_State of Parties in Paris--Royalists--Revolutionists--Buonapartists
--Talleyrand--Chateaubriand--Mission to the Allied Sovereigns--Their
answer--Efforts of the Buonapartists--Feelings of the lowest
classes--of the middling ranks--Neutrality of the National
Guard--Growing confidence of the Royalists--Proclamations and White
Cockades--Crowds assemble at the Boulevards--The Allies are received
with shouts of welcome--Their Army retires to quarters--and the
Cossacks bivouac in the Champs Elysées._
The battle was fought and won; but it remained a high and doubtful
question in what way the victory was to be improved, so as to produce
results of far greater consequence than usually follow from the mere
military occupation of an enemy's capital. While the mass of the
inhabitants were at rest, exhausted by the fatigues and anxieties of the
day, many secret conclaves, on different principles, were held in the
city of Paris, upon the night after the assault. Some of these even yet
endeavoured to organise the means of resistance, and some to find out
what modern policy has called a _Mezzo-termine_, some third expedient,
between the risk of standing by Napoleon, and that of recalling the
banished family.
The only middle mode which could have succeeded, would have been a
regency under the Empress; and Fouché's Memoirs state, that if he had
been in Paris at the time, he might have succeeded in establishing a new
order of things upon such a basis. The assertion may be safely disputed.
To Austria such a plan might have had some recommendations; but to the
sovereigns and statesmen of the other allied nations, the proposal would
only have appeared a device to obtain immediate peace, and keep the
throne, as it were, in commission, that Buonaparte might ascend it at
his pleasure.[23]
[Sidenote: PARTIES IN PARIS.]
We have the greatest doubts whether, among the ancient chiefs of the
Revolution, most of whom had, as hackneyed tools, lost credit in the
public eye, both by want of principle and political inconsistency, there
remained any who could have maintained a popular interest in opposition
to that of the Royalists on the one hand, and the Buonapartists on the
other. The few who remained steady to their democratic principles,
Napoleon had discredited and thrown into the shade; and he had rendered
many of the others still more inefficient, by showing that they were
accessible to bribery and to ambition, and that ancient demagogues
could, without much trouble, be transmuted into supple and obsequious
courtiers. Their day of power and interest was past, and the exaggerated
vehemence of their democratic opinions had no longer any effect on the
lower classes, who were in a great proportion attached to the empire.
The Royalists, on the other hand, had been long combining and extending
their efforts and opinions, which gained, chiefly among the higher
orders, a sort of fashion which those of the democrats had lost.
Talleyrand was acceptable to them as himself noble by birth; and he knew
better than any one how to apply the lever to unfasten the deep
foundations of Napoleon's power. Of his address, though not successful
in the particular instance, Las Cases gives us a curious specimen.
Talleyrand desired to sound the opinion of Decrès, about the time of the
crisis of which we are treating. He drew that minister towards the
chimney, and opening a volume of Montesquieu, said, as if in the tone of
an ordinary conversation, "I found a passage here this morning, which
struck me in an extraordinary manner. Here it is, in such a book and
chapter, page so and so: _When a prince has raised himself above all
laws, when his tyranny becomes insupportable, there remains nothing to
the oppressed subject except----_"
"It is quite enough," said Decrès, placing his hand upon Talleyrand's
mouth, "I will hear no more. Shut your book." And Talleyrand closed the
book, as if nothing remarkable had happened.[24]
An agent of such extraordinary tact was not frequently baffled, in a
city, and at a time, when so many were, from hope, fear, love, hatred,
and all the other strongest passions, desirous, according to the Roman
phrase, of a new state of things. He had been unceasingly active, and
eminently successful, in convincing the Royalists, that the King must
purchase the recovery of his authority by consenting to place the
monarchy on a constitutional footing; and in persuading another class,
that the restoration of the Bourbons was the most favourable chance for
the settlement of a free system of government. Nor did this accomplished
politician limit his efforts to those who had loyalty to be awakened,
and a love of liberty to be rekindled, but extended them through a
thousand ramifications, through every class of persons. To the bold he
offered an enterprise requiring courage; to the timid (a numerous class
at the time) he showed the road of safety; to the ambitious, the
prospect of gaining power; to the guilty, the assurance of indemnity and
safety. He had inspired resolution even into the councils of the allies.
A note from him to the Emperor Alexander, in the following words, is
said to have determined that prince to persevere in the march upon
Paris. "You venture nothing," said this laconic billet, "when you may
safely venture every thing--Venture once more."
