hand; and accordingly, the very next morning he set off from Princeton
for Philadelphia to see Minister Adet. He now found Adet as eager to
forward his design, as he had formerly found him lukewarm. The Minister
promised him letters for the French Government recommending him in the
strongest manner, and offered him money for his expenses. Tone
gratefully accepted the letters but declined the monetary assistance. He
next sent a messenger to Ireland in the person of the young brother,
Arthur, who had in the meantime turned up at Princeton, and charged him
to tell only Neilson, Simms and Russell in Belfast, and Keogh and
MacCormick in Dublin, that he was sailing for France as soon as he could
get a vessel. Everybody else in Ireland—especially his father and
mother—was to be left under the impression that he was farming in
Princeton. Tone then settled up his financial affairs; allowed himself
one day’s holiday in Philadelphia with his old friends Reynolds,
Hamilton Rowan and Napper Tandy (who had recently arrived there). By
December the 13th—that is to say exactly within a fortnight from his
departure—he was back in Princeton with Hamilton Rowan to take leave of
his family.
He has given us a graphic account of the last night in the American
home. “We supped together in high spirits, and Rowan retiring
immediately after, my wife, sister and I sat together till very late,
engaged in that kind of animated and enthusiastic conversation which our
characters and the nature of the enterprise I was embarked in may be
supposed to give rise to. The courage and firmness of the women
supported me, and them, too, beyond my expectations; we had neither
tears nor lamentations, but, on the contrary, the most ardent hope, and
the most steady resolution. At length, at four the next morning, I
embraced them for the last time, and we parted with a steadiness that
astonished me.”
But Tone had not yet gauged the depths of his wife’s heroic devotion to
him—and to Ireland. It was only when he had reached New York and was on
the eve of embarkation—too late to have his determination weakened by
any anxiety for her condition—that she told him of the little life that
stirred beneath her heart.
* * * * *
We have but a scanty record of the life of Matilda and Mary Tone and the
children during the months when Theobald (having landed at Havre de
Grace on February 1st, 1796) was making his way by the mere force of his
will and personality to the cabinets of the most powerful ministers in
France. But our thoughts are turned to them constantly. We know how as
Tone came home from interviews with De La Croix, the Minister of Foreign
Affairs, or the American Minister, Monroe, or Carnot, or Hoche, he was
concerned above all for what his “dearest love” would think of how he
had comported himself. “I mention these little circumstances because I
know they will be interesting to her whom I prize above my life ten
thousand times. There are about six persons in the world who will read
these detached memorandums with pleasure; to every one else they would
appear sad stuff. But they are only for the women of my family, for the
boys if ever we meet again, and for my friend, P.P.” When he sees
Lodoïska, wife of J. B. Loubet, and records her heroism when her husband
was a fugitive from the vengeance of Robespierre, he wishes his dearest
love could see her, too. “I think she would behave as well in similar
circumstances. Her courage and her affection have been tried in some,
very nearly as critical.” When in a fit of self-examination he seeks out
his own motives, he finds it difficult to decide whether it is his
country or his wife he must put first. “I hope (but I am not sure) my
country is my first object, at least she is my second. If there be one
before her, as I rather believe there is, it is my dearest life and
love, the light of my eyes and spirit of my existence. I wish more than
for anything on earth to place her in a splendid situation. There is
none so elevated that she would not adorn, and that she does not
deserve, and I believe that not I only, but every one who knows her,
will agree as to that. Truth is truth! She is my first object. But would
I sacrifice the interests of Ireland to her elevation? No, that I would
not, and if I would, she would despise me, and if she were to despise
me, I would go hang myself like Judas. Well there is no regulator for
the human heart like the certainty of possessing the affections of an
amiable woman, and, if so, what unspeakable good fortune is mine.”
