AFTER THE STORM
We have seen that in spite of the announcement of the Dauphin’s death,
and of all that the Chevalier de Frotté had written to her on the
subject, Lady Atkyns still held persistently to her conviction that the
real proof of the matter had yet to be discovered, and remained still
determined to solve the mystery. If, as she continued to believe, the
young King had been spirited away, it might still be possible to find
him.
But there were new difficulties in the way. Money, for one thing, was
lacking now, and she knew only too well how necessary money was. Now,
too, she was alone. To whom was she to apply for assistance? Of all her
old associates, Peltier alone was accessible, and he was absorbed in
his work, as journalist and man of letters.
Why, she asked herself, should she not seek the help of a member of the
Royal Family of France? The Comte d’Artois, who had taken in his turn
the titles of _Monsieur_ and of Comte de Provence, since his brother’s
proclamation as King, was living in England. Why not apply to him?
The ingenuous lady did not think of the very weighty reasons why such
an appeal must be in vain. Convinced that the Dauphin still lived, she
imagined that she could convert the Comte to her way of thinking, and
induce him to join her in her search after the truth.
Encouraged by the attitude taken up by the British Government towards
her project of inquiring minutely into the matter on the Continent,
Lady Atkyns decided before leaving England to approach the Comte,
hoping to secure not merely his approval, but also some material
assistance. Had she not sacrificed a large portion of her own worldly
goods for the benefit of his family? Thus reasoning, she did not
conceive the possibility of a refusal. But _Monsieur_ could not regard
as anything short of fantastic the supposition upon which her project
was based--the supposition that his nephew still survived. To present
this hypothesis either to him or to his brother the King was to put
one’s self out of court at once.
We can imagine how her application was received. She chose as her
intermediary with the Prince the Baron de Suzannet, who had facilitated
the purchase of the ships and equipages which were procured in
readiness for the rescue of the Queen and the Dauphin.
Having the _entrée_ to the Court, and being one of the most notable of
the _émigrés_ in London, he consented to submit his friend’s request to
_Monsieur_. Did he foresee the issue? Apparently not. Here is what he
writes to her on August 19, 1797:--
“After the decision _M[onsieur]_ has come to, my dear lady, not to
give his countenance to your affair until it has been taken up by
others, and after speaking to him so often on the subject, I cannot
carry the matter any further, and could not ask him for money. But I
see no reason why you should not yourself write to him more or less
what you have told me, viz. that you were about to return to France
with the consent of the Government, that you ought to be provided with
the same amount for returning as you have been for going, but that
fifty louis is very scant provision for that--especially considering
that you have had to hide yourself away here so long--and that you
are afraid you will not have sufficient to enable you to remain long
enough in Paris to get together all the particulars required by the
Government, and to pay the messenger for bringing them here; and
you might point out that you have acted throughout entirely in the
interests of the Royal Family, that you do not regret the £1000[76]
which your attachment has cost you, or regret them only because you no
longer have the money to devote to the cause; and that if _M[onsieur]_
for his part could give you £50, it would free you from anxiety as to
ways and means....
“I shall tell _M[onsieur]_ that I am aware you have written to him,
and that I shall convey his answer to you. He has been taking medicine
to-day and can see no one. To-morrow he is to see some people at the
Duc d’Harcourt’s, if well enough. He will not be going away before
Wednesday. His address is 55, Welbeck Street. I think you would do
well to send your letter to him by hand, sealed and addressed ‘_À
Monsieur Seul_,’ enclosed in an outer envelope with his ordinary
address: ‘_Son Altesse Royale Monsieur, frère du Roi_.’ Send me a line
to tell me what you have done. _Adieu._”
It was not till after a long delay that Lady Atkyns at last succeeded
in meeting the Prince at an inn, only to meet with a point-blank
refusal. But she was not to be discouraged. The very next day she wrote
again to the Comte asking for an audience. This time it was another
member of his suite, the Bishop of Saint-Pol de Léon, who replied to
her communication--
“The moment I saw _M[onsieur]_ yesterday, my dear lady, he told me
about your letter, which gave him great pleasure, though it is a
matter for great regret to him that he is quite unable to do as you
wish, and as he himself would wish. Since his recent attack he has
been unable to dress or go out; he has not been able to receive any
ladies, anxious though he is to welcome those who are here and who
were attached to the Princess. He could not receive one without its
being known, and then he would be expected to receive a number of
others. You know how things get about and what a close watch is kept
on Princes, and how careful our Prince must be to do nothing that
would lay him open to criticism or even to suspicion. If his stay
here were prolonged, and he found he could see other ladies also, the
thing might be managed; but there would be difficulties even then, in
view of your secret being perhaps of a compromising nature. I am but
expressing to you the Prince’s own views. I hope to see you to-morrow
between midday and three o’clock.”
The great of this world are never at a loss for pretexts for refusing
requests. _Monsieur_ was particularly anxious to evade an interview
which he felt to be undesirable, and therefore confined himself to
sending her these amiable phrases.
About the same time M. de Thauvenay, one of the King’s most devoted
courtiers, who happened to be in London, seems to have promised to use
his good offices with his master on her behalf, telling him of her
record and perhaps of her hopes.
Having exhausted all the means at her disposal in England, Lady Atkyns
saw that she must manage her journey as best she could from her own
resources, and resolved to make yet another sacrifice to this end.
She had obtained a considerable loan already once upon a mortgage on
her beautiful estate of Ketteringham. As this was her only source of
revenue, there was no alternative to raising a further mortgage on it,
and this she managed, though with greater difficulty than before. (The
property was not, in fact, her own at this time, being entailed on her
son Edward.)
She seems to have raised in all about £3000 in this way in 1799 and the
three following years.
Some weeks before the “18th Brumaire” and Bonaparte’s _coup d’état_,
she set out for the Continent. What exactly was her purpose? What use
was she going to make of her money? It is impossible to say. To clothe
her errand in the greater mystery, she decided to land in France under
an assumed name, and to veil her personality under the designation of
the “Little Sailor” (_le petit matelot_).
“I feel I must again send my good wishes for a pleasant journey to the
charming ‘Little Sailor,’” some unidentified friend writes to her on
September 7, “and I cannot too often beg him to bear in mind that he
leaves behind him in England friends who take a deep interest in his
welfare, and who will learn with pleasure that he has arrived safely
at his destination, and, above all, that after fulfilling his mission
he has escaped all the unpleasantness and dangers to which his truly
admirable devotion and zeal will expose him. I hope one day to prove
to the ‘Little Sailor’ how he has long filled me with the most genuine
sentiments--sentiments which I have refrained from expressing for
reasons of which the ‘Little Sailor’ will approve. I cannot say too
often to the amiable ‘Little Sailor’ what pleasure I shall have in
repeating to him in France--and in France preferably to elsewhere--the
assurance of eternal and tender attachment that I have vowed him for
ever and ever.”
It is difficult to know what the “Petit Matelot” did on arriving
in Paris. It was a moment of crisis, for the Consulate was being
established. Most of those who had been mixed up in the Temple affair
were inaccessible, and yet it was important to get into touch with them
if anything was to be ascertained about the Dauphin. It would not have
done, however, to provoke suspicion, or Fouché would have been on her
track.
Certain only it is that for several months she seems to have
disappeared from sight. At last she was run to earth and hunted out by
Fouché’s agents, and was obliged to make away to the Loire, where she
had devoted friends.
The Verrière family lived in the country six miles from Saumur, in
Anjou, where many nobles, fleeing from the storm, had found a safe
refuge. The vicinity of the forest of Fontevrault enabled them to
gain the Vendée, and thus escape the fury of the Revolutionists. Mme.
Verrière had met Lady Atkyns in Paris years before, perhaps during the
golden days of Versailles. Recalling their former friendliness, Lady
Atkyns went to them in her trouble. The welcome they extended to her
justified her hopes, and she dwelt with them for some time, until the
police had lost all trace of her.
About this period, vague reports began to be spread about with
reference to the imprisonment of the children of Louis XVI. in the
Temple. The obscurity which had cloaked the last hours of the Dauphin
was still keeping certain brains at work. And a book which was
published in 1800 helped to reawaken public curiosity. In _Le Cimetière
de la Madeleine_, a romance written by an author until then little
known, Regnault-Warin deliberately questioned the alleged death of the
Dauphin, and, in fact, based a story of adventure upon the supposition
of his being still alive. Written in the fashion of the time, full of
surprising episodes, and bristling with more or less untrustworthy
anecdotes touching on the captivity of the Royal Family in the Temple,
this novel had an immense success. If it came before Lady Atkyns it
must have served to stimulate her anxiety to solve the problem she had
so much at heart.
