THE EXPULSION FROM SPAIN.
1812-1813
Increasing Gloom.--Defeat of Marmont.--Retreat of Joseph.--Spanish
Exiles.--Return to Madrid.--Difference between the French and
English.--Withdrawal of the French Troops from Spain.--Outrages of
the English.--Wellington intrusted with the supreme Command.--Battle
of Vittoria.--Victory of the British.--Retreat of the French.--San
Sebastian.--Excesses of the British Troops.--Destruction of St.
Sebastian.--Joseph abandons Spain.--Napoleon's last Struggle.--Joseph's
Devotion to his Brother.--The Surrender of Paris.--Great Perplexities.
--The Empress decides to leave Paris.--Disappointment of Napoleon.
--Panic in Paris.--Grief of the Empress.--Departure of the Empress.--The
Allied Armies.--Joseph joins the Empress.--Retirement of Joseph.
Joseph was much embarrassed. Should he leave his scattered forces
in the south of Spain, there was danger that they would be attacked
and destroyed piecemeal by Wellington. Should he withdraw them, and
concentrate his forces in the north, the whole south of Spain would be
instantly overrun by the English, and Joseph would lose one-half of his
kingdom. His total force in Spain, garrisoning the forts and composing
his detached bands in the south, the centre, the north, and the west,
amounted to a little over two hundred and thirty thousand men.
In the early part of May of this year, 1812, the English, having taken
the defenses which were erected for the fortification of the Tagus,
became dominant in that region. Disaster followed disaster. The King's
couriers were captured, so that his orders did not reach the marshals.
It is hard to be amiable in seasons of adversity, and the marshals
reproached each other. Supplies and communications were cut off, and
women and children were dying of famine. The deadly warfare of guerrilla
bands increased rapidly. The most atrocious acts of vengeance and
atrocity were multiplied, and Joseph had no power to prevent them. As
Marmont was in danger of being cut off by Wellington, Joseph, leaving a
small garrison behind him, took all the troops that could be spared, and
marched rapidly to the relief of the marshal. Leaving the Escurial on
the 23d of July, he reached Peneranda on the 25th, where he learned that
Marmont had attacked Wellington on the 23d at Arapiles, and, after a
desperate conflict, had been repulsed. Marmont was severely censured for
not awaiting the arrival of Joseph, whom he knew to be at hand. He was
accused, perhaps without reason, of precipitating the conflict from fear
that Joseph might take the command and gain the renown. Marmont reported
his total loss in the battle to have been about six thousand men and
nine guns, which were left because their carriages were knocked to
pieces. Wellington reported his own loss at five thousand two hundred
and twenty.
Marmont retreated to Valladolid, to meet re-enforcements which would
join him there. Joseph returned to Madrid, entering the city on the 2d
of August. As the English approached, Joseph, with two thousand horse,
met their advance-guard, and, with the courage of despair, drove them
back in the wildest confusion. He then, at the head of but twelve
thousand troops, commenced his retreat toward Valence. Twenty thousand
Spaniards, men and women, dreading the vengeance of their enemies,
followed, in his retreat, the King whom they had much cause to love. It
was a mournful spectacle. Nobles of the highest rank, and the most
intelligent and opulent of the city, toiled along in their weary march,
the women and the children often unable to restrain their tears and
sobs. The partisans of the English, who crowded into the city, received
Wellington and his troops with every demonstration of joy. The friends
of the new regime who remained behind, crushed in all their hopes,
closed the shutters of their houses, retired to the remote apartments,
and buried their griefs in silence.
Into whatever city the English or the French entered, they were alike
received with unbounded enthusiasm. In every large city there is a
throng ready to shout hosanna to the conqueror, whoever he may be. When
Wellington and his squadrons entered a Spanish city, the friends of the
old regime gathered around them. And so it was with the French and their
friends when they were the victors. Thus at Valence, where Joseph
arrived on the 31st of August, he was received with all the honors which
could be conferred upon the most beloved sovereign. An immense crowd
thronged the streets, and lavished upon him every demonstration of
gratitude. The devout King, much moved by this exhibition of popular
affection in these dark hours of defeat and humiliation, repaired at
once to the cathedral, and in a solemn _Te Deum_ gave expression to his
gratitude to God.
