In less than two months after Louis XVIII took his seat, Talleyrand and Fouché were deep in their element of plot and intrigue. They thought of the son of Philippe Égalité as a possible constitutional ruler; they talked of reëstablishing the imperial regency; with Napoleon placed beyond the possibility of returning, the latter course would be safe. During the succeeding months they continued to juggle with this double intrigue, and around their plots clustered minor ones in mass. Lord Liverpool actually called Wellington to London for fear the duke should be seized, and Marmont put the Paris garrison under arms. On January twenty-first, 1815, the death of Louis XVI was commemorated by the royalists with the wildest talk; and such was the general fury over Exelmans's treatment that Fouché at last stepped forward to give his conspiracy some form. Carnot and Davout were both expected to coöperate; but although they refused, enough officers of influence were secured to make a plan for an extended insurrection entirely feasible. For this all parties were willing to unite; no one knew or cared what was to supplant the existing government—anything was better than "paternal anarchy."
How accurate the information was which reached Napoleon at Elba we cannot ascertain, for his feelings were masked and his conduct was non-committal. He had entirely recovered his health, and though old in experience, he was only forty-five years of age, and still appeared like one in the prime of life. He was apparently vigorous, being short, thick-necked, and inclined to corpulence. His cheeks were somewhat heavy and sensuous, his hair receded far back on the temples, his limbs were powerful, his hands and feet were delicately formed and noticeably small. His movements were nervous and well controlled, his eye was clear and bright, his passions were strong, his self-control was apparent, and the coördination of his powers was easy. To the Elban peasant he was gracious; with his subordinates he was dignified; among his many visitors he moved with good humor and tact; his kindness to his mother and sister made both of them devoted and happy.
The only anxiety he displayed was in regard to assassination and kidnapping: the former he said he could meet like a soldier; of the latter he spoke with anxious foreboding. He had reason to fear both. Every week either in France or Italy or both, there was a plot among fanatical royalists and priests to kill him; and though the Barbary pirates were eager to seize him and win a great ransom, they were excelled in their zeal both by Mariotte, Talleyrand's agent in Leghorn, and by Bruslart, a bitter and ancient enemy, who had been appointed governor of Corsica for the purpose. For these reasons, probably, the Emperor of Elba lived as far as possible in seclusion. As time passed he grew less intimate with Campbell, but the Scotch gentleman did not attribute the fact to discontent. Before leaving Elba, on February sixteenth, to reside for a time in Florence and perform the duties of English envoy in that place, he gave it as his opinion that if Napoleon received the pension stipulated for in the treaty he would remain tranquilly where he was.
CHAPTER XIII
Napoleon the Liberator[16]
Napoleon Ready to Reappear — Reasons for his Determination — The Return to France — The Northward March — Grenoble Opens its Gates — The Lyons Proclamations — The Emperor in the Tuileries — The Emperor of the French — The Additional Act — Effects of the Return in France and Elsewhere — The Congress of Vienna Denounces Napoleon.
It has lately been recalled that as early as July, 1814, the Emperor of Elba remarked to an English visitor that Louis XVIII, being surrounded by those who had betrayed the Empire, would in turn probably be himself betrayed by them. For the ensuing four months, however, the exile gave no sign of any deep purpose; to those who wished to leave him, he gave a hearty good-by. In December, however, he remarked to one of his old soldiers, pointedly, as the man thought: "Well, grenadier, you are bored; ... take the weather as it comes." Slipping a gold piece into the veteran's hand, he then turned away, humming to a simple air the words, "This will not last forever." Thereafter he dissuaded all who sought to depart, saying: "Be patient. We'll pass these few winter days as best we may; then we'll try to spend the spring in another fashion." This vague language may possibly have referred to the Italian scheme, but on February tenth he received a clear account of what had happened at Vienna, and on the evening of the twelfth Fleury de Chaboulon, a confidential friend of Maret, arrived in the disguise of a sailor, and revealed in the fullest and most authentic way the state of France. When he heard of the plan to reëstablish the regency, Napoleon burst out hotly: "A regency! What for? Am I, then, dead?" Two days later, after long conferences, the emissary was despatched to do what he could at Naples, and the Emperor began his preparations.
