Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Volume V

Napoleon placed his court also upon an ambitious scale, having more reference to what he had so long been, than to what he actually now had been reduced to, while, at the same time, the furniture and internal accommodations of the imperial palace were meaner by far than those of an English gentleman of ordinary rank. The proclamation of the French governor on resigning his authority to Napoleon, was well and becomingly expressed; but the spiritual mandate of the Vicar-general Arrighi, a relation of Buonaparte's, which was designed to congratulate the people of Elba on becoming the subjects of the Great Napoleon, was extremely ludicrous. "Elevated to the sublime honour of receiving the anointed of the Lord," he described the exhaustless wealth which was to flow in upon the people, from the strangers who came to look upon the hero. The exhortation sounded as if the isle had become the residence of some nondescript animal, which was to be shown for money.

The interior of Napoleon's household, though reduced to thirty-five persons, still held the titles, and affected the rank, proper to an imperial court, of which it will be presently seen the petty sovereign made a political use. He displayed a national flag, having a red bend dexter in a white field, the bend bearing three bees. To dignify his capital, having discovered that the ancient name of Porto Ferrajo, was Comopoli (i. e. the city of Como,) he commanded it to be called Cosmopoli, or the city of all nations.

His body-guard, of about 700 infantry, and 80 cavalry, seemed to occupy as much of Napoleon's attention as the grand army did formerly. They were constantly exercised, especially in throwing shot and shells; and, in a short time, he was observed to be anxious about obtaining recruits for them. This was no difficult matter, where all the world had so lately been in arms, and engaged in a profession which many, doubtless, for whom a peaceful life had few charms, laid aside with regret, and longed to resume.

As early as the month of July 1814, there was a considerable degree of fermentation in Italy, to which the neighbourhood of Elba, the residence of several members of the Buonaparte family, and the sovereignty of Murat, occasioned a general resort of Buonaparte's friends and admirers. Every day this agitation increased, and various arts were resorted to for disseminating a prospect of Napoleon's future return to power. Sundry parties of recruits came over to Elba from Italy to enlist in his guards, and two persons employed in this service were arrested at Leghorn, in whose possession were found written lists, containing the names of several hundred persons willing to serve Napoleon. The species of ferment and discontent thus produced in Italy, was much increased by the impolitic conduct of Prince Rospigliosi, the civil governor of Tuscany, who re-established in their full force every form and regulation formerly practised under the Dukes of Tuscany, broke up the establishment of the museum, which had been instituted by Buonaparte's sister, and, while he returned to all the absurdities of the old government, relaxed none of the imposts which the French had laid on.

Napoleon's conduct towards the refugees who found their way to Elba, may be judged from the following sketch. On the 11th of July, Colomboni, commandant of a battalion of the 4th regiment of the line in Italy, was presented to the Emperor as newly arrived. "Well, Colomboni, your business in Elba?" – "First, to pay my duty to your Majesty; secondly, to offer myself to carry a musket among your guards." – "That is too low a situation, you must have something better," said Napoleon; and instantly named him to an appointment of 1200 francs yearly, though it appears the Emperor himself was then in great distress for money.

About the middle of summer, Napoleon was visited by his mother, and his sister the Princess Pauline.69 At this time, too, he seems to have expected to be rejoined by his wife Maria Louisa, who, it was said, was coming to take possession of her Italian dominions. Their separation, with the incidents which happened before Paris, was the only subject on which he appeared to lose temper. Upon these topics he used strong and violent language. He said, that interdicting him intercourse with his wife and son, excited universal reprobation at Vienna – that no such instance of inhumanity and injustice could be pointed out in modern times – that the Empress was detained a prisoner, an orderly officer constantly attending upon her – finally, that she had been given to understand before she left Orleans, that she was to obtain permission to join him at the island of Elba, though it was now denied her. It was possible, he proceeded, to see a shade of policy, though none whatever of justice, in this separation. Austria had meant to unite the child of her sovereign with the Emperor of France, but was desirous of breaking off the connexion with the Emperor of Elba, as it might be apprehended that the respect due to the daughter of the House of Hapsburg would, had she resided with her husband, have reflected too much lustre on the abdicated sovereign.