In the summer of 1801 Lady Atkyns appears to have addressed herself to
Louis XVIII., unwarned by her failure with _Monsieur_. In this case
also failure was to be her portion.
“Your letter,” ran the reply, signed by M. de Thauvenay (whom she had
met some years before), and addressed, as a precaution, to Monsieur
James Brown, dated October 2, “would have been enigmatic to me had I
not placed it before my master, who, by a curious series of accidents,
had received only a few days before the communication you sent him
on the 12th of July. In requesting me to reply to you, monsieur, he
charges me to express to you his recognition of your constant interest
and indefatigable zeal for his welfare, and his regret that he is
prevented by his present position from learning the particulars of the
speculation that your heart has formed, and that he cannot have any
share in it.”
Six weeks later Lady Atkyns received a second letter, despatched, like
the first, from Varsovie, reinforcing the above:--
“I wish,” writes M. de Thauvenay, “that I could convey to you the deep
and tender feeling with which my dear and venerated master has read
these new and touching testimonies of your interest and friendship,
and his deep regret at being unable to enjoy the consolations that
your sympathetic and generous nature has proffered him! No, monsieur,
I swear to you, no other house has offered him any kind of interest
in the speculation you have proposed to him. I should add that there
is no one with whom he would rather have shared the chances than with
you; but his position is such that, for the moment at least, he can
only display passive courage in the face of misfortune. I need not
remind you, monsieur, that the most appreciative and most generous of
hearts has eternal claim upon a heart such as yours. Never, I feel
convinced, will your noble and moving sentiment be modified by time
or place. This conviction is sweet to me, and it is with the utmost
sincerity that I render you once again my tender (if I may use the
word) and admiring respect.”
It is not easy at first to understand what M. de Thauvenay means
by this “speculation,” in which the King refuses to take part. On
reflection it seems probable that Lady Atkyns’s proposal, thus
described, had reference to the affair of the Temple, for it seems
impossible that she should have flattered herself that she could see a
way to the return of the exiled King.
However that may be, these two letters convinced her that it would
be useless to prolong her stay in France, and she returned to
Ketteringham, after an absence of three years, without having effected
her purpose.
* * * * *
Two tragic events occurred in the year 1804 to startle the French who
were still taking refuge in England. The first was the arrest and
shooting of the Duc d’Enghien at Vincennes. If Bonaparte had punished
one of the many schemers who had plotted against him on English soil,
his action would have found defenders. But this execution of a Prince,
who was absolutely innocent and who had held apart from all political
intrigues, aroused the same kind of horror that had been evoked eleven
years earlier by the death of Louis XVI. and Marie-Antoinette.
The Prince de Condé, the Duc d’Enghien’s grandfather, was staying in
England at this time, like _Monsieur_, the King’s brother, and their
residences were naturally the centre of the excitement over this
event. The Baron de Suzannet describes the state of things in their
_entourage_ in a letter to Lady Atkyns:--
“It would seem, madame,” he writes to her on April 14, “that the
murder of the Duc d’Enghien has horrified not merely all true
Frenchmen, as was to be expected, but also Englishmen of every class,
the perfidy as well as the cruelty of it is so revolting to all in
whom the sentiment of justice and honour is not extinct. I shall not
speak of the courageous and heroic death of this ill-fated Prince,
but of the condition of his unhappy relatives. Since the day when
_Monsieur_ carried him the terrible news, the Prince de Condé (save
for two journeys to London necessitated by his anxiety) has not left
his room or been down to dinner. Plunged in grief, he sees no one,
and it is much feared that his death may follow that of the Duc
d’Enghien. He loved the Duc as his grandson and his pupil, and perhaps
even more as one qualified by Providence to add still further to the
glory of his illustrious name. The sorrow of the Duc de Bourbon is not
less deep and intense.”
At the same moment, the news of the arrest of Cadoudal in Paris, the
discovery of his plot, the sensational trial of his twelve accomplices,
together with a number of insurgents--forty-seven prisoners in all--and
finally the execution of the famous brigand on the morning of June 25,
came to intensify the agitation of the French in England.
Of these events Lady Atkyns heard particulars from the Comte de Frotté,
father of her friend the General. Throughout five years the venerable
Comte had followed with joy or anguish the career of his son as a
leader of the insurrection in Normandy. Repeatedly he had come to
his aid with money and encouragement. Suddenly the fatal bullet had
ended everything. Henceforth the unhappy father had followed eagerly
everything that could bring back the memory of the Chevalier, and he
had been drawn to Lady Atkyns by his knowledge of the long-standing
friendship that had existed between her and him.
To add to his sorrow, Charles de Frotté, half-brother to Louis, had
been arrested and imprisoned by Napoleon’s police soon after the
execution at Verneuil. He was kept at the Temple for two years, without
apparent reason, then sent to the Fort of Toux, in Jura.
“I learnt yesterday,” writes the Comte de Frotté to Lady Atkyns, “that
my unhappy son has been transferred from the Temple to a château
in Franche Comté. How cruel is this persecution! How terrible this
imprisonment, not only for himself, but for us who are bound to him by
ties of kinship and for his friends.”
Thus Lady Atkyns, though in the seclusion of the country, far from
London and the Continent, remained bound in thought to her life of
earlier days. She had no one now to love except her son, who was an
officer in the first regiment of Royal Dragoons. Owing to the delicacy
of his health, young Edward Atkyns had been obliged to go on leave
for a time, and his mother invited the son of Baron de Suzannet to
Ketteringham to keep him company. But the visit did not come off, and
two months later the young soldier died of the malady from which he had
been suffering for some years.
Two years earlier a somewhat strange incident had occurred in France.
On February 17, 1802, the police court at Vitry-le-Françoi had to sit
in judgment upon a young man named Jean-Marie Hervagault, charged
with swindling, passing under a false name, and vagabondage. This
individual, arrested and imprisoned for the first time in 1799, claimed
to be the Dauphin, escaped miraculously from the Temple. The son of
a tailor of Saint-Lo, Hervagault, in the course of his wanderings,
had managed to convince a certain number of people that he really
was the Prince. Public curiosity was aroused. Many people went to
visit the youth in prison. To put a stop to this movement, the Vitry
Tribunal condemned the adventurer to four years’ imprisonment. His
trial disclosed the fact that amongst his dupes were many persons of
distinction, including M. Lafont de Savines. Some weeks later the Vitry
sentence was ratified at Rouen, and Hervagault was incarcerated in the
prison of Bicêtre in Paris. But the feelings of sympathy and pity that
had been called forth, Hervagault’s assertions and his circumstantial
accounts of the way in which he had been carried off from the
Temple--all these things attracted the more attention by reason of the
appearance a short time before of Beauchamp’s work, _Le faux Dauphin
actuellement en France_.
Lady Atkyns was quick to secure details as to the story of the prisoner
at Bicêtre. There were many contradictions in it that must have come
home to her. And Hervagault mentions the name of the General Louis de
Frotté as that of one of his liberators, whereas, in his letters to
her, the Chevalier had made it quite clear that this could not be so.
However, it seemed worth her while to write to the old Comte de Frotté
on the subject.
“I have just received your letter,” he replies, August 16, 1804, “and
I hasten to send you a line. I have spent a whole week rummaging among
papers. I can assure you that what is stated in the book you have sent
me is all fiction. Louis and Duchale are mentioned in 1802 because
they were both dead. I am almost certain that in 1795 (in the month in
question) Louis was fighting in Normandy, and that he did not leave
his companions once all that year. But we shall go into all this on
your return, and no doubt will be left in your mind. If you arrive
towards the end of the month, tell me at once. I shall call on you
and tell you all I can, and make you see why I am convinced that this
fellow is a puppet in some one else’s hands.”
Lady Atkyns was reluctant to give up the faint hope that there might be
something in this Hervagault narrative, but after some conversations
with the Comte de Frotté, and after comparing the pretender’s statement
with documents left by the Chevalier, she was at last convinced that
the whole thing was a fraud.
We hear of her again in October, 1809, taking a prominent part in the
celebrations being held in her neighbourhood in honour of the jubilee
of George III. Then we lose sight of her until 1814, and the triumphant
return to Paris of Louis XVIII. Lady Atkyns hastens now to secure the
good offices of the Duc de Bourbon, with a view to drawing attention to
all her sacrifices and the sums of money she has expended.
She is delayed, however, over her contemplated journey to France for
this purpose, and Napoleon’s escape postpones for two years more all
hope of accomplishing her return to Paris.
