
 tution was that even in the matter of taxes and loans, the king 
 was sole and absolute legislator ; for the co-operation of the parle- 
 uients could always be reduced to a purely passive action ; and 
 in fact, they had no part in the making of the laws, the passing 
 of which they had no right to propose, nor to prevent. 
 
 The only counterpoise to the royal power consisted in the 
 national manners, and in public opinion, which gives force to the 
 law in well-constituted countries, and which, in purely despotic 
 countries, fills the lack of institutions. This impalpable force 
 was certainly most real in matters of loans ; for the govern- 
 ment might indeed call for capital, and it is confidence, and 
 well-founded confidence which brings it. The Archbishop of 
 Toulouse, Minister of Finances, recognized this truth ; the need 
 of more than four hundred millions to assess on the five years to 
 follow, was each day more fully demonstrated to him. He 
 understood, at the same time, that if this loan were only regis- 
 tered by force, it would be announced under too unfavourable 
 auspices and would never be covered. The /its de justice 
 had become odious. He could not count upon a free consent ; 
 he feared the results of a consent too openly wrenched. He felt 
 the need of bringing authority into action, and, at the same time, 
 of dissimulating this action. He thought then of getting the 
 king to hold a sitting in the park men t of Paris ; a sitting which 
 should be a compound of a lit de justice and of the old royal
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 139 
 
 sessions. Of these he borrowed the name which was not dis- 
 credited, and the mode of suffrage, which permitted each member 
 of parlement to give his opinion, and develop his arguments. He 
 retained the essential parts of the lits de justice, the right to 
 enforce the registering, without regard to the plurality of votes 
 or the wish of the majority. 
 
 On November 19th, 1787, the king presented himself at nine 
 o'clock in the morning at the parlement. The Ducd'Orleans was 
 there, and the other princes of the blood, with the exception of 
 the Prince de Conde, who was then occupied in holding the 
 estates of Burgundy. The king brought with him two edicts, 
 one of which related to the creation of the loan of four hundred 
 millions, and formed the principal object of the session, while 
 the second, which was on the civil condition of the non-Catholics, 
 had only been conceived in order to throw some favourable light 
 on the bursal edict. 
 
 The king opened the session by a speech divided into two 
 parts ; in the first, he announced that he had come to consult 
 his parlement of Paris on two great acts of administration and 
 of legislation. He developed very little of the purpose of these, 
 leaving, as was customary, to his Keeper of the Seals, the care 
 of the details and of the explanations. In the second part, 
 he took occasion to reply to the remonstrances that the 
 parlement of Paris had addressed to him in favour of the 
 parlement of Bordeaux, which had been punished by a re- 
 moval to Libourne for having raised difficulties relative to the 
 registering of a law on the provincial assemblies. The king, in 
 this part of his speech, employed a tone of authority, which 
 being affected and not even sustained during the little time he 
 spoke, served only to make perceptible by its variations, the 
 hesitations of his character. 
 
 The Keeper of the Seals 1 spoke after him ; his discourse 
 embraced a vast plan ; he commenced by attacking directly the 
 
 1 The Keeper of the Seals was then Chretien Francois, Marquis de Lamoignon, 
 cousin of the illustrious Malesherbes. Counsellor to the parlement of Paris, then 
 first president of that court, he was exiled in 1772 ; he was appointed Keeper of the 
 Seals in 1787, in the place of De Miromesnil ; he drew up and presented to the 
 parlement the edicts relative to the stamp duty and to a territorial tax. He resigned 
 in 1788, and died in the following year. His son was peer of France under the 
 Restoration. With him the family of Lamoignon became extinct.
 
 140 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 demand made by the parlement for an immediate convocation of 
 the States-General. Without a positive refusal, he seemed to 
 oppose to this demand some maxims on the absolute power oi 
 the king, which rejected the demand and made it depend 
 entirely upon the king's will. His constitutional system was 
 drawn from the most absolute doctrines ever professed by French 
 ministers at any period in our history. 
 
 From these principles which he gave as a peremptory response 
 to the demands and the decisions of the parlements, the Keeper 
 of the Seals passed to the examination of the proposed laws. 
 He descanted on the value of the ameliorations already or- 
 dered by the king, his measures of economy, the retrenchments, 
 which he desired to make in his personal pleasures rather 
 than on the establishments devoted to the defence or to the 
 splendour of the State. He presented as a work of genius the 
 skilful conception of a loan of four hundred millions which 
 would suffice at the same time to extinguish other more onerous 
 debts, to make useful improvements, to fill the deficit in the 
 revenue, to meet the foreseen and unforeseen expenditure during 
 five years, and even the cost of a war, — for which it was said every 
 measure had been taken, — if such a misfortune should break out, 
 in spite of the justified hopes the king entertained of its being 
 deferred for a long time by the wisdom and firmness of his 
 negotiations. (It was thus that the minister dared to describe 
 the conduct of the court of France towards Holland during the 
 course of the year 1787.) 
 
 This description of the benefits of the present administration 
 led finally to the new edict on the non-Catholics. 1 The Keeper 
 of the Seals called attention to the great advantages that this 
 increase of population would give to industry ; the benefit 
 accruing to society from new citizens ; the laws at last re- 
 conciled with nature and manners. But all could see the 
 object of this philanthropy adopted for the circumstance, and 
 no one would have thought of irritating the minister by adjourn- 
 
 1 The edict of 1787 on the Protestants returned to them a civil status which they 
 had lost after the revocation of the edict of Nantes. It is known that the registers 
 relative to births, marriages, and deaths were held solely by the cures, so that the 
 Catholics alone profited by them. As to the Protestants, their marriages were not 
 recognized, and their children were considered as illegitimate by law.
 
 THE DUC D 'ORLEANS. 141 
 
 ing these benefits of a tolerant legislation, provided the sanction 
 of the loan which was to bring four hundred millions into the 
 public treasury had been voted without delay. 
 
 After the Keeper of the Seals had finished his exposition 
 of the subject under examination, the deliberation followed 
 its course, and took the usual form of sessions of parlement. 
 The rapporteur of the court was first listened to on the subject 
 of the edict for the loan. This rapporteur was one of the 
 magistrates charged with examining all the laws that the 
 government sent to the parlement for registering. This magis- 
 trate was always chosen by the ministry among the oldest 
 judges who formed between themselves a privileged section 
 called the Grand' Chambre, which they entered only by length 
 of service according to their order of reception. The title 
 of rapporteur of the court was not that of an office, but of a 
 place of trust ; it was the road to ambition and to fortune ; it 
 was conferred almost always on an ecclesiastic, because, of all 
 the means of recompensing and enriching a man, the easiest 
 and the cheapest was to give him abbeys. It was in this post 
 that Abbe Terray 1 commenced his reputation and his fortune ; 
 after him, an exception was made by giving this post to 
 M. d'Ammecourt, protege of the house of Orleans. M. de 
 Calonne, who suspected M. d'Ammecourt of serving the minister 
 unfaithfully, because he wished to become minister himself, 
 dismissed him. Abbe Tandeau succeeded M. d'Ammecourt ; he 
 had not the astonishing ability, the great aptitude for affairs, the 
 very composed appearance of that magistrate ; but the essential 
 part of the office was to repeat faithfully the instructions received 
 from the council, to reply to the questions which might be asked 
 by a few explanations, too trivial to really enlighten, but sufficient 
 to appease the pretensions of the large number, more eager for 
 consideration than for enlightenment. Such was on this occasion 
 the report of Abbe Tandeau, a long and fastidious comment 
 on the edict. He concluded by saying that the extreme im- 
 
 1 Joseph Terray, born at Boen (Forez) in 1715. He was at first counsellor of 
 parlement, and took always in parliamentary struggles the part of the court. He 
 was recompensed by being named rapporteur (1775). Comptroller-general in 1769, 
 he became all powerful, after the downfall of Choiseul, with Maupeou andd'Aiguillon 
 Exiled by Louis XVI., he died in 1778.
 
 142 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 portance of such a loan would induce him to ask to have a 
 commission named to examine the edict and make a report on 
 it, if the presence of his Majesty did not apprise him that he had 
 come into the bosom of his parlement to seek there a definitive 
 opinion. 
 
 After the speech of the rapporteur, the discussion was opened : 
 each member in his turn was invited by the first president to give 
 his opinion. The Due d'Orleans in a very few words advocated 
 the rejection of the edict. This was the first action in which he 
 openly declared himself against the court. 
 
 Those orators whose talent and character caused them to be 
 listened to ordinarily with more interest, redoubled their efforts 
 on this day to make themselves noticed by the king and to 
 produce an impression upon him. The presence of the sovereign 
 indicated nothing likely to intimidate courage and discard the 
 truth ; he was said to have come to the Court of Peers in 
 order to obtain the opinion of his natural counsellors. What 
 a glorious success for the magistrates, if, by power of word, they 
 should succeed in withdrawing the king from the seductions of 
 mediocrity, striking his mind with the light of reason, in touching 
 his heart by the picture of the evils from which France was 
 suffering, and which she did not attribute to him. 
 
 M. d'Espresmenil's 1 object was, above all, to achieve this 
 latter point. He was reputed the first orator among the mem- 
 bers of the parlement opposed to the court, and he did not 
 deceive the hopes of his party. On this important occasion, 
 his speech was a special appeal to the personal feelings of the 
 king. He begged him to put aside the advice of his minister, 
 the settled opinions of his council, to weigh without prejudice the 
 truths he was about to hear, and to allow himself to be influenced 
 
 1 Jean Jacques du Val d'Espresmenil, born at Pondichery, January 30, 1746, was 
 the son of Jacques d'Espresmenil, Governor of Madras. His mother was the daughter 
 of the illustrious Dupleix. Having come to France at five years of age, young 
 d'Espresmenil was received as counsellor of parlement in 1775 ; he put himself at the 
 head of the opposition. He it was who provoked the resistance of his colleagues to 
 the edicts of Brienne suppressing all the parlements. Arrested for this, he was de- 
 tained some time in the island of Sainte- Marguerite. Deputy of the nobility to the 
 States-General, he became one of the firmest defenders of the monarchy, and when he 
 found his efforts powerless, he left the assembly never to re-enter it (179 1). He was 
 nearly murdered, August 10. Imprisoned at the Abbaye, he escaped by a miracle 
 from the massacres of September. Arrested anew a few months after, he was 
 guillotined in 1794. His wife shared the same fate.
 
 THE DUC D'ORLEANS. 143 
 
 by the convictions they would carry with them. He entreated 
 him to believe himself in the bosom of his family, surrounded 
 by his children, and not to restrain the emotions that this sweet 
 situation ought to awaken in his paternal heart. 
 
 Each orator seized the points that were most suited to his 
 usual views, and to the nature of his talent. The austere 
 Robert de Saint-Vincent, 1 recapitulating all that had been 
 said by the Keeper of the Seals and the rapporteur of the 
 court, on the actual sum of the charges of the State and the 
 insufficiency of the revenues, on the eventual ameliorations 
 and a recognized deficit, on the future economies and a present 
 poverty, found that the loan had no other guarantee than an 
 enormous deficit ; that thev could not, without fraud, mortgage 
 for a new debt the old taxes already given as a guarantee for 
 the preceding loans ; and that the parlement would share in the 
 responsibility of this crime if it sought the confidence of the 
 lenders, by covering, by the credit of its registering, the bottom- 
 less abyss into which they would precipitate their capital. 
 
 M. Freteau, whose too ready elocution was nourished by a 
 badly arranged knowledge, astonished the king and the assembly 
 by the comparisons with which his memory furnished him. He 
 attacked directly the irregularity of the double position of the 
 Keeper of the Seals, who, while still in possession of the office 
 of first president of the parlement of Paris, came into the midst 
 of this court to fill there the functions of minister, drawing up 
 projects of law in the council, and pretending to deliberate on 
 these same projects in the parlement, accumulating thus sanction 
 with initiative, the partiality of a maker of projects with the 
 impartiality of a magistrate. He concluded with proposing 
 nothing less than excluding M. de Lamoignon from the sitting 
 when they should come to count the votes. Abbe Lecoigneux 
 established the same motive of exclusion against M. Lambert, 2 
 
 1 Robert de Saint- Vincent (1 725-1 799) was the issue of an old family of 
 magistrates. Counsellor to parlement in 1748, he always displayed hostility to the 
 court, notably in the affair of the necklace. He emigrated at the Revolution, and 
 died in 1799. 
 
 2 Charles Guillaume Lambert, born in Paris in 1727. Counsellor of parlement, 
 Councillor of State, member of the Council on Finances, member of the assembly of 
 the notables. Deprived of his honours in August, 1788, he was re-instated in August, 
 1789. On October 19, 1790, the Assembly decreed that he had lost the confidence
 
 144 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 comptroller-general, who had none the less taken his seat as 
 honorary counsellor. 
 
 Abbe Sabatier, whom I have already named as one of the 
 counsellors of the Due d'Orleans, flattered the king by enco- 
 miums which rendered only more cutting the bitter satire which 
 he pronounced against the ministers. He insisted on his favourite 
 project, the convocation of the States-General. He dwelt upon 
 the incapacity of the parlements to win and retain the public faith 
 for the future, and insisted that the assemblies of the nation should 
 meet and re-seize the conduct of their affairs, and put an end to 
 the depredations for which they alone possessed the remedy. 
 
 A few speakers spoke in favour of the edict. The court was 
 not without partisans in this numerous assembly. Foremost 
 among those who declared for it, was the Due de Nivernais, 1 
 who, at the time of the affairs of 1771, had made himself noticed 
 by his opposition to the plans of Chancellor Maupeou. Men 
 rarely keep their energy to the end of their career. Courtiers 
 age early, and nearly all the men who age early become 
 courtiers. 
 
 Seven hours were devoted to this discussion, to which the 
 king listened with sustained attention, and often with manifest 
 interest. He had, above all, to guard himself against the im- 
 pression apparently produced upon him by the discourses of 
 MM. d'Espresmenil, Sabatier and Freteau. But, in this respect 
 he had been well trained. 
 
 After having heard all the speakers, the moment was come to 
 collect the votes, and to count them, when the Keeper of the 
 Seals was seen to rise, approach the king, take his orders, and 
 return to his place. Then the king pronounced these words : 
 " I ordain that the edict providing for . . . be transcribed on 
 
 of the nation. He retired on December 4 following. Arrested in February, 1793, he 
 was guillotined a few days after. 
 
 1 Louis-Jules Mancini-Mazarin, Due de Nivernais, was the grandson of the Due 
 de Nevers, who was the nephew of Cardinal Mazarin. Born in 1 716, he married 
 Mademoiselle de Ponchartrain, sister of M. de Maurepas. He had by her a daughter, 
 who married the Comte de Gisors, son of the Marshal de Belle-Isle, killed at Crevelt 
 in 1758. Nivernais followed at first the career of the army, and fought in the 
 campaigns of Italy (1734), of Bohemia (1742), of Bavaria (1745). He was afterwards 
 ambassador at Rome, then at Berlin (1756), and at London (1762). Under the 
 Revolution, he declined to emigrate. Imprisoned during the Terror, he was delivered 
 on the 9th Thermidor, and died in 1798.
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 145 
 
 the registers of my parlement, to be executed according to its 
 form and tenor." 
 
 It was now that the Due d'Orleans was to appear upon the 
 scene. But better to understand the proceeding agreed upon for 
 him, it is necessary to pay attention to the expressions employed 
 by the king. The formula he had just used would have been 
 the proper formula, if the session had been really a royal session, 
 that is to say, if the deliberation had been completed by the call 
 for the votes, and if the king had not ordained anything except 
 as a consequence of the known and stated wish of the majority. 
 But it was precisely this essential characteristic of all deliberations 
 of an assembly which was lacking in this. They had discussed 
 freely, but had not taken the votes. It is believed, that if a 
 minister, more courageous and more skilful, had dared to count 
 the votes, the result would have been favourable to the edict. It 
 is certain that all measures had been taken to secure a majority. 
 They had chosen the moment of the year when the vacations of 
 the parlement were strictly finished, but a well-known custom 
 prolonged them far beyond the legal term. So great a number 
 of members were absent, that of six presidents there were only 
 four at the session, while the Archbishop of Toulouse had not 
 failed to notify in advance those upon whom he relied. 
 Besides, they had swelled the numbers of the assembly beyond 
 measure, with ordinary counsellors, who seldom made use of 
 their right of entrance ; maitres des requites, dependent by reason 
 of their situation, had been chosen, and who were still more de- 
 pendent by their character or their ambition. In spite of so 
 many precautions, the ministers had not dared to make an 
 appeal to the majority which they would have been so happy, 
 however, to see prevail, and the sitting ended in a regular lit 
 de justice, infallible sign of terror for the support it had wished 
 to attract. One cannot avoid remarking the imprudence and 
 timidity displayed on this occasion. 
 
 The ministers had thought to remedy all by not having the 
 king pronounce in the order of registering, the characteristic 
 words of a /// de justice : by my express command. In withholding 
 these words, they flattered themselves that they would impose 
 upon the public, and believed that they could maintain that the 
 VOL. 1. L
 
 146 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 king had held a royal session. Therefore, to deprive them of 
 this subterfuge was to deal them the finishing stroke ; this was 
 exactly the master-stroke that the counsellors of the Due 
 d'Orleans had managed for him. Hardly had the king finished 
 speaking than the Due d'Orleans arose and said : " If the king 
 holds a session of parlement > the votes ought to be collected 
 and counted ... if it is a lit de justice he imposes silence upon 
 us." He stopped then, and the king not replying, he continued 
 thus : " Sire, allow me to lay at your feet, my protest against the 
 illegality of your orders." It is necessary to revert to the ideas 
 then ruling in France, to the principles of authority then in force, 
 to grasp the effect which must have been produced by the first 
 instance of a prince of the blood making a protest in the midst 
 of parlement, and attacking as null and void, in the presence ot 
 the king himself, the orders he had just given. 
 
 The whole history of the monarchy offers nothing like it. 
 Princes of the blood had been seen to resist with arms in hand 
 the power of the king ; they had never been seen to try to 
 impose constitutional limits to his authority. 
 
 The king, surprised and embarrassed, said with precipitation : 
 " That is legal." And he gave orders for the reading of the 
 second edict to be proceeded with on the instant. As soon as 
 it was finished, he arose and went out with his two brothers, 
 after a sitting of eight hours and a half, which had greatly dis- 
 turbed him, and furnished him with many causes for uneasiness. 
 
 The princes and peers, and with them the Due d'Orleans, 
 arose and accompanied him according to custom, then returned 
 immediately to take up again the deliberation which recom- 
 menced with more heat. The partisans of the court wished to 
 break up the sitting, and to adjourn for a week to give time for 
 minds to calm down. They represented that Messieurs (this 
 was the parliamentary expression) were exhausted with fatigue 
 and that they had need of repose. 
 
 M. Lepclletier de Saint-Fargeau, 1 who, in spite of his ex- 
 
 1 Louis Michel Lepelletier. Cornte de Saint-Fargeau, belonged to an ancient family 
 of magistrates. Born in 1760, he was successively advocate-general, then president a 
 mortier in the parlement of Paris. Deputy of the nobility to the States-General, he 
 was at first a prominent defender of the monarchy. Alone with the Comte de Mirepoix, 
 he refused to unite with the Third Estate, in spite of the order of the king (June 27,
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 147 
 
 treme youth, was already president a mortier, proposed also an 
 adjournment, but only until the morrow. This advice was ap- 
 propriate to the feebleness of his mind and the pusillanimity of 
 his character, which caused him constantly to try to propitiate 
 all parties, until republicanism, becoming dominant in France, 
 fixed his resolution. He little expected then to merit one day as a 
 republican the honours of a martyr and the laurels of apotheosis. 
 On this day, he was strongly opposed by Abbe Sabatier, 
 who, classing together the two dilatory opinions to destroy them 
 at the same time, maintained " That Messieurs ought to have 
 hunger and thirst only for justice, and that they ought to con- 
 secrate to it the remainder of the present day, not being assured 
 that the morrow would be at their disposal." In pronouncing 
 these words he tried to give to his accents a somewhat prophetic 
 character. Abbe Sabatier then invited the Due d'Orleans to 
 draw up his protest in writing, and for fear the memory of 
 the prince might not be accurate, he found in his own and sug- 
 gested to him the expressions, that he believed he had heard him 
 utter. With this aid the Due d'Orleans did what was asked of 
 him, and had it written on the registers of the parlement, that 
 immediately after the order of the king to register the edicts 
 he had risen and made the following protest : 
 
 " Sire, I beg your Majesty to permit me to lay at your 
 feet, and in the midst of the court, the declaration that I regard 
 this registering as illegal, and that it would be necessary for the 
 security of the persons who are accounted as participating in 
 it, to add that they did so by the express command of the king." 
 
 After a little debate, the resolution proposed by Abbe 
 Sabatier prevailed, in these terms : 
 
 " The court, considering the illegality of what has just passed 
 at the royal sitting, in which the votes were not counted in the 
 manner prescribed by the ordinances, so that, in short, the 
 deliberation was not completed — declares that it wishes to be 
 understood as taking no part in the transcription ordered to be 
 
 1789). After July 14, he suddenly changed his colours, and enrolled himself in the 
 most advancedrevolutionary party. Deputy of Yonne to the Convention, he displayed 
 most violence in the trial of the king ; he demanded his being put on trial, voted 
 his death, and refused the appeal to the people. On January 20, following, he was 
 assassinated at the Palais-Royal by a former body-guard named Paris. He was given 
 a solemn funeral service at the Pantheon, 
 
 L 2
 
 1 48 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 made on the registers, of the edict regarding the establishment of 
 loans, gradual and successive, for the years 1788, 1789, 1790, 
 1791, and 1792, and puts off the deliberation of other matters to 
 the next sitting." 
 
 They closed the sitting at eight o'clock in the evening. The 
 Due d'Orleans had carried off all the honour of this day, and it 
 must be acknowledged that all had been planned and conducted 
 with great skill by him and by his friends. 
 
 The minister, who had only been able to resort to trivial 
 means to sustain the already tottering royal authority, found his 
 ends defeated by the protest of the Due d'Orleans, and by the 
 resolution of the parlement, which exposed to the broad daylight 
 the ruse employed by the government, and proved its weakness. 
 
 While all was thus succeeding with the Due d'Orleans, in the 
 interior of the Palais de Justice, agents stationed outside were 
 publishing the proceedings of the sitting, and proclaiming the 
 name of the prince of the blood who had shown himself so good a 
 citizen. The people besieged the Palais in crowds, and could 
 be heard speaking of the pluck and success of the Due 
 d'Orleans. When he appeared to enter his carriage, the waves 
 of this fickle people carried him there, overwhelming him with 
 the most flattering applause. The liberator of his country could 
 not have had a more splendid triumph. He whom they had 
 greeted a few days before with sarcasms, was to-day covered 
 with blessings. Such are the judgments of that throng that one 
 pretends to honour by the name of the people. 
 
 Unfortunately, the Due d'Orleans sought no purer incense ; 
 this one was just to his mind ; as he had not been capable of 
 making true sacrifices to public opinion, so he was not able, cither 
 to detect the value that ought to be attached to this opinion, 
 when it is exalted by those who proclaim it. 
 
 The cries of joy of an ignorant populace flattered his passion 
 against the court, and fortified him in his scorn for public opinion 
 by showing him how easily it could be conquered. 
 
 The Archbishop of Toulouse and the Keeper of the Seals, 
 indignant at seeing that their stratagems had become snares 
 against themselves, united all their efforts to excite the anger 
 of the king and to represent to him the non-execution of their
 
 THE DUC jy ORLEANS. 149 
 
 measures as a public misfortune. " A prince of the blood," they 
 said, " who ought to have sustained the throne, and who had 
 dared to sap its foundations, even to the point of supposing 
 limits to the authority of the king and to say it in his presence ! 
 Judges bold enough to accuse of prevarication the ministers, 
 that is to say the trustees of the confidence of the master, the 
 agents of his will ! Such an excess of audacity merited punish- 
 ment. The exile of the one, the detention of the others, were 
 examples necessary in order to put a stop to similar scandals." 
 
 It was by such discourses that this feeble minister drew the 
 king into measures, which, being the outcome of passion, could 
 only induce all ambitious persons of the same stamp, as abbes 
 Freteau and Sabatier, to wish for a light persecution. The 
 ministers of Louis XVI. were ignorant of the fact that arbitrary 
 power has not the right to punish with moderation those who 
 resist it, and that it is doomed by its nature either to tolerate or 
 to crush its enemies. 
 
 The first alternative would have been more consonant with the 
 character of the king ; the second might well have tempted the 
 ministers, but they knew that they were not strong enough, 
 either with the king or in the eyes of the nation, to take it. They 
 thought they had done much in suggesting the exile of the Due 
 d'Orleans, and in proposing to have counsellors Freteau and 
 Sabatier carried off to prison. They took the first to the citadel 
 of Doullens, and the second to the chateau of Mont Saint- Michel, 
 a kind of isolated tower on a rock washed by the waves of the sea. 
 It was Baron de Breteuil, Minister of Paris, who went, on 
 the 20th of November, at six o'clock in the evening, to notifiy 
 to the Due d'Orleans the order for his exile. This minister was 
 specially entrusted with the distribution of the lettres de cachet} 
 when they were drawn up against one of his brother-ministers or 
 against a prince of the blood. It was customary for the minister 
 to go in person to give the information, and this mission drew 
 upon him, sometimes, receptions which bore the impress of the 
 
 1 Literally sealed letters. Originally they only conveyed the king's orders on State 
 business. Since the sixteenth century, however, they were subscribed by a Secretary 
 of State, and solely employed to notify to the authorities the decision of the king to 
 have persons of rank sent to prison without any trial, and often for imaginary offences. 
 — {Translator.) -
 
 i$o THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 temper of the disgraced ones. Here, the position was so much 
 the more delicate that Baron de Breteuil owed his fortune 
 to the protection of the house of Orleans. His uncle, Abbe de 
 Breteuil, 1 had been chancellor of the late Due d'Orleans, who 
 had loaded him with riches and kindness, and had opened to the 
 nephew the road to favour and high offices* The king's letter, 
 which the latter handed to the Due d'Orleans, contained the 
 order to go that very night to his Chateau at Raincy, 2 in order 
 to arrive on the following day at that of Villers-Cotterets, 3 which 
 was about eighteen leagues distant. The prince received this 
 injunction with ill-humour, and took care to make the bearer of 
 the order feel it. After having given an hour to a few private 
 arrangements, he called for his horses, and entered his carriage. 
 The baron who, according to his instructions, was to accompany 
 him, prepared to take a seat by his side, when the prince stopped 
 him saying : " What are you doing ? " The baron showed his 
 orders. " Oh, well," replied the prince, " get up behind," and he 
 started. The baron, without taking any notice of this passing 
 cloud (that is the expression he used when relating this little 
 incident) entered his own carriage and followed as best he could. 
 The news of the exile of the Due d'Orleans spread quickly 
 in Paris. The garden of the Palais-Royal, all the adjacent 
 streets and places were filled with people, and resounded with 
 cries oi" Long live the Due d'Orleans 1 '" On the 21st, in the 
 morning, the chambers of the parlement reassembled, and decided 
 to send the first president to the king to ask him to recall to his 
 presence the august prince whom he had removed, and to return to 
 the court two members whose zeal alone had dictated their 
 opinions. At noon the parlement was summoned to Versailles, 
 
 1 The Abbe Theodore de Breteuil, born in 1710, prior of Saint-Martin des Champs, 
 at Paris, chancellor of the Due d'Orleans. He died in 1781. 
 
 2 Le Raincy, near Bondy, about nine miles from Paris, had been at first an abbey. 
 In the seventeenth century, Jacques Bordier replaced it by a magnificent chateau, 
 which belonged afterwards to the Princess Palatine. It became, in 1750, the 
 property of the Due d'Orleans. It was sacked during the Revolution, and entirely 
 destroyed in 1848. 
 
 3 Villers-Cotterets, chief place of the Canton of Aisne. In the thirteenth century, 
 Charles de Valois possessed there a chateau which was destroyed during the war of 
 the Hundred Years. Francis I. had another built by the side of the old one, which 
 became one of the favourite residences of the court. It was acquired in the seven- 
 teenth century by the family of Orleans. This chateau is used to-day as a kind of 
 workhouse.
 
 THE DUG D' ORLEANS. 151 
 
 and the king gave orders for the resolution taken on the pre- 
 ceding 19th to be erased from the registers. The speech which 
 he delivered on this occasion is worth being preserved. 
 
 " I have ordered you," said he, " to bring to me the minutes 
 of the resolution taken by you on Monday last, after my leaving 
 the parlement. I cannot allow it to remain on your registers, 
 and I forbid you to replace it in any other manner. 
 
 "How can my parlement say it has taken no part in regis- 
 tering the edicts, which I only pronounced after having listened 
 during seven hours to the advice and opinions of those of the 
 members who wished to give them, and when it was certain for all 
 as for myself, that the majority of the votes were in favour of the 
 registering of my edict, and requested me to hasten the meeting 
 of the States-General of my kingdom. I have already said that 
 I would convoke them before 1792, that is to say, at the latest 
 before the end of 1791. My word is sacred. 
 
 " I approached you with confidence, in this ancient method, so 
 often employed by the parlement of the kings, my predecessors 
 and it is at the moment when I have so deigned to hold council 
 in your midst, on an object of my administration, that you try 
 to transform yourselves into an ordinary tribunal, and to declare 
 illegal the result of this council by invoking ordinances and 
 rules which concern only tribunals in the exercise of their 
 functions. 
 
 " The claims of my parlement ought to come to me only in 
 the form of respectful representations or remonstrances. I dis- 
 approve always of resolutions, which declare their opposition 
 to my will, without expressing any motives for it." 
 
 After this speech, remarkable for the principles it sets forth, 
 and by the formal promise of the States-General it contains, 
 the first president l obtained the permission to have the repre- 
 sentations heard which had been resolved upon that same 
 morning, relative to the exile of the Due d'Orleans, and to the 
 detention of the two counsellors. 
 
 The king replied in these few words : " When I remove from 
 my person a prince of my blood, my parlement ought to believe 
 that I have strong reasons for so doing. I have punished 
 
 1 The first president, d'Aligre.
 
 152 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 two malcontents with whom I had good reason to be dis- 
 satisfied." 
 
 They expected such a cold reply ; it did not prevent the 
 parlement from making a fresh attempt. Its example was 
 followed by all who had the right to raise their voices, and to 
 cause representations to reach even to the foot of the throne. 
 All the parlements emulated with each other in making remon- 
 strances ; all demanded the recall of the prince and of the two 
 magistrates. The princes and the peers were forbidden to attend 
 the sittings of the parlement, which were almost permanent 
 and drew the attention of the people. Experience had taught 
 that importunity was a method not without efficacy with a 
 feeble government. 
 
 In the sitting of the 22nd of November, the parlement had 
 also resolved to send the registrar Isabeau to congratulate the 
 Duchesse d'Orleans, and to express the concern they felt at the 
 exile of her husband. This princess had already departed for 
 Villers-Cotterets. On arriving at the place of his exile, the Due 
 d'Orleans had hastened to beg the parlement of Paris not to 
 take any notice of him. He knew well that in affecting to claim 
 this silence for himself, he would only attach the popular party 
 more strongly to his cause, and he was sure that the zeal of the 
 parlement for his interests would not be slackened. But it must 
 not be possible that the entreaties of that body should be 
 attributed to his instigations, otherwise, they would be more 
 likely to embitter the king than to appease him. The latter 
 could not, without compromising his authority, remit so 
 promptly the punishments he had imposed. 
 
 The peers submitted unwillingly to the prohibition which 
 had been laid upon them to enter parlement. They met 
 secretly at the Hotel de Luyncs, to draw up an address in 
 favour of the exiled prince. Similar requests, as I have said, 
 came from all parts. And yet the Due d'Orleans little merited 
 the interest he inspired. Little impressed by the eclat of his role, 
 he complained with bitterness of the privations it imposed upon 
 him. Never had lighter privations been supported with less 
 patience and less courage. If the Parisians could have read to 
 the depths of the heart of their new idol, they would have been
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 153 
 
 strangely surprised to find what little devotion they were recom- 
 pensing by so much homage. 
 
 The orders of the king forbade the Due d'Orleans to receive 
 in his exile other visits than those of his family and of persons 
 attached to his service. It had been desired to avoid the im- 
 mense concourse of visitors which would not have failed to 
 gather around the exile to honour his retirement, and above 
 all to brave the dissatisfaction he had incurred. However, 
 Villers-Cotterets was anything but a solitude. All the relations 
 of the prince, among whom must not be forgotten the generous 
 Madame de Lamballe, considered it a duty to gather about him ; 
 his children had joined him. His attendants and those of the 
 Duchesse d'Orleans formed a numerous society. At this period 
 of his life he was intimately acquainted with Madame de Bufifon, 1 
 a young and pretty person, whose disinterestedness and extreme 
 devotion have won the indulgence of all who have known her. 
 Once a week, she repaired to Nanteuil, 2 a small city situated at 
 equal distance from Villers-Cotterets and Paris ; it was there the 
 Due d'Orleans went to see her. 
 
 With these resources, in a magnificent dwelling, in the midst 
 of all the distractions procurable by an immense fortune, it 
 would only have required a very ordinary dose of moderation to 
 have been happy. But the prince's position appeared to him 
 unbearable, and it is impossible to deny that, at this time, blind 
 vengeance became the ruling passion of his heart. This is the 
 secret of the second portion of his life. 
 
 While those ideas of vengeance were fermenting in his head, 
 he nevertheless used every means to obtain his liberty. The 
 Parisians, who wished to justify their enthusiasm, related that he 
 had rejected the means of return and of reconciliation offered 
 by the Archbishop of Toulouse. According to them, the Due 
 d'Orleans had refused to re-enter into favour before the two 
 counsellors were recalled, and also before the motive of the 
 
 1 Mademoiselle de Cepoy, married in 1784 to Louis-Marie, Comte de Buffon, son 
 of the illustrious savant, who was decapitated in 1794. The relations existing between 
 the Due d'Orleans and Madame de Buffon determined a separation (1789) between 
 her and her husband, and this was converted into a divorce (1793). 
 
 2 Nanteuil, chief seat of the Canton of Oise ; 1,600 inhabitants ; fifteen miles 
 from Senlis.
 
 154 THE MEMOIRS OE PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 severity which had been employed towards them, should have 
 been made known positively to all three. 
 
 These rumours were credited by those who were on good 
 terms with the inmates of the Palais Royal, where all mention 
 of the vain efforts of the Prince de Conde and of the Due de 
 Bourbon x in the exile's favour was carefully avoided. The king 
 had received those princes with kindness. He had not dis- 
 approved of the interest they had shown for the Due d'Orleans, 
 but, pressed by them to explain himself on the duration of the 
 exile, he contented himself by replying : " Believe me, I am a 
 good kinsman." 
 
 The same newsmongers, as fortunate in invention as in reti- 
 cence, abstained also from speaking of the letters in which the 
 Due d'Orleans had directly solicited his pardon. In these letters, 
 he had not blushed to put forward motives surely much more 
 humiliating than any prayer. It was not on the legitimacy of his 
 conduct nor even on the purity of his intentions that he based 
 his request. In order to move the king, he had sought the most 
 extraordinary means. Thus, he laid weight on the necessity of 
 resuming and superintending the work commenced at the Palais 
 Royal, the suspension of which caused great prejudice to his 
 interests ; he spoke also of the neglect into which these had fallen 
 through the illness of M. de Limon, the intendant of his finances. 
 In order to try everything, he spoke of his health and of that of 
 the Duchesse d'Orleans, saying they could not do without re- 
 turning to Paris. Finally, he laid weight on the retirement of 
 his Chancellor Ducrest, as an expiatory sacrifice which ought 
 to be recompensed by a return of favour, or at least by a 
 generous forgetfulness of the wrongs of which this " imprudent 
 favourite had rendered himself guilty." 
 
 It was true that M. Ducrest had just given in his resignation, 
 and the letter that accompanied it had been circulated in public. 
 
 1 Louis Henry -Joseph, Due de Bourbon, was born August 13, 1776. He was the 
 son of the Prince de Conde. He took no part in public affairs under the reign of 
 Louis XVI. He emigrated at the beginning of the Revolution, and commanded a 
 corps of the army of Conde. He retired afterwards to England. During the 
 Hundred Days, he tried without great success to raise the Vendee. He was appointed, 
 under Louis XVIII., grand master of the king's household. He put an end to his 
 life, August 27, 1830, at Chantilly. He had married his cousin, the Princesse 
 Louise d'Orleans, and was the father of the unfortunate Due d'Enghien.
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 155 
 
 According to that letter, the resignation was purely voluntary ; 
 the faithful servant had perceived that he was injuring his 
 master, and his attachment for him required him to separate from 
 him. Too much hatred had attached to him as the author of the 
 memoranda handed to the king by the Due d'Orleans, for him to 
 hope that he could do the latter any good. He flattered himself 
 that the vengeance of his enemies being satisfied, they would 
 seek no other victim. All this was intermingled with phrases on 
 the success of his administration. Neither the resignation of 
 Chancellor Ducrest, nor his letter, nor that of the Due d'Orleans, 
 had touched the heart of the king, and severity prevailed still in 
 his resolutions. The Due d'Orleans did not even obtain a 
 written answer ; but the Comte de Montmorin, Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs, was instructed to see him, to exhort him to 
 patience, and to say to him that the king did not write in order 
 to spare himself the chagrin of refusing him. 
 
 The parlement > where princes and peers had at last obtained 
 permission to reappear, did not cease to insist on the recall of 
 the two exiled counsellors and of the prince. All the month of 
 December was passed in waiting, and soliciting replies from the 
 government. The Prince de Conde and the Due de Bourbon 
 attracted notice by their assiduity at the sittings of the parlement, 
 and if they appeared to agree with the ministers on some points, 
 they could not be reproached with failing on every occasion to 
 speak in favour of the three exiles. After some weeks rigour 
 at last ceased. The king resolved to trust to mercy, and was 
 pleased to accord to the Duchesse d'Orleans that which he had 
 refused to the entreaties of the parlement. 
 
 The Archbishop of Sens (M. de Brienne had exchanged the 
 Archbishopric of Toulouse for that of Sens,) thinking he had 
 obtained a truce by this concession, prepared with the Keeper 
 of the Seals a new judiciary organization, the effect of 
 which was to suspend the functions of all the sovereign 
 courts of the kingdom at the time when it should be- 
 come law. Sanction was to be given to this new project in 
 an assembly summoned under the name of plenary court, in 
 which the edicts that the minister had proposed to the parle- 
 ment were to be registered. But M. de Brienne had neither
 
 156 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the intellect nor the energy required by projects so vast and 
 circumstances so grave. 1 
 
 The measures taken by the ministry, and the mysterious 
 silence they kept, caused great uneasiness :o all the magis- 
 trates. They made all sorts of attempts to discover the projects 
 of the government. They succeeded . MM. d'Espresmenil and 
 Goislard 2 obtained a copy of the edicts and some documents 
 which related to them. They had them printed and distributed, 
 without the ministry having even had knowledge of the discovery 
 that had just been made. In an assembly of the chambers con- 
 vened immediately, and at which the Due d'Orleans was not 
 present, after all the peers and members of the parlement had 
 taken an oath not to recognize as a courv officer any except those 
 present, and to reject at the risk of their lives all propositions 
 tending to retard the convocation of the States-General, they 
 declared that if violence made it impossible for the court to watch 
 personally over the constituent principles of the French monarchy, 
 they would confide this duty to the hands of the king, the princes 
 of his blood, and the States-General. 
 
 The ministry, informed of what had passed, decided to have 
 those magistrates arrested whom they supposed to have dis- 
 covered and published their projects. M. d'Espresmenil and M. 
 Goislard took refuge in the parlement. A detachment of the 
 armed force that was in Paris followed after them. After some 
 hours they gave themselves up into the hands of M. d'Agoult, 3 who 
 
 1 Brienne undertook to destroy the parlements. On May 8, 1788, the king 
 ordered the parlement to Versailles, and the Keeper of the Seals, Lamoignon, read 
 the following edicts : — The first instituted under the title of Grands Bailliages, new 
 courts of justice which were to decide all civil and criminal cases below 20,000 
 livres. The parlements were only cognizant of cases above that figure, as also of 
 those concerning ecclesiastics and nobles. The second edict reduced considerably 
 the number of counsellors of parlement. The third suppressed all extraordinary 
 tribunals. The fourth abolished the previous question. The fifth, and the most 
 important, instituted a plenary court, charged with verifying and registering the laws 
 for the whole extent of the kingdom. This court was composed of the Chancellor or 
 of the Keeper of the Seals, of the great chamber of the parlement of Paris, of the 
 princes of the blood, the peers, the grand officers of the crown, various dignitaries 
 of the Church and of the army, a certain number of members chosen in the Council 
 of State and the parlements of the provinces. The court had the right of remon- 
 strance, but the king reserved to himself that of dictating his orders at lits de justice. 
 Finally, the sixth edict published an interdict against all existing parlements, and 
 forbade their assembling on any public or private case. 
 
 2 M. Goislard de Monsabert was a young counsellor of parlement. 
 
 3 Antoine Jean, Marquis d'Agoult, born at Grenoble in 1750 of an old family of 
 Dauphiny. Lieutenant of the body-guard (17S1), colonel (1783). He emigrated in
 
 THE DUC U ORLEANS. 157 
 
 commanded the expedition, and who had declared that he 
 would rake them jway by force, if they would not follow him. 
 M. d'Espresmenil was taken to the island of Saint Mar- 
 guerite. I ought to observe, for the sake of the history of 
 the odd freaks of the human mind, of which it is always well to 
 take account, that that same d'Espresmenil — just as in the as- 
 sembly of the clergy held at that time, the Bishop of Blois, like 
 M. de Themines — they both being then leaders of the opposition 
 against the court, and decided advocates of the States-General, 
 — made himself conspicuous, during all the time of the 
 constituent assembly, by sentiments, opinions, and intrigues 
 directed against the new order of things which he had himself 
 produced. 
 
 The Archbishop of Sens after having tried for twenty-four 
 hours a kind of bankruptcy, and having, for some days, re- 
 sorted to a certain severity against the parlements, renounced 
 all his plans, and, promised to summon a meeting of the States- 
 General, in order to gain time, but he did not gain any, and 
 was obliged to retire, leaving the court enfeebled, public opinion 
 informed of its own strength, and, in one word, the Revolution 
 commenced. 
 
 The Due d'Orleans had no influence on the last movements 
 of the parlement, and his name was hardly mentioned at the 
 States-General. I shall not therefore dwell on the events which 
 marked this important period. 
 
 The government had itself proclaimed the limits of its power 
 and invited the public, by an appeal made to all enlightened 
 men. to devise itself the best method of convoking the States- 
 General. Was it not imprudent to agitate France by political 
 discussion: of all kindo and withoui fixed principle^ to start 
 with? \o fact, the first cause of the disorders excited by the 
 assembling of the States-General lay here. 
 
 The first symptoms of these disorders broke out in the Faubourg 
 St. Antoine, and everything goes to prove that the Due 
 d'Orleans was not a stranger to them. A manufacturer named 
 
 1 791, and joined the army of Conde. He remained attached to Louis XVIII. during 
 all his exile, and only returned to France in 18 14. He died in 1828, peer of France 
 and Governor of the Chateau of Saint-Cloud.
 
 158 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Reveillon, 1 a very respectable man, gave employment to a large 
 number of workmen. I do not know what calumny was circulated 
 among them concerning him who gave them their means 
 of livelihood. At the same time money was distributed to 
 them ; and the crowd having mixed with them, the number 
 increased, and the riot became so serious, that it was necessary 
 to employ the French and the Swiss Guards to restore order. 
 The same amount of money, twelve francs, that was found 
 on each of the rioters killed or arrested, proved already that 
 some one of a superior class, had directed that outbreak ; the 
 confessions made by several of those poor wretches allowed 
 it to be no longer doubted that the sedition had been brought 
 about by the agents of the Due d'Orleans. The depraved 
 character of that prince made him enjoy any tumult what- 
 ever ; he was delighted to agitate, to make a noise, to create 
 embarrassment, but he dared not do any more. 
 
 This disturbance had been brought about by M. de Laclos, 2 
 who had been for some time attached to the person of the Due 
 d'Orleans as " secretary of his commands." M. de Laclos had been 
 introduced in Paris to a few houses by the Vicomte de Noailles, 3 
 who had known him in garrison ; his ambition, spirit, and 
 
 1 Reveillon was a stained-paper manufacturer of the Faubourg St. Antoine. He 
 had been accused of having used harsh and unfriendly language to his workmen, 
 which had provoked a furious riot (April 28, 1789). His house and factory were 
 destroyed. The riot was quelled, but not without much bloodshed. 
 
 - Pierre- Ambroise Choderlos de Laclos, bora at Amiens in 1741, was captain of 
 engineers in 1778. He formed an intimacy with the Due d'Orleans, and became 
 "secretary of his commands." He was actively concerned in the intrigues of the 
 party of the prince at the outbreak of the Revolution. He was a member of the 
 Jacobins' Club, and edited its journal. After the flight to Varennes, he moved the 
 deposition of the king, and drew up with Brissot the petition of the " Champ de Mars." 
 He became brigadier-general in 1792. Imprisoned on two different occasions during 
 the Terror, he was, later, sent to the army of the Rhine as general of brigade. In 
 1803, he was inspector-general of artillery at Naples, when he died. Laclos has left 
 also a literary reputation. He is the author of a few light poems and several novels, 
 the best known of v hich is entitled Liaisons Dangerenses. 
 
 3 The Vicomte Louis Marie de Noailles was the second son of Marshal de Mouchy. 
 Born in 1756, he became colonel of the Chasseurs d'AIsace, and joined in the expedi- 
 tion to America. Deputy of the nobility of Nemours to the States-General, he 
 warmly adopted the new ideas, joined the Third Estate, and proposed the aboli- 
 tion of feudal rights (August 4). President of the constituent assembly in 1791, 
 brigadier-general in 1792, he was defeated at Gliswal. He emigrated soon after. In 
 1803, he returned to France, again took service as general of brigade, and was killed 
 in sight of Havanna whilst capturing an English frigate. The Vicomte de Noailles 
 had married his cousin Anne, granddaughter of Marshal de Noailles. She was guil- 
 lotined July 22, 1794, with her mother, the Duchessc d'Ayen, and her grandmother, 
 the Marcchale de Noailles.
 
 THE DUC D 'ORLEANS. 159 
 
 bad reputation had caused the Due d'Orleans to regard him 
 as a man whose support it was by all means good to have 
 in stormy circumstances. Un Eloge de Vauban, the immoral 
 novel entitled Liaisons Dangerenses, some works on tactics, 
 several newspaper articles which had proved the flexibility 
 of his opinions, as of his talent, had induced the Due d'Orleans 
 to entrust him with the draft of the instructions he wished to 
 give to the different persons who were to represent him in the 
 bailiwicks of his appanage. M. de Laclos had written on this 
 occasion a sort of code in which all the philosophical ideas of the 
 time, treated of in separate articles, did not seem sufficiently 
 veiled to the Due d'Orleans. This not suiting him, he sought 
 another compiler. Abbe Sieyes was suggested to him as the 
 man who had reflected most upon the questions which, it 
 was supposed, the States-General would discuss. In a meeting 
 which took place with Sieyes at the house of M. de Biron at 
 Montrouge, the Due d'Orleans showed to the abbe the draft of 
 M. de Laclos, and asked him to make such changes in it as he 
 thought suitable. Abbe Sieyes, who, owing to the disposition of 
 his mind, was usually little pleased with the work of others, found 
 that nothing could be preserved, and drew up a new project 
 which the Due d'Orleans adopted and had printed. 1 My opinion 
 is that, from that time, there were no further relations between 
 
 1 (Paris, 1789, 1 vol. 8vo. ) This document is very interesting ; the fact that it 
 emanates from the first prince of the blood gives it much more value. In it, the author 
 indicates first the principal articles to insert in the cahiers* namely, individual and 
 political freedom ; privacy of letters ; inviolability of property ; periodical vote of 
 taxes, and their equal distribution ; responsibility of ministers ; divorce. Passing next to 
 the regulation of the assemblies, he requests his representatives to take notice only of the 
 present instructions, without paying any attention to the regulation joined to the king's 
 letters of convocation. He deplores that the ministry "by an inconsistency worthy of 
 the enlightenment which has always distinguished them," should have adopted the 
 mode of deliberation by separate orders. " The only important deliberation is that 
 of the Third, for it alone has the general interest in view, it alone is the depositary of 
 the powers of the nation, and it feels that it is about to be entrusted with its 
 destinies." And farther on, he adds : " The duty of the States-General will then be 
 to attack the despotism of the aristocrats, and the unlimited prerogatives of the royal 
 power, to draw up a declaration of the rights of man, and to establish a constitution 
 on the following bases : A national assembly elected in the third degree ; the parish 
 assemblies will elect cantonal assemblies, which in their turn will elect provincial 
 assemblies, which will choose from their midst the national representatives. All the 
 deputies will be subject to dismissal by their constituents." It must not be forgotten 
 that the estates of the Due d'Orleans, where those instructions were scattered, had 
 the extent of three or four French Departments. 
 
 * The instructions given by the constituencies to their deputies with regard to the reforms that 
 weremost needed. — {Translator.)
 
 160 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the Due d'Orleans and Abbe Sieyes, and that this was the 
 only time they met. But, as those instructions caused consid- 
 erable stir, and their author was known, it was supposed, at 
 different stages of the Revolution, that there was a secret bond 
 between Abbe Sieyes and the Due d'Orleans. There never 
 existed, perhaps, two men more incompatible, and nothing 
 would prove it better than to show Sieyes as he is. i will 
 try to make a sketch of him. 
 
 Sieyes has a mind vigorous in the highest degree ; his heart is 
 cold and his soul pusillanimous ; his inflexibility is only in his 
 head. He can be inhuman, because pride will prevent his 
 drawing back, and fear will bind him to crime. It is not out 
 of philanthropy that he professes equality, it is out of violent 
 hatred against the power of others. It cannot be said, how- 
 ever, that the exercise of power suits him, for he would not 
 be at his ease at the head of any government, but would like 
 to be its only thinking and ruling spirit. Exclusive, domineer- 
 ing, he does not confine himself to a continuous and regular 
 action ; disdainful of that which is known, he wishes to go beyond 
 it. Obstacles make him indignant, he scorns every compromise. 
 What he calls a principle, is in his hands a brass sceptre, which 
 does not bend either to the imperfections of nature, or to the 
 weaknesses of mankind. He is equally ignorant of the virtues 
 and of the faults which are inherent in a feeling mind. His 
 resolution once taken, no affection can stop it. Men, in his 
 eyes, are but pawns to be moved about ; they occupy his 
 mind, but awake nothing in his heart. When he draws up a 
 constitution, he treats the country for which it is intended as 
 a place whose inhabitants never felt or saw anything. 1 
 
 The only feeling that has any influence over Sieyes is that 
 of fear. At the Convention he feared death since then, the 
 fear of the vengeance of the house of Bourbon rules him. 
 
 Sieyes is regular in his habits, methodical in his conduct, 
 obscure in his dealings. His private life offers nothing philo- 
 sophically remarkable. In his tastes, he is somewhat choice ; 
 he is difficult to serve, to lodge, to furnish. He is not covetous, 
 but he is not lofty enough to despise fortune ; his pride, even , 
 
 1 Allusion to the constitution proposed by Sieyes in the year VITT.
 
 THE D UC D 'ORLEANS. 1 6 1 
 
 has not been strong enough to prevent that foible detracting, 
 from his political consideration. He has no mental ability ; 
 he cannot argue, because he only knows how to prescribe. 
 He converses badly ; he has no desire to convince, he wishes 
 to subjugate. His humour is sad : it is possible that a natural 
 indisposition which forbids him intercourse with women 
 contributes to this ; and yet he does not disdain to jest with 
 them ; then, he has a kind of grace ; he can smile, and resort 
 to waggish banter, which is measured and rather cutting, 
 but he never stoops so far as to be amiable. Proud and timid, 
 he is necessarily envious and defiant ; so he has no friends, 
 but has submissive and faithful followers. 
 
 Sieyes may be a leader of opinion ; he will never be a leader 
 of a party. His mind is more superb than active. He is all 
 of one piece ; if one does not do as he wishes, he sulks in his 
 corner, and consoles himself that he is looked at there. He has 
 not a happy countenance ; it bears the imprint of a hard and 
 meditative character. His look has somewhat of superiority, 
 of haughtiness, and only lights up when he smiles. His pale 
 complexion, his figure without precision in its form, his slow 
 and gentle walk, all his outward appearance in short, seems plain 
 as long as he does not speak, and yet he does not speak well. 
 He only says words, but each word expresses a thought and 
 indicates reflection. In a serious conversation, he is never 
 captivating, but he imposes. 
 
 Does all I have just said apply to a man who could have 
 submitted his character, his temper, his opinions, to those of 
 a prince ; who could have the complacencies of accessory 
 ambition ? No one will think so. 
 
 I have felt obliged for once to destroy by means of reasons 
 drawn from the essence of their characters, the generally 
 established opinion that the Due d'Orleans had any concerted 
 relations with Sieyes. It is equally true that there was not, 
 between him and any of the remarkable men of that time, any 
 other association than that brought about naturally by private 
 meetings, entirely foreign to all personal combinations. 
 
 After the instructions given to his bailiwicks, the Due 
 d'Orleans ceased to be politically an active person ; his feeble 
 VOL. I. M
 
 1 62 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 character, his equivocal and unsettled position prevented his 
 becoming so. After the crime of his vote, he was no longer 
 of importance, people had no further need of him ; he remained 
 simply in the ranks, and as that was not his place, he was there 
 a cipher, was disgraced and killed. 
 
 What becomes then of the opinion, so positively accredited, 
 that the Due d'Orleans was the prime author of the Revolution ; 
 that his name served for the rallying of a numerous class of 
 citizens ; that he was encouraged by the ambition of a few 
 turbulent minds, to raise his eyes to the throne. This opinion 
 cannot be held before the picture of his life. For immorality, 
 extreme frivolity, want of reflection, and weakness, suffice to 
 explain his agitations as well as his inaction. Furthermore, 
 the impulse once given, the rapid and violent excitement of 
 minds prevented, at every stage of the Revolution, the develop- 
 ment of private ambitions. All ideas tending, from the 
 beginning, to establish equality and to weaken all power, lofty 
 ambitions were necessarily discountenanced. It was not until 
 very much later, after terrible tests, that there began to be felt 
 the need of a leader to modify the state of things which existed ; 
 it was then that Bonaparte appeared. The Due d'Orleans 
 was, doubtless, not the last person to perceive the disposition of 
 minds which I have just indicated. That is why he always 
 concealed the real aim of his ambition. He was not, as I have 
 said, either the principle, the object, or the motive of the 
 Revolution. The impetuous tide carried him along with the 
 others. 
 
 The Due d'Orleans fell back upon himself, his tastes, his 
 needs. Hence the secret thought which led him, after October 
 6, 1789, to undertake the disgraceful journey to England for 
 which men of all parties have reproached him. 1 From that 
 
 1 The Due d'Orleans was accused of having been concerned in the events of 
 October 5 and 6. The court and a portion of the bourgeoisie arose against him. La 
 Fayette took upon himself to echo these recriminations — indeed, these menaces ; so 
 much so that the prince, being intimidated, left for England on a fictitious mission, in 
 spite of all that Mirabeau could do to restrain him. Immediately, the ChStelet 
 opened, on the events of October, an inquiry destined to prove the culpability of the 
 prince. The latter returned suddenly to Paris on July 7, 1790. On August 14 fol- 
 lowing, the court of the Chdtelet delivered its report to the Assembly. It concluded 
 by asking that he should be arraigned, but the Assembly refused to authorize the 
 prosecution.
 
 THE DUC D 'ORLEANS. 163 
 
 moment dates the disappearance of his enormous fortune, which 
 having been put into a form more easy of handling, left even 
 fewer traces than did the superb gallery of pictures of the 
 Palais-Royal, so scattered to-day. The free cash of the Due 
 d'Orleans passed all to England by indirect means and through 
 secret agents, who, on account of their obscurity, were enabled 
 to be unfaithful, and to enjoy the proceeds of their theft. Such 
 is the opinion of the men who were then at the head of affairs. 
 
 If historians make it a point to seek the men to whom they 
 can award the honour, or address the reproach of having made, 
 directed, or modified, the French Revolution, they will give them- 
 selves unnecessary trouble. It had no authors, leaders, nor 
 guides. It was sown by the writers who, in an enlightened and 
 venturesome century, wishing to attack prejudices, subverted the 
 religious and social principles, and by unskilful ministers who 
 increased the deficit of the treasury and the discontent of the 
 people. 
 
 It would be necessary, in order to find the real origin and 
 causes of the Revolution, to weigh, analyze, and judge questions 
 of high speculative politics, and especially to submit to a profound 
 and skilful examination, the question of the struggle between 
 philosophical ideas and prejudices, between the pretensions of 
 the mind and those of power. For, if we were to take into con- 
 sideration only the sole results of that Revolution, we should 
 soon fall into error, and end by mistaking M. de Malesherbes for 
 Mirabeau, and M. de la Rochefoucauld for Robespierre. 
 
 END OF THE SECOND PART. 
 
 M 2
 
 PART III. 
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE, 
 THE EARLY YEARS OF THE EMPIRE. 
 
 1791 — 1808. 
 
 Dangers threatening the royal family — Talleyrand goes to London with a 
 letter of Louis XVI. to the King of England — Defeat of the French 
 troops under the Due de Biron — August 10 — Abolition of royalty — 
 Could the royal family have been saved in 1792 ?— Talleyrand entrusted 
 with a scientific mission to England — The Marquis of Lansdowne — The 
 Marquis of Hastings — Doctors Price and Priestley — George Canning — 
 Samuel Romilly — Jeremy Bentham — Lord Henry Petty — Charles Fox 
 — The responsible authors of the Revolution — The Alien Bill — Lord 
 Melville — William Pitt — Talleyrand expelled from England — Starts for 
 America — Nearly shipwrecked — Stay at Falmouth — General Arnold — 
 Lands at Philadelphia — M. de Beaumetz — William Penn — The Mor- 
 avian brethren — The spirit of enterprise in America — General Hamilton 
 — American commercial competition and its results — Talleyrand at 
 Che'nier's request is authorized to return to France — Starts for Ham- 
 burg — Madame de Flahaut and Talleyrand — Returns to Paris — Elected 
 a member of the Institut — Madame de Stael — Talleyrand and Barras — 
 Talleyrand appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs — Why he accepted 
 office — Carnot and Barras — Talleyrand's first letter to Bonaparte — 
 Treaty of Campo-Formio — Lord Malmesbury— Fructidor 18 — First 
 interview between Bonaparte and Talleyrand — Catherine of Russia and 
 the French Revolution — The Directory and Europe — Moreau — Talley- 
 rand retires from the Cabinet — Si^yes and the Directory — Bonaparte in 
 Egypt — Brumaire 18 — Bonaparte appointed First Consul — Talleyrand 
 takes office again — Paul I. and Bonaparte — Marengo — Treaty of Lune- 
 ville — The United States and the French Republic — Lord Cornwallis 
 and Joseph Bonaparte — Treaty of Amiens — The Concordat — Talley- 
 rand's secularization — Bonaparte's blunder — Annexation of Piedmont 
 to France — England declares war — Pichegru's death — Assassination of 
 the Due d'Enghien — Proclamation of the Empire — Napoleon emperor 
 and king — The camp at Boulogne — The Austrian campaign — Napoleon 
 at Schoenbrunn — Austerlitz — Napoleon and the Faubourg St. Germain 
 — Talleyrand created Prince de Be'ne'vent — Treaty of Presburg — Count
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 165 
 
 von Haugwitz — Fox and Talleyrand — Lord Yarmouth and Lord Lauder- 
 dale — Prussia and Hanover — Battle of Jena— Treaty of Tilsit — Napoleon 
 and Poland — War with Russia — Battle of Eylau — Battle of Friedland — 
 The interview of the three emperors — Napoleon and the Queen of 
 Prussia — Napoleon's return to Paris — Talleyrand appointed Vice Grand 
 Elector — Retires from the Ministry— His apology for doing so — Napo- 
 leon's designs on Spain — Defeat of Junot — Capitulation of Baylen — The 
 Erfurt interview — Talleyrand and the Czar Alexander — Failure of 
 Napoleon's projects against Austria. 
 
