"Since I am on French soil, I will not leave it; let us set out for the Vendée."
M. de ——[399], informed by a faithful man, took her in his carriage as his wife, crossed the whole of France with her, and has put her down at ——-[400]. She has remained some time in a country-house without being recognised by anybody, except the curate of the place. The Maréchal de Bourmont is to join her in the Vendée by another road.
Informed of all this in Paris, it was easy for us to foresee the result. The enterprise has a further drawback for the Royalist Cause: it will discover the weakness of that cause and dispel illusions. If Madame had not gone to the Vendée, France would always have believed that in the West there was a royalist camp standing at ease, as I called it.
But however, there remained still one means of saving Madame and casting a new veil over the truth: the Princess should have left again at once; arriving at her own risk and peril, like a brave general who comes to review his army, to moderate its impatience and its ardour, she would have declared that she had hastened to tell her soldiers that the moment for action was not yet favourable, that she would return to place herself at their head when the occasion should summon her. Madame would at least have once shown a Bourbon to the Vendeans: the shades of the Cathelineaus, the d'Elbées, the Bonchamps, the La Rochejacqueleins, the Charettes would have rejoiced.
Our committee met: while we were discoursing, there came from Nantes a captain, who told us the place where the heroine is staying. The captain is a good-looking young man, brave as a sailor, eccentric as a Breton. He disapproved of the enterprise; he thought it mad; but he said:
"Madame is not going away: it is a question of dying, and that is all; and then, gentlemen of the council, have Walter Scott hanged, for he is the real culprit!"
I thought that we ought to write what we felt to the Princess. M. Berryer[401], who was preparing to go to defend a case at Quimper[402], generously offered to take the letter and to see Madame if he could. When it became necessary to draw up the note, no one thought of writing it: I undertook to do so[403].
Our messenger set out, and we awaited events. I soon received, by post, the following note, which had not been sealed and which had doubtless come under the eyes of the authorities:
Letter from Berryer.