[51]. These words were used to me by Mr. Secretary Cook, at the moment, in Paris. But the truth was, our generals and diplomatists then on the spot knew but little and cared less about the fine arts or belles lettres.
The farce played off between the French king and the allies was considered supremely ridiculous. The Cossacks bivouacked in the square of the Carousel before his majesty’s windows; and soldiers dried their shirts and trowsers on the iron railings of the palace. This was a nuisance; and for the purpose of abating it, three pieces of ordnance duly loaded, with a gunner and ready-lighted match, were stationed day and night upon the quay, and pointed directly at his majesty’s drawing-room; so that one salvo would have despatched the Most Christian King and all his august family to the genuine Champs Elysées. This was carrying the jest rather too far, and every rational man in Paris was shaking his sides at so shallow a manœuvre, when a new object of derision appeared in shape of a letter purporting to be written by King Louis the XVIIIth, expressing his wish that he was young and active enough (who could doubt his wish to grow young again?) to put himself at the head of his own army, attack his puissant allies, and cut them all to pieces for their duplicity to his loving and beloved subjects.
A copy of this alleged letter was given me by a colonel of the national guards, who said that it was circulated by the highest authority. I still retain it.
“Lettre du Roi au Prince Talleyrand.
“Du 22 Juillet, 1815.
“La conduite des armées alliées réduira bientôt mon peuple à s’armer contre elles, comme on a fait en Espagne.
“Plus jeune, je me mettrais à sa tête:—mais, si l’âge et mes infirmités m’en empêchent, je ne veux pas, au moins, paroître conniver à des mesures dont je gémis! je suis résolu, si je ne puis les adoucir, à demander asile au roi d’Espagne.
“Que ceux qui, même après la capture de l’homme à qui ils ont déclaré la guerre, continuent à traiter mon peuple en ennemi, et doivent par conséquent me regarder comme tel, attentent s’ils le veulent à ma liberté! ils en sont les maîtres! j’aime mieux vivre dans ma prison que de rester ici, témoin passif des pleurs de mes enfans.”
But,—to close the scene of his majesty’s gallantry, and anxiety to preserve the capitulation entire. After he had permitted the plunder of the Louvre, a report was circulated that Blucher had determined to send all considerations of the treaty to the d—, and with his soldiers to blow up the Pont de Jena, as the existence of a bridge so named was an insult to the victorious Prussians! This was, it must be admitted, sufficiently in character with Blucher: but some people were so fastidious as to assert that it was in fact only a clap-trap on behalf of his Most Christian Majesty; and true it was, that next day copies of a very dignified and gallant letter from Louis XVIII. were circulated extensively throughout Paris. The purport of this royal epistle was not remonstrance: that would have been merely considered as matter of course: it demanded, that Marshal Blucher should inform his majesty of the precise moment the bridge was to be so blown up, as his majesty (having no power of resistance) was determined to go in person—stand upon the bridge at the time of the explosion, and mount into the air amidst the stones and mortar of this beautiful piece of architecture! No doubt it would have been a sublime termination of so sine cura a reign; and would have done more to immortalise the Bourbon dynasty than any thing they seem at present likely to accomplish!