 What was left of the royal prerogatives after the vote of the 
 Constituent Assembly was but a shadow, growing daily fainter. 
 It was, therefore, of paramount importance to save from further 
 ruin the frail power of the king, which all efforts made in view of 
 restoring to it its lost reality only tended to diminish. The men 
 who still affected to be afraid of it, such as it was, only sought a 
 pretext to complete its destruction. The great point would have 
 been not to have offered them any. They were not satisfied 
 that the king should imitate the reed, that withstands the fury of 
 the wind, simply because it is incapable of offering any resistance 
 to it : they wished his supporters both at home and abroad to 
 indulge in utter inaction, and to abstain from expressing any 
 opinion he might have been accused of sharing. But who could 
 be induced to adopt such unspirited policy ? The revolutionary 
 impulse was given and stirred all classes. 
 
 The cabinet of the time, 1 of which M. Necker was no longer 
 a member, then understood the necessity for royalty to obtain 
 a promise from the chief courts of Europe either to disarm, or 
 not to arm at all. 2 The leaders of the second Assembly, known 
 
 1 This was the Feuillant ministry — the first ministry of the king under the new 
 constitution (November 1791 — March 1792). It was thus composed: Justice, Du 
 Port ; Foreign Affairs, De Lessart ; Taxes and Public Revenue (Finances), Tarbe ; 
 Marine, Bertrand ; Interior (Home Department), Cahier de Gerville ; War Depart- 
 ment, Narbonne. 
 
 2 The Feuillant ministry had no warlike intentions. Thus the aim of all the 
 negotiations it then began with the various courts of Europe was to prevent the 
 breaking out of hostilities. The policy of the French cabinet was to win over 
 Prussia and England, in order to oppose them to Austria. M. de Segur was sent to 
 Prussia (December 22, 1791). At the same time, M. de Narbonne sent off young 
 Custine to the Duke of Brunswick, in order to offer him the post of commander-in- 
 chief of the French forces. In England, M. de Talleyrand (the author of these 
 Memoirs) was officially entrusted with the negotiations (January 12, 1792). M. de 
 Lessart was also endeavouring to keep on good terms with Spain (Bourgoing's mission 
 to Madrid, February, 1792) ; he reassured the Emperor as to the consequences of the 
 reconciliation which it was sought to bring about with England (Lessart's letter to M.
 
 1 66 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 under the name of Girondists, had insisted on this step under the 
 belief that the king's ministry would decline to take it. Their 
 hopes were deceived. M. de Lessart, 1 who was then Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs, took up the suggestion, and proposed that I 
 should go to England in order to open negotiations on the 
 subject. I had been anxious to leave France for some time ; I 
 was tired and disgusted, and sure though I felt that my mission 
 had little chance of success, I accepted it. The king wrote to the 
 King of England a letter of which I was the bearer. 2 
 
 In 1790, war would have been useful to royalty. In 1792, it 
 would only have upset the throne ; that is the reason why the 
 revolutionists wanted it. They thought (as one of them, Brissot 
 de Varville, 3 subsequently confessed) that, if war were once 
 declared, the king, having the direction of the operations, would 
 be left at their mercy, by being obliged to employ only those 
 means that it might please them to place at his disposal, and 
 that they would thus be enabled to urge to rebellion both the 
 army and the masses, by holding the sovereign responsible for 
 disasters which, owing to their own action, had been rendered in- 
 evitable ; an infamous calculation which subsequent events proved 
 to have been made with the utmost skill. This hateful machina- 
 tion could, perhaps, have been thwarted by calling upon the armed 
 
 de Noailles, ambassador to Vienna, January 16, 1792), and tried to prevent all inter- 
 erence on the part of the Imperial Diet (M. Barbe-Marbois' mission, January 1, 1792). 
 
 1 Antoine de Valdec de Lessart, born in 1 742. Was successively ?naitre des requites 
 (1768), comptroller-general (December 1790), Minister of the Interior (January, 1791,) 
 and Minister of Foreign Affairs (November, 1791). On Brissot's motion, the Assembly 
 decreed his arrest and trial, March 2, 1792, when he was arrested and taken to 
 Orleans, the seat of the national High Court of Justice. He was massacred at Ver- 
 sailles (September 9, 1792) on his way back to Paris, where he had been recalled by 
 Danton's orders. 
 
 2 Talleyrand was also'the bearer of a letter from M. de Lessart to Earl Grenville. He 
 had instructions to secure the neutrality, or, if possible, the alliance of England. He 
 started on his mission, January 12, 1792, in the company of the Due de Biron, and 
 returned to Paris on March 9 in the same year. (See Sorel's L? Europe et la Revolu- 
 tion Francaise, Part II., Vol. III.). 
 
 3 Jean-Pierre Brissot was the thirteenth child of a Chartres innkeeper. He was 
 born in 1754, and soon added to his name that of Ouarville, or Warville, the village 
 where he was brought up. Having come to Paris he founded, in 1782, Le Patriote 
 Francois, a journal in which he advocated new ideas with vigour and talent. Having 
 been elected a member of the Commune of Paris in 1791, and deputy to the National 
 Assembly and to the Convention, he became in a couple of years one of the leaders 
 of the Girondist party, which for some time was master of the situation. He, at first, 
 endeavoured to save the king, whose death he eventually voted, subject to an appeal 
 to the people. He was proscribed with all his friends after the trial of the Girondist 
 party, and guillotined May 31, 1793.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 167 
 
 emigres 1 , who everywhere threatened the frontiers, to withdraw 
 and by placing all the troops on a footing of peace. This course, 
 however, was not adopted, or rather the steps resorted to were 
 so full of indecision as to render them utterly useless ; as to the 
 king, his natural weakness led him — in order to remove all sus- 
 picion of his conniving with the foreigners — to be induced to 
 propose to the assembly a declaration of war which that body 
 hastened to accept. The fate of monarchy was then sealed. 
 The events which took place on the frontier 2 served as a pretext 
 for the outrages of June 20, and, shortly after, for the crime of 
 August 10, which the great regard I had for the Due de la 
 Rochefoucauld, 3 enabled me to witness. In compliance with a 
 letter he had written to me, I had come back to Paris in order to 
 share the noble and praiseworthy dangers, which the popularity 
 of Petion, 4 then Mayor of Paris, who, in accordance with a 
 decision of the administrators of the Seine department, whose 
 colleague I was, had been temporarily removed from office, 
 caused us to face. I may add that the marks of approval given 
 us by the queen, when, on the Federation day, we passed under 
 
 1 The name given to the members of the aristocracy who, at the time of the 
 Revolution, left France and fought in the ranks of the foreigners, but especially in 
 what was termed the "army of the princes," under Prince de Conde. — {Translator). 
 
 2 The defeat of the Due de Biron, and running away of General Dillon's troops 
 on the Belgian frontier (April 30, 1792). 
 
 3 Louis-Alexandre, Due de la Roche-Guyon and de la Rochefoucauld d'Enville, 
 Born in 1743, he at first entered the army. Asa member of the Assembly of Notables. 
 he was elected deputy of the nobility to the States-General, where he showed himself 
 favourable to new ideas and voted the chief reforms of the Assembly. He was 
 appointed President of the Paris department in 1791 ; but after the events of June 20, 
 1792. he resigned that post and left Paris. Having been recognized at Gisors, he was 
 stoned to death by the infuriated mob. 
 
 4 Jerome Petion de Villeneuve was born at Chartres in 1753. He was practising 
 as a barrister in that town, when he was elected deputy of the third estate * to the 
 States-General. He soon acquired a great influence in the Assembly and in the clubs. 
 In November, 1790, he was elected President of the Assembly. In June, 1791, he 
 was appointed to fetch the king back from Varennes, and on November 14th of the 
 same year, he was raised to the post of Mayor of Paris. His native town sent 
 him as deputy to the Convention, of which he was subsequently elected President. 
 He eventually sided with the Girondists. He voted for the death of the king. 
 Having been banished and arrested on May 31, he managed to escape, reached Caen 
 and endeavoured to organize the insurrection in the west. After the disaster at Vernon 
 (July, 1793), he disappeared from the scene, and wandered in the south for nearly 
 twelve months. In June, 1794, he was found dead in a field near Saint-Emilion in 
 the Gironde department. 
 
 * The States-General were a meeting of the three states; the clergy, the'nobility, and the third 
 state (chosen from the upper middle classes). The States-General only assembled on solemn occasions. 
 Their chief function was to decide as to the opportunity of raising new taxes, in order to meet the 
 financial embarrassments of the State. — (Translator.)
 
 1 68 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the balcony where she was with the king, further excited the 
 populace against us. 
 
 After the events of that day, and the rout of the Prussians in 
 Champagne, 1 the Revolutionists flattered themselves that they 
 had abolished monarchy for ever. They were blinded by their 
 fanaticism ; but not less so the men who were of opinion that 
 royalty could soon be restored, and Louis XVI. replaced on his 
 throne by force. At this stage, it was no longer a question that 
 the king should reign, but that he himself, the queen, their 
 children, his sister should be saved. It might have been done. 
 It was at least a duty to attempt it. At that time, France was 
 only at war with the Emperor,' 2 the Empire, 3 and Sardinia. 
 Had all the other States concerted themselves to offer their 
 mediation by proposing to recognize whatever form of govern- 
 ment France might be pleased to adopt, with the sole condition 
 that the prisoners in the Temple 4 should be allowed to leave the 
 country and retire wherever they liked, though such a proposal, 
 as may be supposed, would not have filled the demagogues with 
 delight, they would have been powerless to reject it. Indeed 
 what pretext could they have alleged to substantiate their refusal ? 
 Would they have said to France : " General peace is offered 
 us, but we wish for a general war, in which we shall stand 
 alone against all Europe. . . . Our independence is recognized, 
 but we wish to call it in question and cause it to depend on the 
 chances of war. . . . We are not denied the right of governing 
 ourselves as we think best. Nobody thinks of forcing a king on 
 us, but we want to murder the one who did reign over us, in 
 order that his rights may go over to his heirs, 5 who are indeed 
 no longer in our power, and whom all Europe will recognize 
 although we do not." 
 
 So little were the demagogues inclined to general hostilities, 
 that they hastened to make pacific declarations to all the govern- 
 
 1 The victory of Valmy, September 20, 1792. 
 
 2 The Emperor of Austria was the head of the Holy Roman Empire, of which 
 the German States were an integrant part. — [Translator.) 
 
 ■ Austria and the various German States. — {Translator.) 
 
 4 It is well known that Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette, Madame Elizabeth, and 
 the royal children, were imprisoned in the Temple. — ( Translator.) 
 
 6 The Comte de Provence (afterwards Louis XVIII.), and the Comte d'Artois 
 (afterwards Charles X.), brothers of Louis XVI., both left France at the outbreak of 
 the Revolution. — {Translator.)
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 169 
 
 ments with which France was still at peace. Indeed, very few 
 amongst them thirsted after the blood of Louis XVI. ; and if they 
 shed it afterwards, that was owing to special reasons, not one 
 of which would have existed had Europe embraced the course 
 indicated above. 
 
 The royal family might therefore have been saved. A war 
 of twenty-two years, which threatened all the thrones, and upset 
 many, which, by having re-established a few, though not on 
 sufficiently secure bases, now threatens civilization itself, might 
 thus have been averted. The revolutionary government (the 
 barbaric expression of polygarchy could be suitably employed 
 here) would have come to an end much sooner in France, where 
 foreign wars and victories could alone sustain it. 
 
 After August 10, 1792, I solicited a temporary mission to 
 London from the provisory executive. As the object of my 
 mission, I chose a scientific question with which I was somewhat 
 entitled to deal, seeing that it related to a motion previously 
 made by me in the Constituent Assembly. My aim was to 
 establish for the whole kingdom a uniform system of weights and 
 measures. After the exactitude of this system had been vouched 
 for by the most competent men of Europe, it might have been 
 adopted by the different nations. It was therefore advisable 
 to confer with England on the subject. 
 
 My real object was, however, to leave France, where it seemed 
 to me useless, and even dangerous, to stay any longer, but I 
 wished to leave the country with a regular passport, in order that 
 it should not be closed to me for ever. 
 
 As in France, the tide of political passions ran high in the 
 various cabinets of Europe. It was thought that if she were 
 attacked on all sides, France could not resist. Only dreaming 
 of success, they decided to wage war against her. The ad- 
 vantages they expected to reap by their victory were such as to 
 cause them to lose sight of the dangers of the royal family. It 
 was then that the Republicans, seeing war inevitable, took the 
 initiative in declaring it, in order to show that they were not 
 afraid of it. 
 
 I resided in England during the whole of the dreadful year 
 1793 and a portion of 1794. There I was welcomed with the
 
 i7o THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 utmost kindness by the Marquis of Lansdowne, 1 whom I had 
 known in Paris ; he was a nobleman of lofty views, gifted with 
 abundant and lively powers of elocution. He was still free from 
 the infirmities of old age. Some people brought against him 
 the common-place accusation of being too clever ; an accusation 
 by means of which, in England as well as in France, people keep 
 at a distance all the men whose superiority gives them umbrage, 
 and this is really the only reason why he never was in office 
 again. I saw him often, and he kindly sent me word every 
 time he received the visit of some distinguished person whose 
 acquaintance he thought I should be pleased to make. It 
 was at his house that I met Mr. Hastings, 2 and the doctors 
 Price, 3 and Priestley ; i there, I also formed an intimacy with 
 Mr. Canning, 5 Mr. Romilly, 6 Mr. Robert Smith, M. Dumont, 7 
 
 1 William Petty, Marquis of Lansdowne, Earl of Shelburne, was born in 1737, and 
 at first joined the army. In 1761, he entered the House of Lords. Two years later, 
 he was appointed a member of the Privy Council. Having been Chief Secretary of 
 State, he was appointed First Lord of the Treasury in 1782 ; a post which he resigned 
 in the following year. Until his death, in 1804, he remained a friend of France and 
 bitterly opposed to Pitt's policy. 
 
 2 Francis Rawdon, known successively under the names of Earl of Huntingdon, 
 Earl of Moira, and Marquis of Hastings, was born in 1754. He was descended from 
 a Norman family settled in Ireland. He entered the House of Lords in 1782, and 
 always voted with the Whig party. He was successively Governor-General of the 
 East Indies and Governor of Malta. He died in 1816. 
 
 3 Richard Price, an English philosopher and political writer, was born in 1723. 
 He studied finances, and, in 1772, he proposed, for sinking the public debt, a new 
 system which was applied with success by Pitt. He was on intimate terms with the 
 chief members of the French philosophical party, especially with Turgot, and 
 displayed sympathy towards the Revolution. He died in 1791. Talleyrand is 
 therefore mistaken in asserting that he had seen him during his journey to London, 
 seeing that he only visited the English capital several months after Dr. Price's death. 
 
 4 Joseph Priestley, famous English scientist and philosopher, born in 1733. His 
 political and religious opinions compelled him to emigrate to America, where he 
 died in 1804. He had been elected French citizen and honorary member of the 
 Convention. 
 
 5 George Canning, born in London, in 1770, from parents of Irish descent. In 
 1792, he had already distinguished himself as a speaker at public meetings, and was 
 considered as one of the most prominent members of the Whig party. Jn 1793, he 
 suddenly changed his political creed, was elected a member of the House of Commons 
 in 1794, and became one of the most ardent supporters of Pitt. He was appointed 
 Secretary of Foreign Affairs in 1807, and had to resign this post in 1809, in conse- 
 quence of a duel with his colleague, Lord Castlereagh. In 1814, he was sent as 
 ambassador to Lisbon. He again became Chief Secretary of Foreign Affairs in 1822, 
 and died in 1827. 
 
 6 Samuel Romilly, a famous English jurist, was born in 1757. He often visited 
 France, and was on intimate terms with the chief writers and statesmen of the time. 
 He entered the House of Commons in 1815, and was loud in his protests against the 
 imprisonment of Napoleon. He died in 1818. 
 
 7 Pierre Dumont, a Swiss writer, born at Geneva in 1759. He was a Protestant 
 minister. Civil war compelled him to leave his country, and he travelled successively
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 171 
 
 Mr. Bentham, 1 and Lord Henry Petty, 2 the son of Lord Lans- 
 downe, who at this time, was already looked upon as one of the 
 hopes of England. All the friends of Mr. Fox, 3 with which 
 gentleman I had, on several occasions, been on intimate terms, 
 did their best to render my stay in London as pleasant as 
 possible. My mornings were spent in penning down my im- 
 pressions of the previous day, and when, after my return to 
 France from America, my friends forwarded to me all the notes 
 taken during the time I resided in England, I was extremely 
 surprised to notice that they could be of no service to me for the 
 work I am now writing. It would now be impossible for me to 
 relate the events of this period, I do not recollect them ; their 
 connecting link is lost for me. 
 
 Besides, my absence from France during the most terrible 
 years of the Revolution left me in ignorance of the details of its 
 dreadful events ; I could scarcely, at that distance, discern their 
 broad outlines. On the other hand, I turned away from these 
 hideous scenes, in which so much abject spirit was mingled 
 with so much fierceness, too often to be able to depict them. The 
 reign of Henri IV. and that of Louis XIV. are known to us in all 
 their details, but recent events appear confused and problem- 
 atical, even to the very men who played a part in them ; they 
 followed each other with such rapidity, that each in turn almost 
 stamped out the recollection of what had occurred before. 
 
 in Russia, in England, and finally in France, in 1788. Here he met the chief leaders 
 of the Revolution, amongst whom Mirabeau, concerning whom he left some interesting 
 memoirs (Geneva, 1831), and Talleyrand. He went back to Geneva in 1814, and 
 died in 1829. 
 
 1 Jeremy Bentham, an English writer and moralist, born in 1747, died in 1832. 
 
 2 Henry Petty, Marquis of Lansdowne, son of William Petty, Earl of Shelburne 
 and Marquis of Lansdowne, was born in 1780. In 1802, he was elected member of 
 the House of Commons. In 1806, he was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer ; 
 entered the House of Lords in 1809. In 1827, he was Home Minister in the Cabinet 
 of Mr. Canning, and, shortly after, held the same office in the short-lived Cabinet of 
 Lord Goderich. In 1830, he re-entered the Cabinet as Lord President of the Council, 
 resigned in 1834, held the same office again in 1835, and remained in that position until 
 1841. In 1846, he again resumed office as Lord President of the Council, and retired 
 to private life in 1852. 
 
 3 Charles Fox, born in 1748, was the son of Lord Holland, Secretary of State 
 under George II. At the age of nineteen, he was elected member of the House of 
 Commons, and appointed Lord of the Treasury. Having been removed from office 
 in 1774, his powers as a speaker won for him the position of head of the Whig party. 
 In 1782, he was appointed Chief Secretary of Foreign Affairs. He always displayed 
 sympathy towards France and the Revolution, and showed himself a decided adversary 
 of Mr. Pitt's policy. In 1806, he again took up office as Chief Secretary of Foreign 
 Affairs, and died a few months after.
 
 172 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Perhaps also the mob leaves too slight an imprint on its work ; 
 its deeds have but a transient effect, and the character of the men 
 who serve it is such as to make no impression on one's memory. 
 Having lived in obscurity until such day as they appear on the 
 scene, they return to it as soon as their part there is played. 
 
 I confess that it would not cause me the slightest concern if 
 the details of this awful calamity were to leave no trace in men's 
 minds, for they are of no historical importance. Indeed, what 
 teachings could men derive from deeds performed without aim 
 or plan, and which were merely the outcome of ruthless and 
 unruly passions ? 
 
 Teachings of all kinds are rather to be sought in the know- 
 ledge of the facts preceding the catastrophe, and for the investi- 
 gation of which every material exists ; this knowledge will 
 disclose the numerous and weighty causes of the revolution ; 
 this is the truly profitable way of unfolding men's actions, for 
 it bears with itself lessons equally useful to sovereigns, to the 
 upper and to the lower classes. I have recorded in these 
 memoirs all the events which occurred in the time closely 
 preceding that dreadful upheaval, with which I was privately 
 acquainted ; I advise my contemporaries to do likewise, and 
 I feel sure that they will succeed better than I have done. 
 The study of those already distant days possesses, it seems to 
 me, the invaluable advantage of cautioning us against every 
 form of intolerance. When considering the last twenty years 
 of the old monarchy, there is no man of any elevation of mind 
 and good faith who, on remembering what he did or said, what 
 he wrote, what he blamed or approved, will not find some 
 fault with himself — if this man possessed any influence at all : 
 I might almost add that no one knows all the examples — good 
 or bad — he must have set. I thus deny that it is in the power 
 of any of the men I have known, whether princes or simple 
 subjects, to decline all share of responsibility in the subsequent 
 outbreak. 
 
 I do not mean to say that the amount of harm caused by the 
 want of foresight of these men was the same in every case, but 
 simply that it is in no one's power to ascertain and point out 
 exactly the share of reproach deserved by each. The times in
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 173 
 
 which we live, the circumstances in which we are placed, alter, 
 or at least modify, the spirit of all our actions. What, in certain 
 cases, may appear but natural and excusable, will deserve blame 
 in others. Thus, I only insist on this appeal to the conscience 
 of all Frenchmen, that I may eradicate all feelings of hatred and 
 intolerance, and replace them by meekness and urbanity, so long 
 banished from our beautiful country. 
 
 It was not my intention to stay long in England. Though 
 being nominally an outlaw in France, I yet did not wish to place 
 myself in the category of emigre, which I really was not. How- 
 ever, the English Foreign Minister thought it advisable to 
 emphasize his zeal for the general cause by displaying at first 
 his antipathy towards the emigres. With this object, he availed 
 himself of the Alien Bill, 1 which he had wrenched from Parlia- 
 ment, to send me orders to leave the country within twenty-four 
 hours. Had I acted on the first impulse, I should have started 
 off at once, but my dignity required of me to protest against the 
 unjust persecution of which I was the victim. In consequence, I 
 applied to Mr. Dundas, 2 to Mr. Pitt, 3 and to the king himself; 
 being unable to obtain satisfaction in any quarter, I had but to 
 submit, and therefore went to sleep on board a ship which, I had 
 been told, was the first to start for the United States. The state 
 of the weather and some business which the captain had to 
 transact detained us nearly a fortnight in the Thames. In the 
 meantime, a friend of Mr. Dundas came on board to invite me 
 to put up — until such time as the vessel could start — at a house 
 of his, near the river-side, but I declined his pressing offer. 
 
 1 The first Alien Bill was passed in 1782. In 1793, Lord Grenville obtained from 
 Parliament a Bill placing the French refugees under police supervision, and giving to 
 the authorities necessary powers to expel them. This is the bill applied to Talleyrand 
 in 1794. 
 
 2 H. Dundas, Lord Melville, was born in 1 741 from a noble Scotch family. Sent 
 to Parliament by the city of Edinburgh, he always was one of the staunchest advocates 
 of Pitt's policy. He was appointed successively Chief Comptroller for India in 1783, 
 Home Minister in 1791, Chief Secretary of War, Lord of the Privy Seal, and first 
 Lord of the Admiralty in 1801. He died in 181 1. 
 
 6 William Pitt, second son of Lord Chatham, was born in 1759. At twenty- two 
 he was Member of Parliament ; at twenty-eight, Chancellor of the Exchequer ; in 
 1783, he resigned, but re-entered office again at the close of that year as First Lord of 
 trie Treasury. Pitt was the moving spirit of the coalitions against France. The 
 treaty of Luneville, in 1801, compelled him to retire from office, but the breach of the 
 Peace of Amiens brought him back at the head of affairs. In 1805 he brought about 
 the third coalition, and died in 1806.
 
 174 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 I then experienced some satisfaction in refusing people's 
 services : unjust though persecution may be, there are compen- 
 sations in it. I never fully ascertained what my feelings really 
 were at the time, though the fact is I was somewhat pleased. 
 It seems to me that, in these days of general misfortune, I 
 should almost have regretted not being persecuted too. 
 
 We sailed at last. On the second day of our voyage, after 
 having but just left the Thames, we met with a violent storm. I 
 was then between England and France, which, indeed, constituted 
 one of the most critical positions in which any one could be 
 placed. I could see France. . . . my head was in danger there 
 .... I ran no immediate risk by returning to England, but it 
 would have been far too repugnant to me to solicit the hospitality 
 of a government who had tried to wound me. 
 
 Fortunately, the danger we were running was noticed on shore, 
 and induced some Falmouth lightermen to brave the fury of the 
 sea and come to our assistance. With their help, we managed 
 to reach the harbour. Whilst our ship, — all the rigging of which 
 was much damaged, — was being repaired, a rather striking 
 incident added an impression of a special kind to the many I 
 was to experience in the course of this voyage. The innkeeper 
 at whose place I had my meals, informed me that one of his 
 lodgers was an American general. Thereupon, I expressed the 
 desire of seeing that gentleman, and, shortly after, I was intro- 
 duced to him. After the usual exchange of greetings, I put to 
 him several questions concerning his country, but, from the first, 
 it seemed to me that my inquiries annoyed him. Having several 
 times vainly endeavoured to renew the conversation, which he 
 always allowed to drop, I ventured to request from him 
 some letters of introduction to his friends in America. — " No," 
 he replied, and after a few moments of silence, noticing my 
 surprise, he added, " I am perhaps the only American who 
 cannot give you letters for his own country. . . all the relations 
 I had there are now broken. . . I must never return to the States." 
 He dared not tell me his name. It was General Arnold ! 1 I 
 
 1 General Arnold had been sentenced to death during the War of Independence 
 for having furnished the English with information concerning the positions held by 
 the United Stales troops.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 175 
 
 must confess that I felt much pity for him, for which political 
 puritans will perhaps blame me, but with which I do not reproach 
 myself, for I witnessed his agony. 
 
 We left Falmouth with a favourable wind. All the passengers 
 were on deck, and, looking in the direction of the shore, they 
 all said, with evident pleasure : " I still see the land." I was 
 the only one who felt relieved on seeing it no longer. The sea, 
 at this moment, possessed special charms for me ; the sensations 
 I derived from it were particularly suited to my disposition. 
 
 We had been sailing for several weeks, when one morning, 
 the word I feared, " Land ! Land ! " loudly shouted by the people 
 on board, roused me from my sleep. The captain, the crew and 
 the passengers all displayed the most lively joy. On reaching 
 the deck, I saw the pilot who was to take us up the Delaware, 
 and, at the same time, noticed an out-bound ship steering round 
 the headland. Having ascertained from our pilot that this ship 
 was bound for Calcutta, I there and then despatched a boat to 
 her captain, in order to inquire whether he had room for one 
 more passenger. The ship's destination was of no consequence 
 to me ; she was going on a long voyage, and my object was, if 
 possible, to avoid landing. Unfortunately, the captain being 
 unable to accommodate me, I had no choice left but to submit to 
 being taken to Philadelphia. 
 
 On landing in that city, my mind was totally indifferent to 
 the novelties which, as a rule, excite the interest of travellers. I 
 had the greatest trouble in rousing my curiosity. I met in 
 Philadelphia M. Casenove.a Dutch gentleman whom I had known 
 in Paris. M. Casenove was a man of a rather enlightened, though 
 slow, mind, and of a timid and most careless nature. Both his 
 qualities and his defects made him very useful to me. As he 
 never pressed me to do anything, and himself felt interested in 
 but few things, I had no occasion to resist him. Meeting with 
 neither opposition, advice nor direction, my instinct alone guided 
 me ; thus I was led gradually to contemplate more attentively 
 the grand sight under my eyes. 
 
 Only twelve years had elapsed since the United States had 
 ceased to be a colony, and the years of their independence had 
 been lost as far as progress in material prosperity was concerned,
 
 176 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 owing to the inefficiency of their first constitution. The bases 
 of public trust not having been properly defined, a paper-money, 
 more or less discredited, roused everybody's cupidity, encouraged 
 deceit, disturbed all transactions, and caused the institutions 
 which had been rendered necessary by the recent independence 
 of the country to be lost sight of. It was only in 1789, at the 
 time of the new federal constitution, that property in the United 
 States began to rest on truly solid foundations, that social 
 guarantees securing the safety of foreign intercourse were shaped, 
 and that the government of the young nation was admitted to 
 rank with older powers. 
 
 This is the true date of the foundation of the United States. 
 
 I was still haunted by my love for the sea, and I almost 
 forgot I was no longer sailing on it, when I found myself in that 
 vast country, where whatever I saw reminded me of nothing 
 I had seen before. 
 
 Intending to tire myself, I made up my mind to leave 
 Philadelphia, and therefore proposed to M. de Beaumetz 1 and to a 
 Dutch gentleman, of the name of Heydecoper, to travel inland 
 with me. They both accepted, and I must confess that I was 
 pleased with the undertaking from the beginning. I was struck 
 with astonishment ; at less than a hundred and fifty miles dis- 
 tance from the capital, all trace of men's presence disappeared ; 
 nature in all her primeval vigour confronted us. Forests old as the 
 world itself ; decayed plants and trees covering the very ground 
 where they once grew in luxuriance ; others shooting forth from 
 under the debris of the former, and like them destined to decay 
 and rot ; thick and intricate bushes that often barred our pro- 
 gress ; green and luxuriant grass decking the banks of rivers ; 
 large natural meadows ; strange and delicate flowers quite 
 new to me ; and here and there the traces of former tornadoes 
 that had carried everything before them. Enormous trees, all 
 mowed down in the same direction, extending for a consider- 
 able distance, bear witness to the wonderful force of these terrible 
 phenomena. On reaching higher ground, our eyes wandered, 
 
 1 M. de Beaumetz was born in 1769. He was a member of the Sovereign Council 
 of Artois. As deputy to the States-General, he voted with the Constitutional party, 
 lie emigrated in 1792, went to England, and thence to the United States and to 
 India, where he died.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 177 
 
 as far as the sight could range, over a most varied and 
 pleasant picture. The tops of trees and the undulations of the 
 ground which alone interfere with the uniform aspect of large 
 extents of country, produce a peculiar effect. In the face of 
 these immense solitudes, we gave free vent to our imagination ; 
 our minds built cities, villages and hamlets ; the mountain forests 
 were to remain untouched, the slopes of the hills to be covered 
 with luxuriant crops, and we could almost fancy we saw numerous 
 herds of cattle grazing in the valley under our eyes. There is 
 an inexpressible charm in thinking of the future when travel- 
 ling in such countries. Such, said I to myself, was the place 
 where, not very many years ago, Penn x and two thousand emi- 
 grants laid the foundations of Philadelphia, and where a popula- 
 tion of eighty thousand 2 people is now enjoying all the luxuries of 
 Europe. Such was also the seat now occupied by the pretty little 
 town of Bethlehem, 3 whose neat houses and wonderfully fertile 
 environs, due to the energy of the Moravian brothers, excite the 
 admiration of all visitors. After the peace of 1783, the city of 
 Baltimore was but a fishing village ; now spacious and elegant 
 dwellings have there been built everywhere, and dispute the 
 ground with trees whose stumps have not yet been removed. 
 It is impossible to move a step without feeling convinced that the 
 irresistible progressive march of nature requires an immense 
 population to cultivate some day this large extent of ground lying 
 idle now indeed, but which only wants the hand of man to produce 
 everything in abundance. I leave to others the satisfaction of 
 foretelling the prospects of those countries. I confine myself to 
 noticing that it is impossible to walk a few miles away from 
 seaside towns without learning that the lovely and fertile fields 
 
 1 William Penn, born in London in 1644. He was the son of Admiral Penn. 
 Having become a Quaker, he was subjected to numerous persecutions, and imprisoned 
 three times. A state bond of ^16,000 having been bequeathed to him, he received in 
 exchange the country west of the Delaware. There, he founded, in 1681, a colony- 
 called after him Pennsylvania ; he built Philadelphia, and gave to his possessions a 
 constitution which became the basis of that of the United States. He returned to 
 England, where he died in 1718. 
 
 - Philadelphia is now the second city of the States as regards commercial import- 
 ance. In 1874 it had already a population of 920,000 inhabitants. — {Translator.) 
 
 3 Bethlehem, a small town in Pennsylvania, distant about sixty miles from Phila- 
 delphia. It was founded in 1741, by the Moravian brethren, a religious sect dating 
 from the fifteenth century, and whose members are the descendants of the old Hussites. 
 In order to escape oppression and persecution, a number of them had sought refuge in 
 America. 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 178 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 we now admire were, but ten, but five, but a couple of years ago, 
 mere wildernesses of forest. Similar causes must produce similar 
 effects, especially when acting with ever increasing power. The 
 population of the States will therefore daily reclaim some fresh 
 portion of these fallow spaces, the area of which far surpasses 
 that of the ground at present cultivated. 
 
 Having sated myself with these ideas, or rather impressions, 
 my mind being neither free nor active enough to induce me to 
 write a book, I returned to city-life, wishing at the same time 
 that a considerable portion of the capital that took refuge 
 in America, might there be devoted to clearing and tilling the 
 ground on a large scale. 
 
 A new nation, whose manners, without going through the 
 slow process of civilization, takes pattern from the already refined 
 ways- of Europe, stands in need of the teachings of the grand 
 school of nature, for agriculture is the basis on which all States 
 are founded. It is, I admit with the economists, agriculture that 
 forms the chief wealth of the social state, that teaches respect for 
 property, and warns us that we are blind to our own interests when- 
 ever we interfere with those of other people ; it is agriculture 
 that clearly points out to us the indispensable correlation 
 existing between the duties and the rights of men ; by binding 
 the tiller of the soil to his field, it binds men to their country. 
 The first attempts at agriculture teach us the necessity of the 
 division of labour, that marvellous source of all manifesta- 
 tions of public and private prosperity ; agriculture goes deeply 
 enough into the hearts and interests of men to induce them to 
 see in a numerous family so much additional wealth ; while, by 
 teaching resignation, it subjects our intellect to the supreme and 
 universal rules that regulate the world. From all this, I infer that 
 agriculture alone can put a stop to revolutions, because it is the 
 only pursuit that usefully employs all the capabilities of men, that 
 imparts to them calmness and moderation without indifference, 
 that inculcates respect for that experience which enables men to 
 control the results of their new experiments ; which, in short, 
 furnishes constant proofs of the grand results to be obtained 
 by simple regular work, and which neither hurries nor delays 
 in anything.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 179 
 
 In times of revolutions, rashness is regarded as skill, and 
 exaggeration as greatness. To put a stop to them, circumspec- 
 tion must replace audacity, and greatness will then lie in moder- 
 ation, and skill in prudence. A government, which is the friend 
 of liberty and averse to disturbing the tranquillity of the world, 
 must strive to act with moderation. An agricultural nation 
 settles down, it does not wish for conquests. Commerce, on 
 the other hand, always longs for increase of territory. 
 
 After the French Revolution, commercial transactions with 
 foreign countries met with too many obstacles to enable them to 
 become the chief pursuit of the country, and therefore to exer- 
 cise any influence on the manners of the French people ; but if, 
 in consequence of the excitement and vain dreams subsisting in 
 men's minds, the nation, as there is too much reason to fear, 
 turns its views to speculation in public funds, that will indeed 
 be a very great evil, because in operations of this kind deceit is 
 too much resorted to, and the attending ruin or fortune too 
 rapid. 
 
 The American government allowed itself to be too easily 
 influenced by the geographical situation of the States ; it gave 
 too much encouragement to the spirit of enterprise, for, in order 
 to increase its population, America annexed Louisiana ; it will 
 now be obliged to annex the Floridas. Commerce requires ports 
 and harbours from the Sainte-Croix river, near the Saint- 
 Lawrence, to the Gulf of Mexico, yet nine-tenths of the five 
 hundred millions of acres composing the territory of North 
 America are still untilled. Too much activity is devoted to 
 business, and not enough to farming ; and that first impulse 
 given to all the ideas of the country unsettles its social establish- 
 ment. You need only travel a bare hundred miles inland to see 
 people paying in kind for whatever they buy, whilst others draw 
 bills on the first markets of Europe : the contrast is too shocking ; 
 it is the symptom of a social disease. 1 
 
 I saw, sixty miles from Boston, six thousand feet of timber 
 
 1 It must be borne in mind that the author of these Memoirs was travelling in the 
 States as far back as 1794, and therefore long before the great influx of emigration 
 that induced so many German and Irish agricultural labourers to go to America, where 
 they performed the task pointed out to the Americans by Prince Talleyrand. — (M. de 
 Bacourt. ) 
 
 N 2
 
 i8o THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 exchanged for a bullock, and, in Boston itself, twenty pounds 
 paid for a Florence straw hat. 
 
 At Frenchman's Bay, on the border of the Eastern States, a 
 violent storm having compelled me to stop at Machias, 1 I entered 
 into conversation with the man at whose house I was staying. It 
 was indeed the best house in the district, and, as people say in 
 this country, the landlord was a most respectable man. Having 
 exhausted the chapter relative to the value and price of land, I 
 asked him whether he had ever been to Philadelphia. He replied 
 that he had not yet done so. He was a man of about forty-five 
 years of age. I scarcely dared to ask him whether he knew 
 General Washington. " I have never seen him," he said. " If 
 you should go to Philadelphia," I went on, " you will be pleased 
 to see that great man ? " " Why, yes, I shall ; but," he added with 
 an excited countenance, " I should very much like to see Mr. 
 Bingham, who, they say, is so wealthy." 
 
 Throughout all the States I met with a similar love for money, 
 very often quite as coarsely expressed. The country was too soon 
 acquainted with luxuries. The latter are, indeed, ridiculous when 
 men can hardly provide themselves with the necessaries of life. 
 I recollect having seen in the drawing-room of Mrs. Robert 
 Morris, a hat manufactured in the birth-place of the master of 
 the house, carefully laid on an elegant Sevres china table, 
 bought at Trianon by some American. An European peasant 
 would scarcely have consented to wear such a hat. 
 
 On the banks of the Ohio, Mr. Smith possessed a residence 
 known in the country by the name of log-house. The walls of it 
 were formed with rough trees. The drawing-room contained a 
 pianoforte enriched with most beautiful bronzes. M. de Beau- 
 metz having opened it, Mr. Smith said to him, " Please do not 
 attempt to play, for the man who tunes it lives a hundred miles 
 from here, and he has not come this year." 2 
 
 1 Machias, small trading port in the State of Maine. 
 
 2 Several incidents connected with this journey left impressions that are yet present 
 to my mind. To kill time is not so easy as people generally think, especially when 
 one's mind is active and full of apprehension as to news from one's country. Under 
 such ciicumstances, impressions can only be produced by material facts. To be 
 riding through a large wild forest, to lose one's way in it in the middle of the night, 
 and to call to one's companion in order to ascertain that you are not missing each other : 
 all this gives impressions impossible to define, because each incident reflects comically
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 181 
 
 To us, inhabitants of old Europe, there is something awkward 
 in all the luxury displayed by Americans. I grant that our 
 luxury often shows signs of improvidence and frivolousness, but 
 in America, luxury only denotes defects which prove that refine- 
 ment does not yet exist there, either in the conduct of life, or 
 even in its trifles. I must be pardoned for dwelling at some 
 length on America. I was so lonely when there, that many 
 reflections, which would otherwise have found their vent in 
 conversation, now come rushing to my pen. 
 
 During the two winters I spent either in Philadelphia or in 
 New York, I availed myself of the opportunity thus afforded me 
 to see the chief personages whose names the American Revolution 
 has handed to history, especially General Hamilton, 1 whose mind 
 
 on the others. When I cried, "So-and-so, are you here?" and my companion replied, 
 " Unfortunately, I am, my lord," I could not help laughing at our position. That 
 " Unfortunately, I am," so pitifully uttered, and that "my lord," in allusion to the 
 Autun bishopric, sounded most ludicrous. Once, in the heart of Connecticut, after a 
 long day's ride, we stopped at a house where the people consented to give us bed and 
 supper. The food supply was fortunately better than we usually found it in American 
 houses. The family was composed of an elderly man, his wife, about fifty years of 
 age, two grown-up boys, and a young girl. The meal consisted of smoked fish, ham, 
 potatoes, strong beer, and brandy. In a very short time, the beer and brandy had the 
 effect of enlivening the conversation. The two young fellows, who were rather 
 elevated, spoke of a journey they were about to undertake ; they were going beaver- 
 hunting for a few weeks. They spoke of their future expedition in such glowing terms 
 that they roused our interest and curiosity to such a degree that, after drinking a 
 few glasses of brandy, M. de Beaumetz, M. Heydecoper, and myself, were dying to 
 join them. This would have been a novel way of spending or wasting a few weeks. 
 At each question that we put to our hosts, they filled our glasses. From that evening's 
 conversation I learned that the fur of beavers is good only in the fall of the season ; 
 that, to shoot them, one must lie in wait and hold out to them spears baited with 
 split-up wood ; that, in frosty weather, the hunters attack the little dens the beavers 
 build for themselves, thus causing the timid beasts to plunge under the ice, but, as 
 they cannot long remain under water, they soon come up to breathe at holes purposely 
 made in the ice, when they are captured by the foot. All this was sufficiently interesting 
 to induce Beaumetz, either because of his love of sport, or because he felt more merry 
 than we did, to propose that our hosts should allow us to accompany them on their 
 expedition. They both gave their assent, and we were, without further formality, 
 enrolled in the brotherhood of the Connecticut beaver- hunters. Having mutually 
 pledged our word, each of us reached his bed as best he could. When morning came, 
 the effect of the brandy having passed off, and sleep becoming imperious, we began 
 to think the various implements each was to carry too heavy. I believe that the 
 provisions alone weighed about forty pounds ; we also began to realize that spending a 
 couple of months in woods or marshes was really too much of a good thing, so we 
 endeavoured to quash the agreement made the night before. We got free with a few 
 dollars, and resumed our journey, feeling rather ashamed of what we had done. 
 (Prince Talleyrand.) 
 
 1 Alexander Hamilton was born in 1757 in the island of Nevis (East Indies), of 
 Scotch parents. When still very young, he took an active part in the War of 
 Independence, and was appointed Colonel. The State of New York sent him to the 
 Congress which framed the Constitution. Colonel Hamilton was one of the warmest 
 supporters of the federative system. In 1789, Washington appointed him Minister of
 
 1 82 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 and character placed him, I thought, on a par with the most 
 distinguished statesmen of Europe, not even excepting Mr. Pitt 
 and Mr. Fox. 
 
 As I remarked above, I had noticed, whilst travelling in the 
 States, that agriculture was less encouraged than commerce, that, 
 having to choose between two sources of prosperity, government 
 had chosen that the scale should fall in favour of commerce, and, 
 still more recently, had emphasized this intention, by adding to 
 all the real wealth of their country the fictitious one procured by 
 all the banking establishments, which have sprung up everywhere 
 in the States, and which serve exclusively the ends of commerce. 
 Such an impulse once started, vanity and cupidity could not fail 
 soon to denounce prudence, moderation, or simple probity, as 
 narrow views. By overthrowing the barriers formerly raised 
 by the metropolis, which centralized all the products of its 
 colonies on its own markets, and set its own rules to their 
 speculations, the United States take able advantage of the 
 position and power that their independence has obtained for 
 them. They send to all the markets of the old world un- 
 expected quantities of all sorts of goods, the arrival of which, 
 by altering prices, brings about commercial crises impossible to 
 avoid. The chief cause of all these perturbations proceeds from 
 the great distance existing between the eastern and southern 
 ports of the States, whence thousands of ships loaded with 
 similar products start every year, on almost the same day, bound 
 for all the ports of Europe. Thus, for a long time to come, the 
 commerce of America to Europe will be left to chance. 
 
 During the long evenings of my stay in the States, always 
 thinking of my unfortunate country, whose troubles so deeply 
 afflicted me, I often considered what her future prospects were 
 likely to be. I then sought the means of removing, or at least 
 of diminishing, the obstacles which prevented the establishment 
 of mutually advantageous commercial relations. 
 
 I fully realized how idle the wanderings of my imagination 
 were ; yet they pleased me. To put off conjectures, as reason 
 
 Finances. He resigned this post, from his own free will, in 1795. In 1798, when 
 war was on the point of breaking out with France, Hamilton was appointed General. 
 He was killed six years later (1804) in a duel with Colonel Burr, Vice-President of 
 the United States.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 183 
 
 dictated, until such time as the expected quarrel of Spain with 
 her colonies should be settled, 1 was to delay one's hopes too 
 long, for only after the issue of this quarrel can the maritime 
 and commercial interests of the great powers assume a regular 
 course. Thus my hopes of regulation were daily disturbed by 
 all the events taking place under my eyes. 
 
 In 1794, I witnessed the return of the first American trading 
 expedition to Bengal ; the shipowners connected with it were 
 largely repaid for their outlay, and in the following year, fourteen 
 American vessels started for India from different ports, in order 
 to obtain a share of the enormous profits secured by the English 
 company. There is a sort of hostility in the sudden appearance 
 of American competition. This competition immeasurably in- 
 creases the risks of commerce, and thus skilful combinations 
 are seldom rewarded by compensating results. All this has 
 come in times when the growth of population in all civilized 
 countries, is adding daily to the ordinary stimulus of human 
 passions that of the fresh wants it creates. 
 
 All these considerations make it exceedingly difficult to fore- 
 see the future, and well-nigh impossible to direct its course. 
 
 Yet everything seems easy to a man driven from his country 
 and obliged to put up at an inn or reside in indifferent lodgings : 
 it does not seem quite so easy to him who is quietly seated 
 under his own roof. I therefore took advantage of the disposi- 
 tion of mind into which my narrow quarters threw me to 
 indulge in high politics and set the world to rights. Having, 
 like a good member of the Constituent Assembly, waived the 
 question of the characters of men, I had recourse to a philosophi- 
 cal spirit, and devised a new general code of the law of nations, 
 which, after having established the balance of the interests of 
 nations and of individuals, should unite them for the political and 
 reciprocal benefit of the powers, and introduce liberal equality 
 into their habitual intercourse. I even fancy that I was on 
 the point of applying the system of the economists on free 
 trade and the abolition of customs, which must needs be com- 
 
 1 This settlement was the emancipation of the Spanish colonies, of which Mexico 
 was the first to throw off the yoke of the metropolis, in 1810. In 1824, Spain 
 possessed no longer any territory on the continent of America.
 
 1 84 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 prised in my speculative ideas, when, at the very moment I was 
 engaged in trying to solve the problem, a new tariff of customs, 
 adopted by the American Congress, on the motion of my friend 
 Hamilton, came into force. 1 The early conversations I had had 
 with the learned general dwelt on this branch of the American 
 administration " Your economists," he said to me, " made a grand 
 dream, but it is the chimerical exaggeration of people whose 
 intentions were good. Theoretically," he added, " their system 
 might perhaps be contested and its unsoundness exposed ; but 
 we must leave them their pleasant illusions ; the present state of 
 the affairs of this world suffices to prove that, at least for the 
 nonce, their plan cannot be carried out ; let us be satisfied with 
 this fact." I did not make a very firm stand in favour of the 
 economists, yet I could scarcely make up my mind to accept the 
 idea that there could exist " liberal " combinations that did not 
 result in mutual advantages for all commercial nations. Philan- 
 thropic conceptions rush to the mind when one is an outlaw. 
 
 Mr. Hamilton did not seem to me to reject so peremptorily 
 the possibility of all industries being, some day, permanently 
 divided among the nations of the world. 
 
 Europe, said I to him, is acquainted with, and cultivates, all 
 branches of art, and excels in the manufacture of all articles of 
 luxury, as in everything that tends to make life more pleasant 
 and agreeable. 
 
 The new world possesses a kind of wealth peculiar to itself : 
 its crops will always surpass those of any rival nation in 
 quantity. 
 
 Might not, therefore, the distribution of these two modes of 
 applying men's abilities serve, at least for a considerable time to 
 come, as the measure and basis of the relations that must neces- 
 sarily spring up between nations, some of which daily require to 
 buy the most usual necessaries of life at a moderate cost, whilst 
 others are anxious to acquire all that tends to make life more 
 pleasant and agreeable ? 
 
 Might not this natural balance furnish a vast ground for 
 
 1 There is a curious coincidence between this fact and that of these Memoirs 
 appearing at almost the very moment of the adoption of the bill of Major McKinley, 
 which seems to prove that the traditions of American economists of the early school 
 still possess numerous advocates in the States. — (Translator.)
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 185 
 
 intelligent exchange which, being ruled by international con- 
 ventions, would constitute the commercial intercourse of the 
 different powers ? 
 
 " Your idea," Mr. Hamilton said to me, " will only be practical 
 the day when — and it is perhaps not very remote — great markets, 
 such as formerly existed in the old world, will be established in 
 America. 
 
 " There were four chief markets concentrating all the products 
 of the world : that of London, which, notwithstanding our com- 
 mercial successes, will yet be the first, for a long time to come ; 
 that of Amsterdam, which, if things do not mend in Holland, 
 will soon be removed to London ; that of Cadiz, which will 
 eventually pass into the hands of our northern or southern ports ; 
 and that of Marseilles, which owed its flourishing state to Levan- 
 tine trade, but is now on the eve of being lost to you Frenchmen. 
 
 " As for us, we only need two markets, but they are indis- 
 pensable to us : one for the Northern and one for the Southern 
 States. 
 
 " When these large markets are established, commerce will 
 be able to resume its regular course ; commercial enterprise will 
 no longer rely on sole hazard, it being the interest of each 
 market to render public the real price and quality of the various 
 goods finding their way to it ; excessive fluctuations will be 
 thereby avoided, thus keeping within reasonable bounds the 
 losses and gains of all speculations. Then, will sailors of all 
 nations bring in all confidence their cargoes to the various ports 
 of the world." 
 
 I admired the spirit of general order always apparent in the 
 private views expressed by Mr. Hamilton respecting the prosperity 
 of his country. I do not know whether they will ever be realized, 
 but if they do, it will only be when the intrusive and invading 
 spirit of America will have ceased to alter the general relations 
 of the American people with other nations, and when, by a 
 judicious regard for its own interests, it will endeavour to 
 conquer its own country by turning to every possible advantage 
 the vast extent of territory belonging to it. 
 
 I had acquainted myself with almost all I wanted to know in 
 America ; I had been spending nearly thirty months in that
 
 1 86 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 country, 1 without any other aim than that of being away from 
 either France or England, and impelled by the sole interest of 
 seeing with my own eyes the great American nation whose history 
 is only beginning. 
 
 The uncertainty in which the news from Europe left my future 
 prospects, induced me to launch in a speculation which, being 
 carried on with skill and economy, might have proved most profit- 
 able. I made up my mind to go to the East Indies on board a 
 ship I had chartered, and in the cargo of which several important 
 Philadelphia firms and some Dutch capitalists had an interest. 
 My vessel was loaded ; and I was about to start, when a decree 
 from the Convention, permitting me to return to France, reached 
 me. This measure was quite unsolicited by me ; it had been 
 taken on the initiative of Messrs. Chenier, 2 and Daunou, 3 whom 
 I scarcely knew, and to whom, however different their political 
 opinions may be from mine, I shall always bear gratitude. 4 It 
 was necessary to take advantage of this decree, or else to give 
 up for ever the hope of returning to France. M. de Beaumetz, 
 whom I had taken into partnership in my speculation, went to 
 
 1 During his stay in England and in America, Prince Talleyrand kept up with 
 Madame de Stael * an interesting correspondence recently edited by the present Due 
 de Broglie (the editor of these Memoirs) in the January and April numbers of the 
 Revue Diplomatique (1890), under the title of Lettres de M. de Talleyrand a Madame 
 de Stael, extraites des Archives du Chdteau de Broglie. 
 
 2 Marie Joseph Chenier, born in Constantinople in 1764. He was the junior 
 brother of Andre. + He at first entered the army, but left it to devote his time to 
 literature, and wrote several republican and revolutionary plays which gave him a 
 certain reputation. As Deputy of the Department of Seine-et-Oise to the Convention, 
 he voted for the death of the king. He was President of the Assembly in August, 
 1795, and was subsequently elected a member of the "Five Hundred." After 
 Brumaire 1 8, he became a member of the Tribunate. Under the Empire, he was 
 appointed Inspector of Public Education, was dismissed in 1806, and died in 181 1. 
 
 3 Pierre Daunou was born in 1761. He joined the Order of the Oratorians, but 
 gave up his ecclesiastical functions after his election to the Convention by the Depart- 
 ment of Pas-de-Calais in 1792. He protested against the trial of the king, and voted 
 in favour of banishment. Having been arrested with seventy-three of his colleagues 
 on October 31, 1792, he was imprisoned for a whole year. After Thermidor 9, he 
 was appointed President of the Convention. He was, subsequently, a member of the 
 " Five Hundred " and of the Tribunate, from which he was removed in 1802. He 
 took no share in politics under the Empire. He became a Deputy under the Restora- 
 tion, was appointed peer of France in 1839, and died in 1840. 
 
 4 As mentioned here by Prince Talleyrand, the decree of the Convention permit- 
 ting his return to France was proposed by Messrs. Chenier and Daunou, but at the 
 pressing request of many of his friends, amongst whom was Madame de Stael. 
 
 * See footnote (2), p. 47. 
 
 t The author of remarkable poems. His royalist opinions caused him to be arrested during the 
 Terror. The revolutionary tribunal sentenced him to death. He was guillotined in 1793. — 
 ( Translator, )
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 187 
 
 India instead of me and died in that country. I much regretted 
 to part with M. de la Rochefoucauld, 1 for whom I had much 
 affection, and with Mr. Hamilton, who will always occupy a fore- 
 most place in my recollections. Having taken leave of my 
 friends, I took passage on board a wretched Danish vessel bound 
 for Hamburg. 
 
 Before re-entering France, I was anxious to know what was 
 going on there. Madame de Flahaut, 2 who was then at Hamburg, 
 seemed to me hardly disposed to furnish me with the desired 
 information, for, when I was still coming up the Elbe, she sent 
 me word by M. de Ricce, who was simple enough to deliver the 
 message — not to land but go back to America. Her reason for 
 so doing, she told M. de Ricce, was that it being rumoured that 
 she had been on rather intimate terms with me, she feared that 
 my presence should be an obstacle to her marriage with M. de 
 Souza, the Portuguese Minister. However, I thought I could, 
 without any impropriety, take no notice of the extraordinary 
 reasons alleged by M. de Ricce, and spent a month in Hamburg, 
 in the society of persons who did, no more than I did myself, 
 interfere with the marriage of Madame de Flahaut with that 
 dear M. de Souza. In Hamburg, I met Madame de Genlis, 
 whom I found exactly the same as I had known her at Sillery, 
 at Bellechasse and in England. The unchangeableness of 
 compound natures proceeds from their suppleness. 
 
 From Hamburg, I went to Amsterdam, where I spent a 
 fortnight, thence to Brussels, where I stayed long enough to 
 reach Paris' only in the month of September 1796, as it had been 
 my intention. 
 
 A national institute of arts and sciences 3 had been founded 
 
 1 The Due de la Rochefoucauld- Liancourt. 
 
 2 Adelaide Filleul, born in Paris in 1761, married, when very young, the Comte 
 de Flahaut, a brigadier-general, who was guillotined in 1 793. She had left France 
 in 1792. After Thermidor 9, she wished to return to France, but had to stay at 
 Hamburg, where she made the acquaintance of the Marquis Jose de Souza-Bothelo, 
 who was then Portuguese Minister to Denmark, and whose wife she became in 1S02, 
 he having just been appointed Minister to France. The Marquis de Souza lost his 
 appointment shortly after, but resided in Paris until his death (1825). Madame de 
 Souza wrote several novels, which made her reputation. She died in 1836. 
 
 3 All the academies had been done away with in 1792. The Convention inserted 
 in the Constitution of the year III. a clause providing for the foundation of a national 
 institute "entrusted with the care of collecting the various discoveries and improving 
 arts and sciences." A bill passed in 1795, regulated the organization of this institute,
 
 1 88 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 in Paris : the very organization of this institute was sufficient to 
 gauge the spirit then reigning in France. It had been divided 
 into four sections, of which that of physical sciences ranked first, 
 whereas that of moral and political sciences only came next. 
 During my absence, I had been elected a member of the latter. 
 To pay my debt as academician, I read, at two public sittings 
 closely following each other, a couple of papers which attracted 
 a certain notice. The first of these papers related to the 
 United States, the second dealt with the necessity for France to 
 secure colonies. 1 I had also prepared a third paper on the 
 influence of society in France, but, as it was based chiefly on my 
 recollections, my friends did not think it suited to a time when 
 France was ruled by the Directory. So I left it unfinished. 
 
 Having paid my literary debt, and perceiving no element of 
 order and no guarantee of stability in the various political factions 
 whose struggles I witnessed, I took care to keep aloof from 
 active politics. Madame de Stael, who had already resumed a 
 certain influence, closely insisted on my going with her to 
 Barras, 2 one of the members of the Directory. I demurred at 
 first ; I could not call on a member of the Directory, without 
 asking to see all the other Directors, and chiefly those 3 who had 
 been my colleagues in the Constituent Assembly. The reasons 
 alleged to justify my refusal did not seem valid. Besides, they 
 had to be conveyed through Madame de Stael, who, being anxious 
 
 which was divided into four sections, comprising altogether 144 full members and 144 
 associate members. The Institute only resumed its old name of academy in 1816. 
 
 1 These two papers were published in the Recueil des Memoires de V Institut, 
 section of moral and political sciences, vol. ii., first series, 1799. In the first, headed 
 Sur les Relations commerciales de F Angleterre et des Etats- tints, Germinal 5, year V. 
 ("The Commercial Intercourse of England with the United States"), the author's 
 object was to prove that England did not lose anything by the declaration of indepen- 
 dence of her great colony, and that she will always find in America a regular market to 
 buy her goods and adopt the overgrowth of her population. The second was headed, 
 Sur les Avantages a retirer des Colonies nouvelles ( " Advantages to be derived from New 
 Colonies ") ; it was read Messidor 25, year V. The main idea in it is that, as a con- 
 sequence of the revolution, it is necessary, in order to preserve its results, to apply 
 the forces of the country to a new field of activity, and that, in the present state of 
 affairs in France, the government ought to endeavour to supply all agitators and mal- 
 contents of all parties with vast territories to colonize. 
 
 2 The Comte Paul de Barras, born at Fox-Kmphoux, in the Var Department, was 
 a captain in the army in 1789. Having been sent to the Convention, he voted for the 
 death of Louis XVI. In February, 1795, he was appointed President of the Conven- 
 tion. He was elected a member of the Directory at the time of its foundation, and 
 only left it on Hrumaire 18, when he retired to private life. He died in 1829. 
 
 3 La Reveillere-Lepeaux and Rewbell.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 189 
 
 that I should be personally known to Barras, so managed matters 
 that the Director sent me a note inviting me to dine with him at 
 Suresnes on a certain day. I had no alternative but to accept. 
 On the appointed day, I was at Suresnes at about three o'clock 
 in the afternoon. In the dining-room, which I had to cross to reach 
 the drawing-room, I noticed covers laid for five persons. Much to 
 my surprise, Madame de Stael was not invited. A man who was 
 rubbing the floor, showed me a cupboard containing a few odd 
 books, and told me that the Director — the title given to Barras in 
 private life — seldom came home before half-past four. Whilst I 
 was engaged in reading I do not recollect what work, two young 
 men came in to ascertain the time by the drawing-room clock, 
 and seeing that it was only half-past three, they said to each 
 other, " We have time to go for a swim." They had not been 
 gone twenty minutes, when one of them returned asking for 
 immediate help ; I ran, with all the persons in the house, to the 
 riverside. Facing the garden, between the high road and the 
 island, the Seine forms a kind of whirlpool in which one of the 
 young men had disappeared. The watermen of the neighbour- 
 hood soon rowed to the spot, and two of them most courageously 
 dived to the bottom. However, all the efforts made to save the 
 unfortunate fellow proved vain. I went back to the house. 
 
