Life and Adventures of Count Beugnot, Minister of State under Napoleon I. Edited from the French by Charlotte M. Yonge. Two vols. Hurst and Blackett.
Jean Claude Count Beugnot lived through the entire period of the French Revolution. He was born early enough (in July, 1761) to have attained to maturity at its actual outbreak, and to have some intelligent recollection of its immediate antecedents. He lived long enough (until June, 1835) to see its course and issue, and to judge its effects under three succeeding monarchs—Louis XVIII., Charles X., and Louis Philippe. No life could have been more exactly timed for a complete experience of it, and perhaps no life could have been better circumstanced for an intelligent and just appreciation of it. As a minister and a courtier, he was eminent enough to stand within the circle of confidential knowledge, but not so eminent as to be a leader of parties, so as to be blinded by their passions, or to share their fate; as a politician, he was clever enough to fill offices, and to be employed in affairs of importance, but not so clever as to be the victim of great and blinding ambitions. He was, moreover, flexible enough to serve under Louis XVI.—at any rate, as a loyalist member of the States General of 1789, and of the Legislative Assembly of 1791, and to suffer imprisonment during the Reign of Terror; to be Prefect of La Seine Inférieure, and Administrator of the Grand Duchy of Berg under Napoleon; to be Minister of the Home Department under the Provisional Government; and to serve under Louis XVIII. in various important offices—first, as one of the three commissioners selected by the King in the commission for the preparation of the Charter of 1814, next as Director-General of Police, next as Minister of Marine Affairs, next as Postmaster-General. In 1819, a Royal ordinance summoned him to the Chamber of Peers, but before it could be countersigned the ministry resigned, and he did not take his seat until 1830, a few months before the revolution which placed Louis Philippe on the throne. The retrospect of such a man must have been something like that of Noah and his sons. He was a good administrator, a fair Parliamentary orator, an admirable drawer-up of State papers, a cautious, respectable, able coadjutor; ranking, relatively with men in English political history, like Sir J. Graham or Lord Halifax. His literary ability was considerable, as these memoirs prove, but it was not so great as to cause his ambition for original authorship to disqualify his talent for reporting or recording what he heard and saw. He was of the literary type of Mr. Nassau Senior, only with far better opportunities of knowing; and instead of merely reporting the sayings and doings and opinions of others, he aspired to quasi-historical memoir writing, which throws the information that he had such rare opportunities of possessing into an independent narrative form, which is to all intents and purposes history, only with the episodical freedom of journal writing. Perhaps no man, unless it were Talleyrand himself, could have told us so much of the secret history of his times, and Talleyrand could not help writing fiction instead of history. Count Beugnot, as portrayed by himself, produces a feeling of high respect and esteem. He was sincere, honest, and faithful; he was a consistent Liberal, who had respect for authority, and felt it right, in the interests of liberty, to accept whatever Government was in power; he was, moreover, bold and faithful, sometimes in circumstances of great personal peril. We do not feel towards him as towards Mirabeau, or Talleyrand, or Lamartine, or Guizot. He was not positive enough or brilliant enough to excite either high admiration or great antagonism. He was a safe politician, an honourable man, and a literary mediocrity of the very highest class, but no more.
