Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Volume V.

by Walter Scott

THE ARMY—STATE OF PARTIES.

It would be wasting time to show reasons, why the French army should have been attached to Napoleon. They could not be supposed to forget the long career of success which they had pursued under his banner, the pensions granted in foreign countries which were now retrenched, and the licensed plunder of their Emperor's unceasing campaigns. At present, they conceived the King proposed to reduce their numbers so soon as he could with safety, and imagined their very existence was about to be at stake.

Nor was it only the selfish interests of the army which rendered them discontented. The sense of honour, as it was called, or rather the vanity of military ascendency and national aggrandisement, had been inspired by Buonaparte into all classes of his subjects, though they were chiefly cherished by his companions in arms. According to their opinion, the glory of France had risen with Buonaparte, and sunk with him for ever; not, as they fondly contended, through the superior force of the enemy, but by the treachery of Marmont, and the other generals whom Napoleon trusted. This sentiment passed from the ranks of the soldiers into other classes of society, all of which are in France deeply susceptible of what is represented to them as national glory; and it was again echoed back to the soldiers from fields, from workshops, from manufactories. All began to agree, that they had received the Bourbons from the hands of foreign conquerors; and that the King's reign had only commenced, because France had been conquered, and Paris surrendered. They remembered that the allies had declared the restoration of the ancient family was combined with the restriction of France within the ancient limits; and that, accordingly, the first act of Monsieur, as lieutenant of the kingdom, had been to order the surrender of upwards of fifty fortresses beyond the frontiers, which Buonaparte, it was supposed, would have rendered the means of re-acquiring the conquests, of which fortune or treachery had for a time bereft him. The meanest follower of the camp affected to feel his share in the national disgrace of losing provinces, to which France had no title save that of military usurpation. The hope that the government would at least endeavour to reconquer Belgium, so convenient for France, and which, as they contended, fell within her natural boundaries, served for a time to combat these feelings; but when it was perceived plainly that the government of France neither could nor would engage in external war, for this or any other object, the discontent of the army became universal, and they might be pronounced ripe for any desperate enterprise.

Among the soldiers, the late Imperial Guards were distinguished for their sullen enmity to the new order of things, and deemed themselves insulted at the guard of the King's person being committed to a body of household troops, selected as approved loyalists. The army were also much disgusted, that the decorations of the Legion of Honour had been distributed with a profusion, which seemed intended to diminish its value. But the course of promotion was the deepest source of discontent. The princes of the blood-royal had been early declared colonels-general by the King; and the army soon discovered, or supposed they discovered, that under their auspices the superior ranks of the army were likely to be filled by the emigrant nobility, whose military service was considered as having been continued, while they were in attendance upon the King during his exile. The most indecent competition was thus excited between those whose claims were founded on their devoted attachment to the House of Bourbon, and those who had borne arms against that family, but still in the service of France. The truth is, that the derangement of the finances, and the jealousy of the ministers, each of whom claimed the exclusive patronage of his own department, left the King no means so ready for discharging his debts of gratitude, and affording the means of subsistence to his ancient friends and adherents, as by providing for them in the army. The measure, though perhaps unavoidable, was in many respects undesirable. Old men, past the age of service, or young men who had never known it, were, in virtue of these claims, placed in situations, to which the actual warriors conceived they had bought a title by their laurels and their scars. The appearance of the superannuated emigrants, who were thus promoted to situations ill-suited to age and infirmity, raised the ridicule and contempt of Buonaparte's soldiers, while the patrician haughtiness, and youthful presumption, of the younger nobles, excited their indignation. The agents and friends of Buonaparte suffered not these passions to cool. "There is a plot of the royalists against you," was incessantly repeated to the regiments upon which these new officers were imposed. "The Bourbons cannot think themselves safe while those who shared the triumphs of Napoleon have either honour or existence. Your ranks are subjected to the command of dotards, who have never drawn a sword in battle, or who have served only in the emigrant bands of Condé, or among the insurgent Chouans and Vendéans. What security have you against being disbanded on a day's notice? And if the obligations of the government to you bind them, as it would seem, so slightly, will you consider yours to them as of a stricter description?" Such insinuations, and such reasoning, inflamed the prejudices of the army. Disaffection spread generally through their ranks; and, long before the bold attempt of Napoleon, his former soldiery were almost universally prepared to aid him in the recovery of his power.