 The corpse of the young man was only found the next day 
 caught in weeds, at a spot distant more than six hundred yards 
 from the place where he had disappeared. The drowned was named 
 Raymond, Lodeve was his birthplace. Barras was very fond of 
 him ; he had brought him up and, since he had been appointed a 
 Director, he had made him his aide-de-camp. I was alone in the 
 drawing-room, not knowing exactly what to do. Who was to 
 tell Barras the misfortune that had just befallen him ? I had 
 never seen the Director. My position was really unpleasant. A 
 carriage drove up. On opening the door, the gardener said : 
 " M. Raymond has just been drowned, yes, Citizen Director, he 
 has just been drowned." Barras crossed the front yard, and 
 rushed upstairs to his room, crying out aloud. After waiting some 
 little time, one of his servants told him I was in the drawing-room. 
 He sent me word to excuse his not coming down, and requesting 
 me to sit down to dinner at once. The secretary who accompanied
 
 190 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 him remained upstairs. Thus, I was alone at Barras' table. A 
 quarter of an hour having elapsed, a servant came to request me 
 to go up to the Director's room. I felt thankful for his supposing 
 that, under the circumstances, the dinner served to me could have 
 no attraction. I felt quite upset. As I entered his room, he 
 took hold of both my hands and embraced me ; he was weep- 
 ing. I said to him all the kind things which the position in 
 which I saw him and that in which I was myself, could dictate. 
 The sort of embarrassment he, at first, displayed with me, an utter 
 stranger to him, gradually disappeared, and the share I took in 
 his trouble seemed to do him good. He begged of me to go 
 back with him to Paris ; I readily accepted. From that day, I 
 never had any occasion to regret having made his acquaintance. 
 He was a man of an excited and impulsive nature, easily carried 
 one way or the other : I had known him scarcely a couple of 
 hours, and yet might have almost supposed I was the person he 
 liked best in the world. 
 
 Shortly after my first interview, the Directory wished to make 
 a change in the Ministry. 1 To this Barras consented with the 
 condition that his new friend should be appointed " Minister of 
 Foreign Relations." He defended his proposal with great warmth, 
 and so effectively that it was adopted ; at ten o'clock the same 
 night, a gendarme called for me at the club named Salon des 
 Etrangers 2 and handed to me the decree appointing me 
 Minister. 
 
 The absolute character of all the measures taken by the 
 Directory, the pressing requests of Madame de Stael, and above 
 all this, the belief I had that I might possibly work some good, 
 caused me to dismiss all idea of declining the post. On the follow- 
 ing day, I therefore called at the Luxembourg, 3 in order to thank 
 Barras : after which, I went to the Foreign office. 
 
 Under my predecessor, Charles de Lacroix, 4 all State matters 
 
 1 During the summer of 1797, the cabinet was entirely modified. Talleyrand took 
 the Foreign Office, Lambrecht the Justice, Letourneux the Home Department, General 
 Scherer the War Office, Admiral Pleville le Pelley the Marine Department, Sotin 
 was head of the Police Department, and Ramel remained Minister of Finances. 
 
 2 Strangers' or Foreigners' Club. 
 
 3 The residence of Marie de Medici. After passing through different destinations 
 during the Revolution, it became the official residence of the executive during the 
 Directory. It is now devoted to the sittings of the Senate. — {Translator.) 
 
 4 Charles de Lacroix de Constant was born in 1754 ; in 1789, he was chief clerk
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 19 r 
 
 concerning his department were previously settled by the 
 Directory. Like the previous secretary, my duties were confined 
 to signing passports and other administrative documents, and to 
 forwarding to the proper quarters the despatches or communica- 
 tions already drafted by the executive ; yet, I often delayed 
 these communications, which delay enabled me to soften their 
 terms, when the impulse under which they had been written had 
 passed away. All business relative to home affairs was kept from 
 me. I imparted dignity to my odd situation, by trying to con- 
 vince others, and myself to a certain degree, that all progress 
 towards true order at home would be impossible so long as we 
 did not have peace abroad, and adding that, since I had been 
 called upon to contribute to its restoration, I ought to devote 
 myself entirely to this object. 
 
 It has come to my knowledge that some people, not in the 
 days I speak of, but since the Restoration, considered that it was 
 wrong to accept office in times of crisis and revolution, when it 
 is impossible to work absolute good. Such judgment always 
 appeared to me most superficial. In the affairs of this world, we 
 must not simply consider the present. That which is, in the 
 majority of cases, has but a very small importance, whenever we 
 lose sight of the fact that that which is produces that which shall 
 be ; thus indeed, as we frame the present, so will the future be 
 shaped ! If we consider matters, without prejudice and, above 
 all, without envy, we plainly see that men do not always 
 accept office so as to gratify their personal interests, and I might 
 add that it is no mean sacrifice on the part of a political man to 
 consent to being the responsible editor of other people's lucubra- 
 tions. Selfish and timorous people are incapable of so much 
 abnegation ; but, I repeat it, it must be borne in mind that, by 
 declining official posts, in times of upheaval, one simply affords 
 greater facilities to the enemies of public order. He who accepts 
 does so, not to second the advocates of a state of affairs to which 
 he is opposed, but in order to so modify their action that it may 
 
 in the General Comptroller's office. Having been elected to the Convention, he voted 
 for the death of the king. He was subsequently a member of the " Anciens," Minister 
 of Foreign Affairs (1796), Ambassador to Holland (1797), Prefect of the Bouches-du- 
 Rhone, and afterwards of the Gironde. He died in 1808. He was the father of Eugene 
 Delacroix, the famous painter.
 
 192 
 
 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 be profitable to the future. " En toute chose il faut ccnsiderer la 
 fin" 1 said good old La Fontaine, and that is not a mere 
 apologue. 
 
 I must not omit to state that Admiral Bruix, 2 for whose 
 character, intellect, and talent I had the greatest esteem, was to 
 be appointed Minister of Marine ; I was thus entering upon office 
 with a colleague as unacquainted as I was myself with the ways 
 of the Directory, and with whom I could deliberate as to what 
 good might be done and what evil prevented. 
 
 To give a clear conception of what I have termed the ways 
 of the Directory, I think it will be sufficient to relate the inci- 
 dents that marked the first council at which I was present. A 
 quarrel took place between Carnot 3 and Barras ; the latter 
 charged his colleague with having destroyed a letter which 
 ought to have been submitted to the Directory. They were 
 both standing. Carnot, putting up his hand, said : " I give you 
 my word of honour that that is not so ! " " Do not raise your 
 hand," replied Barras, "blood would drip from it." Such 
 were our rulers, and my task was to try to obtain the re-admis- 
 sion of France to the councils of Europe, whilst such men were 
 in power. Difficult though this great undertaking was I did not 
 hesitate to confront it. 
 
 Nearly all the enemies France had had since the beginning 
 of the Revolution, had been compelled to seek safety in peace, 
 which most of them bought and paid for with territorial cessions 
 or pecuniary considerations. 4 Austria, defeated both in Italy 
 
 1 In all things the end should be considered. 
 
 2 Eustache Bruix was born at San Domingo in 1759 ; in 1789, he was a lieutenant 
 in the navy ; in 1798, he was appointed Rear- Admiral and Minister of Marine, and 
 died in 1805. 
 
 3 Lazare Carnot was born at Nolay, in the Department of Cote d'Or, in 1753 ; in 
 1789, he was an officer of artillery. He sat in the Legislative Assembly and in the 
 Convention, where he voted for the death of the king. Having been appointed a 
 member of the Committee of Public Safety, he was entrusted with the organization of 
 the army and the direction of the war. Having been elected a member of the Conseil 
 des Anciens by fourteen Departments, he was appointed a Director. Having been 
 banished on Fructidor 18, he took refuge in Geneva. Under the Consulate, he was 
 Minister of War, and afterwards member of the Tribunate. In 1814, he was appointed 
 General of Division and Governor of Antwerp. He took office as Minister of the 
 Interior during the Hundred Days, was exiled at the Second Restoration, and died at 
 Magdeburg in 1823. 
 
 4 The following is the chronological list of the treaties which brought the war of 
 the first coalition to an end : — With the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Paris, February 9, 
 1795; with Prussia, Basel, April 5, 1795; wiih Spain, Basel, July 22, 1795; with
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 193 
 
 and in Germany, and seeing her territory invaded on both sides 
 and her capital threatened by General Bonaparte, had already 
 signed the preliminaries of Leoben with her victor, and was now 
 engaged in negotiating the definitive treaty, that of Campo- 
 Formio. 
 
 I became Minister of Foreign Affairs x during the time that 
 elapsed between the signing of the preliminaries of peace and 
 the conclusion of the definitive treaty. On learning my ap- 
 pointment, General Bonaparte wrote to the members of the 
 Directory to congratulate them on their choice, and also sent 
 me a very nice letter. From that day, we kept up a close 
 correspondence. 2 All the young victorious general did, said, 
 or wrote was so full of originality, so striking, skilful and daring 
 as to justify building great hopes on his genius. A few weeks 
 after writing his first letter to me, he signed the treaty of 
 Campo-Formio (October 17, 1797). * 
 
 On the other hand, England had sent J^ord Malmesbury 3 to 
 France with proposals of peace ; but in this, she was not sincere. 
 The English Cabinet was then forced to feign entering on 
 negotiations with us, in order to overcome its difficulties at 
 home. 4 
 
 Hesse-Cassel, Basel, August 28, 1795 ; with Sardinia, Paris, May 15, 1796 ; with 
 Wurtemberg, Paris, August 7, 1796 ; with the Margrave of Baden, Paris, August 22, 
 1796 ; with the King of the Two Sicilies, Paris, October 11, 1796 ; with Parma, Paris, 
 November 5, 1796; with the Pope, Tolentino, February 19, 1796; with Venice, 
 Milan, May 16, 1797 ; with Portugal, August 20, 1797 ; with the Emperor, Campo- 
 Formio, October 17, 1797. 
 
 1 July 18, 1797. 
 
 2 The following is the first letter written to Bonaparte by Talleyrand : — 
 
 "Paris, July 24, 1797. 
 
 ' : I have the honour to inform you, General, that the Executive Directory has 
 appointed me Minister of Foreign Affairs. Fully alive to the fearful responsibility 
 my duties lay on me, it is necessary that I should seek confidence in the fact that your 
 glory cannot fail to facilitate the negotiations I may have to carry out. The mere 
 name of Bonaparte will remove all obstacles. 
 
 " I shall diligently acquaint you with all the views the Directory may instruct me 
 to bring to your knowledge, and fame, which quickly spreads all your achievements, 
 will often deprive me of the pleasure of informing the Directors of the manner in 
 which you have carried out their views." (Unpublished official correspondence of 
 Napoleon Bonaparte with the Directory, the Ministry, &c. Paris, 1819. 7 vols. 8vo.) 
 
 3 James Harris, Earl of Malmesbury, was born in 1746. In 1768, he was Secretary 
 of Embassy ; in 1771, he was appointed Minister at Berlin ; in 1777, he went to St. 
 Petersburg in the same capacity ; in 1783, he was sent to the Hague; in 1788, he 
 entered the House of Lords. After his missions to France, he retired to private life. 
 He died in 1820. 
 
 4 As early as 1796, Pitt had made overtures of peace, and sent Malmesbury to 
 Paris. The negotiations were broken off on December 19, 1796. In the following 
 
 VOL. I. O
 
 i 9 4 THE MEMOIRS OE PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Such were the relations of France with foreign countries 
 when I joined the ministry. 
 
 At home a faction was plotting the overthrow of the existing 
 order of things, to replace it by what ? Nobody ever knew or 
 ever will know ; for this faction was not numerous, and was 
 composed of Republicans and of former members of the Con- 
 stituent Assembly and of the National Convention, who may 
 have been united by common hatred, but who could certainly 
 not work any plan together. 
 
 At any rate, what soon became evident was the weakness 
 of this faction, easily overcome, and whose real or pretended 
 leaders were, in the course of a few hours, arrested for the most 
 part, charged with plotting against the established government, 
 convicted without being heard, and transported to Cayenne, 1 
 by virtue of what was then termed a law. 
 
 Civil war continued to desolate the western provinces, where 
 the Republicans were masters of nearly all the towns. This 
 war, — the organizers of which handed to their families the 
 proud title of Vendeen, afterwards replaced and spoilt by that 
 of CJiouan, — was then confined within limits beyond which some 
 vainly endeavoured to extend it. It had become more irksome 
 than dangerous for the government. 
 
 The words of Republic, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, were 
 everywhere inscribed on all the walls, but the ideas and feelings 
 they expressed were nowhere to be met with. From the highest 
 authorities to those of the lowest rank, there was scarcely 
 one that was not most arbitrary in its formation, its composition 
 and mode of action. All was done with violence, and, as a 
 natural consequence, nothing could last. 
 
 The young general Bonaparte, who, for the last two years, 
 shone so brilliantly on the stage of the world, refused to be 
 swamped amongst the crowd of single generals ; he wanted to 
 hear his name bruited abroad more yet, and to continue to 
 attract all looks upon himself. Besides, he feared a situation in 
 
 year, Malmesbury returned to Lille (July 4), and began fresh negotiations, which, 
 however, also failed. 
 
 1 This was the coup d'itat of Fructidor 18, year V. (September 4, 1797), made by 
 the Directory with the assistance of the army against the Councils, where the elections 
 of the previous May had sent an anti-revolutionist majority. The greater portion of 
 these elections were quashed, and sixty- five Deputies transported to Cayenne.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 195 
 
 which he would be defenceless against the very dangers to which 
 his fame might give birth. Ambitious enough to wish to be 
 head of all, he was yet not so blind as to think this possible for 
 him in France, at least not without a concurrence of events 
 which, at that time, could not be regarded as close at hand, or 
 even as probable. 
 
 England in the time of Cromwell had but one army. Crom- 
 well, who had selected all its officers, had only his own creatures 
 among them. Outside the army he had no rival in fame. Two 
 hours' fanaticism, skilfully employed, sufficed to put the troops 
 into the state of mind he wished. Finally, the Long Parliament, 
 which had concentrated all power within itself, had played its 
 part ; 1 all parties had grown tired of its tyranny ; they all 
 desired its overthrow. 
 
 These circumstances were all lacking in Bonaparte's case. 
 
 But if he had not yet the chance of ruling, as Cromwell, in his 
 
 own country, it was, on the other hand, not impossible that he 
 
 might cut out for himself a sovereignty elsewhere, provided 
 
 • France first furnished him with the means. 
 
 After having signed the peace with Austria at Campo- 
 Formio, and paid a short visit to Rastadt, the place agreed upon 
 with the empire 2 for treating of the peace (for, after the example 
 of the old Romans, the French Republic had adopted the 
 principle of never comprising two of its enemies into the same 
 peace), he went to Paris to propose the conquest of Egypt to 
 the Directory. 
 
 I had never seen him. At the time of my nomination to 
 the Ministry of Foreign Affairs he had written to me, as I have 
 already mentioned, a long letter, carefully compiled, in which he 
 wished to appear under a different character from that which he 
 had hitherto played on the stage of public life. This letter is 
 
 1 The Long Parliament is the name given in England to the last Parliament 
 convened by Charles I. Having assembled in 1640, it lasted more than twenty 
 years. In 1648, Cromwell dismissed all members who were hostile to his own 
 policy, and in 1653, he dissolved it. Recalled in 1659, and nicknamed The Rump. 
 This Parliament broke up in 1660. 
 
 2 Since the treaty of Campo-Formio, a congress had met at Rastadt (Grand 
 Duchy of Baden) to regulate the questions still under discussion (navigation of the 
 Rhine, indemnities to dispossessed princes, &c). Reassembled at the beginning of 
 1 798, it was suddenly interrupted by war at the beginning of the following year. 
 
 O 2
 
 iq6 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 sufficiently interesting to make one wish it to be inserted at the 
 end of these Memoirs} The evening of the day on which he 
 arrived in Paris, he sent me an aide-de-camp to ask at what 
 hour he could see me. I replied that I awaited his leisure ; he 
 fixed the next day at eleven a.m. I informed Madame de Stael 
 of this ; she was in my drawing-room at ten o'clock. There 
 were also some other persons whom curiosity had attracted 
 thither. I remember that Bougainville 2 was there. The 
 general was announced, and I went to meet him. While 
 crossing the room, I introduced Madame de Stael to him, but 
 he bestowed very little attention upon her. Bougainville was 
 the only one whom he condescended to notice, and to whom 
 he paid a few compliments. 
 
 At first sight, he seemed to me to have a charming face ; so 
 much do the halo of victory, fine eyes, a pale and almost con- 
 sumptive look, become a young hero. We entered my study. 
 Our first conversation was full of confidence on his part. He 
 dwelt in kind terms on my appointment as Foreign Secretary, 
 and insisted on the pleasure it afforded him to correspond with 
 a person of a different stamp from that of the directors. Almost 
 abruptly he said to me, " You are the nephew of the Archbishop 
 of Rheims, who is with Louis XVIII." (I noticed that he did not 
 then say with the Comte de Lille 3 ) ; and he added, " I also have 
 an uncle who is an archdeacon in Corsica, 4 it was he who 
 brought me up. In Corsica, you know, an archdeacon is like a 
 bishop in France." We soon returned to the drawing-room 
 which had become filled with visitors, and he said in a loud 
 voice : " Citizens, I appreciate the attentions paid to me ; I 
 
 1 This letter has not been found among the papers of the Prince de Talleyrand. 
 
 '-' Louis Antoine de Bougainville, born in 1729, was at first secretary of embassy, 
 and afterwards an officer of Dragoons. He was thirty-four years old when he 
 entered the navy. In 1766, he undertook round the world a voyage which lasted 
 three years. He left the navy in 1790, entered the Institute (1796), was made a 
 senator under the empire, and died in 1814. 
 
 3 That was the name adopted by Louis XVIII. during the emigration. 
 
 4 Joseph Fesch, born in 1763, at Ajaccio. He was, in 1789, archdeacon of the 
 chapter of that town. Having protested againt the civil constitution of the clergy, 
 he retired from the chapter, put aside his ecclesiastical functions, and became 
 commissaire des guerres to the army of Italy (1795). After the 18th of Brumaire, 
 Fesch resumed his ecclesiastical duties, became Archbishop of Lyons (1802^ ; cardinal, 
 and was sent as envoy extraordinary to Rome (1804). He was recalled in 1808. 
 Peer of France during the Hundred Days, he retired to Rome at the Restoration 
 and died in 1809.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 197 
 
 waged war as well as I could, and as well as I could, made peace. 
 It now rests with the Directory to turn the latter to the happi- 
 ness and prosperity of the Republic." We then went together to 
 the Directory. 
 
 The hesitations and jealousy of the Directory caused a 
 certain annoyance to Bonaparte during the first weeks of his 
 • stay in Paris. I gave a fete to celebrate his victories in Italy 
 and the glorious peace he had signed. I spared no trouble to 
 make it brilliant and attractive ; although in this, I experienced 
 some difficulty on account of the vulgarity of the directors' 
 wives, who of course enjoyed precedence over all other ladies. 
 My apartments had been decorated as tastefully as possible, 
 and everybody congratulated me. 
 
 " All this must have cost you a lot, Citizen Minister? " Madame 
 Merlin, 1 the wife of the director, said to me. 
 
 " Not a fortune, Madam" I replied, in the same tone. 
 
 The next day numerous other jokes, most of which were 
 quite authentic, were going their round in Paris. 
 
 The Directory were then contemplating an expedition to 
 Ireland 2 ; its command, at first intended for Hoche, 3 who died 
 in the meantime, was afterwards offered to General Bonaparte, 
 but it did not suit his views. This expedition, whether a 
 success or a failure, could evidently not last long, so that the 
 young general would, on his return, have found himself exactly 
 in the same situation as he actually was. The army he would 
 have led to Ireland he could not have used as a tool to further 
 his own projects ; and, besides, he could have had no hope 
 of establishing himself firmly in that country. 
 
 Nor did he think of obtaining supreme power in Egypt, nor 
 indeed in any country he might have conquered with a French 
 
 1 Merlin de Douay (1754-1838), former member of the Constituent Assembly and 
 of the Convention. In 1795, he became Minister of Justice, then Minister of General 
 Police, and finally a director after the 18th of Fructidor ; he was chief president of 
 the Court of Cassation, under the Empire. 
 
 2 The Directory intending to attack England at home, Ireland seemed to offer a 
 propitious field of operations ; a rising of her inhabitants might be expected. A first 
 attempt to land troops on that island had failed in January 1797. A second expedi- 
 tion started in August. General Humbert landed with i,ioo men in the bay of Sligo, 
 was victorious at Killala and at Castlebar, but was defeated at Ballinamuck and 
 obliged to surrender. 
 
 3 Hoche died suddenly, September 18, 1797. He was then commander-in-chief 
 of the armies of " Sambre-et-Meuse " and of " Rhin-et-Moselle."
 
 198 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 army. He did not yet anticipate that his army would be 
 satisfied with achieving victories that would only benefit him, and 
 consent to letting him take a crown, and still less placing it on 
 his head. The more so, that the troops over which he possessed 
 most command, and which, for this very reason, he most wished 
 to take with him, were composed of the very men with whom 
 he had just been campaigning in Italy, and whose republican 
 fanaticism he had himself aroused and carefully kept up. All 
 he expected from them was that they should enable him to 
 appear in the eyes of the Christians of the East and of all 
 Greeks, as a liberator ready to break their fetters ; as for the 
 ultimate realization of his ambitious dreams, he trusted to the 
 number, the energy and gratitude of these same Greeks, but 
 above all to some unforeseen chance. Such hopes, if they could 
 have been suspected, would not have been likely to promote the 
 success of his negotiation with the Directory. He therefore 
 affected to have but one aim in view — to further the interests of 
 France. He spoke of Egypt as of a colony alone worth all the 
 colonies France had lost, and whence deadly blows could be 
 struck at the English power in India. He sometimes, however, 
 allowed his impetuous imagination and natural loquacity to 
 carry him beyond the limits of prudence, and talked of return- 
 ing to Europe by way of Constantinople, which was not exactly 
 the road to India ; so that it did not require much penetration 
 to guess that if ever he took Constantinople, the result of his 
 victory would not be to consolidate the throne of the successor 
 of the Kalifs or to substitute a republic one a?td indivisible to the 
 Ottoman Empire. 
 
 Yet the Directory were so struck with the importance of 
 getting rid of a man who caused them such umbrage and whom 
 they felt powerless to keep in check, that they eventually yielded 
 to Bonaparte, agreed that an expedition should be sent to 
 Egypt, appointed him to the command of the troops composing 
 the expedition, and thus paved the way for events they were 
 most anxious to prevent. 
 
 I must state here succinctly what was the situation of 
 Europe towards France at the time of Bonaparte's departure. 
 
 The Empress Catherine of Russia had been the first to
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 199 
 
 declare against the French Revolution, but all her policy had 
 been limited to making her opinions publicly known by means 
 of despatches which her ministers were instructed to show in the 
 different courts to which they were accredited. I saw a great 
 number of these letters in the hands of the Prince of Nassau. 1 
 She had carefully abstained from joining in a war, the result of 
 which was necessarily to weaken her neighbours and, as a matter 
 of course, to increase her relative power. Having no fear that 
 French principles should contaminate her subjects, but justly 
 afraid of the efforts made by Poland to shake off her anarchy, 
 she had taken advantage of the moment when France, Prussia, 
 and Austria were fighting together to plot the dismemberment 
 of that kingdom, a portion of which she had already added to 
 her dominions, leaving the rest to Austria and Prussia. 2 She 
 died soon after (November 17, 1796). 
 
 It is impossible to tell what her successor, Paul I., who had 
 inherited the disease of his father, Peter III., 3 would have done, 
 but for the invasion of Egypt by F ranee. At any rate, this 
 invasion became for him a decisive and peremptory pretext. 
 
 Since the time of Peter I., Russia had never ceased to con- 
 sider European Turkey as a prey which was eventually to fall to 
 her, which she was to absorb gradually, being unable to do so all 
 at once. This prey would have slipped from her for ever if, 
 through a revolution, Greece had recovered her independence ; 
 and the invasion of Egypt not only caused Russia to fear this 
 revolution, but pointed out to it as being inevitable. 
 
 Paul I., instead of the natural enemy of the Turks, at once 
 became their ally ; he entered into a league with England. 
 Austria joined them all the more readily that she had laid down 
 her arms against her will, and that, since the peace of Campo- 
 Formio, France had caused her much justifiable alarm. 
 
 1 The Prince Otto von Nassau- Siegen, born in 1745, accompanied Bougainville 
 on his voyage round the world (1 766-1 769). On his return, he took service in 
 France, went afterwards to Spain, where the title of grandee and the rank of general 
 were conferred on him. In 1787, he went to Russia, was appointed head of a naval 
 squadron, and entrusted with sundry diplomatic missions to Vienna, Versailles and 
 Madrid. Vice-admiral in 1790, he was defeated by King Gustavus III. He then 
 retired to private life, came to Paris in 1802, and died in 1809. 
 
 2 This was the third and final dismemberment of Poland (February n, 1795). 
 
 3 Through debauchery and excesses of all kinds, Peter III. had brought on him- 
 self epileptic fits. — {Translator.)
 
 200 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Some dispute which had arisen between the Vaudois and 
 the senate of Bern, their sovereign, afforded a pretext to the 
 Directory for sending troops to Switzerland, to both places at 
 once, and change the confederation into a republic one and 
 indivisible} 
 
 Under some other pretexts the Papal States had been 
 invaded by French troops, the Pope Pius VI. taken as a 
 prisoner to the Chartreux convent of Florence, and thence to 
 Valence, in Dauphiny, where he died ; his government replaced 
 by what was then called a repiiblican administration. 2 
 
 The King of Naples, justly afraid, but whom prudence 
 should have advised to keep quiet and bide his time, having 
 rashly, and against the advice of the court of Vienna, begun 
 hostilities with inexperienced and undisciplined troops, had 
 to take refuge in Sicily, abandoning his kingdom of Naples, 
 which the French Directory soon transformed into a Partheno- 
 pean republic. 3 
 
 The Directory could then, if they had wished it, have made of 
 Italy a bulwark for France by forming but one single state with 
 the former fine country. But, far from doing so, they felt much 
 provoked on learning that the fusion of the new republics into 
 one was secretly prepared in Italy, and they opposed this fusion 
 with all their might. They wanted republics which made them 
 odious to monarchies, but they wanted only small and weak 
 republics, in order to occupy militarily their territories under the 
 guise of protecting them, but in reality to rule them and feed 
 their troops at their expense, which made them odious to these 
 very republics. 
 
 All these upheavals taking place in the immediate neigh- 
 
 " 1 The Swiss cantons were not all then independent as to-day The canton of 
 Vaud, for instance, was subject to the authority of Bern. It rose in insurrection 
 against the latter and was crushed. Many Vaudois then took refuge in France. They 
 all pretended that Switzerland was in the hands of the Federalist party, which was itself 
 serving the ends of Austria, and solicited the intervention of the Directory. Switzer- 
 land was invaded (February 1798), and the republic of Leman proclaimed with a 
 constitution similar to that of France. 
 
 - On December 27, 1797, a riot had broken out in Rome, General Duphot had 
 been killed in the course of it. On February 10 following, General Berthier became 
 master of the town. Five days later, the Roman republic was proclaimed by a 
 popular vote, at the instigation of the Directory. 
 
 3 January 1799. Ferdinand IV., son of Charles III., King of Spain, was then 
 reigning at Naples. He had married Marie -Caroline, daughter of the Empress 
 Maria-Theresa.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 2or 
 
 hood of Austria, modified too much her relative situation for her 
 to witness them peaceably. 
 
 Her first object in taking up arms again was to break off the 
 negotiations of Rastadt : in this she succeeded ; but it is unfor- 
 tunate for her that to this rupture of negotiations should have 
 been added the assassination of the French plenipotentiaries. 1 
 After this event it was but natural to expect a furious renewal 
 of hostilities. 
 
 The Directory were not wanting in soldiers to wage the war ; 
 but, since the proscription of Carnot (Fructidor 18), they had 
 no one capable of directing the military operations ; and of all 
 their renowned generals, Moreau 2 alone was in France. But he 
 was accused, if not of having been implicated in the anti- 
 revolutionary plans of his friend Pichegru, 3 at least of having 
 known them, and of having only disclosed them when too late. 
 For this reason, he was so much in disfavour with the re- 
 publicans, that the Directory would not have dared to entrust 
 him with a command however much inclined they might have 
 felt to do so. By authorizing Moreau to enlist as a simple 
 
 1 Roberjot, Bonnier and Debry : the latter was the only one to survive his 
 wounds. 
 
 2 Victor Moreau, born at Morlaix in 1763, was in 1787, prevost of the school of 
 law. He took service as a volunteer in 1792, became general in the following year 
 and commanded successively the army of the Rhine (1796), the army of Italy (1799), 
 and again the army of the Rhine (1800). He was very hostile to the First Consul ; he 
 was implicated in the conspiracy of Georges Cadoudal,* arrested, tried and sentenced to 
 two years' imprisonment. Bonaparte commuted this sentence into banishment. In 
 1 81 3, Moreau returned from America, where he had been residing, served in the 
 Russian army as field-marshal, and was mortally wounded at Dresden August 25. 
 
 3 Charles Pichegru (1761-1804) was a non-commissioned officer of artillery in 1789. 
 In 1793) he was appointed general commander-in chief of the army of the Rhine, 
 took the command of the army of the North in 1794, and conquered Holland. He 
 allowed himself to give way to the solicitations of the royalist party, and plotted with 
 the chiefs of Conde's army. Having aroused the suspicions of the Directory, he lost 
 his command in 1796. Having been elected, in 1797, a member of the Conseil des 
 Cinq-Cents, he became the leader of the anti-revolutionary party, which, on Fructidor 
 18, led to his arrest and transportation to Guyana. He managed^to escape, however, 
 a short time after, reached England, joined in Cadoudal's conspiracy in 1803, was 
 arrested in Paris and strangled himself in his prison. 
 
 * Georges Cadoudal, one of the most famous and gallant leaders of the royalist rising, known under 
 the name of C/w?ia/!nerie,wa.s born at Kerleano near Auray,in Morbihan (Brittany). His father was 
 a small landowner and had him brought up at the college ofVannes. A fervent Catholic and loyal 
 royalist, Cadoudal was the first to organize the insurrection in Vendee, in 1793. Though often crushed 
 by the Republican troops, he always managed to escape, soon to appear again elsewhere at the head 
 of his followers, until at last General Brune annihilated them completely at the battle of Grand- 
 Champ, January 26, 1800. Bonaparte, admiring Cadoudal's indomitable energy and courage, sent him 
 a safe-conduct and had him summoned to his presence, when he endeavoured to win him over. But 
 Cadoudal declined every offer, although he bound himself not to take up arms again. Having been 
 implicated in the plot of December 1S00, when Bonaparte miraculously escaped the explosion of an 
 infernal machine in the Rue St. Nicaise, Cadoudal was arrested with many of his accomplices and 
 executed June 10, 1804.— (Translator.)
 
 202 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 volunteer in the army of Italy, they considered they had done 
 much. 
 
 The presence of Moreau at the army of Italy did not 
 prevent it being thoroughly beaten and routed at the very 
 beginning of the action. Macdonald, 1 who was coming up 
 from the heart of Italy with thirty-five thousand men, in order 
 to reinforce it, was crushed at Trebia? 
 
 All these sham republics raised by the Directory, vanished 
 as soon as reverse befell French arms, and, but for the 
 precaution previously taken by the Directory to retain in trust all 
 the fortresses in Piedmont, all the French troops would have 
 had to evacuate Italy. By rallying in and around these places 
 the scattered remnants of the armies of the Republic, Moreau 
 succeeded in stopping the progress of the enemy. 
 
 When the Directory revolutionized Switzerland, they did not 
 suspect that they were re-opening an inlet, closed for centuries, 
 by which foreigners were one day to enter France, and bring 
 about thither the great change so much dreaded by the revolu- 
 tionists. The Directory must even have experienced it themselves, 
 but for the blunder of the Archduke Charles, 3 who evacuated 
 Switzerland in order to besiege Philipsburg in vain, and only 
 left behind him a body of Russian troops, thus enabling Massena 
 to win the victory of Zurich, 4 which was all the more extolled in 
 Paris, that it was indispensable to the safety of France. 
 
 The Directory shared the fate of all despots. So long as their 
 armies were victorious, people hated their rule but feared their 
 power. But as soon as the hour of defeat came, that govern- 
 ment met with universal contempt. The press attacked it, 
 lampoon-writers held it up to ridicule, everybody denounced it. 
 
 1 Alexandre Macdonald (1765-1840), was born of Irish parents, took service in 
 Dillon's Irish troops, became general of division in 1795, governor of the Papal 
 States in 1798. He fell out of favour in 1804, again took service in 1809, became 
 marshal of France and Due de Tarente after the victory of Wagram. In 1814, he 
 became a member of the House of Peers, and high-chancellor of the Legion of Honour 
 in 1816. 
 
 2 June 17, 18, and 19, 1799. 
 
 8 The Archduke Charles was born in 1771 ; he was the son of the Emperor Leopold. 
 He became field-marshal of the German empire in 1795, and Minister of War in 1802. 
 Generalissimo of the Austrian armies in 1805 and 1809, the Archduke Charles was one of 
 the first captains of his time, and the most formidable of Napoleon's adversaries. He 
 died in 1847. 
 
 4 Massena was then commander-in-chief of the army of Helvetia. The battle' 
 of Zurich, where the Russian army was destroyed, was fought on August 26, 1799.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 203 
 
 Naturally, the members of the ministry were not spared ; this 
 offered the opportunity I was looking for of resigning my post. 
 I had then ascertained that what little evil I could prevent was but 
 insignificant, and that, only later, could any real good be worked. 
 The intention I had had for a long time of resigning 
 had induced me to take certain precautions. I had acquainted 
 General Bonaparte with my resolution before his departure for 
 Egypt ; he fully approved the reasons which had led me to take it, 
 and kindly used his influence with the directors to solicit for me 
 the appointment of ambassador to Constantinople, in the event 
 of it being possible to come to some understanding with the 
 Porte, or else the authorization of joining him at Cairo, where, 
 there was reason to believe, negotiations might have to be opened 
 with the agents of the Sultan. 1 Having obtained that authoriza- 
 tion, I sent in my resignation, and retired to the country, near 
 Paris, whence I watched the course of events. 2 
 
 The staunch demagogues, who had, for some time past, resumed 
 an alarming attitude, agitated, and threatened to bring about a 
 new Reign of Terror. But their clubs, which they had re- opened, 
 and which Fouche 3 closed as soon as he deemed it advisable, 
 were not to cause the overthrow of the Directory : the Directory 
 fell by the fault of its own members. 
 
 Sieyes was envoy extraordinary and plenipotentiary minister 
 of the Republic in Berlin, when he was elected a member of the 
 Directory. His return to Paris was awaited with such impatience 
 that the time he required to take leave of the Prussian court, 
 start on the journey and reach the capital seemed intolerably 
 long to his colleagues of the government. They credited him 
 with possessing infallible means to remedy the critical situation 
 of France at home and abroad. He had scarcely alighted than 
 
 1 This is what Napoleon said subsequently, concerning his relations with Talley- 
 rand, before his departure for Egypt : " It had been agreed with the Directory and 
 Talleyrand, that immediately after the departure of the expedition sent to Egypt, 
 negotiations should be opened with the Porte concerning the object of this expedition. 
 Talleyrand was even to be the negotiator and to start Jor Constantinople twenty-four 
 hours after the expeditionary corps to Egypt had left the port of Toulon. This promise, 
 expressly claimed and positively given, had been forgotten, not only did Talleyrand 
 remain in Paris, but no negotiation took place," {Memoir es de Napoleon dictes a Saint- 
 Helene au general Gourgaud, vol. i., p. 62.) 
 
 2 July 20, 1799. 
 
 3 Fouche had been appointed minister of police, on Barras motion.
 
 204 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 everybody begged of him to divulge those means. The most 
 influential among the members of both assemblies 1 assured him 
 that he had but to speak, and that, in all in which they can help 
 him, they will strongly assist him. Before proposing anything, 
 Sieyes desired to see everything with his own eyes, to examine 
 and to ponder. The result of his investigations was that nothing 
 useful could be accomplished with the colleagues he had. There 
 and then three of them were removed. Among their successors 
 two were but regular ciphers, the third was devoted to him. 2 Sieyes 
 then no longer complained of the men, it was, he urged, abso- 
 lutely necessary to modify the institutions. Five rulers were too 
 many ; three would be sufficient. The name of Directory had 
 become hateful ; it must be replaced by some other appellation. 
 It was, above all things, indispensable that the government 
 should comprise among its members a military man possessing 
 the confidence of the army, as unless a government be supported 
 by the army, it is powerless to do any good. 
 
 Moreau, having been sounded as to whether he would accept 
 the post of member of the government, declined all but military 
 functions. General Joubert was then thought of, and, in order to 
 enable him to win the desirable fame he did not yet possess, he 
 was sent to Italy with a command. On arriving, he fought 
 imprudently the battle of Novi, 3 and was killed at the beginning 
 of the action, thus causing all the hopes built on him to vanish. 
 The situation remained as intricate as ever, and goodness knows 
 how matters would have ended, but for an event which the 
 Directory least expected. 
 
 After the conquest of Egypt, Bonaparte had followed up the 
 execution of his plans by attempting that of Syria. But Acre 
 stopped his progress. Although he had lost all his siege guns, 
 captured by English cruisers, on the way from Egypt to Syria, he 
 insisted on attacking the Turkish stronghold. After furiously 
 
 1 The Conseils des Anciens (Council of the Elders) and the Conseil des Cinq Cents 
 (Council of the Five Hundred). — {Translator.) 
 
 2 This change of directors constituted what is known in history as the coup d'itat 
 of Prairial 30 (May 1799), aimed by the assemblies against the Directory. Director 
 Treilhard was removed, and Gohier appointed in his stead. Lareveillere-Lepeaux 
 and Merlin were called upon to resign, being replaced by Moulins and Roger Ducos. 
 The latter was entirely devoted to Sieyes. 
 
 3 August 15, 1799.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 205 
 
 storming the place three times, he was, however, compelled to 
 withdraw and bring his troops back to Egypt, where the English 
 threatened to land. His magnificent hopes were thus vanishing ; 
 that even of holding his own in Egypt was becoming anything 
 but certain. He was haunted by the fearful apprehension of being 
 reduced to leave the country only through a capitulation, which 
 would have left him the reputation of being but an adventurer. 
 Fortunately, the vicissitudes of the French arms in Italy relieved 
 him from his perplexity, by giving him the rashness of doing what 
 otherwise he never would have dared to attempt. Without any 
 authority to do so, he handed his command to Kleber, left Egypt, 
 escaped from English cruisers, and landed at Frejus. 1 
 
 As anticipated by him, the political parties of France saw in 
 him not a man who was to account for his conduct, but one whom 
 circumstances rendered indispensable, and whose favour it was 
 necessary to win. 
 
 At first, some people thought that Barras, the author of 
 Bonaparte's fortune, who of all former directors was the only 
 one still in office, was so far mistaken in his judgment of the 
 young general and had so much overrated his own influence over 
 him, as to flatter himself that he could induce him to play the 
 part of a Monk ; but Bonaparte who, even if he had been able 
 to do so, would have declined it, was really not at that time in 
 a position to play such a part. 
 
 He could not, therefore, hesitate long, between such a proposal, 
 supposing it was made to him, and the offer not exactly of 
 supreme power, but of a position that enabled him to aspire 
 to it. 
 
 A great number of his supporters would doubtless have 
 preferred to see him appointed simply a member of the Directory, 
 but matters had reached such a point, that everybody was obliged 
 to be satisfied with whatever Bonaparte might wish, and the very 
 nature of things made him master of the situation. As a director, 
 he could not have carried out his ambitious designs. 
 
 It was therefore agreed that the Directory should be replaced 
 by three provisory consuls who, with the assistance of two 
 committees from the conseils, would have to draft a new consti- 
 
 1 October 9, 1799.
 
 206 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 tution to be submitted to the approval of the primary assemblies, 
 for the sovereignty of the people was a dogma which nobody 
 was, then, dreaming of putting into question. 1 
 
 This plan having been arranged, the council of elders, 
 according to the rights conferred on them by the constitution, 
 and under the pretext of the excitement existing in Paris, 
 transferred the seat of the legislature to St. Cloud. By so 
 doing, it was hoped to check all obstacles to the measures that 
 had been concerted. The two most influential members of the 
 Directory (Sieyes and Barras), the majority of the council of the 
 elders and a portion of the council of the Five Hundred, were 
 in favour of this step. On Brumaire 18 (November 9, 1799), the 
 Directorial guards under the command of Augereau, who had 
 been appointed to it since Fructidor 18, a host of general officers 
 and other military men of all ranks, as also a few sightseers, 
 amongst whom I was, repaired to St. Cloud, in order to attend 
 the sitting. 
 
 Notwithstanding this display of force, the council of the 
 
 1 A few days before Brumaire 18, my house was the scene of an incident, the whole 
 interest of which lies in the circumstances that attended it. General -Bonaparte, who 
 was then residing in the rue Chantereine,* called on me, one evening, to talk about 
 the preliminaries of his intended coup d'etat. I was then living in a house in the rue 
 Taitbout, which, I believe, has since been known as number 24. It was situated at 
 the back of a yard, and, the first floor of it communicated with rooms overlooking the 
 street. We were engrossed in conversation in the drawing-room which was lighted 
 by a few candles ; when, at about one o'clock in the morning, we heard a great noise 
 in the street ; it sounded like the riding of carriages and the stamping of horses, such 
 as might be produced by an escort of cavalry. .Suddenly the carriages stopped in 
 front of my house. General Bonaparte turned pale, and I quite believe I did the 
 same. We at once thought that people had come to arrest us by order of the 
 Directory. I blew out the candles, and went on tiptoe, to one of the front rooms 
 whence I could see what was going on in the street. Some time elapsed before I could 
 ascertain the real cause of all this uproar, which, however, turned out to be simply 
 grotesque. As in those days, the streets of Paris were hardly safe at night, all the 
 money of gambling-houses was collected, at closing-time, and removed in cabs, for 
 which, in this case the proprietor bad obtained from the police that an escort of 
 gendarmes, which he himself paid, should, every night, accompany the cabs as far as 
 his residence which was in the rue de Clichy, or thereabout. On the night in question, 
 one of these cabs had met with an accident exactly in front of my door, thus causing 
 the whole party to stop on their way for about a quarter of an hour. We laughed a 
 good deal, the general and I, at our panic, which however was but natural on the 
 part of people acquainted as we were with the disposition of the Directory, and the 
 violent measures they were capable of resorting to. — {Prince Talleyrand.) 
 
 * In 1680, it was but a small lane known under the name of " Ruellette aux maraisdes Porcherons" 
 (Little lane of the swineherds' swamp). In 1734, it was called " Ruelle des postes," changed after- 
 wards to that of "rue Chantereine." There, Bonaparte possessed a residence, where he came to live 
 on re-entering France, after the treaty of Campo-Formio. From this circumstance, that street received 
 the name of " rue de la Victoire." In 1816, it resumed its former name of rue Chantereine, and in 
 1832, it reassumed the name of rue de la Victoire, which it preserves to this day. It is situated not 
 far from the Opera. — (Translator.)
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 207 
 
 Five Hundred offered such opposition to the proposed modifica- 
 tion of the constitution, as to jeopardize the execution of the plan 
 in view, although its object was merely to substitute one form of 
 polygarcJiy for another (I am always obliged to make use of 
 this barbaric expression, for want of any equivalent). Thus it 
 is easy to imagine what would have happened to him who had 
 manifested any desire to play the part of Monk ; he would have 
 had against him nearly all the men to whom the success of the 
 coup d'etat of Brumaire 1 8 was, more or less, due. 
 
 At last, both persuasion and threats having been brought to 
 bear, the motion was carried. The Directory was dissolved, 
 Sieyes, Roger Ducos, 1 and Bonaparte were appointed consuls, 
 and the committees who were to draft the project of constitution 
 were all that remained of the Councils. Ten or twelve days 
 later, I again became Foreign Secretary. 
 
 The overthrow of the Directory could not fail to please, or at 
 least, be indifferent to all the foreign powers friendly with France. 
 There being no reason to fear any modification in their disposi- 
 tion, no special steps were needed to inform them of the change 
 of government. As for hostile powers, the only hope of altering 
 their attitude towards France lay in fresh victories. Though no 
 negotiations had to be carried on abroad, yet at home a most 
 important and delicate negotiation was being proceeded with, 
 and although I had nothing to do with it in an official capacity, 
 it could not be either foreign or indifferent to me. 
 
 It became necessary either to re-establish monarchy or else 
 to have made the 18 Brumaire in vain, thus postponing to an un- 
 certain and perhaps indefinite date the hope of a restoration of 
 monarchical institutions. Re-establishing monarchy did not mean 
 raising the throne again. Monarchy has three degrees or forms : 
 it is elective for a time, elective for life, or hereditary. What is 
 called the throne cannot belong to the first of these three forms, 
 and does not necessarily belong to the second. Now, to reach the 
 
 1 The Comte Roger Ducos, born in 1754, had been a member of the National 
 Convention, where he voted for the death of the king. He was elected a member of 
 the Council of the Elders, of which he became the president in 1796. On Prairial 30, 
 he was appointed one of the Directors. On Brumaire 18, he gave active support to 
 Bonaparte, became a consul pro tempore, and was appointed a senator under the empire, 
 in 1814 ; he was appointed a peer of France, during the Hundred Days, was exiled in 
 1815, and died at Ulm in 1816.
 
 2o8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 third, without passing successively by the two others, unless 
 France were in the power of foreign forces, was a thing abso- 
 lutely impossible. It might, it is true, not have been so, if Louis 
 XVI. had lived, but the murder of that prince had put an insur- 
 mountable obstacle in the way 
 
 The passing from polygarchy to hereditary monarchy could not 
 be immediate, the result being, as a necessary consequence, that 
 the re-establishment of the latter and the re-establishment of the 
 house of Bourbon could not be simultaneous. Thus it was 
 indispensable to pave the way for the restoration of monarchical 
 institutions without having regard for the special interests of 
 the house of Bourbon, which time might bring back, if it so 
 happened that he who was to occupy the throne proved himself 
 unworthy and deserved to lose it. It was necessary to make a 
 temporary sovereign who might become sovereign for life, and 
 eventually hereditary monarch. The question was not whether 
 Bonaparte had the qualities most desirable in a monarch ; he 
 had unquestionably those which were indispensable to again 
 accustom France to monarchical discipline, as she was still 
 infatuated with every revolutionary doctrine ; and no one 
 possessed those qualities in the same degree as he did. 
 
 The real point was how could Bonaparte be made a temporary 
 sovereign ? If one proposed to appoint him sole consul, one 
 betrayed views which could not be concealed with too much 
 care. If, on the other hand, one gave him colleagues equal to 
 him in rank and power, one remained in polygarchy. 
 
 They remained in polygarchy if they established a legislative 
 body, either permanent, or which was to sit at fixed dates without 
 previous summons, and to prorogue itself. If this body, though 
 divided into two distinct assemblies, could alone make the 
 laws, they remained in polygarchy. In short, they remained in 
 polygarchy if the high officials, and chiefly the judges, were to 
 continue to be named by the electoral assemblies. The problem 
 to be solved was, as may be seen, very intricate, and bristling 
 with so many difficulties that it was almost impossible to avoid 
 arbitrary measures ; and they were not avoided. 
 
 Three consuls were created, a first, a second, and a third 
 consul, unequal in rank, and whose respective duties were such
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 209 
 
 that, with some interpretations (that Bonaparte knew better than 
 any one how to give when his own power was at stake), the First 
 Consul was almost alone invested, by that very fact, with the 
 share of authority which, in limited or constitutional monarchies, 
 is in the hands of the sovereign. The only essential difference 
 was, that, instead of limiting his power to the sanction of the 
 laws, he was also entrusted with proposing them, a plurality 
 of power which proved fatal to himself. 
 
 In order to render the power of the First Consul still more 
 effective, I made, on the very day of his installation, a proposi- 
 tion which he readily accepted. The three consuls were to meet 
 every day, and the ministers were to acquaint them with the 
 affairs of their respective departments. I pointed out to General 
 Bonaparte the fact that all matters connected with foreign affairs, 
 being essentially secret, should not be discussed in council, 
 and that it was necessary that he should himself alone decide 
 all questions of foreign policy, which the head of a government 
 should have entirely in his hands and manage. He fully grasped 
 the utility of that advice ; and as, when organizing a new govern- 
 ment, everything is easier to settle, it was agreed, from the very 
 first day, that I should work only with the First Consul. 
 
 The first act of General Bonaparte, in quality of First Consul, 
 was to write to the King of England a letter in which he ex- 
 pressed the wish for a prompt reconciliation between the two 
 countries. He made a similar advance to the Emperor of Austria. 
 These two attempts led to no reconciliation, and could not lead 
 to any, but they had a happy effect upon the internal peace of 
 the country, because they announced dispositions which ought 
 to be agreeable to the people, in revealing as a skilful statesman 
 the great general who had become the head of the government 
 This done, the refusal of the two cabinets being well proved 
 by a failure to reply to those letters, which were not even honoured 
 with an acknowledgment, 1 Bonaparte no longer thought of any- 
 thing but taking measures to go to meet the enemy on a field 
 of battle, where he was to find none but Austrians. 
 
 Paul I., discontented with Austria, by whom he believed him- 
 
 1 Lord Grenville and Herr von Thugut both replied to M. de Talleyrand to 
 reject the propositions of the First Consul. 
 
 VOL. I. P
 
 210 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 self to have been betrayed, 1 had recalled his troops from Germany. 
 The First Consul, availing himself of this circumstance, collected 
 the few Russian prisoners who were in France, had them newly 
 clothed, and sent home without ransom. He directed one of 
 the officers who commanded them to offer to the Emperor Paul 
 the sword of La Valette found at Malta. It is known that the 
 Emperor of Russia had taken the order of Malta under his 
 special protection. 2 Touched by these delicate proceedings, the 
 Emperor Paul, who got easily prejudiced, directed General von 
 Sprengtporten, 3 to make overtures of peace to France ; these 
 overtures were followed up by M. de Kalitcheff, and led to a 
 definite treaty, which I negotiated and signed with M. de Markoff. 4 
 
 1 Souwaroff had just conquered Piedmont, and, by the orders of his master, had 
 written to the King of Sardinia to invite him to return to his possessions. Austria, which 
 coveted Northern Italy, was stirred by that measure, and the Aulic Council, which 
 had the direction of the military operations, rid themselves of this troublesome ally by 
 sending him to Switzerland. The Russian army suffered cruelly in crossing the Alps, 
 and was destroyed at Zurich. The Emperor Paul and Souwaroff were much irritated 
 against the Austrians, whom they accused of being the cause of this disaster, and the 
 Russian troops were recalled. 
 
 2 The intervention of the Czar Paul in the affairs of the order of Malta is one of 
 the singularities of the history of that time. The relations between the two powers 
 date from 1795. The order possessed great wealth in Poland. This wealth being 
 included in the territories fallen to Russia after the division of 1795, the Grand- Master, 
 Prince de Rohan, endeavoured to negotiate an arrangement with Catherine. The 
 Emperor Paul, having in the meantime ascended the throne, took the affair to heart, 
 entered into relations with Malta, and was inflamed with a lively admiration for the 
 old and glorious traditions of the Knights of St. John. On January 4, 1797, there 
 was signed an instrument by the terms of which the possessions of the order in 
 Poland were transferred to the grand priory of Russia. Seventy-two commanderies 
 were created in one year. The Czar and his son became Knights of Malta. After 
 the taking of the island by the French, the Czar, on the request of the grand priory 
 declared himself protector of the order (September 1798), and two months after, 
 the place of Grand Master having become vacant, a fraction of the order had the 
 idea of offering it to the Czar. Paul solemnly accepted this new dignity. Bonaparte 
 profited skilfully by these circumstances to conciliate Russia, and to detach it from 
 Germany. It was then that he sent to the Czar the sword of La Valette, the Grand 
 Master, found at Malta ; or, according to another authority, the sword of the 
 Grand Master Villiers de i'lle-Adam, that Leo X.had given to that illustrious warrior 
 as a remembrance of his fine defence of Rhodes. When Malta was taken by the 
 English, Paul claimed it in quality of Grand Master (September 1800). But the Eng- 
 lish refused formally to cede this important post, and a rupture ensued. The death 
 of Paul (March 1801) terminated this curious episode. His successor, Alexander, did 
 not claim the island, and the matter ended there. (Consult the Memoirs of Abbe 
 Georgel. ) 
 
 3 Baron Joram von Sprengtporten, a Swedish general, and one of the authors of 
 the Revolution of 1772, passed afterwards into the service of Russia. He became 
 governor of Finland, after the conquest of that country by Russia, and died in oblivion. 
 
 4 October 8, 1801. Arcadi Ivanovitch, Count Markoff, was, under the reign of 
 Catherine, first counsellor of foreign affairs. Having fallen into disgrace under Paul 
 I., he was recalled by Alexander, and appointed ambassador at Paris in 1801. He 
 incurred the enmity of Bonaparte, who demanded and obtained his removal. On
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 211 
 
 M. de Markoff had made his first appearance in public life 
 under the reign of the Empress Catherine, and had been sent 
 later to Paris, as one of the most skilful business men of Russia. 
 He appeared to me a bad-tempered man, without instruction, but 
 witty. His temper bore then upon his own government, which 
 is very convenient for the minister of foreign affairs of another 
 country. While the Emperor Paul lived, business relations were 
 easy and agreeable, but, at the accession of the Emperor 
 Alexander, M. de Markoff became arrogant and insupportable. 
 It was with him that I treated the important matter of the 
 secularizations in Germany. 1 
 
 Carnot, member of the Directory, having escaped from 
 Cayenne, where he had been so cruelly exiled, with so many 
 others, on Fructidor 18, had for some time been holding 
 the post of minister of war. His first care, on taking 
 office, was to assemble two armies, one on the Rhine, the 
 other at the foot of the Alps. General Moreau had the 
 command of the first ; Bonaparte with the second rushes 
 upon Italy by a new route, and, without losing a cannon, 
 crosses Great St. Bernard, May 20, 1800. He falls, without 
 warning, upon the Austrians, and, after several fortunate encoun- 
 ters, he gives battle, June 14, at Marengo ; after a hard contest 
 Fortune, aided by General Desaix, 2 and General Kellerman, 3 
 
 his return to Russia, Markoff was often entrusted with important diplomatic missions. 
 He died at a very advanced age. 
 
 1 It would need a volume, and perhaps I shall make it, to give a full account ot 
 this important question. The Marquis de Lucchesini (*) has tried it, but in his work he 
 has only occupied himself with personal justifications — a strange way of writing the 
 history of one's times, for it rarely modifies the opinions of one's contemporaries. When 
 one is called to settle political questions of great importance, one must leave to 
 those whose private interests have been sacrificed to the general interest the consola- 
 tion of blaming the negotiators and of calumniating them without scruple. Up to this 
 time, that which appears to be most exact on that period is the work of Baron von 
 Gagern (t), a man of sense, attached to the house of Nassau. — {Talleyrand.) 
 
 * The Marquis Jerome de Lucchesini (1752-1825), a Prussian diplomatist, was ambassador at 
 Paris in 1S02. The work mentioned above : Sidle cause e gli effecti della. confederazione rhenana (J) 
 was published anonymously in Italian (Florence, 1829). 
 
 t The Baron Juhan von Gagern (1766-1852) was minister of the Prince of Nassau at Paris, under 
 the Consulate. He has left numerous works on history and political economy. 
 
 \ Causes and Consequences of the Confederation of the Rhine. 
 
 2 Louis- Antoine Desaix, issue of a noble family originally of Ayat, near Riom, and 
 known before the Revolution under the name of Des Aix de Veygous. Born in 1768, 
 Desaix was in 1789, sub-lieutenant in the Brittany regiment. He became Commissary 
 of War in 1791, and general of division in 1794. He was intimately associated with 
 Bonaparte, followed him into Egypt, returned to Europe after the treaty of El Arisch, 
 and was killed at Marengo, June 14, 1800. 
 
 a Francois-Etienne Kellermann (1770- 1835) was the son of the old Marshal 
 
 P 2
 
 212 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 declares for him when even he himself no longer hoped for it. 
 The armistice which followed, made him again master of 
 Italy. Warned by the fears that he had had of a defeat, he 
 knew now better how to profit by his victory without abusing it. 
 He felt the need of strengthening his power before increasing 
 it, and knowing well that military glory would be his principal 
 title to power, he feared those victories for which France would 
 not be indebted to him. almost as much as the reverses he 
 endured himself. So he hastened to set up, by his armistice, the 
 basis of a new peace, in which the empire of Germany should be 
 comprised, which rendered almost useless the victory of Hohen- 
 linden, 1 which had opened the road to Vienna to General Moreau. 
 The treaty between France and Austria stipulating for herself 
 and for the empire, was to be negotiated at Luneville, and 
 Count Louis von Cobenzl 2 had been designated as plenipoten- 
 tiary by the emperor, who had authorized him to go to Paris 
 before the opening of the negotiations. The court of Vienna 
 had chosen him because he had treated at Campo-Formio with 
 Bonaparte, who was then only General of the Army of Italy, 
 and because intimate relations had then sprung up between them 
 which Count von Cobenzl believed it would be easy to renew, 
 but which the First Consul soon caused him to forget. There 
 happened on this occasion a rather curious scene. 
 
 Bonaparte gave Cobenzl a first audience at nine o'clock in the 
 evening, at the Tuileries. He had attended personally to the 
 arrangement of the room in which he wished to receive the 
 Austrian plenipotentiary ; it was in the parlour which precedes 
 the king's study. He had caused to be put in the corner a 
 small, table in front of which he was seated ; all other seats had 
 been removed, there only remained sofas, which, however, were 
 rather far from the table. On this were papers and an inkstand 
 
 Kellerman, Due de Valmy. He was general of brigade at Marengo, where he decided 
 the viciory at the head of his cavalry. He became peer of France during the Hundred 
 Days,* was excluded from the Upper House by Louis XVIII., and did not re-enter it 
 until 1830. 
 
 1 A village of Bavaria thirty kilometres east of Munich. The victory of Moreau 
 over the Archduke Johan was obtained December 3, 1800. 
 
 2 Louis, Count von Cobenzl (1 758- 1808), ambassador from Austria at Copenhagen, 
 
 at Berlin and at St. Petersburg, plenipotentiary at Campo-Formio, at Rastadt and at 
 
 Luneville. Chancellor of State and Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1S02. 
 
 * The period extending from March 20, 18:5 (return from Elba), to June 28, 1815 (abdication of 
 Napoleon at Fontainebleau). — {Translator.)
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 213 
 
 with writing materials ; there was but one lamp ; the chandelier 
 was not lighted. Count von Cobenzl entered : I led the way. 
 The gloom of the room, the distance which separated the visitor 
 from the table at which Bonaparte was sitting and whom the 
 former barely perceived ; the kind of embarrassment resulting from 
 these circumstances ; the attitude of Bonaparte, who rose and 
 seated himself again ; the impossibility in which the Count was 
 not to remain standing, set each at once in the right place, or, 
 at least, in the place the First Consul intended each to occupy. 
 