Joseph's first care was for the unhappy fugitives who, dreading the
vengeance of the foe, had abandoned home and all, to accompany him in
his flight. He had neither money, food, nor shelter to give them. He
therefore sent this sorrow-stricken band, counting over twenty thousand,
under an escort across the Pyrenees into France, where they would be
protected and provided for.
At Valence Joseph concentrated his scattered forces, and early in
November commenced his march back to Madrid. It is very difficult to
ascertain the precise number of the forces on each side. Wellington's
army was estimated at ninety-two thousand men. Joseph had collected
superior numbers, and marched eagerly to attack him. Wellington rapidly
retreated toward Ciudad Rodrigo, and on the 3d of December Joseph
entered Madrid again in triumph.
Conciliation, kindness, deference to the wishes of others are not
characteristic virtues of the English. They had long assumed, and with
no little semblance of reason, that in wealth, power, arts, and arms
they were the leading nation upon the globe. This assumption has made
them unpopular as a people. They are so honest and plain-spoken that
they never attempt to disguise their contempt for other nations. The
victorious soldiers of Wellington particularly despised the Spaniards.
This contempt neither officers nor soldiers attempted to conceal.
It is just the reverse with the French. The characteristic politeness of
the nation leads them to compliment others, and to pay them especial
deference. They conceal the sense of superiority which they may perhaps
cherish. It is frequently said, as characteristic of the two nations,
that the stranger in London gets the impression that every Englishman he
meets has taken a special dislike to him personally; in Paris, on the
other hand, he receives the impression that every Frenchman with whom he
is brought into contact has a special fancy for him, perceiving in him
virtues and excellences which he never supposed that he possessed.
The Duke of Wellington himself was a haughty, overbearing man. No
soldier loved him, but all bowed submissive to his inflexible will. The
deportment of the British troops in the Spanish capital was such as to
alienate those who at first welcomed them, and they soon became
universally disliked. The Spaniards are proud, proverbially proud; and
they could not endure this contemptuous assumption of superiority. So
great became the dissatisfaction that many of the Spanish generals
proposed to unite their troops with those of King Joseph if he would
grant them independent commands.
Exultantly the English on the Peninsula heard the tidings of the
terrible disasters Napoleon was encountering in Russia. They could
scarcely exaggerate them. It was manifest that for a long time, at
least, Joseph could receive no assistance from France; on the contrary,
many regiments of infantry and cavalry, and a number of companies of
artillery, received orders immediately to leave Spain, and to hasten to
the aid of the Emperor. Joseph, thus hopelessly crippled, was directed
by the Emperor to concentrate his enfeebled forces upon the line of the
Douro. Leaving a garrison of ten thousand men in Madrid, Joseph, with
the remainder of his troops, retired toward the north.
In Wellington's retreat from Madrid, his troops committed all imaginable
outrages. In his dispatch to his officers commanding his divisions and
brigades, he said:
"From the moment the troops commenced their retreat from the
neighborhood of Madrid on the one hand, and Burgos on the other, the
officers lost all command over the men. Irregularities and outrages of
all descriptions were committed with impunity, and losses have been
sustained which ought never to have occurred. The discipline of every
army, after a long and active campaign, becomes in some degree relaxed;
but I am concerned to observe that the army under my command has fallen
off in this respect, in the late campaign, _to a greater degree than any
army with which I have ever been, or of which I have ever read_."[Y]
[Footnote Y: Wellington to Officers commanding Divisions and Brigades,
ix. 574, 575.]
Thus terminated the year 1812. The disappointment of the British
Government, in view of the discomfiture and retreat of Wellington, was
very great, and the indignation of that portion of the English people
who were opposed to this interminable warfare against the new regime in
France knew no bounds. That the English army had, through a long line of
disastrous retreat, according to the testimony of its commander,
inflicted outrages upon the Spanish people, its allies, _greater than
that commander had ever read of in history_, keenly wounded the national
pride.
As fresh tidings arose of the disasters which had befallen Napoleon in
the north, the British Government renewed their zeal to assail him from
the south. Large re-enforcements were sent out during the winter with
such abundant supplies as to enable Wellington to commence the spring
campaign with every assurance of success. The Cortes in Cadiz, with
ever-varying policy, much to the disgust of many of the Spanish
generals, invested the British duke with the supreme command. The
opposition, however, was so great that the duke's brother, Mr. Henry
Wellesley, who was then British ambassador at Cadiz, advised him not to
accept the office. But the energetic duke was confident that, by
combining the whole military strength of the Peninsula with the army and
fleet of England, he could drive the feeble remnants of the French from
the kingdom. He therefore undertook the command.
