Were I not bound to attend an appointment at twelve o’clock, in the event of which I am deeply interested, methinks it were a curious speculation (to which I incline) to try to develope what will be the probable state of France, when peace with all her neighbours shall be restored to her. The thinking part of the nation survey, not without alarming anticipation, the consequence of a million and a half of armed men, to whom a habit of indolence is become familiar, being turned loose upon a country whose specie has disappeared, whose foreign commerce is annihilated, and whose manufactures must be born again, for hardly a trace of their having ever existed remains: add to this, that the government, by being no longer revolutionary, will lose its strong executive spring: and that the people are split into innumerable parties, which hate each other with irreconcileable inveteracy.
National prejudices and political antipathies I consider as a vile state engine, which, in the hands of a few crafty men, has for more than five thousand years wrought the misery of the human race. Englishmen and Frenchmen, the Charib and the Hindoo, the philosopher of Europe and the naked savage whose wanderings I have witnessed at Botany Bay, shall one day, I presume in humble confidence to trust, be assembled before the “living throne,” of a common Father; and look back on that diminutive speck, which in the boundless ocean of infinity nothing short of divine irradiation could make visible to their eyes;—to review with unqualified contempt, sorrow, and repentance, those false principles, and sanguinary conclusions, which rendered it unto them a theatre of contention and horror, and caused their days to be “few and evil!”
If such be my sentiments, I have no right to wish calamity to France. I do not.—May she conclude peace with her neighbours; and labour to settle her own government; and render happy her numerous children! But when I look forward to the completion of such an event, I think I foresee so many long years of havoc, which have yet to urge their course in this devoted country, that I will drop the curtain, and hasten to meet —— ——. Adieu.
LETTER XII.
Plymouth, 11th May, 1795.
MY DEAR ——,
CONGRATULATE me. The circumstances which led to my obtaining permission to come to England, prove me fortunate beyond example; and as I think them honourable to French generosity, I shall not omit to record them.
I arrived here yesterday, in a little Danish brig bound to Copenhagen, which ran off the Sound, and made a signal for a pilot. One of the Cawsand boats in consequence pushed out to us, and received Admiral Bligh, his two young gentlemen, and myself. We were soon landed; and I am happy to tell you that I found — —— —— —— —— —— —— —— —— — —— —— —— —— —— —— —— ——
The packet which accompanies this will explain to you my hopes, and the measures which I intended to pursue, at the time it was written. The Admiral’s liberation and passport arrived on the 2d instant; and, on his request for his aid-de-camp and interpreter to accompany him, the good commissary made no scruple of furnishing me with a passport to go to Brest, upon pledging myself to return, in case my application to the representatives might be rejected. Having bidden adieu to my friends, I set out on the following morning on horseback, with the Admiral and the two boys in a carriage, the best the town afforded, without springs, and with traces made of ropes. Our sudden departure was in consequence of knowing that an embargo, which had subsisted for some time, was just taken off, and that several American vessels were ready to sail for England. We travelled about thirty-six miles, through a country which is full of young promising corn, indicating a plentiful crop, and appearing not to have suffered from wanting husbandmen to sow it. About four o’clock we reached a village, whence there is a ferry about ten miles across to Brest. Here we embarked, with more than a dozen country people, who were carrying the produce of their farms to the next day’s market. Only one of them could speak French, who satisfied the curiosity of the rest about us. They made their supper of crape, and were abundantly thankful to us for a remnant of a piece of cold veal which we had brought with us, some bread, and a little wine, which they ate as luxuries. Owing to a contrary wind, it was midnight before we got abreast of the harbour’s mouth; when we learned, by hailing a vessel, to our unspeakable mortification, that all the Americans had sailed in the course of the day. The circumstance of having missed, by being a few hours too late, an opportunity, the fellow of which might not arrive for months, joined to the apprehensions and perplexity of men in our situation, on entering into a garrison-town like Brest, at so unseasonable and suspicious an hour, rendered our feelings very unenviable. We wanted the boatmen to land us at the town, and to shew us to an inn, where we might be accommodated with beds; but this they peremptorily refused to do, telling us, that we might every moment expect to be hailed by one of the forts, and ordered on shore to give an account of ourselves. This happened, as they had foretold, in a few minutes, when we were summoned through a speaking-trumpet to land within some pallisades at the point of the dock-yard. A serjeant and a file of men received us, and conduced us immediately to their officer at the guard-house, a tall well-looking young man; who after having inspected our passports, and listened to our wishes, very civilly offered to accommodate us as well as he could in his guard-room, or, if this proposition were not agreeable, to send a serjeant with us to knock up an inn. We were grateful for his politeness, and begged to accept the latter, requesting permission to leave our baggage under his care until morning, which was complied with, and a serjeant was directly sent away with us. We had, however, but just passed one of the barriers of the dock-yard, when we were stopped by a municipality patrole, who, notwithstanding our conductor’s explanations and remonstrances, carried us all forthwith to their guard-house, and gave us to understand, that we must pass the night there as well as we could. This treatment enraged us; and I bade them recollect that they were offering an unnecessary indignity to a “General Anglais,” who had not entered Brest without ample and sufficient authority, and who would certainly represent their interference and impertinence, on the next morning, to his friend Admiral Villaret, and the members of the convention on mission here. This resolute tone, to which the Admiral desired me to give full force, had quickly its effect, and this bourgeois collection of tinkers and taylors thought proper to send us under an escort to a neighbouring inn; but it was now become so late, that, after having knocked at the door for more than half an hour, we were obliged to return to the guard-house, and take up our lodging there: the Admiral sitting up, on a bench, by the fire, and the two youngsters and I lying down on the guard-bed with the soldiers.
In the morning we took our leave with very little ceremony, and repaired again to the inn, where we found admission. After breakfasting, and rendering our dress as decent as we could without our baggage, we went, as we had been directed at Quimper, to the office of the maritime agent, and produced our passports. He received us very properly, and furnished us with tickets to shew in case of being stopped—an event not unlikely to happen to English officers walking in their uniforms about the streets of Brest. Our next visit was to Monsieur Villaret, whose reception of Admiral Bligh, and whose undeviating conduct to us both while we remained here, was friendly, polite, and flattering in the extreme. I had never before seen him, and had now the honour to be introduced to him by Admiral Bligh, as his aid-de-camp. His frank and gentlemanlike manners at once won my esteem. He appears to be between forty and fifty years old, is of an engaging countenance, well made, of a middle size, and has a military carriage. Upon hearing where we had left our baggage on the preceding evening, he directly dispatched his own coxswain for it, and it was brought to us safe and entire. But his goodness to me (as the friend of an officer whom he so highly respected for his gallant defence of his ship, as Admiral Bligh) must be particularly stated to you. No sooner was the predicament in which I stood made known to him, than he offered his interest to back my application to the representatives; and insisted that we all should immediately set out to their office to undertake it. Upon our arrival there, we were introduced to one of them, Champeaux, an old man, who at Admiral Villaret’s intercession consented at once, without starting a difficulty, to my being allowed to accompany my Admiral, and promised me a passport.