 After the conferences held at Luneville between Joseph 
 Bonaparte and Count von Cobenzl, they soon signed the treaty, 1 
 and general peace was thus very nearly restored on the 
 Continent. 
 
 A short time before, a convention made with the United 
 States, signed at Mortefontaine also by Joseph Bonaparte, had 
 terminated all the differences which existed between the French 
 Republic and that power. 2 
 
 England, without allies abroad, and experiencing some em- 
 barrassment within, felt herself the need of peace. The pre- 
 liminaries, after some debates rather curious for all the wit 
 displayed for and against a maritime armistice, were concluded 
 at London between Mr. Addington 3 and M. Otto. 4 It was at 
 Amiens, that Lord Cornwallis 5 and Joseph Bonaparte signed 
 the definitive treaty. France, who had lost all her colonies, 
 
 1 February 9, 1801. 
 
 2 American commerce had greatly suffered from the measures taken by the Conven- 
 tion against neutrals. The United States having signed a treaty with England which 
 gave to that power the right of confiscating all ships carrying enemies' goods (Novem- 
 ber 1794), the Convention retaliated by an identical measure, and broke off all 
 relations with the American Cabinet. On its side, Congress annulled all past treaties 
 with France. They were advancing towards an open rupture when Bonaparte, coming 
 into power, abolished the decrees of the Convention. A treaty signed on September 
 30, 1800, smoothed all difficulties, and the relations between the two countries 
 resumed their normal course. 
 
 3 Henry Addington, Viscount Sidmouth, born in 1755- Member of the House of 
 Commons in 1782. Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1801, he contributed actively to 
 the Peace of Amiens. He retired in 1804, but re-entered office again for a short 
 time in 1806. In 18 12, he was appointed Home Minister, a post which he occupied 
 until 1822. He died in 1844. 
 
 4 Guillaume Otto, Comte de Mosloy (1754-1817), was minister at London in 1800. 
 He became minister at Munich, Councillor of State, ambassador at Vienna (1809), 
 Minister of State in 1813. 
 
 5 Charles Cornwallis, statesman and English general, born in 1738, Member of 
 the Chamber of Lords, 1762, Governor of India, 1786, Governor of Ireland, 1793. 
 In 1801 he was one of the plenipotentiaries at Amiens. Again Governor of India in 
 1S05, he died on reaching his post.
 
 214 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 recovered them all, without having to restore anything. Per- 
 haps her dignity may have suffered from her having left all 
 the burden of the compensations to the charge of Spain and 
 Holland, her allies, who had been engaged in the war only for 
 her sake and by her advice. 1 But that is a consideration made 
 by few people, and which never presents itself to the minds 
 of the multitude, accustomed to take the success of bad faith 
 for cleverness. 
 
 I must not omit to state that one of the articles of the treaty 
 of Amiens stipulated the abandonment of Malta by the English. 
 Bonaparte, who, by gaining possession of this island, had changed 
 the fate of the Mediterranean, put great stress upon having it 
 restored to its old masters, and could not bear to hear me say 
 that I would willingly have left Malta to the English, provided 
 the treaty had been signed by Mr. Pitt or by Mr. Fox, instead 
 of by Mr. Addington. 
 
 Previous to those treaties, a kind of compact or agreement 
 had put an end to the civil war which had broken out anew in 
 Vendee and the provinces of the west. 
 
 At the time of the battle of Marengo, a secret bond was 
 formed between Bonaparte and the Papal Court. 3 The victorious 
 general had held, at Milan, several conferences with an envoy 
 from Pius VII., elected at Venice as successor to Pius VI. : these 
 conferences eventually led to the Concordat* subsequently 
 signed at Paris by Cardinal Consalvi. This compact and its 
 immediate ratification reconciled France with the Holy See, 
 without any other opposition than that of a few military men, 
 very brave, be it said, but whose minds were not lofty enough 
 for a conception of that kind. 
 
 It was after this reconciliation with the Church, to which I 
 powerfully contributed, that Bonaparte obtained from the Pope 
 
 1 Spain lost the island of Trinity, and Holland, Ceylon. 
 
 2 A suspension of arms had been signed in December 1799. On January 18, 
 1S00, M. d'Autichamp surrendered in the name of the provinces of the left bank of 
 the Loire. On the 20th, M. de Chatillon did the same in the name of the right 
 Wank. In Brittany, M. de Bourmont gave himself up on January 24, and Georges 
 Cadoudal on the 27th, so that the whole country was soon pacified. 
 
 3 As early as June 1800, Bonaparte had opened negotiations with the court of 
 Rome, through the medium of Cardinal Martiniane, Bishop of Verceil. 
 
 4 The Concordat was signed on July 15, 1801. Cardinal Consalvi was the Secretary 
 if State to the Court of Rome.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 215 
 
 a brief for my secularization. The brief is dated from Saint 
 Peter's of Rome, June 29, 1802. 1 
 
 It seems to me that nothing expresses better the indulgence 
 of Pius VII. towards myself, than what he said one day to 
 Cardinal Consalvi, in speaking of me : " M. de Talleyrand ! ah ! 
 ah ! may God have his soul ; as for me, I am very fond of him ! " 
 
 Switzerland, whom the Directory, at the instigation of 
 MM. La Harpe 2 and Ochs 3 wished to transform into a republic 
 one and indivisible, had become again, as she desired, a con- 
 federation with the ancient leagues ; and this, by virtue of an 
 act called the act of mediation, because France had served as 
 mediator between all the old and new cantons. 4 
 
 1 ACTE DU GOUVERNEMENT. 
 
 ARR£TE DU 2 FRUCTIDOR, AN X. 
 
 Les Consuls de la republique ; vu le bref du Pape Pie VII. donne a. Saint-Pierre 
 de Rome le 29 Juin, 1802 ; 
 
 Sur le rapport du Conseiller d'Etat charge de toutes les affaires concernant les 
 cultes ; 
 
 Le Conseil d'Etat entendu ; 
 
 Arretent : Le bref du Pape Pie VII. donne a Saint-Pierre de Rome, le 29 Juin 
 1S02, par lequel le citoyen Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, ministre des relations 
 exterieures de France, est rendu a la vie seculiere et la'ique, aura son plein et entier 
 effet. 
 
 Le premier consul : BONAPARTE. 
 Le secretaire d'Etat : H. B. MARET.* 
 
 2 Frederic-Cesar de la Harpe (1754-1838), born in the Canton of Vaud, had taken 
 an active part in the troubles which broke out in that country. Proscribed after the 
 victory of the Canton of Bern, and obliged to take refuge in France, he brought 
 about the intervention of the Directory ; he was named director at the time of the 
 proclamation of the Helvetian Republic (1798). 
 
 3 Pierre Ochs (1749- 1824) was also a Swiss refugee compromised after the rising 
 of the Canton of Vaud. He was a member of the Helvetian senate and director in 
 1798. 
 
 4 The intervention of the Directory in Switzerland had only increased the disorder ; 
 so, when in 1802, Bonaparte proposed his mediation, it was immediately accepted. 
 All the cantons sent deputies to Paris who entered into conference with MM. 
 Barthelemy, Fouche, and Roederer. The Act of Mediation was signed February 19, 
 1803. It fixed for each canton a special constitution, and organized a federal power. 
 On October 19, following, a treaty of alliance was made between France and 
 Switzerland. 
 
 * ACT OF THE GOVERNMENT. 
 
 ORDER OF FRUCTIDOR 2, YEAR X. 
 
 The Consuls of the Republic ; according to the brief of Pope Pius VII. given at Saint-Peter of 
 Rome, on June 29, 1802 ; 
 
 In accordance with the report of the Councillor of State entrusted with all matters relative to public 
 worship ; 
 
 After taking the advice of the Council of State ; 
 
 Order : The brief of Pope Pius VII., given at Saint-Peter of Rome on June 29, 1802, according to 
 which citizen Charles Maurice de Talleyrand, Minister of Foreign Affairs of France, is authorized to 
 resume secular and lay life, shall take full and entire effect. 
 
 The First Consul: BONAPARTE. 
 The Secretary of State : H. B. MARET.
 
 216 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Spain, in accordance with the clauses of the treaty of Basel, 
 had restored Louisiana to France who, in consideration of the 
 payment of a certain sum, ceded it to the United States 
 (April 30, 1803). The latter kept a portion of the price as 
 indemnity for the losses sustained by American citizens in con- 
 sequence of the absurd decrees of the Convention. 
 
 The Ottoman Porte, Portugal, the Two Sicilies, had re- 
 newed their old ties of friendship and of commerce with 
 France. 1 
 
 The distribution of the secularized territories in Germany 
 was being made under the double mediation of France and of 
 Russia. 2 
 
 It can be said without the least exaggeration, that at the time 
 of the Peace of Amiens, France was without in possession of a 
 power, a glory, an influence, than which the minds of the most 
 ambitious could have desired no greater for their country ; and 
 what rendered this situation more marvellous still was the 
 rapidity with which it had been created. In less than two 
 years and a half, that is to say from the iSth Brumaire (Novem- 
 ber 9, 1799), to March 25, 1802, date of the Peace of Amiens, 
 France had passed from the humiliating depths into which the 
 Directory had plunged it, to the first rank of Europe. 
 
 But while occupying himself with foreign affairs, Bonaparte 
 had not neglected those at home. His incredible activity sufficed 
 for all. He had given new regulations for the administration, 
 
 1 Treaty with Turkey, June 25, 1802. With Portugal, September 20, 1801. 
 With the Two Sicilies, March 28, 1801. These last two powers promised to close 
 their ports to the English. 
 
 2 Before the wars of the Revolution, the left bank of the Rhine was covered with 
 secular and ecclesiastic principalities. The treaties of Campo-Formio and Luneville 
 in ceding to France all those territories had stipulated that the lay princes should be 
 indemnified with the wealth of the secular clergy. It remained now to apply the 
 principle. The emperor, who would have had to take this affair in hand, allowed 
 himself to be forestalled by the First Consul, who, being solicited by several of the 
 interested princes, was careful not to fail to profit by the occasion. He assured him- 
 self of the concurrence of Prussia, by promising that country considerable advantages 
 (secret treaty, May 23, 1802). The Emperor Alexander, whom family alliances had 
 united to the Houses of Bavaria, Baden, and Wurtemberg, entered into his views, and 
 declared himself the protector of the dispossessed princes (Convention of October 11, 
 1802). Immediately secret treaties were negotiated between France on the one side, 
 and Wurtemberg, Baden, Bavaria, Hesse-Cassel on the other, which assured their 
 share to each of these States. Those treaties were submitted to the Diet, which 
 adopted the whole of the plan of indemnities (decision of February 25, 1803) and 
 the emperor, after much hesitation, ratified that decision on the 27th of the following 
 April. (See Lefebvre, History of the Cabinets of Europe, vol. L ch. vi.)
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 217 
 
 which he had made as much as possible monarchical. He had 
 skilfully re-established order in the finances. The ministers of 
 religion were honoured. Not satisfied with crushing the various 
 political parties, he had sought to attach them to himself, and he 
 had succeeded to a certain extent. To have been an emigre, or 
 a Jacobin, was no longer considered a reason for exclusion. In 
 order to further isolate Louis XVIII. and to take away from him 
 the kingly air that a large emigration had given him, Napoleon 
 permitted many e'migres to re-enter France. He bestowed 
 appointments on many of them, and attached some to his own 
 person. The Jacobins forgot their aversion for personal rule, and 
 the emigres were led to regret less that authority had passed into 
 other hands. 1 
 
 In spite of the prolonged troubles of the Revolution, indus- 
 trial arts had reached a very prosperous state in France. Much 
 capital had been attracted by them. To attain high internal 
 prosperity, all that was now necessary was security, and the 
 general opinion of France was that Bonaparte had given it. 
 
 Thus those who had helped in raising him to power, had 
 reason to congratulate themselves. He had used his authority in 
 a manner to render it useful, even to make himself loved. One 
 could believe that he had put an end to the Revolution. In 
 restoring power, he had become the auxiliary of all the thrones. 
 The salutary influence it had acquired, gave the Consulate, in 
 the eyes of Europe, the stability of an old government. Con- 
 spiracies, from one of which Bonaparte had miraculously escaped, 
 had strengthened the sentiment felt towards him by the friends 
 of order. Thus, when his two colleagues proposed the primary 
 assemblies of France to name him First Consul for life, this 
 proposition received an almost unanimous vote. 2 
 
 The deputies of the Cisalpine Republic repaired to Lyons, in 
 
 1 I remember, that one' day, as I seemed astonished at seeing some of the most 
 shameless Jacobins of the Revolution leave the study of the First Consul, he said 
 to me : " You do not know the Jacobins. There are two classes of them : the sweet 
 and the salt* The one you just saw come out was a salt Jacobin ; with these, I do 
 what I wish : no one better fit to defend all the daring acts of a new power. Some- 
 times it is necessary to stop them, but with a little money it is soon done. But the 
 sweet Jacobins ! ah ! they are ungovernable. With their metaphysics they would 
 ruin any government." — {Talleyrand.) 
 
 2 August 2, 1802. 
 
 * Lcs Sucre's et lcs sales, that is, the mild and the violent.
 
 2i8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 order to obtain from the First Consul a definitive organization 
 for their country. 1 Although the business which was to be 
 negotiated at Lyons was foreign to my duties, Bonaparte made 
 use of me considerably to conduct it. I was obliged to proceed 
 to that city in order to see the members of the deputation. In 
 such delicate matters he did not much rely on what was done or 
 said by M. Chaptal, 2 his Minister of the Interior, whom he deemed 
 heavy, vain, without tact, and whom he abstained from dismissing 
 in order not to grieve Cambaceres 3 who protected him. On 
 arriving at Lyons, I saw M. de Melzi, 4 with whom I had been 
 acquainted a long time, and I unbosomed myself to him, not as to 
 what the First Consul desired, but as to what should be the de- 
 mands of the Cisalpine Republic. In a few days, I achieved my pur- 
 pose. At the moment Bonaparte entered Lyons all was prepared. 
 From the second day, the principal Milanese pressed him to 
 accept the presidency for life, and from gratitude, he consented 
 to substitute for the name of Cisalpine Republic that of Kingdom 
 of Italy? and to name vice-president M. de Melzi, who, having 
 
 1 The Cisalpine Republic, proclaimed in 1791, destroyed in 1799, re-established 
 after Marengo, had not seen its government reorganized in 1800. Bonaparte, in 
 conjunction with the leading men of the country, gave it a definite organization. 
 There were three electoral colleges, named for life : that of the great landlords, that 
 of the merchants, that of the men of letters and ecclesiastics — in all, 700 electors. These 
 elected a Commission de Censure, charged to name to all the bodies of the State, 
 namely, a Senate of eight members, a Council of State, and a Legislative Body, which 
 had the same privileges as in France. At the head of the republic were a president 
 and a vice-president. In January, 1802, Bonaparte summoned at Lyons a large 
 meeting of nearly 500 members to approve the constitution. The presidency of that 
 meeting was awarded to him. 
 
 2 Antoine Chaptal, born in 1756, was already an illustrious savant when he 
 entered upon a public career. He became Councillor of State and Minister of the 
 Interior after the 18th Brumaire, then senator and Comte de Chanteloup, in 1804 ; 
 minister and peer of France during the Hundred Days. Louis XVIII. recalled him 
 to the Chamber of Peers in 1819. He died in 1832. 
 
 3 Jean Jacques-Regis de Cambaceres, born at Montpellier in 1753 of an °^ family 
 of magistrates. Counsellor at the Court of Accounts of Montpellier. Deputy from 
 Herault to the Convention, he voted the death of the king, with this restriction, that 
 the decree was only to be put into execution if France should be invaded by the 
 enemy. He was president of the Convention after the 9th Thermidor, then member 
 and president of the Council of Five Hundred ; Minister of Justice in 1798. He was 
 elected Second Consul after the 18th Brumaire. In 1804, Cambaceres became prince 
 arch-chancellor of the Empire and Due de Parma. Exiled in 1815, he died in 1824. 
 
 4 Francois Melzi d'Eril (1753-1S16) had been, from its foundation, one of the most 
 ardent defenders of the Cisalpine Republic. He became afterwards Due de Lodi, 
 Crand-Chancellor and Keeper of the Seals of the Viceroy Eugene. 
 
 5 There is here an error in the text. The kingdom of Italy dates only from 1805 
 (the consecration at Milan was on May 26). M. de Talleyrand has evidently meant 
 to say that in 1802, the official denomination of Italian Republic was substituted for 
 that of Cisalpine Republic.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 219 
 
 presented to him the keys of Milan on his first invasion, was 
 sufficiently compromised towards Austria for Bonaparte to place 
 in him every confidence. 
 
 Until the time of the Peace of Amiens, Bonaparte may have 
 committed many faults, for what man is free from them ? But 
 none of the plans he had conceived were such that any true and 
 patriotic Frenchman could have felt any reluctance to contribute 
 to their execution. One may not always have agreed as to the 
 excellence of the means resorted to by Bonaparte, but the utility 
 of the aim could not be contested, being simply, on the one hand 
 to bring foreign wars to an end, and, on the other hand, to close 
 the revolutionary era by re-establishing monarchy, which, in my 
 candid opinion, it was then impossible to do in favour of the 
 legitimate heirs of the last king. 
 
 The Peace of Amiens was scarcely concluded, when Bonaparte 
 began to give up moderation ; the provisions of that peace had 
 not yet been carried out, when he already sowed the seeds of 
 new wars which, after overwhelming Europe and France, were to 
 lead him to his ruin. 
 
 Piedmont ought to have been given back to the King of 
 Sardinia immediately after the Peace of Luneville ; it was 
 merely in trust in the hands of France. To give it up would 
 have been both an act of strict justice and a very wise policy. 
 Bonaparte, on the contrary, annexed it to France. I made vain 
 efforts to dissuade him from such a measure. He believed his 
 personal interest required him to do so, his pride seemed to him 
 to claim that arbitrary step, and all the counsels of prudence 
 failed to alter his mind in that respect. 1 
 
 Although he had by his victories contributed to the aggran- 
 dizement of France, none of the territories with which it had 
 been aggrandized had been conquered by the armies which he 
 had commanded. It was under the Convention that the county 
 
 1 On December 9, 1798, King Charles-Emmanuel, being vanquished and dispos- 
 sessed, had renounced the throne for himself and heirs, and given his subjects orders 
 to obey in future the French authorities. Thereupon, Piedmont was subjected to 
 the direct rule of French generals. In 1800, before Marengo and Hohenlinden, 
 Bonaparte, in his preliminaries of peace, offered to return Piedmont to the King of 
 Sardinia. His subsequent victories made him more exacting, and on the occasion 
 of the treaty of Luneville, he refused to bind himself at all in that respect. On 
 April 19, 1801, Piedmont was divided into six departments and became a military 
 division ; on September 4, 1802, it was annexed to France.
 
 220 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 of Avignon, Savoy, Belgium, the left bank of the Rhine had 
 been added to France ; and Bonaparte could not claim any of 
 those conquests as coming from him personally. To rule, and 
 to rule hereditarily, as he aspired to do over a country aggran- 
 dized by generals formerly his equals, and whom he wished to 
 become his subjects, seemed to him almost humiliating, and 
 moreover, might arouse an opposition which he was anxious to 
 avoid. It was thus that, in order to justify his pretensions to 
 the title of sovereign, he deemed it necessary to annex to France 
 countries which he alone had conquered. He had crushed 
 Piedmont in 1796; and his victories in that quarter seemed to 
 him to justify the arbitrary views he entertained towards that 
 country. He accordingly caused the senate to assent to and 
 proclaim the annexation of Piedmont to France, never think- 
 ing that any one might call him to account for so monstrous a 
 violation of what the law of nations consider as most sacred. 
 His illusion was not destined to last long. 
 
 The English government had made peace only out of 
 necessity ; as soon as the home difficulties which had caused the 
 making of peace almost unavoidable, were overcome, the English 
 cabinet who had not yet restored Malta, and wished to keep it, 
 seized the occasion offered by the annexation of Piedmont to 
 France, and took up arms again. 1 
 
 But events quickened Bonaparte's resolution to transform 
 the consulate for life into an hereditary monarchy. The English 
 had landed on the coasts of Brittany a few devoted and most 
 enterprising emigres. Bonaparte took advantage of this new 
 royalist plot, in which he flattered himself to implicate, at the 
 same time, Dumouriez, 2 Pichegru and Moreau, his three rivals in 
 glory, to wrench from the senate the title of Emperor. But 
 
 1 May 16, 1803. 
 
 2 Charles-Francois Duperrier-Dumouriez, born at Cambrai in 1739, entered the 
 army at sixteen. In 1763, he changed the swoid for diplomacy, and became one 
 of the most active secret agents of the king. Under Louis XVI., he was appointed 
 Governor of Cherbourg, and brigadier-general. In 1792, he joined the Girondist 
 Cabinet as Minister of Foreign Affairs (March 15), and three months later, was 
 appointed general-inchief of the army of the north. Victorious at Valmy and at 
 Jemmapes, but defeated at Nerwinden, and on the point of being tried, he entered 
 into negotiations with Prince von Coburg, delivered into the hands of the Austrians 
 the Commissioners sent by the Convention to arrest him, and himself went over to 
 the enemy. He lived abroad until his death (1823), often engaged in ro)alist 
 intrigues and plots.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 221 
 
 that title, which, with moderation and wisdom, he would just as 
 well have obtained, though perhaps not quite so soon, became 
 the meed of violence and crime. He ascended the throne, but a 
 throne besmeared with innocent blood — blood which former and 
 glorious recollections made dear to France. 
 
 The violent and unexplained death of Pichegru, the means 
 used to obtain the conviction of Moreau, might be put to the 
 account of policy ; but the assassination of the Due d'Enghien, 1 
 committed solely in order, by placing himself in their ranks, to 
 make sure of those whom the death of Louis XVI. caused to 
 fear all manner of power not coming from them, this assassina- 
 tion, I say, could be neither excused nor forgiven, nor has it ever 
 been so ; Bonaparte has therefore been reduced to boast of it. 2 
 
 The new war in which Bonaparte found himself engaged with 
 England necessitating the employment of all his resources, it 
 only needed the most common prudence to abstain from under- 
 taking anything that might induce the powers on the Continent 
 to make common cause with his enemy. But vanity still 
 prevailed in him. It was not sufficient for him to have himself 
 proclaimed under the name of Napoleon, Emperor of the French ; 
 it was not sufficient for him to have been consecrated by the 
 Sovereign Pontiff; he wished besides to be King of Italy, in 
 order to be emperor and king as well as the head of the House 
 of Austria. Consequently he had himself crowned at Milan, and 
 instead of taking simply the title of King of Lombardy, he 
 chose the more ambitious, and, therefore, more alarming title 
 of King of Italy, as if his design were to submit Italy entirely 
 to his sceptre ; and that there might be less doubt as to his 
 intentions, Genoa and Lucca, 3 where his agents had skilfully 
 aroused fear, sent him deputations by the agency of whom the 
 one gave herself to him, the other asked as a sovereign a member 
 of his family ; and both under different names, since then, form 
 
 1 March 21, 1804. 
 
 2 Prince Talleyrand has devoted to the affair of the Due d'Enghien a special 
 chapter, which will be published in one of the subsequent volumes of these 
 Memoirs. 
 
 3 After the conventions of October 10, 1796, and June 6, 1797, the Republic of 
 Genoa, transformed into Ligurian Republic, was the ally of France. It was on 
 June 3, 1805, that the senate and the doge solicited the annexing of their city to 
 France, which was immediately enforced. As to Lucca, it was assigned to Elisa 
 Bonaparte, Princess of Piombino (June 24, 1805).
 
 222 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 a part of that which for the first time began to be called the 
 great empire. 
 
 The consequences of that conduct were such as could be 
 naturally foreseen. Austria took up arms, and a continental war 
 became imminent. Then Napoleon tried negotiations on all 
 sides. He attempted to draw Prussia into his alliance, 1 by offering 
 her Hanover, and when on the point of succeeding, he caused 
 everything to fail by sending to Berlin General Duroc, 2 who by 
 his awkward bluntness, destroyed the good effect of the advances 
 previously made according to my instructions by M. de la Forest, 3 
 who was there as Minister of France. 
 
 The emperor was more fortunate with the Electors of Bavaria, 
 Wurtemberg and Baden, whom he maintained this time in 
 his alliance. 
 
 The camp of Boulogne, which he formed at this period for 
 the purpose of menacing the coasts of England, had for first 
 result to make the war popular in that country, and of creating 
 there an as yet unheard-of thing, a numerous permanent army. 
 And it was while Napoleon seemed absorbed by the organization 
 of that camp, that the Austrians crossed the Inn, traversed 
 Bavaria, occupied the centre of Suabia, and were already arriving 
 on the banks of the Rhine. It was nevertheless this precipita- 
 tion of the Austrians which preserved Napoleon from the more 
 than critical position in which he would have been placed, if 
 they had awaited the arrival of the Emperor Alexander and 
 his hundred thousand Russians, who were on the march to 
 join themselves to them, for Prussia would have been infallibly 
 drawn into the coalition, but the Austrians wished to show that, 
 alone, they were able to engage the struggle and win the day. 
 
 Napoleon, with the military genius and the celerity which 
 make his glory, at once availed himself of this blunder. In a 
 
 1 From 1803 to 1805, Napoleon on the one side, and Austria and Russia on the 
 other, disputed for the alliance of Prussia. King Frederick William dared not take 
 any decision. However, in 1805, he signed with France a simple compact of 
 neutrality. 
 
 2 Duroc was from 1796 the favourite aide-de-camp of Napoleon. Born in 1772, 
 he became under the Empire general of division, Grand-Marshal of the Palace, and 
 Due de Frioul. He was killed at Wurtschen, May 22, 1813. 
 
 3 Antoine, Comte de la Forest (1756-1847), minister at Munich, 1801 ; at the 
 Diet at Ratisbon, 1802 ; at Berlin, 1803 ; ambassador at Madrid in 1807. Minister 
 and peer of France under the Restoration.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 223 
 
 few weeks, one might say in a few days, he transported the 
 large army of the camp of Boulogne to the banks of the Rhine, 
 whence he led it to new victories. 
 
 I received instructions to accompany him to Strasburg, there 
 to be ready to follow his headquarters according to circum- 
 stances (September, 1805). A fit which happened to the 
 emperor at the beginning of this campaign frightened me very 
 much. The very day of his departure from Strasburg, I had 
 dinner with him ; on leaving the table, he went to see the 
 Empress Josephine. He had only been with her a few minutes, 
 when suddenly he came out of her apartment ; I was in the 
 drawing-room, he took me by the arm and led me into his room. 
 M. de Remusat, 1 the first chamberlain, who came for instructions, 
 entered at the same time. We were hardly there, when the 
 emperor fell on the floor ; he had barely time to tell me 
 to close the door. I tore away his cravat, because it seemed 
 to choke him ; he did not vomit, he groaned and foamed at the 
 mouth. M. de Remusat gave him some water, and I bathed 
 him with Cologne water. He had a kind of convulsions that 
 ceased after a quarter of an hour ; we placed him on an arm-chair ; 
 he commenced to speak, dressed himself again, and enjoined 
 secrecy on us ; half an hour later, he was on his way to Carlsruhe. 
 On reaching Stuttgart, he wrote me to give me news of his health ; 
 his letter ended with these words, " I am well. The Duke of 
 Wiirtemberg came to meet me as far as outside the first gate of 
 his palace ; he is a man of sense." A second letter from Stutt- 
 gart, bearing the same date, ran as follows : " I am acquainted 
 with Mack's movements ; these are all I could desire. He 
 will be caught in Ulm, like a fool ! 2 " 
 
 Some people have since endeavoured to spread the rumour 
 
 1 Auguste, Comte de Remusat, born in 1762, was in 1789, an advocate to the 
 Cour des Comptes at Aix. He stayed in France during the whole of the Revolution. 
 In 1802, he became prefect of the palace ; chief chamberlain in 1804, and superin- 
 tendent of theatres. In 181 5, he was appointed prefect of the Nord, and subse- 
 quently of the Haute-Garonne department. He was dismissed in 1821, and died 
 in 1823. 
 
 2 Charles, Baron von Mack von Lieberich, born in 1752. He was several times 
 in command of Austrian armies, but was always beaten. He signed the capitulation 
 of Ulm on October 19. Having been, shortly after, tried by court-martial, he was 
 sentenced to death, but the Emperor Francis commuted the sentence into an imprison- 
 ment which only lasted a few years. He died in oblivion in 1828.
 
 224 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 that Mack had been bribed ; this is false ; it was only their pre- 
 sumption that caused the defeat of the Austrians. It is known 
 how their army, partially beaten on several points and driven 
 back into Ulm, was obliged to capitulate ; it remained there 
 prisoner of war, after having passed under the yoke. 
 
 In announcing to me his victory, Napoleon wrote me what 
 were, in his idea, the conditions he wished to impose upon 
 Austria, and what territories he wished to take from her. 
 I replied to him that his real interest was not to enfeeble 
 Austria, that in taking from her on one side, he must return 
 to her on the other, in order to make of her an ally. The 
 memorandum in which I set forth my reasons, struck him so that 
 he placed the matter for deliberation before the council he held 
 at Munich whither I had gone to meet him, and induced him 
 to follow the plan I had proposed to him, and which can still 
 be found in the archives of the government. 1 But new advan- 
 tages brought about by one of the divisions of his advance 
 guard, firing his imagination, made him desire to march upon 
 Vienna, to hasten to new successes, and to date decrees from 
 the Imperial Palace of Schoenbrunn. 
 
 Master in less than three weeks of all Upper Austria and 
 of all that part of the Lower which is at the south of the Danube, 
 he crosses this river and enters in Moravia. If then sixty 
 thousand Prussians had invaded Bohemia, and sixty thousand 
 others come by Franconia had occupied the road to Lintz, it 
 is doubtful if he could have succeeded in escaping with his 
 person. If the Austro-Russian army that he had in front of him, 
 and which was about one hundred and twenty thousand men 
 strong, had only avoided all general action and given to the 
 Archduke Charles time to arrive with the seventy-five thousand 
 
 1 This memorandum has recently been published in the Lettres inedites de TalUy- 
 rand a Napotion, par tierre Bertrand (Pans, 1889, I vol. 8vo. pp. 156). Foreseeing 
 that the design of the emperor was already to crush Austria in order to make sooner 
 or later his junction with Russia, Talleyrand seeks to turn him aside from his purpose, 
 and warmly recommends the Austrian alliance. He wishes to make Austria the bulwark 
 of Europe against Russia, and for this end to put her in contact with this empire by 
 ceding to her Moldavia, Walachia, Bessarabia, and a part of Bulgaria. In exchange, 
 they could then take away all her possessions in Italy and Suabia. This system 
 would have besides another advantage ; it would remove all contact between the 
 empire of Napoleon and that of the Hapsburgs, and suppress thereby all pretext for 
 war. Hence the Franco- Austrian alliance being made solid and durable, would be 
 the safeguard of all western Europe.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 225 
 
 men who were under his orders, instead of dictating laws, 
 Napoleon would have been under the necessity of submitting 
 to them. But, far from coming with her army, Prussia sent a 
 negotiator, who, out of folly or crime, did nothing of what 
 he was charged to do, and dug the precipice where his country 
 itself was shortly to be engulfed. 1 
 
 The Emperor Alexander, who was wearily waiting at Olmiitz, 
 and who had not yet seen any battle, desired to have the 
 amusement of it ; and, in spite of the representations of the 
 Austrians, in spite of the advice the King of Prussia had sent 
 him to abstain, he fought the battle known under the name 
 of Battle of Austerlitz, and lost it completely, deeming himself 
 fortunate to be permitted to withdraw by daily stages, as the 
 armistice, subsequently signed, imposed on him the humiliating 
 obligation of doing. 
 
 Never has a military feat been more glorious. I still see 
 Napoleon re-entering Austerlitz on the evening of the battle. 
 He lodged at a house belonging to Prince von Kaunitz ; and 
 there, in his chamber, yes, in the very chamber of Prince von 
 Kaunitz, were brought at every moment Austrian flags, Russian 
 flags, messages from the archdukes, and from the Emperor of 
 Austria, and prisoners bearing the names of all the great houses 
 of the Austrian monarchy. 
 
 As all these trophies came in, I remember that a messenger 
 entered the yard bringing letters from Paris, together with the 
 mysterious portfolio in which M. de La Valette 2 inclosed the 
 secret or private letters which were of any importance, and the 
 reports of all the French police. In war, the arrival of letters is a 
 most pleasant event. Napoleon, by having the letters imme- 
 diately distributed, relaxed and recompensed his army. 
 
 1 The King of Prussia had ended by yielding to the entreaties of the Emperor of 
 Russia, and had signed with him a convention (November 3, 1805), according to which 
 he bound himself to propose his armed mediation, and if it were not accepted by 
 Napoleon on December 15, to declare war against him. Count von Haugwitz, who 
 was entrusted with the negotiation, was only received by Napoleon on December 13, 
 at Schoenbrunn, and there, frightened by the menaces of the emperor, instead of acting 
 according to his instructions, he allowed to be imposed upon him a treaty of alliance, 
 of which Hanover was the price (December 15). 
 
 2 Marie Chamans, Comte de la Valette (1 769-1830), was then director-general of 
 the post-offices of France. He had, at first ; entered the army, and had become a captain 
 and confidential aide-de-camp of Napoleon. Sentenced to death in 1815, he was 
 
 VOL. I. O
 
 226 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 1 must not omit to mention here a peculiar incident which 
 fully depicts the character of Napoleon and his opinions. The 
 emperor, who at this time had great confidence in me, asked 
 me to read to him his correspondence. We began with the 
 deciphered letters of the foreign ambassadors in Paris ; they 
 interested him but little, because all the great news of the world 
 took place about him. We then went on to the police reports ; 
 several spoke of the difficulties of the Bank of France, brought 
 on by some bad measures of the Minister of Finances, M. de 
 Marbois. 1 However, the report to which he paid most attention 
 was that of Madame de Genlis ; it was long and written entirely 
 in her own hand. She spoke of the spirit of Paris, and quoted 
 a few offensive conversations held, she said, in those houses 
 which were then called the Faubourg Saint-Germain ; she 
 named five or six families, which, never, she added, would rally 
 to the government of the emperor. Some rather biting ex- 
 pressions which Madame de Genlis reported set Napoleon in 
 an inconceivable state of fury ; he swore and stormed against the 
 Faubourg Saint-Germain. " Ah ! they think themselves stronger 
 than I," said he. " Gentlemen of the Faubourg Saint-Germain, 
 we shall see, we shall see." And that we shall see ! came when ? 
 .... But a few hours after a decisive victory obtained over the 
 Russians and the Austrians. So much strength and power did 
 he recognize in public opinion, and especially in that of a few 
 nobles, whose only action was limited to keeping aloof from 
 him. So, on returning to Paris later on, he regarded as a great 
 achievement the fact that Mesdames de Montmorency, 2 de 
 
 saved, thanks to the devotion of his wife, Mademoiselle Emilie de Beauharnais, niece 
 of the Empress Josephine. 
 
 1 Francois, Comte, afterwards Marquis, de Barbe-Marbois (1745-1837), former 
 deputy to the Conseil des Anciens, Director, Minister of the Public Treasury in 1802; 
 he was later (from 1808 to 1837) first president of the Cour des Cotnptes. In con- 
 nection with a financial crisis for which he was held responsible, he was dismissed 
 from the cabinet in 1806. He had consented that certain State-contractors, forming 
 a company known under the name of Negotiants reunis, should be paid in such a way 
 as to exclude almost entirely the control of the Treasury. That company had betrayed 
 the confidence of the minister, and compromised the finances of the State in risky 
 speculations, the result of which was that in October, 1805, the Bank of France only 
 possessed ,£60,000 in cash, whereas the amount of payments it had to make was 
 £"3,680,000. The panic that ensued much disturbed the market for several months. 
 On his return to Paris, the emperor appointed M. Mollien to M. de Barbe-Marbois' 
 post. (See Thiers's Le Consulat et V Empire [vol. vi. p. 3oandfol., 187 and fob, 
 375I, and M. Mollien's Memoirs.) 
 
 2 Valentine de Harchies, married to Anne, Comte de Montmorency (1787- 1858).
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 227 
 
 Mortemart, 1 and de Chevreuse, 2 accepted the post of ladies in 
 waiting to the empress, thus ennobling Madame de Bassano 3 
 who had been appointed with them. 
 
 At the end of twenty-four hours, I left Austerlitz. I had 
 spent two hours on this terrible battle-field ; Marshal Lannes 
 had taken me there, and I owe it to his honour, and per- 
 haps to military honour in general, to say that this same man 
 who, on the evening before, had performed such prodigious 
 feats of valour, who had displayed unprecedented courage as 
 long as he had enemies to fight, was about to faint when his 
 eyes gazed on the dead and maimed soldiers of all nations ; he 
 was so moved that, when showing me the different points where 
 the principal attacks had been made, he said to me : " I cannot 
 stay longer, unless you wish to come with me to knock down 
 these villanous Jews who are robbing the dead and the dying." 
 
 The negotiations, of which, before this great battle, there had 
 only been a pretence, then became serious. They commenced 
 at Brunn in Moravia, and ended at Presburg, 4 where General 
 Giulay 5 and the loyal Prince Johan von Lichtenstein G had 
 repaired with me. 
 
 While I was in the first of these cities, the Emperor Napo- 
 leon dictated to Duroc, and Count von Haugwitz, Minister of 
 Prussia, signed, a treaty (Dec. 15, 1805), in which were men- 
 tioned the cessions exacted from Austria, and by which Prussia 
 
 1 Eleonore de Montmorency, born in 1777, married to Victor de Rochechouart, 
 Marquis de Mortemart. She was lady in waiting to the empress in 1806. 
 
 2 Francoise de Narbonne-Pelet, married in 1802 to Charles- Andre d'Albert, Due 
 de Luynes and de Chevreuse. She was lady of the household of the empress in 
 1807, and died in 1813. 
 
 3 Madame Maret, the wife of the emperor's minister. 
 
 4 December 26, 1805. Austria lost all her Italian possessions, which were united 
 with the new kingdom of Italy. The Tyrol and Vorarlberg, the principality of 
 Eichstedt, the city of Augsbourg, and several other manors were assigned to Bavaria. 
 The Count de Hohenberg, the Landgrave of Nellenburg, a part of Brisgau, and 
 seven other important cities were given to Wurtemberg. The Elector of Baden 
 received Orteuau, the rest of Brisgau, and Constance. Finally, the title of King was 
 acknowledged for the Electors of Bavaria and of Wurtemberg, and that of Grand 
 Duke for the Elector of Baden. 
 
 5 Count Ignatius Giulay (1763-1831) became general in 1800. He took part in all 
 the wars of his time, became field-marshal in 1813, chief commander of Bohemia in 
 1823, and president of the Aulic Council, 1830. 
 
 6 Johan von Lichtenstein, Prince Sovereign of Germany, born in Vienna in 1766 : 
 general in the Austrian army in 1794. In 1 814, he retired to his principality, over 
 which he reigned until his death. (Principality of Lichtenstein, between the Tyrol 
 and Switzerland ; 8,000 inhabitants ; chief town, Vaduz. ) 
 
 Q 2
 
 228 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 herself ceded Anspach and Neufchatel, in exchange for Hanover 
 which she received. Napoleon had successes of all kinds ; and he 
 abused them beyond measure, above all by dating from Vienna, 
 a short time after, the insolent decree in which he declared that 
 Ferdinand IV., King of the Two Sicilies, had ceased to reign, and 
 gave to Joseph Bonaparte, his eldest brother, the kingdom of 
 Naples, which he conquered easily, and that of Sicily, over 
 which his imagination only has ever reigned. 
 
 The system that Napoleon then adopted, the secret of which 
 I have mentioned, was the first act that must be reckoned among 
 the causes of his fall. I will make known later, with special 
 reference to each of the new kings he made, all that there was 
 impolitic and destructive in this method of overthrowing govern- 
 ments in order to create others which he was not slow to pull 
 down again, and that in all parts of Europe. 
 
 Austria, in the state of distress to which she now was reduced, 
 could not do otherwise than accept the conditions imposed by 
 her victor. Those conditions were harsh indeed, and the treaty 
 made with Count von Haugwitz made it impossible for me to 
 mitigate them in any other clauses than those relative to the 
 indemnity to be paid to France. I, at least, managed that the 
 conditions imposed on Austria should not be rendered worse by 
 any fallacious interpretation. Being master of the wording, on 
 which Napoleon's influence was minimised by the distance I was 
 from him, I applied myself to make it free from any ambiguity ; 
 so that, although he had obtained everything that it was possible 
 for him to obtain, the treaty did not please him. He wrote to 
 me some time after : " You have made 'me, at Presburg, a treaty 
 that annoys me a great deal ; " which did not, however, prevent 
 him giving me, a short time after, a marked proof of satisfaction 
 by creating me Prince of Benevento, the territory of which was 
 occupied by his troops. I say with pleasure that, thereby, this 
 duchy, which remained my property until the Restoration, was 
 saved all sorts of vexations, and even conscription. 
 
 Count von Haugwitz surely deserved to pay with his head for 
 the treaty he had dared to make without authority and against 
 what he knew perfectly well to be the wish of his sovereign ; 
 but to punish him would have been to attack Napoleon himself.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 229 
 
 The King of Prussia dared not disclaim it ; he had even the 
 weakness to resist the noble solicitations of the queen ; and yet, 
 ashamed to give his approbation to such an act, he at first only 
 ratified the treaty conditionally. But, for the conditional rati- 
 fication which Napoleon rejected, he was obliged, under pain of 
 having him for an enemy, to substitute one pure and simple, 
 which constituted Prussia at war with England. 1 
 
 Napoleon, since he was emperor, wished for no more 
 republics, above all in his vicinity. Consequently he changed 
 the government of Holland, and eventually demanded that one 
 of his brothers should be king of that country. 2 He did not 
 suspect then that his brother Louis, whom he had chosen, was 
 too honest a man to accept the title of King of Holland, without 
 becoming a thorough Hollander. 
 
 The dissolution of the German Empire was already im- 
 plicitly operated by the treaty of Presburg, since it had recog- 
 nized as kings the Electors of Bavaria and Wurtemberg, and the 
 Elector of Baden as Grand-Duke. This dissolution was con- 
 summated by the act which instituted the Confederation of the 
 Rhine, 3 an act which cost the existence of a host of small states 
 preserved by the rescript of 1803, and that I tried once more to 
 save. But I succeeded only for a small number of them, the 
 principal confederates not wishing to accept this act unless they 
 obtained territorial compensations. 
 
 Murat, one of Napoleon's brothers-in-law, to whom the 
 countries of Cleves and Berg had been given in sovereignty, was 
 included in that confederation, with the title of Grand-Duke ; 
 he exchanged it later for that of King, which it would have 
 been much better for him never to have obtained. 
 
 1 Definitive treaty of alliance of February 15, 1806, ratified by the King of Prussia, 
 March 9. 
 
 2 Louis Bonaparte was proclaimed King of Holland, June 5, 1806. 
 
 3 The old German Empire existed no longer, except in name, in 1806. Napoleon 
 gave it the last blow, July 12, 1806, by the compact he signed with thirteen German 
 princes, the principal of whom were Baron von Dalberg, Archbishop of Mayence, 
 Prince Primate of Germany, the Kings of Bavaria and Wurtemberg, the Grand Duke 
 of Baden, the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, &c. By the terms of this compact, the 
 contracting princes separated themselves from the Empire, and constituted a Confedera- 
 tion of the Rhine, acknowledging as Protector the Emperor Napoleon, and signed with 
 him a treaty of alliance, offensive and defensive. The Emperor Francis could but 
 recognize the accomplished facts. On August 6 following, he declared the German 
 Empire dissolved, abdicated the title of Emperor of Germany, and took that of 
 Emperor of Austria.
 
 230 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 While the King of Prussia was embroiling himself with 
 England by occupying Hanover, the latter was thinking of 
 treating with France. Mr. Pitt being dead, 1 Mr. Fox, who was 
 not destined to survive him long, had become, by dint of talent 
 and in spite of the repugnance of the king, chief Secretary 
 of State for Foreign Affairs in the cabinet of which Lord 
 Grenville 2 was the nominal head. No one detested more than 
 Mr. Fox the oppression of the government of Napoleon ; but 
 whether not to put his conduct in contradiction with the 
 language he had used during some years as chief of the oppo- 
 sition, or from a real desire for peace, he believed he ought to 
 make pacific demonstrations. He wrote to me 3 to inform me 
 of an intended attempt on the life of the emperor (or of the leader 
 of the French, as he named him in the letter), which had been 
 revealed to him by one of the wretched authors of the plot. 
 
 I eagerly seized this occasion, and in thanking him in the 
 name of the emperor, I expressed dispositions which were soon 
 followed by overtures made by the channel of Lord Yarmouth. 
 After two or three conferences, Mr. Fox, to be agreeable to Lord 
 Grenville, adjoined Lord Lauderdale 4 with Lord Yarmouth. 
 
 On his side, the Emperor Alexander sent to Paris M. 
 d'Oubri to arrange a reconciliation. I induced him to make a 
 treaty, which he negotiated with Mr. Clarke. 5 The Emperor of 
 Russia, who did not wish to go so far, refused to ratify it, and 
 disgraced him who had signed it. 
 
 As to the negotiation which had been well begun by Lord 
 Yarmouth, and spoiled by Lord Lauderdale, it ended in aven- 
 ging England on Prussia much more than England herself would 
 have wished. 
 
 1 January 23, 1806. 
 
 - William Wyndham, Lord Grenville (1759-1834), Secretary of State for Hume 
 Affairs, and afterwards for Foreign Affairs (1791). He retired in 1S01. 
 
 3 February 20, 1806. 
 
 4 James Maitland, Earl of Lauderdale, born in 1759, peer of Scotland in 1789. 
 He came to France at this period, and associated himself with the leading Girondists. 
 Always a friend of France, he combated the policy of Pitt, became, in 1806, Privy 
 « Councillor, Keeper of the Scotch Seal, ambassador extraordinary at Paris. In 1816, 
 he protested loudly against the detention of Napoleon. He died in retirement in 
 1839. 
 
 5 October 14, 1806. General Comte Clarke (1765-1818), became in the following 
 year (1807), Secretary of War, and was created Due de Feltre. He was appointed 
 Marshal of France under the Restoration.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 231 
 
 Peace between England and France was morally impossible 
 without the restitution of Hanover ; and Napoleon having 
 disposed of that country for equivalents, which he had also 
 disposed of, the restitution was likewise morally impossible. 
 But the emperor, who held as real only the difficulties which 
 could not be overcome by sheer force, did not hesitate to admit 
 this restitution as one of the bases of the agreement to be made. 
 He said to himself : " Prussia, who has received Hanover through 
 fear, will return it through fear ; and, as for the equivalents which 
 she has given, I shall compensate them by promises which will 
 meet the pride of the cabinet, and with which the country shall 
 be obliged to be satisfied." 
 
 Prussia could not long be ignorant of this treacherous pro- 
 ceeding ; the English were interested in making Prussia know it, 
 and, in addition, Prussia was soon to be the victim of another 
 perfidy. 
 
 In the conversations which Count von Haugwitz had had at 
 Vienna as well as at Paris, with the Emperor Napoleon, the 
 latter had spoken to him of his project of dissolving the 
 German Empire, and of substituting for it two confederations, 
 one of the south, the other of the north. He did not wish, he 
 said, to have any influence except over the first ; Prussia would be 
 at the head of the second. The Prussian cabinet allowed itself to 
 be allured by this project, but when they wished to proceed with 
 the demarcation of the two confederations, Napoleon declared 
 that Prussia could not include in her part either the Hanseatic 
 cities or Saxony, that is to say, the only countries which were 
 not already under the influence and protection of Prussia. The 
 latter, seeing herself cheated, took counsel only of the 
 irritation which reigned in all classes of the nation, and rushed 
 to arms. 
 
 It was not without secret uneasiness that the emperor went, 
 for the first time, to measure his strength with hers. The 
 ancient glory of the Prussian army imposed upon him ; but after 
 an action of only four hours, the phantom vanished, and the 
 battle of Jena 1 put the Prussian monarchy completely at the 
 mercy of a conqueror, all the more pitiless that the wrongs 
 
 1 October 14, 1806.
 
 232 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 were on his side, and that, besides, he had had some fear, and 
 that they knew it. 
 
 Napoleon was already at Berlin, when he received an im- 
 prudent proclamation from the Prince of the Peace, which seemed 
 to announce the approaching defection of Spain. 1 He then made 
 up his mind to destroy at any price, the Spanish branch of the 
 House of Bourbon ; and I, I took inwardly the oath to cease, at 
 whatever price, to be his minister, as soon as we should have 
 returned to France. He confirmed me in this resolution by the 
 barbarity with which, at Tilsit, he treated Prussia, although he 
 made me the instrument of it. This time he did not apply to me 
 to treat for contributions of war and for the evacuation of the 
 territories by his troops. He charged Marshal Berthier 2 with this 
 duty. He thought that, at Presburg, I had acted in a manner too 
 much opposed to what he believed to be his real interests ; but 
 I am anticipating events. 
 
 We remained but a few days at Berlin. Herr von Zastrow, 
 confidential aide-de-camp of the king, and Herr von Lucchesini 
 had had permission to repair to that place. Herr von Lucchesini 
 passed in Prussia for being very capable and above all very subtle. 
 His subtilty has often recalled to me the mot of Dufresne, " Too 
 much sense, that is to say not enongli" These two plenipotentiaries 
 came to negotiate an armistice which perhaps they might have 
 obtained if they had not been informed too late of the capitula- 
 tion of Magdeburg. The Russian army, it is true, was still 
 intact, but it was too small, and besides the Prussians were 
 completely discouraged, all their strong places had opened their 
 gates, and finally Polish deputations hastened from all sides to 
 
 1 In 1806, the Spanish government had for a moment the thought of breaking off 
 with France. The unsuccess of her struggle with England, the uneasiness caused her 
 by the dispossession of King Ferdinand, all contributed to force her that way. The 
 Prince of the Peace, who then directed the politics of the cabinet, seized the moment 
 when Napoleon was engaged with Prussia, and issued, not in the name of the king, 
 but in his personal name, a rather ambiguous proclamation, in which, without 
 designating any one, he excited the Spanish people to prepare for war. After the 
 victory of Jena, the Prince of the Peace, frightened, capitulated immediately, and spread 
 abroad the report that the only enemy of Spain was England, but no one was deceived 
 by this change of tactics — Napoleon least of all. 
 
 2 Marshal Alexandre Berthier, born in 1753, was major-general of the Grand Army, 
 and grand master of the hunt. In 1807, he became vice-constable, Prince de Neuf- 
 chatel and Prince de Wagram. In 1814, he supported Louis XVIII., who named him 
 peer of France and captain of the guards. During the Hundred Days, he retired to 
 l'..imberg (Bavaria), where he died June I, under very mysterious circumstances.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 233 
 
 meet Napoleon. It did rust need all this to decide him to leave 
 Berlin, and to march on rapidly by way of Posen to Warsaw. 
 
 What a singular sight it was to see Napoleon go out of the 
 cabinet of the great Frederick, where he had just written a 
 bulletin for his army, pass into the dining-room where Mollen- 
 dorff, 1 who was a prisoner, and Miiller, 2 who was the historio- 
 grapher of the Prussian monarchy dined with him ; to offer to 
 one and the other appointments which they accepted, then enter 
 his carriage and depart for Posen ! 
 
 He had sent on before him General Dombrowski 3 and 
 Count Wybicki, who had both served under his orders in the 
 campaigns of Italy. It was from Posen that they dated a kind 
 of appeal to all Poland, announcing its re-establishment. This 
 document which had been committed to them at Berlin, disclosed 
 and at the same time concealed sufficiently the authorization of 
 Napoleon, to enable him to own or disown it, according as circum- 
 stances favoured or arrested his undertaking. At Posen, they 
 received him with enthusiasm. A deputation arranged by Murat, 
 who was already at Warsaw, and composed of men of sufficient 
 position to make it believed that they spoke in the name of the 
 nation, was on the day after the arrival of Napoleon, at the 
 gate of the palace he occupied. 
 
 This deputation was numerous ; the names which have 
 remained in my memory are those of Alexander Potocki, 
 Malachowski, Gutakowski, Dzialinski. In the speech they 
 addressed to the emperor, they offered him all the forces of the 
 country. Napoleon seized upon this offer, and explaining him- 
 self little as to the rest of their demands, replied to them : 
 " When you shall have an army of forty thousand men, you 
 will be worthy of being a nation ; and then you will have a 
 
 1 Field-Marshal Count von Mollendorff, former lieutenant of Frederick II., and 
 one of the best generals of the Prussian army. He had been grievously wounded at 
 Auerstadt (1 725-1816). 
 
 2 Johan von Miiller, German historian, born at Schaffhausen in 1752, was Aulic 
 councillor at Mayence, then at Vienna. He came to Berlin in 1795, and Frederic II. 
 named him private counsellor and historiographer of his house. Napoleon saw him 
 in 1806, attached him to himself, and employed him as minister of state of the new 
 kingdom of Westphalia. He died in 1809. 
 
 3 Jean Dombrowski, Polish general, one of the heroes of the insurrection of 1794. 
 In 1795, he had offered his services to the Directory, which had authorized him to 
 raise a Polish legion for the service of France. He commanded it up to 1814.
 
 234 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 right to all my protection." The deputation returned promptly 
 to Warsaw, full of hope. 
 
 It was at Posen that the emperor treated with the Elector 
 of Saxony, until then an ally of Prussia. The elector joined 
 the Confederation of the Rhine and took the title of king. 1 On 
 this occasion, Napoleon received the list of pictures that M. 
 Denon 2 induced him to take from the gallery of Dresden. He 
 was reading it when I entered his study, and he showed it to me. 
 "If your Majesty," said I to him, "carries away any of the 
 pictures of Dresden, you will do more than the King of Saxony 
 allowed himself to do, for he does not believe he has the power 
 to put any of them in his palace. He respects the gallery as 
 national property." 
 
 " Yes," said Napoleon, " he is a very good man ; we must 
 not cause him any grief, I am going to give orders not to 
 touch anything. We will see later." 
 
 The emperor, being certain of having a new army corps of 
 at least forty thousand Poles, left a few days after for Warsaw. 
 
 Murat alone was informed of the exact moment of his arrival 
 in that city, which he entered in the middle of the night. At six 
 o'clock in the morning, the new authorities, all created by the 
 influence of the French officers who belonged to the army corps 
 of Murat, received the order to repair to the palace where they 
 were to be presented to the emperor. He received with marked 
 distinction the most ardent among the men who came there ; 
 they belonged to that class of patriots always ready to welcome 
 any change whatever in the organization of their country. He 
 showed himself more severe towards the others, and particularly 
 towards Prince Joseph Poniatowski, 3 whom he blamed very 
 bitterly for not having consented to take his rank in the army 
 again until positive orders had been given him by Murat in the 
 name of the emperor. By deserving this reproach made to his 
 fidelity, Prince Joseph secured a special place in the esteem 
 
 1 December II, 1806. 
 
 - The Baron Denon (1747-1825) was Director-General of Museums. 
 
 3 Prince Joseph Poniatowski, nephew of the last King of Poland, Marshal of 
 France in 1813. He was drowned in the Elster, the day after the battle of Leipzig. 
 In 1806, he put himself at the head of the Polish army, after having exacted and 
 obtained that this army should preserve its nationality and its autonomy, and should 
 not be incorporated into the French troops.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 235 
 
 of the emperor, who, at the moment he gave Poland a pro- 
 visory government, appointed him Minister of War. 
 
 The first stay of Napoleon at Warsaw was very short. In 
 all the conversations he had had with the most influential 
 persons of the country, he had announced his intention to march 
 soon upon Grodno, adding that, the obstacles being insignificant, 
 he would in a short time have destroyed all what he already 
 called the remains of the Russian army, and driven back, as he 
 said, these new Europeans into their former frontiers. The quag- 
 mires of Pultusk 1 delayed for some time the execution of his 
 plans, without however modifying his language. On returning to 
 Warsaw, he announced that he had just had great successes, but 
 that he did not wish to avail himself of advantages which the 
 season rendered very painful to his troops, and that he was 
 going to take up his winter quarters. 
 
 He employed that period of rest which, after all, was not long, 
 in organizing Poland in such a manner that she became a great 
 help to him, at the opening of the campaign. 
 
 And as he knew that imagination only rules in that peculiar 
 country, he devoted his whole care during the three weeks which 
 he spent in Warsaw, to exalting the military spirit of the nation, 
 to giving fetes, balls, concerts, to showing contempt for the 
 Russians, to displaying great luxury, and to speaking of John 
 Sobieski. He also laid his glory publicly at the feet of a beauti- 
 ful Polish lady, Madame Anastase Walewska, who followed him 
 to Osterode and to Finkenstein, whither he betook himself, in 
 order to visit all his troops. 
 
 I was to remain at W T arsaw, where there was a kind of diplo- 
 matic corps ; I was surrounded by German ministers, whose 
 masters, in these destructive times, had the face to think of ob- 
 taining enlargements of territory. Austria, from different 
 motives, had sent there Baron de Vincent. 2 His instructions 
 
 1 Pultusk, a city of Russian Poland on the Narew (4,800 inhabitants). Victory of 
 Lannes over Benningsen in 1807. 
 
 2 Baron Ch. de Vincent, born in Lorraine, entered the service of the Empire ; he 
 was employed in the negotiations with Pichegru ; was one of the signatories of the 
 treaty of Campo-Formio, became, in 1814, governor of the Low Countries in the 
 name of the allies, and was afterwards sent as ambassador to Paris. The provinces 
 whose interests were entrusted to his care in 1807, were the Palatinates of Cracow, 
 Sandomir, and Lublin, whose frontier follows the course of the river Boug.
 
 236 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 were confined to seeing that order was not disturbed in the 
 former Polish possessions which had fallen to the share of the 
 Emperor of Austria since the last partition of Poland, and which 
 were close to the seat of war. I entered into his views, and 
 helped him by all the means in my power to fill his mission 
 satisfactorily. 
 
 Napoleon had appointed as Governor of Poland a man so 
 utterly incapable that he instructed me, during his absence, to 
 watch over details which were naturally among the duties of the 
 Governor. Thus, I clothed the troops, sent them off, bought the 
 provisions, visited the hospitals, witnessed the dressing of wounds, 
 distributed gratuities, and had even to go so far as to indicate to 
 the Governor what he ought to put in the orders of the day. 
 This kind of occupation, being entirely foreign to my usual 
 pursuits, would have been very laborious, had I not found in the 
 house of Prince Poniatowski, and in that of the Countess Vincent 
 Tyszkiewicz, his sister, all sorts of help and assistance. The 
 marks of interest at first, of affection afterwards, which I received 
 in that excellent and noble family, are indelibly engraved on my 
 grateful heart. I was grieved at leaving Warsaw. But the battle 
 of Eylau had just been fought with a certain amount of success, 1 
 and Napoleon, being anxious to enter on negotiations, had in- 
 structed me to join him. However, all the attempts made in 
 that direction failed ; it was still necessary for him to fight, and, 
 after a few days, he understood it. The taking of Danzig, 2 had 
 raised again what is called the spirit of the army, a little de- 
 pressed by the difficulties it had experienced at Pultusk, by 
 the battle of Eylau, by the climate, and, for Frenchmen, by 
 too prolonged an absence from their country. The emperor, with 
 all the troops he had collected, marched on Heilsberg, where he 
 won a first victory 3 ; pursuing the Russians, he beat them again 
 at Gutstadt and finally at Friedland. 4 
 
 The terror that this last defeat spread among the Russians 
 induced them to desire the quick termination of that great 
 struggle. An interview, to take place in the middle of the 
 Niemen, was proposed by Alexander ; it was so romantically 
 conceived and might be so magnificently arranged, that Napoleon, 
 
 1 February 8, 1807. - May 26. 3 June II. * June 14.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 237 
 
 who saw in it a brilliant episode for the romance of his life, 
 accepted it. The bases of the peace were laid out there. We all 
 repaired immediately after, to Tilsit, where my instructions were, 
 not to negotiate with the Prussian plenipotentiaries, General 
 Kalkreuth 1 and Count von Goltz, 2 but to sign with them the treaty 
 which contained the territorial cessions of Prussia, as they had been 
 agreed upon between the Emperor Napoleon and the Emperor 
 Alexander. 3 The latter did not confine himself to making peace, 
 but he became, by a treaty that I negotiated and signed with Prince 
 Kourakin, 4 the ally of Napoleon, and, by that very reason, the 
 enemy of his own former allies. 5 
 
 The Emperor Alexander, satisfied with losing nothing, and 
 with gaining even something (which, historians, however impartial 
 they may be, will not like to admit), and with having thus screened 
 the interests of his pride in regard to his subjects, thought he 
 had fulfilled all the duties of friendship towards the King of 
 Prussia, by helping him to retain nominally half of his king- 
 dom ; after which he left, without even taking the precaution of 
 ascertaining whether the half which the king was to keep should 
 be promptly restored to him, whether that half should be entirely 
 restored, and whether His Prussian Majesty might not be obliged 
 to buy it again at the cost of fresh sacrifices. This was to be 
 
 1 Frederick-Adolphus, Count von Kalkreuth (1737-1818). He enlisted in 1752, 
 became field-marshal in 1807, and Governor of Berlin. 
 
