“Sire, be so good as not to disapprove of my refusal to accept the money of the Empress, and permit me to return it to Vienna. I should, however, be willing to accept an honorable word, or her portrait, or any similar token which I could oppose to the reproach which is everywhere made me of having been arrested in Vienna as a suspicious character.... I await the orders of your Majesty.
“Caron de Beaumarchais.”
The money was subsequently returned, and in its place a valuable diamond ring was sent by the Empress. This ring shone on its possessor’s finger, from henceforth, on all occasions of ceremony. As for the suspicions of Kaunitz, which have been shared by many, we can do no more than refer the reader to the special literature on this subject. The story of the brigands is unquestionably an invention, as for proofs of forgery, or real guilt of any kind,—after the most exhaustive investigations, none has ever been found.
In his edition of the History of Beaumarchais, by Gudin, 1888, Maurice Tourneux in a lengthy note points out the fallacies in the story of this adventure as told by Gudin. After speaking of the most recent accusations against Beaumarchais, he says, “But it must be admitted, this is to venture upon a series of very serious as well as practically gratuitous accusations.”
Lintilhac does not hesitate to assert that Angelucci did exist, and that not a line of the libel is from the pen of Beaumarchais. As this is the most recent study of the subject which has appeared, it attempts to answer all the
arguments set forth by the adversaries of Beaumarchais, and through before unpublished documents, to prove the fallacy of all their conjectures. (See Beaumarchais et ses œuvres, by E. Lintilhac, Paris, 1889.)
What is, however, of vital importance for the life of Beaumarchais, and above all for the very important rôle which he is about to play in the War of American Independence, is that the adventure just related did not in the least bring upon him the dislike of Marie Antoinette, who had always protected him, or of Louis XVI, or his ministers. On the contrary, he had hardly returned when he found himself summoned to confer with the heads of the government upon the recall of the parliaments. A greater honor could scarcely have been paid to the sound judgment of the man who passed for the wittiest, the most fascinating, in a word the most brilliant man of his time. While conferring with the ministers upon weighty matters of state, Beaumarchais took pains at the same time to obliterate as far as possible from the public mind the impression made by the news of his imprisonment at Vienna. Immediately on his arrival, he launched forth a song which he had composed for this purpose, a song which became at once universally popular, and which renewed the admiration of the people for its author.
The song in question begins with the following stanza:
“Toujours, toujours, il est toujours le même,
Jamais Robin,
Ne connut le chagrin,
Le temps sombre on serein,
Les jours gras, le carême;
Le matin ou le soir;
Dites blanc, dites noir,
“Toujours, toujours, il est toujours le même.”