Ten Years' Exile / Memoirs of That Interesting Period of the Life of the Baroness De Stael-Holstein, Written by Herself, during the Years 1810, 1811, 1812, and 1813, and Now First Published from the Original Manuscript, by Her Son.

by Madame de Staël

CHAPTER 2.

Return to Coppet.—Different persecutions.

In returning to Coppet, dragging my wing like the pigeon in Lafontaine, I saw the rainbow rise over my father's house; I dared take my part in this token of the covenant; there had been nothing in my sorrowful journey to prevent me from aspiring to it. I was then almost resigned to living in this chateau, renouncing the idea of ever publishing more on any subject; but it was at least necessary, in making the sacrifice of talents, which I flattered myself with possessing, to find happiness in my affections, and this is the manner in which my private life was arranged, after having stript me of my literary existence.

The first order received by the prefect of Geneva, was to intimate to my two sons, that they were interdicted going into France without a new permission of the police. This was to punish them for having wished to speak to Bonaparte in favor of their mother. Thus the morality of the present government is to loosen family ties, in order to substitute in all cases the emperor's will. Several generals have been mentioned as declaring, that if Napoleon ordered them to throw their wives and children into the river, they would not hesitate to obey him. The translation of this is, that they prefer the money which the emperor gives them, to the family which they have from nature. There are many instances of this way of thinking, but there are few who would have impudence enough to give utterance to it. I felt a mortal grief at seeing for the first time my situation bear upon my sons, scarcely entered into life. We feel ourselves very firm in our own conduct, when it is founded on sincere conviction; but when others begin to suffer on our account, it is almost impossible to keep from reproaching ourselves. Both my sons, however, most generously diverted this feeling from me, and we supported each other mutually by the recollection of my father.

A few days afterwards the prefect of Geneva wrote me a second letter, to require me, in the name of the minister of police, to deliver up the proof sheets of my book which were still in my hands; the minister knew exactly the number I had sent and kept, and his spies had done their duty well. In my answer, I gave him the satisfaction of admitting that he had been correctly informed; but I told him at the same time that this copy was not in Switzerland, and that I neither could nor would give it up. I added, however, that I would engage never to have it printed on the Continent, and I had no great merit in making this promise, for what Continental government would then have suffered the publication of any book forbidden, by the emperor?

A short time afterwards, the prefect of Geneva* was dismissed, and it was generally believed on my account; he was one of my friends, yet he had not deviated one iota from the orders he had received: although he was one of the most honorable and enlightened men in France, his principles led him to the scrupulous obedience of the government, whose servant he was; but no ambitious view, or personal calculation gave him the zeal required. It was another great source of chagrin to be, or to be regarded as being, the cause of the dismissal of such a man. He was generally regretted in his department, and from the moment it was believed that I was the cause of his disgrace, all who had any pretensions to places avoided my house as they would the most fatal contagion. There still remained to me, however at Geneva, more friends than any other provincial town in France could have offered me; for the inheritance of liberty has left in that city much generous feeling; but it is impossible to have an idea of the anxiety one feels, when one is afraid of compromising those who come to visit you. I made a point of getting the most exact information of all the relations of any lady before I invited her; for if she had only a cousin who wanted a place, or had one, it was demanding an act of Roman heroism to expect her to come and dine with me.

At last, in the month of March 1811, a new prefect arrived from Paris. He was a man admirably well adapted to the reigning system: that is to say, having a very general acquaintance with facts, coupled with a total absence of principles in matters of government; calling every fixed rule mere abstraction, and placing his conscience in devotion to the reigning power. The first time I saw him, he told me that talents like mine were made to celebrate the emperor, who was a subject well worthy of the kind of enthusiasm which I had shown in Corinna. I gave him for answer, that persecuted as I was by the emperor, any thing like praise of him coming from me, would have the air of a petition, and that I was persuaded that the emperor himself would find my eulogiums very ridiculous under such circumstances. He combatted this opinion very strongly: he returned to my house several times to beg me, in the name of my own interest, as he styled it, to write something in favor of the emperor, were it but a sheet of four pages; that would be sufficient, he assured me, to put an end to all the disagreeables I suffered. He repeated what he told me to every person of my acquaintance. Finally, one day he came to propose to me to celebrate in verse the birth of the king of Rome; I told him, laughing, that I had not a single idea on the subject, and that I should confine myself to wishes for his having a good nurse. This joke put an end to the prefect's negociations with me, upon the necessity of my writing in favor of the present government.

* M. de Barante, father of M. Prosper de Barante, member of the
* Chamber of Peers.