He compares French women and English women in point of charm and
attractiveness—and awards the palm to the French. But both of them must
yield to Irish women. “Give me Ireland for women to make wives and
mothers of.... The more I see of this wide world, the more I prize the
inestimable blessing I possess in my wife’s affection, her virtues, her
courage, her goodness of heart, her sweetness of temper, and besides she
is very pretty, a circumstance which does not lessen her value in my
eyes. What is she doing just now, and what would I give to be with her,
and the little _fanfans_ for half-an-hour.” But one would need a whole
book for Tone’s charming love-making to his wife.
In May, 1796, Tone wrote to Matilda desiring her to come to France. She
sold out their little property in America, turned the proceeds into
_louis d’or_, and set off with Mary and the children. On the voyage they
met two men who were to be intimately connected with their fate. One was
a Scotchman, Mr. Wilson, of Dullatur; the other, a young Swiss merchant
called Giacque. M. Giacque fell deeply in love with Mary Tone, and his
love being returned, the first letter Theobald received from his wife,
announcing their safe arrival in Hamburg, contained also a request for
his consent to Mary’s marriage.
Tone received that letter after his return from the unfortunate
expedition to Bantry Bay. The prospect of seeing his dear ones again
consoled him for the terrible disappointment of the expedition. But
alas! There was news in the letter which disturbed him deeply. Mrs.
Tone’s health had suffered gravely from all she had undergone. For this
reason her husband considered it unwise for her to undertake the journey
from Hamburg in the depth of winter. He, therefore, instructed her to
stay in Hamburg for the present, more especially as Mary and her husband
were likely to set up house there, pending the arrangements he would be
able to make for her.
To some of Matilda Tone’s letters written from Hamburg while her husband
was serving under Hoche in the Army of _Sambre et Meuse_ were attached
postscripts from Maria. The first line he had ever seen of his little
daughter’s writing moved Tone strangely, and there were tears in his
eyes as he sat down to write her the following answer:
“Dearest Baby,—You are a darling little thing for writing to me,
and I doat upon you, and when I read your pretty letter, it
brought the tears into my eyes, I was so glad. I am delighted
with the account you give me of your brothers; I think it is
high time that William should begin to cultivate his
understanding,[67] and therefore I beg you may teach him his
letters, if he does not know them already, that he may be able
to write to me by and by. I am not surprised that Frank is a
bully, and I suppose he and I will have fifty battles when we
meet. Has he got into a jacket and trousers yet? Tell your mamma
from me, ‘_we do defer it most shamefully, Mr. Shandy_.’[68] I
hope you will take great care of your poor mamma, who, I am
afraid, is not well; but I need not say that, for I am sure you
do, because you are a darling good child, and I love you more
than all the world. Kiss your mamma and your two little
brothers, for me, ten thousand times, and love me, as you
promise, as long as you live.
“Your affectionate _Fadoff_,
J. Smith.”[69]
Footnote 67:
William had then reached the mature age of six, and Frank was a year
younger.
Footnote 68:
One of the favourite games in the family circle was matching and
identifying quotations. Tone’s Journal is full of them.
Footnote 69:
This was the name under which Tone served in the French army.
It was not until May 7th, 1797, that Tone and his family were re-united.
He got leave of absence from his regiment, and wrote to them to meet him
at Gröningen. He arrived here on May the 2nd and for the next five days
he haunted the canal—“tormented with the most terrible apprehensions on
account of the absence of my dearest love, about whom I hear nothing;
walked out every day to the canal, two or three times a day to meet the
boats coming from Nieuschans when she will arrive. No love! No love! I
never was so unhappy in my life.... At last, this day (May 7th), in the
evening, as I was taking my usual walk along the canal, I had the
unspeakable satisfaction to see my dearest love and our little babies,
my sister and her husband, all arrive safe and well; it is impossible to
describe the pleasure I felt.”
A fortnight was spent very delightfully travelling through Holland and
Belgium. After that Tone went to Germany, and Matilda and her charge
proceeded to Paris under the escort of M. Giacque.
