20th.—Various reports of an engagement in France, but without official authority. The only certain news seemed to be that Bonaparte was advancing without interruption. I dined at Mr. Hallam’s. Mr. W. Spenser, the poet; M. de Pfeffel, the Bavarian Minister, and his secretary of embassy, were among the company.
21st.—No certain accounts from France. I dined at Lord Rolle’s. In the evening had two letters from Princess Charlotte, who has had great worries, but the Orange business is at last really given up; she corresponds with her father, who seems to have something in view which will please all parties. I may be sure she will do for the best. Very amiable in her anxiety about the Royal Family of France, and in her wish that they should be informed of it if possible.
22nd.—I called on Lady Ashbrook, and made other visits. She was very sad. Bonaparte near if not in Paris. I dined at Prince Castelcicala’s, and was at Lady Charleville’s in the evening. The Colonel had just heard that the King had left Paris, but did not think he would come to England. The Duchess of Orleans, with her four children and their governor, and the Countess de Visac, is at the hotel at Dover. The Regent offered her the Castle, which she declined, and also excused herself from receiving his visit and that of the Duke of Kent. Yesterday Lord Cochrane walked into the House of Commons and took his seat there, whence he was carried[[33]] back to prison in the King’s Bench. Lady Castlereagh said the news from Paris was not official.
23rd.—The papers say Bonaparte entered Paris without the slightest obstacle on the 20th;[[34]] that the King had left it the day before, and slept at Abbeville on the 21st, on his way to Calais.
24th (Good Friday).—Princess Castelcicala wrote me that no certain news had been received of Bonaparte’s being at Paris; that the King had certainly left that city, but that he was not coming to England; and that the accounts, though bad enough, were not so desperate as the papers represented them; that the Duchess of Orleans had not heard from her husband, and would probably come to Town; that the Princes were dispersed, and were gone to their armies, and that more news was expected.
25th.—Everybody fearful of a new war, for which great preparations seem to be making by sea and land. The common people sadly discontented, and very seditious in their expressions. In the evening I received a note from Lady Mary Hill to say that they had seen the Duke de Sérent in good spirits; that the King of France would remain at Lille; that the Duke d’Angoulême was going about collecting troops, and that La Vendée was favourably disposed towards the Royal cause.
26th (Easter Sunday).—I dined at Lord Rolle’s. He had been at White’s, and brought very bad accounts of the reports in town. It was said the King could not remain at Lille, but was gone on to Tournay, and would go to Mittau, in Courland, where he was before; that Mr. Bagot was gone with him; but that Lord Fitzroy Somerset was detained at Paris. Lord Exmouth is going off immediately to take the command of the fleet in the Mediterranean, and arming by sea and land is the order of the day.
27th.—The papers mention Lord Fitzroy Somerset’s detention[[35]] at Paris, or at least his stay there, but nothing about Tournay. I dined at Lord Ashbrook’s; heard of the enormous tribe of people who are living at Cranbourne Lodge, and the confused, expensive manner in which they are going on.
26th.—Dined with Mrs. C. B. Egerton. General Egerton asked an audience of the Duke of York, to offer his services. He was the forty-second person who had one this morning, and seven or eight more were waiting in the ante-room.
29th.—Dined at Prince Castelcicala’s, and went in the evening to the Duchess of Orleans (Princess Maria Amelia of Naples). She received me with great kindness, and appears more amiable than ever, but is very thin, and has a dreadful cough. She has with her four children, the Duke de Chartres, the Duke de Nemours, and the Princesses Louise and Marie. The Count de G. is governor to the Duke, and the Countess de Visac, of the Vintimille family, is with her. The King of France is at Ostend; Monsieur at Namur. The Duchess d’Angoulême was at Bordeaux on the 19th, and meaning to stay there, as it was the anxious wish of the inhabitants that she should; but what their opinion may be when they hear of Paris being in the hands of Bonaparte, is not known. An emigrant, who left Paris on Easter Sunday, says that the strong manifesto published by the Allied Sovereigns at Vienna, of which two or three copies have been circulated at Paris, has occasioned great alarm there, and also that Bonaparte has excited jealousy between the old Imperial Guards at Paris and those he brought from Elba, by placing the latter, with a fine inscription, as to the bravest of soldiers, in the Hôtel des Cent Suisses. In the evening I saw the good old Duke de Sérent, whose resignation, under all his misfortunes, at eighty years of age, is truly admirable.