 '-' Augustus Frederick, Count von Goltz (1765-1832), entered in 1787 the diplo- 
 matic service of Prussia, was minister at Copenhagen, at Mayence, at Stockholm, at 
 St. Petersburg. He became, in 1814, marshal of the court, then deputy of Prussia 
 to the Diet and councillor of state. 
 
 3 July 9> 1807. This treaty merely reproduced certain articles of the treaty with 
 Russia, for Napoleon, out of increased contempt for Prussia, wished to appear to have 
 consented to the existence of that state solely out of consideration for the Emperor 
 Alexander ; thus he had insisted that the stipulations concerning Prussia should 
 appear to have been debated only between the Emperor of Russia and himself. 
 Prussia lost all she possessed between the Elbe and the Rhine, including Magdeburg, 
 and nearly all her Polish provinces. She was reduced from 9,000,000 of inhabitants 
 to 4,000,000. 
 
 4 Field- Marshal Prince Kourakin had been minister and vice-chancellor of Russia. 
 After the Peace of Tilsit, he was ambassador at Paris. 
 
 5 The treaty with Russia was signed on July 7, 1S07. The Emperor Alexander 
 recognized the new state of things which had taken place in the west, as well as all 
 the kingdoms recently created by Napoleon. Besides, a secret treaty of alliance 
 was signed on the same day. Russia promised to declare war against England on 
 December 1 following. In return, France promised her mediation and, if need be, 
 her alliance against Turkey, and a plan of partition of the Ottoman Empire was 
 arranged. An expedition to India was likewise mentioned. Already, the winter before, 
 Napoleon had sent General Gardanne to Persia to prepare the way.
 
 238 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 feared after the brutal question which Napoleon one day asked 
 the Queen of Prussia : " How did you dare to make war against 
 me, Madam, with such feeble means at your disposal ? " " Permit 
 me, Sire, to tell your Majesty that the glory of Frederick II. had 
 misled us as to the true state of our power." That word glory, 
 so happily placed, and at Tilsit, in the very study of the Em- 
 peror Napoleon, seemed to me superbly dignified. I repeated 
 this fine reply of the queen, often enough for the emperor to say 
 to me one day : " I cannot imagine what you think so fine in that 
 saying of the Queen of Prussia ; you might as well speak of 
 something else." 
 
 I was indignant at all I saw or heard, but was obliged to 
 conceal my indignation, and I shall ever be thankful that the 
 Queen of Prussia, who deserved to live in better days, was 
 graciously pleased to acknowledge it. If in the recollections 
 of my life, several are necessarily painful, I remember at 
 least with much sweetness the things which she then had the 
 goodness to say to me, and those which she almost entrusted to 
 me. " Prince de Benevent," she said to me the last time I had 
 the honour of seeing her to her carriage, " there are only two 
 persons who regret my having had to come here, I and yourself. 
 You are not angry, are you, at my thinking so ? " The tears 
 of compassion and pride that filled my eyes were my sole 
 reply. 
 
 The efforts made by this noble woman were without avail 
 with Napoleon ; he triumphed, and was therefore inflexible. The 
 promises he had caused to be broken, and those he had obtained, 
 had intoxicated him. He was pleased also to believe, that he 
 had made a dupe of the Emperor of Russia ; but time has proved 
 that the real dupe was himself. 
 
 By the treaty of Tilsit, the youngest of his brothers, Jerome 
 Bonaparte, had been recognized as King of Westphalia. His 
 kingdom was composed of several of the provinces ceded 
 by Prussia, of the greater part of the electorate of Hesse, 
 and of the duchy of Brunswick-Wolfenbiittel, conquered but 
 not ceded. Napoleon desired greatly to add to them also the 
 principalities of Anhalt, Lippe and Waldeck. But, taking 
 advantage of the real embarrassment in which he found him-
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 239 
 
 self after the battle of Pultusk, which, however, he would 
 not acknowledge, I had had these principalities admitted as well 
 as those of Reuss and Schwarzburg into the Confederation of 
 the Rhine, and he did not yet dare to attempt, as he did later, 
 anything against the princes he had admitted to that body. The 
 treaty of Tilsit having been signed and ratified, we could, at 
 last, return to France. 
 
 The excitement which I had been subjected to for nearly a 
 year, made me feel inexpressibly happy and comfortable, while 
 passing through Dresden, where I spent several days. The noble 
 and quiet manners of the Court of Saxony, the public and private 
 virtues of King Frederick Augustus, 1 the benevolence and sin- 
 cerity which appeared everywhere, made me preserve a special 
 remembrance of this stay at Dresden. 
 
 Napoleon, on arriving in Paris, created for Marshal Berthier 
 the post of vice-constable, and for myself that of vice-grand- 
 elector. These posts were honourable and lucrative sinecures ; 
 I then left the cabinet as I had intended to do. 
 
 During all the time I had charge of the management of 
 foreign affairs, I served Napoleon with fidelity and zeal. As 
 to the emperor, he adhered, for a long time, to the views 
 which I considered it a duty to suggest to him. Those views 
 were based upon these two considerations : To establish for 
 France monarchical institutions which should secure the pre- 
 rogatives of the crown and the authority of the sovereign, 
 by keeping them within just limits ; to spare Europe in order 
 that the Powers might pardon France her achievements and 
 glory. In 1807, Napoleon had already for a long time past, it 
 must be owned, kept away from the path on which I had done 
 my best to keep him, but I had been unable, until the occasion 
 which now presented itself, to give up the nominal direction 
 of foreign affairs. It was not so easy as one might suppose to 
 resign a post, the duties of which brought its occupant in daily 
 contact with him. 
 
 1 Frederick Augustus I., born in 1758, Elector of Saxony at the death of his 
 brother in 1763. Married Amelia, Princess of Zwei-Briicken. He took the title of 
 King in 1806, and remained faithful to Napoleon until 18 13. The Congress of 
 Vienna gave him back a portion of his possessions. He died in 1827, leaving the 
 throne to his elder brother, Antoine.
 
 240 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 Hardly returned from Tilsit, Napoleon devoted all his atten- 
 tion to the execution of his designs on Spain. The intrigue of 
 this undertaking is so involved that I have thought it necessary 
 to explain it separately. 1 I must only say here that the 
 emperor, clinging to the belief that I approved his projects, 
 chose precisely my estate of Valencay, to become the prison 
 of Ferdinand VII., his brother, and their uncle. But neither 
 these princes nor the public were deceived by this. He 
 succeeded no more in making people believe that, in this, I was 
 his accomplice, than he did in the conquest of Spain. 
 
 When the Emperor Alexander and he had separated at 
 Tilsit, they promised to see each other again soon. This was a 
 promise Napoleon had no desire to keep, at least unless the 
 state of his affairs made it necessary. But when General 
 Junot had been driven from Portugal by the English, 2 when 
 General Dupont was forced to capitulate at Baylen, 3 and when 
 a general insurrection in Spain, gave prospects of a resistance 
 which might be of long duration, he began to fear that Austria 
 might profit by these circumstances, and felt the need of 
 making more sure of Russia's intentions. He then grew 
 anxious to see the Emperor Alexander once more, and invited 
 him to an interview to take place at Erfurt. 4 Although 
 already very cold with me, he wished me to accompany him ; 
 he was persuaded that I might prove useful to him and that 
 sufficed him. The numerous and piquant incidents of this 
 interview form an episode by themselves : I have thought it 
 advisable to make a separate chapter of them. 5 The intention 
 of Napoleon, however, must find a place here. His purpose was 
 
 1 See Part IV. 
 
 2 General Andoche Junot, Due d'Abrantes, had been placed at the head of the 
 army of Portugal. At first successful (1807), he was, on August 21, 1808, defeated 
 at Vimeiro by the Anglo-Portuguese army, and forced to sign at Cintra a capitulation, 
 by the terms of which he was to evacuate Portugal. 
 
 3 General Pierre Dupont de l'Etang (1765-1839) had been, in 180S, placed at the 
 head of the Andalusian army. On July 22, being attacked by superior forces com- 
 manded by the Spanish general, Castanos, he capitulated in the open field near 
 Baylen. 8,000 French soldiers were disarmed and sent to the rocks of Cabrera 
 (Balearic Island.-), where they died for the most part from sickness and misery. 
 General Dupont, having returned to France, was tried by a court-martial, and 
 .sentenced to imprisonment for life. He came out of prison in 1814, and was Minister 
 of War under the first Restoration. 
 
 4 A city of the kingdom of Saxony (to-day annexed to Prussia) on the Gera. 
 
 5 See Part V.
 
 THE CONVENTION, THE DIRECTORY, THE CONSULATE. 241 
 
 to induce the Emperor Alexander to make a special alliance 
 with him against Austria. That which he had concluded at 
 Tilsit, although general, was particularly directed against Eng- 
 land. If he had succeeded at Erfurt, he would, under some 
 pretext easily invented, have sought a quarrel with Austria, 
 and after a few military successes he would have tried to do 
 with it as he had done with Prussia. 
 
 The complete co-operation of Russia would have thoroughly 
 enabled him to reach his goal. Having a very small opinion of 
 the genius and self-will of the Emperor Alexander, he hoped to 
 succeed. His intention was to intimidate the Czar at first, and 
 then to arouse both his vanity and his ambition ; and, indeed, it 
 was to be feared that on these three points, the Emperor of Russia 
 might prove only too accessible. But the star of Austria 
 willed that M. de Caulaincourt, 1 who has always been persistently 
 misjudged, should inspire the Emperor of Austria with confidence, 
 and not cause the Emperor Alexander to lose that he placed 
 in me. I had seen him several times in private at Tilsit. I 
 saw him nearly every day at Erfurt. Our conversations were 
 at first of a general turn concerning the common interests ex- 
 isting between the great powers of Europe ; the conditions on 
 which the ties, which it was important to preserve between them, 
 were to be broken ; the equilibrium of Europe in general ; the 
 probable consequences of its destruction ; then, gradually our 
 conversations turned more particularly to the States whose 
 existence was necessary for this equilibrium, especially to 
 Austria. These conversations put the emperor in such a state 
 of mind that the coaxing, the persuasion, and the threats of 
 Napoleon were a dead loss ; and that, before quitting Erfurt, the 
 Emperor Alexander wrote in his own hand to the Emperor of 
 Austria to reassure him with regard to the fears, which the 
 Erfurt interview had caused him. It was the last service I was 
 able to render Europe, as long as Napoleon continued to reign, 
 and this service, in my opinion, I was also rendering to himself 
 personally. 
 
 1 Louis de Caulaincourt, born in 1773 at Caulaincourt (Aisne), of noble parentage. 
 Under the Empire he became general of division, grand-equerry and Due de Vicence 
 (Vicenza). He went to Russia as ambassador in 1807, was appointed Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs in 1813, and died in 1827. 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 After having given many fetes and made a kind of treaty 
 essentially different from that he had in view on coming to 
 Erfurt, the emperor returned to Paris, and M. de Champagny, 1 
 thereafter had the sole direction of the department of Foreign 
 Affairs. As for me, I resumed the insignificant life of a grand 
 dignitary. 
 
 At all hazards, I did what was in my power to obtain the 
 confidence of the Emperor Alexander, and I succeeded, suffi- 
 ciently well for him to send to me, as soon as his first trouble broke 
 out with France, Count de Nesselrode, councillor to the Russian 
 Embassy in Paris, who, on entering my room, said to me, " I 
 have just come from St. Petersburg ; I hold an official situation 
 with Prince Kourakin, although it is really to you that I am 
 accredited. I am keeping up a private correspondence with the 
 emperor, and now bring you one of his letters." 
 
 1 Jean-Baptiste Nompere de Champagny, Due de Cadore (i 756-1834), former 
 deputy of the nobility to the States-General, became, in 1800, councillor of state, 
 ambassador at Vienna (1801), and Minister of the Interior; in 1807, he succeeded 
 Talleyrand as Minister of Foreign Affairs. 
 
 END OF THE THIRD PART.
 
 PART IV. 
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 
 
 1807 
 
 Napoleon at Finkenstein — His love of deceit — Situation of France at the 
 close of the year 1807 — Napoleon's designs on Spain — The pretext 
 he chose to carry them out — Talleyrand endeavours to dissuade the 
 emperor from wronging the old ally of France. — Treaty of Fontainebleau 
 — Napoleon's shameful breach of faith towards Charles IV. of Spain — 
 Don Juan de Escoiquiz, Canon of Toledo, and the Prince of the Asturias 
 — The intrigues of Godoy, Prince of the Peace — Don Escoiquiz' plan to 
 thwart them — The French ambassador and Don Escoiquiz — Napoleon's 
 ruse — Letter of the Prince of the Asturias to Napoleon — Letter of the 
 Prince of the Peace to the Emperor — Provisions of the treaty of 
 Fontainebleau — Projected dismemberment of Portugal — Secret Conven- 
 tion aimed at Spain, though ostensibly, at Portugal — The French troops 
 in Spain — Arrest of the Prince of the Asturias — He is put on his trial — 
 Declared not guilty — Occupation of Navarra, Catalonia and Guipuzcoa 
 by the French— Fears of the Prince of the Peace — Projected flight of 
 the royal family — Indignation of the people — General discontent against 
 Godoy, Prince of the Peace — The Aranjuez riots — Popular hatred 
 against Godoy — Loyalty of the people towards the royal family — Arrest 
 of Godoy— He is put on his trial — Abdication of King Charles IV. in 
 favour of Ferdinand, Prince of the Asturias — Arrival of Ferdinand VII. at 
 Madrid — The Grand Due de Berg (Murat) and King Ferdinand — Change 
 of the people's disposition towards the French — Negotiations between 
 Don Escoiquiz and the Grand Due de Berg — Murat insists on the sus- 
 pension of Godoy's trial — Murat demands the release of the latter, in 
 Napoleon's name — Ferdinand VII. sends his brother Don Carlos to 
 meet Napoleon on his way to Spain — Charles IV.'s protest — Retracts 
 his abdication — Don Antonio appointed Regent — Ferdinand VII. leaves 
 Madrid, on his way to Bayonne — Free for eight hours- — Lasciate ogni 
 speranza — Arrival at Bayonne — -Ferdinand and the Infante Antonio prac- 
 tically prisoners — Napoleon unmasks his designs — Offers to Ferdinand 
 the kingdom of Etruria, in exchange for the cession of the rights of the 
 latter to the Crown of Spain — Refusal of Ferdinand — Noble reply of the 
 Marquis de Labrador to M. de Champagny — Napoleon and Don 
 
 R 2
 
 244 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Esco'fquiz — It is too late ! — Charles IV. at Bayonne — Ferdinand's re- 
 nunciation of the crown — Murat appointed lieutenant-general of Spain 
 — The royal princes of Spain at the chateau of Valengay — Prince 
 Talleyrand welcomes them — Inaptitude of the princes for study — 
 Everyday life at Valencay — Talleyrand summoned to Nantes — Napo- 
 leon's bluster — Scathing retort of Talleyrand — Rupture between Napo- 
 leon and Talleyrand — Talleyrand summoned to Erfurt — Takes leave of 
 the Spanish princes — Their gratitude — By the grace of God — The 
 Emperor of Russia recognizes Joseph Bonaparte as King of Spain — 
 Treaty of Valencay — Failure of Napoleon's designs on Spain — The 
 result of Napoleon's threats against England — Want of dignity of 
 Ferdinand VII. — His return to Madrid — His cruel proceedings towards 
 his faithful supporters — England's fault in Spain. 
 
 NAPOLEON was at Finkenstein, 1 and said one day, in a cheerful 
 moment, " I know, when necessary, how to throw off the skin 
 of the lion, and put on that of the fox." 
 
 He was fond of deceiving, and would do so for the mere love 
 of it ; apart from his policy, his instinct would have made it a 
 necessity for him. For the carrying out of the projects which he 
 was always meditating, artifice was no less necessary than force. 
 It was especially in the accomplishment of his views on Spain 
 that he felt that force alone could not be sufficient. 
 
 Napoleon, seated on one of the thrones of the House of 
 Bourbon, considered the princes who occupied the other two, as 
 his natural enemies, whom it was his interest to overthrow. 
 But it was an undertaking in which he could not fail, without 
 ruining his own designs, and perhaps himself as well. It was 
 not then to be entered upon, without being fully certain of success. 
 
 The first condition to secure that success was that there 
 should be no occasion to fear a diversion on the Continent. 
 
 At the end of 1807, Napoleon was master of the whole of 
 Italy, 2 and of that portion of Germany that lies between the Rhine 
 and the Elbe. 3 He had, under the name of duchy of Warsaw, 
 restored a part of ancient Poland, extending from Silesia to the 
 
 1 Head -quarters of the Emperor Napoleon during the campaign of 1807, in 
 Poland. 
 
 2 The treaty of Presburg had given Venice to the kingdom of Italy. Joseph 
 reigned at Naples. Thus the Papal States alone were not directly dependent on the 
 emperor. 
 
 3 Jerome Bonaparte reigned in Westphalia ; Murat at Berg. The Kings of Bavaria 
 and Wurtemberg, the Grand Duke of Baden, and the other princes of the Rhenish 
 Confederation, were at the time thoroughly devoted to France.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 245 
 
 Niemen, 1 so that that country was devoted to him. Prussia was 
 almost crushed. Austria, weakened by the losses of all kinds 
 which she had suffered, was not in a position to undertake 
 anything alone ; on the other hand, Napoleon had easily brought 
 Russia to entertain ambitious plans, and in giving her two wars 
 to carry on, had given her what would, for a long time, occupy 
 all her forces. 2 Therefore, Spain appeared to him as completely 
 isolated as he could wish. But in attacking her he had a two- 
 fold danger to fear. 
 
 Since the Peace of Basel between France and Spain, that is 
 to say for eleven years, Spain had been the faithful ally of 
 France. Money, ships, soldiers, she had put everything at the 
 disposal of the latter, she had lavished all on her. At this 
 time, twenty thousand men, the flower of her troops, and the best 
 of her generals were serving in the French army at the further 
 extremity of Europe. How could he declare war against her ? 
 What pretext could he allege ? Could he divulge the motives of 
 his dynastic ambition ? In making them known, he exposed 
 himself to the risk of turning against himself the feelings of his 
 own subjects ; and all his contempt for the human race did not 
 prevent him from understanding that the force of public opinion 
 must count for something. In declaring war he would provoke 
 Spain to resistance ; a thousand unforeseen circumstances might 
 arise, and, however successful and short this war might be, it 
 would none the less leave to the Spanish royal family both 
 the means and the time to repair to its possessions on the other 
 side of the ocean. Spain, in this case, would become for him a 
 possession, dangerous and difficult to govern, for the nation, 
 being attached to the royal family, would have formed wishes 
 for the success of its legitimate rulers, and always sided with the 
 American colonies ; this was leaving to the House of Bourbon, a 
 hope, a favourable prospect of returning to Spain. Besides, 
 the separation of the Spanish colonies from their metropolis 
 would entail serious losses on French commerce, and Napoleon 
 
 1 The Grand Duchy of Warsaw, formed of the Polish provinces taken from Prussia, 
 had been given to the King of Saxony. 
 
 2 The first against Sweden in order to annex Finland ; and the other against 
 Turkey, in the hope of acquiring the Danubian principalities.
 
 246 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 would consequently find that he had injured one of the dearest 
 interests of his people. 
 
 He must then employ all his art to prevent this twofold danger. 
 If it were possible for him to veil the odium of his undertaking, 
 knowing the inclination of men to pardon successful crimes, he 
 could flatter himself that the impression of the one he was medi- 
 tating would be much weakened, if already accomplished when 
 becoming known. 
 
 To conquer Spain, without striking a blow, there existed but 
 one means : it was, to introduce under the shadow of friendship, 
 sufficient forces to prevent, or to suppress everywhere, what 
 resistance might be offered. He must have a pretext. The 
 refusal of Portugal to break off relations with England furnished 
 it. Napoleon had been careful to prepare that pretext at Tilsit, 
 in his treaty of alliance with Russia, by stipulating that should 
 Portugal remain at peace with England, it should be treated as 
 an enemy. Instead then of declaring war against Spain, he 
 concluded a new alliance with her against Portugal. 1 After being 
 conquered, a portion of that kingdom was to be annexed by the 
 Spanish monarchy, another portion was to be handed to the 
 Infanta Maria Louisa, and to her son, as indemnity for the 
 kingdom of Etruria which had been given to Napoleon, 2 and the 
 remainder was to form a principality for the Prince of the Peace. 3 
 That was the bait, by means of which the emperor persuaded that 
 traitor to obtain the signature of his sovereign to the treaty. 
 
 The emperor had spoken to me several times of his project 
 of seizing Spain. I opposed this plan with all my might, 
 showing the immorality and the dangers of such an undertaking. 
 He always alleged, as an excuse, the danger which a diversion 
 of the Spanish government would cause him, if he should meet 
 with any reverse on the banks of the Rhine or in Italy, and he 
 
 1 Treaty of Fontainebleau, October 27, 1807. 
 
 2 The Treaty of Luneville had given the Grand Duchy of Tuscany to Louis, Duke 
 of Parma, son-in-law of Charles IV., King of Spain, in exchange for his States, which 
 were annexed to the kingdom of Italy. Tuscany then took the name of Kingdom of 
 Etruria. King Louis dying in 1803, his son, Louis II., was proclaimed under the 
 regency of his mother, the Infanta Maria Louisa. The secret treaty of Fontainebleau, 
 October, 1807, dispossessed the King of Etruria, whose States were incorporated with 
 the French empire. In compensation he was promised the future kingdom of Lusi- 
 tania, which was to be created at the expense of Portugal. 
 
 3 Manuel Godoy, born 1767, died 185 1 . From simple body-guard, he rose to the 
 post of Prime Minister. Was created Duke of Alcudia and Prince of the 1'eace after 
 the signature of the Peace of Basel. — {Translator.)
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 247 
 
 quoted to me the unfortunate proclamation of the Prince of 
 the Peace on the occasion of the battle of Jena. I had often 
 refuted that objection, reminding him that it would be very un- 
 just to hold the Spanish nation responsible for the fault of a 
 man whom it detested and despised, and that it would be easier 
 for him to overthrow the Prince of the Peace than to seize Spain. 
 But he replied to me that the idea of the Prince of the Peace 
 might be adopted by others, and that he would never be safe on 
 the Pyrenean frontier. It was then that, driven into a corner by 
 the artful arguments of his ambition, I proposed to him a 
 plan which presented the guarantees of security which he was 
 pretending to look for in Spain. I advised him to occupy 
 Catalonia until he should obtain maritime peace with England. 
 " You will declare," said I to him, " that you will keep that 
 pledge until the peace, and by so doing you will hold the 
 Spanish government in check. If peace should be deferred 
 it is possible that Catalonia, which is the least Spanish of all the 
 provinces of Spain, might become attached to France ; there 
 are historical traditions for that ; and perhaps it might be- 
 come definitely united with France. But anything further that 
 you may do will one day cause you bitter regrets." I did not 
 convince him, and he mistrusted me on this matter. 
 
 As I have just said, he tempted the cupidity and ambition of 
 the Prince of the Peace by a treaty relative to a dismemberment 
 of Portugal. 
 
 That treaty was negotiated secretly and signed on the 27th 
 of October, 1807, at Fontainebleau, by General Duroc, and 
 Councillor Izquierdo, 1 (confidential agent of the^ Prince of the 
 Peace),unknown to M. de Champagny, Foreign Minister, and also 
 unknown to me, although at that time I was chief Councillor of 
 State, 2 and was residing at Fontainebleau. 
 
 As a result of the treaty of Fontainebleau an army of 30,000 
 Frenchmen was to cross Spain to unite with a Spanish army in 
 the conquest of Portugal. A second army of 40,000 men was to 
 be assembled on the Pyrenean frontier in order to be ready in case 
 
 1 Don Eugenio Izquierdo de Ribera y Lezaun, born at Saragossa, was a secret 
 agent of Spanish diplomacy, when, in 1797, he obtained, thanks to the protection of 
 Godoy, the position of Privy Councillor. He conducted several confidential missions, 
 principally under the Directory, and later in 1807. He died in 1813. 
 
 3 One of the prerogatives of the Chief Councillor of State was to sign all treaties.
 
 248 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 of need to assist the first, which was commanded by Marshal 
 Junot. This second army crossed the frontier under various 
 pretexts, and occupied fortresses in the north of Spain, and in 
 Catalonia. It was to take a solid footing in the country, which 
 was moreover totally without an army, the only really good 
 troops having been sent to serve with the French. These troops 
 mustering 20,000 men, commanded by the Marquis de La 
 Romana, had been sent to the borders of Denmark. Napoleon, 
 as one may see, had taken every precaution. 1 
 
 The only thing that Napoleon might still have to fear, was 
 that the king and his family, taking alarm, should retire into a 
 distant province, and give from there the signal for resistance, 
 or that they should cross the sea. 
 
 I am now going to relate by what shameful ruses Napoleon 
 compelled the whole of this unfortunate family to deliver itself 
 into his hands. 
 
 In the month of March, 1807, the Prince of the Asturias, who 
 was in secret correspondence with Don Juan de Escoi'quiz, 2 
 Archdeacon and Canon of Toledo, his former tutor, sent to 
 him at Toledo, where he lived, a private confidant of his, named 
 Don Jose Maurrique. The prince had given him a letter which 
 was to be handed to Don Escoi'quiz. He spoke therein of his 
 suspicions as to the ambitious intentions of the Prince of the 
 Peace, who, obtaining every day from the king or the queen some 
 favour or other, was becoming more powerful. He commanded, 
 with the title of generalissimo and admiral, all the army, the 
 militia, and the navy ; it was already announced that the King, 
 Charles IV., tired of state affairs, and often ill, had left to him 
 
 1 In 1807, Napoleon, wishing to punish the Madrid cabinet for the hostile 
 demonstration which it had made at the time of the rupture with Prussia (proclama- 
 tion of the Prince of the Peace), and to weaken the Spanish army, requited the despatch 
 of a body of 15,000 men, destined to serve in the north of Europe. The Marquis de 
 la Romana, lieutenant-general, commanded it. He was quartered in Fionia when the 
 news of the events of 1808 arrived. La Komana entered at once into negotiations 
 with the English fleet, which was cruising in the offing, and had his troops embarked 
 and transported to Spain. La Romana at their head fought energetically against the 
 French. He was a member of the Supreme Junta when he died (1811). 
 
 a Don Juan de Escoi'quiz, born in 1762, canon at Satagossa, was nominated by the 
 Prince of the Peace tutor of the Prince of Asturias, over whom he exercised the greatest 
 influence. He became Privy Councillor in 1808. He followed the prince to Valencay, 
 was imprisoned at Bourges, returned to Madrid in 1814, was appointed minister, but 
 did not exercise any further political influence.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 249 
 
 the regency of the kingdom. Once regent, the death of the 
 king would open a new career to his ambition, the bounds of 
 which no one knew. The character of the Prince of the Peace, 
 his marriage, which had placed him nearer the throne, 1 
 frightened all those who were attached to the royal family. 
 Don Escoi'quiz, alarmed by the letter of the Prince of the 
 Asturias, believed, good man that he was, that he had only to 
 enlighten the king and queen as to the designs of the Prince of 
 the Peace. He believed in the influence, which a letter, handed 
 by the Prince of the Asturias to the queen his mother would 
 have, and in which he would show the danger which the royal 
 family incurred on account of the blind confidence which the 
 king had in the Prince of the Peace. This letter, too full of logic 
 and truth, frightened the Prince of the Asturias, who did not dare 
 to deliver it, he was satisfied with copying and preserving it. 
 Ashamed of his want of resolution he wrote to Don Escoi'quiz 
 that he considered it impossible for the queen to be unde- 
 ceived, and that it would be easier to make matters plain to the 
 king, if he should chance one day to speak to him in tete-a-tete. 
 
 The good canon of Toledo wrote a note, which he adapted as 
 well as possible to the foibles of the king, and he sent it to the 
 Prince of the Asturias who waited in vain for the moment when he 
 could hand it to his father. This document, like the first, was 
 copied by the prince himself, and, also like the first, locked up 
 in his desk, where it was found when his papers were seized. 
 
 The Prince of the Peace, who suspected that the conduct of the 
 Prince of the Asturias hid some project scarcely favourable to his 
 views, endeavoured to find means to pry into the privacy of the 
 prince, and got the queen to propose to the latter to marry Dona 
 Maria Theresa, his (Godoy's) sister-in-law, second daughter of 
 the Infant Don Luis. This princess had a beautiful face, was 
 ambitious, and had already shown little aversion for love affairs. 
 The prince, who only knew her to be beautiful and pretty, had 
 given his consent to this marriage. But for some months the 
 ambition of the Prince of the Peace having become more asserted 
 and bold, this match was no longer spoken of. Don Escoi'quiz 
 
 1 The Prince of the Peace had married a Spanish princess, daughter of the Infant 
 Don Luis.
 
 250 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 seeing that all means of getting the king and queen to know 
 the truth were failing, and that the proposition of the marriage 
 with Dona Maria Theresa had fallen through, fancied that a 
 foreign and powerful interest would alone afford real support to 
 the prince, in the critical position in which he found himself, 
 and it occurred to him to marry the latter with one of the 
 daughters of Napoleon's 1 family. 
 
 At this time a marriage with a niece of Napoleon seemed 
 likely to ensure to the Prince of the Asturias the shaken throne of 
 Spain, and to put this beautiful and noble country beyond the 
 reach of divisions. This result was to be preferred to that which 
 unexpected events soon brought about. 
 
 Don Esco'fquiz thought more every day of the plan which he 
 had adopted. Rumours disquieting to the royal family assumed 
 every day more consistency, and were spread among all classes. 
 Not being able now to bear the idea of being so far from his former 
 pupil, he wished to be nearer the centre of affairs and went to 
 Madrid. There he made the acquaintance of the Count d'Orgaz, a 
 loyal Spaniard, particularly attached to the Prince of the Asturias. 
 He spoke to him of his fears and his projects. In one of their 
 conversations Count d'Orgaz told him that Don Diego Godoy, 
 brother of the Prince of the Peace, was distributing money to the 
 Madrid garrison, and, by this means had secured the support of 
 a large number of the subaltern officers ; a colonel of the dragoons, 
 Don Thomas Jauregui, who was in the garrison kept him ac- 
 quainted with all the attempts which were being made to corrupt 
 the troops. There was not one officer of note to whom an agent 
 of the Prince of the Peace had not said, " You see the wretched 
 state of Spain, the Bourbon dynasty is absolutely on the decline ; 
 the king is on the point of death ; the prince is an imbecile ; 
 measures must be taken ; you are a good Spaniard, we count on 
 you." A thousand propositions of this sort were openly made, 
 and by men who inspired confidence on account of their repu- 
 tation, and the positions they occupied. Don Luis Viguri, an 
 
 1 This project had for a moment some consistency. Napoleon being sounded on 
 the matter had appeared to reply favourably (letter of the Emperor to the Prince 
 of the Asturias, April 16, 1808, Correspondence, vol. xvii.). A daughter of Lucien 
 Honaparte had been proposed, but this plan was not carried out. It is probable that 
 thj emperor never intended that it should be.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 251 
 
 officer in the commissariat who had kept up relations with the 
 chief officers, was one of the most active in that respect. In the 
 schools, in the academies, in all public buildings, the same 
 language was used. Abbe Stala, librarian of St. Isidro, had been 
 so imprudent even as to show the documents of which the 
 purport was to make clear to the Spanish nation, that, in the 
 crisis which was being prepared, there could only be safety 
 in placing entire confidence in the Prince of the Peace. Don 
 Escoiquiz felt that there was not a moment to lose, and that 
 all the friends of the throne must unite and form a league for 
 its defence. With this aim, he asked the Prince of the Asturias 
 for a credential in order that he could explain matters con- 
 fidentially to the Duke of Infantado, a young man of noble 
 birth, of a fine character, and pleasing and commanding appear- 
 ance, and standing well in public opinion. With this letter, written 
 by the prince, the canon sought the Duke of Infantado, 1 and 
 spoke to him with the greatest frankness, but their principles not 
 permitting them to adopt any measure which could be contrary 
 to the fidelity they owed to the king, they confined themselves to 
 taking measures of precaution for the time when the king, whose 
 health was daily getting weaker and weaker, should die. The 
 Prince of the Peace had it in his power to conceal for some 
 moments the death of the king. The distrust, and the hatred 
 which he had skilfully inspired in the queen for her son, 
 enabled him to surround and fill the castle with devoted troops. 
 Supported by etiquette, he could, and that was his intention, have 
 brought the Prince of the Asturias to the bedside of the king, who 
 would be supposed to be still alive ; there to seize him, and all 
 the royal family, and make them sign by force, all the necessary 
 orders to place the authority in his hands, determining after- 
 wards what should be done with the princes. 
 
 The Duke of Infantado and Don Escoi'quiz considered that 
 the only means of preventing this outrage would be to have 
 
 1 The Infantado was an ancient manor of Castile, so named, because it had formerly 
 been the appanage of the heirs presumptive of Spain. The duke, of whom mention 
 is made here, belonged to the Silva family, who had acquired the duchy two 
 centuries before. Born in 1771, he became the friend of the Prince of the Asturias ; in 
 1808, he recognized at first King Joseph, but soon separated from him and took 
 command of a Spanish army corps. President of the Council of Castile in 1820, 
 he retired in 1826, and died in 1836.
 
 252 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 an act given beforehand by the new king, which would place 
 supreme military command in the hands of the Duke of 
 Infantado. This act would have also put all the authorities, even 
 the Prince of the Peace, under his absolute command, through- 
 out New Castile, and especially at Madrid, and in all the royal 
 residences. With this order, the Duke of Infantado, at the 
 first news he should have of the coming death of the king, was 
 to prepare the notification of his powers, take the supreme com- 
 mand of all the military forces, appear in the town, and in the 
 royal houses in the uniform of generalissimo, and even have 
 the Prince of the Peace arrested should he give signs of the least 
 restlessness. Don Escoiquiz drew up the act in question, and 
 sent it to the prince, explaining to him the object of the mea- 
 sure ; he persuaded him to write it out with his own hand, to 
 sign it, and to place on it his seal. The prince carried out all 
 that was suggested. The act was handed to the Duke of 
 Infantado, who was to keep it carefully till the time when he 
 should be called upon to make use of it. This act read as 
 follows : — 
 
 "We, Ferdinand VII., by the grace of God, King of 
 Castile, &c 
 
 "The Lord having deigned to take to Himself our dear and 
 well-beloved father, the King Charles IV., whom may God have 
 in His holy keeping, and consequently having ourselves ascended 
 the throne of Spain, as his natural and legitimate heir, knowing 
 that in the first moments of suspension of authority, which is 
 an inevitable consequence of the death of kings, it may happen 
 that there are persons who wish to take advantage of it, to 
 disturb the public peace, as the public voice seems to indicate ; 
 and considering that the best means of repressing malevolence 
 should it dare to take the form of any project of that sort, is to 
 put the entire military forces which surround us in the hands of 
 one whom we can trust, and who, besides talent, courage, and 
 noble birth, enjoys public esteem ; finding in you, Duke of 
 Infantado, my cousin, all these qualities united, we have 
 considered it our duty to confer on you, as we do by this 
 decree, the supreme command of the entire military forces in 
 New Castile, and in all the royal residences, infantry, cavalry, 
 artillery, militia, &c, without any exception, not even the 
 body-guard and the troops which compose our Royal Guard, 
 nor those which form the guard of the generalissimo, in order
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 253 
 
 that you may make use of them in the way in which you 
 shall deem useful or necessary to put down any rising, to 
 disperse any meeting, to dispel every seditious project against 
 our person, or the Royal Family, or any which is capable of dis- 
 turbing the public peace in any way whatever. Our wish being 
 to suspend, as we do suspend, every authority, even all military 
 power, which do not come under your orders, to that of the Prince 
 of the Peace as generalissimo, as well as that of the Captain 
 General of New Castile, we order, that all the military chiefs, 
 of whatever class or rank they may be, obey strictly your orders 
 as though they were our own, in everything which may concern 
 the public peace, for which we hold you responsible. And we 
 declare, subject to the punishment of traitors and enemies of 
 the country all those who by ignorance, affected or intentional, 
 shall oppose your orders, or shall not display the strict obedience 
 they owe you. We decree also, that all the civil and military 
 tribunals, and all magistrates of whatever class they may be, 
 assist in the execution of your orders, and all that concerns 
 them, under the same penalties for not so doing. 
 
 " We give you also all the necessary authority to imprison, 
 if it be necessary, all persons of whatever class, condition, or 
 rank they may be, without any exception, who shall be suspected 
 of wishing to disturb the public peace, or who shall disturb it. 
 
 " This is our will, as also that this decree, although not bear- 
 ing the ordinary sanction of one of the ministers, on account of 
 the urgency of the circumstances in which we are placed, be 
 observed and carried out as though it had the signature of one 
 of our ministers, being written, signed and sealed as it is, by 
 our own hand. The whole to be carried out under the penalties 
 of high treason on those who oppose it. 
 
 "At the of the year 
 
 "Signed Yo El Rl\" 
 
 This decree had the date in blank, and it was to be filled 
 in at the moment of the death of the king, by the Duke of 
 Infantado. 
 
 Towards the middle of the month of June, 1807, Don Escoi- 
 quiz received another letter from the Prince of the Asturias, in 
 which his Royal Highness told him that he had had it handed to 
 him by Don Juan Manuel de Villena, his first equerry, who 
 had received it from Don Pedro Giraldo, colonel of Engineers, 
 and tutor of the Infante Don Francisco, 1 a letter which was 
 
 1 The Infante Don Francisco was the third son of King Charles IV.
 
 254 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 intended to be delivered into the hands of his Royal Highness, 
 and was written by an individual, who said he belonged to 
 the French Legation. The contents announced a very secret 
 communication, which M. de Beauharnais, 1 the ambassador of 
 France, desired to make to his Royal Highness. Don Escoi'quiz, 
 consulted by the prince, in order to know what he should answer, 
 told him to say to the persons who had given him the letter, that 
 he did not interfere in any matter, and did not make any private 
 appointments. He offered the prince to find out exactly if this 
 message was really from the ambassador of France or not. 
 To be certain on this point might be very useful, because, if the 
 message were false, the aim of it could only be to lay a trap for 
 his Royal Highness, which it was important to find out; and that 
 if it were true, it was of the greatest consequence for the 
 interests of the prince not to lose the opportunity of becoming 
 acquainted with the intentions of Napoleon, both as regards the 
 position of the Prince of the Peace to the emperor, which was not 
 sufficiently known, as well as the marriage of the Prince of the 
 Asturias with one of the nieces of Napoleon, a subject on which 
 vague rumours were already in circulation. The reply of Don 
 Escoi'quiz showed the utility as well as the security which the 
 support of Napoleon would give to the prince, if this marriage 
 should suit his ambition or his vanity. 
 
 To this letter, which, owing to subsequent circumstances, 
 furnished documentary evidence at the Escurial trial, the Prince of 
 the Asturias replied, giving his unreserved approval. Thereupon 
 Don Escoi'quiz saw the Duke of Infantado, and, after having 
 told him of this new intrigue, asked him for an introduction, 
 under some plausible pretext, to the ambassador of France, 
 to whom he was not known. They chose as the pretext for the 
 introduction to the ambassador, who was considered, in Spain, 
 to be fond of literature, the presentation to him of a work 
 entitled The Conquest of Mexico, an epic poem written by 
 Don Escoi'quiz. The ambassador, without showing any surprise 
 
 1 Francois, Marquis de Beauharnais, brother-in-law of the Empress Josephine. 
 Born in 1756, he was deputy from Sologne ; emigrated in 1792, and served in 
 the army of Conde ; returning to France in 1800, he was nominated ambassador 
 at the court of the King of Etruria in 1805 ; then at Madrid. He was recalled 
 in 1808, and exiled to Sologne. Peer of France under the Restoration, he died 
 in 1823.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 255 
 
 at his supposed literary reputation replied to the Duke that 
 he received the book and the author with pleasure. After 
 a few words about the conquest of Mexico, and a few questions 
 or remarks, which drew gradually nearer the object of his 
 visit, Don Escoi'quiz opened his mind to the ambassador on 
 the subject of the message which was attributed to him, and 
 of the wish of the Prince of the Asturias to know the truth. 
 
 M. de Beauharnais displayed some embarrassment, evaded 
 the subject of the message, confining himself to saying that 
 such a step on his part would not be becoming towards the heir 
 to the throne, adding immediately, that his respect for the 
 Prince of the Asturias was such that he would be delighted to 
 have private opportunities of paying his court to his Royal 
 Highness. Don Escoi'quiz clearly saw that the ambassador 
 admitted more than he denied. Emboldened by the indecision 
 of M. de Beauharnais he explained in a manner more precise, 
 and led the ambassador to say, that a letter from the prince in 
 his hands would give him sufficient confidence to speak with 
 him (Escoi'quiz) of matters of the greatest interest to his Royal 
 Highness. To which Don Escoi'quiz replied laughing that it 
 appeared to him that skilful diplomats liked to be able to deny 
 messages, but that a sign agreed upon beforehand could produce 
 the same effects, and give the same amount of confidence. It 
 was then decided between them that as the court was coming to 
 Madrid in two or three days, the ambassador should present 
 himself, according to custom, at the head of the diplomatic corps, 
 to his Royal Highness, and that there the prince should ask him 
 if he had been to Naples ; that on leaving the ambassador, and 
 passing to another foreign minister, he should draw his hand- 
 kerchief from his pocket, and keep it in his hand for a moment. 
 
 On the 1st July, the ambassadors attended a presentation to 
 the princes, and his Royal Highness made the sign agreed upon. 
 Two days later, Don Escoi'quiz, informed of what had taken 
 place, went to the ambassador of France, from whom he 
 received most positive assurances of the affection which Napo- 
 leon entertained for the Prince of the Asturias, of the inclination 
 which he had to favour him in every way he could, and at the 
 same time of the small esteem in which he held the Prince
 
 256 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 of the Peace. Vague as these assurances were, Don Escoi'quiz, 
 somewhat elated at the new part he was playing, and anxious 
 on account of the position of the prince, exploded the question 
 of marriage, and even went so far as to say that the prince left 
 to Napoleon the choice of that niece of his whom he should 
 think fit to give him. Secrecy was recommended on both sides. 
 M. de Beauharnais wrote at once to Paris, and asked for the 
 necessary authorizations to negotiate with the king, Charles IV., 
 in order to prevent the Prince of the Asturias being com- 
 promised in the eyes of his father. 
 
 The vigilant watch kept by the Prince of the Peace over all 
 that concerned the French Embassy, had determined M. de 
 Beauharnais and Don Escoi'quiz to select for their first inter- 
 view a retired spot in the garden of the Retiro. Twenty 
 days had elapsed when Don Escoi'quiz received notice to be at 
 the spot agreed upon at two o'clock in the afternoon, when the 
 excessive heat would drive every one from the promenade. The 
 reply which the ambassador had received, was rather insignificant, 
 and did not allude to the proposition of marriage. M. de Beau- 
 harnais attributed this silence to the fact that there was nothing 
 officially written on the part of the prince, and he advised 
 Don Escoi'quiz to get His Royal Highness to write direct 
 to Napoleon. Don Escoi'quiz thought this step likely to cause 
 too many difficulties for him to dare to propose it; and he 
 persuaded, on his part, the ambassador to point out in his next 
 despatch, that the position of the prince did not admit of such a 
 delicate step being taken, until affairs were in a more advanced 
 stage. It may be doubted, owing to the vague language of M. 
 de Beauharnais, whether he had positive instructions ; but either 
 to serve the interests of the Beauharnais or that of the Bonapartes 1 
 he entered into an intrigue with the Prince of the Asturias, which 
 intrigue could only serve the views of the emperor. However 
 it may be, M. de Beauharnais promised to write again, and to 
 send to Don Escoi'quiz, who was obliged to return to Toledo, the 
 answer of Napoleon. 
 
 1 The Beauharnais wished the Prince of the Asturias to marry a niece of the 
 Empress Josephine, while the Bonapartes wished him to marry a daughter of 
 Lucicn. The emperor only wished what would serve his purpose — {Prince Talley- 
 rand).
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 257 
 
 Things remained in this state during the whole of the month 
 of August, and nearly the whole of September. It was only on 
 the 30th September, 1807, that Don Escoiquiz received at Toledo 
 a letter from the ambassador of France, in which were extracts 
 from Napoleon's letter, the following words being underlined : 
 
 " / do not buy, I do not sell, I do nothing without 
 
 guarantee. Have you received any letter, any official note on this 
 matter ? " The terms of blunt frankness employed in this letter, 
 induced Don Escoiquiz to go to Madrid. He saw M. de Beau- 
 harnais at the Retiro. At this meeting, the ambassador com- 
 plained that the prince had not had confidence in his first pro- 
 position, and he renewed it with greater insistence, saying, that 
 nothing was possible as long as his Royal Highness did not write 
 himself. Don Escoiquiz, who for a long time had been of opinion 
 that the support of Napoleon was the only means for the prince to 
 escape from the dangers he was incurring, allowed himself to be 
 persuaded. He drew up a draft of a letter, and M. de Beau- 
 harnais having agreed that the terms which were employed 
 would suit Napoleon, the canon sent it to the Prince of the 
 Asturias, who made a copy of it in his own hand, and forwarded 
 it to Don Escoiquiz to give to the ambassador. He inclosed 
 with it, a note in which he pointed out Don Escoiquiz as the 
 only man who had his entire confidence in this matter. The 
 letter of the Prince of the Asturias shows too clearly the 
 general feeling of the time, for it not to be here reproduced in 
 its entirety. 
 
 The Prince of the Asturias to the Emperor Napoleon. 
 
 "The Escurial, Oct. 11, 1807. 
 " SlRE, — I consider this day as the happiest of my life, seeing 
 that it affords me the opportunity of expressing to your Imperial 
 and Royal Majesty — to a hero, destined by Providence to 
 restore peace, order, and prosperity in Europe, threatened as 
 it is by a complete overthrow, and to strengthen tottering 
 thrones — the sentiments of regard, admiration and respect 
 with which your brilliant qualities inspire me. I should have 
 had, a long time since, this satisfaction, as well as that of assuring 
 your Imperial and Royal Majesty of the sincere desire which I 
 have to see increase happily the existing friendship between 
 our two houses, and to see this alliance, so advantageous to 
 VOL. 1. S
 
 258 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 both nations, become closer every day, by means of a marriage 
 which would unite me to a Princess of your Majesty's family. 
 But circumstances have obliged me to be silent, and it is 
 only in consequence of the explanations of M. de Beauharnais 
 and of the information which he has given me as to the wishes 
 of your Imperial Majesty, that I have resolved to speak. 
 
 " I fear that this step, so innocent in the terms in which I 
 make it, and in the position I- am in, might be considered as a 
 crime should it be discovered. 
 
 " Your Imperial and Royal Majesty knows much better than 
 I, that the best kings are the most exposed to become victims 
 of the artifices of the ambitious and intriguing men who surround 
 them. Our court is not free from such men, and the benevolence 
 and uprightness of my dear parents expose them the more to 
 be the victims of their unloyal plots. I fear then, that those 
 men may have obtained their consent to some other projected 
 marriage for me, more suitable to their own interests, and I take 
 the liberty of asking your Majesty to open the eyes of my dear 
 parents, and to get them to adopt the alliance which I beg to 
 ask of you. 
 
 " The least intimation on the part of your Majesty will suffice 
 to ruin all the prospects, and to destroy all the projects of those 
 selfish and malicious men, regarding their Majesties, my august 
 parents, who love your Majesty so sincerely. 
 
 " As for myself, full of respect and filial obedience towards 
 their Majesties, I can only play a passive part in this matter, and 
 this will be to refuse any alliance which shall not have the approval 
 of your Majesty, and I shall expect from your kind offices, the 
 happiness of my dear parents, that of my country, and my 
 own, by the marriage with the princess whom I hope to receive 
 from their hands, and from those of your Imperial and Royal 
 Majesty. 
 
 " I am, &c, 
 
 " (Signed) Ferdinand, Prince of the Asturias." 
 
 The Prince of the Peace was informed by the spies whom he 
 had in the house of M. de Beauharnais, of what was going on, 
 and he immediately got the king to write a letter, which his 
 ambassador, Prince Masserano, 1 had orders to carry imme- 
 diately to Napoleon, wherever he might be. This letter reached 
 
 1 Carlo Ferrero-Fieschi, Prince Masserano, captain of the body-guards of 
 Charles III., ambassador at Paris in 1805, and grandmaster of ceremonies of King 
 Joseph. He died in 1837.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 259 
 
 the emperor three days before he received that of M. de Beau- 
 harnais at Fontainebleau. 
 
 The King of Spain complained very strongly to Napoleon 
 of his being in secret communication with his son, and he 
 spoke of the letter, which no doubt Napoleon had received from 
 the Prince of the Asturias. 
 
 For some weeks, affairs in Spain remained in suspense ; 
 and suddenly they assumed a new aspect, owing to the unfore- 
 seen arrival of the French army in several provinces of the 
 kingdom. The apparent object of this singular arrangement 
 was, as one has seen above, to oblige the court of Portugal to 
 separate its cause from that of England. It was in consequence 
 of the communications made by the Prince of the Asturias, and of 
 the complaints made against him by his father to Napoleon, 
 that the latter, partly by threats, and partly by promises, induced 
 the Prince of the Peace to consent to the stipulations of the 
 two treaties of the 27th October, 1807, which we consider it our 
 duty to insert here, on account of their importance in the 
 question under consideration. We have already said that these 
 treaties had been negotiated at Fontainebleau with the utmost 
 secrecy, by Don Izquierdo, the secret agent of the Prince of the 
 Peace, and Marshal Duroc, that is to say, in reality, Napoleon 
 himself. The treaty ran thus : — 
 
 " His Majesty the Emperor of the French, King of Italy, &c. . . 
 and His Catholic Majesty the King of Spain, being spontaneously 
 desirous to regulate the interests of the two States, and to 
 determine the future condition of Portugal in a manner con- 
 formable to the policy of the two nations, have appointed for their 
 ministers plenipotentiary, namely: His Majesty the Emperor of 
 the French, General of Division Michael Duroc, Grand Marshal 
 of the Palace, &c, and His Catholic Majesty the King of Spain, 
 Don Eugene Izquierdo de Ribera y Lezaun, his honorary Coun- 
 cillor of State, &c. . ., who, after having exchanged their full 
 powers, have agreed upon what follows : 
 
 "Art. 1. — The provinces lying between the Minho and the 
 Duero, with the city of Oporto, 1 shall be given in all property and 
 sovereignty to His Majesty the King of Etruria, under the title 
 of King of Northern Lusitania. 
 
 1 That is to say the northern part of Portugal, minus the province of Tras-os- 
 montes. 
 
 S 2
 
 260 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 " Art. 2. — The kingdom of Alentejo and the kingdom of the 
 Algarves, 1 shall be given in all property and sovereignty to the 
 Prince of the Peace, to be henceforth known under the title 
 of Prince of the Algarves. 
 
 " Art. 3. — The provinces of Beira, Tras-os-montes and Portu- 
 guese Estramadura, 2 shall remain in pledge until the general 
 peace, when it will be disposed of according to circumstances, 
 and in a manner which will then be determined by the high 
 contracting parties. 
 
 " Art. 4. — The kingdom of Northern Lusitania shall be pos- 
 sessed by the hereditary descendants of His Majesty the King of 
 Etruria, conformably to the laws of succession adopted, by the 
 reigning family of His Majesty the King of Spain. 
 
 " Art. 5. — The principality of the Algarves shall be hereditary 
 with the issue of the Prince of the Peace conformably to the 
 laws of succession adopted by the reigning family of His 
 Majesty the King of Spain. 
 
 " Art. 6. — In default of a descendant or legitimate heir of the 
 King of Northern Lusitania, or of the Prince of the Algarves, 
 these countries shall be given by form of investiture to His 
 Majesty the King of Spain, on the condition that they shall 
 never be re-united under one head, nor re-united to the crown 
 of Spain. 
 
 " Art. 7. — The kingdom of Northern Lusitania and the prin- 
 cipality of the Algarves recognize also as protector His Catholic 
 Majesty the King of Spain, and the sovereigns of these countries 
 shall not in any case, make war or peace without his consent. 
 
 " Art. 8. — In case the provinces of Beira, Tras-os-montes, and 
 Portuguese Estramadura, held in pledge, should be, at the 
 general peace, returned to the House of Braganza in exchange 
 for Gibraltar, Trinity and other colonies that the English have 
 acquired from the Spanish and their allies, the new sovereign of 
 these provinces shall hold towards His Majesty the King of 
 Spain the same obligations which are held towards him by the 
 King of Northern Lusitania and the Prince of the Algarves. 
 
 "Art. 9. — His Majesty the King of Etruria cedes in all 
 property and sovereignty the kingdom of Etruria to His 
 Majesty the Emperor of the French, King of Italy. 
 
 " Art. 10. — When the definitive occupation of the provinces of 
 Portugal shall have been effected, the respective princes who will 
 be put in possession of them, shall name conjointly commissioners 
 to fix the proper limits. 
 
 1 All the southern part of Portugal, situated to the south of the Tagus, having 
 about 6oo,coo inhabitants. 
 
 2 All the central part of Portugal, situated between the Tagus and the Douroand, 
 besides, the province of Tras-os-montes, that is, nearly half of the kingdom.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 261 
 
 " Art. 1 1. — His Majesty the Emperor of the French, King 
 of Italy, guarantees to His Catholic Majesty the King of 
 Spain the possession of his states on the continent of Europe, 
 south of the Pyrenees. 
 
 "Art. 12. — His Majesty the Emperor of the French, King 
 of Italy, consents to recognize His Catholic Majesty the King 
 of Spain, as Emperor of the two Americas, at the date which 
 shall have been determined by His Catholic Majesty to take 
 this title, which will take place at the general peace, 'or at the 
 latest in three years hence. 
 
 "Art. 13. — It is understood between the two high contracting 
 parties that they shall divide equally between themselves the 
 islands, colonies and other maritime possessions of Portugal. 
 
 " Art. 14. — The present treaty shall be kept secret. It shall 
 be ratified, and the ratifications shall be exchanged at Madrid 
 twenty days at the latest after the date of the signing. 
 
 "Done at Fontainebleau, October 27, 1807. 
 
 "DUROC. 
 
 " E. IZQUIERDO." 
 
 Secret Convention of the Same Day. 
 
 " His Majesty the Emperor of the French, King of Italy, 
 &c, and His Catholic Majesty the King of Spain, desiring to 
 settle the bases of an arrangement relative to the conquest and 
 occupation of Portugal, in consequence of the stipulations of 
 the treaty signed to-day, have named, &c, who, after having 
 exchanged their full powers, have agreed upon the following 
 articles. 
 
 " Art. 1. — A corps of twenty-five thousand men of infantry, 
 and of three thousand cavalry, of the troops of His Imperial 
 Majesty will enter Spain to repair directly to Lisbon ; it will be 
 joined by a corps of eight thousand men of the Spanish infantry 
 and three thousand cavalry, with thirty pieces of artillery. 
 
 " Art. 2. — At the same time a division of ten thousand men 
 of the Spanish troops shall take possession of the province 
 of Entre-Minho-Duero and the city of Oporto, and another 
 division of six thousand men of the Spanish troops shall take 
 possession of Alentejo and of the kingdom of the Algarves. 
 
 "Art. 3. — The French troops shall be fed and supported 
 by Spain, and their pay shall be furnished by France during the 
 time of their march across Spain. 
 
 " Art. 4. — From the instant when the combined troops shall 
 have effected their entrance into Portugal, the government
 
 262 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 and administration of the provinces of Beira, Tras-os-montes 
 and of Portuguese Estramadura (which are to remain in pledge) 
 shall be handed to the general commanding the French troops, 
 and all contributions shall be raised to the profit of France. The 
 provinces which are to form the kingdom of Northern Lusitania 
 and the principality of the Algarves shall be administered and 
 governed by the Spanish divisions which shall take possession of 
 them, and the contributions there shall be levied to the profit of 
 Spain. 
 
 " Art. 5. — The central corps shall be under the orders of the 
 commander of the French troops, whom the Spanish troops 
 attached to this army shall be likewise bound to obey. Neverthe- 
 less in case the King of Spain or even the Prince of the Peace 
 should judge it proper to join this corps, the French troops as 
 well as the general who shall command them, shall submit to 
 their orders. 
 
 " Art. 6. — Another body of forty thousand men of French 
 troops shall be assembled at Bayonne on November 20 next, at 
 the latest, to be ready to enter Spain, for the purpose of going to 
 Portugal in case the English should send reinforcements or 
 threaten an attack. Nevertheless, this new corps shall not enter 
 Spain until the two high contracting parties shall have mutually 
 agreed on this point. 
 
 " Art. 7. — The present convention shall be ratified and the 
 ratifications shall be exchanged at the same time as those of 
 the treaty of this day. 
 
 " Done at Fontainebleau, October 27, 1807. 
 
 " DuROC. 
 
 " IZQUIERDO." 
 
 The entry of the French troops into Spain was considered in 
 various manners, according to the different interests which 
 then divided this unhappy country. 
 
 The Prince of the Peace regarded it as a means of putting 
 into execution his views on the sovereignty of a part of Portugal, 
 which had been assured to him by the treaty of Fontainebleau. 
 
 The persons attached to the Prince of the Asturias saw in 
 it a means employed by Napoleon to impose upon them the 
 Prince of the Peace, whom they supposed to be anxious to put 
 an obstacle in the way of the marriage of their prince and of the 
 abdication of King Charles which would result from it. 
 
 The mass of the Spanish people regarded Napoleon as a dis-
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 263 
 
 interested protector, who was going to relieve the nation from 
 the oppression of the Prince of the Peace, and establish with the 
 country relations which would be advantageous for France and 
 for Spain. 
 
 A few months afterwards all these chimeras vanished. In 
 the first place, the Prince of the Asturias was arrested at the end 
 of the month of October, as guilty of high treason. Later, the 
 Prince of the Peace barely escaped perishing in a riot, and only 
 escaped death by being in his turn thrown into prison. As to 
 the Spanish people, who had so desired the arrival of the French, 
 and who looked upon them as liberators, they had to suffer on 
 their part at Burgos, and above all at Madrid, a treatment 
 which they had been far from anticipating. 
 
