PARIS, August, 1805.
MY LORD:--Thanks to Talleyrand’s political emigration, our Government has
never been in ignorance of the characters and foibles of the leading
members among the emigrants in England. Otto, however, finished their
picture, but added, some new groups to those delineated by his
predecessor. It was according to his plan that the expedition of Mehee
de la Touche was undertaken, and it was in following his instructions
that the campaign of this traitor succeeded so well in Great Britain.
Under the Ministry of Vergennes, of Montmorin, and of Delessart, Mehee
had been employed as a spy in Russia, Sweden, and Poland, and acquitted
himself perfectly to the satisfaction of his masters. By some accident
or other, Delessart discovered, however, in December, 1791, that he had,
while pocketing the money of the Cabinet of Versailles, sold its secrets
to the Cabinet of St. Petersburg. He, of course, was no longer trusted
as a spy, and therefore turned a Jacobin, and announced himself to
Brissot as a persecuted patriot. All the calumnies against this Minister
in Brissot’s daily paper, Le Patriote Francois, during January, February,
and March, 1792, were the productions of Mehee’s malicious heart and able
pen. Even after they had sent Delessart a State prisoner to Orleans, his
inveteracy continued, and in September the same year he went to
Versailles to enjoy the sight of the murder of his former master. Some
go so far as to say that the assassins were headed by this monster, who
aggravated cruelty by insult, and informed the dying Minister of the
hands that stabbed him, and to whom he was indebted for a premature
death.
To these and other infamous and barbarous deeds, Talleyrand was not a
stranger when he made Mehee his secret agent, and entrusted him with the
mission to England. He took, therefore, such steps that neither his
confidence could be betrayed, nor his money squandered. Mehee had
instructions how to proceed in Great Britain, but he was ignorant of the
object Government had in view by his mission; and though large sums were
promised if successful, and if he gave satisfaction by his zeal and
discretion, the money advanced him was a mere trifle, and barely
sufficient to keep him from want. He was, therefore, really distressed,
when he fixed upon some necessitous and greedy emigrants for his
instruments to play on the credulity of the English Ministers in some of
their unguarded moments. Their generosity in forbearing to avenge upon
the deluded French exiles the slur attempted to be thrown upon their
official capacity, and the ridicule intended to be cast on their private
characters, has been much approved and admired here by all liberal-minded
persons; but it has also much disappointed Bonaparte and Talleyrand, who
expected to see these emigrants driven from the only asylum which
hospitality has not refused to their misfortunes and misery.
Mehee had been promised by Talleyrand double the amount of the sums which
he could swindle from your Government; but though he did more mischief to
your country than was expected in this, and though he proved that he had
pocketed upwards of ten thousand English guineas, the wages of his
infamy, when he hinted about the recompense he expected here, Durant,
Talleyrand’s chef du bureau, advised him, as a friend, not to remind the
Minister of his presence in France, as Bonaparte never pardoned a
Septembrizer, and the English guineas he possessed might be claimed and
seized as national property, to compensate some of the sufferers by the
unprovoked war with England. In vain did he address himself to his
fellow labourer in revolutionary plots, the Counsellor of State, Real,
who had been the intermedium between him and Talleyrand, when he was
first enlisted among the secret agents; instead of receiving money he
heard threats; and, therefore, with as good grace as he could, he made
the best of his disappointment; he sported a carriage, kept a mistress,
went to gambling-houses, and is now in a fair way to be reduced to the
status quo before his brilliant exploits in Great Britain.
Real, besides the place of a Counsellor of State, occupies also the
office of a director of the internal police. Having some difference with
my landlord, I was summoned to appear before him at the prefecture of the
police. My friend, M. de Sab-----r, formerly a counsellor of the
Parliament at Rouen, happened to be with me when the summons was
delivered, and offered to accompany me, being acquainted with Real.
Though thirty persons were waiting in the antechamber at our arrival, no
sooner was my friend’s name announced than we were admitted, and I
obtained not only more justice than I expected, or dared to claim, but an
invitation to Madame Real’s tea-party the same evening. This justice and
this politeness surprised me, until my friend showed me an act of forgery
in his possession, committed by Real in 1788, when an advocate of the
Parliament, and for which the humanity of my friend alone prevented him
from being struck off the rolls, and otherwise punished.
As I conceived my usual societies and coteries could not approve my
attendance at the house of such a personage, I was intent upon sending an
apology to Madame Real. My friend, however, assured me that I should
meet in her salon persons of all classes and of all ranks, and many I
little expected to see associating together. I went late, and found the
assembly very numerous; at the upper part of the hall were seated
Princesses Joseph and Louis Bonaparte, with Madame Fouche, Madame
Roederer, the cidevant Duchesse de Fleury, and Marquise de Clermont. They
were conversing with M. Mathew de Montmorency, the contractor (a
ci-devant lackey) Collot, the ci-devant Duc de Fitz-James, and the
legislator Martin, a ci-devant porter: several groups in the several
apartments were composed of a similar heterogeneous mixture of ci-devant
nobles and ci-devant valets, of ci-devant Princesses, Marchionesses,
Countesses and Baronesses, and of ci-devant chambermaids, mistresses and
poissardes. Round a gambling-table, by the side of the ci-devant Bishop
of Autun, Talleyrand, sat Madame Hounguenin, whose husband, a ci-devant
shoeblack, has, by the purchase of national property, made a fortune of
nine millions of livres--L375,000. Opposite them were seated the
ci-devant Prince de Chalais, and the present Prince Cambaceres with the
ci-devant Comtesse de Beauvais, and Madame Fauve, the daughter of a
fishwoman, and the wife of a tribune, a ci-devant barber. In another
room, the Bavarian Minister Cetto was conferring with the spy Mehee de la
Touche; but observed at a distance by Fouche’s secretary, Desmarets, the
son of a tailor at Fontainebleau, and for years a known spy. When I was
just going to retire, the handsome Madame Gillot, and her sister, Madame
de Soubray, joined me. You have perhaps known them in England, where,
before their marriage, they resided for five years with their parents,
the Marquis and Marquise de Courtin; and were often admired by the
loungers in Bond Street. The one married for money, Gillot, a ci-devant
drummer in the French Guard, but who, since the Revolution, has, as a
general; made a large fortune; and the other united herself to a
ci-devant Abbe, from love; but both are now divorced from their husbands,
who passed them without any notice while they were chatting with me. I
was handing Madame Gillot to her carriage, when, from the staircase,
Madame de Soubray called to us not to quit her, as she was pursued by a
man whom she detested, and wished to avoid. We had hardly turned round,
when Mehee offered her his arm, and she exclaimed with indignation, “How
dare you, infamous wretch, approach me, when I have forbidden you ever to
speak to me? Had you been reduced to become a highwayman, or a
housebreaker, I might have pitied your infamy; but a spy is a villain who
aggravates guilt by cowardice and baseness, and can inspire no noble soul
with any other sentiment but abhorrence, and the most sovereign
contempt.” Without being disconcerted, Mehee silently returned to the
company, amidst bursts of laughter from fifty servants, and as many
masters, waiting for their carriages. M. de Cetto was among the latter,
but, though we all fixed our eyes steadfastly upon him, no alteration
could be seen on his diplomatic countenance: his face must surely be made
of brass or his heart of marble.