further his ends. were admirable, by they gave proof of. down the landmarks

The first steps of Bonaparte (when First Consul) reason of the forethought, the sagacity, and the skill He began with what was indispensable, and laid that indicated the road, and made it safe.'

We must pass over Pasquier's rapid sketch of Marengo, of the events that led to Lunéville and Amiens, and of the settlement of France by the First Consul. It was the bright prime of the rule of Napoleon; history mournfully exclaims, O si sic omnia,' as she looks from 1800-1 to 1810-15. Of all the noble reforms of the Consular era, Pasquier thought the Concordat the most beneficent:

'I was present at the ceremony when the Concordat was proclaimed at Notre-Dame. Bonaparte never, to my mind, was greater than on that day. It was the most brilliant victory that could be won from the Genius of the Revolution, and all those which succeeded it were, without a single exception, the consequences of this one. The delight of the immense majority of Frenchmen imposed silence on the discontented, even on the boldest of them. A multitude of people, who, before the success of the experiment, feared to disclose their real feelings, concealed them no longer; and it became evident that Bonaparte had read the hearts of men better than all those around him.'

There was much opposition to the Concordat, especially in the case of the theorists of 1789; but it is not generally known that the ill will it provoked in the army was so intense that a military plot was formed against the First Consul's life. Pasquier asserts that Moreau, and even Lecourbe, were, at least, consenting to this design; and the conspiracy of the old army of the Sambre and Meuse, of which Marbot has left an account, was possibly a ramification of the same evil root. Napoleon's hold on power was still insecure; and, in fact, he narrowly escaped death at the hands of Cadoudal's band through the infernal machine. The instability, however, of the Consular throne, and even of the double peace of 1801-2, was not perceived by the keenest observers amidst the blaze of the military glory of France, and of her astonishing rise out of weakness and anarchy. The external aspect of the country presented a contrast in 1799 and 1803 of the most wonderful kind ::--

'It is impossible for those who were not eye-witnesses, before and after the 18th Brumaire, to conceive what devastation the Revolution wrought. To all the incidents of ruin which were due to acts of violence should be added those caused by sheer neglect during a period of nearly ten years. For instance, two or three of the great roads only were passable. There was, perhaps, not one which did not present points dangerous to travellers. As for intermediate communications, the greatest number of these were completely broken up. Navigation

had become impossible in rivers and canals. In every province the edifices dedicated to the public service, and the monuments which constitute the splendour of the State, were falling into ruin. It must be acknowledged that, if the work of destruction had been prodigiously rapid, that of restoration was not less so. Everything was undertaken at the same time, and was quickly executed. Not only was all that was needed for the requirements of the public restored throughout France, noble and most useful erections were designed, and, in many instances, were completed. This was unquestionably one of the most brilliant sides of the Consular and Imperial régime.'

Like most Frenchmen, Pasquier is unjust to England in his comments on the rupture of the Peace of Amiens. His ignorance of the real state of foreign affairs, and especially of the spirit and power of this country, is conspicuous, also, in his absurd boast that the landing of 40,000 Frenchmen on the shores of Kent or Sussex would have subdued this island. Napoleon himself thought quite otherwise. He never believed that even his whole army, 160,000 strong, would have brought England under the yoke of conquest; be reckoned on the sudden fall of a Tory Government, and the establishment of a Democratic Republic in its stead, to be directed at the bidding of France, like her Cisalpine and Batavian satellites-chimeras, indeed, but not the less significant. Pasquier, too, ought not to have repeated the falsehood, refuted by ample proof at the time, that British statesmen connived at attempts against Napoleon's life; they had emissaries to stir up discontent in France, as he had emissaries to provoke a rising in Ireland, but the taint of blood never stained their hands. The following should not have been published:

'It was, doubtless, the prospect of this immense danger which caused the British Ministry to give assistance, by all means in its power, to the attacks directed against the person of its formidable adversary. England thought herself justified in dealing with Bonaparte in a way she would have blushed to pursue in the case of the sovereign of Prussia or of Austria. She placed him, so to speak, out of the pale of right and law. It was a dangerous example to set to a man possessing enormous power, and known not to be scrupulous.'

The restoration of order in France, and the marked favour shown by the First Consul to the men of the old régime, and even to émigrés, had caused the remains of the noblesse to feel strong sympathy with the head of the State. Pasquier had settled in Paris, and saw with delight how the life of the Faubourg was renewed, and began its round of pleasure again; and, with others of his order, he looked

forward to office under the Consular Government. These aspirations were rudely dashed by the terrible fate of the Duc d'Enghien, which recalled for a time the evil days of the Terror, and caused widespread indignation and alarm. We commented at length,* some years ago, on the incidents of the tragedy of Vincennes, and in glancing at the subject shall now confine ourselves to Pasquier's narrative and the conclusions he formed. He examined the whole case with no ordinary care, and fully confirms, we regret to say, M. Welschinger's charges against Talleyrand-charges, we must add, which Talleyrand's Memoirs, in our judgement, do not in the least confute. From first to last Talleyrand, who in these years feared and hated the Bourbons, we cannot forget, urged Napoleon to perpetrate the deed of blood, Lebrun and Cambacérès faintly resisting:

Talleyrand's advice was to employ extreme measures against the Prince. M. Lebrun, the Third Consul, thought it enough to remark that the event would cause a terrible noise in the world. M. de Cambacérès entreated that nothing more should be done than to keep the Duc as a hostage for the safety of the First Consul.'