The Austrian commissioner, General Kohler, on the other hand, insisted that the separation took place by the Empress Maria Louisa's consent, and even at her request; and hinted, that Napoleon's desire to have her society was dictated by other feelings than those of domestic affection. But allowing that Napoleon's views in so earnestly desiring the company of his wife might be political, we can see neither justice nor reason in refusing a request, which would have been granted to a felon condemned to transportation.

We have not thought it necessary to disturb the narrative of important events by noticing details which belong rather to romance; but as we are now treating of Napoleon in his more private character, a mysterious circumstance may be mentioned. About the end of August 1814, a lady arrived at the Isle of Elba, from Leghorn, with a boy about five or six years old. She was received by Napoleon with great attention, but at the same time with an air of much secrecy, and was lodged in a small and very retired villa, in the most remote corner of the island; from whence, after remaining two days, she re-embarked for Naples. The Elbese naturally concluded that this must have been the Empress Maria Louisa and her son. But the individual was known by those near Napoleon's person to be a Polish lady from Warsaw, and the boy was the offspring of an intrigue betwixt her and Napoleon several years before.70 The cause of her speedy departure might be delicacy towards Maria Louisa, and the fear of affording the Court of Vienna a pretext for continuing the separation, of which Napoleon complained. In fact, the Austrians, in defence of their own conduct, imputed irregularities to that of Buonaparte; but the truth of these charges would be no edifying subject of investigation.

About the middle of May, Baron Kohler took farewell of Napoleon, to return to Vienna. He was an Austrian general of rank and reputation; a particular friend and old schoolfellow of Prince Schwartzenberg. The scene of Napoleon's parting with this gentleman was quite pathetic on the Emperor's side. He wept as he embraced General Kohler, and entreated him to procure, if possible, his re-union with his wife and child – calling him the preserver of his life – regretted his poverty, which prevented his bestowing on him some valuable token of remembrance – finally, folding the Austrian general in his arms, he held him there for some time, repeating expressions of the warmest attachment. This sensibility existed all upon one side; for an English gentleman who witnessed the scene, having asked Kohler afterwards what he was thinking of while locked in the Emperor's embraces – "of Judas Iscariot," answered the Austrian.

After the departure of Baron Kohler, Colonel Sir Niel Campbell was the only one of the four commissioners who continued to remain at Elba by orders of the British Cabinet. It was difficult to say what his office really was, or what were his instructions. He had neither power, title, nor means, to interfere with Napoleon's motions. The Emperor had been recognised by a treaty – wise or foolish, it was too late to ask – as an independent sovereign. It was therefore only as an envoy that Sir Niel Campbell could be permitted to reside at his court; and as an envoy also, not of the usual character, for settling affairs concerning the court from which he was despatched, but in a capacity not generally avowed – the office, namely, of observing the conduct of that at which he was sent to reside. In fact, Sir Niel Campbell had no direct or ostensible situation whatever, and of this the French minister of Elba soon took advantage. Drouet, the governor of Porto Ferrajo, made such particular inquiries into the character assumed by the British envoy, and the length of his stay, as obliged the latter to say that his orders were to remain in Elba till the breaking up of the Congress, which was now settling the affairs of Europe; but if his orders should direct him to continue there after that period, he would apply to have his situation placed on some recognised public footing, which he did not doubt would be respectable.

Napoleon did not oppose or murmur at the continued, though equivocal residence of Sir Niel Campbell at Elba; he affected, on the contrary, to be pleased with it. For a considerable time, he even seemed to seek the society of the British envoy, held frequent intercourse with him, and conversed with apparent confidence upon public affairs. The notes of such conversations are now before us; and though it is, on the one hand, evident that Napoleon's expressions were arranged, generally speaking, on a premeditated plan, yet, on the other, it is equally certain, that his ardent temperament, when once engaged in discourse, led him to discover more of his own private thoughts than he would, on cool reflection, have suffered to escape him.