When at last the monarchy is restored once more, she finds that her
aspirations are destined to be disappointed, despite all the kind words
with which she was soothed in England, and we find her uttering the
word “ingratitude,” which is henceforth to be so often on her tongue.
There were so many who held themselves entitled to gratitude and
recognition at the hands of Louis XVIII.--_émigrés_ returned to France
after twenty years of sorrow and indignities, and now counting upon the
recovery of their possessions or on being reimbursed in some way by the
act of the Sovereign. What an awakening they met with when the time
came to formulate their applications and they found themselves obliged
to condescend to the drafting of innumerable documents, and to put up
with interminable delays!
On September 27, 1816, Lady Atkyns writes to her friend Mme. de
Verrière an account of her disappointing experiences. She had been well
received at Court, but that was all.
“The kind of ingratitude I have been meeting with is not very
consoling. They give me plenty of kind words, but nothing more. I
have written a long letter to the man of business, begging of him to
get the employer to reimburse me a little for the moment, but I have
received nothing yet, and this puts me out greatly. Perhaps something
will turn up between now and the end of the week. If not I must go and
see my poor mother and beg to get my affairs into order.”
The state of her affairs, for long precarious, was now giving the
poor lady very serious anxiety. By recourse to various expedients
she had managed to hold out until the return of the Bourbons, and to
stave off her creditors. But she was now at her last gasp. If the King
refused to help her, to “reimburse” her, she was ruined. The Comte de
la Châtre had assured her that her application was under favourable
consideration, that the King regarded it approvingly, that the Comte
de Pradel, the head of the King’s household, had it in hand; but, in
spite of this, there was a series of delays.
At last, worn out with waiting, she writes in her naïve style to the
Comte on October 10, 1816--
“I beg of you to be good enough to get the King to decide this matter
as soon as ever possible. I must get away to England in three weeks
to see my mother, who is ill, and I can’t possibly do this until I
know the King’s decision in regard to me. I know his Majesty is too
good to injure one who has given so many proofs of boundless devotion
to the Royalist cause and to the entire Royal Family. Although I
have a splendid estate in England, I am now in great difficulties by
reason of this devotion. I tell you all this, Monsieur le Comte, so
that, like the good Frenchman you are, you may do me this kindness of
getting the King to give you his orders. I have run every conceivable
kind of evils during these twenty-four years. I beg of you to excuse
all the trouble I am giving you, and I have the honour to be, Monsieur
le Comte,
“Your very obedient servant,
“CHARLOTTE ATKYNS.”
This appeal seems to have been no more successful than the preceding
ones, for three months later we find Lady Atkyns still awaiting the
promised audience. To distract her thoughts from the subject, she
goes about Paris--a new city now to her--is present at sittings of
the Chamber of Deputies, and hears the speech from the Throne. On All
Souls’ Day she joins in the solemn pilgrimage to the Conciergerie. Who
could have been more in place on such an occasion? But with the sad
thoughts evoked by the sight of the Queen’s prison were mingled regrets
that the sanctuary had not been left as it was. The place had been
enlarged, and a massive, heavy-looking tomb stood now where the bed
had been.
“I knelt before this tomb,” she writes to Mme. de Verrière, “but I
should have preferred to have seen the prison room unaltered, and the
tomb placed where the Queen used to kneel down to pray. The place has
been made to look too nice, and a simple elegance has been imparted
to it which takes away all idea of the misfortunes of that time. I
would have left the bed, the table, and the chair. There is a portrait
of the Queen seated on the bed, her eyes raised heavenwards with
the resignation of a martyr. This portrait is very like, especially
the eyes, with that look of angelic sweetness which she had. There
is another tomb with a crucifix on it, as on hers, upon which are
inscribed the words: ‘_Que mon fils n’oublie jamais les derniers mot
de son père, que je lui répète expressément; qu’il ne cherche jamais
à venger notre mort_.’ You go in by the chapel, and behind the altar,
to get to where the Queen used to be.... I repeated on the tomb what
I vowed to the Queen--never to abandon the cause of her children. It
is true that only Madame remains now, but she one day will be Queen of
France, and if she has need of a faithful friend she will find one in
me.”
These last lines seem a strange avowal. Lady Atkyns seems to be
renouncing her faith. What is the explanation? It is simple enough.
She has realized that as long as she puts forward her inopportune plea
regarding the child in the Temple she must expect to find nothing but
closed doors. Yet she has by her proofs of what she alleges, and she is
prepared in substantiation of her memorials to hand over a selection
of the precious letters from her friends which she has received in the
course of her enterprise. These, doubtless, would be accepted, but
would never be given back. What, then, is she to do? Threatened on the
one side by the distress which is at her heels; a prey, on the other
hand, to her inalterable conviction, the luckless lady comes for a
moment to have doubts about her entire past. However, this disavowal,
as it seems, is but momentary; a calmer mood supervenes, and she
returns to her former point of view, unable ever to free her mind from
doubts as to the real fate of the Dauphin.
The King’s generosity in this year, 1816, does not appear to have given
her much satisfaction.
“At last I have received a little money,” she writes to Mme. de
Verrière just before Christmas, when preparing to return to England,
“but so little that it is really shameful.”
The following spring she is back again in France, still carrying on
her campaign. From 1817 to 1821 her letters pour in upon the Ministry
of the Royal Household. Did they contain indiscreet allusions to the
affair of the Temple? Perhaps. In any case, with a single exception,
all these letters have disappeared.
We find a curious reference to Lady Atkyns in a letter dated January
11, 1818, preserved in the archives of the Comte de Lair--
“She is still in Paris,” says the writer. “For the last two months she
has been going every week! She declares now she will start without
fail on Tuesday morning, but the Lord knows whether she will keep her
word.... She is still taken up with the affair in question, and passes
all her time in the company of those who are mixed up in it. I assure
you I don’t know what to make of it all myself, but it is certain that
a number of people believe it.”
The “affair in question” was the detention at Bicêtre of an individual
about whom the most sensational stories were current. A maker of
_sabots_, come over--no one quite knew how--from America, Mathurin
Bruneau, playing anew the Hervagault comedy, had been passing himself
off as the Dauphin. Arrested and imprisoned on January 21, by order of
Decazes, the Minister of Police, Bruneau had for two years been leading
a very extraordinary life for a prisoner.
He was by way of being in solitary confinement, but there was in
reality a never-ending succession of visitors to him in his prison.
A certain Branzon, formerly a customs-house officer at Rouen, who
had been condemned to five years’ imprisonment with hard labour, had
become his inseparable companion. With the support of a woman named
Sacques and a lady named Dumont, Branzon got together a species of
little court round the adventurer, issuing proclamations, carrying on
a regular correspondence with friends outside, and playing cards until
three o’clock in the morning--finally composing, with the help of large
slices out of _Le Cimetière de la Madeleine_, a work entitled _Mémoires
du Prince_. Some unknown painter executed a portrait of the prisoner as
“a lieutenant-colonel or colonel-general of dragoons,” and a mysterious
baron, come from Rouen to set eyes upon his Sovereign, took the oath
of fidelity to him on the Holy Scriptures in the jailer’s own room! On
April 29, 1817, the walls of Maromme, Darnétal, and Boudeville, near
Rouen, were covered with placards calling upon France to proclaim its
legitimate King. And all this happened under the nose of Libois, the
Governor of Bicêtre.
There seems, in fact, to be no room for doubt that, as has been well
said, “in this prison, in which there has been a constant procession
of comtes and abbés, and a whole pack of women, there has been enacted
in the years 1816-1818 a farce of which his Excellence Decazes is the
author.” The object of this mystification was simply to baffle the
Duchesse d’Angoulême in the first instance, and to prevent public
opinion from being led astray in another direction. Bruneau did not
stand alone. Six months earlier another pretendant, Nauendorff, a
clockmaker at Spandau, had written to the Duchesse d’Angoulême to
solicit an interview. It was all important to put a stop to this
dangerous movement. Therefore when on February 9, 1818, the proceedings
were opened at Rouen, no pains had been spared to give the affair the
appearance of a frivolous vaudeville. On February 19 Mathurin was
condemned to five years’ imprisonment. The court was crowded with all
kinds of loafers and queer characters, many of them from Paris, drawn
by the rumours so industriously spread about.