In the new home in Paris, to which Theobald returned as often as his
military duties permitted, Matilda Tone devoted herself to the education
of her children while the fateful months from the end of May, 1797, to
the beginning of September, 1798, sped by. During that “crowded hour” of
her husband’s glorious life much history was a-making; and now, as
always, his wife performed her woman’s part: to watch and wait, and
suffer and sacrifice herself to her husband’s—a splendidly tragic
destiny—with incomparable and heroic devotion.
She had need of all her woman’s resources to comfort him as one after
another his dearest hopes were blighted. There was first the death of
Hoche; then the defeat of the Dutch fleet at Camperdown, and the
consequent abandonment of the Dutch expedition to Ireland. Then there
was the rise to supreme military power in France of Bonaparte, whom
Thomas Addis Emmet later pronounced to be “the greatest enemy the Irish
people ever had.”
When Bonaparte, on the eve of the Irish Insurrection, sailed to Egypt
with the army which had been ostensibly collected for an attack on
England through Ireland, Tone gave up all hope. It was in this frame of
mind he joined Hardy’s expedition which sailed (in the wake of Humbert’s
failure, and the fiasco of Napper Tandy’s descent on Rutland Island)
from the Bay of Cameret on September 20th, 1798. William Tone relates
that “at the period of this expedition he was hopeless of its success,
and in the deepest despondency at the prospect of Irish affairs. Such
was the wretched indiscretion of the [French] Government, that before
his departure he read himself, in the _Bien Informé_, a Paris newspaper,
a detailed account of the whole armament, where his own name was
mentioned in full letters with the circumstance of his being on board
the _Hoche_. There was therefore no hope of secrecy. He had all along
deprecated the idea of these attempts on a small scale. But he had also
declared repeatedly that if the Government sent only a corporal’s guard,
he felt it his duty to go along with them.... His resolution was,
however, deliberately and inflexibly taken, in case he fell into the
hands of the enemy, never to suffer the indignity of a public
execution.” Of this resolution of her husband’s, Matilda Tone was fully
informed. For he spoke of it quite plainly in her presence on the
occasion of a dinner-party given at their house in Paris a few days
before the departure of the expedition.
And so she let him go from her—knowing full well that she would never
see him again. How truly had he judged of her—and of himself—when he
wrote the words: “She is my first object. But would I sacrifice the
interest of Ireland to her elevation? No that I would not, and if I
would, she would despise me, and if she were to despise me I would go
hang myself like Judas.”
* * * * *
His body was lying under the green sod in Bodenstown Churchyard when his
last message to her was delivered. How did she ever bear to read the
lines he penned in his prison cell, when even now at this distance of
time, we who knew him not at all can hardly see them for our tears?
“Provost Prison—Dublin Barracks,
“_Le 20 Brumaire, an 7_ (10 Nov.’98).
“Dearest Love,—The hour is at last come when we must part. As no
words can express what I feel for you and our children, I shall
not attempt it; complaint of any kind would be beneath your
courage and mine; be assured I will die as I have lived, and
that you will have no cause to blush for me.”
“I have written on your behalf to the French Government, to the
Minister of Marine, to General Kilmaine and to Mr. Shee. With
the latter I wish you especially to advise. In Ireland I have
written to your brother Harry, and to those of my friends who
are about to go into exile, and who, I am sure, will not abandon
you.
“Adieu, dearest love: I find it impossible to finish this
letter. Give my love to Mary; and above all things, remember
that you are now the only parent of our dearest children, and
that the best proof you can give of your affection for me will
be to preserve yourself for their education. God Almighty bless
you all.
“Yours ever,
“T. W. TONE.”
“P.S.—I think you have found a friend in Wilson who will not
desert you.”