On the 16th September 1814, for example, Sir Niel Campbell had an audience of three hours, during which, Napoleon, with his habitual impatience of a sedentary posture, walked from one end of the room to the other, and talked incessantly. He was happy, he said, that Sir Niel remained in Elba, pour rompre la chimère, (to destroy, namely, the idea, that he, Buonaparte, had further intention of disturbing the peace of Europe.) "I think," he continued, "of nothing beyond the verge of my little isles. I could have supported the war for twenty years, if I had chosen. I am now a deceased person, occupied with nothing but my family, my retreat, my house, my cows, and my poultry." He then spoke in the highest terms of the English character, protesting it had always had his sincere admiration, notwithstanding the abuse directed against it in his name. He requested the British envoy to lose no time in procuring him an English grammar. It is a pity Mr. Hinton, the boatswain, was not present, to have accompanied this eulogy with his favourite ejaculation.

In the rest of the conversation, the Elbese Emperor was probably more serious. He inquired with eagerness after the real state of France. Sir Niel Campbell informed him, that all the information he had been able to collect, ascribed great wisdom and moderation to the sovereign and government; but allowed that those who had lost good appointments, the prisoners of war who had returned from abroad, and great part of the army who remained embodied, were still attached to Napoleon. In answer, Buonaparte seemed to admit the stability of the throne, supported as it was by the maréchals and great officers; but he derided the idea of affording France the benefit of a free constitution. He said, the attempt to imitate that of Great Britain was a farce, a caricature. It was impossible, he observed, to imitate the two Houses of Parliament, for that respectable families like those composing the aristocracy of England, did not now exist in France. He talked with bitterness of the cession of Belgium, and of France being deprived of Antwerp. He himself spoke, he observed, as a spectator, without hopes or interest, for he had none; but thus to have mortified the French, showed an ignorance of the national character. Their chief feeling was for pride and glory, and the allies need not look forward to a state of satisfaction and tranquillity under such circumstances as France was now placed in. "The French," he said, "were conquered only by a great superiority of number, therefore were not humiliated; and the population had not suffered to the extent alleged, for he had always spared their lives, and exposed those of Italians, Germans, and other foreigners." He remarked that the gratitude of Louis XVIII. to Great Britain was offensive to France, and that he was called in derision the King of England's Viceroy.

In the latter months of 1814, Sir Niel Campbell began to become sensible that Napoleon desired to exclude him from his presence as much as he possibly could, without positive rudeness. He rather suddenly intrenched himself within all the forms of an imperial court; and without affording the British envoy any absolute cause of complaint, or even any title to require explanation, he contrived, in a great measure, to debar him from opportunities of conversation. His only opportunity of obtaining access to Napoleon, was on his return from short absences to Leghorn and Florence, when his attendance on the levee was matter of etiquette.

On such occasions, the tenor of Napoleon's prophecies was minatory of the peace of Europe. He spoke perpetually of the humiliation inflicted upon France, by taking from her Belgium and his favourite object Antwerp. On the 30th of October, while enlarging on these topics, he described the irritable feelings of the nation, saying, every man in France considered the Rhine to be their natural boundary, and nothing could alter this opinion. There was no want, he said, of a population in France, martial beyond any other nation, by natural disposition, by the consequences of the Revolution, and by the idea of glory. Louis XIV., according to his account, notwithstanding all the misfortunes he had brought upon the nation, was still beloved on account of the eclat of his victories, and the magnificence of his court. The battle of Rosbach had brought about the Revolution. Louis XVIII. totally mistook the character of the French in supposing, that either by argument or by reasoning, or indulging them with a free constitution, he could induce them to sink into a state of peaceful industry. He insisted that the Duke of Wellington's presence at Paris was an insult on the French nation; that very strong discord prevailed in the country, and that the king had but few friends, either in the army or among the people. Perhaps the King might try to get rid of a part of the army by sending them to St. Domingo, but that, he observed, would be soon seen through; he himself had made a melancholy trial, with the loss of 30,000 men, which had proved the inutility of such expeditions.