Lady Atkyns would seem to have given some attention to this new alleged
Dauphin without being carried off her feet. She lost no opportunity of
endeavouring to get at the truth, it is clear, and this, as we learn
from a police report, involved a number of visits to the house in
which Gaillon was imprisoned, and to which Bruneau was transferred
after his condemnation. It was even stated that she had offered sums
of money to enable Bruneau to escape. She soon had her eyes opened,
however, to this new fraud.
The accession of _Monsieur_ to the throne, in 1824, does not seem to
have had any favourable result for Lady Atkyns, for we find her at
last reduced in this year to taking a step, long contemplated but
dreaded--the handing over of Ketteringham to her sister-in-law, Mary
Atkyns, in consideration of a life annuity.
She continues, however, to make her way every year to France, buoyed
up by the assurances of interest in her which she has received from
officials of the Royal Household. At first she stays with friends,
the Comte and Comtesse de Loban. Then in 1826, when her mother dies,
aged eighty-six, she establishes herself definitively in Paris, taking
up her abode in a house in the Rue de Lille, No. 65, where she rents
a small _appartement_ on the first floor. Here she gets together the
few souvenirs she has saved from Ketteringham--some mahogany furniture
covered with blue cloth, a sofa covered with light blue silk, and
portraits on the walls of the Dauphin, his father, his uncle, and the
Duc de Berry.
It was while residing here that Lady Atkyns lived through the
revolution of Italy, after witnessing in turn the reign of Louis XVI.,
the Terror, the Empire, the Restoration, and the reign of Charles X.
What an eventful progress from the careless, happy days when she
played her part in the dizzying gaieties of Versailles!
Some weeks before the fall of Charles X., Lady Atkyns drew up yet
another petition for presentation to the chief of the King’s household.
She did not mince her words in this document.
“I little thought that lack of funds would be advanced as a reason
for delaying the execution of the King’s orders. I will not enlarge
upon the strangeness of such an avowal, especially as a reimbursement
of so sacred a character is in question, sanctioned by the Royal
will. I would merely point out to you, Monsieur le Marquis, that I
have contrived to find considerable sums (thereby incurring great
losses) when it was to the interest of France, and of her King, and
of her august family. Failing a sufficiency of money to liquidate
this debt, I have the honour to propose to your Excellency that you
should make out an order for the payment, and I shall find means
of getting it discounted. In your capacity as a Minister to the
King, your Excellency will be able, without delay, to obtain the
amount necessary, minus a discount, from the Court bankers. Will
you not deign, monseigneur, to ask them to do this, and I shall
willingly forego the discount that may be stipulated for.... Finally,
monseigneur, I beg of you to tell me immediately the day and the hour
when I may present myself at the Ministry to terminate this matter. I
must venture to remind you that the least delay will involve my ruin,
and therefore I cannot consent to it.”
Lady Atkyns’s persistence and the King’s procrastination seem
intelligible enough when one learns that the sums expended by her, from
the time when Louis XVI.’s reign was projected down to the last year of
the Consulate, amounted to more than £80,000. The Englishwoman might
well speak of the sacrifices she had made and the loss of her fortune
at the dictates of her heart.
One other letter we find amongst Lady Atkyns’s papers--a letter
notable for its fine, regular penmanship. It evidently reached her
about this date. The writer was yet another _soi-disant_ Dauphin, the
third serious pretendant. The Baron de Richemont--his real name was
Hebert--had published in 1831 his _Mémoires du Duc de Normandie, fils
de Louis XVI. écrits et publiés par lui-même_, and he was not long in
convincing a number of people as to his identity. He probably owed most
of his particulars as to his alleged escape from the Temple to the wife
of Simon, whom he had visited at the Hospital for Incurables in the
Rue de Sèvres. Possibly it was through her also that he heard of Lady
Atkyns. At all events, he thought it worth while to approach her.
“Revered lady,” he writes to her, “I am touched by your kind
remembrance.... The idea that I have found again in you the friend who
was so devoted to my unhappy family consoles me, and enables me the
better to bear up under the ills that Providence has sent me. I shall
never forget your good deeds; ever present to my memory, they make me
cherish an existence which I owe to you. I cannot tell what the future
may have in store for me, but whatever my fate you may count upon all
my gratitude. May the Lord be with you and send prosperity to all your
enterprises! He will surely do so, for to whatever country you may
take your steps, you will set an example of all the virtues.
“We shall see you, I hope, in a better world. Then and in the company
of the august and ill-fated author of my sad days, you will be in
enjoyment of all the good you have done, and will receive your due
recompense from the Sovereign Dispenser of all things.
“There being no other end to look for, I beg of God, most noble lady,
to take you under His protection.
“LOUIS CHARLES.”
Richemont shows some aptness and cleverness in the way he touches the
note of sensibility, and attains to the diapason appropriate to the
_rôle_ he is playing. Had his letter the effect desired? It is hardly
likely, but it is the last item in Lady Atkyns’s correspondence, and we
have no means of finding an answer to the question.
* * * * *
In the night of February 2, 1836, Lady Atkyns died. By her bedside
one person watched--her devoted servant, Victoire Ilh, whose conduct,
according to her mistress’s own statement, “had at all times been
beyond praise.”
The few friends who could attend gathered together in due course to pay
the last honours to the dead. Her remains were conveyed to England for
burial at Ketteringham, in accordance with the wish she herself had
expressed.
Time passed inexorably over her memory, and twenty years later there
was nothing to recall the life of love and devotion of this loyal and
unselfish Englishwoman.
FOOTNOTES:
[76] This is far below the actual figure.
EPILOGUE
Not more than two or three generations separate us from the period
through which we have seen come and go the various actors involved in
the enterprise of which the prisoners in the Temple were the stake.
The _rôle_ that was played by Lady Atkyns and her confidants, forming
as it did a minor episode in the changeful story of the emigration and
of the fortunes of the Royalists during the Revolution, deserved to be
set forth. But the interest attached to such narratives becomes greatly
intensified the more completely the records of those mentioned in it
can be traced to the end. It seems well, therefore, to see what became
of the principal performers who have passed before our eyes in this
slight study.
Of Cormier’s two sons, Achille, the elder, disappears from the scene
completely, and all our efforts to trace him have been in vain. In the
case of his brother we have been more fortunate. Having served as an
officer in the army of Vendée, Patrice de Cormier, from the moment of
the Restoration, sought to return to active service. Being on terms
of intimacy with Prince de la Tremoïlle, Frotté’s old friend, who
was then presiding over the commission inquiring into the claims of
Royalist officers with a view to according recompense to them, Cormier
petitioned for employment in the company of light horse. His loyalty
was not in doubt, for a memorandum supporting his application recorded
that “when the allies entered Paris, he secured a drum of the National
Guard by purchase, and beating it in front of a white flag, made his
way through the streets of Paris.” The “Hundred Days” interfered with
his ambitions, and he was obliged to betake himself to England, whence
he made his way back to France in July, 1815. The warmth with which
Prince de la Tremoïlle recommended him to the favour of Louis XVIII.
showed what value he attached to his friendship.
“He has accompanied me constantly as my aide-de-camp,” said the
Prince, “on my mission, at the time of my arrest and during my
escape, and he has never failed to give me new proofs daily of his
intelligence and zeal, of his boundless devotion to the King, and
of his capacity. If ever services rendered could justify me in
recommending any one to the favour of the King, this estimable officer
would be the first I should venture to recommend.”
These words produced their effect. On February 24, 1816, Cormier was
appointed “_chef de bataillon_” in the first regiment of infantry of
the Royal Guard. Three years later he became a lieutenant-colonel,
and as such he took part in the Spanish expedition of 1823, under the
command of the Duc d’Angoulême. Charged with the carrying out of an
order to the Royal Spanish troops before Figuières, he fell into an
ambuscade of thirty Constitutional soldiers, and received their volley
at a distance of a few yards. By a miracle he escaped with a wound on
the hip, and succeeded in fulfilling his mission.
Promoted to the rank of colonel, November 1, 1823, Cormier was
stationed at the Garrison at Rochefort at the outbreak of the
Revolution of July. Refusing to serve under the new _régime_, he sent
in his resignation to the Minister for War, August 5, 1830. This is the
last we hear of him. He died in a suburb of Paris.
His uncle, de Butler, after living for some time in Hamburg, where he
doubtless was regarded by the other _émigrés_ with suspicion by reason
of his intimate relations with Bourrienne, Minister to the Emperor,
returned to England, where he is lost sight of. He died at Gothenburg
in Sweden in 1815.
Bereft of his two sons, Comte Henri de Frotté remained in England
entirely alone for a time, but returned to France on the restoration
of the Bourbons, obtained the rank of _maréchal de camp_, and died
in Paris, February 28, 1823. An enthusiastic Royalist, active and
keen, the Comte de Frotté had never ceased to interest himself in the
welfare of the _émigrés_ in England, and came to be regarded as their
benefactor.
