He wanted to see Beranger. He went to Passy twice without being able to find him at home. His cousin Napoleon timed his visit more happily and found Béranger by his fireside. He asked him:
“What do you advise my cousin to do?”
“To observe the Constitution.”
“And what ought he to avoid?”
“Violating the Constitution.”
Béranger could not be induced to say anything else.
Yesterday, December 5, 1850, I was at the Français. Rachel played “Adrienne Lecouvreur.” Jerome Bonaparte occupied a box next to mine. During an entr’acte I paid him a visit. We chatted. He said to me:
“Louis is mad. He is suspicious of his friends and delivers himself into the hands of his enemies. He is suspicious of his family and allows himself to be bound hand and foot by the old Royalist parties. On my return to France I was better received by Louis Philippe at the Tuileries than I am at the Elysee by my nephew. I said to him the other day before one of his ministers (Fould): ‘Just remember a little! When you were a candidate for the presidency, Monsieur here (I pointed to Fould) called upon me in the Rue d’Alger, where I lived, and begged me in the name of MM. Thiers, Mole, Duvergier de Hauranne, Berryer, and Bugeaud to enter the lists for the presidency. He told me that never would you get the “Constitutionnel;” that in Mole’s opinion you were an idiot, and that Thiers looked upon you as a blockhead; that I alone could rally everybody to me and win against Cavaignac. I refused. I told them that you represented youth and the future, that you had a quarter of a century before you, whereas I could hardly count upon eight or ten years; that I was an invalid and wanted to be let alone. That is what these people were doing and that is what I did. And you forget all this! And you make these gentlemen the masters! And you show the door to your cousin, my son, who defended you in the Assembly and devoted himself to furthering your candidacy! And you are strangling universal suffrage, which made you what you are! I’ faith I shall say like Mole that you are an idiot, and like Thiers that you are a blockhead!’”
The King of Westphalia paused for a moment, then continued:
“And do you know, Monsieur Victor Hugo, what he replied to me? ‘You will see!’ No one knows what is at the bottom of that man!”