He then checked himself, and endeavoured to show that he had no personal feeling or expectation from the revolutions he foretold. "I am a deceased man," he said; "I was born a soldier; I have mounted a throne; I have descended from it; I am prepared for any fate. They may transport me to a distant shore, or they may put me to death here; I will spread my bosom open to the poniard. When merely General Buonaparte, I had property of my own acquiring – I am now deprived of all."

On another occasion he described the ferment in France, which he said he had learned from the correspondence of his guards with their native country, and so far forgot the character of a defunct person, as to say plainly, that the present disaffection would break out with all the fury of the former revolution, and require his own resurrection. "For then," he added, "the sovereigns of Europe will soon find it necessary, for their own repose, to call on ME to tranquillize matters."

This species of conversation was perhaps the best which could have been adopted, to conceal his secret purpose from the British commissioner. Sir Niel Campbell, though not without entertaining suspicions, judged it, upon the whole unlikely that he meditated any thing eccentric, unless a tempting opening should present itself on the part of France or Italy.

Napoleon held the same species of language to others as well as the British resident. He was affable, and even cordial (in appearance,) to the numerous strangers whom curiosity led to visit him; spoke of his retirement as Dioclesian might have done in the gardens of Salonica; seemed to consider his political career as ended, and to be now chiefly anxious to explain such passages of his life as met the harsh construction of the world. In giving free and easy answers to those who conversed with him, and especially to Englishmen of rank, Buonaparte found a ready means of communicating to the public such explanations concerning his past life, as were best calculated to serve his wishes. In these he palliated, instead of denying, the scheme of poisoning his prisoners in Syria, the massacre at Jaffa, the murder of the Duke d'Enghien, and other enormities. An emperor, a conqueror, retired from war, and sequestered from power, must be favourably listened to by those who have the romantic pleasure of hearing him plead his own cause. Milder editions of his measures began to be circulated in Europe, and, in the curiosity to see and admire the captive sovereign, men forgot the ravages which he had committed while at liberty.

As the winter approached, a change was discernible in Napoleon's manners and habits. The alterations which he had planned in the island no longer gave him the same interest; he renounced, from time to time, the severe exercise in which he had at first indulged, used a carriage rather than his horse, and sunk occasionally into fits of deep contemplation, mingled with gloomy anxiety.

PECUNIARY DIFFICULTIES

He became also subjected to uneasiness, to which he had hitherto been a stranger, being that arising from pecuniary inconveniences. He had plunged into expenses with imprudent eagerness, and without weighing the amount of his resources against the cost of the proposed alterations. The ready money which he brought from France seems to have been soon exhausted, and to raise supplies, he commanded the inhabitants of his island to pay up, in the month of June, the contributions of the last year. This produced petitions, personal solicitations, and discontent. It was represented to him, that so poor were the inhabitants of the island, in consequence of want of sale for their wine for months past, that they would be driven to the most extreme straits if the requisition should be persisted in. In some of the villages, the tax-gatherers of the Emperor were resisted and insulted. Napoleon, on his side, sent part of his troops to quarter upon the insurgent peasantry, and to be supported by them at free cost, till the contributions should be paid up.

Thus, we recognise, in the government of this miniature state, the same wisdom, and the same errors, by which Buonaparte won and lost the empire of the world. The plans of improvements and internal ameliorations which he formed, were probably very good in themselves, but he proceeded to the execution of that which he had resolved with too much and too reckless precipitation; too much of a determination to work his own pleasure, and too little concern for the feelings of others.

The compositions proving a weak resource, as they were scarce to be extracted from the miserable islanders, Napoleon had recourse to others, which must have been peculiarly galling to a man of his haughty spirit. But as his revenue, so far as tangible, did not exceed 300,000 francs, and his expenditure amounted to at least a million, he was compelled to lower the allowances of most of his retinue; to reduce the wages of the miners to one-fourth; to raise money by the sale of the provisions laid up for the garrisons; nay, even by selling a train of brass artillery to the Duke of Tuscany. He disposed also of some property – a large house which had been used as a barrack, and he went the length of meditating the sale of the Town-house at Porto Ferrajo.