The career of Jean-Gabriel Peltier was of a more singular description.
This energetic pamphleteer had been editing in London ever since 1802
a journal entitled _L’Ambigu_, in which he unceasingly vented his
spleen against the “Premier Consul.” His violence went to such lengths
that in 1803, on the reiterated demand of the incensed Napoleon, he
was brought before an English tribunal. He was defended by the famous
counsel, James Mackintosh, and received only a mild sentence, with the
result that he left the court in triumph, and attained wide celebrity
throughout Europe over the affair. In addition to his newspaper work,
Peltier was interested in a number of publishing enterprises, which
helped to make a livelihood for him.
Some years later the Fates made him _chargé d’affaires_ to the Emperor
of Haïti. The amusement produced by this strange appointment may be
imagined. What made the thing still funnier was the fact that His
Haïtian Majesty paid his representative not in money but in kind,
transmitting to him cargoes of sugar and coffee. Peltier negotiated
these from time to time for the benefit of his creditors.
On the return of the Bourbons, Peltier returned to France, hoping,
like every one else, for his share of recompense, but only to be
disillusioned. He consoled himself with the reflection that if his King
treated him like a nigger, at least his nigger (the Emperor of Haïti!)
treated him like a king--
“Mon roi me traite comme un nègre
Mais mon nègre a son tour me traite comme un roi.”
Unfortunately, the “_nègre_” soon had enough of his epigrams, and
abandoned him, and this brought about his ruin. Haying lost all his
means of subsistence, he went back once more to Paris to implore pity
from the King, but in vain, and on March 29 he died miserably in an
attic in the Rue Montmartre, aged sixty-five.
APPENDIX
We print here a certain number of letters and documents found for the
most part among the unpublished papers of Lady Atkyns, not used in the
body of this book, yet too interesting to be entirely omitted. The
letters of the Princess de Tarente, in particular, seem to deserve
inclusion in their entirety.
_Letter from Jean-Gabriel Peltier to Lady Atkyns._
“London, January 1, 1803.
“I have the honour of sending you, Madame, a letter which I received
yesterday from my friend.[77] The ferment Paris is now in makes me
fear that he may have been obliged to leave the night of December
27-28, and it must have been very stormy.
“I have at last managed to get at Mr. Burke in the House of Commons.
He has promised me an interview at as early a date as possible. I
introduced M. Goguelat to him, and he seemed very glad to make his
acquaintance. He had been driving the evening before with M. de
Choiseul, Mr. Pitt, Lord Grenville, and Lord Loughborough, at Lord
Hawkesbury’s. We had time only for a word.
“I cannot close my letter, January 1, without sending you _à la
Française_, my good wishes for the New Year. I know well what the
object is that you yourself would wish most to see achieved.”
_Letter from Louis de Frotté to Lady Atkyns._
“London, December 10, 1794.
“Lovers and Ministers who don’t realize their opportunities often
regret them afterwards when they are gone, never to be found again.
This is what I fear is happening to us ... for your Government is
allowing precious days to pass by without profiting by them, and
by its dilatoriness may perhaps lose all the advantages that are
calculated to put an end to our troubles. Could you believe, dear
friend of mine, that it is proposed to put off the expedition for
some weeks!... However, I feel less disquieted over it all when I
reflect that we must have a great many supporters, and very powerful
ones, among those who are playing the _rôle_ of the enemy, for all
these troubles in the interior not to have produced more effect in the
Assembly. Indeed, if some advantage is not derived from this, those at
fault in the matter should be placed in a lunatic asylum. For myself,
without knowing Puisage, I should certainly give my vote for his
being made Constable if he succeeds in spite of all that can be said,
because it will be to him that the King will be under the greatest
obligations. And if any one were to ask me the name of the woman whom
the King has most reason to love, I should tell him to become my
rival, and should declare that, King though he was, he could never
repay the heart that has suffered so much for him.
“I have seen M. W[indham], and after giving me a number of evasive
replies, at last, on my insisting that I wanted to be off, he answered
rather warmly: ‘Oh, I can send you off at once if you like; but what
do you propose to do? I have nothing definite to put in your hands.
I have others to carry my packets, and I have no one except yourself
to carry out the mission I have in my mind for you. Do have a little
patience, and if you follow my advice you will be all right. Be sure
that I have my eye on you all the time.’ So you see I am still in this
state of suspense. If only you had been able to remain I should not
have found the time so long. Unable to get away to serve my King, I
should have consoled myself as much as possible in the presence of
Madame....”
_Letter from Reinhard, Representative of the Directoire in the
Hanseatic Towns, to the Foreign Minister, Delacroix._[78]
Very private.
Extract to be made for the
Directoire and Police;
name of Colleville to be
kept secret.
(14th Prairial) Altona. This 1st Prairial, Year IV. of
the French Republic,
Citizen Giraudet one and undivisible.
To be sent at once to (May 20th, 1796).
the Minister of Police.
“CITIZEN MINISTER,
“I hasten to reply to your despatch, dated the 20th floréal, which
accords remarkably with one I sent you from here on the 21st. It
even seems that we have had the same sources of inspiration, and
I shall not be surprised to find that the same Baron d’Auerweck,
whom I denounced to you, had been in his turn the denouncer of Le
Cormier. From the impressions I have been given of his character and
principles, it is quite possible. However that may be, I have lost no
time in having an interview with Colleville, who had already told me
of the arrival of the Bishop of Arras, and who then further informed
me (before he knew what my business with him was) that this person
had written to him yesterday that his arrival was postponed, and that
perhaps it would not take place at all, on account of the prolonged
stay of the King of Verona with Condé’s army. The King (Colleville
assured me) would not leave this army, as it had been averred that he
would.
“I began by telling Colleville that I had had a favourable reply from
you about his affairs. He assured me of his gratitude, and at once
spoke to me of his favourite idea of obtaining permission to serve you
elsewhere than at Hamburg--a very natural desire, whether one explains
it by his conviction that he would play a more active part somewhere
else, or by his possible apprehension that his relations with us may
be in the end discovered.
“I thought it better not to tell the man all I knew. I told him that
before leaving Hamburg he would have to throw some light upon the
things that were going on in that town; and I said enough to him to
explain what I meant and to put him on his mettle. He replied that
he knew nothing whatever of the meeting I had mentioned; that he was
sure that if there was a question of it, Le Cormier, whom he saw
every day, would have told him; and that the latter had been thinking
for some days past of going into the country with M. de Bloom (who
was formerly Danish Minister in Paris), but that it seemed that he
would not now go. He added that he knew enough of the emigrants at
Hamburg to be certain that, with the exception of Le Cormier, there
was not an enterprising man in the ‘Ancien Régime’ section; that if
such a plan had existed, he thought it was more than likely that the
King of Verona’s change of position would have caused another to be
substituted for it; and that, in any case, he would investigate and
explain, and might depend on his giving me all the information he
could get. He further said that the Prince of Carawey, whom he knew
privately, was expected at Hamburg from Lucerne within the fortnight,
and if there was anything to be learnt from him, he (Colleville) would
make it his business to learn it. I asked him what Lord Mc. Cartally
had come here for. He did not know. I hope that I shall have found out
whether he has left or not before the courier goes.
“In fact, Citizen Minister, Colleville’s absolute ignorance of the
meeting you speak of leads me to have some doubt of its reality. But I
shall not leave it at that. I have already taken measures to get hold
of my man, and also to have the plotters whom you indicate to me well
watched from other quarters. I am aware that with men of Colleville’s
stamp there is always the evil, if not of being spied on in our
turn--which is easily avoided with a little prudence--at any rate of
being given information with a double purpose. It was as such that I
regarded what he told me of a general plan of the _émigrés_, which was
to operate in the very heart of the Republic, and to re-establish the
Monarchy by the organs of the Law itself. He thought himself sure
of a man in the Legislative body (he told me his name was Madier).
He knew all the details of the system they were to follow, and the
details of the prosecution of the 2nd of September were actually to
enter into it. As to the 2nd of September, I answered, every Frenchman
regards it with horror, and the scoundrel ought to be punished. The
Government will certainly take care that an act of justice does not
become an anti-revolutionary instrument.
“Le Cormier has a brother-in-law called Buter (_sic_), who goes and
comes from Paris to Boulogne, Calais, and Dunkirk, carrying despatches
and money from England. Dr. Theil, who is settled in London, continues
to serve as go-between for the Princes’ correspondence. At Hamburg a
man named Thouvent does the business.
