Читать книгу The Life, Exile and Conversations with Napoleon - Emmanuel-Auguste-Dieudonné Las Cases - Страница 55

THE FAUXBOURG SAINT-GERMAIN, &C.—THE EMPEROR’S FREEDOM FROM PREJUDICE AND ILL-WILL.—CHARACTERISTIC LANGUAGE.

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16th.—To-day the Emperor put some questions to me relative to the Fauxbourg Saint-Germain; that last bulwark of the old aristocracy, that refuge of old-fashioned prejudices; the Germanic League, as he called it. I told him that, before his last misfortune, his power had extended into every part of it: it had been invaded, and its name alone remained; it had been shaken and vanquished by glory; and the victories of Austerlitz and Jena, and the triumph of Tilsit, had achieved its conquest. The younger portion of the inhabitants, and all who had generous hearts, could not be insensible to the glory of their country. The Emperor’s marriage with Maria-Louisa gave it the last blow. The few malcontents who remained were either those whose ambition had not been gratified, and who are to be found in all classes, or some obstinate old men, and silly old women, bewailing their past influence. All reasonable and sensible persons had yielded to the superior talents of the Head of the State, and endeavoured to console themselves for their losses in the hope of a better prospect for their children. This became the point towards which all their ideas were directed. They gave the Emperor credit for his partiality to old family names; they agreed that any one else in his place would have annihilated them. They prized very highly the confidence with which the Emperor had collected individuals of ancient family about his person; and they valued him no less for the language he had made use of in making choice of their children to serve in the army:—“These names belong to France and to History; I am the guardian of their glory, I will not allow them to perish.” These and other such expressions had gained him numbers of proselytes. The Emperor here expressed his apprehension that sufficient favour had not been shewn to this party. “My system of amalgamation,” said he, “required it: I wished and even directed favours to be conferred on them: but the ministers, who were the great mediators, never properly fulfilled my real intentions in that respect; either because they had not sufficient foresight, or because they feared that they might thus create rivals for favour, and diminish their own chances. M. Talleyrand, in particular, always shewed great opposition to such a measure, and always resisted my favourable intuitions towards the old nobility.” I observed, however, that the greater part of those whom he had placed near him had soon shewn themselves attached to his person; that they had served him conscientiously, and had, generally speaking, remained faithful to him at the critical moment. The Emperor did not deny it, and even went so far as to say that the twofold event of the King’s return and his own abdication must naturally have had great influence on certain doctrines; and that, for his own part, he could see a great difference between the same conduct pursued in 1814 and in 1815.

And here I must observe that, since I have become acquainted with the Emperor’s character, I have never known him to evince, for a single moment, the least feeling of anger or animosity against those individuals who had been most to blame in their conduct towards him. He gives no great credit to those who distinguished themselves by their good conduct: they had only done their duty. He is not very indignant against those who acted basely; he partly saw through their characters: they yielded to the impulses of their nature. He speaks of them coolly, and without animosity; attributing their conduct in some measure to existing circumstances, which he acknowledged were of a very perplexing nature, and placing the rest to the account of human weakness. Vanity was the ruin of Marmont: “Posterity will justly cast a shade upon his character,” said he; “yet his heart will be more valued than the memory of his career. The conduct of Augereau was the result of his want of information, and the baseness of those who surrounded him; that of Berthier, of his want of spirit, and his absolute nullity of character.”

I remarked that the latter had let slip the best and easiest opportunity of rendering himself for ever illustrious, by frankly making his submission to the King, and intreating his Majesty’s permission to withdraw from the world, and mourn in solitude the fate of him who had honoured him with the title of his companion in arms, and had called him his friend. “Yes,” said the Emperor; “even this step, simple as it was, was beyond his power.”—“His talents, his understanding,” said I, “had always been a subject of doubt with us. Your Majesty’s choice, your confidence, your great attachment, surprised us exceedingly.”—“To say the truth,” replied the Emperor, “Berthier was not without talent, and I am far from wishing to disavow his merit, or my partiality for him; but his talent and merit were special and technical; beyond a limited point he had no mind whatever: and then he was so undecided.”—I observed that “he was, notwithstanding, full of pretensions and pride in his conduct towards us.”—“Do you think, then, that the title of Favourite goes for nothing?” said the Emperor. I added, that “he was very harsh and overbearing.” “And what,” said he, “my dear Las Cases, is more overbearing than weakness which feels itself protected by strength? Look at women, for example.”

Berthier accompanied the Emperor in his carriage during his campaigns. As they drove along, the Emperor would examine the order-book and the report of the positions, whence he formed his resolutions, adopted his plans, and arranged the necessary movements. Berthier noted down his directions, and at the first station they came to, or during the first moments allotted to rest, whether by night or by day, he made out, in his turn, all the orders and individual details with admirable regularity, precision, and despatch. This was a kind of duty at which he shewed himself always ready and indefatigable. “This was the special merit of Berthier,” said the Emperor: “it was most valuable to me; no other talent could have made up for the want of it.”

I now return to notice some characteristic traits of the Emperor. He invariably speaks with perfect coolness, without passion, without prejudice, and without resentment, of the events and the persons connected with his life. It is evident that he would be capable of becoming the ally of his most cruel enemy, and of living with the man who had done him the greatest wrong. He speaks of his past history as if it had occurred three centuries ago: in his recitals and his observations he speaks the language of past ages: he is like a spirit discoursing in the Elysian fields; his conversations are true Dialogues of the Dead. He speaks of himself as of a third person; noticing the Emperor’s actions, pointing out the faults with which history may reproach him, and analysing the reasons and the motives which might be alleged in his justification.

He never can excuse himself, he says, by throwing blame on others, since he never followed any but his own decision. He may complain, at the worst, of false information, but never of bad counsel. He had surrounded himself with the best possible advisers, but he had always adhered to his own opinion, and he was far from repenting of having done so. “It is,” said he, “the indecision and anarchy of agents which produce anarchy and feebleness in results. In order to form a just opinion respecting the faults produced by the sole personal decision of the Emperor, it will be necessary to throw into the scale the great actions which he would have been prevented from performing, and the other faults which he would have been induced to commit, by those very counsels which he is blamed for not having followed.”

In viewing the complicated circumstances of his fall, looks upon things so much in a mass, and from so high a point, that individuals escape his notice. He never evinces the least symptom of virulence towards those of whom it might be supposed he has the greatest reason to complain. His greatest mark of reprobation, and I have had frequent occasion to notice it, is to preserve silence with respect to them, whenever they are mentioned in his presence. But how often has he not been heard to restrain the violent and less reserved expressions of those about him? “You are not acquainted with men,” he has said to us; “they are difficult to comprehend, if one wishes to be strictly just. Can they understand or explain even their own characters? Almost all those who abandoned me would, had I continued to be prosperous, never, perhaps have dreamed of their own defection. There are vices and virtues which depend on circumstances. Our last trials were beyond all human strength! Besides I was forsaken rather than betrayed; there was more of weakness than of perfidy around me. It was the denial of St. Peter: tears and repentance are probably at hand. And where will you find, in the page of history, any one possessing a greater number of friends and partisans? Who was ever more popular and more beloved? Who was ever more ardently and deeply regretted? Here, from this very rock, on viewing the present disorders in France, who would not be tempted to say that I still reign there? The Kings and princes, my allies, have remained faithful to me to the last, they were carried away by the people in a mass: and those who were around me, found themselves enveloped and overwhelmed by an irresistible whirlwind.... No! human nature might have appeared in a light still more odious, and I might have had still greater cause of complaint!”

The Life, Exile and Conversations with Napoleon

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