A short time afterwards the physicians ordered my youngest son the baths of Aix, in Savoy, at twenty leagues from Coppet. I chose the early part of May to go there, a time of the year when the waters are quite deserted. I gave the prefect notice of this little journey, and went to shut myself up in a kind of village, where there was not at the time a single person of my acquaintance. I had hardly been there ten days, before a courier arrived from the prefect of Geneva to order me to return. The prefect of Mont-Blanc, in whose department I was, was also afraid lest I should leave Aix to go to England, as he said, to write against the emperor; and although London was not very near to Aix in Savoy, he sent his gendarmes every where about, to forbid my being furnished with post horses on the road. I am at present tempted to laugh at all this prefectorial activity against a poor thing like myself; but at that time the very sight of a gendarme was enough to make me die with fright. I was always alarmed lest from a banishment so rigorous the change might shortly be to a prison, which was to me more terrible than death itself. I knew that if I was once arrested, that if this eclat were once got over, the emperor would not allow himself again to be spoken to about me, even if any one had the courage to do so; which was not very probable at that court, where terror was the prevailing sentiment every minute of the day, and in the most trifling concerns of life.

On my return to Geneva, the prefect signified to me not only that he forbid me from going under any pretence to the countries united to France, but that he advised me not to travel in Switzerland, and never to go in any direction beyond two leagues from Coppet. I objected to him that being domiciliated in Switzerland, I did not clearly understand by what right a French authority could forbid me from travelling in a foreign country. The prefect no doubt thought me rather a simpleton to discuss at that moment a point of right, repeated his advice to me in a tone singularly approaching to an order. I confined myself my protest: but the very next day I learned that one of the most distinguished literati of Germany, M. Schlegel, who had for eight years been employed in the education of my sons, had received an order not only to leave Geneva, but to quit Coppet. I wished still to represent that in Switzerland the prefect of Geneva had no orders to give; but I was told, that if I liked better to receive this order through the French ambassador, I might be gratified: that the ambassador would address the landamann, and the landamann would apply to the canton of Vaud, who would immediately send M. Schlegel from my house. By making despotism go this roundabout, I might have gained ten days, but nothing more. I then wished to know why I was deprived of the society of M. Schlegel, my own friend, and that of my children. The prefect, who was accustomed, like the greater part of the emperor's agents, to couple very smooth words with very harsh acts, told me that it was from regard to me that the government banished M. Schlegel from my house as he made me an Anti-gallican. Much affected by this proof of the paternal care of the government, I asked what Mr. S. had ever done against France: the prefect objected to his literary opinions, and referred among other things to a pamphlet of his, in which, in a comparison between the Phedra of Euripides and that of Racine, he had given the preference to the former. How very delicate for a Corsican monarch to take in this manner act and cause (sic) for the slightest shades of French literature! But the real truth was, M. Schlegel was banished because he was my friend, because his conversation animated my solitude, and because the system was now begun to be acted upon, which soon became evident, of making a prison of my soul, in tearing from me every enjoyment of intellect and friendship.

I resumed the resolution of leaving Switzerland, which the pain of quitting my friends and the ashes of my parents had made me so often give up; but there remained a very difficult problem to solve, and that was to find the means of departure. The French government threw so many difficulties in the way of a passport for America, that I durst no longer think of that plan. Besides, I had reason to be afraid lest at the moment of my embarkation they should pretend to have discovered that I was going to England, and that the decree might be applied to me, which condemned to imprisonment all who attempted to go there without the authority of the government. It seemed to me, therefore, much preferable to go to Sweden, that honorable country, whose new chief already gave indications of the glorious conduct which he has since known how to sustain. But by what road to get to Sweden? The prefect had given me to understand in all ways, that wherever France commanded, I should be arrested, and how was I to reach the point where she did not command? I must necessarily pass through Russia, as the whole of Germany was under the French dominion. But to get to Russia, I must cross Bavaria and Austria. I could trust my self in the Tyrol, although it was united to a state of the confederation, on account of the courage which its unfortunate inhabitants had shewn. As to Austria, in spite of the fatal debasement into which she had sunk, I had sufficient confidence in her monarch to believe that he would not deliver me up; but I knew also that he could not defend me. After having sacrificed the ancient honor of his house, what strength remained to him of any kind? I spent my days, therefore, in studying the map of Europe to escape from it, as Napoleon studied it to make himself its master, and my campaign, as well as his, always had Russia for its field. This power was the last asylum of the oppressed; it was therefore that which the conqueror of Europe wished to overthrow.