 It was on the same day that the treaty of Fontainebleau 
 was signed, October 27, 1807, a * ten o'clock in the evening, that 
 the heir to the crown of Spain was arrested at the Escurial. They 
 accused him — these are the terms of the writ : — of having wished 
 to dethrone his father and of having tvislied to assassinate him. 
 The same writ stated that the king had received this intelligence 
 from an unknown source, and that the affair would be tried 
 before a tribunal, composed of the Governor of Castile, Don 
 Arias Mon, of Don Domingo Fernandez de Campomanes, and 
 of Don Sebastian de Torres. The duties of clerk to the court 
 were to be performed by Don Benito Arias de Prada, the 
 Court alcade. Out of regard for the person of the prince, they 
 charged the Governor of Castile and the Minister of Justice, 
 the Marquis de Cavallero 1 to receive his declarations. The 
 persons accused as accomplices were : Don Escoi'quiz, the Duke 
 of Infantado, the Marquis d'Orgaz, Count de Bornos, Don Juan 
 Emmanuel de Villena, Don Pedro Giraldo. Imprisoned in the 
 cells of the Escurial, they were deprived of all communication 
 between themselves and the outer world. To the three judges I 
 have just named, and at their request, after two months and a 
 half of examination, eight other judges drawn from the Council 
 
 1 Joseph, Marquis de Cavallero, born at Saragossa in 1760, Fiscal of the Supreme 
 Council of war in 1794, Minister of Justice, 1798. He was dismissed in 1808, but 
 remained Councillor of State and head of the Council of Finances. President of the 
 Section of Justice at the Council of State under King Joseph, he took refuge in 
 France in 1814, returned to Spain in 1820, and died in 1821.
 
 264 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 of Castile were added. The number of judges was thus increased 
 to eleven. 
 
 They declared unanimously on January II, 1808, that the 
 prince and the others accused were not guilty. The verdict 
 was sent to the king who did not publish it, and who, a few 
 days after, exiled to various different parts all the persons 
 against whom the accusation had been directed. The Prince 
 of the Asturias was consigned to his palace. 
 
 During the course of the trial, the number of French troops 
 entering the kingdom increased, and they took position at places 
 near Madrid, such as Segovia, Avila 1 Olmedo and Aranda de 
 Duero. 
 
 These positions, which were not on the route of an 
 expedition coming from France to go to Portugal, and the 
 manner in which they took possession of Pampeluna and 
 Barcelona, 2 might lead one to believe in some menacing inten- 
 tions towards Spain itself. Explanations between the two 
 governments dissipated for a moment this uneasiness, but not 
 enough however to prevent the Prince of the Peace believing he 
 ought to give to the Spanish troops who were marching towards 
 Portugal, under the command of Lieutenant-General Solano, 
 orders to retrace their steps. 3 
 
 The ambassador of France pretended to be ignorant of this, 
 and a few days after received an order to say that the Spanish 
 government, by the movement it had just had made by its troops, 
 having failed in the plans agreed upon and necessary for the 
 occupation of Portugal, the emperor found himself obliged, in 
 order to ensure the success of the expedition, to introduce into 
 Spain forces much greater than those of which the treaty 
 authorized the introduction. For fear of a counter order from 
 the Spanish government, which, in effect, arrived soon after, 
 Napoleon had his troops make forced marches, and, in a few 
 days, he occupied other places in Catalonia, Navarra and 
 Guipuscoa such as Figuera, San-Sebastian, &c. 
 
 1 Segovia and Avila are situated at only about sixty miles north-west of Madrid. 
 
 2 These two cities were carried by force and by surprise by the French troops. 
 
 3 Don Francisco Solano, Marquis del Socorro (1770- 1808). A fervent admirer 
 and partisan of France, he served as a common soldier in the army of Moreau. 
 Named later Captain-General of Andalusia, he tried to prevent, and afterwards to 
 quell, the insurrection, and was assassinated at Cadiz in a riot.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 265 
 
 The Court of Spain wished to appear reassured ; the communi- 
 cations between the two governments followed the usual course, 
 while the country was invaded, without at all comprehending 
 such grave events. The Prince of the Peace began, nevertheless, 
 to lose a little of the confidence he had in Napoleon, and thought 
 of proceeding with the royal family towards the port of Cadiz. 
 Without daring at first to disclose all his projects, he confined 
 himself to proposing a journey to Andalusia. On March 13, 1808, 
 he made the proposition to the king, who adopted the plan and 
 gave that very night the necessary orders to the Marquis de 
 Mos, Grand Master of the Palace, to the first Secretary of 
 State, Don Pedro Cevallos, 1 and to the Marquis of Cavallero, 
 Minister of Justice. 
 
 This departure, at first fixed for a near day, was put off to 
 March 16, which gave time for the Marquis de Cavallero to 
 oppose a project which he disapproved. His private opinion 
 was that the king ought to wait at Madrid or at Aranjuez for 
 the arrival of Napoleon to take with him a determination upon 
 the political affairs of the two countries. The reasons given 
 by the Marquis de Cavallero to the king, in the presence of the 
 queen, produced a sufficient impression to cause him to revoke 
 the order for the journey, which was beginning to be no longer a 
 secret. The requisitions made in order to procure carriages and 
 horses for conveyance, the departure of Madame Tudo, 1 who 
 had crossed Aranjuez in a travelling carriage, accompanied by 
 her children ; all these circumstances had caused agitation 
 among the people. 
 
 A decree badly drawn up, whose object was to reassure, and 
 which produced a contrary effect, increased the indignation 
 already so strong against the Prince of the Peace. They accused 
 him loudly of having counselled the king to abandon Madrid. 
 This counsel, they said, could only come from a man who sought 
 to fill the soul of the king with personal fears ; the moment has 
 come, said they, for delivering the country from his oppressor. 
 
 1 Don Pedro Cevallos, born in 1764, was Minister of Foreign Affairs. Deeply 
 attached to the Prince of the Asturias, he was constantly the adversary of King Joseph, 
 and became the leader of the National Junta. He was disgraced in 1820, and died in 
 1840. He had married a niece of the Prince of the Peace. 
 
 2 Dona Josepha Tudo was the mistress of the Prince of the Peace. Some people 
 have pretended that they were united by a secret marriage.
 
 266 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The body-guard, which, for several months, had not received 
 their pay, showed themselves discontented at a journey burden- 
 some to them ; the palace servants, whose wages were equally 
 behindhand, and who found some aid at Madrid and at Aran- 
 juez, were in great uneasiness. Their fears spread among the 
 lower people ; the agitation had been manifesting itself for 
 several days ; the hatred which the people bore towards the 
 Prince of the Peace was still increased by the instigations of those 
 who, fearing his return and his vengeance, would without grief 
 have seen him perish in an insurrection. Popular risings are 
 very convenient for intriguers ; the threads are broken there 
 and researches become impossible. No measure of precaution 
 had been taken ; there were at Aranjuez only the number of 
 troops necessary for ordinary duty ; and besides they had not 
 chosen those upon whom they might count the most. Two 
 Swiss regiments, faithful and available, had been left and almost 
 forgotten at Madrid. 
 
 In this state of affairs, the slightest event might have in- 
 calculable results. On the night of the 17th to the iSth of March, 
 before midnight, a quarrel, in which were fired several pistol 
 shots between a patrol of carabineers and some body-guards, 
 became the signal for the insurrection. The people came out in 
 crowds ; passion carried them towards the house of the Prince of 
 the Peace ; they broke open the doors. The body-guard who were 
 at Aranjuez, and the Spanish guards and Walloons, consulting 
 only their duty, endeavoured to quell the disturbance. In spite 
 of all their efforts the house was sacked ; the rioters, however, 
 did not find the prince who had taken refuge on the roof, at a 
 place which by foresight he had had prepared, and that each year 
 of his administration had rendered more necessary. The people, 
 in the midst of this tumult, were particular to testify by the cries 
 of: "Down with Godoy ! Long live the king! Long live the 
 queen ! " who was the real object of their hatred ; they paid even 
 some marks of regard to the Princess of the Peace whom they led 
 to the palace with the Duchess of Alcudia, her daughter. The 
 effervescence lasted through the night, and at daybreak, the 
 people wishing to show the king their respect and attachment, 
 repaired to the palace, demanding to see the king, who came out
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 267 
 
 upon the balcony with all the royal family ; and there, several 
 times, they were applauded and greeted by the most lively 
 demonstrations of love and fidelity. A few signs of kindness and 
 of sensibility from the king, and the condescension shown in de- 
 claring himself that he would deprive the Prince of the Peace of the 
 offices of general-in-chief and admiral, sufficed to cause the with- 
 drawal of this multitude and to restore tranquillity for that day. 
 
 The troops, re-assured by the disposition of the people 
 towards the king, saw with pleasure the humiliation of the 
 Prince of the Peace. He was believed to have fled, and the crowd 
 which at first seemed only to wish to be delivered from him 
 retired and appeared satisfied. On the 19th, however, the rumour 
 spread in the city that the prince was hidden in his house ; he 
 had been discovered by a sentinel who refused to give him the 
 means of escape. The people ran in from all sides ; the prince, 
 perceiving some troops in the street, darted out ; before he could 
 reach the body-guards who surrounded him, he received several 
 blows upon the head. The king, informed of what was taking 
 place, and thinking that the Prince of the Asturias would have 
 more influence over the people than himself, induced his son to go 
 and announce to this immense crowd, that the Prince of the Peace 
 would be put on his trial. The Prince of the Asturias executed 
 promptly the orders of his father ; he addressed himself to those 
 who appeared the most excited and promised them, if they 
 would retire, that the prince should be led to prison and tried 
 according to the full rigour of the laws. These promises, the 
 distance that was gradually covered, the watch of the body- 
 guards brought the Prince of the Peace to the barracks of the 
 guards. They closed the gates, and he was taken to a room, 
 which by one of those chances destined to give men great lessons, 
 happened to be the same that he occupied when he was a simple 
 body-guard. 
 
 In the first moment, the king resolved to send the Prince 
 of the Peace to Grenada, to the castle of the Alhambra ; this 
 project was soon renounced, because it was feared that the 
 people might manifest displeasure at seeing him sent away and 
 perhaps escape, for whom they demanded chastisement. 
 
 The irresolution in which the absence of the Prince of the
 
 268 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Peace left the king, the uneasiness which filled his mind, the little 
 confidence he had in himself, the perfectly material life that he 
 had led for many years, everything in fine made him think that 
 his health was feeble enough so that in such difficult circum- 
 stances, he might, without dishonour, abdicate the throne. 
 
 Perhaps he was also influenced by the fear he had, as well 
 as the queen, of seeing massacred under their own eyes the man 
 who, for so long a time and with such sway, had enjoyed their 
 confidence and all their favour ; but finally, this determination, 
 whatever may have been the motive, was taken without having 
 consulted any one. The king had Don Cevallos called and 
 ordered him to draw up an act of abdication. Don Cevallos 
 had already been informed of this resolution of the king by 
 the members of the diplomatic corps whom His Majesty had 
 seen in the morning, and before whom he had formally declared 
 that circumstances impelled him to put into execution a project 
 which his age and his infirmities had led him to conceive long 
 before, and that he was going to entrust the crown to hands 
 younger and more able to sustain the burden of it. The king, 
 addressing himself afterwards directly to Count Strogonoff, 1 
 minister of Russia, said to him, with an air of satisfaction, 
 that he had never taken a resolution that was more agreeable 
 to him. His language was the same throughout the day with 
 the persons whom he had occasion to see, and particularly with 
 the ministers, the captain of the body-guard, and the colonel of 
 the Walloons. 
 
 On the 19th, in the evening, the act of abdication being signed, 
 and invested with all the necessary formalities, the king ordered 
 the Prince of the Asturias to come into his presence, com- 
 municated it to him, and had it published. The prince, 
 immediately after having kissed the hand of the king, his father, 
 received by his order the felicitations and homage of the House 
 of His Majesty and of all the court. 
 
 The new king, desiring to have the first act of his reign 
 agreeable to his father, took on the instant, the measures he 
 judged most proper to arrest the movements of the people which 
 
 1 Gregory Alexandrowitch, Count Strogonoff, ambassador of Russia at Constan- 
 tinople, then at Madrid and at London. He died in 1857.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 269 
 
 at Madrid were directed against the relations and friends of 
 the Prince of the Peace. The ministers of the King Charles IV. 
 were retained in their offices, with the exception of Don Solar 
 who, being a partisan of the Prince of the Peace, had been 
 obliged in the first moments of the outbreak at Aranjuez to hold 
 himself aloof. They replaced him by Don de Azanza, 1 former 
 viceroy of Mexico ; the Duke of Infantado, to whom public 
 opinion was favourable, became president of the Council of Castile 
 and colonel of the Spanish Guards. The Prince of the Peace was 
 transferred to Pinto under the guard of Lieutenant-General 
 Marquis de Castellar. 
 
 The first arrangements made, the new king thought it proper 
 for him to repair to Madrid and to pass some time there. This 
 resolution, to which he was led at the instance of the people 
 of the capital, and perhaps also by the secret desire that he had 
 to see a general sanction given to the abrupt and important 
 acts which had taken place at Aranjuez, may have had a very 
 great influence over the destinies of Spain, since by this step 
 Ferdinand closed for himself the road to Andalusia. This 
 reflection was no doubt overlooked by the Grand Due de Berg, 2 
 who, on being informed of the project of the king, instructed M. 
 de Beauharnais to repair to Aranjuez, to dissuade His Majesty 
 from coming to Madrid, while so many French troops were 
 there. The king while refusing to accede to the proposition 
 made to him by the ambassador, put forward the engagements 
 he had taken with his capital. 
 
 The arrival of the king at Madrid was announced by a 
 proclamation, and had the effect of re-establishing order in the 
 city. The inhabitants of all classes hurried to meet him, and 
 with the most lively and most affectionate expressions, testified 
 to him their joy, and showed the hopes the new reign raised in 
 them. 
 
 1 Don Jose Miquel de Azanza, born in 1746, was at first charge d'affaires in 
 Russia, then in Prussia. He entered the army afterwards, was appointed Minister of 
 War in 1795, then Viceroy of Mexico. Having returned to Spain in 1799, he 
 became Minister of Finances on the accession of Ferdinand (1808). He was one of 
 the first to attach himself to King Joseph, became Minister of Justice, then of Foreign 
 Affairs. Exiled in 1814, he took refuge in France, where he died. 
 
 2 Murat, Grand Due de Berg, was then lieutenant of the Emperor in Spain, and 
 resided at Madrid.
 
 270 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The object, which at this moment filled all minds and occupied 
 them solely, did not allow them to perceive the situation in which 
 the country was placed. Very few of the inhabitants of Madrid 
 knew that the city was surrounded by 60,000 Frenchmen, and on 
 March 23, when the Grand Due de Berg, followed by his staff- 
 officers, entered Madrid, he astonished the greater number of the 
 inhabitants who were ignorant of his arrival in the kingdom, and 
 he frightened no one. The species of revolutionary giddiness 
 which agitated the minds, led the multitude to believe there 
 were no dangers which could not be conquered by men who had 
 defeated the power of the Prince of the Peace. 
 
 On the day after the arrival of King Ferdinand VII. in 
 Madrid, the foreign ministers, with the exception of the am- 
 bassador of France, the minister of Holland and the charge 
 d'affaires of Saxony, 1 presented themselves at the palace to have 
 the honour of paying their respects to the new king. 
 
 M. de Beauharnais, ambassador of France, saw him in private, 
 and announced the approaching arrival of the emperor in Spain. 
 The relations he had previously had with the king, authorized 
 him in believing that he might counsel him to go and meet 
 Napoleon. He tried to induce him even to pursue his journey 
 as far as Bayonne, assuring him that the emperor, touched by 
 this proof of confidence, would not delay a moment in recogniz- 
 ing him as King of Spain, and according him one of his nieces 
 in marriage. The ambassador added that it would be suitable 
 for the king to take the necessary precautions for putting the life 
 of the Prince of the Peace out of all danger, and for giving his 
 orders to have the procedure which had been commenced against 
 him suspended. The Grand Due de Berg, who saw King 
 Ferdinand VII. at the house of the Queen of Etruria on two 
 occasions, used the same language, with this difference, that in 
 speaking of the Prince of the Peace, his expressions were less 
 measured than those of M. de Beauharnais. Both, in addressing 
 the king, used no title except that of Royal Highness, and even 
 displayed some affectation in making use of this title. The king 
 
 1 The minister of Holland was M. de Verhuell, and the charge d'affaires of 
 Saxony Baron von Forell. As is known, Louis Bonaparte was then King of 
 Holland and the King of Saxony was entirely devoted to Napoleon, which explains 
 the reserve of the two diplomatists.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 271 
 
 made no agreement with them ; his replies were polite, and a 
 slight embarrassment enabled him to make them very laconic. 
 
 The difficult circumstances in which King Ferdinand found 
 himself, induced him to form a private council immediately. 
 He composed it of Dons Infantado, Escoi'quiz, San Carlos, 1 
 Cevallos, Cavallero, Olaguer, and Gil de Lemos. The Duke of 
 San Carlos had the position of grand master of the household of the 
 king, the Marquis de Mos, who had filled it, having been dismissed. 
 The king charged Don Escoi'quiz to follow up particularly all the 
 affairs that the cabinet might have to treat of with the ambassa- 
 dor of France and the Due de Berg. The choice of Don Escoi'quiz 
 had been determined by the idea that the ambassador of France, 
 whose position was believed to be uneasy, would feel more at 
 home, or, what would amount to the same thing, more em- 
 barrassed with Don Escoi'quiz than with any other member of 
 the council. 
 
 The first conference of Don Escoi'quiz with the ambassador 
 of France took place a few days later, but it threw no light 
 upon the state of affairs. The Grand Due de Berg was present ; 
 the language used was the same. In the menacing volubility of 
 Murat, and the meek, vague and reserved words of M. de Beau- 
 harnais, Don Escoi'quiz believed he could see that the real 
 interest of the two principal personages that were supposed to 
 act by direct order of Napoleon, bore especially upon the 
 journey of Ferdinand VII. to Bayonne, where he was to find 
 the emperor, and upon the interruption of the trial of the Prince 
 of the Peace. M. de Beauharnais, restrained and directed in this 
 conference by the language of the Grand Due de Berg, perceived 
 that he had not, up to that time, been thoroughly on the side of 
 his government, and like people who change opinion, not from 
 reflection but solely from interest, he threw himself without 
 
 1 Don Jo c e Miquel de Carvajal, Duke of San Carlos, born in 1771, was brigadier- 
 general, then chamberlain of the Prince of the Asturias and governor of his children : 
 Viceroy of Navarra in 1807. He was compromised in the plot of the Escurial and 
 disgraced in 1808. Ferdinand afterwards recalled him to his council. The duke 
 followed his master to Valencay, but was afterwards confined at Lons-le-Saunier. He 
 returned to Spain in 1814, was named minister of state, then ambassador at 
 Vienna (18 15) and at London (181 7). After the Revolution of 1820, he retired to 
 Lucca, where an Infanta of Spain (the Duchess Maria Louisa, former Queen of 
 Etruria), was reigning, and was named by her minister to France. After the return 
 of Ferdinand, he became ambassador of Spain at Paris. He died in 1828.
 
 272 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 reserve into all the ideas of the Grand Due de Berg, in whom 
 he did not inspire so much confidence as that he had lost on the 
 part of King Ferdinand. The Grand Due de Berg terminated 
 this conference by observing to Don Escoi'quiz that it was im- 
 portant to take measures to put an end to the agitation raised 
 among the people by the presence of so large a number of 
 Frenchmen in Madrid. 
 
 This change of feeling towards the French came from the 
 people's believing they no longer had need of them. They were 
 delivered by their own efforts from the oppression of the Prince 
 of the Peace, and were full of confidence in their new king ; thus 
 no longer regarding the French as liberators, they found them 
 very dear and inconvenient guests. 
 
 Don Escoi'quiz reported to the council the result of his 
 conference with the Grand Due de Berg and the ambassador 
 of France. Thereupon his colleagues associated with him for 
 further conferences the Duke of Infantado ; and both 
 were instructed by the king to go to Murat and say to him 
 that it was the intention of King Ferdinand VII. to go to 
 meet the emperor as soon as he should have certain news of his 
 arrival on the frontier, but that the letters from France did not 
 advise him yet of his departure from Paris ; that, as to the 
 Prince of the Peace, his trial could not be suspended, because 
 the prosecution and the publicity of this act of justice were 
 one of his duties towards the nation, but he promised that the 
 sentence, whatever it might be, should not be executed until 
 after having been submitted to the approval of the emperor. 
 Dons Infantado and Escoi'quiz added that they had just 
 taken the most efficacious measures to restore tranquillity in 
 Madrid, and, in effect, it had been ordered that all house- 
 owners should patrol night and day the quarters in which 
 they lived. The garrison of Madrid, at the request of the 
 Grand Due de Berg, had been reduced to two battalions of 
 Spanish guards and Walloons, and the body-guards. This 
 small number of troops were employed in seeing the orders of 
 the magistrates of police executed, and in putting a stop to 
 the quarrels which might arise between the inhabitants of 
 the city and the French.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 273 
 
 These answers did not satisfy Murat, who, after having 
 insisted most strenuously as to the suspension of the trial 
 of the Prince of the Peace, complained bitterly of the delays 
 experienced in the execution and even in the replies to all 
 the demands he made for the support of his troops. These 
 new complaints would furnish special motives for independent 
 action, of which he could make use according to his views, 
 and this remark received, a few days after, its application. A 
 body of troops on horseback, under the pretext of seeking 
 fodder, came with artillery to occupy the heights of Pinto. 
 The Marquis de Castellar informed the king of this new move- 
 ment of the French. After some altercation between the Grand 
 Due de Berg and the Spanish government on this subject, the 
 latter decided that the Prince of the Peace should be trans- 
 ferred from Pinto to the Castle of Villa Viciosa situated 
 three leagues from Madrid, and where there were no French 
 troops. 
 
 The council of the king believed itself perfectly secure on 
 this point, when the Grand Due de Berg sent for the Duke of 
 Infantado and Don Escoi'quiz and declared to them that he 
 had received new orders from the emperor demanding that the 
 person of the Prince of the Peace should be delivered into his 
 hands. He engaged to have him taken out of Spain, and gave 
 his word of honour that he should never re-enter the country, 
 adding that the will of the emperor was so precise that it was 
 his duty to take possession of the Prince of the Peace by force, 
 if he were not given up immediately. The king authorized 
 Dons Infantado and Escoi'quiz to reply that the arrival of the 
 emperor was announced as being very near at hand, and that 
 it Avould be so decisive for the internal affairs of Spain, of which 
 he was going to be the arbiter, that he did not doubt that the 
 Grand Due would put off until that moment the mode of 
 action which he had threatened to employ. They added that 
 if he resorted to force to carry off the Prince of the Peace, his 
 safety would certainly be compromised, in consequence of the 
 inevitable popular rising which would be provoked by such a 
 measure. 
 
 To the menacing instances of Murat were added those of 
 vol. 1. T
 
 274 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the ambassador and of General Savary. 1 The latter, in pre- 
 senting the same demands in the name of the emperor, whom 
 he had left only a few days before, brought positive news of his 
 arrival at Bordeaux. He was pleased to speak of the disposition 
 of Napoleon for Ferdinand VII., employing all the terms calcu- 
 lated to inspire confidence. Thus, he assured the new king that 
 he would be recognized ; that his marriage would be concluded ; 
 that the integrity of Spain would be guaranteed at the first 
 interview that the prince would have with the emperor ; and 
 that, for so many advantages, the emperor wished only to hear 
 from the mouth of the prince, in whom he confided, that Spain, 
 under his authority, would be as faithful an ally of France as it 
 had been after the Family Compact. 2 
 
 The same demands, the same replies repeated for several 
 days left matters in the same state, up to the 8th of April, when 
 the king, after having taken the advice of his council, decided to 
 send the Infante Don Carlos 3 to meet Napoleon. The prince 
 was to go even to Paris, if he did not find the emperor on the 
 road. He was the bearer of a letter from the king, his brother, 
 in which, after having spoken of the desire to form the closest 
 alliance with the emperor, and having renewed his demand for 
 one of his nieces in marriage, he announced that he would go 
 to meet His Majesty, as soon as he should be aware of his 
 approaching the frontiers of Spain. He concluded his letter by 
 leaving to the equitable decision of His Majesty the affair of 
 the Prince of the Peace. 
 
 The Infante departed with this letter April 9. He was 
 accompanied by the Duke of Hijar, Don Vallejo, Don Macanaz, 4 
 
 1 Rene Savary, born in 1774 a! Marc, near Vouziers, entered the army at an early 
 age, and was colonel of gendarmes in 1800. Closely attached to the emperor, he 
 became general of division and Due de Rovigo, and was named ambassador at St. 
 Petersburg in 1807. In 1808, he commanded for a short time the French troops in 
 Spain. He became Minister of Police in 1810. Having been sentenced to death 
 per contumaciam in 1815, he returned to France and had the sentence quashed. He 
 lived in retirement under the Restoration. In 1831, he was named Governor of 
 Algeria, and died in 1833. 
 
 - The treaty concluded in August, 1761, by which all the branches of the House 
 of Pourbon agreed mutually to assist one another. — {Translator.) 
 
 3 The Infante Don Carlos, second son of King Charles, was born in 1788. In 
 1S08, he accompanied Ferdinand to Valencay, and did not return to Spain until 1814. 
 At the death of the king, his brother, he vainly claimed the throne in the name of 
 the Salic law. The Carlist party dates from that time. 
 
 4 Don Pedro Macanaz, born in 1760, was Secretary of Embassy in Russia. He
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 275 
 
 and the Marquis of Feria. At Bayonne, he found the Duke of 
 Frijas, the Duke of Medina-Cceli, and Count of Fernan-Nunez, 1 
 already sent by King Ferdinand to pay his respects to Napo- 
 leon, who a few days after arrived at Bayonne. 
 
 The news of his departure from Paris, reached Madrid on 
 April 11. King Ferdinand, harassed by all the claims of the 
 Grand Due de Berg, the entreaties of General Savary, and the 
 suggestions of M. de Beauharnais, took the resolution of leaving 
 on the 10th for Burgos. His ministers had advised this unani- 
 mously. Seeing that the king could neither negotiate nor defend 
 himself, nor escape, they thought there was no other course for 
 this unhappy prince to take, than to place himself with confi- 
 dence in the hands of Napoleon. 
 
 They could not negotiate seeing that Ferdinand VII. had not 
 been recognized : Napoleon had not replied to any of his letters, 
 and there was reason to suspect that the frequent communications 
 which took place between the king, the queen and the Grand 
 Due de Berg, through the medium of the Queen of Etruria, had 
 for their object to induce King Charles to withdraw his abdi- 
 cation. These secret negotiations, which had adjutant-general 
 de Monthion, 2 for messenger, and the Queen of Etruria for 
 instrument, produced the antedated act of March 21, in which 
 King Charles declares : 
 
 " I protest and declare that my decree of March 19, by which 
 I abdicate the crown in favour of my son, is an act to which I 
 was forced in order to prevent the greatest misfortunes, and the 
 shedding of the blood of my beloved subjects. It must, in con- 
 sequence, be regarded as of no value. 
 
 " I, the King." 
 
 accompanied the princes of Spain into France, was shut up for some time at Vin- 
 cennes, and kept afterward under supervision at Paris. In 1 8 14, he became Minister 
 of Justice, was arrested for malversations and suffered two years imprisonment. He 
 died shortly after. 
 
 1 Count of Fernan-Nunez, born in 1778, was one of the most ardent supporters of 
 the Prince of the Asturias. He accepted, nevertheless, the office of Grand Veneur* 
 at the court of King Joseph ; but having been convicted of treason, he was forced to 
 fly. In 1815, he was named by Ferdinand ambassador at London, and then at Paris 
 in 1817. He died in 1821. 
 
 2 General Monthion had been instructed by Murat to approach Charles IV. for 
 the purpose of pressing him to protest against his first abdication in favour of Fer- 
 dinand. (See on this episode Memoirs on the Affairs of Spain, by Abbe de Pradt.) 
 
 * Grand- Master of the Hunt. 
 
 T 2
 
 276 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The natural result of this protest, which was as yet only 
 suspected by the ministers of Ferdinand VII., must be an 
 appeal of King Charles to Napoleon against his rebellious and 
 usurping son. 
 
 It could not be prevented ; the essential forces of the king- 
 dom were enfeebled by the absence of a corps of nearly twenty 
 thousand men, who, under the command of the Marquis de la 
 Romana, were fighting in the north of Europe with the French 
 armies. Ferdinand VII. had hardly three thousand men about 
 him ; the people were without arms, and when, under any 
 pretext whatever, the government spoke of bringing a few 
 battalions to Madrid, the Grand Due de Berg opposed it with 
 all the boldness inspired by the one hundred and fifty thousand 
 men whom he commanded. 
 
 Flight was impossible ; the least preparation would have 
 betrayed the project ; the suspicion aroused by the attempted 
 escape of Charles IV., some days before, kept the people upon 
 the alert. The king was surrounded by spies, perhaps even 
 in the very council, although Don Cavallero and Don Olaguer 
 were no longer members of it, and had been replaced by 
 Don Penuelas and Don O'Farril. 1 Besides, to retire without 
 an army, without strongholds, and without money, even to 
 Algesiras, was a desperate step. The council was lacking in 
 energy. 
 
 Besides, it was known that, in a treaty drafted at Paris about 
 March 20 by Don Izquierdo, Napoleon had inserted among the 
 bases of an agreement, the obligation for Spain to cede to him 
 a portion of her territory by fixing the Ebro as the boundary of 
 the two countries. No one revolted at this idea ; everybody, it 
 is true, grieved at the necessity of making this sacrifice, but it 
 was hoped that, at the moment of the marriage, Napoleon 
 would forego his project, and restrict himself to securing the 
 military route which was necessary for France in order to com- 
 municate with Portugal, and to obtain for French commerce, the 
 
 1 Don Gonzalo O'Farril, born in 1753 of an Irish family in the service of Spain, 
 was lieutenant-general and inspector of infantry. After the departure of the king, he 
 was a member of the Junta of government presided over by the Infante Don Antonio. 
 Nevertheless, he recognized King Joseph, and served him faithfully. Condemned to 
 death in 1814, he took refuge in France, where he died.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 277 
 
 free introduction into France of the products of the Spanish 
 colonies. 
 
 Ferdinand VII., before leaving Madrid, entrusted the care of 
 the government, during the time of his absence, to a Junta 
 presided over by the Infante Don Antonio, 1 his uncle, and com- 
 posed of Dons Penuelas, O'Farril and Azanza. He was accom- 
 panied by the Dukes of Infantado and of San Carlos, and by 
 Dons Cevallos, Escoi'quiz, Musquiz, Labrador, 2 and a very small 
 number of attendants. He had with him only a single squadron 
 of the body-guards. Two companies of Spanish guards and 
 Walloons were ordered to await him at Burgos. He took three 
 days to reach there. The determination that had been taken 
 had been preceded by so much irresolution, that all motives for 
 retarding his progress agreed with the disposition in which the 
 king and his retinue were at the time. The king found the 
 roads covered with French troops all armed, and did not meet 
 with a single Spanish soldier on his route. At Burgos, Marshal 
 Bessieres was in command of a body of nearly ten thousand 
 men ; he offered to the king to reach Vittoria by means of the 
 relays prepared for Napoleon ; the king availed himself of 
 them. General Savary, who had accompanied him so far, went 
 on in advance to Bayonne, whence he returned on the 18th 
 to Vittoria with new instructions. Vittoria was occupied by 
 the first brigade of General Verdier's division, which was 
 composed of nearly four thousand men. General Lefebvre 
 had brought, on the evening before, from Burgos, two hundred 
 dragoons of the guard, and Lieutenant-Colonel Henri was 
 there with fifty chosen gendarmes. On the 20th, Marshal 
 Bessieres was to be there with four battalions of Napoleon's 
 guard. 
 
 King Ferdinand VII. took up his quarters at the Vittoria 
 town-hall, and remained there three days. General Savary 
 brought him a letter from Napoleon. In spite of the ob- 
 
 1 The Infante Don Antonio, brother of King Charles IV., was born in 1755. He 
 had married his niece, the Infanta Maria- Amelia. 
 
 2 Pedro Gomez Kavelo, Marquis de Labrador, born in 1775. He was in 1807 
 minister of Spain at Florence. He accompanied King Ferdinand to Valencay, was 
 in 1814 named councillor of state, ambassador at Paris, and plenipotentiary at the 
 Congress of Vienna. He became after this, ambassador at Naples, then at Rome, 
 and died in 1850.
 
 278 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 scurity of some of the expressions of this letter, the difficulties 
 of the situation in which King Ferdinand found himself were 
 such that he felt inclined to put a favourable interpretation upon 
 all that came from Napoleon, and this disposition was shared 
 by all the persons attached to the king, even by those who 
 had preceded him to Bayonne. Count of Fernan-Nunez, Dons 
 Hijar, Vallejo, and Macanaz wrote that they anticipated the 
 happiest results from the interview about to take place between 
 the two sovereigns. 
 
 The king, decided though he was to go on to Bayonne, 
 liked to have reasons given him for continuing his route. Several 
 times in the day, he took the advice of his council, and although 
 the opinion was always the same, he consulted them still. The 
 slow progress occasioned by the inaction in which they remained 
 during three days, gave uneasiness to General Savary, who had 
 orders to bring the princes to Bayonne, willingly or by force. 
 Plans were made to carry them off on the 19th, if, during the 
 day of the 18th, a last attempt at persuasion did not succeed. 
 The town-hall was to be surrounded on the 19th, in the 
 morning, by the infantry of General Verdier ; three pieces of 
 artillery, loaded with grape-shot, were to be placed at the three 
 gates of the city ; General Savary, at the head of his gendarmes, 
 and supported by a hundred men of light infantry, was to force 
 his way into the palace. All these arrangements proved useless, 
 the king having announced that he would leave the next day 
 at nine o'clock in the morning. At the moment the king 
 stepped into his carriage, popular instinct collected a great 
 crowd around it ; they cut the traces of the mules ; cries 
 of fury were heard on all sides. This tumult might have 
 become very serious, if the king had not decided at once 
 to make a proclamation the effect of which upon the people 
 was remarkable ; their cries became tears, and shortly after 
 they became prostrated. The mules were again put to the 
 carriages ; the body-guards mounted their horses and all set out. 
 At eleven o'clock in the evening, the king arrived at Irun with 
 his retinue. He alighted at the house of Don Olazabal, which 
 was outside that little city. It was guarded by a battalion of the 
 king's regiment. General Savary did not arrive at Irun until the
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 279 
 
 20th at seven o'clock in the morning. An accident to his 
 carriage had caused this delay. 
 
 Thus, the king and his attendants were eight hours alone, 
 without a French escort in a Spanish house on the seashore, 
 where several boats were fastened to stakes placed in the garden 
 itself. General Savary, on alighting from his carriage, repaired 
 in great haste and perplexity to the house where the king 
 was staying, and found him asleep. At eight o'clock in the 
 morning, they all left for Bayonne. At the moment when the 
 king arrived on French territory, detachments of the Imperial 
 Guards surrounded his carriage. Their number appeared to some 
 of the Spaniards rather large for a simple escort of honour. This 
 remark, vague at first, became a sinister foreboding, when, on 
 passing Ogunna, they read on the arch of triumph, these words : 
 " He ivho makes and unmakes kings is more than a king himself." 
 Such an inscription was a startling menace for the princes of 
 Spain, and said to them, like that of Dante : 
 
 " Lasciate ogni speransa, voi ch'entrate." x 
 
 Thus was achieved the most memorable, perhaps, of all the 
 outrages of Napoleon. The princes of Spain were outside of 
 Spanish territory, and the emperor held them in his power. 
 
 Their sojourn at Bayonne possesses no other interest than 
 that proceeding from the different means the imagination of 
 Napoleon employed to deceive himself, or that his character and 
 malice furnished him for prolonging for some hours the error of his 
 simple and unfortunate victims, and for exciting gigantic efforts 
 on the part of France, which did not offer any other prospect 
 than to place one of his brothers on the throne of Spain. All 
 that passed then is found described in detail, with exactness and 
 interest, in the work of M. de Pradt f and therefore my object 
 
 1 " All hope abandon, ye who enter here." 
 
 2 Dominique Dufour de Pradt, born in 1759 at Allanches (Auvergne), of a noble 
 family. He was at first an officer, but left the military career to enter orders. Vicar- 
 general at Rouen, he was afterwards deputy of the clergy to the States-General. He 
 emigrated in 179 1, returned to France under the Consulate, and became chaplain to the 
 emperor, then Bishop of Poitiers (1805). Napoleon employed him in the affairs of Spain 
 in 1808, and gave to him soon after the archbishopric of Malines. He was ambassador 
 to Warsaw in 1812. In 1814, he was named Grand Chancellor of the Legion of 
 Honour. He was, in 181 7, elected deputy from Clermont-Ferrand. He died in 1837. 
 M. de Pradt has written much. The work mentioned above, Memcires Hisloriques 
 sur la Revolution d'Espagne, was published in Paris in 1815.
 
 280 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 is simply to follow, as a mere thread, the special events of each 
 of the days that the young princes passed at Bayonne, before 
 proceeding to Valencay, where I was to have the honour of 
 receiving them, and where I was fortunate enough to be able 
 to spare them, at least, some anxiety and cares. 
 
 Between Vidante and Bayonne, King Ferdinand met the 
 Infante Don Carlos, who, accompanied by Dons Frias, Medina- 
 Cceli, and Fernan-Nunez, came to meet his unhappy brother. 
 The king had them enter his carriage, and there he learned 
 from them, with the greatest surprise, that Napoleon had 
 declared to them the day before at ten o'clock in the morning, 
 that they should never return to Madrid, and that one of his, 
 Napoleon's, brothers was to occupy the throne of Spain. I 
 mention the hour at which this declaration was made because it 
 proves that it had taken eighteen hours to bring this news to 
 Irun ; and at Irun, as has been seen, King Ferdinand could still 
 have released himself from his despoilers. At one league from 
 Bayonne, there no longer remained for the princes anything but 
 sad resignation or confidence in reasons, on the force of which 
 it would have required much simplicity to rely. 
 
 The carriages advanced towards Bayonne ; at half-past 
 twelve the princes arrived there, and a few moments later, King 
 Ferdinand received a visit from Napoleon. In this first inter- 
 view, all was insignificant, except the alarming word Elle 
 employed by Napoleon, and this word, an ordinary expression 
 of regard, was as applicable to the title of Majesty as to that of 
 Royal Highness. Ferdinand VII. hastened at once to repair to 
 the palace to present his homage to Napoleon who had paid 
 him the first visit. Napoleon invited him to dine at the Chateau 
 of Marrac j 1 he also invited the Dukes of San Carlos, of Medina- 
 Cceli, and of Infantado ; the Prince dc Neufchatel was the only 
 Frenchman present at the dinner. They did not speak of politics. 
 On the morrow, Napoleon granted private audiences to the Dukes 
 of San Carlos, and of Infantado and to Don Escoiquiz. He 
 told them he was determined to change the dynasty that reigned 
 
 1 The Chateau of Marrac, situated one kilometre south of Bayonne, was built 
 in 1707 for the Queen-Dowager of Spain, widow of Charles II., refugee in France. 
 Napoleon bought it in 1807. It was destroyed by fire in 1825.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 281 
 
 on the throne of Spain, and, forgetting that he had repeated a 
 thousand times that his existence at the head of France was 
 incompatible with that of a prince of the House of Bourbon on 
 one of the thrones of Europe, he craftily gave for the date and 
 motives of his projects as to Spain, the proclamation made by the 
 Spanish government at the time of the battle of Jena. It had 
 been, he said, regarded in France, if not as a declaration, at least 
 as a menace of war : he then announced, in a firm voice, that 
 nothing could move him from his purpose. There he stopped, as 
 if to note the full effect of the terrible words he had just pro- 
 nounced. After a moment of silence, which he broke by the softest 
 expressions, he spoke of the misfortunes of the young princes, 
 and said that his policy being in veritable contradiction to his 
 heart, he could not refuse any means of happiness for them, 
 which would be compatible with the system he had adopted. 
 He even went so far as to offer King Ferdinand, provided he 
 would cede his right to the crown of Spain, Etruria, with the 
 title of King, a year of this kingdom's revenue so that he might 
 form his establishment, one of his nieces in marriage, and, in 
 case he died without children, to establish the succession in the 
 male line of the princes, his brothers. 
 
 Struck by what they had just heard, the Dukes of Infantado, 
 and of San Carlos, and Don Escoi'quiz, tried to combat the system 
 of Napoleon, who, entering into their feelings, but as a man whose 
 ideas are irrevocably settled, bade them to omit nothing which, 
 on returning to their master, they might reproach themselves for 
 having failed to mention. With one mind they said that the 
 object of the emperor being to secure the durable alliance of 
 Spain, the known character of the young king, and his marriage 
 with one of Napoleon's nieces, was for the time being a guarantee 
 preferable to all others, and that, if they wished to carry forward 
 their ideas to a distant future, they must own that besides the 
 track of human policy being lost in its mists, the descendants of a 
 prince of the House of Napoleon, in proportion to their removal 
 from their common origin, would become indifferent to family 
 sentiment, and. might even, on occasion, endure impatiently the 
 yoke imposed by an older and more powerful branch. And with 
 a noble and touching expression, they added that it would be
 
 282 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 very difficult for history, to whose burin he had furnished such 
 beautiful illustrations, to set down the motives for the despoiling 
 of a powerful king, who had come in confidence to render homage 
 to a sovereign, who had been his ally for six years. Then entering 
 into the examination of the political consequences of the resolu- 
 tion of the emperor, they predicted that the Spanish colonies, 
 whose fidelity under the actual dynasty was nothing less than 
 assured, would under another dynasty become the prey of 
 England or constitute themselves an independent power ; that 
 England would then pour therein the products of her manufac- 
 tures, and that this new and great outlet would secure for her a 
 commercial superiority absolutely crushing for the other powers 
 of the world. These reasonings, which seemed more like the 
 discharge of a conscientious duty than an argumentation from 
 which any advantage might be expected, were minutely gone 
 into. Napoleon listened to them without showing any impatience, 
 but said, that for a long time he had considered the question 
 under all its aspects, that Don EscoTquiz and the Dukes of San 
 Carlos and of Infantado had pointed out to him nothing new, 
 and that he persisted immovably in the system he had adopted. 
 
 Dons Infantado, Escoi'quiz and San Carlos retired and reported 
 to the persons who had accompanied Ferdinand VII., and who 
 were in his confidence, the conversation they had had with 
 Napoleon, and added — believing that in this they were performing 
 an act of courage — that their opinion was that his offers must 
 not be declined. 
 
 Their grounds for this opinion were : the situation of the 
 king and of the Infante, now in the hands of Napoleon, the 
 number of French armies actually in Spain, the positions they 
 occupied, the inefficiency of the Spanish army, few in numbers 
 and scattered about the country, and finally, the feebleness of 
 King Charles IV., who was lending himself to all the wishes of 
 Napoleon. Don Cevallos, who was the only one of a contrary 
 opinion, based it upon very strong considerations, and proposed 
 as a sequel to the negotiation, to refuse all verbal communica- 
 tion and to resort to written notes, as if Napoleon were still in 
 Paris, King Ferdinand at Madrid, the French troops in Germany 
 and the Spanish troops occupying all the strong places on the
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 283 
 
 frontiers. He accused of weakness and even of cowardice, the 
 members of the council who expressed an opinion different from 
 his own ; he sustained that no arrangement must be made whose 
 basis was to be the cession of the crown, and he demanded that 
 all the members of the council having to answer for their opinion 
 to the Spanish Court should express it in writing. 
 
 Their courage returned when there was no longer need for 
 anything but resignation. Is it not remarkable that the same 
 men who in Spain had not known how to resist either the 
 Prince of the Peace, the Grand Due de Berg, or General Savary, 
 believed they could achieve anything by establishing at Bayonne, 
 in writing, the right of principles, the law of abdication, the 
 dangers they ran on the subject of the colonies, &c. ? 
 
 Dons Infantado and Escoi'quiz were instructed to acquaint 
 Napoleon with the decision taken by the princes to name a 
 plenipotentiary, who should be authorized to treat in writing the 
 points which were to be settled. Napoleon, while saying that 
 the resolution of the princes did not appear to him calculated to 
 advance affairs, complied with the request to name a plenipo- 
 tentiary. He told Dons Infantado and Escoi'quiz that he would 
 give his powers to M. de Champagny, his Minister of Foreign 
 Affairs. He asked who was the person to whom the princes 
 would give their powers. The Duke of Infantado said that it 
 would probably be among the Spaniards in the service of the 
 department of Foreign Affairs that the princes would choose their 
 plenipotentiary, and he named as attached to that career, Dons 
 Cevallos, Labrador, Musquiz, Vallejo, and Macanaz. At the 
 name of M. de Labrador, he made some unkind remarks, the 
 very nature of which were honourable for the character and 
 abilities of that minister. 
 
 Dons Infantado and Escoi'quiz acquainted the king's council 
 with the result of their new conference with Napoleon. They 
 proposed there and then to name a plenipotentiary, and Don 
 Cevallos saw in Napoleon's opinion of the Marquis of Labrador 
 only another motive for proposing him to the council. The king 
 acted upon this advice and appointed the marquis. The latter 
 had a conference with M. de Champagny, who demanded, as* a 
 preliminary act, the cession of the crown of Spain. The Marquis
 
 284 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 of Labrador declared that he had not, and that before God, lie hoped 
 he never would have, the power to cede it. They broke up the con- 
 ference, and while the council was discussing the question as 
 to whether they should, or should not, give the necessary powers 
 for continuing the negotiation, Napoleon sent for Don Escoi'quiz, 
 and told him that if before eleven o'clock in the evening, he did 
 not bring to him the formal renunciation of King Ferdinand to 
 the throne of Spain, and his request for that of Etruria, he would 
 treat with Charles IV., who was to arrive on the morrow, Don 
 Escoi'quiz reported to the council the determination of Napoleon. 
 Don Cevallos begged the king to refuse unreservedly the pro- 
 positions made to him. On the following day, Don Escoi'quiz 
 ventured to speak again of Tuscany to Napoleon who, with- 
 out entering into the matter, said to him, " My dear sir, it is 
 too late." 
 
 On the 30th at four o'clock in the evening, Charles IV. and 
 the queen arrived at Bayonne. Napoleon had sent one of his 
 chamberlains to congratulate them at Irun. In the carriage 
 following that of the king was the Duchess of Alcudia, daughter 
 of the Prince of the Peace. Orders had been given that the entry 
 of the king and queen into Bayonne should be brilliant. The 
 princes, their children, went to meet them and re-entered the 
 city with them. The Prince of the Peace, who at the repeated 
 request of the Grand Due de Berg had been released from Villa 
 Viciosa, left the private house where he was lodging, and went 
 to dwell with the king and queen. 
 
 The arrival of King Charles changed the aspect of affairs ; he 
 consented to everything. Napoleon charged Don Escoi'quiz to 
 tell King Ferdinand that, King Charles having protested against 
 his abdication, the duty of the Prince of the Asturias was to return 
 him the crown by a renunciation pure and simple. The council 
 induced Ferdinand VII. to announce his submission, but to 
 propose to perform the act of renunciation only at Madrid. 
 
 A threatening letter from King Charles to his son, the severity 
 with which he had treated him in the presence of Napoleon, the 
 intention he had announced of having the counsellors of King 
 Ferdinand tried as rebels ; all these means combined produced the 
 effect Napoleon had hoped from them ; the prince sent his resigna-
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 2S5 
 
 tion pure and simple to King Charles, who immediately named 
 the Grand Due de Berg lieutenant-general of the kingdom. 
 
 This nomination put an end to the powers of the Infante 
 Don Antonio, who had been left at Madrid by the young king 
 as president of the Junta. He had been ordered to Bayonne by 
 a command of King Charles IV., addressed to the Grand Due de 
 Berg, who intimated it to him and had it executed immediately. 
 The Infante, at the commencement of his short administration, 
 had been under the unpleasant necessity of being forced by the 
 Grand Due de Berg to give up the Prince of the Peace into his 
 hands. Murat had declared to him that he would carry him off by 
 force if he were not delivered up to him, and he had added that 
 the lives of the princes who were at Bayonne should answer for 
 that of the Prince of the Peace. Don Antonio had believed he 
 ought to yield, and an aide-de-camp of the Grand Due de Berg 
 had been charged to escort the Prince of the Peace as far as 
 Bayonne where he had arrived on the 25th. On the road, he 
 had incurred some danger, particularly at Tolosa, where the 
 people, greatly excited, had, in order to detain him, unharnessed 
 and overturned the carriages on the bridge. The prince only 
 owed his safety on this occasion, to the captain of the cuirassiers 
 who commanded the escort. 
 
 King Charles IV. and the queen, during their journey from 
 Madrid to Bayonne, had been received with marks of neither 
 hatred nor esteem. 
 
 Murat, on the arrival of the powers which conferred upon him 
 the rank of lieutenant-general of the kingdom, had, as has been 
 seen, hastened the departure of the Infante Don Antonio for 
 Bayonne. The Queen of Etruria arrived there at the same time 
 with the Infante Don^Francisco. 
 
 The renunciation pure and simple of Ferdinand VII. had 
 been sent to King Charles. Napoleon believed that the 
 moment had come to propose to the Prince of the Asturias, his 
 brothers, and his uncle, to make a treaty of cession of all their 
 rights to the crown of Spain. He agreed to give them the territory 
 of Navarre, and to allow them to receive .the revenues of their 
 commanderies and of their lands in Spain. The bases of this 
 treaty, the drafting of which was entrusted to Don Escoi'quiz and
 
 2S6 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 to General Duroc, having been settled, the princes started for 
 Valencay, where Napoleon sent them until the chateau of 
 Navarre should be made habitable. They stopped two days at 
 Bordeaux, and, on the 19th of May, they made their entry into 
 Valencay. I had been there several days when the princes 
 arrived. This moment has left on my mind an impression which 
 will never be effaced. The princes were young, and over them, 
 around them, in their clothing, in the liveries of their servants, was 
 seen the image of bygone centuries. The coach from which I saw 
 them alight might have been taken for a carriage of Philip V. 
 This air of antiquity, in recalling their grandeur, added to the 
 interest of their position. They were the first Bourbons that I 
 saw again after so many years of storms and disasters. It 
 was not they who felt embarrassed, it was I, and I am pleased 
 to say it. 
 
 Napoleon had had them accompanied by Colonel Henri, 
 a superior officer of the gendarmerie d'elite?- and one of those 
 police-agents who believe that military glory is acquired by 
 fulfilling with severity a mission of this kind. I soon perceived 
 that this man affected to show his suspicions and fears, which 
 might make the sojourn at Valencay insupportable for the 
 princes. I adopted with him the tone of a master, in order to 
 make him understand that Napoleon did not reign either in the 
 apartments or in the park of Valencay. This reassured the 
 princes, and was my first recompense. I surrounded them with 
 respect, attention and care ; I allowed no one to present 
 himself before them until after having obtained permission 
 from them. No one approached them except in full dress ; I 
 never failed myself in what I had prescribed in this respect. All 
 the hours of the day were distributed according to the habits of 
 the princes ; mass, hours of rest, promenades, prayers, &c, each 
 of these had its proper time. Will it be credited that at 
 Valencay, I made the princes of Spain acquainted with a kind 
 of liberty they had never known when near their father's throne ? 
 Never, at Madrid, had the two elder princes walked out to- 
 gether without a written permission from the king. To be alone, 
 to go out ten times a day in the garden, in the park, were 
 
 1 A picked police force.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 287 
 
 pleasures new to them. They had never before been able to be 
 so unconstrained towards each other. 
 
 I cannot understand why hunting, horse-riding, and dancing 
 had been forbidden them in Spain. I had them take their first 
 shot with a gun ; I confided them to the care of a former 
 keeper of Monseigneur the Prince de Conde, named Aubry, 
 who had taught the Due de Bourbon how to shoot. This old 
 man, full of respect and affection, mentioned persons of their 
 family to them, on every occasion. I had them ride horses with 
 Foucault who had long been attached to me ; brought up in the 
 chief stables of the king, he had been special attendant of 
 Madame Elizabeth of France ; all the examples he cited, all his 
 recollections, were drawn from their House. Boucher put all his 
 skill and all his heart into making them bad Spanish stews. 
 The terrace which is in front of the chateau became our ball- 
 room, where the princes could witness, as by chance, some 
 of those dances the French call rondes, and in which they might 
 join without knowing how to dance. Guitars, and amongst 
 others, that of Castro, were heard in all corners of the garden. 
 
 I had endeavoured to have them spend some hours in the 
 library ; in this I did not meet with great success, although the 
 librarian, M. Fercoc, and I, tried all the means that we could 
 imagine to retain them there. Having failed by books alone to 
 arouse their interest, we called their attention to the beauty of 
 the editions, and to the works which contained engravings ; we 
 even resorted to common pictures ; yet, I dare not say how 
 useless all our efforts proved. Don Antonio, their uncle, who 
 feared for them the greater number of books which compose a 
 good library, soon imagined some reason for inducing them to 
 retire to their apartments ; and for this he met with less resistance 
 than when he wished them to leave the exercises and the amuse- 
 ments which form the charm of summer evenings in the country. 
 In addition to these distractions, which everybody about the 
 chateau helped me to organize, the princes had the consolations 
 of religion ; great misfortune always renders faith more lively 
 and the soul more sensitive. Each day closed with a public 
 prayer at which I had all visitors to the chateau, the officers 
 of the departmental guard and even the men of the gendar-
 
 2S8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 merie attend. Every one left these gatherings with softened 
 hearts ; the prisoners and their guards praying on their knees, 
 next each other, to the same God, appeared to regard one 
 another less as enemies ; the guards were no longer so fierce, 
 nor the prisoners so alarmed ; perhaps some displays of interest 
 made them even conceive a little hope. The feeling hearts 
 of the princes led them to ascribe to me the consolation they 
 experienced. I cannot remember without emotion the grief they 
 showed when, a letter from Napoleon, on his way from Bayonne, 
 directed me to go to meet him at Nantes, and leave them for a 
 few days. 
 
 The emperor had for some time been wounded at the opinion 
 I had expressed as to his undertaking in Spain ; nay, more, he 
 had thought that the plans I had made at the time of the arrival 
 of the princes at Valencay, had too much their safety in 
 view. Thus, as soon as we met at Nantes, we had some 
 conversations — I might say rather some irritating discussions. 
 On one occasion among others, taking a bantering tone with 
 me, rubbing his hands, and walking up and down the room, 
 while looking at me with a mocking air, he said to me, " Well, 
 you see what all your predictions as to the difficulties I should 
 encounter in regulating the affairs of Spain according to my 
 views have amounted to ; I have, however, overcome these 
 people here ; they have all been caught in the nets I spread 
 for them, and I am master of the situation in Spain, as 
 in the rest of Europe." Provoked by this boasting, so little 
 justified in my eyes, and above all by the shameful means he 
 had employed to arrive at his ends, I replied to him, calmly, 
 that I did not see things under the same aspect as he, and that 
 I believed he had lost more than he had gained by the events at 
 Bayonne. " What do you mean by that ? " he replied. " Mon 
 Dieu" I said, " it is very simple, and I will show you by an 
 example. If a man in the world commits follies, has mistresses, 
 conducts himself badly towards his wife, does even grave wrongs 
 to his friends, he will doubtless be blamed ; but if he is rich, 
 powerful, and clever, he may still expect to be treated with in- 
 dulgence in society. If he cheats at gaming, he is immediately 
 banished from good company, which will never pardon him."
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 289 
 
 The emperor turned pale, remained confused, and spoke to me 
 no more on that day ; but I can say that from this moment 
 dated the rupture which, more or less marked, took place 
 between him and me. Never after did he pronounce the name 
 of Spain, of Valengay, or mine, without adding to it some 
 injurious epithet which his temper furnished. The princes had 
 not been three months at Valencay before he already believed 
 that he saw all the vengeances of Europe proceeding therefrom. 
 The persons who surrounded him have often said to me that he 
 spoke of Valencay with uneasiness, whenever his conversation 
 or questions bore upon that place. 
 
 My absence lasted only a few days ; the princes saw me 
 again and received me with extreme kindness. A letter from 
 Napoleon which I found on my return merits being preserved ; 
 here it is literally : — 
 
 " Prince Ferdinand, in writing to me addresses me as his 
 cousin. Try to have the Duke of San Carlos understand that 
 this is ridiculous, and that he must simply call me Sire." 
 
 After Ajaccio and Saint Helena, comment is useless. 
 
 I have not added to this recital any fragments but what are 
 absolutely necessary to the subject, the others being found in 
 the different writings which are already published, or in records 
 which are not at my disposal. 
 
 Our uneventful life at the chateau continued some weeks 
 longer, and only ended when the journey to Erfurt recalled me 
 to Paris. On my departure all three princes came to take leave 
 of me in my apartment, with tears in their eyes ; they asked 
 what they could do to give me some mark of their friendship and 
 gratitude, for it is thus they expressed themselves. Each of 
 them offered me the old prayer-book which he used at church ; I 
 received them with respect, and with an emotion I shall never 
 have the temerity to express. I have dared to recall the word 
 gratitude of which they deigned to make use on this occasion, 
 because this expression is so rare with princes that it honours 
 those who employ it. It is in order to avoid discharging this 
 noble debt that ancient dynasties affect to trace their origin to 
 Providence : "By the grace of God" is a formula of ingratitude. 
 vol. 1. U
 
 290 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 On leaving Valencay, I returned to Paris ; I spent only a 
 few days there before leaving for Erfurt, where Napoleon and 
 the Emperor of Russia were to meet. The details of this inter- 
 view will form a separate chapter. The frequent conversations 
 I then had with Napoleon, led me to apprehend that he meditated 
 causing the princes of Spain to fall into a snare that his minister 
 of general police had laid for them by his order. The results 
 might be fatal to them ; I believed there was not a moment to 
 lose to forewarn them of it, so I had M. Mornard, my secretary, 
 leave immediately for Paris, and call, with the utmost speed, 
 on the Duke of San Carlos, who was then in that city. His zeal 
 and interest for the princes took him only four days to reach 
 there. 
 
 My mind, my heart, my memories, were filled with interest 
 for the princes of Spain. I have still present to my mind the 
 effect produced upon me, at the first interview at Erfurt, when 
 the Emperor of Russia, among the obliging things he said 
 to Napoleon, announced to him that he had recognized his 
 brother Joseph as King of Spain. 
 
 From this moment, the existence of the princes up to the 
 time of their return to Spain was uneventful ; all that can be 
 said of them during these five years is, that they lived. 
 
 M. dc la Forest came to negotiate at Valencay the treaty 1 
 by virtue of which the return of the princes to Spain was con- 
 sented to by the Emperor Napoleon, who signed on February 8, 
 1 8 14, at Nogent-sur-Seine, the order for their departure. It was 
 desired to give the appearance of a free consent to an order which 
 was drawn out in the hope of preventing the army of the coali- 
 tion from entering France by the frontier of the Pyrenees. The 
 respectful forms employed by M. de la Forest in all his relations 
 with the Spanish princes must have been so much the more 
 appreciated by them, that for several years they had been 
 obliged to preserve themselves from the bad conduct and heavy 
 dealings of MM. de Darby, Henri, Kolli, and a host of other 
 
 1 The treaty of Valencay was signed December n, 1813. The integrity of Spain 
 was promised. The French troops were to evacuate the country, the Spanish and 
 English armies were not to cross the Pyrenees. Finally, Ferdinand had admitted in 
 principle the idea of a marriage with the daughter of King Joseph. The treaty was 
 brought by the Duke of San Carlos before the Cortes, and Ferdinand left Valenray 
 March 3.
 