“The prime mover in the new Royalist manœuvres, and the designer of
the plan they are conducting in the interests of the Republic, is (so
Colleville says) the Duc de le Vanguyon. Maduron, that brother of de
la Garre, whom I once denounced to you, said that he had been arrested
once or twice at Paris, and taken before the police, but that he had
got out of it by means of his Swiss passport. It is certain that the
_émigrés_, when they talk of a journey to France, do not anticipate
any more dangers than if they were going from Hamburg to Altona. An
Abbé de Saint-Far, residing at Hamburg, has, it is said, a quantity
of arms in his house. I told you some time ago that he had contracted
for some millions of guns. I suppose it was at that time for England.
My next despatch, Citizen Minister, shall contain more positive
information on the matter you desire me to investigate. If the meeting
is actually to take place, I think I shall certainly be able to solve
the problem you suggest to me.
“Greetings and respects,
“REINHARD.”
_Letter of the Princess de Tarente to Lady Atkyns._
“St. Petersburg, August 14-25, 1797.
“To-day, dearest Charlotte, is, by the old style, the birthday of the
King of France, and also that of one of his most devoted, though
least useful subjects--myself. This month is one of sad memories. It
was in this month that _her_ birthday also fell; that she left the
Tuileries and entered the Temple prison; indeed, August is filled
with dates unforgettable at all times to the faithful, remembered the
more poignantly when the day itself recalls them. I had your letter
yesterday: it gave me pleasure, dear Charlotte. When I read it I was
nearly asleep, for it was three in the morning, and I had come back
from a stupid ball that I had been obliged to go to.
“You are always talking to me about a diary, my dear, but I have not
the courage to tell you the wretched history of my life. I am just a
machine wound up. I go on for ever, but without pleasure or interest
in what I do. I live on in anguish, and my letters would be very
doleful if they were a faithful portrait of myself; but we are so
far apart, my dear, you and I, and letters pass through so very many
hands, that we must only guess at one another’s meaning--we cannot
speak out. You know my heart--it will always be the same, and despite
appearances, my feelings have not altered, I swear to you. But one has
to be careful, when one can’t speak face to face. It is a sacrifice;
but who has not sacrifices to make? How many I’ve made in the last two
months! I’ve left everything to come to a country where I know nobody.
Here I am friendless among strangers; naturally I am criticised, and
severely. All the kindness of LL.MM.II. has aroused great expectations
in society; I feel that, and, shy as I always am, I get shyer and
shyer. But indeed I ought to be grateful, for I am received and
treated with consideration by many people here; they take a pleasure
in showing their admiration for my conduct. My conduct! Ah! when fate
brought one into contact with _Her_, was it possible to help adoring
her? What merit was there in being faithful to Her, when one could not
possibly have been anything else?
“I am sorry, dear Charlotte, for all the worries that the storm caused
you on shore; to tell the truth, I felt best at sea. Do believe that
I am not a coward, and that I was scarcely frightened at all. The
weather was rough only twice, when we were entering the Cattegat,
before the Sound; I think it must have been a tribute to the shock
caused by the encounter of the two seas. Then on Friday, or rather
Thursday the 27th, when we were arriving at Cronstadt, the weather
was very bad, and I must confess that that evening and night I did
feel uneasy. It wasn’t cowardice. The captain himself was anxious,
and, indeed, the heavy rain and the darkness of the night, besides the
number of small rocks that stick out of the water here, and could not
be seen at all on account of the darkness, made our situation pretty
serious, I assure you. Thank Heaven, though, I got on very well.
When the captain came to say we were at anchor, I felt a wonderful
gladness, and yet, all of a sudden, I began to cry, for I could not
help saying to myself: ‘Yes, I’m here! And what have I come for? Where
shall I find any friends?’
“Well, Heaven has not forsaken me. If it had not found friends for
me, at any rate it _has_ found benefactors, and I am as comfortable
as I could possibly have expected to be. At Court, while I stayed
there, every one, beginning at the very top, was eager to show me
respect and interest; and, here in the town, many people help to make
my life happy and tranquil. There are little groups in which I am
certain I shall enjoy myself when I am more at my ease. I am received
most cordially and flatteringly; it seems a kindly, quiet sort of
set; every one is eager to be nice to me, and there are not too many
people. Ease, without which there is no such thing as society, is the
dominant note in this set. But, Charlotte dear, don’t imagine that
I’m already devoted to these folk. I shall never care deeply for any
one again, nor make any other close friendship. It was _She_ who drew
us together, Charlotte; my love for you shall be my last and dearest
devotion, I promise you. Good-bye, my dear; I think of you a thousand
times a day; I am happy now, for I am doing something for you, and
to prove my love for you is one of the ways to make me happy. If you
see H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, lay my respectful homage at his feet,
and tell him that my prayers follow him always. Yesterday I bought a
carriage which is really quite new, and yet it only cost me 115 louis;
I drove to my ball in it last night (about 13 miles from here) over a
pavement that no one could imagine if they had not driven over it! My
dear, in one minute I spent as much money as I did in the whole of the
last year I lived in England. I use only four horses, and that shows
how moderate I am, for a lady in my position ought not to have less
than six. They threaten me with having to order the ‘St. Catherine’
liveries, which would cost 1200 roubles, that is, 150 louis. Compare
this picture, dear Charlotte, with that of two months ago, when, with
my linen frock tucked up under my arm, I was going about alone in the
streets, knocking at Charlotte’s door--and now, driving about in my
own carriage, drawn by four horses, with two lackeys behind, dressed
out, feathers in my hair--in short, a lady of fashion! Doesn’t it seem
like a dream, Charlotte? I assure you it does to me; and I assure you
also, my dear, that the idea of coming seemed impossible--this world
is not like the one we lived in then. The sacrifice was necessary; it
had to be made; that was inevitable for both of us. I believed, at any
rate, that I had to make it; and every minute I congratulate myself on
having done so. Adieu! I hope you will have noticed the date of one
of my letters; I am the more particular about this, since receiving
yours of yesterday. Send my letters under cover to M. Withworth, your
Minister here; and don’t let them be quite so thick, so as not to tax
your Government too severely.
* * * * *
“P.S.--A thousand loving remembrances to your mother and your son.
What a mania for marriage you’ve got, all of a sudden, and where are
all your husbands? You hid them very well from me, for a whole year.
I never beheld one of them; and you have two, my dear! I _had_ a good
laugh, I can tell you! What are their names? And when is either of the
two marriages to come off?”
St. Petersburg, October 15, 1797.
“I am alone to-day, my Charlotte; a year ago this very day I was with
you; I had the relief of speech, but I could not feel more deeply
than I do now the terrible anniversary which this shameful day marks
for us. At this hour we were on the Richmond Road. Yes, Charlotte
dear, I am thinking sadly of _her_, whom I loved more than all the
world besides, to whom I would have sacrificed anything. That thought
is my one solace now; that thought stays with me still, the thought
of _Her_, of _Her alone_.... It is eleven o’clock now. Where was
_She_ then? I evoke it all--the whole scene, afresh; I have read
again the lamentable story of her final sufferings, and my heart is
oppressed--I feel almost crazy--I know not what I want to say! I
assure you, Charlotte, that it makes me happier to tell you all this;
particularly to-day, when I’m so miserable, my friendship with you is
a consolation--ah! you see I cannot write coherently. I feel so ill I
wish I could talk to somebody, and tell them about myself; but how can
I? There is no one at all to listen to me. For who can understand all
that we feel about _her_? No one, no one. It’s better to say nothing,
and I have said nothing; I haven’t spoken of the anniversary, not even
to M. de C. If I wasn’t feeling so serious, I’d tell you that he bores
me to death. He’s the most exacting creature in the world, and I am
only sorry that I brought him with me. He has done not a bit of good
here, and he is going back to you. Don’t tell him that I’ve spoken of
him like this; he would be horrified. Now enough of him!
“For a whole week I’ve been thinking sadly of to-morrow. The little
circle of people I know best were to play a little comedy for the King
of Poland. I thought that the 16th was the day they had fixed on.
The idea came into my head at a party--a supper-party, on Thursday
evening, at the Prince Kowakin’s. I never like to speak of my feelings
and my memories; one must suffer in silence. I was quite determined
not to go, Charlotte; you won’t, I hope, imagine that I debated _that_
for a moment; but I was worried, for I didn’t quite know how I was
going to get out of it without saying why. A lady, who is always very
very kind to me, saw by my face that I was unhappy about something.
