[33] Lady Blennerhassett misses the subtlety of the distinction when she suggests that Talleyrand attempted to play a double game with Napoleon on this occasion. Compare Mr. Holland Rose’s version: “Talleyrand took the most unscrupulous care that the affair of the Presidency should be judiciously settled.” Standing between the two I should say he took most “scrupulous care” to have Napoleon’s wish realised. The full passage in the memoirs runs: “Je m’ouvris à Melzi, non pas sur ce que le Premier Consul désirait, mais sur ce qu’il fallait que la République Cisalpine demandat. En peu de jours je parvins à mon but. Au moment que Bonaparte arriva á Lyons, tout était préparé, &c.”
[34] Yet M. Olivier, in his attack on Talleyrand (Revue des Deux Mondes, September, 1894), complains of him deserting the English Alliance under Napoleon.
[35] Contrast with Mr. Rose’s opinion that of E. Ollivier, a violent modern critic: “He threw himself with equal zeal into the negotiation of the Concordat.”
[36] See M. Crétineau-Joly’s Bonaparte et le Concordat.
[37] As described in the civil registry of marriage at the time.
[38] The habit is, of course, pointed to as proof of the indolence of the legendary Talleyrand. The more candid observer would be disposed to refer it to his lameness. We know that Talleyrand had to keep a heavy ironwork about his foot and wear a heavy thick-soled boot. One can easily understand his preference for lying in bed or on a couch.
[39] Mr. Holland Rose claims to have shown that the officials of the English Foreign Office were co-operating in the Cadoudal conspiracy.
[40] In one letter, for instance, he tells how the Spanish Minister at Paris had died and left him 60,000 francs to settle on his god-daughter. “I found,” he adds, “that she had a more sacred title to his interest than that.”
[41] Rogers, hearing this from Talleyrand, asked Lucien if he knew of it. Lucien said he did not; but he added with a laugh that he knew his brother had once had a similar fit when an actress declined to be honoured by him.
[42] He relieves his narrative here by telling how the courier arrived from Paris, and Napoleon interrupted his triumph to read his correspondence. There was a letter from Mme. de Genlis, and Napoleon fell into a violent storm of anger and mortification in the midst of his glory as he heard of the irrepressible chattering about him of the Faubourg St. Germain.