He was missed at Délices. Madame de Fontaine was ill there in the autumn. Her uncle’s cook was too good for both her and her sister, who were always calling in Tronchin to cure them of “a little indigestion.” And of course Voltaire (though certainly not from the same cause) was ill himself. “We have been on the point, my dear universal philosopher,” he wrote to d’Alembert on October 9th, “of knowing, Madame de Fontaine and I, what becomes of the soul when separated from its partner. We hope to remain in ignorance some time longer.”
On December 9th Voltaire received a visit from an old friend, George Keith, Earl Marischal of Scotland.
He did not come as the emissary of Frederick; or to recall, though no doubt he did recall, to Voltaire those early golden days of the Prussian visit when they had sat together at the most famous supper-table in the world. He introduced many of his countrymen to the “old owl of Délices.” But that was not the reason either of his visit. He came to plead the cause of Admiral Byng.
Richelieu had just taken Minorca from the English. The fleet sent by England to its relief retired under Byng, before the French. Paris went mad with delight as only Paris can, and sang the exploits of Richelieu in one of those national songs whose glow and vigour keep them fresh for ever:
Plein d’une noble audace
Richelieu presse, attaque la place——
Voltaire was nearly as enthusiastic as Paris. He had prophesied such splendid things of his hero! And it would have been very damping to his ardour to have had his prophecies and hero-worship proved wrong. Then, too, England had been so confident of victory; and so dreadfully rude and aggressive in her confidence. Such pride deserved a fall; and great was the fall of it. To be beaten on the sea by the French seemed to Britain like being struck across the face by the open hand of insult. She forgot that love of fair play which she has some right to call her national instinct. She did what, with all her faults, she very seldom does—she hit a man when he was down, and wreaked upon him, in the bitterness of her disappointment, the anger she should have kept for the blundering ministry who had commanded him impossibilities. Byng was arraigned on a charge of treason and cowardice. But he had a friend—and the friend remembered Voltaire. True, Voltaire was a Frenchman, and the closest intimate of Richelieu. But Keith knew that he was first of all a humanitarian; and that he had a passion for justice and a rage against tyranny which made him love his enemies if they were oppressed, and hate even his friends if they were oppressors. On December 20th, Voltaire wrote to Richelieu telling Byng’s story. Richelieu replied in an open letter which generously vindicated the character of his foe. Had Byng continued the fight, the English fleet must have been totally destroyed. A clever sailor and a brave man, his misfortunes were from the Hand of God—and the valour of the French.
Voltaire sent that letter to Byng with a letter of his own. He had known the Admiral as a young man, when he was in England; but he judged it better not now to mention that they were acquainted, lest his interference might be attributed to personal partiality. The sequel is very well known. The miserable ministry wanted a scapegoat. Though Byng was recommended to mercy by the court which tried him, he was shot on March 14, 1757, meeting his death with the courage with which his foes declared he had met them.
He left grateful messages to Richelieu and to Voltaire; and to Voltaire a copy of his defence.
The author of “Candide” added later to that famous satire a few stinging and immortal lines on this cause célèbre. “In this country it is good to put an admiral to death now and then, to encourage the others.”
Voltaire’s part in the affair of Byng is not only of importance as being of interest to English people. It began a new era in his life.