Nevertheless, Sire, I implore and expect this favour from your Majesty. And how happy should I be if your Majesty should deign to add to it that of confiding to my care that part of the private and moral interest which your great engagements cannot have compelled you to renounce. And who better than myself, Sire, could fulfil that duty? Who could devote himself to it with more ardour? I have banished myself from my native country, in order to be able to give up to that purpose the rest of my life without interruption or restraint. Deign, Sire, to listen to me, and comply with my request, I beseech you. And on whom are these cares to be bestowed? In whose favour do I solicit to be allowed to sacrifice myself? Sire, it is in favour of the man whom you once called your friend.
The reign of your Majesty is sufficiently distinguished by prodigies and monuments of glory; with these, history is already provided; let it also record acts of more exalted virtue; do something for friendship!—Let history say of you: In the midst of the most violent political contest that ever existed, he set the example of something still greater than victory—he remembered, he respected, the feelings of ancient friendship!
How many times, on our rock, have I heard the Emperor Napoleon conversing on the past events of his life, as if they had occurred several centuries ago, and, already speaking the language of history, say: I never had any war with the Emperor Alexander but a political one; that war had nothing to do with our individual feelings: I cannot suppose him to feel any personal animosity against me. A circumstance which would be worthy of you, Sire, tended to confirm him in this opinion. A report reached us on our rock that the Commissioner of your Majesty at St. Helena had, at the end of his instructions, a recommendation, written by your Majesty’s own hand, enjoining him most positively to shew the same marks of respect to the Emperor Napoleon as are shewn to yourself. We took pleasure in repeating this report to him; we were aware that he was pleased by it. Such a proceeding was in harmony with the character of your Majesty, and we believed in it without, however, having had it in our power to convince ourselves of its truth; for (during my stay, at least) we never could hold any communication with the Commissioner of your Majesty. You will doubtless have heard that Napoleon being required by the Governor of St. Helena to receive the Commissioner of your Majesty, and that of your illustrious ally, the Emperor of Austria, ordered the following answer to be given: That if those Commissioners were ordered by their Masters to take care that, in an island in the midst of the ocean, remote from the rest of the world, he should be treated with the respect due to him, he recognised in that measure the character of these two Princes; that the Governor having declared that they had no right to interfere in any thing that happened on that rock, they from that moment were without an official character in his eyes. He, however, added that he should be happy to see them as private individuals; but this message remained without effect, either from their having never been apprized of it, or from their instructions not allowing them to take advantage of it; or lastly, perhaps (and I do not think it at all improbable), because the English Governor wished in that case to subject them to certain conditions which were inconsistent with their character.
If I have thus presumed, Sire, to raise my humble voice to your Majesty, my temerity was inspired by the entire, ardent, and unalterable devotion which I cherish for him who once reigned over me, who was my master ... and that sentiment will plead in my favour in the eyes of your Majesty.
I am, &c.
COUNT DE LAS CASES.
With a heart still oppressed by all the ill usage I had experienced, proceeding from the British Government, I deemed it incumbent upon me, and a public duty as it were, to complain to Lord Bathurst in the following letter, which, by the way, was kept secret for upwards of ten months, and might have remained so for ever, had not Mr. Goulburn, Under Secretary of State, by certain misplaced and incorrect assertions which he made in the House of Commons concerning me, as will hereafter be seen, compelled me in some degree to publish it. This circumstance, however, is an additional pledge to the reader of the authenticity and correctness of all the facts which I have stated.
LETTER OF COUNT DE LAS CASES TO LORD BATHURST.
My Lord,—Were I to bear in silence the arbitrary and tyrannical acts, the infraction of the laws, the contempt of all forms, the violation of principles, of which I have been a victim, for upwards of a year that I have been in the hands of your agents, my silence might be construed into a tacit acquiescence, which would render me guilty towards myself, towards you, and towards society at large. Towards myself, because I have ample cause to seek for redress; towards you, who are ignorant of my grounds of complaint, and might perhaps hasten to grant me that redress; and towards society, on whose behalf every upright man ought sternly to resist the encroachments of power, for the honour of the laws, and for the protection of those who come after him.
My Lord, if I have so long delayed stating my grievances to you, the blame attaches to yourself, to the persecution that has assailed me upon your shores, and to that to which you have given the impulse in neighbouring countries. It would appear, in fact, as if a species of torment had been invented for me; a deportation along the high roads. I have been carried from town to town like a malefactor, though I was in a dying state, without any motive having been assigned for such conduct, and without being allowed to take any rest. How then was it possible for me to write to you?