‘What is it, _chou_?’ she said to me. ‘You’re sad.’ I said, ‘Oh no!
it’s nothing.’ ‘But I see you; I see there’s something wrong.’ And
at last I _had_ to tell her.... The little entertainment came off
yesterday. It was charming, but it made me so sad that I could not
hide my sadness. All things of that kind have a most curious effect
upon me quite different from what they have of other people. Still, I
must admit (the Comedy was well acted, by people whom I see a great
deal of), I was interested--very much insulted; and yet, when it
was over, there was nothing but melancholy in my heart. I came home
to bed, and to thoughts of Her and you; and this morning, I had an
immense letter from you which I’ll answer to-morrow. I have read it;
and I was very near being late for a long long mass--it took two
hours. This evening, I had intended to spend here, all by myself. I
refused a supper invitation from a kind young woman of whom M. de Cl.
will tell you; and I meant to return here. Another lady (the one I
mentioned first) sent her husband to tell me that she was ill, and
that she would be alone and would I not come? So when I had been to
a tea-party that I was engaged for, I did go there, but indeed I was
very sad, and more silent than usual. (How people can treat me as they
do in this country, I don’t know--they are certainly most kind). I
was determined, at any rate, to leave the party before ten o’clock.
They tried to prevent me, but I insisted. At ten o’clock I put on my
gloves, but they said: ‘You shan’t go!’ and at last the mistress of
the house, thinking of what I had confided to her a couple of days
before, said to me: ‘What day is to-day?’... Seeing that she had
guessed, I said, turning away with my poor heart swelling: ‘Don’t
speak to me of the day!’... I came back here alone to weep for my
Queen, and to implore God to make me worthy to be with her again, and
that soon--if he will indeed permit me to see her again, where _she_
surely is. I have much to atone for--I feel it, know it; but I _do_ in
truth even now atone for much. I swear to you, Charlotte, I have never
dared to put into words with you what you speak of to me to-day,--and
with an ‘_again_’ underlined. Do you think that _I_ wished it to be
so--tell me, _do_ you? No, no; Charlotte could never think that! If
I _did_ ever tell you, Charlotte, all that I could tell you, it’s
because I love you with all my heart, and because I’m sad, and haunted
by memories.... To-morrow, I shall be alone all day; I won’t see my
brother-in-law, or any one else. My door will be fast shut, and I
shall return to you, and tell you all I am feeling.”
St. Petersburg, October 16, 1797.
“The date, my dear Charlotte, will be enough to tell you what I am
mournfully thinking of. I began my day by going to church to hear a
mass for Her; and to listen there to those dear sacred names of Hers.
The mass was said by two Trappists, and I was very sorry that I had
not asked the Abbé to say it.... What odd incidents there are in the
history of our revolution! I await the portrait with a respectful
interest, and I thank you in advance for all the pleasure it will give
me. Ah, my dear Charlotte, what a sad day! My heart aches so deeply
and feels so heavy that it’s as if I were carrying a load, and if I
don’t think clearly, I am soon enough reminded of everything by the
pain of it. I can’t speak of anything but Her. To-day is mail-day; so
I must defer until next time my answer to your last letter, for I must
go and talk about her to some other friends, who loved her too. I have
the dress, and it’s charming. That’s all I can say about it, Adieu. I
love you for Her and for yourself, with all my heart.”
St. Petersburg, October 16, 1797.
“When I stopped writing to you last night, I went to bed and to rest
my poor head. I read for half an hour that lovely romance of _Paul
and Virginia_. My candle went out. Just like that, four years ago,
some hours earlier--one of the world’s choicest treasures went out
to.... I gave myself up to sad thoughts; I imagined to myself all
that she, so lowly tormented, must have suffered then. But somehow I
fell asleep, and I slept on until the fatal hour when _She_ must have
realized how few more hours were left to her on that earth where she
was so worshipped. All my thoughts were fixed on her, I lay awake
for several hours in great agitation; then I went to sleep again,
and at eight o’clock I was awakened so as to go to hear the mass
where her loved name should fall once more upon my ears. I set off,
accompanied by a French nobleman, whom I love and esteem, because he
regrets his Sovereigns as I do. His kind heart comforted mine; the
time I spent with him instilled solace into my soul, and I was not so
unhappy when I came back from mass. I constantly read over with him
all that I have written, especially all that I remember _her_ having
said in and before the days of her long martyrdom. He will put it
all in order, and make these fragments as interesting as they ought
to be. I was interrupted in this occupation by a man who belongs to
this place, and whom I met in France, when LL.MM.II. came there to
see the objects of my love and sorrow. This man--whom I like better
than any other I have met here--has given me a thousand proofs of
his interest in me, which I prize as coming from a heart like his.
He knew the anniversary, and spoke to me reverently of it; he is the
only person I have seen to-day. But my dear Charlotte, I must shut out
all extraneous thoughts and think only that She exists no more, and
that her end was hastened by the villany and foul revenge of human
beings, formerly her subjects, formerly her worshippers, beings with
hearts--no! they had no hearts, since they shed ... since they put an
end to that existence ... when her rank, her character, her face....
“Last year I was with you all through this day; we wept together for
the Queen of Love; to-day, alone with my sad heart, I can only write
to you. Distance separates our bodies; but our souls and our thoughts
and our feelings are the same, and I know that Charlotte and Louise
are together to-day.”
* * * * *
_After dinner._
“I dined alone. I ate little, Charlotte. Last year, I dined at your
bedside, and I remember that when our dinner had been served, you told
me an anecdote about the little Prince which made me cry. This year I
did not cry at dinner; but I felt even sadder than I had felt then.
The solitude and isolation, and the want of intimate friends, made me
doubly sad. But I must not let myself think of myself. A voice ordered
me to do as I did and I was bound to follow it--’twas the voice of
Right and Well-doing.”
* * * * *
_Before going to bed._
“I want to talk to you one moment longer about this sad day, now that
it is wrapped in night’s shadows. The crime is committed, and I bury
it in the bottom of my heart; the memory of it lives there for ever;
but I will speak no more of it, Charlotte. All to-day I was Her’s
alone; I forgot every one else, and I lived only for my old friends,
just as if I were not in Russia at all. M. de Crussol came while I
was at supper, and at half-past eleven he told me, without my in the
least wanting to know, where he had supped....”
* * * * *
_Morning of the 17th._
“Many things have happened to distract me since I came here, my
Charlotte, as you may see from the fact of my having written to you
on the tenth, 7th August, without noticing the date. I should never
forgive myself for it, if I had really forgotten, if those events had
not been as present to my poor heart as they always are, and always
will be, I should be angry with myself; and I should tell you the
truth quite frankly, even if I were to lose by doing so what I should
not wish to have on false pretences--but that fault (if it was one)
was not through want of heart. No! I can answer for my heart; it is
good and true. Since you wished it, I wish I had written to you on
St. Louis’ day; but I would swear that I never _did_ write to you
unless it was mail-day; and that that was the first time I wrote to
you several days running. The sad circumstance was certainly enough
for one to do something out of the way. Don’t scold me, if you can
help it. You’re really too fond of scolding. To-day it’s about a
watch; the next, about yourself! My dear, you are very good at curing
one of little fancies; you’ve quite cured me of mine for my little
watch, and I no longer think at all of the pleasure it used to give
me; but only of what it gives you, since it comes from me. You must
admit that that’s a very nice way of speaking about a sacrifice, for I
won’t conceal from you that it _was_ one for me. And as to your watch,
Charlotte, I think the watchmaker must have sold it--I’ve been vainly
asking for it, for the last six weeks. When you write several sheets
_do_ number them....”
“St. Petersburg, November 6 (1797).