SECOND LETTER
“Dearest Love,—I write just one line to acquaint you that I have
received assurance from your brother Edward of his determination
to render every assistance and protection in his power; for
which I have written to thank him most sincerely. Your sister
has likewise sent me assurances of the same nature, and
expressed a desire to see me, which I have refused, having
determined to speak to no one of my friends, not even my father,
from motives of humanity to them and myself. It is a very great
consolation to me that your family are determined to support
you; as to the manner of that assistance, I leave it to their
affection for you, and your own excellent good sense, to settle
what manner will be most respectable for all parties.
“Adieu, dearest love. Keep your courage as I have kept mine; my
mind is as tranquil at this period as at any period of my life.
Cherish my memory; and especially preserve your health and
spirits for the sake of our dearest children.
“Yours ever affectionately.”
* * * * *
There still remained to Matilda Tone more than fifty years of painful
pilgrimage on this earth, before she was re-united to the husband—who
had never ceased to be the lover—of her youth. The story of twenty-eight
of these years has been told by her son William, and we may fittingly
leave the tale to his telling, only taking it up again when his voice,
too, was silenced—and to use her own pathetic phrase, his mother was
left widowed and childless for twenty years more,
“=Lonely and desolate to mourn her dead.=”
* * * * *
“At the close of this last expedition [_i.e._ Hardy’s], a strict
embargo reigned on the coasts of England, and no news could
reach to France but through the distant and indirect channel of
Hamburg. It was not till the close of November that the report
of the action of October 11th, of the capture, trial, defence
and condemnation of Tone, and of the wound which he was reported
to have inflicted upon himself, reached all at once to Paris. It
was also stated at first that this wound which he was reported
to have inflicted upon himself was slight, that the law courts
had claimed him, that all proceedings were therefore stopped,
and that there were strong hopes of his recovery. My mother,
then in the most delicate and precarious state of health, a
stranger in the land (of which she scarcely spoke the language)
and without a friend and adviser (for she had ever lived in the
most retired privacy) rallied, however, a courage and spirits
worthy of the name she bore. Surmounting all timidity and
weakness of body as well as of mind, she threw herself instantly
into a carriage, and drove to the minister of foreign affairs
(Tallyrand Perigord). She knew that he spoke English and had
been acquainted with my father both in America and in France. He
received her with the most lively interest. Cases of this kind
did not belong to his department, but he promised all the
support of his credit with the Government, and gave her an
introduction to the Directory. She immediately called on La
Reveilliere Lepaux, then president of the Directory, and met
with a reception equally favourable and respectful. He gave the
most solemn assurances that my father should be instantly
claimed; and mentioned in the demand by the name of Tone, by
that of Smith, and individually as a French officer, lest his
assumed name should occasion any diplomatic delay; he added that
the English officers then in the French prisons should be
confined as hostages to answer for his safety; and that, if none
were equal to him in rank, the difference should be made up in
numbers. It was unfortunate that Sir Sidney Smith had then
escaped from the Temple. As soon as these papers were drawn, La
Reveilliere Lepaux addressed her with them to the minister of
marine, Bruix, who assured her that preliminary steps had
already been taken, and that these despatches should be
forwarded in the course of the same day. From thence she called
on Schimmelpennick, the Dutch ambassador, who gave her similar
assurances that my father should be claimed in the name of the
Batavian republic, in whose service he bore the same rank as in
the French. She wrote for the same purpose to his friend,
Admiral Dewinter, and to General Kilmaine, commander-in-chief of
the army in which he served; they both gave the same promises in
return.
“To the French ministers, my mother expressed, at the same time,
her determination to join and nurse her husband in his prison,
taking my young sister along with her, and leaving my brother
and myself to the care of my aunt [_i.e._ Mary Tone, now Madame
Giacque]. For she did not expect that even these efforts would
obtain his release, but probably a commutation of his fate to a
confinement which she wished to share. It may well be believed
that these reclamations excited the most lively and universal
interest. All the credentials and all the means which she could
wish, were furnished to her, and she was already on her way to
embark for Ireland, when the news of his death arrived and put a
stop to all further proceedings. It would be needless to dilate
upon, and impossible to express, her feelings on the occasion.