We have said, that Napoleon's impatience to execute whatever plans occurred to his fertile imagination, was the original cause of these pecuniary distresses. But they are not less to be imputed to the unfair and unworthy conduct of the French ministry. The French administration were, of all others, most intimately bound in conscience, honour, and policy, to see the treaty of Fontainbleau, as forming the footstool by which Louis XVIII. mounted his restored throne, distinctly observed towards Napoleon. The sixth article of that treaty provides an annuity, or revenue of two millions five hundred thousand francs, to be registered on the Great Book of France, and paid without abatement or deduction to Napoleon Buonaparte. This annual provision was stipulated by the maréchals, Macdonald and Ney, as the price of Napoleon's resignation, and the French ministers could not refuse a declaration of payment without gross injustice to Buonaparte, and at the same time a severe insult to the allied powers. Nevertheless, so far from this pension being paid with regularity, we have seen no evidence that Napoleon ever received a single remittance to account of it. The British resident observing how much the Ex-Emperor was harassed by pecuniary straits, gave it, not once but repeatedly, as his opinion, "that if these difficulties pressed upon him much longer, so as to prevent him from continuing the external show of a court, he was perfectly capable of crossing over to Piombino with his troops, or committing any other extravagance." This was Sir Niel Campbell's opinion on 31st October, 1814, and Lord Castlereagh made strong remonstrances on the subject, although Great Britain was the only power among the allies, who, being no principal party to the treaty of Fontainbleau, might safely have left it to those states who were. The French were not ashamed to defend their conduct on the technical objection, that the pension was not due until the year was elapsed; a defence which we must consider as evasive, since such a pension is of an alimentary nature, the termly payments of which ought to be made in advance. The subject was mentioned again and again by Sir Niel Campbell, but it does not appear that the French administration desisted from a course, which, whether arising from a spirit of mean revenge, or from avarice, or from being themselves embarrassed, was at once dishonourable and impolitic.

Other apprehensions agitated Buonaparte's mind. He feared the Algerine pirates, and requested the interference of England in his behalf. He believed, or affected to believe, that Brulart, the governor of Corsica, who had been a captain of Chouans, the friend of Georges, Pichegru, &c., was sent thither by Louis XVIII.th's administration for the purpose of having him assassinated, and that fitting agents were despatched from Corsica to Elba for that purpose.71 Above all, he pretended to be informed of a design to dispense with the treaty of Fontainbleau, and to remove him from his place of refuge, to be imprisoned at St. Helena, or St. Lucie. It is not impossible that these fears were not altogether feigned; for though there is not an iota of evidence tending to show that there was reason for believing the allies entertained such an unworthy thought, yet the report was spread very generally through France, Italy, and the Mediterranean, and was encouraged, doubtless, by those who desired once more to place Buonaparte in action.72 He certainly expressed great anxiety on the subject, sometimes declaring he would defend his batteries to the last; sometimes affecting to believe that he was to be sent to reside in England, a prospect which he pretended not to dislike personally, while he held out sufficient reasons to prevent the course from being adopted. "He concluded," he said, "he should have personal liberty, and the means of removing prejudices entertained against his character, which had not yet been fully cleared up;" but ended with the insinuation, that, by residing in England he would have easier communication with France, where there were four of his party to every single Bourbonist. And when he had exhausted these topics, he returned to the complaints of the hardship and cruelty of depriving him of the society of his wife and child.

While Buonaparte, chafed by poverty, and these other subjects of complaint, tormented too by the restlessness of a mind impatient of restraint, gave vent to expressions which excited suspicion, and ought to have recommended precaution, his court began to assume a very singular appearance, quite the opposite of that usually exhibited in the courts of petty sovereigns upon the continent. In the latter there is an air of antiquated gravity, which pervades the whole establishment, and endeavours to supply the want of splendour, and of real power. The heavy apparatus designed for the government of an independent state, is applied to the management of a fortune not equal to that of many private gentlemen; the whole course of business goes slowly and cumbrously on, and so that appearances are maintained in the old style of formal grandeur, the sovereign and his counsellors dream neither of expeditions, conquest, nor any other political object.