This was soon known on the mainland, and three days later a personage whose identity has never been revealed arrived in the guise of a Marseilles merchant, declaring that, except the rich and the emigrants, every human being in France longed for the Emperor's return. If he would but set up his hat on the shores of Provence, it would draw all men toward it. When Napoleon turned pseudo-historian he declared in one place that the breaches of the Fontainebleau treaty and his fears of deportation had nothing to do with his return from Elba; in another he states the reverse. Since the legend he was then studiously constructing required the unbroken devotion of the French to the standard-bearer of the Revolution for the sake of consistency, he probably recalled only the feelings awakened by Fleury's report that opportunity was ripe, and that, too, earlier than had been expected. But there were other motives at the time, for Peyrusse, keeper of Napoleon's purse during the Elban sojourn, heard his master asseverate that it would be more dangerous to remain in Porto Ferrajo than to return to France. In any case, so far as France and the world at large were concerned, the contemptuous indifference of Louis and his ministers to their obligations under the treaty powerfully justified Napoleon's course. Even Alexander and Castlereagh had early made an indignant protest to Talleyrand; but the latter, already deep in conspiracy, turned them off with a flippant rejoinder.
With great adroitness and secrecy Napoleon collected and fitted out his little flotilla, which consisted of the Inconstant, a stout brig assigned to him at Fontainebleau, and seven smaller craft. During the preparations the French and English war-vessels patrolling the neighboring waters came and went, but their captains suspected nothing. Campbell's departure created a false rumor among the islanders that England was favoring some expedition on which the Emperor was about to embark, thus allaying all suspicion. When, on the twenty-sixth, a little army of eleven hundred men found itself afloat, with eighty horses and a number of cannon, no one seemed to realize what had happened; except Drouot, who pleaded against Napoleon's rashness, all were enthusiastic. To avoid suspicion, each captain steered his own course, and the various craft dotting the sea at irregular intervals looked no way unlike the other boats which plied those waters. Several men-of-war were sighted, but they kept their course. As one danger after another was averted, the great adventurer's spirits rose until he was exuberant with joy, and talked of Austerlitz. It was March first when land was finally sighted from the Inconstant; as if by magic, the other vessels hove in sight immediately, and by four the men were all ashore on the strand of the Gulf of Jouan. Cambronne, a colonel of the imperial guards, was sent to requisition horses at Cannes, with the strict injunction that not a drop of blood be shed. As the great actor had theatrically said on board his brig, he was "about to produce a great novelty," and he counted upon dazzling the beholders into an enthusiasm they had ceased to feel for the old plays. Among others brought to Napoleon's bivouac that night was the Prince of Monaco, who had been found by Cambronne at St. Pierre traveling in a four-horse carriage, and had been taken as a prisoner into Napoleon's presence. "Where are you going?" was, according to tradition, the greeting of Napoleon. "I am returning to my domains," came the reply. "Indeed! and I too," was the merry retort.
Recalling the mortal agony he had endured on the highway through Aix but a short year before, and its causes, and having been informed how bitter was the anti-royalist feeling in the Dauphiné, Napoleon set his little army in march direct toward Grenoble. At Cannes there was general indifference; at Grasse it was found that the division general in command had fled, and there were a few timid shouts of "Long live the Emperor!" Thence to Digne on the Grenoble highway was a mountain track over a ridge twelve thousand feet above the sea. In twenty hours the slender column marched thirty-five miles. The "growlers" joked about the "little corporal" who trudged at their side, the Alpine hamlets provided abundant rations, and the government officials furnished blank passports which enabled Napoleon to send emissaries both to Grenoble and to Marseilles, where Masséna was in command. The little garrison of Digne was Bonapartist in feeling, but it was not yet ready to join Napoleon, and withdrew; that at Sisteron was kept from meddling by a body of troops which had been despatched as a corps of observation from Marseilles, while the populace shouted heartily for the Emperor. At Gap the officials strove to organize resistance, but they desisted before the menaces of the people. By this time the peasantry were coming in by hundreds. So far Napoleon's enterprise had received but four recruits: two soldiers from Antibes, a tanner from Grasse, and a gendarme. Now he was so confident that he dismissed the peasantry, assuring them that the soldiers in front would join his standards.