 SPANISH AFFAIRS. 291 
 
 agents who had been placed near them to guard and spy upon 
 them. Before leaving the French territory the princes had still 
 to submit to an insult provoked by the Due de Feltre, who, 
 without having received the order from Napoleon, but in the 
 hope of pleasing him, had one of them stopped on the frontier 
 as hostage. 
 
 If ever the success of an enterprise should have appeared 
 infallible, it was assuredly an enterprise in which treason had 
 combined everything in such a manner as to leave nothing to 
 be done by force of arms. It must have seemed impossible that 
 Spain, invaded before she could possibly expect it, deprived of 
 her government and of a portion of her strongholds, with a 
 regular army mediocre in number, and more mediocre in quality, 
 without harmony between her provinces, and almost without the 
 means of establishing any, could think for a moment of offering 
 resistance, or of attempting to do so except for her ruin. How- 
 ever, those who knew Spain and the Spaniards judged otherwise, 
 and were not deceived. They predicted that Spanish pride would 
 calculate neither ultimate result nor present dangers, but would 
 find in indignation and despair, a vigour and resource continually 
 renewed. 
 
 Napoleon, in menacing England with an invasion, had forced 
 her to create an army of considerable strength, and thus, without 
 foreseeing it, had prepared help for the Peninsula. Seventeen 
 thousand English, and some thousand Portuguese, made the 
 French evacuate Portugal ; the latter re-entered momentarily, but 
 were unable to establish a firm footing there. The Portuguese 
 soon had a numerous army, brave and well-disciplined, and, with 
 the English, developed into the auxiliaries and the support of 
 the resistance which had burst forth simultaneously over all 
 parts of Spain, and which could be entirely suppressed only by 
 immense armies, which it was impossible to maintain in that 
 country, because it was impossible to nourish them. The title 
 " invincible " that the continual victories over regular armies 
 had attached to the name of Napoleon became contestable, and 
 it was from Spain that Europe learned that he could be con- 
 quered, and how it could be done. The resistance of the Spaniards, 
 in setting a precedent prepared that made later by the Russians, 
 
 U 2
 
 292 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 and led to the fall of the man who had promised himself the 
 domination of the world. Thus was verified what Montesquieu 
 had said of the projects of an universal monarchy : that they 
 could not fail in a single point without failing everywhere. 
 
 At the first indications they had in France of the projects of 
 Napoleon on Spain, a few persons said : " This man is under- 
 taking a thing which, if it fail, will ruin him ; and if it succeed, 
 will ruin Europe." It has failed enough to ruin him, and perhaps 
 it has succeeded sufficiently to ruin Europe. 
 
 Ferdinand VII., at Valengay, humbled himself beyond mea- 
 sure, to the point of congratulating his oppressor on his victories 
 over the Spaniards. Hardly had he remounted the throne, than 
 without discriminating between his faithful subjects and those 
 who, carrying into the Cortes the revolutionary spirit, wished, to 
 annihilate the royal power to substitute their own to it, Fer- 
 dinand VII. sentenced to exile, to irons, to death even, those who 
 had inflamed their countrymen for his defence, those whose 
 constancy had broken his irons for him, those by whose aid he 
 was now reigning. All the weakness he had shown in misfortune, 
 changed into a furious craving for absolute power. The English, 
 who boast of being the liberators of Spain, who ought to have 
 made stipulations in her favour, and who could have done it, did 
 not do it. They confined themselves to making representations, 
 the inutility of which could easily be foreseen, and the success 
 of which, there is reason to believe, was most indifferent to them, 
 for they hate tyranny abroad, only when, as under Napoleon, it 
 menaces their existence, and they delight, (we need not furnish 
 any instance of it) in turning the subjection of peoples to the 
 profit of their pride or of their prosperity. A more far-sighted 
 policy would have inspired the Cabinet which governed England 
 at that time with very different views. 
 
 1 Qu'ils ne pouvaient echouer surun seul point qu'ils n'echouassent partout. 
 
 END OF THE FOURTH PART.
 
 PART V. 
 
 THE ERFURT INTERVIEW. 
 
 1808. 
 
 Napoleon holds out a bait to Russia — The prospective partition of Turkey 
 — Silesia to France as compensation for Wallachia and Moldavia to 
 Russia — Alexander incensed — Napoleon'sletterto the Czar, desisting from 
 all pretensions to Silesia and proposing to meet him in order to arrange 
 the best means of carrying war into India — Reply of Alexander accept- 
 ing to meet Napoleon — Count Romanzoff and Turkey — Russia wants 
 Constantinople — The Turks must be driven back to Asia — France and 
 the Porte — Russia and Sweden — Conquest of Finland — Talleyrand 
 receives orders to accompany Napoleon to Erfurt, the emperors' meet- 
 ing-place — Confidence displayed by Napoleon towards Talleyrand — 
 A brilliant journey — Napoleon wishes to dazzle the Germans — Invites 
 Talleyrand to induce the kings and princes to come to Erfurt — 
 Napoleon and Dazincourt — Choice of plays — Cinna— The actors of the 
 Comedie Frau^aise ordered to repair to Erfurt— The military retinue of 
 Napoleon — Napoleon discloses to Talleyrand his projects for Erfurt — 
 Orders Talleyrand to draw up a convention aimed against England — 
 Text of that convention — Napoleon objects to certain expressions — 
 Austria, Napoleon's enemy— Napoleon insists on inserting in the 
 convention a clause directed against Austria — Rebukes Talleyrand — 
 Vflus etes toujours Autrichien! — Final instructions of Napoleon to 
 Talleyrand — Talleyrand's arrival at Erfurt — M. de Caulaincourt and 
 Talleyrand — List of the crowned heads and eminent personages present 
 at Erfurt — Arrival of the Emperor Napoleon at Erfurt — General 
 enthusiasm — The attendant kings and princes humble themselves in the 
 presence of their victor — Arrival of the Czar Alexander — His friendly 
 meeting with Napoleon — The latter introduces changes into the projected 
 convention — Austria's fears — M. de Vincent and Talleyrand — Interview 
 between Napoleon and Goethe — Napoleon's judgment on Schiller's 
 Thirty Years' IVar.—The play at Erfurt — The impressions of the kings 
 and princes — Delight of the Czar — Private interview between Napoleon 
 and the latter — Uneasiness of the Austrian envoy — The Princess of 
 Tour and Taxis — Napoleon invites Goethe and Wieland to lunch — 
 Napoleon's judgment as to the influence of Christianity on the development
 
 294 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 of civilization — Conversation of Napoleon with Wieland — Interview 
 between the Czar and Talleyrand — The latter endeavours to defeat the 
 projects of Napoleon — Induces the Czar to write to the Emperor of 
 Austria, in order to soothe his apprehensions — Napoleon fails to 
 persuade the Czar— He lets out his secret — Fete at Weimar — Napoleon's 
 opinion on Tacitus — Wieland's defence of the great Roman historian — 
 Return to Erfurt — Confidential interview between Napoleon and the 
 Czar — Conversation with Talleyrand — Napoleon wants to divorce — 
 Judgment of the Czar on Napoleon — Napoleon and the Czar before a 
 pitfulof kings at Erfurt — Napoleon's opinion of ideologists — Christianity 
 the best system of philosophy — Napoleon starts for Spain — The Erfurt 
 convention. 
 
 In the course of the conferences preceding the treaty of 
 Tilsit, the Emperor Napoleon often spoke to the Czar Alexander 
 of Moldavia and Wallachia as provinces destined some day to 
 become Russian. Affecting to be carried away by some irre- 
 sistible impulse, and to obey the decrees of Providence, he spoke 
 of the division of European Turkey as inevitable. He then 
 indicated, as if inspired, the general bases of the sharing of 
 that empire, a portion of which was to fall to Austria, in order 
 to gratify her pride rather than her ambition. A shrewd mind 
 could easily notice the effect produced upon the mind of Alex- 
 ander by all those fanciful dreams. Napoleon watched him 
 attentively and, as soon as he noticed that the prospects held 
 out allured the Czar's imagination, he informed Alexander that 
 letters from Paris necessitated his immediate return, and gave 
 orders for the treaty to be drafted at once. My instructions on 
 the subject of that treaty were, that no allusion to a partition of 
 the Ottoman Empire should appear in it, nor even to the future 
 fate of the two provinces of Wallachia and Moldavia. These 
 instructions were strictly carried out. Napoleon thus left Tilsit, 
 having made prospective arrangements which could serve him 
 as he pleased for the accomplishment of his other designs. He 
 had not bound himself at all, whereas, by the prospects he had 
 held out, he had allured the Czar Alexander and placed him, 
 in relation to Turkey in a doubtful position which might enable 
 the cabinet of the Tuileries to bring forth other pretensions 
 untouched in the treaty. 
 
 In the month of January 180S, at one of the receptions of 
 the court, Napoleon tried, for the first time, to take advantage
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 295 
 
 of that situation. He went up to M. de Tolstoi, 1 then Russian 
 ambassador, took him aside, and, in the course of a conversation, 
 in which he called attention to the great advantages Russia was 
 likely to derive from the possession of Wallachia and Moldavia, 
 ventured to speak incidentally of the compensations France 
 was to obtain, and mentioned Silesia as the province which 
 would suit her best. On this occasion, as on all those when he 
 meditated some fresh aggrandisement, he emphasised his fears 
 of England's ambition : that country, he said, refused to listen 
 to any proposal of peace, and obliged him to resort to all the 
 means dictated by prudence, in order to reduce the power of all 
 the countries with which there was some reason to believe she 
 was in league. For the present, he added, all prospects of a 
 partition of the Ottoman Empire must be abandoned, because, 
 to make an attempt upon Turkey, without possessing greater 
 naval facilities, would be to place one's most valuable possessions 
 at the mercy of Great Britain. M. de Tolstoi whose duty it 
 was to listen, and who, besides, was hardly fit for any other, 
 reported to his sovereign the hints thus given him. These were 
 received most unfavourably by the Emperor Alexander who, 
 rather sharply, said to the French ambassador : 2 " I can hardly 
 believe the intelligence contained in Tolstoi's despatches ; is it 
 intended to tear up the treaty of Tilsit ? I do not understand 
 the emperor ! It cannot be that he wishes to cause me personal 
 trouble. On the contrary, it is indispensable that he should clear 
 me from responsibility in the eyes of Europe, by at once placing 
 Prussia in the situation agreed to in the treaty. This is really an 
 affair of honour with me." 
 
 This incident gave rise to certain explanations, culminating 
 in a letter from the Emperor Napoleon, which reached St. Peters- 
 burg about the end of February 1808. 3 That letter contained: 
 
 1 Pierre, Count Tolstoi, born in 1 769, served in the army under the command 
 of Souvaroff, and became general in 1805. After Friedland, he was employed in 
 negotiations, and in 1807, he was chosen as ambassador at Paris. Napoleon asked 
 and obtained, a short time after, his recall, which was granted. In 1812, he commanded 
 the militia in Moscow, and served in the campaigns of 1813 and 1814. Later, he 
 became the director of the military colonies, made the campaigns of Poland in 1834, 
 became president of the department of Military Affairs in the Council of the 
 Empire ; he died in 1844. He was a brother of the grand-marshal Count Tolstoi. 
 
 2 General Caulaincourt, Due de Vicence. 
 
 3 A letter of February 2, 1808, Correspondance de Napoleon /<""., t. xvi. , p. 498.
 
 296 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 1st. The implicit renunciation of all pretensions to Silesia ; 
 2nd. Fresh suggestions concerning the eventual division of the 
 agreed portion of Turkish territory ; 3rd. A plan for carrying 
 war into India ; 4th. A proposal, either to send a responsible 
 person to Paris to settle these important questions, if the Czar 
 could not come himself, or to appoint a suitable place where 
 the two sovereigns could meet. 
 
 It may be noticed that, in his letter, the Emperor Napoleon, 
 whilst proposing a partition of the Ottoman Empire, made no 
 mention of the manner in which the territories wrenched from 
 Turkey were to be divided. Thus, with the exception of the 
 difficulty relative to Silesia, which was now removed, things 
 remained in the same uncertain state. Nevertheless, the 
 Emperor Alexander experienced so much relief at being no 
 longer obliged to stand up in defence of the private interests of 
 the King of Prussia, that he received the letter with the utmost 
 satisfaction, and decided there and then to have an interview 
 with the Emperor Napoleon to whom he wrote to that effect in 
 reply. 
 
 This interview was sought by the Emperor of Russia only 
 with the idea and upon the condition, that the partition of Turkey 
 should be settled previously, and that the only object of the 
 interview should be simply to come to a thorough understanding 
 respecting the means to be adopted in carrying out the said parti- 
 tion, and to make their ratification still more solemn and binding, 
 by mutually pledging their word as man to man, that each 
 should conform to the clauses of that arrangement. M. de 
 Romanzoff 1 was instructed to open negotiations on those bases 
 with the French ambassador, M. de Caulaincourt. 
 
 It is most important to indicate here, in all their essentials, 
 the various arrangements and the special intentions of the 
 Emperor Napoleon, and of the Czar Alexander, as also those of 
 Count Romanzoff as the representative of public opinion in 
 Russia. 
 
 1 Count Nicholas Romanzoff, born in 1750, was the son of the field-marshal of 
 that name. He at first entered the diplomatic service. Later, he became Minister 
 of Commerce, and afterwards Minister of Foreign Affairs at the accession of Alex- 
 ander. He was a warm advocate of the French alliance, which led to his being 
 obliged to resign in 1812. He afterwards lived in retirement and died in 1826.
 
 THE ERFURT INTERVIEW. 297 
 
 Count Romanzoff considered the destruction of the Ottoman 
 Empire as a victory for his family. He was anxious to complete 
 the great work begun by his father. Thus, if the point to be 
 debated in the conferences consisted of a mere dismemberment, 
 it seemed to him full of difficulties; if, on the contrary, he foresaw 
 the possibility of a partition, nothing hindered him ; he became 
 exceedingly generous, and, first of all, boldly claimed Constan- 
 tinople and the Dardanelles for Russia. " Any division," he said, 
 in one of the conferences, " that did not give Constantinople and 
 the Dardanelles to Russia would not obtain the approval of the 
 nation, nay, would even dissatisfy it more than the present state 
 of affairs, bad as it was in everybody's opinion." At any rate, he 
 offered everything in exchange for that advantage : fleets, armies, 
 and the co-operation of Russia in an expedition against India, 
 but he refused that co-operation in an attack against Syria and 
 Egypt, in case of a simple dismemberment that would leave 
 Constantinople to the Turks. When the French ambassador 
 proposed, as a compromise, to found a civilized and independent 
 government at Constantinople, alluding, in support of that 
 suggestion, to the intention previously expressed on the subject 
 by the Emperor Alexander ; the chancellor dismissed the 
 proposal by saying that his sovereign no longer entertained that 
 idea. Count Romanzoff wanted Constantinople ; that acquisi- 
 tion was to give everlasting glory to his name. With the 
 exception of Constantinople, he gave up the rest of the world to 
 France. He put forth no pretensions to India, and was quite 
 willing that the Emperor Napoleon should place the crown of 
 Spain on the head of one of his brothers, and annex, either to 
 France, or to the kingdom of Italy, whatever country he 
 thought fit. 
 
 The Emperor Alexander affected scarcely to care about 
 possessing the two provinces of Wallachia and Moldavia ; his 
 ambition was confined to acquiring the banks of the Danube. 
 " And yet," he said, " it is merely because I see, in that arrange- 
 ment, the means of strengthening our alliance. Anything that 
 suits the Emperor Napoleon will suit me ; if I wish for new 
 territories, it is merely in order to promote the attachment of my 
 people to French policy, and justify our undertakings." When,
 
 298 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 in the course of discussion, he brought forth higher pretensions, 
 he merely seemed to uphold the plans of his minister, and to 
 yield to some old Russian ideas ; he seemed to be more in- 
 fluenced by philosophical maxims than by political views. " It 
 is more than ever the case," he remarked one day, " of giving 
 to the projects we formed at Tilsit, the liberal appearance 
 which should always mark the acts of enlightened sovereigns. 
 The times we live in, more than political necessity, doom the 
 Turks to be driven back to Asia. It is a noble action that 
 of ridding those beautiful countries from Turkish ignorance and 
 tyranny. Humanity requires that those barbarians should no 
 longer remain in Europe. Civilization demands it ; " and so on. 
 I repeat word for word what he said. 
 
 The French ambassador, a faithful agent of Napoleon, made 
 use of all his influence and dexterity in getting the Russian 
 cabinet to indicate how far they carried their views, and at each 
 imperial meeting, he exerted himself to increase the infatuation 
 for Napoleon which possessed the Czar Alexander, so as to 
 induce the latter to ask for an interview with Napoleon, as 
 being the only means by which they could arrive at a mutual 
 understanding. When discussing with M. de Romanzoff, he 
 skilfully came to the point ; with the Czar he criticized the 
 plans of M. dc Romanzoff, but never intimated those of 
 Xapoleon ; he refused all, but did not ask anything. Like the 
 Emperor Alexander, he was of opinion that the requirements of 
 the times were indeed rather imperative, but affected to be fear- 
 ful of so vast an undertaking as that proposed by M. de 
 Romanzoff, and was ever calling attention to difficulties that 
 could be solved only by the sovereigns themselves. The vague- 
 ness of Alexander's ideas led him to confess the truth of these 
 statements, and the interview was fixed for September 27, 
 1808. 
 
 The cabinet of the Tuileries had done all in their power to 
 raise as many incidents as possible. Unknown to Russia, they 
 gave their word to the Ottoman Porte that the armistice with 
 Russia should be prolonged. The report of General Sebastiani, 1 
 
 1 Horace Sebastiani, born in 1772 near Bastia, was a lieutenant in 17S9, general 
 of division in 1805, ambassador at Constantinople in 1806, where he distinguished
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 299 
 
 made just after his voyage in the Levant, was communicated to 
 the Russian cabinet ; and the consequence of this communica- 
 tion was to render problematical all that had been said and 
 written relative to the division of Turkey, of whom the French 
 cabinet still spoke as the old ally of France, and for whom, on 
 every occasion, they displayed some sort of interest. Silesia was 
 no longer alluded to, but the right to delay the evacuation of 
 Russia was claimed as a compensation for the cession of the two 
 provinces. 
 
 From this it is easily seen that the Emperor Napoleon, fully 
 appreciating the strength of his position after the treaty of 
 Tilsit, was anxious to remove all pretexts for hostilities in 
 Europe until such time as his designs on Spain were accom- 
 plished. Until then, the project of a war in India, and that of a 
 division of the Ottoman Empire, seemed like mere phantoms 
 intended to occupy Russia's attention. Thus, during the time 
 that elapsed between the two interviews of Tilsit and Erfurt, 
 all the points that were discussed in Paris or in St. Petersburg 
 made no apparent progress. Nothing had been done. What 
 the Czar Alexander said to the ambassador of France five days 
 before his departure for Erfurt, he might have said five days 
 after the departure from Tilsit. " We must come to terms, 
 and act in concert in order to obtain mutual advantages ; I 
 shall ever remain true to my word, for I have always done so ; 
 what I have said to the emperor and what he said to me, is as 
 sacred and binding to me as treaties, and so on . . . ." 
 
 The words were the same. With the exception of the con- 
 quest of Finland x on the one hand, and of the invasion of Spain 
 on the other, the situation was unaltered on the 27th of Septem- 
 ber. 1808. This did not however lead to any remonstrance 
 worth mentioning between the respective cabinets. Thus, at 
 
 himself by his energy at the appearance of the English squadron in the Bosphorus. 
 He was elected a deputy under the Restoration ; was appointed Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs and ambassador under Louis Philippe, and Marshal of France in 
 1840. He died in 1851. 
 
 1 In accordance with the treaty of Tilsit, the Czar Alexander was to declare war 
 against Sweden if that power did not break off with England. Sweden having by a 
 convention dated February 8, 1808, renewed her relations with the cabinet of London, 
 Alexander began the campaign by invading Finland. The treaty of Friedrichshaum, 
 September 5/17, 1809, put an end to the war. According to the treaty, Sweden joined 
 the continental system and gave up Finland to Russia.
 
 300 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Erfurt, the two sovereigns could be looked upon as coming 
 direct from Tilsit. 
 
 The part I had taken in the treaty of Tilsit ; the marks of 
 special kindness which the Czar Alexander had shown me ; the 
 annoyance caused to the Emperor Napoleon by M. de Cham- 
 pagny, who, as His Majesty himself said, displayed his zeal every 
 morning in order to be forgiven his blunders of the day before ; 
 my intimacy with M. de Caulaincourt, whose great abilities 
 must, in justice, be acknowledged some day ; were the reasons 
 that induced the emperor to apologize for having reproached 
 me so violently for the disapproval I had dared to express of 
 his designs on Spain. He then proposed that I should follow 
 him to Erfurt, and personally conduct the negotiations to be 
 carried on there, with the exception that the treaty, likely to 
 result from those negotiations, should be signed by his Minister 
 of Foreign Affairs. I consented to this. The confidence which 
 he displayed in our first interview I looked upon as a sort of 
 apology for his treatment of me. He had all the despatches 
 of M. de Caulaincourt delivered to me ; I found them everything 
 that could be desired. In a few hours, he acquainted me with all 
 the negotiations that had taken place at St. Petersburg ; and my 
 sole object was so to check the spirit of enterprise that it should 
 not get the upper hand at this singular interview. Napoleon 
 wished the latter to be very brilliant. It was his custom to speak 
 continually tothose about him of the one idea whichpossessed him. 
 I was still grand chamberlain. At every moment, he summoned 
 me to his presence, as well as General Duroc, grand marshal of 
 the palace, and M. de Remusat, who had the management of 
 the plays. " I wish my journey to be brilliant," he repeated to 
 us every day. At one of his lunches, where we were all three 
 present, he asked me who were the chamberlains on duty. " It 
 seems to me," he said, " that we have not any very aristocratic 
 names ; I must have some. The fact is, that the members of 
 the aristocracy are the only men who know how to be dignified 
 at court. We must do justice to the French nobility. They are 
 admirable in that respect." 
 
 " Sire, you have M. de Montesquiou." 1 
 
 1 The Comte Pierre de Montesquiou-Fezensac was born in 1764. He was an
 
 THE ERFURT INTERVIEW. 301 
 
 " Good."— 
 
 " Prince Sapieha." * 
 
 " Not bad." 
 
 " It seems to me that two will be sufficient. The journey 
 being short, your Majesty could always have them with you." 
 
 " Very soon, Remusat, I must have a play. Send for 
 Dazincourt 2 — is he not the director ? " 
 
 " Yes, your Majesty." 
 
 " I wish to astonish Germany by my splendour." 
 
 Dazincourt was out. The arrangements for the play were 
 put off until the next day. 
 
 " Your Majesty's intention," said Duroc, " is to engage cer- 
 tain important personages to come to Erfurt, and time is limited." 
 
 "There is one of Eugene's 3 aides-de-camp," replied the 
 emperor, "who leaves to-day. You might hint to Eugene what 
 he must say to his father-in-law, the King of Bavaria ; and if 
 one of the kings come, they must all come. But no," he added, 
 "we must not employ him. As for that, he is not quick 
 enough. He knows how to do just what I wish, but he is worth 
 nothing for acting a part. Talleyrand would do better. More- 
 over," he said, laughing, " that, to criticize me, he will tell them 
 that they will please me in coming. It will then be for me to 
 show that I am perfectly indifferent, and that, if anything, 
 their coming has annoyed me." 
 
 officer in the cavalry in 1789. He remained in retirement during the Revolution. In 
 1804, he was elected deputy of the legislature. He replaced M. de Talleyrand as 
 High Chamberlain in 1808. He became president of the legislative body, 1810; 
 peer of France under the first Restoration, again High Chamberlain during the 
 Hundred Days. In 1819, he re-entered the House of Peers. He died in 1834. 
 
 1 Prince Alexander Sapieha, descended from an old and illustrious Polish family 
 which was forced to exile itself after the reverses of its country, was born in Strasburg 
 in 1773. Prince Alexander applied himself exclusively to study. He became 
 chamberlain to the Emperor and died in 1812. 
 
 2 Joseph Albouis Dazincourt, born in 1747 at Marseilles, was first librarian to 
 Marshal Richelieu. He afterwards joined the Theatre Francais, of which he became 
 associate in 1778. In 1808, he was elected professor of elocution at the Conservatoire, 
 and director of the Court plays. He died in 1809. 
 
 3 Eugene de Beauharnais, son of General Vicomte de Eeauharnais and of the 
 Empress Josephine, was born in 1781. He enlisted in 1796, followed Bonaparte 
 in Italy and Egypt, and became brigadier-general in 1804 ; then French prince and 
 arch-chancellor (Lord High Chancellor), February 1, 1805. In June, he was chosen 
 as Viceroy of Italy. In 1814, he retired to Bavaria where he died in 1824, under 
 the title of Duke of Leuchtemberg. The Prince Eugene married Amelie, daughter 
 of the King of Bavaria. His eldest daughter married the prince royal of Sweden, 
 son of Bernadotte.
 
 302 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 At lunch the next day the emperor had Dazincourt sent 
 for. The latter awaited his Majesty's orders. Napoleon had 
 told M. de Remusat, General Duroc, and myself to meet 
 Dazincourt there. 
 
 " You have heard that I am going to Erfurt ? " 
 
 " Yes, your Majesty." 
 
 " I should like the Comedie Francaise to come." 
 
 " Would it be to play comedies and tragedies ? " 
 
 " I only want tragedies. Our comedies would be of no use. 
 They would not understand them across the Rhine." 
 
 "Your Majesty would undoubtedly wish for a brilliant 
 play." 
 
 " Yes, our most beautiful piece." 
 
 " Sire, we could have Athalie represented." 
 
 "■Athalie ! fie on it ! Here is a man who does not understand 
 me. Am I going to Erfurt to put some Joash in those Germans' 
 heads? Athalie! How silly of you! My dear Dazincourt, 
 enough of this ! Tell your best tragedians that they must 
 prepare to go to Erfurt, and I shall give you instructions as 
 to the day of our departure and the pieces that shall be 
 played. How stupid those old people are ! Athalie, indeed! — 
 but then it is my fault ; why consult them ? I should not 
 consult any one. Still, if he had mentioned Cinna. That 
 is a very interesting play, especially the scene of mercy, 
 which is always good. Though I knew nearly all Cinna by 
 heart, yet I never could declaim well. Remusat, are not the 
 following lines in Cinna ? — 
 
 " ' Tous ces crimes d'Etat qu'on fait pour la couronne 
 Le ciel nous en absout lorsqiiil nous la donne.' 1 
 
 Cinna, Act V., Scene II. 
 
 I am not sure if I repeat the verse correctly." 
 
 " Sire, it is in Cinna, but I believe that it is — Alors quil nous 
 la donne!' 
 
 " What are the following lines ? Take a Corncillc." 
 
 1 " All those foul deeds to secure a crown, 
 
 Heaven condones them, when this it p;ives us."
 
 THE ERFUR T IN TER VIE IV. 303 
 
 " Sire, it is not necessary ; I remember them — 
 
 " i Le ciel nous en absout, alors qu'il nous la donne ; 
 Et dans le sacre rang 01c safaveur l'a mis, 
 Le passe devient juste et I'avenir per mis. 
 Qui pent y parvenir ne petit etre coupable ; 
 Quoi qu'il ait fait ou fasse, il est inviolable.' " J 
 
 " That is capital, and especially for those Germans who always 
 stick to the same ideas, and who still speak of the death of 
 the Due d'Enghien. Their minds must be enlarged. I do not 
 say that for the Czar Alexander. Such things have no effect 
 upon a Russian ; but it is a good thing for men with melancholy 
 ideas like the Germans, and Germany is full of such. We shall, 
 then, have China represented : that will do for the first day. 
 Remusat, you will look up the tragedies that can be given the 
 following days, and you will report to me before making any 
 final arrangements." 
 
 " Sire, does not your Majesty desire that a few good actors 
 be left in Paris ? " 
 
 " Yes — substitutes. We must take all the good ones. It will 
 do no harm to have too many." 
 
 The order to be present at Erfurt for September 22, was sent 
 immediately to Saint Prix, Talma, Lafont, Damas, Despres, 
 Lacave, Varennes, Dazincourt, Mademoiselle Raucourt, Mmc. 
 Talma, Mdlle. Bourgoin, Mdlle. Duchesnois, Mdlle. Gros, Mdllc. 
 Rose Dupuis, and Mdlle. Patrat. 2 
 
 1 " Heaven condones them, when this it gives us ; 
 And in the sacred rank obtained from its favour, 
 All past deeds become legitimate and future ones permitted. 
 He who can reach it, cannot be held guilty ; 
 Whatever those deeds may be or have been, he is inviolable." 
 
 2 They were given before their departure the list of the pieces that were to be 
 played. The first, as we have already mentioned, was Cinna. then Andromaque, 
 Britannicus, Zaire, Mithridate, CEdipe, Iphigenie en Aulide, PhZdre, La Mort de 
 Char, Les Horaces, Rodogune, Mahomet, Radamiste, Le Cid, Manlius, Bajazet. — 
 {Prince Talleyrand. ) 
 
 home of these artists have become famous. The first among them was, without 
 doubt, Talma (1 766-1826), the most celebrated of our tragic actors. It is well known 
 that Napoleon was very fond of him, and honoured him with his protection during 
 his reign. Pierre Lafon, born in 1775, entered the Theatre Francais in 1800, and 
 contested with Talma for the first place. He excelled equally in tragedy and comedy. 
 Afterwards came St. Prix, whose real name was Foucault. He made his debut in 1782, 
 and played successively at the Feydeau theatre, at the Odeon, and finally at the 
 Theatre Francais in 1803. Amongst the actresses, the best known of them are 
 Mesdemoiselles Raucourt and Duchesnois. The former made her first appearance
 
 304 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The journey having been announced in the Moniteur} every 
 one tried to be of the party. The emperor's two aides-de-camp, 
 Savary and Lauriston, 2 were chosen first. The military retinue 
 was to be very brilliant. The emperor wished to be accompanied 
 by those lieutenants whose names had caused most excite- 
 ment in Germany. First, Marshal Soult, Marshal Davoust, 
 Marshal Lannes, the Prince de Neufchatel, Marshal Mortier, 
 Marshal Oudinot, General Suchet, General Boyer, General Nan- 
 souty, 3 General Claparede, 4 General St. Laurent, 5 M. Fain 6 and 
 M. de Meneval. 7 These two last, private secretaries of the 
 emperor, received, as did M. Daru, 8 M. de Champagny, and 
 
 on the stage in 1772, and met with the most brilliant success : she was long imprisoned 
 under the Terror. She died in 1815, and her funeral gave rise to riotous scenes in 
 Saint-Roch's church. Mademoiselle Duchesnois entered the Theatre Francais in 
 
 1802, and soon rose to the foremost rank as a tragedian. 
 
 1 The official gazette. 
 
 2 Jacques Bernard Law, Marquis de Lauriston, was born at Pondichery, in 1758. 
 He was the grandson of the famous financier of the Regency. He enlisted in the 
 artillery in 1793, became colonel in 1795, and aide-de-camp to Bonaparte, brigadier- 
 general in 1800. He was, at different times, charged with diplomatic missions. In 
 181 1, he was named ambassador at St. Petersburg. He remained in retirement during 
 the Hundred Days, was peer under the Restoration, then minister of the king's house- 
 hold, marshal in 1823, grand master of the hunt, and minister of state. He died in 
 1828. 
 
 3 Etiene Champion, comte de Nansouty, born in 1768 of a humble family of 
 Burgundy, was in 1789 captain in the Lauzun Hussars. He served in all the 
 campaigns of the Revolution and of the Empire, became general of division in 
 
 1803, and had (on several occasions) important commands in the cavalry. In 
 
 1804, he was appointed first chamberlain to the empress ; then first equerry to 
 the emperor (1808). He died in 1815. He had married Vergennes' niece. 
 
 4 The comte Claparede, born in 1774, served in the army of the Republic, and 
 was chief of battalion in 1798. Brigadier-general in 1804, he took part in all the 
 wars of his time ; he distinguished himself in 1809. He was appointed, under the 
 Restoration, general-inspector of infantry and peer of France. He died in 1841. 
 
 6 Louis St. Laurent, born in 1763, was officer of artillery in 1789, became 
 general of division in 1807, baron of the Empire in 1810. He left the army in 
 that same year and died in 1832. 
 
 6 F'rancois Fain, born in 1778, entered the administration in 1794, and for 
 twelve years was engaged in sundry employments in the offices of the conventional 
 committees, then in those of the Directory and of the State Secretary. In 1805, he 
 became private secretary of the emperor. He became baron of the Empire and 
 matt re des requetes in 1809. He followed Napoleon in all his campaigns. He lived 
 in retirement under the Restoration. In 1830, he was appointed private secretary 
 of the king, administrator of the civil list and councillor of State. In 1834, he was 
 elected to the Chamber of Deputies. He died in 1837. 
 
 7 Francois de Meneval, born in 1778, was at first secretary to Joseph Bonaparte 
 in 1802. He entered Napoleon's service as secretary, an office which he retained 
 until 1815. In 1812, he became baron of the Empire and maitre des requites. 
 He has left historical memoirs on Napoleon and Marie Louise (three octavo 
 volumes). 
 
 8 The Comte Daru, born in 1767, was lieutenant in the artillery; afterwards 
 commissariat-officer. Arrested in 1793 he remained in prison until Thcrmidor 9. 
 In 1796, he became commissaire-ordonnateur, then after, Brumaire 18, inspector of
 
 THE ERFURT INTERVIEW. 305 
 
 M. Maret, orders to repair to Erfurt. General Duroc appointed 
 M. de Canouville to make arrangements for the lodgings. 
 " Bring Beausset, 1 also," said the emperor. " We really must 
 have some one to introduce our actresses to the Grand Duke 
 Constantin. 2 He can also, at dinner, discharge his duties of 
 prefet of the palace, besides he bears a great name." Each 
 day some one left for Erfurt. The route was covered with 
 waggons and saddle- and coach-horses, and some of the 
 emperor's livery servants. 
 
 The month of September was drawing to a close. I had 
 read over all the correspondence, but the emperor had not yet 
 had with me the principal conversation on those affairs that were 
 to be treated. A few days before that fixed for my departure, 
 the grand marshal informed me that the emperor desired him to 
 tell me to present myself at the grand reception that evening. 
 I was scarcely in the drawing-room than he led me to his study. 
 " Well," he said, " so you have read all the Russian correspond- 
 ence ? What do you think of my move with the Czar 
 Alexander ? " and then he recalled in an amusing retrospect all 
 he had done and written for the past year. He concluded by 
 pointing to me the influence he had gained over the Czar, 
 whereas, as far as he was concerned, he had executed only 
 what suited him of the treaty of Tilsit. " Now," said he, " I 
 shall go to Erfurt. I wish, in returning, to be free to do what I 
 wish in Spain. I wish to be assured that Austria will be afraid 
 and hold back, and I do not desire to be engaged in too precise 
 a manner with Russia concerning the affairs in the East. Pre- 
 pare me a convention which will satisfy the Czar Alexander, 
 and be directed especially against England, and in which I shall 
 
 reviews. In 1800 he was chosen as general secretary to the minister of war, and 
 entered the Tribunate in 1802. In 1805, he became intendant-general of the 
 emperor's household and councillor of state ; intendant-general of the grand army, 
 1806 ; minister at Berlin in 1807 ; minister and Secretary of State in 181 1. He lived 
 in retirement under the Restoration, and died in 1829. 
 
 1 Louis de Beausset, nephew of the cardinal of that name and born in 1770, 
 became in 1805, Prefet of the Imperial palace, and retained that appointment until 
 1815. He followed then the Empress Marie Louise to Vienna, and was for a time 
 grand master of her household. He has left memoirs on the Empire. 
 
 2 The Grand Duke Constantin (1779-1834), was the youngest brother of the Czar 
 Alexander. He devoted all his life to military affairs, but never obtained any 
 important command. In 1845, he was appointed generalissimo in the army of the 
 new kingdom of Poland and retained that post until his death. 
 
 VOL. I. X
 
 3 o6 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 be perfectly free for the rest. I shall help you, and the prestige 
 shall not be lacking." I was two days without seeing him. In 
 his impatience he had written what he wished the articles to 
 contain and sent the note to me, requesting that I should bring 
 them to him drawn up, as soon as possible. I did not make 
 him wait, and a few hours later I went to him with the projected 
 treaty drawn up as he had indicated. 
 It ran as follows : — 
 
 " His Majesty the Emperor of the French, &c, and his 
 Majesty the Czar of all the Russias, &c, wishing to render 
 more and more binding and durable, the alliance which unites 
 them, and reserving to themselves to endeavour to come to an 
 agreement, as soon as possible, on the new means and 
 methods of directing an attack upon England, the common 
 enemy of themselves and of the Continent, have resolved to 
 set down in a special convention the principles they have 
 determined to follow — [Here the Emperor interrupted me and 
 said, "Principles is good, it is not binding"] and which will 
 direct them in all their steps towards the restoration of peace. 
 They have therefore, to that effect, named for their pleni- 
 potentiaries, &c who have agreed to the following 
 
 articles : — 
 
 "Art. I. — His Majesty the Emperor of the French and his 
 Majesty the Czar of Russia confirm, and in case of need, will 
 renew the alliance agreed upon between them at Tilsit, not only 
 binding themselves, to make no treaties of peace with the 
 common enemy, but also not to enter into any negotiations 
 with her — nor to listen to any propositions but by common 
 consent. 
 
 "Art. II. — Resolved to remain closely united in peace and 
 in war, the high contracting parties agree to appoint pleni- 
 potentiaries to treat for peace with England, and to send them 
 into such continental town as England may indicate. 
 
 " Art 1 1 1. — In the course of the negotiation, if it should take 
 place, the respective plenipotentiaries of the two high con- 
 tracting parties will act invariably in the most perfect accord, and 
 it will not be permitted to either of them to accept, or approve, 
 against the advice of the other, any proposition or demand of 
 the English plenipotentiary. 
 
 "Art. IV. — The two high contracting parties agree not to 
 receive on the part of the enemy, during the whole of the 
 negotiations, any proposition, offer or communication whatever
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 307 
 
 without letting it at once be known to the respective pleni- 
 potentiaries. 
 
 " Art. V. — It will be proposed to England to treat all ques- 
 tions pending, on the basis of the uti possidetis, including Spain ; 
 and the condition sine gua 11011 which the high contracting parties 
 agree never to depart from, will be that England recognize on 
 the one hand, the union of Wallachia and Moldavia, and of 
 Finland with the Russian Empire, and, on the other, Joseph 
 Napoleon Bonaparte as King of Spain and the Indies. 
 
 "Art. VI. — The Ottoman Porte having experienced since the 
 treaty of Tilsit many changes and revolutions which seem not to 
 leave to it any possibility to give, and does not, consequently, leave 
 any hope of obtaining from it, sufficient guarantees for the 
 respect of the lives and properties of the inhabitants of Wallachia 
 and Moldavia, his Majesty the Czar of Russia, who, since the 
 said treaty, has contracted towards them special engagements, 
 and who, as a consequence of the said revolutions, has been 
 involved in enormous expenses to protect those provinces, being 
 for those motives resolved not to relinquish them, the more so 
 as their possession can alone give his empire its natural and 
 necessary boundary, his Majesty the Emperor Napoleon will 
 not oppose, as far as he is concerned, their being annexed to the 
 Russian Empire. And His said Majesty foregoes the mediation 
 offered by him, and accepted by Russia in the treaty of Tilsit." 
 
 (" I will not have this article, it is too positive." " Never- 
 theless, Sire, lie s'opposera point, is certainly one of the expressions 
 which bind the least ; besides, the following article is a great 
 corrective.") 
 
 "Art. VII. — Nevertheless his Majesty the Emperor of all the 
 Russias will limit himself, for the present, to continue, as in the 
 past, to occupy Wallachia and Moldavia, leaving everything on 
 the same footing as it is to-day, and will propose to open 
 either in Constantinople, or in an island of the Danube, and 
 under the mediation of France, negotiations, in view of obtain- 
 ing peacefully the cession of those two provinces. Those 
 negotiations, however, will be opened only when the negotiations 
 with England shall have had an issue, in order not to give rise to 
 new discussions which may delay the peace." 
 
 (" That article is good ; with my mediation, I remain the 
 master, and the preceding article will perplex Austria, my true 
 enemy." "Your enemy, Sire, at present, perhaps, but at heart 
 
 X 2
 
 3o8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 her policy is not in opposition to that of France ; she is not 
 aggressive, but conservative." " My dear Talleyrand, I know 
 that this is your opinion ; we will speak of that when the 
 Spanish business is over.") 
 
 "Art. VIII. — His Majesty the Emperor Napoleon will act 
 conjointly with his Majesty the Czar of Russia, in order to obtain 
 from the Ottoman Porte an amicable cession. All the notes of, and 
 all the steps taken by, the two allied courts, in order to reach this 
 end, will be made in conjunction and in the same spirit. 
 
 "Art. IX. — In case a refusal from the Ottoman Porte led 
 to a renewal of the hostilities and to the continuation of the 
 war, the Emperor Napoleon would take no part in it, and will con- 
 fine himself to help Russia by his good offices. But if it should 
 happen that Austria or any other power made common cause 
 with the Ottoman Porte in the said war, his Majesty the Emperor 
 Napoleon will at once make common cause with Russia, being 
 obliged to regard this case as being that of the general alliance 
 which binds the two empires." 
 
 (" That article is insufficient ; it does not quite convey my 
 idea. Nevertheless, proceed, I will tell you what you must 
 add to it") 
 
 " Art. X. — The high contracting parties agree besides, to 
 maintain the integrity of the other possessions of the Ottoman 
 Empire, not wishing to decide, or to undertake of themselves, 
 anything with regard to them, nor to suffer that anything be 
 undertaken by whomsoever without their having previously 
 agreed upon it. 
 
 "Art. XI. — In the negotiations with England, his Majesty the 
 Emperor Napoleon will support Russia's claim to obtain the 
 recognition of Wallachia and Moldavia as provinces of the 
 Russian Empire, whether the Ottoman Porte has consented to it 
 or not. 
 
 "Art. XII. — In return for the relinquishment made by the 
 Emperor Napoleon in the above article, his Majesty the Czar 
 Alexander desists from the eventual engagement taken towards 
 him by the fifth of the secret articles of the treaty of Tilsit, and 
 the said article remains null and void — 
 
 " That is about all I have said to you ; leave me this draft, 
 I will arrange it. We must add to one of the last articles, to 
 that one where I stopped you, that, in case Austria gave any
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 3°9 
 
 uneasiness to France, the Czar of Russia, on the first demand 
 which would be made to him, pledges himself to declare against 
 Austria, and to make common cause with France, this case 
 being equally one of those to which the alliance which binds 
 the two powers applies. — This is the essential article. How 
 could you have left it out ? You are still an Austrian ! " — 
 " Somewhat, Sire. Yet I think it would be more exact to say 
 that I am never a Russian, but always a Frenchman." 
 
 " Make your arrangements to leave : you must be at Erfurt 
 a day or two before me. During the time of our stay there, 
 you try to see the Czar as often as possible. You know him 
 well, you will speak to him in that language that suits him. You 
 will tell him that in the benefit our alliance may prove to 
 mankind, one recognizes one of the great purposes of Providence. 
 Together we are destined to restore general order in Europe. 
 We are both young, we need not hurry. You will insist greatly 
 upon that — for Count Romanzoff is sanguine about the Eastern 
 question. You will say that nothing can be done without public 
 opinion, and that it is necessary that, without being scared 
 by our combined power, Europe should see with pleasure the 
 achievement of the great undertaking we contemplate. The 
 security of the neighbouring powers, the respect of the legiti- 
 mate interest of the Continent, seven millions of Greeks restored 
 to independence. All this constitutes a fine field for philan- 
 thropy. I will give you carte blanche for that. I wish only that it 
 be distant philanthropy. Good-bye." 
 
 I returned home, I put my papers in order, I carried 
 away all that I thought I should require and I got into my 
 carriage. I arrived at Erfurt, Saturday, September 24th, at ten 
 o'clock in the morning. M. de Canouville lodged me in a 
 house very near that which the emperor was to occupy. A few 
 minutes after my arrival, M. de Caulaincourt came to see me. 
 The first day I spent with him proved very useful to me. We 
 spoke of St. Petersburg, and of the disposition in which the two 
 sovereigns had come to the interview. We told each other 
 what we knew, and soon agreed upon all points. 
 
 I found all Erfurt in excitement, there was not a respect- 
 able house that did not provide accommodation for a sovereign
 
 3io THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 and his retinue. The Emperor of Russia arrived there with the 
 Grand Duke Constantin, Count Romanzofif, Count Tolstoi', grand 
 marshal, General Tolstoi', ambassador to France, Prince Wol- 
 konski, Count Oszarowski, 1 Prince Troubetzkoi', Count Ouwaroff, 2 
 Count SchouwalofT, 3 Prince Gagarin, M. Speranski, M. Labenski, 
 Herr Bethmann, General Hitroff, State Councillors Gervais and 
 Creidemann, Herr von Schroder, Prince Leopold of Saxe- 
 Coburg. 4 I think that I have mentioned there almost all those 
 who had the honour to accompany the Czar Alexander. He 
 was expected a day later than the Emperor Napoleon, having 
 to stop twenty-four hours at Weimar. 
 
 A chamberlain of the King of Saxony has just told me 
 that his master would sleep at Erfurt on the 25th, and that 
 he was followed by Count von Bose, 5 cabinet minister, Count 
 Marcolini," master of the horse, Baron von Funck, 7 Baron von 
 Gutschmidt, Major Thielemann, Chamberlain von Gablenz, 
 Herr von Marxhansky and by Herr von Schonberg. M. de 
 Bourgoing, 8 minister of France at Dresden, also had permission 
 to follow the king. 
 
 1 Count Adam of Alkcantara Oszarowski, descended from an old Polish family 
 allied to Russia. He was the Czar Alexander's aide-de-camp. 
 
 2 Count Theodore Ouwaroff, commander-in-chief of the imperial guard and first 
 aide de-camp general to the Czar. He had been one of the conspirators who assas- 
 sinated the Czar Paul. 
 
 3 General Count Schouwaloff (i 775-1823), aide-de-camp to the emperor. He 
 held important commands in all the wars of that time. In 1814, he was one of the 
 commissioners charged to accompany Napoleon to Frejus. 
 
 4 Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg Saafeld, born in 1790, son of Francis, Duke 
 of Saxe-Coburg, and of Caroline, Countess of Reuss, entered the Russian army quite 
 young with the grade of general. In 1810, he was obliged to leave the Russian service 
 to obey the injunctions of Napoleon, re-entered the ranks in 1813, served in the 
 campaigns of Germany and France, and entered Paris with the allied sovereigns in 
 1814 and in 1815. In the following year, he married the Princess Charlotte, the 
 grand-daughter of King George III. and heiress to the Crown. Leopold was 
 naturalized English, but the princess died in the following year. In 1830, he was 
 elected King of the Belgians. Two years later, he married the Princess Louise 
 d'Orleans, the eldest daughter of King Louis-Philippe. He died in 1865. 
 
 5 Frederick William, Count von Bose (1753-1809) was minister of Saxony at Stock- 
 holm, then marshal of the court at Dresden, and grand chamberlain. In 1806, he 
 signed peace with Napoleon and became Minister of Foreign Affairs. 
 
 6 Count Marcolini (1739-1814) was grand chamberlain and master of the horse 
 to the King of Saxony. He became minister of state in 1809. He was devoted to 
 the French alliance, to which he remained faithful until his death. 
 
 7 Baron von Funck, a Saxon general (1 761 -1828), took an active part in the war 
 of 1806. In 1812, he served in our ranks in the campaign of Russia,. at the head of 
 the Saxon cavalry. In 18 13, he was employed on various diplomatic missions, and 
 was minister at London in 1818. 
 
 s Jean -Francois, Baron de Bourgoing, born in 1748 at Nevers, was at first an officer
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 311 
 
 It may be interesting to know now the names of the im- 
 portant personages who, from time to time, arrived at Erfurt. 1 
 The Duke of Saxe-Gotha, 2 accompanied by Baron von Thiimmel, 
 Herr von Studnitz, Herr von Zigesar, Barons Herda and Wan- 
 genheim, and by Herr von Hoff; 3 the Duke of Saxe-Weimar 
 with the hereditary prince, 4 Baron von Egloffstein, 5 Baron Ein- 
 siedel, Herr Goethe, and Herr Wieland, 6 both of whom were 
 intimate counsellors of Weimar; the Duke of Oldenburg, 7 with 
 Baron von Hammerstein, 8 and Baron von Gall ; the Duke of 
 Mecklenburg-Schwerin, 9 the hereditary prince of Mecklenburg- 
 Strelitz, 10 the Prince of Dessau, 11 the princes von Waldeck, Hesse- 
 Homburg, Reuss-Greitz, Reuss-Ebersdorfr", Reuss-Lobenstein, 12 
 
 and then secretary of embassy. In 1787, he became minister of France at Hamburg, 
 then at Madrid (1791), and was, in 1795, charged to negotiate the peace at Basel. 
 Minister at Copenhagen, then at Stockholm under the Consulate, he became, later on, 
 minister to Saxony, and died in 181 1. 
 
 1 In the long enumeration that is about to follow, a great number of personages 
 who have left no trace in history, and on whom we have not been able to procure 
 any information, are mentioned. We have furnished particulars only of the most 
 important among them. As for the sovereign princes, we noticed only those who, 
 by their fame or by their family alliances, deserved special mention. 
 
 2 Augustus, Duke of Saxe-Gotha and Altenburg (1772-1822), member of the Con- 
 federation of the Rhine (December 15, 1806). 
 
 3 Karl von Hoff (1771-1831). Secretary of embassy in the service of the Duke 
 of Saxe-Gotha, and afterwards Aulic Councillor and state minister. He has left 
 numerous books on politics and history. 
 
 4 Karl Augustus of Saxe-Weimar (1757-1828), member of the Confederation of 
 the Rhine (December 15, 1806). His son, Prince Charles-Frederick, married the 
 Princess Marie, daughter of the Czar Paul. 
 
 6 Augustus, Baron von Egloffstein (1771-1834). Officer in the service of Prussia, 
 then of the Duke of Saxe-Weimar. In 1807, he became general of brigade and com- 
 mander of the Saxon troops in the service of France, in Austria, Spain, and Russia, 
 and during the siege of Danzig (1814). 
 
 6 Christopher-Martin Wieland, born in 1733, became in 1792 the preceptor of the 
 Princes of Weimar, then intimate counsellor. He was a member of the academy of 
 that town, which then included the most distinguished men and the most illustrious 
 savants in Germany. He has left many works, including poems, novels, comedies, &c. 
 He died in 1813. 
 
 7 Peter Frederick, Prince of Lubeck, regent of the duchy of Oldenburg, in the 
 name of his cousin. His son, heir presumptive to the duchy, married the Grand- 
 duchess Catherine, daughter of the Czar Paul. 
 
 8 Hans Detlef, baron of Hammerstein (1768-1826), minister of the Duke of 
 Oldenburg. Later he went to Hanover, and became member of the private council 
 of war, and plenipotentiary to the Diet of Frankfort. 
 
 9 Frederick Francois, Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, born in 1756. His son 
 married the Grand-duchess Helena, daughter of the Czar Paul. By a subsequent 
 marriage he had a daughter, the Princess Helena, who married the Due d'Orleans. 
 
 10 George Frederick, born in 1779, succeeded his father 1816. He was brother to 
 Louise, Queen of Prussia. 
 
 11 Leopold, Prince von Anhalt-Dessau (1740-1817) one of the most faithful allies of 
 France, member of the Confederation of the Rhine. 
 
 12 The house of Reuss was divided into four reigning branches, the Greitz, Ebers-
 
 312 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 the Duchess of Saxe-Hildburghausen, 1 the Prince of Schwarz- 
 burg- Rudolstadt, 2 with Herr von Kettelhutt, Herr von Weisse 
 and Herr von Gleichen ; the Prince and Princess of Tour and 
 Taxis 3 with Herr von Leikam ; the Prince of Hesse-Rothenburg, 
 the Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, 4 with the Prince of 
 Reuss-Schleiz and Major von Falkenstein ; the Duke William 
 of Bavaria, the prince-primate 5 (Furst von Dalberg), to whom 
 each inhabitant of the town readily offered lodging accommo- 
 dation ; he had been governor of that town and was beloved 
 by all : the Prince of Hohenzollern-Hechingen, 6 with the 
 hereditary prince ; Herr von Hovel, Herr von Bauer ; the he- 
 reditary Prince of Baden, with the Princess Stephanie Napoleon ; 7 
 Frau von Venningen and Mile, de Bourjolly ; Baron von Dalberg, 
 minister of Baden at Paris, 8 the Prince of Reuss XLL, the 
 hereditary Prince of Darmstadt, 9 Count von Keller, 10 Prince 
 
 dorff, Lobenstein, and Schleiz. All these princes had joined the Confederation of the 
 Rhine (April 1807). 
 
 1 Member of the Confederation of the Rhine (December 15, 1806). 
 
 2 Member of the Confederation of the Rhine (April 1807). 
 
 3 Charles Alexander, Prince of Tour and Taxis, born in 1770, Privy Councillor of 
 the Austrian Empire. He was grand-master of the Imperial post offices, a post 
 which was held in his family since 1695. He married in 1773, the Princess Theresa, 
 daughter of the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. 
 
 4 Antoine, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, born in 1762, member of the Con- 
 federation of the Rhine (July 12, 1806). The princes of the different branches of 
 the house of Hohenzollern, having abdicated in favour of the branch of the house of 
 Hohenzollern-Brandenburg, which occupied the throne of Prussia, the King of 
 Prussia assumed the sovereignty of these principalities. 
 
 5 Charles, Prince of Dalberg, born in 1744, took holy orders and became, in 1772, 
 intimate counsellor of the Elector of Mayence, then governor of Erfurt, coadjutor 
 of the Archbishop of Mayence, to whom he succeeded in 1802. He was afterwards 
 named Archchancellor of the empire. In 1806, he had to resign this dignity ; was in 
 compensation named by Napoleon, prince-primate of the Confederation of the Rhine, 
 prince-sovereign of Ratisbonne, Grand Duke of Fulde and of Hanau. He died in 1817. 
 
 6 Member of the Confederation of the Rhine (July 12, 1806). 
 
 7 Charles Louis Frederick, hereditary prince of Baden, married Stephanie Tascher 
 de la Pagerie, cousin of the Empress Josephine, an adopted daughter of Napoleon. 
 He became Grand Duke in 181 1 and died 1818. He was member of the Confedera- 
 tion of the Rhine. 
 
 8 Emeric-Joseph, Baron von Dalberg, born in 1773, entered the diplomacy in 
 the service of the prince primate, his uncle. In 1803 he became minister of Baden 
 at Paris. From that time dates his connection with M. de Talleyrand. In 1809, he 
 became Minister of Foreign Affairs of Baden, but did not relinquish his situation in 
 Paris. The same year, he was naturalized French, was created Duke by Napoleon 
 and councillor of state with an endowment of four millions. In 1814, he became 
 member of the provisory government, afterwards peer of France and state minister 
 in 1815. He died in the year 1817. 
 
 9 He was the son of Prince Louis, who took the title of grand duke on joining 
 the Confederation of the Rhine (July 12, 1806). He succeeded his father in 1830, 
 and abdicated in 1840. 
 
 10 Louis Christopher, Count von Keller (1757-1827), was first chamberlain and
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE IV. 
 
 j' j 
 
 Dolgorouki, 1 Count von Lerchenfeld, Prince von Leyen, 2 Prince 
 William of Prussia, 3 Count von Goltz, Minister of Foreign Affairs ; 
 M.Le Cocq, M. de Dechen, Jerome Napoleon, King of Westphalia, 
 with the queen, who was born Princess of Wurtemberg ; Prince 
 of Hesse-Philippsthal, 4 Count and Countess von Bucholz, Counts 
 von Truchsess and Wintzingerode, the King of Bavaria, 5 Baron 
 von Montgelas, 6 Counts von Wurtemberg and von Reuss, the 
 King of Wurtemberg 7 the Prince of Hohenlohe, the Duchess of 
 Wurtemberg, Count von Taube, Baron von Gorlitz, Baron von 
 Moltke, Count von Salm Dyck. 8 I surely must forget some 
 people, and apologize for so doing. 
 
 Already the emperor's pages had arrived and were walking 
 about the town in full dress. The military duties were 
 performed by a battalion of grenadiers of the imperial guard ; 
 a detachment of picked gendarmes ; the 6th regiment of 
 cuirassiers ; the 1st regiment of hussars ; and the 17th regiment 
 of light infantry. 
 
 counsellor of the Embassy of Frederick IT., minister of Prussia at Stockholm (1779) 
 at St. Petersburg, and at Vienna. In 181 1, he became minister of the Grand Duchy 
 of Frankfort at Paris. 
 
 1 There were then several princes of the Dolgorouki family. He who attended 
 the meeting at Erfurt is doubtless Prince George, Prussian general and diplomat, who 
 commanded in Finland (1795), and at Corfou (1804), was ambassador at Vienna 
 and to Holland ; or his cousin, Prince Michel, aide-de-camp of the emperor, and 
 Major-general, who was killed a short time later in Finland. 
 
 2 Member of the Confederation of the Rhine. 
 
 3 Prince William of Prussia was the fourth son of Frederick II. He was general 
 in the Prussian Army, and took an active part in the wars of 1806, 1813 and 1814. 
 In 1831, he was governor of the Rhine provinces. 
 
 4 Francis of Hesse-Philippsthal, died in 1810. He was the brother of Louis of 
 Hesse-Philippsthal, general in the service of the King of the two Sicilies, who 
 sustained the memorable siege of Gaeta, in 1806. 
 
 5 Maximilian-Joseph (1756-1825) Duke of Bavaria in I799, : king December 26, 
 1805. He was a member of the Confederation of the Rhine. His daughter married 
 Prince Eugene de Beauharnais, Napoleon's adopted son. 
 
 6 Maximilian-Garnerin, Baron von Montgelas (1759-1838), Aulic Counsellor of 
 Bavaria, Minister of Foreign Affairs (1799). He was a sincere ally to France ; he 
 knew how to profit by it in obtaining great advantages for his country. He retired 
 in 1814. 
 
 7 Frederick (1754-1816), Duke of Wurtemberg in 1797, elector in 1803, king 
 1805, member of the Confederation of the Rhine in 1806. He married an English 
 princess. One of his daughters, Princess Frederique Sophie Dorothee, married the. 
 King Jerome Napoleon. 
 
 8 Joseph Count von Salm-Reiferscheid-Dyck, younger branch of the house of 
 Salm. His estates, which were situated near Cologne, were united with Francein 1801, 
 then with Prussia in 1814. He received in exchange a pension of 28,000 florins and the 
 title of prince (1816). At first, he married Maria-Theresa, Countess von Hatzfeld, 
 and afterwards, Constance Marie de Theis, daughter of a forests-superintendent of 
 Nantes. The latter is renowned on account of her literary works.
 
 314 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The emperor entered Erfurt, September 27, 1808, at ten 
 A.M. An immense crowd surrounded the avenues leading to the 
 palace. Every one wished to see and would approach him who 
 dispensed all : thrones, misery, fears, and hopes. Augustus, 
 Louis XIV. and Napoleon are the men on whom most praises 
 have been bestowed. Times and talent gave different forms 
 to these praises ; but they were, in reality, the same thing. My 
 duties as grand chamberlain enabled me to see the forced, simu- 
 lated, or even sincere homage which was rendered to Napoleon, 
 more than I could have done otherwise, and gave it proportions 
 which appeared to me monstrous. Never did baseness display 
 so much genius : it suggested the idea of having a hunt on the 
 very ground where the emperor had gained the famous battle 
 of Jena. A slaughter of wild boars and beasts was there to 
 remind the victor of the success of this battle. I have often 
 remarked that the more resentment people were justified in 
 feeling against the emperor the more they smiled at his good 
 fortune, which, they said, was Heaven's will. 
 
