After 9 thermidor, the Count de Ribbing could return to France, where he bought three or four châteaux and two or three abbeys at a very low price. Among these châteaux were Villers-Hellon, Brunoy and Quincy. The count had acquired all these properties simply on the recommendations either of friends or of his solicitor. Villers-Hellon was, among others, quite unknown to him. One day he made up his mind to pay a visit to the lovely estate people had praised so much. Unluckily, the time was ill-chosen for seeing all its charms: the communal authorities of Villers-Hellon had handed over the château to an association of shoemakers who made shoes for the army, consequently the worthy disciples of St. Crépin had taken possession of the domain, had set up their workrooms in the salons and in the bedrooms and, the better to communicate with one another, they had made openings through the ceilings. When they had any oral communication to make, they made it by means of these peep-holes without having to leave their seats; if they had to come up or downstairs to see one another, they put ladders through these holes and so saved the turns and twists of the proper staircase. One can imagine how greatly such tenants would detract from the appearance of the château the count had just bought. The sights, and above all the smells, about the place so disgusted him that he fled precipitately back to Paris. Some days later he recounted his misadventure in his own witty way to M. Collard, then connected with the commissariat department of the army. M. Collard was more accustomed to the value of material goods than the noble exile, and he then and there offered to take over his purchase. M. de Ribbing consented, and Villers-Hellon became from that moment the property of M. Collard. Happily, the Count de Ribbing had still two or three other châteaux where he could reside instead of in the one he had just sold. He chose Brunoy, which later he gave up to his friend Talma, as he had Villers-Hellon to his friend Collard, and then he established himself in the château of Quincy.
During the whole of Napoleon's reign the Count de Ribbing lived very quietly, spending his winters in Paris and his summers in the country, devoting himself to agriculture and to fishing in his ponds, in which, once, he caught such an enormous pike that when it was put in the scales with Adolphe at the other end, the pike was actually the heavier. Napoleon offered M. de Ribbing military positions more than once—offers which he I declined, on account of the Conqueror's love of invasion, fearing he might one day be compelled to carry arms against Sweden.
On the second return of the Bourbons to power, their revenge for past political events pursued M. de Ribbing to his private retreat. He was obliged to exile himself again, crossed the frontier, and under an assumed name went to live in Brussels with his wife and son. But the incognito of the Count de Ribbing was soon to betray him under circumstances that will give some idea of his character. In Brussels, the count found himself at the same table with some foreign officers who, inflated with pride at the victory of Waterloo, abused France and Frenchmen right and left. One colonel, who was covered with decorations, especially distinguished himself by his exaggerated attacks. The conversation was carried on in German, but as the Count de Ribbing had been brought up in Berlin, German was almost like his mother tongue; he did not therefore lose a single word of the conversation, although he pretended he was not taking any notice. Suddenly he rose, and, advancing with his usual coolness to the colonel, he slapped him right and left across the face, accompanying the blows with a statement of his name and titles, and then he quietly returned to his seat. Cauchois-Lemaire, then only a young man, was at the same table, so was the poet Arnault, who was already an old man; both, at great risk to themselves, offered their services to the Count de Ribbing as seconds. Happily these services were not required: the colonel would not fight.
The roll of the Thirty Eight enriched Brussels at the expense of France,—Arnault, Excelmans, Regnault de Saint-Jean d'Angély, Cambacérès, Harel, Cauchois-Lemaire were all exiled. M. de Ribbing attached himself to them, and, with them, founded le Nain Jaune—a journal that soon earned itself a European reputation.
Following upon an article published by the count in this journal, the Prussian Government demanded that the author of it should be handed over to them. This meant nothing less than imprisonment for life in a castle—Prussia is still, as one knows, the land of castles, and it has long been the land of imprisonments. However, King William left the Count de Ribbing the choice of being delivered over to Prussia or to France—somewhat after the fashion of the cook who gives a fowl its choice between being boiled or roasted. M. de Ribbing chose France. He was taken prisoner, flung into a post-chaise with his son, and driven to the borders of Condé. There he looked about him, to discover from which of his old friends he could ask hospitality. The nearest happened to be M. Collard, so he took his way towards Villers-Hellon.
It need hardly be said that he was received with open arms. He had been living but three days in that lovely place—changed so greatly since the days of the bootmakers that it was almost beyond recognition—when I met his son, Adolphe de Leuven, with Madame Capelle on his arm, and holding little Marie by the hand.