* * * * *
“In the first moments after the death of my father the interest
excited by his fate, and by the state of his family was
universal. The Directory instantly passed a decree by which an
immediate aid of 1,200 francs, from the funds of the navy, and
three month’s pay from the war department, were assigned to his
widow, and she was requested to produce her titles to a regular
pension. At the same time, Bruix and Tallyrand (to the latter of
whom, whatever character be assigned him in history, we
certainly owe gratitude for the lively and disinterested part he
took in our fate, on the few but important occasions on which we
addressed him) proposed, the first, to take charge of my
brother, and the other of me. Kilmaine, who had no children,
proposed to adopt us both. But, grateful as my mother felt for
those offers, she declined them, determined never to part from
her children; and to fulfil, to the last, the solemn engagement
under which she considered herself bound, to superintend their
education; she did not wish them to be bred as favourites and
dependants in great families; and trusted rather to the
gratitude of the nation to give them a public, simple and manly
education, as an homage to their father’s services. These
gentlemen entered into her views; and on their demand, the
Directory decreed that the sons of Theobald Wolfe Tone, adopted
by the French republic, should be educated at the national
expense, in the Prytaneum.
“The pensions which the executive had, constitutionally, a power
to grant to the widows and families of officers killed on the
field of battle, were limited by law according to the rank of
these officers, and to the length of time during which they had
served. According to this law, the pension to which my mother
was entitled, amounted only to 300 francs, or little more than
£12 sterling a year. This she refused either to demand or
accept. But in special cases the legislature had reserved to
itself the right of granting pensions to any amount. Ours was a
very special case; but it was necessary to address the council
of four hundred on the subject. Official delays intervened; it
was difficult to collect at once all the legal proofs required;
the business was therefore dropped for the present; and indeed
in the varying and shifting movement of that most unstable of
governments, no single object, however interesting at first,
could fix the public attention for a period of any duration. In
a few months three of the directors were expelled by their
colleagues, and replaced by others; the affairs of Ireland, Tone
and his family, and the fatal indiscretion of Humbert, who now
returned from captivity, were all forgotten in the disasters of
Italy and Germany, and the victories of Suwarrow and Prince
Charles of Austria.
“In the meantime, withdrawing from the interest she had excited,
my mother retired almost in the precincts of the university, to
be near her children, and superintend their education. This was
the most quiet and distant quarter of Paris, and farthest from
the bustle of the great and fashionable world. On the style in
which we lived, I will only observe, that we saw no company,
English nor French; and that my mother, attending exclusively to
the education of her daughter, and to the superintendence of her
two boys, who dwelt in the college beneath her eyes, was under
the protection of that body as much as if she had been a member
of it. Such was the esteem, confidence and, I would almost say,
veneration with which she inspired its director and professors,
that contrary to the severe regulations of French discipline,
they trusted us entirely to her care. Indeed, we were all so
young and so helpless, that we were general favourites, and the
whole of our little family seemed adopted by the establishment.
“It was nearly a year from my father’s fate; our permanent
provision was yet unsettled, and our slender means could not
last many months longer; when my mother, reading some old papers
in her solitude, fell on a beautiful speech pronounced some
months before in the council of five hundred, by Lucien
Buonaparte. He proposed to simplify the forms of paying the
pensions of the widows and children of military and naval
officers; he represented in the most noble and feeling terms the
hardship of high-spirited females and mothers of families, whose
claims were clear and undoubted, obliged, in the affliction and
desolation of their hearts, to solicit and go through numberless
delays in the public offices. He also proposed to augment these
pensions, which were too small. The sons of warriors killed on
the field of battle ceased to receive them when they reached
their fourteenth year; he proposed to extend this period to the
age when they might, in their turn, enter the service.