The Cortes was led to this decisive measure from the fact that there was
a strong and increasing party of their own number in favor of rallying
to the support of Joseph. Their only choice lay between Joseph or
Ferdinand, or the experiment of a democratic republic. Wellington's
visit to Cadiz, says Alison, "brought forcibly under his notice the
miserable state of the Government at that place, ruled by a furious
democratic faction, intimidated by an ungovernable press, and
alternately the prey of aristocratic intrigue and democratic fury. He
did not fail to report to the Government this deplorable state of
things."
In the beginning of May Wellington was prepared to take the field with
an allied army of two hundred thousand men. The navy of England actively
co-operated with this immense force, conveying supplies and protecting
the extreme flanks of the line, which stretched across the kingdom.
The storm of war burst forth again in all its fury. Manfully Joseph
contended to the last. In the vicinity of Valladolid he had concentrated
fifty thousand men, and hoped to be able there to give battle. But
Wellington came upon him with an army one hundred thousand strong, which
was reported to be one hundred and ninety thousand.
The French on the 14th of June retreated to Vittoria. The garrison in
Madrid and the civil authorities now abandoned the capital and took
refuge with the army. Here a short but terrible battle ensued. The
English had eighty thousand combatants on the field; the French,
according to their statement, had but half as many. Alison states their
force at sixty-five thousand. It was an awful battle. Both parties
fought desperately. The loss of the French was six thousand nine hundred
and sixty; that of the English five thousand one hundred and eighty.[Z]
The French army was impoverished after weary months of warfare, in a
land stricken by famine, and wasted by the sweep of armies and the
plundering of banditti. It was with very great difficulty that Joseph
could support his destitute troops. Yet Alison, in that strain of
exaggeration which sullies his often eloquent pages, writes:
[Footnote Z: King Joseph, writing to Clarke, under date of July 6, 1813,
says: "Our army at Vittoria was but thirty-five thousand. That fact can
not be contested. The enemy had certainly seventy thousand combatants. I
can not be deceived when I say that his force was double of ours."]
"Independent of private booty, no less than five millions and a half of
dollars in the military chest of the army were taken; and of private
wealth the amount was so prodigious that for miles together the
combatants may almost be said to have marched upon gold and silver,
without stooping to pick it up."
In the hour of victory Wellington seemed to have no control over his
soldiers, whom his pen describes as drunken and brutal. Reeling in
intoxication, they wandered at will. Wellington states that three weeks
after the battle above twelve thousand of his soldiers had abandoned
their colors. "I am convinced," he says in a dispatch to Lord Bathurst,
"that we have out of our ranks doubled our loss in the battle, and have
lost more men in the pursuit than the enemy have."
The retreat of the French was conducted with the firmness and admirable
discipline characteristic of French soldiers. As the troops slowly
and sullenly retired toward the French frontier, pressed by superior
numbers, they turned occasionally upon their pursuers, and the
advance-guard of the foe encountered several very bloody repulses.
We have not space to allude to these various conflicts, which only
checked for a moment the onrolling tide of the victorious allied army.
Wellington's troops took the town of San Sebastian by storm. This was a
beautiful Spanish city, through which the French retreated, and where
they made a short and desperate stand. We will leave it to Mr. Alison
to describe the conduct of Lord Wellington's troops.
"And now commenced," writes Alison, "a scene which has affixed as
lasting a stain on the character of the English and Portuguese troops,
as the heroic valor they displayed in the assault has given them
enduring and exalted fame. The long endurance of the assault had
wrought the soldiers up to perfect madness. The soldiers wreaked their
vengeance with fearful violence on the unhappy inhabitants. Some of the
houses adjoining the breaches had taken fire from the effects of the
explosion. The flames, fanned by an awful tempest which burst on the
town, soon spread with frightful rapidity. The wretched inhabitants,
driven from house to house as the conflagration devoured their
dwellings, were soon huddled together in one quarter, where they fell a
prey to the unbridled passions of the soldiery.
