CONVERSATION RESPECTING THE SITUATION OF ENGLAND.—LETTERS DETAINED BY THE GOVERNOR.—CHARACTERISTIC OBSERVATIONS.
31st.—At five o’clock, I went to join the Emperor in the garden; we were all assembled there. The conversation turned on politics. He described the melancholy situation of England, amidst her triumphs. He alluded to the immensity of her debt, the madness, the impossibility of her becoming a continental power, the dangers which assailed her constitution, the embarrassment of her ministers, and the just clamour of the people. England with her 150 or 200 thousand men, made as many efforts as he, the Emperor, had ever made during the period of his great power, and perhaps even more. He had never employed beyond 500 thousand French troops. The traces of his Continental system were followed by all the powers on the Continent, and would be pursued still further in proportion as those powers became more settled. He did not hesitate to say, and he proved it, that England would have gained by adhering to the treaty of Amiens; that such a line of conduct would have been to the advantage of all Europe, but that Napoleon himself, and his glory would have suffered by it. Yet it was England, and not he, who broke the treaty.
There was only one course, he continued, for England to pursue; namely, to return to her constitution and abandon the military system; to interfere with the Continent only through her maritime influence, in which she was pre-eminent. It was, he said, easy to foresee that great calamities would assail her should she adopt any other course, and this she would inevitably do, because all her aristocracy urged her to it, and because the folly, pride, or venality of her present ministry caused her to persist in the system she was pursuing.
The conversation being concluded, the Emperor returned to his study, and desired me to follow him. He told me that a letter which had been sent to him from England by post was said to have been kept back by the Governor, because it was not addressed to him officially; and it was said that a letter for the Grand Marshal had been detained for the same reason. The Emperor observed that, if this were true, there was something peculiarly cruel in the conduct of the Governor, in having sent back the letters without even mentioning them to us, and without affording us the consolation of knowing from whom they came.... A neglect of form, he said, might easily be corrected in the Island; but it could not so easily be observed at 2000 leagues’ distance. I told the Emperor that a circumstance nearly similar to that which he had just mentioned had occurred to me eight or ten days back. “A person who was on his way to Europe had tormented me with his offers of service. I yielded to his solicitations, and commissioned him to order me some shoes and to get a watch changed for me, for there is no person here who knows how to repair a watch. The Governor had forbidden the execution of those commissions, because they had not been addressed to himself. I have said nothing on the subject to any one, Sire, because it is a principle with me to conceal an insult for which I cannot obtain redress; but I shall find an opportunity to tell the Governor my mind. In the mean time, neither he nor the person to whom I gave the commission, has been able to draw from me a line, or a single word, though the latter has made several attempts to do so.”
After dinner the Emperor, conversing on our situation and the conduct of the Governor, who came to-day and took a rapid circuit round Longwood, reverted to the subject of the last interview they had had together, and made some striking observations respecting it. “I behaved very ill to him, no doubt,” said he, “and nothing but my present situation could excuse me; but I was out of humour, and could not help it; I should blush for it in any other situation. Had such a scene taken place at the Tuileries, I should have felt myself bound in conscience to make some atonement. Never, during the period of my power, did I speak harshly to any one without afterwards saying something to make amends for it. But here I uttered not a syllable of conciliation, and I had no wish to do so. However, the Governor proved himself very insensible to my severity; his delicacy did not seem wounded by it. I should have liked, for his sake, to have seen him shew a little anger, or bang the door after him when he went away. This would at least have shown that there was some spring and elasticity about him; but I found nothing of the kind.”
The Emperor then again resumed his conversation on political affairs, which he maintained with so much spirit and interest, that I could have forgotten for a time what part of the world I was in. I could have believed myself still at the Tuileries or in the Rue de Bourgogne.