It is not to be supposed that Talleyrand wrought in this deep intrigue
without active coadjutors. The Abbé de Pradt, whose lively works have so
often given some interest to our pages, was deeply involved in the
transactions of that busy period, and advocated the cause of the
Bourbons against that of his former master. Bournonville and other
senators were engaged in the same cabals.
[Sidenote: PROCLAMATION OF THE ALLIES.]
The Royalists, on their own part, were in the highest state of activity,
and prepared to use their utmost exertions to obtain the mastery of the
public spirit. At this most critical moment all was done, by Monsieur de
Chateaubriand, which eloquence could effect, to appeal to the
affections, perhaps even the prejudices of the people, in his celebrated
pamphlet, entitled, "Of Buonaparte and the Bourbons." This vigorous and
affecting comparison between the days when France was in peace and
honour under her own monarchs, contrasted with those in which Europe
appeared in arms under her walls, had been written above a month, and
the manuscript was concealed by Madame de Chateaubriand in her bosom. It
was now privately printed. So was a proclamation by Monsieur, made in
the name of his brother, the late King of France. Finally, in a private
assembly of the principal Royalists, amongst whom were the illustrious
names of Rohan, Rochefoucault, Montmorency, and Noailles, it was
resolved to send a deputation to the allied sovereigns, to learn, if
possible, their intention. Monsieur Douhet, the gentleman intrusted with
this communication, executed his mission at the expense of considerable
personal danger, and returned into Paris with the answer, that the
allies had determined to avoid all appearance of dictating to France
respecting any family or mode of government, and that although they
would most joyfully and willingly acknowledge the Bourbons, yet it could
only be in consequence of a public declaration in their favour. At the
same time Monsieur Douhet was furnished with a proclamation of the
allies, signed Schwartzenberg, which, without mentioning the Bourbons,
was powerfully calculated to serve their cause. It declared the friendly
intention of the allies towards France, and represented the power of the
government which now oppressed them, as the only obstacle to instant
peace. The allied sovereigns, it was stated, sought but to see a
salutary government in France, who would cement the friendly union of
all nations. It belonged to the city of Paris to pronounce their
opinion, and accelerate the peace of the world.[25]
Furnished with this important document, which plainly indicated the
private wishes of the allies, the Royalists resolved to make an effort
on the morning of March 31st. It was at first designed they should
assemble five hundred gentlemen in arms; but this plan was prudently
laid aside, and they determined to relinquish all appearance of force,
and address the citizens only by means of persuasion.
In the meantime, the friends of the imperial government were not idle.
The conduct of the lower classes, during the battle on the heights, had
assumed an alarming character. For a time they had listened with a sort
of stupified terror to the distant thunders of the fight, beheld the
wounded and fugitives crowd in at the barriers, and gazed in useless
wonder on the hurried march of troops moving out in haste to reinforce
the lines. At length, the numerous crowds which assembled in the
Boulevards and, particularly in the streets near the Palais Royal,
assumed a more active appearance. There began to emerge from the suburbs
and lanes those degraded members of the community, whose slavish labour
is only relieved by coarse debauchery, invisible for the most part to
the more decent classes of society, but whom periods of public calamity
or agitation bring into view, to add to the general confusion and
terror. They gather in times of public danger, as birds of ill omen and
noxious reptiles are said to do at the rising of a tropical hurricane;
and their fellow-citizens look with equal disgust and dread upon faces
and figures, as strange to them as if they had issued from some distant
and savage land. Paris, like every great metropolis, has her share, and
more than her share, of this unwholesome population. It was the frantic
convocations of this class which had at once instigated and carried into
effect the principal horrors of the Revolution, and they seemed now
resolved to signalize its conclusion by the destruction of the capital.
Most of these banditti were under the influence of Buonaparte's police,
and were stimulated by the various arts which his emissaries employed.
At one time horsemen galloped through the crowd, exhorting them to take
arms, and assuring them that Buonaparte had already attacked the rear of
the allies. Again they were told that the King of Prussia was made
prisoner, with a column of 10,000 men. At other times, similar
emissaries, announcing that the allies had entered the suburbs, and were
sparing neither sex nor age, exhorting the citizens, by placards pasted
on the walls, to shut their shops, and prepare to defend their houses.
This invitation to make the last earthly sacrifices in behalf of a
military despot, to which Zaragossa had submitted in defence of her
national independence, was ill received by the inhabitants. A free state
has millions of necks, but a despotic government is in the situation
desired by the Imperial tyrant--it has but one. When it was obvious that
the Emperor Napoleon had lost his ascendency, no shop-keeper in Paris
was fool enough to risk, in his cause, his shop, his family, and his
life, or to consent to measures for preserving the capital, which were
to commence by abandoning to the allied troops, and the scum of their
own population, all that was, to him individually, worth fighting for.