"Attempts were at first made by the British officers to extinguish
the flames, but they proved vain among the general confusion which
prevailed. The soldiers broke into the burning houses, pillaged them of
the most valuable articles they contained, and rolling numerous casks of
spirits into the streets, with frantic shouts, emptied them of their
contents, till vast numbers of them sank down like savages, motionless,
some lifeless, from the excess.
"Carpets, tapestry, beds, silks and satins, wearing apparel, jewelry,
watches, and every thing valuable, were scattered about upon the bloody
pavements, while fresh bundles of them were thrown from the windows
above to avoid the flames, and caught with demoniac yells by the drunken
crowds beneath. Amidst these scenes of disgraceful violence and
unutterable woe, nine-tenths of the once happy, smiling town of St.
Sebastian were reduced to ashes. And what has affixed a yet darker blot
on the character of the victors, deeds of violence and cruelty were
perpetrated hitherto rare in the British army, and which causes the
historian to blush, not merely for his country, but for his species."
The account which is given by Spanish historians of these transactions
is even far more dreadful than the above; so revolting that we can not
pain our readers by transcribing it upon these pages. A document issued
by the Constitutional Junta, after describing crimes as awful as even
fiends could commit, adds:
"Other crimes more horrible still, which our pen refuses to record, were
committed in that awful night, and the disorders continued for some days
after without any efficient steps being taken to arrest them. Of above
six hundred houses, of which St. Sebastian consisted on the morning of
the assault, there remained at the end of three days only
thirty-six."[AA]
[Footnote AA: Manifeste par la Junte Constitutionale, et les habitans de
St. Sebastien.]
The Duke of Wellington, in his dispatch to the Spanish Minister of War,
said, in reference to these excesses, that it was impossible for him to
restrain the passions of his soldiers, that he and his officers did
their utmost to stop the fire and to avoid the disorders, but that all
their efforts were ineffectual.
Joseph, in his retreat, threw three thousand men into the citadel of St.
Sebastian. They held back the British army sixty days. Their skill and
valor extorted the commendation of their foes. The siege cost the allied
army three thousand eight hundred men, and delayed for three months the
invasion of the southern provinces of France.
Joseph slowly retreated, fighting his way, step by step, across the
Pyrenees into France, pursued by the victors. On the 12th of April,
Joseph, having crossed the mountains, and being thus driven from his
kingdom, had no longer any legitimate power. The command of the French
army devolved upon Soult. Utterly weary of the cares and harassments of
royalty, for which Joseph never had any inclination, he joined his wife
and children at his estate at Mortfontaine. England had wrested the
crown of Spain from Joseph Bonaparte, one of the best men whom a crown
has ever adorned, and soon, with the aid of allied Europe, placed that
crown upon the brow of Ferdinand VII., one of the worst men who has ever
disgraced a throne. The result was that Spain was consigned to another
half-century of shame, debasement, and misery.
Joseph had scarcely re-united himself with his wife and children in
their much-loved home at Mortfontaine, when the allied armies, numbering
more than a million and a half of bayonets, came crowding upon France
from the north, from the east, and from the south; while the fleet of
England, mistress of all the seas, lent its majestic co-operation on the
west. Then ensued the sublimest conflict of which history gives us any
account. Never before, in all Napoleon's world-renowned campaigns, had
he displayed such vigor as in the masterly blows with which he struck
one after another of his thronging assailants, and drove them, staggered
and bleeding, before him.
France was exhausted. All Europe had combined to crush the Republican
Empire, and restore the despotism of the old regime. Through an almost
uninterrupted series of victories, Napoleon lost his crown. When in any
one direction he was driving his foes headlong before him, from all
other points they were rushing on, till France and Paris were well-nigh
whelmed in the mighty inundation. In these hours of disaster, Joseph
offered life, property, all to the service of his brother. They held a
few hurried interviews in Paris, and then separated, each to fulfill his
appointed task in the terrible drama.
The Emperor confided to Joseph the defense of Paris, and the protection
of his son and of the Empress. On the 16th of March, 1814, the Emperor
wrote to his brother from Reims:
"In accordance with the verbal instructions which I gave you, and with
the spirit of all my letters, you must not allow, happen what may, the
Empress and the King of Rome to fall into the hands of the enemy. The
manoeuvres I am about to make may possibly prevent your hearing from
me for several days. If the enemy should march on Paris with so strong a
force as to render resistance impossible, send off toward the Loire the
Regent, my son, the great dignitaries, the ministers, the senators, the
President of the Conseil d'Etat, the chief officers of the crown, and
Baron de la Bouillerie, with the money which is in my treasury. Never
lose sight of my son, and remember that I would rather know that he was
in the Seine, than that he was in the hands of the enemies of France.