Talleyrand, too, there is much reason to believe, precipitated the mock trial and the execution at night-one of the foulest of judicial murders :

:

'The Duc de Rovigo asserted that M. de Talleyrand, who had caused the arrest and the accusation of the Prince more than anyone else, was eager, above all things, for his condemnation and execution. He feared, up to the last moment, that the First Consul would relent, and was apprehensive of the influence of advice opposed to his own, and backed by the entreaties of Joséphine; so, persisting in his intention to make Bonaparte and the Bourbons irreconcileable, he not only persuaded him to permit of no delay in the sentence and its execution, but extorted from him the orders sent to Murat.'

Talleyrand knew beforehand of the doom of the victim :

'On the day of the arrest there was a ball at the Hôtel de Luynes. M. de Talleyrand was a guest. Someone asked him in a low tone of voice, "What will we do with the Duc d'Enghien?" He replied, "He will be shot."'

Nor did Talleyrand feel compunction for the crime :—

'When he saw the indignation to be read in the eyes of M. d'Hauterive, "What is the matter?" he said; "your eyes are staring out of your head." "What is the matter?" retorted M. d'Hauterive; "it should be the same with you if you have read the 'Moniteur.' What a frightful thing!" "Well, well," answered M. de Talleyrand, "are you crazy?

Why should all this fuss be made? A conspirator is seized on the verge of the frontier, he is brought to Paris, and is shot-is that extraordinary? "'

Réal, who arrived at Vincennes after the death of the Duc, charged, it is alleged, by the First Consul expressly to interrogate the prisoner and to make a report, asserted that Talleyrand took care that the lips of the victim should be sealed, being afraid of ugly revelations against himself. This story, if correct, is full of significance:

'M. Réal, always ready to find a conspiracy in everything, was disposed seriously to believe that great efforts were made to prevent aim entering into an inquiry from which he might have obtained information prejudicial to many, and even to powerful, people; and since he cordially detested M. de Talleyrand, being an old friend and creature of Fouché, he was inclined to suspect that M. de Talleyrand had done some treasonable act, that he had been in communication with the conspirators, and that all this might have come out had the Prince been examined. According to M. Réal, it was likely enough that, to avert this danger, M. de Talleyrand contributed by his counsels, and some underhand manoeuvring, to accelerate the catastrophe.'

On the whole, little doubt can exist that Talleyrand was a chief instigator of the crime from beginning to end; and Napoleon repeatedly and publicly threw the blame on him. It may be, however, that in this matter he played a double part, as Fouché often did; and that he secretly tried to save the Duc, while he egged on his master to shed innocent blood. Pasquier gives us the following for what it may be worth; but it really may be the unexplained reason why not only Louis XVIII. and the Comte d'Artois, but even D'Enghien's parents, called Talleyrand a friend :

"If we are to believe M. d'Hauterive, M. de Talleyrand gave the Duc de Bourbon evidence, satisfactory to the Duc, which clearly showed that, as soon as the arrest of the Duc d'Enghien had been decided, he sent a courier to Madame de Rohan to inform her of the fact, and to supply her with the means of saving the Prince. The courier was delayed by an accident, or by illness, at Strasburg, and arrived too late. This having been shown, the Duc de Bourbon, according to M. d'Hauterive, restored M. de Talleyrand to his good graces.'

As for the share of the First Consul in this deed of wickedness, his correspondence and his will leave no doubt on the subject. He had resolved to mark down and destroy a Bourbon, in order to terrify the whole family; and he did not hesitate to seize the Duc in a neutral country, to arrest him upon an obsolete charge, and to do him to death without scruple or pity. Undoubtedly the fear of assassination

VOL. CLXXIX. NO. CCCLXVII.

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was on him, a fear that has shattered nerves of iron :-"I 'have it from M. Cambacérès that M. Regnier had, on several 'occasions, made the First Consul thoroughly alarmed.'

This plea, however, is of little avail; Napoleon had time to examine the facts, and to read the evidence against the Duc, evidence inconsistent with murderous guilt, and he arranged the charge, the trial, and the sentence himself, and sent his victim to his doom for reasons of State, as he deliberately asserted in his last moments. It is probable that he despatched Réal to Vincennes, with directions to obtain a confession from the Duc, or information that might serve his purpose; but assuredly he would not have spared Réal, or listened to the excuse that his agent was too late, had he intended to pardon his ill-fated prisoner. Pasquier was told the following by M. Rémusat; if the tale be true, it proves that Napoleon had made up his mind hours before the trial, and for ourselves we are convinced of this :

'He shut himself up in his closet during the greater part of the day before the execution, and forbade everyone to enter it. His wife, however, made her way in, and-I have it from M. Rémusat, who on that occasion was on duty as chamberlain, and by whose means she almost forced the door open-that an angry scene took place between her husband and herself. The only answer he made to her supplication was "Go away, you are a child; you do not understand what affairs of State impose on one." Nay, more, on awaking at five in the morning, he said to Madame Bonaparte at his side, "By this time the Duc d'Enghien will have ceased to live." She cried aloud, shed tears, and was only told, "Try to go to sleep; you are a mere baby."

The policy of Napoleon for the moment triumphed; plots like those of Cadoudal were no more heard of; and, though more than one foreign Court made a protest, the death of the Duc d'Enghien led to the Empire. The restoration of monarchic government in France made, Pasquier tells us, a profound impression on the immense majority of the French people; it seemed to reconcile the Revolution with the past, and to secure the interests created in the new era on the basis of time-honoured traditions; and it was welcomed even in old Europe. The noble classes turned to Napoleon again, and when Austerlitz seemed to have set a seal to the supremacy of France, under an all-powerful sovereign, they thronged his Court and entered his service. Through the influence of Cambacérès, Pasquier obtained the office of Maitre des Requêtes in the Council of State, an office somewhat resembling a Master in Chancery, but in a political not