“Mr. Keith has arrived, my dear Charlotte, and the morning of the very
day of his arrival (Friday) he sent me your letters; and this evening
he sent the case, which I think charming, especially the top. I assure
you that it gave me intense pleasure; but what sacrifice have you made
me--where did you get all that hair? It can’t be of recent cutting;
there are so few white hairs that I should scarcely recognize them for
those dear tresses. In London you showed me only a tiny bit. Where
did you get these? I thank you most gratefully for such a sacrifice;
I confess that it would have been beyond me, and so I feel all the
more grateful. I’m so afraid of breaking either of the glasses; the
case is so high. I must have seen her like that, but I do not remember
it; the earliest memory I have of her is seeing her twenty-one years
ago at some races; and I remember her dress better than her charming
face. The copy is very well done, and I have had the pleasure of
examining it twice. It was given to me by artificial light, and next
day it seemed quite different, the daylight improved it ever so much;
I thank you a thousand times. It is the most delightful gift I could
have had. The cameo is very pretty. I imagine it would fain be your
portrait, and is really the portrait of Thor’s daughter; she is rather
elongated, poor little lady, but apparently the qualities of her heart
atone for the defects of her face. My dear, you’re mad with your
‘fashions’! Let me tell you that, except when I go to Court, I’m just
as I was in London, almost always in black-and-white linen gown. All
the women, you know, dress themselves up, if you please, nearly every
day. I never cared about that kind of thing--indeed, I detested it;
and having to dress myself up four times a week makes me incredibly
lazy on the days that, with joy untold, I can rest from all that
bother. My friends are always laughing at me for my dowdiness--so you
see what I’ve come to. As to having to wear warm clothing in Russia,
as you think one has, you are quite mistaken. Once inside the street
door, the houses are so warm that a very thin dress is by far the best
to wear. So muslin is better than warm materials. One has to wear
fur-cloaks, and well padded ones too, when one is going out, even from
one house to another. That is necessary here; but indoors one would be
suffocated in padded clothes. I used to think the same as you. I had
a dress made in London, and I’ve only worn it once or twice, and then
I thought I would die of heat; so you see it will hang in my wardrobe
for a long time.
“Yes, I like caricatures; why not? I don’t see anything wrong about
them. And I don’t care whether they’re of Bonaparte, or any other of
those gentlemen. To tell you the truth, I wish they would do something
worse to them than only make fun of them; but now, with the way Lord
Nelson of the Nile has disposed of Bonaparte, one certainly can have a
good laugh at him. _He_ doesn’t carry the austerity of his principles
as far as you do, my dear Charlotte.
“I shall have the inscription of the Queen’s portrait changed;
her name is wrong. It ought to be ‘M. A. de Lorraine, Archduchess
of Austria.’ The portrait is charming, but all the same it is not
the Queen _we_ knew; and I loved her so much better than when that
portrait was done. Adorable lady! She was always beautiful and sweet.
My dear, I’m ashamed to say I’ve forgotten to tell you that the
portrait, though it didn’t come on our day of mourning, did arrive on
November 2, her natal day. I thought of Her all day long; and when Mr.
Keith came, it quite distracted me, for everything that reminds me of
England puts me in such a state of mind. I talked to him about the
case; and he tells me that he had given it to the captain and begged
him to put it in his pocket, and that he was to see him again in the
afternoon. Imagine my uneasiness and impatience! I made a lackey wait
at my house all day, and about eight o’clock the precious case was
brought to me. I thank you for it with all my heart. I wish I could
send you something as precious, but I haven’t an idea what to send.
For the rest, I haven’t got anything, not even the black glass for
my friend. My dear Charlotte, you will never cure yourself of giving
little _coups de patte_; you know that I never guess anything; but
still...! That black glass must be for some one who draws, and since I
take the trouble of doing your commissions, it must be for some one I
like. Adieu, my dear! Forgive this small reflection. But though you’re
so used to liberty, you don’t allow me many liberties, I think. Well,
it’s better to give them back than to have them stolen--and so I do,
you see! A thousand kisses!”
_Letter from Count Henri de Frotté to Lady Atkyns._
“Tuesday, January 1, 1805.
“Nobody does you more justice than I do, madame; nobody reveres you
more. The devotion which the French people displayed during the
Revolution was no more than their duty. They owed the sacrifice of
their lives to the cause of the restoration of the Monarchy, and of
order to the country.
“But you, madam, a native of England, _you_, with your feeling heart,
have undertaken for this just cause more than could have been hoped
for from a lady, and a lady who was a foreigner, and whom nothing
bound in any way to our sovereigns, our country, and our troubles. By
risking your life, as you have done several times, you have acquired a
right to the respectful gratitude of all honourable Frenchmen.
“My own present troubles may make me more unhappy in certain
circumstances, but shall never make me unjust. Appearances may be
against me. On your return I shall open my heart to you, and you shall
judge. All I can say here is, that I have lost everything. I have a
son still, but he is in the enemy’s chains, and that enemy has means
of intelligence everywhere, which informs him both of what is and of
what is not. I ought to be more circumspect than others; but, all the
same, no consideration shall prevent me from keeping my promises. If
I meet unjust men as I go along, so much the worse for the master
whom they serve, and for the faithful subjects who may have relations
with them, particularly in these critical times. What I now have the
honour to write to you, will be an enigma to you for the present. I
will explain to you when you return, but I think I may presume that
your discernment will have given you an indication to the solution.
No, madam, it was not because the money was not delivered to me at
the time you arranged that I had ceased to ask for it. I remember
very well that you were kind enough to say you would lend the 200
francs which I asked you for, if it was possible for you to do so.
The impulse which moved me in that matter was natural in an unhappy
father, deserted and mourned for by those who ought to have protected
him. I added, in speaking to you then, that I had inherited some means
from my father, which would put me in a position to be able to pay
this debt; but that heritage was in reality such a small affair I dare
not run the risk of embarrassing my friends if God were to cut short
my career. And _that_ is why I ask you not to do anything further in
that affair.
“Accept my deep regrets for having troubled you at a moment which must
be so painful to you. I have shared your too-just regrets, and all
through my life I shall sympathize with anything that concerns your
affections. It is the natural consequence of my respectful and undying
attachment for the friend of my unfortunate son.
“My friend assures you of his respect, and of the sympathy he felt in
the cruel loss which you have suffered.”
_Will of Lady Atkyns._
“January 6, 1835.
“I, Charlotte Atkyns, give to Victoire Ilh, my maid-servant,
at present in my service, all effects of furniture, linen,
wearing-apparel and silver that I possess; and, generally, all objects
which may be found in my room, in my house, or lodging, at the date
of my decease, whatever they may be; and also my carriage. I give
moreover to the said Victoire Ilh, the sum of £120 sterling, which is
due to me to-day from Nathaliel William Peach, of 13, Saville Street,
London, and of Ketteringham in the County of Norfolk, or from his
heirs, which sum shall be payed on demand to the said Victoire Ilh,
after my decease. I further give to Victoire Ilh the sum of £1000
sterling, which shall be paid to her within three months of my death.
“I charge these gifts on the Norfolk property, which is at present
in the possession of the said Nathaliel W. Peach as a guarantee for
all my debts, I having mortgaged the said property in favour of my
sister-in-law, the late Mary Atkyns, for £18,000 sterling, and in
addition for an annuity of £500 sterling payable quarterly each year;
and as in consequence the freehold belongs to me, I charge it with the
payment of my lawful debts, and of my funeral expenses.
“I desire that my body be taken to Ketteringham and interred in the
family vault; and that my name and age be inscribed on a plain marble
stone, near the monument of my late dear son. I have mentioned in
another will the names of some friends from whom I beg acceptance of
some souvenirs of my consideration and esteem. I give the box which I
have left with Messrs. Barnard and Co., N. Bankers, Cornhill, London,
to Mr. Nathaliel W. Peach. It contains some pieces of silver. I left
it there, I think, on November 10, 1832. I give the freehold of all
my properties in Norfolk to Nathaliel W. Peach for the payment of all
charges and debts, present and future. I give £100 sterling to my
servant, Jean-Baptiste Erard, native of Switzerland, who has served me
faithfully for five years, and whose conduct has always been regular.
As to that of Victoire Ilh, ever since she came into my service,
it has been beyond all praise. This girl was not born to wait upon
others; she belonged to a very respectable family of Munich. I appoint
Nathaliel W. Peach my executor. I request that immediately after my
death the Counsel for the British Embassy, Mr. Okey (or whoever may be
Counsel at the time) be sent for; and I desire him to be good enough
to act for Mr. Nathaliel W. Peach here at Paris.
“In the name of God, I sign the present testament.”
FOOTNOTES:
[77] Baron d’Auerweck.
[78] Note in Lady Atkyns’ handwriting at the foot of a letter from
Cormier, dated June 3, 1795.
THE END
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.
Transcriber’s Notes
A few minor inconsistencies or omissions in punctuation have been
corrected.
Page 26: “pot which had been arranged” changed to “plot which had been
arranged”
Page 149: “Mme. de Tarante” changed to “Mme. de Tarente”
Page 172: “for his on first attempt” changed to “for on his first
attempt”
Page 194: “of Rothemburg” changed to “of Rothenburg”
Page 214: “the year 1604” changed to “the year 1804”
Page 246: “made be doubly sad” changed to “made me doubly sad”