It is impossible to exaggerate the rich materials of these volumes. They lack the aristocratic gossip of the memoirs of St. Simon; they have not the melodramatic excitement or literary brilliancy of the historical romances of Lamartine; they are destitute of the doctrinaire philosophising which characterizes Guizot; but they are most interesting and sober recitals of what may be called the social history of the Revolution, in many of its byways, as well as at its centre. Almost every page is a romance, revealing—sometimes pitiably and ignominiously—the secret springs of great transactions, the littleness of great men, the selfishness of patriots, the intrigues of politics, the little wisdom with which the world is governed. Count Beugnot, moreover, possesses the rare qualities of truthfulness and fairness. He manifestly tries to tell us the truth, and with great shrewdness and justice he endeavours to present both the defects and excellencies of the monarchs under whom he served. He has generous words for Napoleon, does full justice to his superb genius, while he exhibits his hard coarseness and selfish, unscrupulousness, and clearly discerns the fatal defects which led to his fall. He respects Louis XVIII., his refinement and his wit, while in a very quiet way he exhibits his intense heartlessness and selfishness. He penetrates the unprincipled, intriguing character of the Orleans Princes, and prepares his readers for their fall, which he did not live to see. He appreciates, too, with much of the judicial power of an Englishman, the character of the French nation, and the fatal defects which keep it in almost a chronic state of eruption. It is impossible to cull from the rich repertory of these pages. We can only indicate a few of the points of interest. A native of Bar-sur-Aube, Count Beugnot became acquainted with the notorious Madame de Lamotte, the heroine of the 'Diamond Necklace,' who in 1762 (a misprint, surely, for 1782) took refuge in Bar-sur-Aube, on escaping with her sister from the Convent at Longchamps. The two young ladies were descendants of the Baron de Rémi, a natural son of Henry II., and claimed the estates of their family, the only thing which it had preserved being its pedigree. The king had granted to their father a pension of £40, and to the girls £24 each, besides placing them gratuitously in the Abbey of Longchamps, near Paris, with a view to the honourable extinction of a family which had troublesome claims. Madame de Surmont took compassion upon them, and Mademoiselle de St. Rémi fascinated M. de Surmont, and married his nephew, M. de Lamotte. The part of Madame de Lamotte in the amazing story of the 'Diamond Necklace' is told at great length, as also are many details of her history, M. de Beugnot being on terms of intimacy with her, and more than once coming into perilous contact with this strange tragedy. To her and Cagliostro three chapters are devoted; both are admirably sketched, and many illustrative anecdotes of them are told. The Cardinal de Rohan had faith in Cagliostro and 'the Duke de Chartres (Egalité), at whose court it had been decided no longer to believe in a God, but who was quite inclined to believe in Cagliostro.' Beugnot helped Madame de Lamotte to destroy her letters on the night of her arrest. 'Here it was that, casting cursory glances over some of the thousands of the letters of Cardinal de Rohan, I was sorry to see what a wreck the delirium of love, exaggerated by the madness of ambition, had made of this wretched man. It is fortunate for the Cardinal's memory that these letters have been suppressed, but it is a loss to the history of human passion. What an age was that when a prince of the Church did not hesitate to write, to sign with his name, and to address to a woman, letters that a man of our day, who had the least self-respect, might begin to read, but would never finish!' This story, in the light which it throws upon the condition of France, forms a kind of prelude to the personal history of Beugnot, who is first elected a Deputy to the States General. Curious things are told of Marat, who 'was then only a professor of physic, and made a crusade against the sun, declaring that it was not the fountain of light, and found persons senseless enough to listen to, and even to commend him.'
A characteristic story of the hauteur of the old French aristocracy is told of Madame de Brionne, who, at the time of the first insurrection of Paris, was advised by the Bishop of Autun to go and spend some time in a little provincial town, where she would not be known. 'A little provincial town!' she replied, 'Oh, M. de Perigord, I can be a peasant if you please, but never a bourgeoise!'
Louis XV. blamed the Archbishop of Narbonne for his inordinate love of hunting. 'My Lord Archbishop, you are a great hunter; I know something about it. How can you forbid your priests from hunting if you spend your life in setting them an example of it?' 'Sire,' he replied, 'for my priests, hunting is their own vice; in my case, it is the vice of my ancestors.' 'My Lord Archbishop,' said the King on another occasion, 'they say that you are in debt, and, very deeply.' 'Sire,' was the reply, 'I will ask my steward about it, and have the honour of informing your Majesty.'
