The unique character of this contest as well as its sublimity lies in this, that it is not simply a personal matter in which he was engaged. The blows he dealt so deftly had behind them the force of a nation eager to avenge itself, a nation whose favorite weapon was ridicule. Never was that weapon wielded by “a hand more intrepid and light. It seemed to amuse him to lead before the public so many personages like animals for combat.” “Simpletons,” says La Harpe, “are by no means rare and they bore us; to put them before us in a way to make us laugh so heartily and
so long, to make them amusing to the point of finding pleasure in their stupidity, is surely no common talent, it is that of good satire and good comedy.”
This was the talent of Beaumarchais. The public laughed, it is true, but the simpletons thus led forward did not laugh, nor did the chancellor Maupeou. They were waiting, rage in their hearts, for the day of vengeance which was not far off.
Begun in August, 1773, the suit had gone on until February of the following year. “The day of judgment,” says Loménie, “arrived on the 26th of February, 1774, in the midst of universal interest.
“‘We are expecting to-morrow,’ wrote Madame du Deffand to Horace Walpole, ‘a great event, the judgment of Beaumarchais.... M. de Monaco has invited him for the evening to read us a comedy de sa façon, which has for the title le Barbier de Séville.... The public is crazy over the author who is being judged while I write. It is supposed that the judgment will be rigorous and it may happen that instead of supping with us he will be condemned to banishment or to the pillory; this is what I will tell you to-morrow.’
“Such is the dose of interest which Madame du Deffand takes in people. What a pity for her if the accused had been condemned to the pillory. She would have lost the reading of the Barbier. She lost it anyway. For twelve hours the deliberation of the judges prolonged itself. Beaumarchais addressed to the prince of Monaco the following note which belongs with the letter of Madame du Deffand.
“‘Beaumarchais, infinitely sensible of the honor which the Prince of Monaco wishes to do him, replies from the Palace where he has been nailed since six o’clock this morning, where he has been interrogated at the bar of justice, and where
he waits the sentence which is very long in coming; but, in whatever way things turn, Beaumarchais who is surrounded by his family at this moment cannot flatter himself to escape them until he has received either their congratulations or their condolence. He begs therefore that the Prince of Monaco will be so good as to reserve him his kindness for another day. He has the honor of assuring him of his very respectful gratitude.
“‘This Saturday, February 26th, 1774.’”
“The evening before the judgment,” says Gudin, “he arranged his private affairs, passed the night at work, and went to the gate of the palace before it was day, saw the judges pass before him and submitted to his last interrogation. When it was finished and it only remained to the judges to decide, Beaumarchais returned to the home of his sister who lived near the Palais de Justice. Fatigued from so much labor and very certain that there was nothing left for him to do in that critical time, he went to bed and slept as profoundly as though no one in the universe were occupied with the thought of him. I arrived and found him sunk in a sleep such as only comes to a pure, strong soul, and a truly superior mind, because at such a moment it would have been considered pardonable in anyone to have felt the anguish of anxiety. He slept while his judges watched, tormented by the furies. Divided among themselves, they deliberated in tumult, spoke in rage, wishing to punish the author of the memoirs but foreseeing the clamor of the public ready to disavow them. At last after almost fifteen hours of contradictory opinions and violent debates, they abandoned reciprocally their victims.