 I am inclined to believe that flattery possesses secrets with 
 which princes alone, — not those who have lost their thrones, but 
 those who subjected their crowns to some ever-threatening 
 protectorate, — are acquainted ; they know skilfully how to make 
 use of them, when placed in the presence of the power which 
 rules over and could overthrow them. I have heard the following 
 line, of I know not what wretched tragic play, quoted : 
 
 " Tu rias su qn'obeir, tu serais un tyran." x 
 
 I have not met with a single prince at Erfurt, to whom I 
 should not have been more justified in saying: 
 
 " Tu n'as su que regnerj tu serais un esclave." 2 
 
 It is easy to understand this. Mighty sovereigns wish their 
 courts to convey the idea of the importance of their power. On 
 the contrary, petty princes wish theirs to disguise the narrow 
 limits of their rule. Everything magnifies, or rather swells, 
 about a petty sovereign : etiquette, regard, and flattery ; the 
 latter is the standard of his greatness ; he never thinks it 
 
 1 " You would be a tyrant, seeing that you have only known how to obey." 
 
 2 " You would be a slave, seeing that you have only known how to reign."
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 315 
 
 exaggerated. This way of judging things becomes quite natural 
 to him, and is not altered by the vicissitudes of fortune. Thus, 
 if victory brings into his dominions, into his very palace, a man 
 before whom he can himself be but a courtier, he will stoop, in 
 the presence of his victor, as low as he wished his own subjects 
 to do before himself. He cannot conceive any other form of 
 flattery. At powerful courts, they know another means of raising 
 themselves : it is to bow ; petty princes only know how to crawl, 
 and remain crawling until fortune comes to raise them. I did 
 not see at Erfurt a single hand nobly stroking the lion's mane. 
 
 After these scathing remarks, illustrations of which I refrain 
 from giving, I am happy to resume my subject. On September 
 28, news came of the arrival of the Emperor Alexander, who 
 had been spending the night at Weimar. Napoleon, followed 
 by his aide-de-camp and by his generals in full dress, rode up to 
 meet him. When within sight of each other, the two sovereigns 
 rushed to each other's arms in the most friendly fashion, after 
 which Napoleon led the Emperor Alexander to the residence 
 prepared for him, and having carefully ascertained that the Czar 
 was provided with everything he needed, took leave of him. 
 
 I was in the Emperor Napoleon's palace, awaiting his return. 
 He seemed very pleased with the first impressions of his 
 journey, and he told me that he augured well of it, but that 
 nothing should be hurried. " We are so glad to see each other 
 again," he said, laughing ; " that we must be allowed to enjoy 
 that feeling a little." He had scarcely finished dressing when 
 the Czar arrived, and I was introduced to him. " He is an old 
 acquaintance," said the Emperor of Russia ; " I am delighted to 
 see him again. I hoped he would be of our party." I wanted 
 to retire ; but, as Napoleon wished to avoid conversing on any 
 serious subject, and was only too glad that I should be there, 
 he desired me to stay. The two sovereigns conversed with 
 the most lively interest on insignificant family matters. The 
 Empress Elizabeth was the first topic of conversation. 1 Then 
 it turned on the Empress Josephine, and then on the Grand 
 
 1 Louise Elizabeth, daughter of Charles-Louis, hereditary prince of Baden and of 
 Amelia of Hesse-Darmstadt, born in 1779. Married in 1793, to Alexander, future 
 Czar of Russia.
 
 316 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Duchess Anne, 1 and the Princess Borghese, 2 &c. Had the time 
 of a first visit permitted, there probably would have been a 
 word about the health of Cardinal Fesch. The two sovereigns, 
 feeling quite comfortable as to the state in which they had left 
 their respective families, separated. Napoleon showed the Czar 
 to the stairs, and I the Emperor of Russia to his carriage. 
 While walking together, the latter said to me several times : 
 "Nous nous verrons" 3 and that, with an expression that proved 
 that M. de Caulaincourt, who had met him on his arrival, had 
 told him that I knew what was going to happen. I then went 
 up to the emperor, who said to me : " I have modified the draft 
 of the treaty ; I am taking more precautions against Austria ; I 
 will show it you." — He did not enter into any more particulars. — 
 " The Czar seems to me disposed to do anything I wish. If he 
 speaks to you on the subject, tell him that I at first intended 
 the negotiation to be made between Count Romanzoff and 
 yourself, but that I have changed my mind, and that my con- 
 fidence in him is such that I think it better for everything to 
 pass between ourselves. When the convention is settled, the 
 ministers will sign it. Remember, though, in everything you 
 say, that any delay will be useful to me. The language of 
 all the kings about to meet here will be submissive ; they fear 
 me. Before discussing the real object of this meeting, I wish 
 the Emperor of Russia to be dazzled by the sight of my power. 
 For there is no negotiation that it could fail to render easier." 
 
 On returning home, I found a note from the Princess of 
 Tour and Taxis, informing me of her arrival. I immediately 
 went to her. It afforded me much pleasure to see her again, 
 she was such an excellent lady. She told me she had come to 
 Erfurt to ask the Czar to use, in her favour, his influence over 
 
 1 Anne, daughter of the Czar Paul and of Sophia Dorothy, Princess of Wurtemberg, 
 born in 1795, married, in 1816, to William Prince of Orange, who in 1840 became 
 King of the Netherlands. 
 
 - Marie-Pauline Bonaparte, second sister of the emperor, born at Ajaccio in 
 1780; she married in 1801, General Leclerc, whodied at San-Domingo in 1802. In 
 1803, she married the Prince Borghese, the head of one of the most illustrious families 
 of the Roman nobility. The Princess Pauline's brother had created her Duchess of 
 Guastalla in 1806, but this country was shortly after incorporated with the kingdom 
 of Italy. In 1814, she accompanied the emperor to the Island of Elba, and, in the 
 following year, went to Rome, where she died in 1825. 
 
 3 " We will see each other."
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE IV. 317 
 
 the German Princes, with whom her husband, grand master of 
 the German Posts and relays, vainly tried to make arrangements 
 for some years. I was not with her a quarter of an hour, when 
 the Czar was announced ; he was most amiable and communi- 
 cative, and asked the princess to give him some tea, telling her 
 that she ought to give us some every evening after the play ; 
 for it would be the best way to chat at one's ease and finish the 
 day pleasantly. It was agreed upon, and nothing of interest 
 was discussed that evening. 
 
 This interview at Erfurt, without Austria being invited or 
 even officially informed, had alarmed the Emperor Francis, who, 
 of his own accord, had sent Baron de Vincent straight to Erfurt 
 with a letter to Napoleon, and I also think one to the Czar. 
 M. de Vincent, a gentleman from Lorraine, had entered the 
 Austrian service long before the French Revolution, on account 
 of the relationship of his family with the House of Lorraine. I 
 knew him well ; for ten years, I had had frequent intercourse 
 with him, and I can add that he had cause to congratulate him- 
 self that he knew me, for, eighteen months before, it pleased me 
 to render his mission in Warsaw a brilliant one, by assuring him 
 that the influence I could dispose of — it was then considerable — 
 would be applied to thwarting all the outbreaks ready to take 
 place in Galicia. M. de Vincent showed me a copy of the letter 
 of which he was the bearer : the style of this letter was noble, 
 rendering any uneasiness on the part of his sovereign impercep- 
 tible. M. de Vincent had been ordered to confide in me. I told 
 him that his mission gave me much pleasure, for I was not 
 without fear concerning the opinions of the two sovereigns. 
 At the beginning, it was easy to see from Napoleon's own 
 words that he recognized me to be, and he was right, a partisan 
 of the alliance of France with Austria. I then thought, and I 
 still believe that such alliance was to the interest of France. I 
 assured M. de Vincent that I had done, and was still doing, all 
 in my power to prevent any of the resolutions arranged at Erfurt 
 causing prejudice to the interests of his government. 
 
 Napoleon, faithful to his present dilatory system, had dis- 
 posed of the first days so as never to be able to find a moment 
 to speak of business matters. He spent a good deal of time
 
 3 i 8 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 over his lunch. He received visitors with whom he willingly 
 chatted ; then followed some visits to the public establishments 
 of the country, from whence he went to manoeuvres outside the 
 town, at which the Czar and the Grand Duke never failed to 
 meet him. Then, only sufficient time remained to dress for 
 dinner, which was succeeded by the play, which took up the 
 rest of the day. 
 
 I have known many of those dejeihiers to last more than two 
 hours. To them, Napoleon generally bid the eminent and 
 remarkable men who had come to Erfurt to see him. Every 
 morning, he perused, with much interest, the list of new arrivals. 
 One day, having noticed the name of Herr Goethe among the 
 number of newly-arrived visitors, he sent for him. 
 
 " Monsieur Goethe," he said to him on seeing him, " I am 
 delighted to see you." 
 
 " Sire, I see that when your Majesty travels, you do not 
 neglect to notice even the most insignificant persons." 
 
 " I know you are Germany's first dramatic poet." 
 
 " Sire, you wrong our country ; we are under the impression 
 we have our great men. Schiller, Lessing, and Wieland are surely 
 known to your Majesty." 
 
 " I confess I hardly know them. However, I have read 
 La Guerre de Trente Ans, 1 and that, I beg your pardon, 
 seemed to me to furnish dramatic subjects only worthy of 
 our boulevards." 
 
 " Sire, I do not know your boulevards, but I suppose that 
 popular plays are given there. I am sorry to hear you judge so 
 severely one of the greatest geniuses of modern times." 
 
 "You generally live in Weimar ; it is the place where the most 
 celebrated men of German literature meet ? " 
 
 " Sire, they enjoy great protection there; but, for the present, 
 there is only one man in Weimar who is known throughout 
 Europe ; it is Wieland." 
 
 " I should be delighted to see Monsieur Wieland ! " 
 
 " If your Majesty will allow me to ask him, I feel certain 
 that he will come here immediately." 
 
 1 Geschichte des dreissigjiihrigen Krieges, Schiller's chief and last historical work. 
 It was published in 1792. — {Translator.)
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE IV. 319 
 
 " Does he speak French ? " 
 
 " He knows it, and has corrected several French translations 
 of his works." 
 
 "While you are here, you must go every night to our 
 plays. It will not do you any harm to see good French 
 tragedies." 
 
 " I'll go willingly. I must confess to your Majesty that it 
 was my intention ; for I have translated, or rather imitated, some 
 French pieces." 
 
 " Which ones ? " 
 
 " Mahomet and Tancrede." 
 
 " I shall ask Remusat if he has any actors here to play them. 
 I should be very glad for you to see them represented in our 
 language. You are not as strict as we are in theatrical rules." 
 
 " Sire, unity with us is not so essential." 
 
 " How do you find our sojourn here ? " 
 
 "Very brilliant, sire, and I hope it will be useful to our 
 country." 
 
 " Are your people happy ? " 
 
 " They hope to be so soon." 
 
 " Monsieur Goethe, you ought to remain with us during the 
 whole of our stay and write your impressions of the grand sight 
 we are offering." 
 
 " Ah ! sire, it would require the pen of some great writer of 
 antiquity to undertake such a task." 
 
 " Are you an admirer of Tacitus ? " 
 
 " Yes, sire, I admire him much." 
 
 " Well, I don't ; but we shall talk of that another time. 
 Write and tell Monsieur Wieland to come here. I shall return 
 his visit at Weimar, where the duke has invited me. I'll be very 
 glad to see the duchess ; she is a lady worthy of much esteem. 
 The duke was troublesome enough, for some time. But he has 
 been punished." x 
 
 " Sire, troublesome though he may have been, the punishment 
 was a little severe. But I am not a judge of such things ; he 
 
 1 The Grand Duke of Saxe- Weimar had taken Prussia's part in 1806, His 
 troops were literally crashed, at Jena, and his capital, which was on the line of retreat 
 of the Prussian army, was devastated by the pursuers.
 
 3 20 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 protects literature and sciences, and we have nothing to say 
 against him, but rather everything in his favour." 
 
 " Monsieur Goethe, come to-night to IpJiigenie ; it is a good 
 piece. It is not, however, one of my favourites, but the French 
 think a good deal of it. You will see in my pit a great number 
 of sovereigns. Do you know the Prince Primate ? " 
 
 " Yes, sire ; almost intimately. He is very clever, very well 
 informed, and very generous." 
 
 " Well, you will see him, to-night, fast asleep on the 
 shoulder of the King of Wurtemberg. Have you already seen 
 the Czar ? " 
 
 " No, sire, never ; but I hope to be introduced to him." 
 
 " He speaks your language ; should you write anything on 
 the Erfurt interview, you must dedicate it to him." 
 
 " Sire, it is not my habit to do so. When I first commenced 
 to write, I made it a principle never to dedicate anything to any 
 one, in order that I should never repent it." 
 
 " The great writers of Louis the Fourteenth's time were not 
 of your opinion." 
 
 " But your Majesty cannot be sure they never repented doing 
 what they did." 
 
 " What has become of that scoundrel, Kotzebue ? " x 
 
 "Sire, they say he is in Siberia and that your Majesty 
 will solicit his pardon from the Czar." 
 
 " But he is not the man for me." 
 
 " Sire, he has been very unfortunate, and is a man of great 
 talent." 
 
 " Good-bye, Monsieur Goethe." 
 
 I followed Herr Goethe to invite him to dine with me. On 
 coming home, I wrote this first conversation, and, while at 
 dinner, I ascertained, by different questions I put to him, that 
 
 1 Augustus von Kotzebue, born in 1761, at Weimar, entered the Russian service, 
 and became secretary to the government of St. Petersburg, and President of Justice 
 in Esthonia. He was arrested and transported to Siberia in 1800, as the author of 
 libels against the Czar Paul ; he returned in the following year, and was appointed 
 Aulic councillor. He came afterwards to Paris, where he remained from 1802 to 
 1806. After the battle of Jena, he fled to Russia, where he circulated pamphlets of a 
 violent nature against France and Napoleon. In 1813, he was one of the promoters 
 of the national insurrection of Germany, but he changed his colours in 1815, and 
 became one of the most ardent political defenders of the Holy Alliance. He was 
 assassinated in 1819.
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 32 1 
 
 what I had written was correct. On rising from table, Herr 
 Goethe went to the theatre ; I was anxious that he should be 
 near the stage, but that was difficult enough, for the seats in front 
 were occupied by the crowned heads, and the chairs placed 
 behind them were taken up by the hereditary princes, while the 
 seats still farther off were filled by ministers and princes. I, 
 therefore, recommended Herr Goethe to Dazincourt who, without 
 wounding propriety, found the means of placing him advan- 
 tageously. 
 
 The choice of the pieces for those plays at Erfurt had been 
 made with great care and art, the subjects having been taken 
 from heroic times or great historical events. Napoleon's idea in 
 causing heroic times to appear on the stage, was to mislead all 
 that old German nobility in the midst of which he was, and to 
 carry them away by imagination into other regions where men 
 great by themselves, fabulous by their actions, creators of their 
 race, and pretending to draw their origin from the gods, passed 
 before its eyes. In the pieces drawn from history, the repre- 
 sentation of which he ordered, the policy of some chief 
 character always recalled some circumstances analogous with 
 those which occurred daily since he himself had appeared on 
 the stage of the world ; and all that became the subject of flatter- 
 ing allusions. The hatred of Mithridates against the Romans 
 called to mind Napoleon's hatred against England, and after 
 hearing the following verses : 
 
 " Ne vous figurez pas que de cette contree, 
 Par d'eternels remparts, Rome soit sdparee, 
 Je sais tous les chemins par ou je dois passer, 
 Et si la mort bientot ne vient me traverser," 1 
 
 everybody whispered : " Yes, he knows all the roads to 
 success ; yes, it must be borne in mind, he knows them all." 
 
 The ideas of immortality, glory, undaunted bravery, and 
 fatality, which, in Iphigenie, recur constantly, either as the chief 
 idea, or as accessory, served the purpose of his main thought, 
 
 1 " Do not fancy that from this country 
 
 Rome be protected by everlasting obstacles, 
 
 I know all the paths which lead to that city, 
 
 And if death does not soon thwart my purpose," . . . 
 
 —(Mithridates, Act III., Scene I.) 
 
 VOL. I. Y
 
 322 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 which was to arouse unceasing amazement in all who approached 
 him. Talma had received orders to deliver slowly the following 
 fine passage : 
 
 " L'honneur parle, il suffit, ce sont Ik nos oracles. 
 Les dieux sont de nos jours les maitres souverains, 
 Mais, seigneur, notre gloire est dans nos propres mains, 
 Pourquoi nous tourmenter de leurs ordres supremes ? 
 Ne songeons qu'a nous rendre immortels comme eux-memes, 
 Et laissant faire au sort, courons ou la valeur 
 Nous promet un destin aussi grand que le leur," . . } 
 
 But the play of Napoleon's choice, that which indicated best 
 the causes and the source of his power, was Mahomet, because, 
 during the whole performance, it seemed to him that he was the 
 chief character. From the beginning of the first act : 
 
 " Les mortels sont egaux, ce n'est point la naissance, 
 Cest la seule vertu qui fait la difference. 
 II est de ces esprits favorise's des cieux 
 Qui sont tout par eux-memes et rien par leurs aieux. 
 Tel est l'homme, en un mot, que j'ai choisi pour maitre ; 
 Lui seul dans l'univers a merite" de l'etre ; 
 Tout mortel a ses lois doit un jour obe"ir," . . . 2 
 
 the eyes of all present were riveted on him ; they listened 
 to the actors but could not help looking at him. And, in 
 another passage, every German prince must naturally have 
 applied to himself the following verses uttered by Lafont in a 
 dismal tone : 
 
 " Vois l'empire romain tombant de toutes parts, 
 Ce grand corps de'chire' dont les membres epars 
 
 1 " The dictates of honour suffice, they constitute our oracle. 
 
 The gods are the sovereign masters of our life, 
 
 But, my Lord, our glory depends on ourseives, 
 
 Why trouble about their supreme orders ? 
 
 Let us only think of becoming immortal like themselves, 
 
 And letting fate take its course, let us hasten where valour 
 
 Holds out for us the prospect of a fate as great as their own," . . . 
 
 — {fphigenie, Act I., Scene II.) 
 
 2 " All men are equal, it is not to birth, 
 
 But to virtue alone that difference between them is due. 
 
 There are some men, favoured by Heaven, 
 
 Who are everything by themselves and owe nothing to their ancestors. 
 
 Such, in short, is the man I chose for master ; 
 
 He alone in the world deserved to be mine ; 
 
 All nations will some day submit to his sway," . . . 
 
 — {Mahomet (Voltaire), Act I., Scene IV.)
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 321 
 
 Languissent disperses, sans honneur et sans vie ; 
 Sur ces debris du monde elevons l'Arabie. 
 II faut un nouveau culte, il faut de nouveaux fers, 
 II faut un nouveau Dieu pour l'aveugle univers." 1 
 
 At this point, respect only prevented the audience from 
 demonstrating their approval ; and the applause almost broke 
 forth at the following verse : 
 
 " Qui l'a fait roi ? Qui l'a couronne' ? La Victoire." 2 
 
 Mahomet, Acte L, Scene IV. 
 
 Perhaps they only affected to be touched when Omar 
 added : 
 
 " Au nom de conquerant et de triomphateur, 
 II veut joindre le nom de pacificateur." 3 
 
 Mahomet, Acte I., Scene IV. 
 
 At this last verse, Napoleon cleverly evinced an emotion which 
 showed that it was there, he wished them to find the explana- 
 tion of all his life. 
 
 They even plainly displayed their approbation when Saint- 
 Prix, in La Mort de Cesar, said, with admirable expression, in 
 speaking of Sylla : 
 
 " II en etait l'effroi, J'en serai les delices, etc." 4 
 
 La Mort de Ce'sar (Voltaire), Acte I., Scene IV. 
 
 I do not wish to quote any more applications, or inductions 
 of the same kind which I heard people make every day. I only 
 cite those that are indispensable in order to enable my readers 
 to grasp more fully the spirit of this great assembly. 
 
 After each play, I saw the Emperor Alexander at the house 
 of the Princess of Tour and Taxis, and sometimes M. de Vincent 
 
 1 " Behold the Roman empire breaking up everywhere, 
 
 Great tattered body whose scattered limbs 
 Linger disconnected in inglorious death ; 
 We must raise Arabia on this wreck of the world. 
 A new worship is needed, men require fresh fetters, 
 A new God must rule over blind mankind." 
 
 — (Mahomet, Act II. Scene V. ) 
 
 2 " Who made him king ? Who crowned him ? Victory." 
 
 3 "To the name of victor and of conqueror, 
 
 He wishes to add that of pacifier." 
 
 4 "He was the dread of Rome, I shall be her delight "... 
 
 Y 2
 
 324 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 called on me. Their impressions on the entertainment were 
 very different. The emperor was always delighted with the 
 performance, and M. de Vincent always despondent. He 
 had the greatest difficulty in persuading himself that the em- 
 perors were not making some arrangement ; and yet he was 
 positive that during the first days no business had been touched 
 upon. However, when they did speak, the conversation was a 
 long one. The emperors discussed thoroughly everything that 
 had been treated of between the two cabinets for the last year, and 
 the Emperor Napoleon finished by communicating a project of 
 convention which, he said, he had drawn up for their mutual 
 advantage. He gave it to the Emperor Alexander, after having 
 made him promise not to show it to anybody ; not even to one 
 of his ministers. It was an affair, he added, which must be 
 treated of between themselves, and to prove the importance 
 which he attached to its being kept a secret, he himself had 
 written out some of the articles, not wishing any one to know 
 them. 
 
 The words, " not any one," which he repeated, were evidently 
 meant for Count Romanzoff and me. The Emperor Alexander 
 had the goodness not to understand them so ; and, after having 
 begged the Princess of Tour and Taxis to admit nobody, he took 
 the treaty out of his pocket. Napoleon had taken the trouble 
 to copy, as well as he could, nearly all the project I had 
 given him. He had, however, changed one or two articles, 
 and added that a corps of the Russian army, under pretext of 
 the position of the cabinet of St. Petersburg with regard to 
 the Ottoman Porte, should be placed near the Austrian frontiers. 
 The Emperor Alexander, after having remarked to the Em- 
 peror Napoleon that the bases of the treaty differed from 
 those which had been almost decided on at St. Petersburg, 
 reserved to himself to make in writing any observations he 
 should think proper. Russian secrets seem to be badly kept, 
 for the next morning, M. de Vincent came to me and told me 
 that he knew the negotiations had commenced, and that there 
 was already a project of convention drawn up. I advised him 
 to keep quiet, and take only the necessary steps, and above all 
 not to show any uneasiness. I also told him that I was placed
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 325 
 
 so as to have some influence on the resolutions which would be 
 taken, and he knew how strongly I was opposed to any measures 
 which would be detrimental to the security or dignity of 
 Austria. 
 
 Two or three days elapsed without the two emperors 
 seeing each other, except at parade, at dinner time, or at the 
 play. I continued to go every evening to the Princess of 
 Tour's ; the Emperor Alexander also came there regularly ; he 
 seemed preoccupied, so I did my best to make the conversation as 
 frivolous as possible. One day, however, as I was looking over 
 Mithridate, which had just been given me, I remarked on the 
 number of passages in the piece which might serve as allusions. 
 Addressing myself to the Princess of Tour, I quoted several 
 verses, but my little plan did not succeed. The emperor said 
 he had a headache and withdrew, but his last words were "d 
 demain? Every morning, I saw M. de Caulaincourt. I asked 
 him if he did not think that the Emperor Alexander was growing 
 cooler. He said, No ; that he thought he was only perplexed, 
 but that his enthusiasm for Napoleon was still the same, and 
 that his perplexity would soon cease. 
 
 During these days of political reserve, the Emperor Napoleon 
 continued to see, every morning after his breakfast, the Germans 
 he prized and whose suffrage he wished to have. The errand he 
 had given to Herr Goethe had been faithfully executed, and 
 Herr Wieland had arrived. He had them both invited to lunch. 
 I remember that the prince-primate and many other people were 
 present that day. The emperor was always anxious to shine in 
 conversation, and so, carefully prepared some subject, which he 
 broached unexpectedly to the person with whom he was speaking. 
 He was never embarrassed by a direct contradiction, for he easily 
 found a reason for interrupting the person who spoke. I have 
 several times had opportunities for remarking that, when out of 
 France, he was fond of speaking on elevated subjects, which are 
 generally unknown to military men ; this fact gave him at once 
 a character apart. His self-confidence in this respect, whether 
 it was owing to the brilliancy of his life, or to the illusions of his 
 pride, would not have been shaken by the presence of either 
 Montesquieu or Voltaire.
 
 326 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 There were three or four subjects on which he spoke willingly. 
 At Berlin, the preceding year, addressing himself to Johan von 
 Miiller, he had tried to fix the different epochs of the great 
 efforts of the human mind. I fancy I still see the astonish- 
 ment on Muller's face when he heard him assert that the 
 propagation and the rapid development of Christianity had 
 worked an admirable reaction of the spirit of Greece against that 
 of Rome, and lay stress on or applaud the skill which Greece, 
 vanquished by physical force, displayed in dealing with the con- 
 quest of the empire of intellect, a conquest, he added, which had 
 been effected by taking advantage of the beneficial seeds of 
 Christianity, whose influence on mankind had been so great. 
 He must have known this sentence by heart, for I have heard him 
 repeat it in the same way to M. de Fontanes x and to M. Suard. 2 
 Miiller did not reply. He was quite taken aback ; the emperor 
 took advantage of this opportunity to ask him to write his 
 history. 
 
 I do not know what he wished to obtain from Wieland, but 
 he was particularly affable with him. 
 
 " M. Wieland, we like your works much in France : it is you 
 who are the author of Agathon and Oberon. We call you the 
 Voltaire of Germany." 
 
 " Sire, the comparison would be a flattering one, if it were 
 justified. It is very great praise from very kind people." 
 
 " Tell me, Monsieur Wieland, why your Diogenes, your 
 Agathon, and your Peregrinus are written in the equivocal 
 style which mixes romance with history and history with 
 romance. A superior man like yourself ought to keep each style 
 distinctly separate. What is mixed is generally confused. 
 That is the reason we like the drama so little in France. But 
 I am afraid to say too much on this subject, because I am 
 dealing with some one so much more conversant with the 
 matter than I am ; especially as what I say has as much 
 reference to Monsieur Goethe as to you." 
 
 1 M. de Fontanes, born in 1787, occupied himself, before the Revolution, with 
 literature and poetry. He entered the Inst Out under the Consulate, became a member 
 of the legislative body in 1804, and president of that assembly (1805). Grand- 
 master of the University in 1808, and senator in 1810. He died in 1821. 
 
 2 Jean Baptiste Suard, litterateur and distinguished writer, member of the French 
 Academy. He became Censor under the Restoration. (1733-1817.)
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 327 
 
 " Sire, your Majesty will permit us to point out to you that, 
 in the French theatre, there are very few tragedies which are 
 not a mixture of history and romance ; but I am now on Herr 
 Goethe's land. He, will reply himself, and certainly he will 
 reply well. As to myself, I wished to give man some useful 
 lesson. The authority of history was necessary. I intended 
 that the examples I borrowed should be easy and agreeable to 
 imitate, and to do that, it was necessary to mix the ideal 
 and the romantic. Men's ideas, sometimes, are worth more 
 than their actions, and good novels are more valuable 
 than mankind. Compare, sire, the century of Louis XIV. 
 with Tclemaque, where are found the best lessons for sovereigns 
 and for the people. My Diogenes is virtuous, though living in 
 a cask." 
 
 " But do you know," said the emperor, " what happens to 
 those who always display virtue in their stories ? They cause 
 the impression that virtue is but a dream. History has often 
 been calumniated by historians themselves." 
 
 This conversation, in which Tacitus could not fail to be intro- 
 duced, was interrupted by M. de Nansouty, who just came to 
 tell the emperor that a messenger from Paris had brought him 
 some letters. The prince -primate left with Wieland and Goethe, 
 and begged me to go with them to dine at his house. Wieland, 
 who in his simplicity did not know whether he had replied well or 
 badly to the emperor, had gone into his room to write the con- 
 versation he had just had. He brought that recital to the prince- 
 primate, such as has just been read. All the great minds of 
 Weimar and suburbs attended that dinner. I observed a lady from 
 Eisenach who was seated opposite the primate. No one spoke to 
 her without giving her the name of a muse, and that without 
 affectation. " Clio, will you have so and so ? " was the primate's 
 manner of addressing her, to which she would reply simply 
 " Yes " or " No." She was called Baroness Bechtolsheim. After 
 dinner, every one went to the play, and, when it was over, follow- 
 ing my custom, I saw the emperor home, and went, afterwards, 
 to the Princess of Tour's. 
 
 The Czar Alexander was already there. His face did not 
 wear its ordinary expression. It was plain that his uncertainties
 
 328 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 still existed, and that his observations on the project of the 
 treaty were not made. 
 
 " Has the emperor been talking to you lately ? " was his first 
 question. 
 
 " No, sire ; " and I ventured to add that if I had not seen 
 M. de Vincent, I could have believed that the Erfurt interview 
 was only a pleasure party. 
 
 " What does M. de Vincent say ? " 
 
 " Sire, only very reasonable things. He hopes that your 
 Majesty will not allow yourself to be led by the Emperor Napo- 
 leon to take threatening, or at least, offensive measures against 
 Austria ; and if your Majesty will permit me to tell you so, I 
 have formed the same opinion." 
 
 " I should also like to refrain from them, but it seems very 
 difficult to do so, for the Emperor Napoleon seems to me much 
 incensed." 
 
 " But, sire, you have certain observations to make. Can your 
 Majesty not consider as useless those provisions relative to 
 Austria and say that they are included in the treaty of Tilsit ? 
 It seems to me that one could add that the proofs of confidence 
 ought to be reciprocal ; and that your Majesty, while allowing the 
 Emperor Napoleon to be, in a measure, the judge of the circum- 
 stances where certain articles of the draft submitted to you could 
 be executed, has, on the other hand, the right to exact that he 
 leave you to judge the cases where Austria might become a real 
 obstacle to the projects adopted by the two sovereigns. This 
 being understood between you, everything concerning Austria 
 should be erased from the draft of the treaty. And if your 
 Majesty thinks of the fright that the Erfurt interview, arranged 
 without the knowledge of the Emperor Francis, must have 
 caused at Vienna, perhaps you would like to re-assure him in a 
 letter, on everything which interests him personally." I saw 
 that the Czar Alexander was pleased. He took notes with his 
 pencil on all that I had said ; but it was necessary to decide, and 
 that he had not yet done. It was M. de Caulaincourt who, by 
 his personal influence over him carried his determination. 
 
 The next day the Czar Alexander showed me his observa- 
 tions on the project of the treaty, and said to me blandly :
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE IV. 329 
 
 " You will recognize yourself there, perhaps, in several places. I 
 have added many things taken from the past conversations 
 the Emperor Napoleon and I have had together." Those obser- 
 vations were sufficiently good. I found him decided to propose 
 them the next morning. It gave me pleasure, for his expres- 
 sion was not yet so free from anxiety that it did not cause me 
 to wish the first step had been taken. My fears were not with- 
 out foundation, for at a conference which lasted three hours, he 
 yielded nothing to the Emperor Napoleon, who sent for me at 
 the time of their separating. 
 
 " I have done nothing with the Emperor Alexander," he said. 
 
 " Sire, I believe your Majesty has done a great deal since he 
 has been here, for the Czar Alexander is completely under 
 the spell." 
 
 " He is simply acting a part. If he cares so much for me, why 
 does he not sign ? " 
 
 " Sire, there is something so chivalric in his nature that so 
 many precautions quite shock him. He believes that by his 
 word and his affection for you, he is more bound than by 
 treaties. His letters, which your Majesty gave me to read, are 
 full of passages which prove it." 
 
 " That is all nonsense !" 
 
 He walked up and down in his room, interrupting the silence 
 now and then by saying : 
 
 " I shall not return to that subject again with him — that 
 would show him that I placed too much interest in it. Our only 
 interview, by the mystery in which it was enveloped, will impose 
 on Austria. She will believe in the existence of secret articles, 
 and I shall not undeceive her. If, at least, Russia, by her example, 
 induce the Emperor Francis to recognize Joseph as King of Spain, 
 that would be something, but I don't expect it. What I have 
 done in eight days with the Czar Alexander would require 
 years to do at Vienna. I do not understand your leaning 
 towards Austria. It is the ancient policy of France." 
 
 " Sire, I believe that such ought to be the policy of the 
 new France, and if I dared add it, your own, for you, sire, 
 are the one sovereign on whom the world depends most to 
 preserve civilization. The presence of Russia at the peace of
 
 330 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 Tcschen 1 has been a serious misfortune for Europe, and a grave 
 error on the part of France, who did nothing to prevent it." 
 
 " That is no longer the question, my dear. We must take 
 things as they are. You must charge M. de Vergennes with the 
 responsibility of the past. Few people now take an interest in 
 civilization." 
 
 " We think of our business." 
 
 " You do not understand ; you know why it is that no 
 one deals openly with me? It is that having no children, 
 they believe I only have a life-interest in France. That 
 is the secret of all that you see here. They are afraid of 
 me, and each one gets out of trouble as well as he can. It is 
 a bad state of things for everybody. And," he added gravely, 
 " it must needs some day be remedied. Continue seeing the 
 Czar Alexander. I have been perhaps a little brusque in our 
 conferences, but I desire that we part on friendly terms. I have 
 still a few days before me. To-morrow we shall go to Weimar 
 and it will not be difficult to be gracious on the grounds of Jena 
 where they are having a fete for me. You will be at Weimar, 
 before myself ; tell the duchess who is too grand a lady to come 
 to Jena, that I should like to see all the savants who live in her 
 midst, and that I beg her to acquaint them with my wish. It 
 would be a pity that all the plans for this journey should fail." 
 
 The emperor had sent all the Comedie Francaise to Weimar. 
 The day began by a hunt on the grounds of Jena, afterwards 
 there was a grand dinner served on a table in the shape of a 
 horse-shoe, at which were placed only reigning princes. I lay 
 stress on that expression, for that title enabled them to render a 
 fresh homage to Napoleon by calling on the prince of Neufchatel 
 and myself to sit at that table. On leaving the table they went 
 to the play, where La Mort de Cesar was to be represented before 
 all the sovereigns and princes who had come from Erfurt to 
 Weimar. After the play, we passed into the ball-room. It was 
 
 1 The peace of Teschen (Silesia), signed on May 10, 1779, between Austria and 
 France, put an end to the war of the succession of Bavaria that the Emperor Joseph 
 II. had instigated in the preceding year, in endeavouring to take possession of that 
 state, after the death of the Duke Maximilian-Joseph. King Frederick II. being 
 opposed to that claim, a short war was the result. The Empress Catherine II., had 
 been clever enough to place herself as mediator between the two powers, in concert 
 with France.
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 331 
 
 a very beautiful hall, large, lofty and square, illuminated from 
 above, and adorned with many columns. The impression that 
 La Mort de Cesar had left was soon driven away by the sight 
 of a quantity of young and pretty girls, who had come to the 
 ball. Napoleon loved to touch upon serious questions in the 
 drawing-room, at the hunt, at a ball, sometimes opposite the 
 gaming table. He intended to prove, by it, that he was not 
 susceptible to the impression that such displays give to men 
 in general. Having made the rounds of the room and pausing 
 near some young ladies, the names of whom he inquired of 
 Herr Friedrich von M tiller, the duke's chamberlain, who had 
 received the order to accompany him, he retired at a distance 
 from the vast throng, and requested Herr von Mtiller to fetch 
 Herr Goethe and Herr Wieland. Herr von Mtiller is not of the 
 same family as the renowned Johan von Mtiller, the historian, 
 but he is a member of the literary society of Weimar, and I 
 believe that he is the secretary of it. He went to fetch those 
 gentlemen, who, with a few other members of that academy, 
 looked upon that beautiful and extraordinary sight. Herr 
 Goethe, on approaching the emperor, asked his permission to 
 introduce them. I do not give their names, because they are not 
 found in the notes, albeit quite complete in other respects, 
 which Herr von Mtiller gave me the next day. I had asked him 
 to write all he saw on this journey, so that I might compare 
 them with what I had written myself. 
 
 " You are pleased with our plays I hope," said the emperor 
 to Herr Goethe. " Have these gentlemen come to them ? " 
 " To the one of to-day, sire, but not to those at Erfurt." 
 " I am sorry for it. A good tragedy should be looked upon as 
 the most worthy school for superior men. From a certain point of 
 view, it is above history. In the best history, very little effect is 
 produced. Man when alone is but little affected, men assembled 
 receive the stronger and more lasting impressions. I assure you 
 that Tacitus, the historian, that you are always quoting, never 
 taught me anything. Could you find a greater and, at times, 
 more unjust detractor of the human race? In the most simple 
 actions he finds criminal motives, he makes emperors out as the 
 most profound villains, in order to awake admiration for the
 
 332 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 genius that has penetrated them. People are right in saying that 
 his Annals are not a history of the empire, but an abstract of the 
 prison-records of Rome. They are always dealing with accusa- 
 tions, with convicts, and with people who open their veins in their 
 baths. He who speaks incessantly of accusations, he is the most 
 notorious informer. What an involved style ! How obscure ! I 
 am not a great Latin scholar, but Tacitus' obscurity displays 
 itself in ten or twelve Italian and French translations that I have 
 read. I, therefore, conclude that his chief quality is obscurity, 
 that it springs from that which one calls his genius, as well as 
 from his style, and that it is so connected with his manner of 
 expressing himself only because it is in his conception. I have 
 heard people praise him for the fear he awakes in tyrants ; he 
 makes them afraid of the people. That is a great mistake, and 
 does the people harm. Am I not right, Monsieur Wieland ? But 
 I am interrupting you. We are not here to speak of Tacitus. 
 Look ! how well the Czar Alexander dances. 
 
 " I do not know why we are here, sire," replied Herr Wieland, 
 " but I know that, at this moment, your Majesty makes me very 
 happy." 
 
 " Ah ! Really ? In what way ? " 
 
 " Sire, the manner in which your Majesty has spoken to me, 
 makes me forget that he has two thrones. I see in him only a man 
 of letters, and I know that your Majesty will not disdain that title, 
 for I remember that, on leaving for Egypt he signed his letters, 
 ' Bonaparte, membra, de Vinstitnt et general en chef.' It is, then, 
 to a man of letters, sire, that I shall try to reply. I felt, at 
 Erfurt, that I defended myself but feebly when I was the object 
 of your criticism ; but I believe I am able to defend Tacitus better. 
 I understand that his principal aim is to punish tyrants — but if 
 he denounces them it is not to their slaves, whose revolt would 
 only bring a change of tyranny ; he denounces them to the justice 
 of ages and to mankind. And the latter ought to have had 
 enough trouble and experience, that its reason should henceforth 
 acquire the rule heretofore solely enjoyed by its passions." 
 
 "That is what all our philosophers say ; but that supremacy 
 of reason I look all about for and find it nowhere." 
 
 " Sire, it is not long since Tacitus began to have so many
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE IV. 333 
 
 readers. That hankering for him is a clear progress of the human 
 mind, for, for centuries, he was shut out of academies as well as 
 from courts. The slaves of taste were quite as much afraid of it 
 as the servants of despotism. It is only since Racine named him 
 Le plus grand peintre de tantiqnite} that your universities and 
 our own have thought this judgment might be true. Your 
 Majesty says that in reading Tacitus, you see nothing but 
 assassins, informers, and scoundrels ; but, sire, that is exactly 
 what the Roman Empire was, governed by those monsters fallen 
 under Tacitus' pen. The genius of Tacitus travelled the world with 
 the legions of the Republic. The genius of Tacitus must almost 
 always have been applied to the study of the prison-records of 
 Rome, for there only could he find all the history of the Empire. 
 It is even only in prison-records," said he, in an animated voice, 
 " that historians can become acquainted with those unhappy 
 times, amongst all nations, when princes and their people, 
 opposed in views and principles, live trembling before each 
 other. Then, the slightest pretext gives rise to criminal trials, 
 and death appears to be inflicted by centurions and executioners 
 oftener than by time and nature. Sire, Suetonius, Dion, and 
 Cassius relate a much greater number of crimes than Tacitus, 
 in a style void of energy, while nothing is more terrible than 
 Tacitus' pen. However, his genius is as impartial as it is inexor- 
 able. Whenever he can see any good, even in the monstrous 
 reign of Tiberius, he looks it out, takes hold of it, and shows it 
 off in the bold relief he gives to everything. He can find even 
 praise for that imbecile Claudius, who was really so only by 
 nature and by his dissipation. That impartiality — the most im- 
 portant quality of justice — Tacitus exercises on the most opposite 
 subjects, on the republic as well as the Empire ; on citizens as well 
 as on princes. By the stamp of his genius one would believe he 
 could love only the republic. One could confirm that opinion by 
 his words on Brutus, Cassius and Codrus, so deeply engraven in 
 the memory of our youth ; but when he speaks of the emperors 
 who had so happily reconciled what was thought could not be 
 reconciled, the Empire and liberty, one feels that the art of 
 governing appears to him the most beautiful discovery on earth." 
 
 1 The greatest painter of antiquity.
 
 334 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 The prince-primate who had approached, and all the little 
 academy of Weimar which surrounded Wieland, could not 
 contain their joy. 
 
 " Sire," he continued, " if it be true to say of Tacitus, that 
 tyrants are punished when he paints them, it is still more true to 
 say that good princes are rewarded when he traces their images 
 and presents them to future glory." 
 
 " I have too strong a party to cope with, Monsieur Wieland, 
 and you neglect none of your advantages. I think you knew 
 that I did not like Tacitus ; do you correspond with Herr von 
 Midler, 1 whom I saw at Berlin ?" 
 
 " Yes, sire." 
 
 " Confess that he has written to you on the subject of our 
 conversation ? " 
 
 " It is true, sire. It is by him that I knew your Majesty 
 liked to speak of Tacitus, but did not, however, like him." 
 
 " I do not like to say I am beaten, Monsieur Wieland : to 
 that I would consent with difficulty. To-morrow I return to 
 Erfurt, and we shall continue our discussion. I have a good store 
 of weapons in my arsenal for sustaining that Tacitus has not 
 entered far enough into the development of the causes of events; 
 that he has not sufficiently shown the mystery of the actions 
 that he relates, and their mutual linking together in order to 
 prepare the judgment of posterity, which must judge men and 
 governments such as they were in their time and in the midst of 
 the circumstances which surrounded them." 
 
 The emperor concluded that conversation by saying to Herr 
 Wieland, with a mild expression, that the pleasure of being with 
 him caused him to be for some time, an object of scandal 
 for the dancers, and he went away with the prince-primate. 
 After having paused for some moments to witness the beautiful 
 contre-dance, and having spoken to the Duchess of Saxe- 
 Weimar about the elegance and beauty of that brilliant fete, he 
 left the ball and went back to the magnificent apartment prepared 
 for him. All the young academicians, fearing to trust to their 
 memory, had already gone away to write down among themselves 
 all that they had just heard. And the next day, the day of our 
 
 1 Johan von Miiller, the historian.
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 335 
 
 departure, Herr von Miiller was with me at seven o'clock, to ask 
 me if the onslaught of the emperor against Tacitus was truthfully 
 recorded. I had altered some words in it, and that gave me the 
 right to have a complete copy of these gentlemen's works, 
 destined for the archives of Weimar. We left this beautiful 
 place in the morning. The Kings of Saxony, Wurtemberg, and 
 Bavaria set off in order to return to their dominions. 
 
 When Napoleon returned to Erfurt, he was more friendly, 
 more confidential with the Czar Alexander than he had been 
 yet. The convention that had become so insignificant, was 
 settled almost without discussion ; the emperor did not appear 
 to take a real interest in anything except in what pleased his 
 august ally. A life of excitement fatigued him, he said to the 
 Czar Alexander. He needed rest, and he only longed at 
 present, after the time when he could give himself up to 
 domestic life, to which all his tastes led him. " But that 
 happiness," he added with a deeply concerned expression, " is 
 not for me. Is there any home without children ; and can I 
 have any ? My wife is ten years older than myself — I beg your 
 pardon, this must all appear ridiculous to you, but I obey the 
 dictates of my heart, which it soothes me to unbosom to you." 
 And then he talked about the long separation, the great 
 distance, the difficulty in seeing each other again. " But there 
 is only a short time before dinner," he said, " and I must again 
 assume all my composure in order to give M. de Vincent his 
 audience of leave." That evening the Czar Alexander was still 
 fascinated by the charm of that intimate conversation. I was 
 only able to see Napoleon at a very late hour. He was very 
 much pleased with the day, and bade me stay with him a long 
 time after he had retired. His agitation was singular. He 
 asked me questions without waiting for my answer. He tried 
 to speak to me, he wanted to say something else than what he 
 did say ; and, at last, he pronounced the one word divorce. " My 
 destiny exacts it," he said, " and the tranquillity of France 
 demands it. I have no successor ; Joseph is nothing, and he 
 has only daughters. It is I who must found a dynasty. I can 
 only do so by getting married to a princess from one of the 
 reigning houses of Europe. The Emperor Alexander has
 
 336 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 sisters. There is one whose age suits me. Speak of that to 
 Romanzoff. Tell him that once my affairs in Spain are settled, 
 I will enter into all his views for the partition of Turkey ; 
 besides, other arguments will not fail you, for I know you are 
 an advocate of divorce. The Empress Josephine believes in it 
 also, I can tell you." 
 
 " Sire, if your Majesty permits I will say nothing to Count 
 Romanzoff, although he be the hero of the Chevaliers du 
 Cygnc of Mme. de Genlis. 1 I do not think he has sense 
 enough. Besides, after I have told him what you have suggested 
 he will have to repeat it all to the Czar Alexander. Will he 
 repeat it correctly, or will he choose to repeat it incorrectly ? 
 I cannot tell. It is much more natural, and I may say, much 
 more simple, to have a conversation with the Czar Alexander 
 himself about so important a question ; and if your Majesty 
 adopts this opinion, I shall undertake to prepare the way for 
 him." 
 
 " Well and good," said the emperor, " but remember that it 
 is not as coming from me you must speak. It is as a French- 
 man that you must address him, in order that he may obtain from 
 me a decision ensuring the stability of France whose fate 
 would be uncertain at my death. As a Frenchman you could 
 say everything you liked. Joseph, Lucien and all my family 
 offer you a free field. Say about them all you like, they are 
 nothing for France. My son even, but that is useless to say, 
 would need to be my son over again, in order to succeed peace- 
 fully to the throne of France." 
 
 It was late, I ventured however to go to the Princess of 
 Tour, whose door was not yet closed. The Czar Alexander 
 had remained there longer than usual. He related with 
 admirable good faith to the princess the sad scene of that 
 morning. 
 
 "Nobody," said he, "has a true idea of that man's 
 character. What alarming measures he sometimes resorts to, 
 
 1 Les Chevaliers du Cygne, on la Cotir de Charlemagne, is a historical romance of 
 Madame de Genlis in the style of the romances of chivalry of the eleventh century. 
 The authoress endeavoured to write, in the guise of fiction, numerous allusions to 
 the scenes of the Revolution, and in several of her personages, she wished to depict 
 certain celebrities of her time. Count Romanzoff had, it appears, been one of her 
 models.
 
 THE ERFURT INTERVIEW. 337 
 
 for other countries, he is by his position forced to take. We 
 do not know how good he is. You think so, do you not, you 
 that know him well ? " 
 
 " Sire, I have many personal reasons for, and I always state 
 them with great pleasure. Dare I ask your Majesty if to- 
 morrow morning you can grant me an audience ? " 
 
 "To-morrow? yes, willingly, before or after I have seen 
 M. de Vincent. I have a letter to write to the Emperor 
 Francis." 
 
 " After, sire, if you permit it. I should be very sorry to 
 retard that good work. The Emperor Francis is in great 
 need of comfort, and I have no doubt that your Majesty's 
 letter will procure that for him." 
 
 " That is at least my intention." The Czar remarked with 
 astonishment that it was nearly two o'clock. 
 
 The next day, before going to the appointed audience, 
 M. de Vincent called on me, and I told him how much 
 reason he had to be satisfied with every one in general, and 
 with the Czar Alexander in particular. His face beamed with 
 satisfaction. In bidding me good bye, he gave me an affec- 
 tionate and grateful grasp of the hand. He set off for Vienna 
 immediately, having obtained his audience, during which I 
 weighed in my mind the means I should employ to discharge 
 the errand I had accepted, in such a way as to please every one as 
 well as myself. I confess I was frightened for Europe at the 
 idea of another alliance between France and Russia. As for 
 me, it was necessary that the idea of that alliance should be 
 sufficiently admitted by Europe to satisfy Napoleon, and that, 
 on the other hand, it contained reservations hindering its 
 application. All the art I thought I wanted was useless to 
 me with the Czar Alexander. 
 
 At the first word, he understood me, and he understood me 
 precisely as I wished him to. 
 
 " If it were only a question of myself I would willingly 
 give my consent ; but my consent is not the only one we must 
 have. My mother has retained a power over her daughters, 
 that I must never question. I can try to give her certain advice 
 which it is probable she may follow, but I do not dare to take 
 VOL. I. Z
 
 333 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 it upon myself to say she will. All that, inspired by a real 
 friendship, ought to satisfy the Emperor Napoleon. Tell 
 him that I shall be with him in a moment." 
 
 " Sire, your Majesty will not forget that that conversation 
 ought to be solemn and affectionate. Your Majesty will speak 
 of the interests of Europe and of France. Europe requires that 
 the throne of France be protected from every storm, and 
 it is the manner of reaching that great end which your Majesty 
 is about to propose." 
 
 " That will be my text. It is a fertile field. I will see you 
 this evening at the Princess of Tour's." 
 
 I informed the Emperor Napoleon of the result of my 
 interview ; he was delighted with the idea that he would have 
 to reply instead of asking. I had scarcely time to add several 
 words. Already the Czar Alexander dismounted from his horse 
 in the yard. The two sovereigns remained several hours to- 
 gether, and all the court was from that moment, struck with the 
 familiar expression of friendship that existed between them ; 
 even etiquette seemed to be relaxed between them during those 
 last days. An air of harmony displayed itself everywhere, and 
 it was also true that they were perfectly happy The great 
 divorce question was mooted ; and it was so in a way to furnish 
 Napoleon with replies to all those who, attached to the Empress 
 Josephine, found in her accession a guarantee of their personal 
 situation. 
 
 Napoleon was already dreaming of founding a lasting em- 
 pire ; the Czar of Russia believed he had bound Napoleon to 
 himself, and flattered himself that, by his personal influence 
 he had given to Russian policy the support of him to whom 
 the entire world rendered homage, and before the genius of 
 whom all difficulties vanished. Thus, at the play, in the presence 
 of all Erfurt, he arose and took the hand of Napoleon, at this 
 line of (Edipe ; 
 
 " Eamitie (T un grand hotntne est tin present des dieux." 1 
 
 —{CEdipe (Voltaire), Act I., Scene I.) 
 
 They then both looked upon each other as essential to their 
 
 1 " The friendship of a great man is a gift from the gods."
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE W. 339 
 
 common future. When the number of days that should occupy 
 the interview had passed, they separated in testifying the most 
 sincere regrets, and the most complete confidence. The last 
 morning that Napoleon spent at Erfurt, was employed in seeing 
 people. The scene that his palace presented that last day will 
 never vanish from my memory. He was surrounded by princes, 
 of whom he had either destroyed the armies, or reduced the 
 dominions, or humbled the pride. There was no one who dared 
 ask for anything. They simply wished to be seen, and to be 
 seen the last to be remembered by him. All such humility 
 was without recompense. He noticed only the academicians 
 of Weimar. It was to them alone that he spoke, and he desired 
 at the last moment to leave with them a new variety of 
 impression. He asked them if there were many ideologists in 
 Germany. 
 
 "Yes, sire," replied one of them, " a sufficiently large number." 
 
 " I pity you. I have some at Paris. They are dreamers, 
 and dangerous dreamers. They are all plain or disguised 
 materialists. 
 
 " Gentlemen," he said, in raising his voice, " philosophers 
 labour hard to create systems ; they will search in vain for a 
 better one than that of Christianity, which, in reconciling man 
 with himself assures at the same time public order and the 
 tranquillity of the state. Your ideologists destroy all illusions, 
 and the age of illusions is, for nations, as for individuals, the 
 age of happiness. I take away with me on leaving you a 
 thought that is very precious to me, it is that you will preserve 
 a pleasant remembrance of me." A few minutes after, he was 
 in his carriage, on his way, as he thought, to the conquest of 
 Spain. 
 
 I subjoin here, the treaty, such as it was signed at Erfurt. 
 A few differences will be found in the order of the articles, 
 between the project which the emperor had requested of me 
 to draw up, and that treaty. The article concerning Wallachia 
 and Moldavia has the appearance of being modified, and, never- 
 theless the Emperor Napoleon, though he had formally recognized 
 the union of those two provinces with Russia, exacted so pro- 
 found a secret on the consent that he gave to that union, that in
 
 34o THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLE YRAND. 
 
 his thoughts the two articles had very nearly the same sense. It 
 will be noticed, especially in this last drafting of the treaty, 
 that there is no longer any question of the two articles that the 
 Emperor Napoleon had introduced in the second, the one by 
 which he established himself as judge of the motives that should 
 determine Russia to declare war upon Austria, the other rela- 
 tive to the march of a body of Russian troops near the Austrian 
 frontiers, under the pretext of the position of the cabinet of 
 Saint Petersburg with the Ottoman Porte. 
 
 The Erfurt Convention, October 12TH, 1808, ratified 
 
 on the 13TH. 
 
 " H.M. the Emperor of the French, King of Italy, protector of 
 the Confederation of the Rhine, &c, and H.M. the Emperor of 
 Russia, &c, wishing to render more binding and for ever 
 durable the alliance which unites them, and taking it upon 
 themselves to come to an ulterior understanding, if there should 
 be any need of it, on the new decisions to take, and on the new 
 methods of attack to be directed against England, their common 
 enemy and the enemy of the Continent, have resolved to 
 establish in a special convention the principles that they have 
 determined to invariably follow, in all their undertakings, to 
 secure the restoration of peace. 
 
 " They have, to that effect appointed, namely, H.M. the 
 Emperor of the French, &c, H. Exc. M. Jean Baptiste Nom- 
 pere de Champagny, Count of the Empire, &c, his Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs. 
 
 "And H.M. the Czar of all the Russias, &c, H.Exc. the 
 Count Nicolas de Romanzoff, his private counsellor, actually a 
 member of the Council, Minister of Foreign Affairs, &c. 
 
 " Who agree to that which follows : 
 
 " Art. I.— H.M. the Emperor of the French, &c. and H.M. the 
 Czar of all the Russias, &c, confirm, and inasmuch as there 
 is need, renew the alliance concluded between them at Tilsit, 
 engaging themselves not only to abstain from making with the 
 common enemy any separate peace, but also not to enter with 
 her on any negotiation and not to listen to any of her pro- 
 positions except by mutual consent. 
 
 "Art. II. — Thus resolved to remain inseparably united in 
 peace as in war, the high contracting parties agree to name 
 plenipotentiaries to treat for peace with England, and to send
 
 THE ERFUR T INTER VIE IV. 34 r 
 
 them to that effect in that town of the Continent that England 
 shall designate. 
 
 " Art. III. — In all the course of the negotiation, if there should 
 be one, the respective plenipotentiaries of the two high contract- 
 ing parties will ever act with the most perfect harmony, and 
 it will not be permissible to any one of them, not only to 
 support, but even to accept or to approve of, against the 
 interests of the other contracting party, any proposition or 
 request from the English plenipotentiaries which, taken in 
 itself, and being favourable to the interests of England, might 
 also offer some advantages to one of the contracting parties. 
 
 " Art. IV. — The basis of the treaty with England will be 
 the uti possidetis. 
 
 " Art. V. — The high contracting parties bind themselves to 
 regard as the absolute condition of peace with England that 
 she recognize Finland, Wallachia, and Moldavia, as forming a 
 part of the Russian Empire. 
 
 "Art. VI. — They likewise bind themselves to regard as an 
 absolute condition of peace that England recognize the new 
 order of things established by France in Spain. 
 
 "Art. VII. — The two high contracting parties bind them- 
 selves not to receive from the enemy during the continuation of 
 the negotiations any proposition, offer, or communication what- 
 ever, without immediately reporting the same to their respective 
 courts, and if the said propositions are made at the congress 
 assembled for the discussion of peace, the plenipotentiaries will 
 communicate the same to each other respectively. 
 
 "Art. VIII. — H.M. the Czar of all the Russias on account 
 of the revolutions and changes which agitate the Ottoman 
 Empire, and leave no possibility of giving, and, consequently, 
 no hope of obtaining sufficient guarantees for the persons and 
 property of the inhabitants of Wallachia and Moldavia, having 
 already extended the limits of her empire to the Danube, on 
 that side, and annexed Wallachia and Moldavia to her empire, 
 can only, on that condition, recognize the integrity of the 
 Ottoman Empire. H.M. the Emperor Napoleon therefore, 
 recognizes the said annexation and that the limits of the Russian 
 Empire, on that side, are carried to the Danube. 
 
 "Art. IX. — H.M. the Czar of all the Russias binds himself to 
 keep in utmost secrecy the preceding article, and to open, be 
 it at Constantinople or elsewhere, negotiations in view of 
 obtaining, in a friendly manner, if possible, the cession of those 
 two provinces. France renounces her mediation. The plenipo- 
 tentiaries or agents of the two nations will agree on the language 
 to use in order not to compromise the friendly relations exist-
 
 342 THE MEMOIRS OF PRINCE TALLEYRAND. 
 
 ing between the French nation and the Porte, as well as the 
 security of the French subjects resident in Levantine ports, and 
 to prevent the Porte from throwing itself upon the protection 
 of England. 
 
 " Art. X. — In case the Ottoman Porte refuse the cession of 
 the two provinces, war shall then be declared. The Emperor 
 Napoleon will take no part in it, and will limit himself to em- 
 ploying his good offices to decide the Ottoman Porte ; but, if it 
 should come to pass that Austria, or any other power make 
 common cause with the Ottoman Empire in the said war, 
 H.M. the Emperor Napoleon will make common cause imme- 
 diately with Russia, such case being one of those foreseen by 
 the General Alliance that unites the two empires. 
 
 " In case Austria declared war against France, the Czar of 
 Russia binds himself to declare war against Austria, and to 
 make common cause with France. 
 
 " Art. XI. — The high contracting parties bind themselves 
 to maintain moreover the integrity of the other possessions of 
 the Ottoman Empire, not willing to make themselves, or to 
 suffer that there should be made, any attempt against any 
 portion of that empire, without their having previously agreed 
 to it. 
 
 "Art. XII. — If the attempts made by the two high contract- 
 ing parties to bring about peace should fail, be it that England 
 decline the propositions that shall be made her, or that the 
 negotiations be broken, Their Imperial Majesties shall meet 
 again within the delay of one year, to agree upon the mutual 
 operations of the war and upon the methods or means to 
 continue it with all the resources of the two empires. 
 
 "Art. XIII. — The two high contracting parties, willing to 
 recognize the loyalty and the perseverance with which the King 
 of Denmark has sustained their common cause, bind them- 
 selves to procure him compensation for his sacrifices and to 
 recognize the acquisitions he might make in the course of the 
 war above alluded to. 
 
 "Art. XIV. — The present convention shall be held secret 
 during the space of at least ten years. 
 
 " Erfurt, October 12, 1808." 
 
 END OF THE FIFTH PART.
 
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