In October, 1793, M. de Beugnot was imprisoned in the Conciergerie, where, and at La Force, he remained until the fall of Robespierre, in daily danger of death, but, strangely, escaping it. Of the interior of prison life during this period he gives vivid sketches; describes his fellow-prisoners—many of them illustrious for rank, talents, or virtues—and the incidents connected with the daily death delivery of one or more of them. It is a vivid and powerful sketch of a notable interior. This section of the work is a series of carefully executed sketches of notable persons, especially of the leading Girondists, including a full-length portrait of Madame Roland. He says, 'I more than once made this reflection, that death on the scaffold only causes horror to the generality of men, because they compare it with a state of peace, of enjoyment, and perhaps of happiness they are experiencing; but death considered from the depths of a dungeon, or what is more, death when the whole existence is changed into torture, is no longer the height of evils, but their remedy.'
Here we must leave M. de Beugnot. The subsequent portions of his book are even more important and interesting, as the author himself rose to eminence, and came into closer contact with the great movements of history. Every page teems with interest, not only to the historical student, but to the general reader. Miss Yonge has done good service in translating this important work, especially at this juncture, when the spiral cycle of French destiny has again brought its revolutionary tragedy. It is needless to say that she has executed her task well, although she might, in one or two places, have still further exercised her power of excision.
The Coolie: His Rights and Wrongs. Notes of a Journey to British Guiana, with a review of the System and of the recent Commission of Inquiry. By the Author of 'Ginx's Baby.' Strahan and Co.
The conditions of coolie emigration from the East Indies to the West, although attracting but little attention from the general public, have been regarded anxiously by politicians and philanthropists, who know how easily enormous oppression and cruel wrong may shelter themselves under legal forms of emigration, and what a peculiar field for unscrupulous cupidity is constituted by the transmigration of helpless Hindoos and Chinese to British plantations in British Guiana. That great abuses have been perpetrated admits of no doubt, but happily facilities of knowledge and of redress are much greater than in the old days of slavery; and experience has made the British public and the British Government susceptible and suspicious so that long continuance of wrong is not possible. A Mr. Des Vœux, formerly a stipendiary magistrate in Demerara, now an administrator in St. Lucia, at the close of 1869 addressed a letter to Earl Granville, the Colonial Secretary, representing the state of the coolie emigrants 'to be little other than that from which not many years ago the tillers of the same soil were redeemed by our generous fathers. Seduced from India or China by false promises (so he seems to have averred), not duly notified of the legislation which would affect their relations when they reached the field of labour, assigned without due caution on the part of the executive to the power of unconscientious masters, wronged by the law and against law, daily injured, and unable to obtain redress because of combinations between unjust magistrates, hireling doctors, and manœuvring planters, dying unrecked and unreckoned (I have tried faithfully thus to sum up this man's charges), such a fifty thousand British subjects anywhere existing would heat the sympathies of English hearts to boiling point.' Earl Granville consequently appointed a commission of inquiry, and two philanthropic societies, 'The Anti-Slavery,' and 'The Aborigines Protection Society,' induced no doubt by the humane sympathies and the great descriptive power of 'Ginx's Baby,' engaged Mr. Jenkins, who is a barrister, to go out as counsel to watch proceedings on their behalf—'to represent the coolies in this inquiry.' 'I accepted and held their retainer as a counsel, not as a partisan.' This volume is his report. It is, we must confess, simply a blue-book; but little of the dash and humour and graphic description of 'Ginx's Baby' characterize it. His clients are distant; his employers required exact statements of facts and figures. It is a law case, and not a romance. It is full of valuable information, but useful information is interesting only to politicians and philanthropic societies. Mr. Jenkins is not dull—he is most so when he tries to force the fun; ordinarily, he is as graphic in description and as picturesque in statistics as his subject-matter will permit him to be. Everywhere he is intelligent and apparently most solicitously impartial. In the descriptive parts of his book he suffers by comparison with the graphic power of Mr. Kingsley's 'At Last,' yet fresh in the memory of all readers. The book is to be accepted, therefore, simply as a blue-book of useful information. The question is one of interest and importance; it affects our national honour and philanthropy. It is 'whether an artificial system for the transfer of the swarming hives of Eastern Asia to the needy plains of the tropical West can be formed, organized, and conducted with results equally efficacious to the capitalists and beneficial to the emigrants.'