The state of active political parties in France, we have thus described; but, as is usual, the mass of the population were somewhat indifferent to their principles, unless in moments of excitation. Parties in a state are to the people at large what the winds are to the ocean. That which predominates for the time, rolls the tide in its own direction; the next day it is hushed, and the waves are under a different influence. The people of France at large were averse to the Republicans or Jacobins. They retained too awful an impression of the horrors of the tyranny exercised by these political fanatics, to regard them otherwise than with terror. They were as little Buonapartists; because they dreaded the restless temper of him who gave name to this faction, and saw that while he was at the head of the French government, the state of war must be perpetual. They could not be termed Royalists, for they comprehended many with whom the name of Bourbon had lost its charms; and a very large proportion of the country had their fortune and prosperity so intimately connected with the Revolution, that they were not disposed to afford any countenance to the re-establishment of the monarchy on its ancient footing.

Upon the whole, this class of Frenchmen who may be called moderates, or constitutionalists, and who contained the great bulk of the men of property, substance, and education, hoped well of the King's government. His good sense, humanity, love of justice, moderation, and other valuable qualities, recommended him to their esteem, and they thought his restoration might be considered as the guarantee of a lasting peace with the other nations of Europe. But they dreaded and deprecated that counter revolutionary reaction, as the established phrase was, which was regarded as the object of the princes of the blood, the nobility, and the clergy. The property of many of the constitutionalists was vested in national domains, and they watched with doubt and fear every step which the emigrant nobility and clergy seemed disposed to take for recovery of their former rights.

On this subject the moderate party were sensitively jealous, and the proceedings which took place in the Chamber of Deputies threw striking light on the state of the public mind. We must, therefore, turn the reader's attention in that direction.

A petty riot, concerning precedence, had arisen in a church called Durnac, between the seigneur of the parish, and the mayor of the commune. The mayor brought the affair before the Chamber of Deputies by a violent petition, in which he generalized his complaint against the whole body of emigrants, whom he accused of desiring to place themselves above the constituted authorities, and to treat France as a conquered country. The Chamber, 20th November, 1814, treated the language of the petition as calumnious, and the squabble as unworthy of their notice. But the debate called forth expressions which intimated a suspicion that there existed a dark and secret system, which tended to sow the seeds of discord and anarchy among the citizens, and to resuscitate pretensions incompatible with the laws. "It was," said the member[78] who made this statement, "important to impress every class of Frenchmen with the great idea, that there was no safety for France, for the King, for every member of society, but in the maintenance of those constitutional principles on which were founded the laws for protecting the whole."

EMIGRANT-CLAIMS.

The claims of the emigrants for restoration of their forfeited property, were, abstractedly, as just and indubitable as that of the King to the throne. But the political considerations in which they were involved, rendered any general attempt to enforce those claims the sure signal of civil war; a civil war almost certain to end in a second expatriation, both of the royal family and their followers. In this dilemma, government seems to have looked anxiously for some means of compromise which might afford relief to the emigrants, without innovating on that article of the charter which ratified the sale of national domains. M. Ferrand brought forward in the Chamber of Delegates, a motion [Dec. 3] for the restoration of such estates of emigrants as yet remained unsold. But this involved a question respecting the rights of the much more numerous class whose property had been seized upon by the state, and disposed of to third parties, to whom it was guaranteed by the charter. Since these gentlemen could not be restored ex jure, to their estates, as was proposed towards their more fortunate brethren, they had at least a title to the price which had been surrogated in place of the property, of which price the nation had still possession.