"Irresolution and deliberation are no longer in season," he said slowly, and then added with sudden fire:
"I renounce Louisiana! It is not only New Orleans I will cede, it is the whole colony without reservation. I renounce it with the greatest regret! To attempt obstinately to retain it would be the greatest folly. I direct you to negotiate this affair with the envoys of the United States. Do not even await the arrival of Mr. Monroe; have an interview to-morrow with Mr. Livingston. But I require a great deal of money for this war with England, and I would not like to commence it with new contributions. I will be moderate, in consideration of the necessity in which I am of making a sale; but keep this to yourself. I want fifty millions, and for less than that sum I will not treat; I would rather make a desperate attempt to keep these fine countries. To-morrow you shall have full power."
I think my uncle was somewhat aghast at the suddenness of the decision to sell the whole country, though he had himself advised it, and still more at the great responsibility thrust upon him of conducting the negotiations in place of the Minister of Foreign Relations. Perhaps, too, now that the sale was fully determined upon, he was touched with regrets and misgivings. At any rate, he said, somewhat hesitatingly:
"You feel sure, Citizen Consul, that we have a right to cede the sovereignty of a people without consulting the people themselves? Have we a right to abandon what the Germans call the souls? Can they be the subject of a contract of sale or exchange?"
Now I really think from what I had seen of Bonaparte's reverie while the minister was out of the room, of his frowning cogitations in that rapid walk to and fro, and of the solemnity of his manner when he finally announced his determination to sell, that he had been troubled by the same misgivings. But none the less did his lip curl satirically as he listened to my uncle, and his eyes narrow and glow with a malevolent fire. He hardly waited for him to finish till he burst forth bitterly:
"You are giving me, in all its perfection, the ideology of the law of nature and nations! But I require money to make war on the richest nation of the world. Send your maxims to the London market! I am sure they will be greatly admired there; and yet no great attention is paid to them when the question is the occupation of the finest regions of Asia!"
I thought my uncle would have wilted under such bitter sarcasm, for never have I seen anything more malevolent than Bonaparte's whole aspect, and I trembled for him. But he seemed not greatly afraid of the great man's bluster, and persisted in his argument when it seemed to me the part of wisdom would have been to keep silence.
"But, Citizen Consul," he urged, "are you not afraid by ceding such great possessions to America you may make her in the course of two or three centuries too powerful for Europe—the mistress of the world?"
The Consul's lip curled again. He answered in a harsh voice:
"My foresight does not embrace such remote fears. I have no children; after me the deluge! Besides, we may hereafter expect rivalries among the members of the Union. The confederations that are called perpetual only last till one of the contracting parties finds it to his interest to break them."