Although Mr. Jenkins thinks that Mr. Des Vœux's statement, made under fear, as he says, of a coolie rising, are exaggerated, and that his examination before the commissioners 'proved to be of a very unsatisfactory character,' that he had written 'a very long and serious letter, with the honestest of intentions but with the least business-like of performance,' he thinks that there was a necessity for the inquiry, and that 'the severe animadversions on Mr. Des Vœux's conduct, in the report of the commissioners, was beyond the proper sphere of their duty;' also that, 'on one or two points, absolute justice does not seem to have been done him in the report.' Mr. Jenkins describes his voyage out, several farms which he visited, the proceedings before the commissioner, the organization for emigration in India and in British Guiana, with the management of the emigration office, indentures, registers, &c., women and marriages, emigration laws, remedies against employers, wages, medical inspection, &c., illustrating each by facts, anecdotes which may not be always facts, and various details. He also traces the growth of the coolie system from the time of the abolition of slavery, and discusses the apprenticeship and other provisions for its regulation. The home Government has refused to subsidize the emigration; hence it has been in a state of chronic feud with the colony. The details given by Mr. Jenkins in his appendix, under the head 'Review of Emigration,' are of a very grave and ominous character. First he tells us that 'every importation of African blood, whether aboriginal or West Indian, has from the first regularly disappointed its promoters; the causes 'lie partly in the character of the negro, partly in the incapacity of the old labour system for adaptation to a state of things in which the labourers had become free.' In 1839, a society was formed to procure emigrants without the aid of the State; 2,900 labourers were obtained from Barbadoes, and thirty from the United States. The emigrants were speedily absorbed into the mass of village population. In 1841, bounty was paid on 8,098 emigrants, chiefly Portuguese, from Madeira and Brazil; the mortality was appalling, and under an act of disallowance in October of the same year, public emigration came to an end. In 1844, Acts were passed providing for Chinese and coolie emigration, and the next year 563 emigrants came from Calcutta, and 225 from Madras. In the following year nearly 6,000 Portuguese emigrants arrived, together with 1,373 from Calcutta, and 2,455 from Madras. They were 'ravaged by disease, and literally decimated year by year in the process of acclimatization.' Between 1845 and 1851, 18,707 Madeirans had been imported. The census of 1851 showed that only 7,928 were in the colony; some, however, had returned to their native country. The quinquennial increase in the number of Indian emigrants arriving during each of the four periods 1851–1855, 1856–1861, 1861–1865, 1806–1870, is represented by the figures 9,000, 14,000, 18,000, and 24,000. In 1853, besides the Indians, 647 Chinese were added, and in the seven years 1859–1866, about 12,000 more. The Chinese have proved very valuable emigrants. About 10,000 Barbadians, 12 Portuguese, and 2,500 Africans, made an estimated rural population of 92,466. The death-rate is very high, never less than 10 per cent. The proportion of women to men among the coolies in British Guiana is as 10,000 to 29,000, among the Chinese as 2 to 114. The detailed evils resulting from this, given in Mr. Jenkins's chapter on the subject, are appalling. Mr. Jenkins also quotes from the Pioneer of India an ugly story concerning Jamaica emigration agents, who attempted in India to carry off some twenty women by force, whom they had got into confinement; and were defeated only by the energy of the Rev. Mr. Evans. Although women are almost useless as labourers, it is a suspicious fact that the fee for each woman recruited in India is seven rupees, while that for a man is only four. We cannot discuss the various points of emigration policy advocated by Mr. Jenkins; we can only thank him for directing public attention to a matter so deeply affecting our colonial future on the one hand, and our national honour on the other.