CHAPTER XXXVI.
INVASION SQUIBS, continued—TALLEYRAND’S DISINCLINATION TO INVADE ENGLAND.
‘A full and particular Account of the Trial of Napoleon Buonaparte before John Bull,’ drawn by Woodward, etched by Cruikshank (September 14, 1803), is a broadside not remarkable for artistic merit; it does not even give a fair idea of Napoleon’s features. The letterpress is as follows:—
The Court being opened, and John Bull on the bench, Napoleon Buonaparte was put to the Bar, charged with various high crimes, thieving, and misdemeanours. Counsellor Tell Truth opened the case on the part of the prosecution, as follows:
Counsellor. May it please your worship Mr. John Bull, and Gentlemen of the Jury, From the Indictment now before you, you will perceive the prisoner stands charged as follows: that he, Napoleon Buonaparte, on the 28th of December, 1793, caused at Toulon, when the siege was over, fifteen hundred men, women, and children, to be fired upon with grape shot; that by these means he became a favourite of Robespierre, and, in concert with that destroyer, did on the 13th Vendemaire, October 4, 1795, sweep the streets of Paris near the Pont Neuf with artillery, and covered the steps of St. Roch with heaps of slaughtered bodies; the persons massacred on the whole amounted to about eight thousand. At Pavia, the magistrates having interfered to save the people from the bayonet, were bound together, and shot by his order; he also burnt the town of Benasco, and massacred the inhabitants. At Alexandria he gave up the city to his soldiers for four hours; the old people, women, and children, flew to the mosques, but the mosques were no protection from brutal fury, though Buonaparte professed himself a Turk;—at Jaffa, horrid to relate! three thousand eight hundred prisoners were marched to a rising ground, and there destroyed by means of musquetry, grape shot, and the bayonet; in short, his various massacres, robberies, and pillage, are too numerous to bring forward. I shall only observe, that this gentle, this merciful man, at the above place, Jaffa, finding his hospitals crowded with sick of his own army, caused the whole to be poisoned; thus, in a few hours, five hundred and eighty soldiers died miserably by order of their General—; so says Sir Robert Wilson.
John Bull. Mercy on me, Mr. Tell Truth, let me hear no more, it will lift my wig off with horror!!!
Counsellor T. T. I shall briefly observe, that this man, after overrunning all Italy, France, Holland, Switzerland, stealing our beloved George’s horses at Hanover, and various other sacrifices to his unbounded ambition, had the audacity to declare he would invade the happy shores of Great Britain, and disturb the fireside of honest John Bull and his children; but he was stopped in his career by a single English seaman, who will lay the particulars before the Court. Crier, call in Tom Mizen.
Crier. Tom Mizen, come into Court.
John Bull. Now, Mister Mizen, what have you to say?
Tom Mizen. You must know, Mr. Bull, having, as it were, lashed myself to a love of my King and Country, and hearing the land lubber at the bar was about to bring over his Cock boats; I thought myself, in duty bounden, to see what sort of game he was after; so, rigging out my little skiff the Buxom Kitty, I clapped a few pounders aboard, with an allowance of grog, and set sail; when I got near Bull-hog-ney—I think they call it so in their palaver—but I never can think of their outlandish palaver, not I—howsomdever I soon spied a little gun boat or two, and on board one of them I saw a little pale-faced olive-coloured man in a large cocked hat, taking measure of the sides: may I never set sail again, said I, if that is not little Boney—so I made no more ado, but got ready my cordage and grappling irons, and after one broadside, towed the little gentleman into Brighton.
John Bull. Bravo, Mister Mizen—now let us hear what Mynheer Dutchman has to say.
Dutchman. Indeed, Mynheer Bool, I have nothing to say in his favour—he has robbed me of my liberty, my money, and everything that is dear to me.
Italian. I am precisely in the same position.
Swiss. And I.
The Pope. I once had a voice in the senate, but he has totally abridged my power.
Hanoverian, &c. We are one and all tired of his tyrannical usurpation.
John Bull. Then it appears to me no one will speak in his favour.
From the Court. Not one.
John Bull. Well then—what has the prisoner to say in his own defence?
Buonaparte. I am a man of few words, and leave my defence, entirely to my counsel.
The Devil, as Counsellor for the Prisoner. Mr. Bull, and Gentlemen of the Jury, I blush for the first time in my life; it is well known I am the father of lies and mischief, and have had the prisoner at the bar a considerable time in training, but he really goes so much beyond my abilities, that I entirely give up to the discretion of the Jury.
John Bull. I shall very briefly, gentlemen, sum up the evidence; you have heard a long and serious detail of the prisoner’s cruelties in different parts of the world. The conduct of our worthy countryman, Tom Mizen, you must all admire; you perceive there is not one person to speak in his favour; and even his old counsel the Devil will have nothing to do with him—I therefore leave him to your verdict.
The Jury, without leaving the Court, pronounced the prisoner Guilty.
John Bull then passed sentence, as follows:
Napoleon Buonaparte—after a fair trial, you have been found guilty of various high crimes and misdemeanours, in different parts of this world. I am a man that delights not in blood; I therefore sentence you to be turned over to the care of my trusty and beloved friend Mr. Pidcock, proprietor of the Wild beasts over Exeter ‘Change in the Strand; there to be publicly shewn to my fellow citizens, inclosed in an iron cage for three months; after the expiration of which time, I sentence you to be transported to your native town of Ajaccio in Corsica for three months, and, for the remainder of your life, to be hung up by your legs in the mines of Mexico.
Mr. Pidcock attended with a cage, and disposed of the prisoner according to his sentence; he appeared extremely hardened during the whole of the trial. The Court was uncommonly crowded.
‘Buonaparte’s Soliloquy at Calais, written and designed by G. M. Woodward,’ was published September 21, 1803. It is as follows:—
To go or not to go? that is the question;—
Whether ’tis better for my views to suffer
The ease and quiet of yon hated rival,
Or to take arms against the haughty people,
And by invading, end them? T’ invade,—to fight,—
No more! and by a fight, to say we end
The envy and the thousand jealous pangs
We now must bear with; ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. T’ invade—to fight—
To fight?—perchance be beat: aye, there’s the rub;
For in our passage hence what ills may come,
When we have parted from our native ports,
Must give us pause there’s the respect
That makes th’ alternative so hard a choice.
For who would bear their just and equal laws,
Their sacred faith, and general happiness,
That shew in contrast black our tyrant sway,
Our frequent breach of treaty, and the harms
Devouring armies on the people bring,
When he himself could the dark shame remove
By mere invasion? Who would tamely view
That happy nation’s great and thriving power,
But that the dread of falling on their coast,
(That firm and loyal country, from whose shores
No enemy returns,) puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear the ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard, their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.