The placards we have mentioned were pulled down, therefore, as fast as
they were pasted up; and there was an evident disposition, on the part
of the better class of citizens and the national guards, to discourage
all counsels which tended to stimulate resistance to the desperate
extremity therein recommended.
Nevertheless, the state of the capital continued very alarming, the
lower classes exhibiting alternately the symptoms of panic terror, of
fury, and of despair. They demanded arms, of which a few were
distributed to them; and there is no doubt, that had Napoleon arrived
among them in the struggle, there would have been a dreadful battle, in
which Paris, in all probability, would have shared the fate of Moscow.
But when the cannonade ceased, when the flight of Joseph, and the
capitulation of the city became publicly known, this conflict of jarring
passions died away into silence, and the imperturbable and impassive
composure of the national guard maintained the absolute tranquillity of
the metropolis.
On the morning of the 31st, the Royalists were seen in groups in the
Place Louis Quinze, the Garden of the Tuileries, the Boulevards, and
other public places. They distributed the proclamations of the allies,
and raised the long-forgotten cry of _Vive le Roi!_ At first, none save
those engaged in the perilous experiment, durst echo back a signal so
dangerous; but by degrees the crowds increased, the leaders got on
horseback, and distributed white cockades, lilies, and other emblems of
loyalty, displaying banners, at the same time, made out of their own
handkerchiefs. The ladies of their party came to their assistance. The
Princess of Leon, Vicomtesse of Chateaubriand, Comtesse of Choiseuil,
and other women of rank, joined the procession, distributing on all
hands the emblems of their party, and tearing their dress to make white
cockades, when the regular stock was exhausted. The better class of the
bourgeois began to catch the flame, and remembered their old royalist
opinions, and by whom they were defeated on the celebrated day of the
Sections, when Buonaparte laid the foundation of his fame in the
discomfiture of the national guard. Whole pickets began to adopt the
white, instead of the three-coloured cockade; yet the voices were far
from unanimous, and, on many points, parties of different principles met
and skirmished together in the streets. But the tendency to discord was
diverted, and the attention of the Parisians, of all classes and
opinions, suddenly fixed upon the imposing and terrible spectacle of the
army of the allies, which now began to enter the city.
[Sidenote: ENTRANCE OF THE ALLIES.]
The sovereigns had previously received, at the village of Pantin, the
magistrates of Paris, and Alexander had expressed himself in language
still more explicit than that of their proclamation. He made war, he
said, on Napoleon alone; one who had been his friend, but relinquished
that character to become his enemy, and inflict on his empire great
evils. He was not, however, come to retaliate those injuries, but to
make a secure peace with any government which France might select for
herself. "I am at peace," said the Emperor, "with France, and at war
with Napoleon alone."
These gracious expressions were received with the more gratitude by the
citizens of Paris, that they had been taught to consider the Russian
prince as a barbarous and vindictive enemy. The measure of restoring the
Bourbons seemed now to be regarded by almost every one, not particularly
connected with the dynasty of Napoleon, like a haven on the leeward,
unexpectedly open to a tempest-tossed and endangered vessel. There was
no loss of honour in adopting it, since the French received back their
own royal family--there was no compulsion, since they received them upon
their own free choice. They escaped from a great and imminent danger, as
if it had been by a bridge of gold.
