Carnot, Mémoire adressé au Roi, p. 20.
Wellington Despatches, xii. 248. On the ground of his ready-money dealings, it has been supposed that Wellington understood the French people. On the contrary, he often showed great want of insight, both in his acts and in his opinions, when the finer, and therefore more statesmanlike, sympathies were in question. Thus, in the delicate position of ambassador of a victorious Power and counsellor of a restored dynasty, he bitterly offended the French country-population by behaving like a grand seigneur before 1789, and hunting with a pack of hounds over their young corn. The matter was so serious that the Government of Louis XVIII. had to insist on Wellington stopping his hunts. (Talleyrand et Louis XVIII., p. 141.) This want of insight into popular feeling, necessarily resulted in some portentous blunders: e.g., all that Wellington could make of Napoleon's return from Elba was the following:-"He has acted upon false or no information, and the King will destroy him without difficulty and in a short time." Despatches, xii. 268.
A good English account of Vienna during the Congress will be found in "Travels in Hungary," by Dr. R. Bright, the eminent physician. His visit to Napoleon's son, then a child five years old, is described in a passage of singular beauty and pathos.
British and Foreign State Papers, 1814-15, p. 554, seq. Talleyrand et Louis XVIII., p. 13. Kluber, ix. 167. Seeley's Stein, iii. 248. Gentz, Dépêches Inédites, i. 107. Records: Continent, vol. 7, Oct. 2.
Bernhardi, i. 2; ii. 2, 661.
Wellington, S.D., ix. 335.
Wellington, S.D., ix. 340. Records: Continent, vol. 7, Oct. 9, 14.
Talleyrand, p. 74. Records, id., Oct. 24, 25.
Wellington, S.D., ix. 331. Talleyrand, pp. 59, 82, 85, 109. Klüber, vii. 21.
British and Foreign State Papers, 1814-15, p. 814. Klüber, vii. 61.