The members of the Congress went to dinner, using the sceptre of St. Louis as a rush with which to mark the folio at which they had left off in their protocols.
Upon the obstacles encountered by the Tsar, M. de Talleyrand faced about: foreseeing that the stroke would resound, he sent a report to Louis XVIII. (in a despatch which I have seen and which was numbered 25 or 27) of this strange session of the Congress[306]; he thought himself obliged to inform His Majesty of so exorbitant a proceeding, because this news, said he, would not long delay in reaching the King's ears: a singular ingenuousness for M. le Prince de Talleyrand.
There had been a question of a declaration on the part of the Alliance, in order to make it quite clear to the world that there was no quarrel except with Napoleon, that there was no pretension to impose upon France either an obligatory form of government or a sovereign who should not be of her own choice. This latter part of the declaration was suppressed, but it was positively announced in the official journal of Frankfort. England, in her negociations with the Cabinets, always employs that Liberal language, which is only a precaution against the parliamentary tribune.
We see that the Allies were troubling themselves no more about the re-establishment of the Legitimacy at the Second than at the First Restoration: the event alone did all. What mattered it to such short-sighted sovereigns whether the mother of European monarchies had her throat cut? Would that prevent them from giving entertainments and keeping guards? The monarchs are so solidly seated to-day, the globe in one hand, the sword in the other!
M. de Talleyrand, whose interests were at that time in Vienna, feared lest the English, whose opinion was no longer so favourable to him, should begin the military game before all the armies were drawn up in line, and lest the Cabinet of St. James should thus acquire the predominance: that is why he wished to induce the King to re-enter by the south-eastern provinces, in order that he might find himself under the protection of the Austrian Empire and Cabinet. The Duke of Wellington had given a precise order not to commence hostilities; it was Napoleon who wanted the Battle of Waterloo: the destinies of such a nature are not to be arrested.
Those historic facts, the most curious in the world, have remained generally unknown; in the same way, also, a confused opinion has been formed of the Treaties of Vienna relating to France: they have been thought the iniquitous work of a troop of victorious sovereigns, implacably bent upon our ruin; unfortunately, if they are harsh, they have been envenomed by a French hand: when M. de Talleyrand is not conspiring, he is trafficking.
Prussia desired to have Saxony, which will sooner or later be her prey; France ought to have countenanced this wish, for, Saxony obtaining an indemnification within the sphere of the Rhine, Landau would have remained to us with our surrounding territories; Coblentz and other fortresses would have passed to a small friendly State, which, placed between ourselves and Prussia, prevented any point of contact; the keys of France would not have been handed over to the shade of Frederic. For three millions which Saxony paid him, M. de Talleyrand opposed the combinations of the Cabinet of Berlin; but, in order to obtain the assent of Alexander to the existence of Old Saxony, our Ambassador was obliged to abandon Poland to the Tsar, notwithstanding that the other Powers desired that a Poland of some kind should restrict the freedom of the Muscovite's movements in the North. The Bourbons of Naples redeemed themselves, like the sovereign of Dresden, with money[307]. M. de Talleyrand claimed that he was entitled to a subvention, in exchange for his Duchy of Benevento: he was selling his livery on leaving his master. When France was losing so much, could not M. de. Talleyrand also have lost something? Benevento, moreover, did not belong to the High Chamberlain: by virtue of the revival of the ancient treaties, that principality was a dependency of the States of the Church.