An immense crowd filled the Boulevards (a large wide open promenade,
which, under a variety of distinctive names, forms a circuit round the
city,) in order to witness the entrance of the allied sovereigns and
their army, whom, in the succession of four-and-twenty hours, this
mutable people were disposed to regard as friends rather than enemies--a
disposition which increased until it amounted to enthusiasm for the
persons of those princes, against whom a bloody battle had been fought
yesterday under the walls of Paris, in evidence of which mortal strife,
there still remained blackening in the sun the unburied thousands who
had fallen on both sides. There was in this a trait of national
character. A Frenchman submits with a good grace, and apparent or real
complaisance, to that which he cannot help; and it is not the least
advantage of his philosophy, that it entitles him afterwards to plead,
that his submission flowed entirely from good-will, and not from
constraint. Many of those who, on the preceding day, were forced to fly
from the heights which defend Paris, thought themselves at liberty next
morning to maintain, that the allies had entered the capital only by
their consent and permission, because they had joined in the plaudits
which accompanied their arrival. To vindicate, therefore, their city
from the disgrace of being entered by force, as well as giving way to
the real enthusiasm which was suddenly inspired by the exchange of the
worst evils which a conquered people have to dread for the promised
blessings of an honourable peace and internal concord, the Parisians
received the Emperor Alexander and the King of Prussia with such general
and unremitting plaudits, as might have accompanied their triumphal
entrance into their own capitals. Even at their first entrance within
the barriers, we learn from Sir Charles Stewart's official despatch,[26]
the crowd was already so enormous, as well as the acclamations so great,
that it was difficult to move forward; but before the monarchs had
reached the porte St. Martin to turn on the Boulevards, there was a
moral impossibility of proceeding; all Paris seemed to be assembled and
concentrated in one spot--one spring evidently directed all their
movements. They thronged around the monarchs, with the most unanimous
shouts of "_Vive l'Empereur Alexandre!_--_Vive le Roi de Prusse!_"
mingled with the loyal exclamations, "_Vive le Roi!_--_Vive Louis
XVIII.!_--_Vivent les Bourbons!_" To such unexpected unanimity might be
applied the words of Scripture, quoted by Clarendon on a similar
occasion--"God had prepared the people, for the thing was done
suddenly." The procession lasted several hours, during which 50,000
chosen troops of the Silesian and grand army filed along the Boulevards
in broad and deep columns, exhibiting a whole forest of bayonets,
mingled with long trains of artillery, and preceded by numerous
regiments of cavalry of every description. Nothing surprised those who
witnessed this magnificent spectacle, more than the high state of good
order and regular equipment in which the men and horses appeared. They
seemed rather to resemble troops drawn from peaceful quarters to some
grand or solemn festival, than regiments engaged during a long winter
campaign in constant marches and countermarches, as well as in a
succession of the fiercest and most sanguinary conflicts, and who had
fought a general action but the day before.[27] After making the circuit
of half of Paris by the interior Boulevards, the monarchs halted in the
Champs Elysées, and the troops passed in review before them as they were
dismissed to their quarters in the city. The Cossacks of the guard
established their bivouac in the Champs Elysées themselves, which may be
termed the Hyde Park of Paris, and which was thus converted into a
Scythian encampment.
FOOTNOTES:
[22] "During the battle, the Boulevards des Italiens, and the Caffé
Tortoni, were thronged with fashionable loungers of both sexes, sitting
as usual on the chairs placed there, and appearing almost uninterested
spectators of the number of wounded French, and prisoners of the allies
which were brought in. About two o'clock, a general cry of _sauve qui
peut_ was heard on the Boulevards; this caused a general and confused
flight, which spread like the undulations of a wave, even beyond the
Pont Neuf. During the whole of the battle, wounded soldiers crawled into
the streets, and lay down to die on the pavement. The _Moniteur_ of this
day was a full sheet; but no notice was taken of the war or the army.
Four columns were occupied by an article on the dramatic works of Denis,
and three with a dissertation on the existence of Troy."--_Memorable
Events_, pp. 90-93.
[23] The passage is curious, whether we regard it as really emanating
from Fouché, or placed in the mouth of that active revolutionist by some
one who well understood the genius of the party. "Had I been at Paris at
that time," (the period of the siege, namely,) "the weight of my
influence, doubtless, and my perfect acquaintance with the secrets of
every party, would have enabled me to give these extraordinary events a
very different direction. My preponderance, and the promptness of my
decision, would have predominated over the more slow and mysterious
influence of Talleyrand. That elevated personage could not have made his
way unless we had been harnessed to the same car. I would have revealed
to him the ramifications of my political plan, and, in spite of the
odious policy of Savary, the ridiculous government of Cambacérès, the
lieutenancy of the puppet Joseph, and the base spirit of the Senate, we
would have breathed new life into the carcase of the Revolution, and
these degraded patricians would not have thought of acting exclusively
for their own interests. By our united impulse, we would have pronounced
before the interference of any foreign influence, the dethronement of
Napoleon, and proclaimed the Regency, of which I had already traced the
basis. This conclusion was the only one which could have preserved the
Revolution and its principles."--_Mémoires_, tom. ii., p. 229.
[24] Las Cases, tom. ii., p. 251.
[25] London Gazette, April 5.--"Early in the morning of the 31st March,
before the barriers, were open, the soldiers of the allied army climbed
up the pallisades of the barrier Rochechouard to look into Paris. They
threw this proclamation over the wall, and through the iron
gates."--_Memorable Events_, p. 124.
[26] London Gazette Extraordinary, April 9.
[27] "This magnificent pageant far surpassed any idea I had formed of
military pomp. The cavalry were fifteen abreast, the artillery five, and
the infantry thirty. All the men were remarkably clean, healthy, and
well clothed. The bands of music were very fine. The people, astonished
at the prodigious number of troops, repeatedly exclaimed, 'Oh! how we
have been deceived.'"--_Memorable Events_, p. 106.