“She herself saw that there was every prospect of his being very shortly driven out of Spain. And I was equally convinced he would be driven out of Russia. It was the very day of the battle of Borodino. ‘J’en accepte l’augure,’ she said. ‘Everything that you say of him is very just. But I have particular reason for resentment against him. I have been persecuted by him in the most shameful manner. I was neither suffered to live anywhere nor to go where I would have gone, all for no other reason but because I would not eulogize him in my writings.’ As to our war with England I told her that I deeply lamented it and yet cherished the hope that it would not last long. That England had forced it upon us by measures as outrageous upon the rights of an independent nation as tyrannical as oppressive as any that could be charged upon Buonaparte. Her pretences were retaliation and necessity. Retaliation upon America for the wrongs of France and necessity for man Stealing. We asked of England nothing but our indisputable rights, but we allowed no special prerogatives to political Quixotism. We did not consider Britain at all as the defender of the liberties of mankind but as another Tyrant pretending to exclusive dominion upon the ocean. A pretension full as detestable and I trusted in God full as chimerical as the pretension of universal monarchy upon the land.
MADAME DE STAËL
“Madame de Staël was of her own opinion still but on the point of empressment she owned that my observations were reasonable. I have not yet found a European of any nation except the English who on having this question in its true state brought to a precise point had a syllable to say for the English side. In conclusion I told her that the pretended retaliation of England had compelled us to resort to real retaliation upon them and that as long as they felt a necessity to fight for the practice of stealing men from American merchant vessels on the high seas we should feel the necessity of fighting against it. I could only hope that God would prosper the righteous cause.
“Madame de Staël charged me if I ever should be again in any place where she should be at the same time not to neglect paying her a visit which I very willingly promised. She left St. Petersburg the same day. I should ask Sir Francis D’Ivernois pardon. I began this letter with him, but whom can one help deserting for Madame de Staël? I will return to Sir Francis by the next opportunity. Dutifully and affectionately yours.”
Half-tone plate engraved by H. Davidson
MY DAUGHTER