The fate of Astyanax, prisoner to the Greeks, has always seemed to me
the most lamentable in history."
Faithfully, energetically, wisely, Joseph fulfilled the mission
intrusted to him. In every possible way he endeavored to aid the Emperor
in his heroic efforts; recruiting troops, arming them, and hurrying them
off to the points where they were most needed. It was not till the
allied forces were upon the heights of Montmartre, and where further
resistance would but have exposed the capital to the horrors of a
bombardment, that he consented to a surrender. All the arms in the city
had been given out to the new levies, as they had been sent to the seat
of war, and none remained to place in the hands of the populace, even
were it judged best to summon them to the defense of the metropolis. A
grand council was called on the 29th of March. The ministers, the grand
dignitaries, the presidents of the sections, of the Council of State,
and the President of the Senate were present.
The majority of the council were in favor of defending the city to the
last possible moment. There were at hand the two corps of the dukes of
Ragusa and Trevise, consisting of about seventeen thousand combatants, a
few thousand of the National Guard, poorly armed, a few batteries served
by the students of the schools and by the Invalides, and a few hundred
recruits not yet organized. It was urged that the Empress, like another
Maria Theresa, should remain with her son in the city, to assure the
populace by her presence, and embolden the defense. She was to show
herself to the people at the Hotel de Ville, with her son in her arms.
Should the Empress leave the city, it would so discourage the people
that all attempts at defense would be hopeless. Should she remain, the
danger was very great that both she and her son might be captured; and
unless she should immediately escape, all egress might be cut off, as
the Allies were rapidly surrounding the city.
Toward the close of the discussion, the Emperor's letter to Joseph of
the 16th of March was presented and read. In this it will be remembered
that he said:
"You must not allow, happen what may, the Empress and the King of Rome
to fall into the hands of the enemy. Never lose sight of my son, and
remember that I would rather know that he was in the Seine, than that
he was in the hands of the enemies of France. The fate of Astyanax,
prisoner to the Greeks, has always seemed to me the most lamentable in
history."
This settled the question. The situation of affairs was so desperate
that for the Empress to remain in Paris would be extremely perilous. It
was therefore decided that she, with the Government, should retire to
Chartres, and thence to the Loire. But Joseph stated that it was
important to ascertain the real force of the hostile army, which was
driving before them the two marshals, Marmont and Mortier. He therefore
offered to remain in the city, making all possible arrangements for its
defense, till that fact should be ascertained. Should it be found that
resistance was quite impossible, he would rejoin the Government upon the
Loire.
It is very evident that Joseph and the assembled Senate, and that
Napoleon himself, hoped that Maria Louisa, from her own inward impulse,
would soar to the heights of a heroine. Napoleon could not ask her to
come thus to his defense. At St. Helena the Emperor allowed the regret
to escape his lips that Maria Louisa was not able to rise to the
sublimity of the occasion. The Empress, however, was but an ordinary
woman, incapable of a grand action, and it is to be remembered that she
must have been embarrassed by the thought that, in striving to arouse
France for the defense of her husband, she was arraying the empire
against her own father. Maria Louisa, as regent, presided over this
private council. The session was prolonged until after midnight. Joseph
and the arch-chancellor accompanied the Empress to her home. It is
evident, even then, that Joseph hoped that the Empress would assume the
responsibility of a heroic act. M. Meneval, the secretary of the
Empress, who was present at this interview, says:
"After the exchange of a few words upon the disastrous consequences of
abandoning Paris, Joseph and the arch-chancellor ventured to say that
the Empress alone could decide what course it was her duty to pursue.
The Empress replied 'that they were her appointed advisers, and that she
could not undertake any course unless she was advised to do it by them,
over their own seal and signature.' Both declined to assume this
responsibility."
The departure of the Empress was fixed at eight o'clock the next
morning. Joseph had already passed the barriers, to proceed to the
advance posts of the army to reconnoitre the foe. The day had not
yet dawned, when the saloons of the palace were filled with those who
were to accompany the Empress in her flight. Anxiety sat upon every
countenance, and the solemnity of the occasion caused every voice to be
hushed, so that impressive silence reigned. Early as was the hour, the
alarming rumor that the Empress was to abandon Paris had reached the
ears of the National Guard. Suddenly the officers of the guard who
were stationed at the palace, with several others who had joined them,
precipitately entered, and, by their earnest request, were conducted to
the Empress. They entreated her not to leave Paris, promising to defend
her to the last possible extremity.
[Illustration: ANGUISH OF MARIA LOUISA.]
The Empress was moved to tears by their devotion, but alleged the order
of the Emperor. Nevertheless, conscious of the discouraging effect of
her departure, she delayed hour after hour, hoping without venturing to
avow it that some chance might arise which would enable her to remain.
M. Clarke, the Minister of War, alarmed at the danger that soon all
egress would be impossible, sent an officer to the Empress to represent
to her the necessity of an immediate departure. Thus urged by some
to go, by others to remain, the Empress was agitated by the most
distracting embarrassment. She returned to her chamber, threw her hat
upon her bed, seated herself in a chair, buried her face in her hands,
and burst into an uncontrollable flood of tears. "O my God," she was
heard to exclaim, "let them decide this question among themselves, and
put an end to this my agony."
About ten o'clock the Minister of War sent again to her a message
stating that she had not one moment to lose, and that unless she left
immediately she was in danger of falling into the hands of the Cossacks.
As Joseph was now absent, and she could receive no further counsel from
him, she hastened her departure. It was indeed true that the delay of a
few hours would have rendered her escape impossible, for that very day
the banners of the Allies presented themselves before the walls of the
metropolis.
Joseph had returned rapidly to the city, to make as determined a defense
as possible. The National Guard hastened to the posts assigned them.
Volunteers, many of them armed with shot-guns, advanced to operate as
skirmishers against the foe. The students of the Polytechnic School
served the artillery confided to their "young and brilliant" valor. The
thunders of the cannonade were soon heard, rousing the populace to a
frenzy of courage. They rushed through the streets demanding arms, but
there were none to be given them. The arsenals were all empty.
The allied troops came pouring on like the raging tides of the sea.
Their numbers in advance and in the rear far exceeded a million of
bayonets. It was all dynastic Europe arrayed against one man. Distinctly
the allied kings had declared to the world that they were not fighting
against France, but against Napoleon.
The next day, the 30th, Joseph received a note from General Marmont,
written in pencil, from the midst of the conflict, stating that it would
be impossible to prolong the resistance beyond a few hours, and that
measures must immediately be adopted to save Paris from the horrors of
being carried by storm. Joseph instantly convoked a council, and the
opinion was unanimous that a capitulation was inevitable. Accordingly
Joseph at once sent General Stroltz, his aide-de-camp, to Marshals
Marmont and Mortier, authorizing them to enter into a conference with
the enemy, while they were to continue their resistance as persistently
as possible.
All hope of defending Paris was now abandoned. In accordance with the
instructions of the Emperor, it was the duty of Joseph to join himself
to the Empress and her son. At four o'clock he crossed the Seine. A few
moments after the bridges were seized by the enemy. Napoleon had retired
to Fontainebleau. Passing through Versailles, where he ordered the
cavalry in that city to follow him, Joseph proceeded to Chartres, where
he joined the Empress and her son, and with them advanced to Blois. He
hoped to join his brother at Fontainebleau, there to confer with him
upon the measures to be adopted in these hours of disaster. With this
intention he set out from Blois, but squadrons of hostile cavalry were
sweeping in all directions, and his communication beyond Orleans was cut
off. He was therefore compelled to return to Blois. There he was in the
greatest peril, for the Cossacks were in his immediate vicinity. He
could neither reach the Emperor nor communicate with him. Neither could
he ascertain the result of the negotiation entered into at Paris with
the foe.
Almost immediately the news came of the Emperor's abdication. The
Cossacks escorted Maria Louisa and the King of Rome to Rambouillet,
where they were placed under the care of her father, the Emperor of
Austria. The Emperor was sent to Elba. Joseph, who was still wealthy,
purchased the estate of Prangins, on the border of the lake of Geneva.
Here he had a brief respite from the terrible storms of life, with his
wife and children, in that retirement which he loved so well.