I have already said that the excitement did not abate, but the more serious-minded began to look critical, and, among the latter, curiously enough, there were a good many superior officers in the army. They were too loyal to express openly their want of confidence in their leaders, but it was evident enough to the careful listener that that want of confidence did exist. I had a conversation during that week with one of the former, whose name, for obvious reasons, I must suppress; and this is, as far as I can remember, what he said, knowing that he could trust me. "There is not a single properly drawn ordnance map of France at the War Office; and if there were, there is not a single man in power there who would know how to use it. I doubt whether there is a settled plan of campaign; they'll endeavour to conduct this war as they conducted the Crimean, Italian, and Mexican wars--that is, on the principle which stood them in such good stead in Algeria, though they ought to know by this time how very risky those experiments turned out, especially in '59; and I have no need to tell you that we are going to confront a different army from that of the Austrians or the Russians, Todleben notwithstanding. The African school of warfare ought to be played out by now, but it is not. To a certain extent, the Emperor is to blame for this. You remember what his uncle said: 'There is not a single general of whose draught I am not aware. Some will go up to their waists; others up to their necks; others, again, to over their heads; but the latter number is infinitely small, I a.s.sure you.' The Emperor is not in the same position with regard to the capacity of his generals, let alone of his officers."

"But he ought to be," I objected; "he interviews a great many of them on Sunday mornings." I was alluding to the informal levee held at the Tuileries every week, to which the generals and the general officers by sea and by land were admitted.

"You are right--he ought to be," was the answer; "and if a great deal of conscientious trouble on his part could have put him in possession of such knowledge, he would have had it by this time. Of course, you have never been present at such a reception; for all civilians, with the exception of a few ministers, are rigorously excluded. I repeat, the intention is a good one, but it is not carried out properly. The very fact that at the outset it met with the most strenuous opposition from nearly all the ministers and high dignitaries of the Imperial household ought to have shown his Majesty the necessity of interviewing these officers alone, without as much as a chambellan in waiting. As it is, do you know what happens? I will tell you. The Emperor pa.s.ses before these officers as they are standing around the room, stops before nearly every one to ask a question, inviting him, at the same time, to lodge a protest if necessary against any standing abuse or to suggest a measure of reform. But the chambellan is close at his heels; the minister for war, the marshal commanding the Imperial Guard, the military governor of Paris, are standing but a few steps away. The officer to whom the question is addressed feels himself tongue-tied; he knows that all these can hear every word he says, and, rather than be marked by his superiors as a tiresome meddler, he prefers to hold his tongue altogether--that is, if he be comparatively honest. Call it cowardice if you like, but most men will tell you that such cowardice exists in all administrations whether civil or military. Consequently, the Emperor, though he may know a good many officers by name and by sight, in reality knows nothing of their capacities. I may safely say that, for the last fifteen or sixteen years, there have not been a dozen important promotions, either in the army or the navy, justified by the 'record of service' of the officer promoted. Divisions--nay, whole army corps--have been confided to men who, in the hour of need, will, no doubt, prove very dashing and very plucky, but who have no more notion of handling large ma.s.ses of men than an ordinary drill-sergeant. To use a more striking metaphor--they have selected the most desperate punters at baccarat to work out complicated chess problems. What the result will be with such a champion as Von Moltke, Heaven only knows. There are men at the head of our cavalry forces who can scarcely hold themselves on horseback; there are others commanding divisions and even corps-d'armee who know all about bridges, pontoons, artillery, and so forth, but who could no more execute a regularly organized retreat or advance than a child. The theory is that their dash and courage, their reckless, happy-go-lucky, but frequently successful African system, will make up for their ignorance of tactics and strategy. Naturally this is an implied rather than an expressed opinion, for many of those favourites believe themselves to be the equals in these latter sciences of Jomini and Napoleon, perhaps of Moltke also. Do not misunderstand me; there are a number of officers in the French army who have made a careful study of the science of war, and who, in that respect, would favourably compare with an equal number of the best instructed German officers, but they have by this time resigned themselves to keep in the background, because any attempt on their part to raise the standard of military knowledge has for years been systematically discountenanced by those nearest to the throne. On the other hand, the men thus kept at arm's length have not been altogether satisfied to suffer in silence. I do not mean to say that they have given vent to their grievances openly; they have done worse, perhaps, from the point of view of maintaining the discipline of the army. They have adopted a semi-critical, semi-hostile att.i.tude towards their superiors. The officers' mess, such as it exists in England, is virtually unknown on the Continent, and least of all in France. The unmarried officer takes his daily meals at the table d'hote of an hotel, and he does talk 'shop' now and then in the presence of civilians. The criticisms he utters do find their way to the barrack-room, so that by now the private has become sceptical with regard to the capabilities of the generals and marshals. The soldier who begins to question the fitness of his chiefs is like the priest who begins to question the infallibility of the pope; he is a danger to the inst.i.tution to which he belongs."

In reality, my informant told me little that was new, though he perhaps did not suspect that I was so well informed. I had heard most of all this, and a great deal besides, from a connection of mine by marriage, whose strictures in the same direction came with additional force, seeing that he was a frequent and welcome guest at the Tuileries. He was a general officer, but, with a frankness that bordered on the cynical, maintained that but for his capital voice and skill at leading "the cotillon" he would probably have never risen beyond the rank of captain; "for there are a thousand captains that know a great deal more than I do, a couple of thousand that know as much as I do, and very few who know less, none of whom have ever been promoted, and never will be, unless they earn their promotion at the point of the sword." According to him, the "records of service" were not as much as looked into at the periods of general promotions. "A clever answer to one of the Emperor's questions, a handsome face and pleasing manners, are sufficient to establish a reputation at the Chateau. The ministers for war take particular care not to rectify those impulsive judgments of the Emperor and Empress, because they rightly think that careful inquiries into the candidates' merits would hurt their own proteges, and those of their fellow-ministers. This happy-go-lucky system--for a system it has become--founded upon the most barefaced nepotism, is condoned, by those who ought to have opposed it with all their might and main at the very outset, on the theory that Frenchmen's courage is sure to make up in the end for all shortcomings, which theory in itself is a piece of impertinence, or at any rate of overweening conceit, seeing that it implies the absence of such courage in the officers of other nations.

But there is something else. All these favourites are jealous of one another, and, mark my words, this jealousy will in this instance lead to disastrous results, because the Emperor will find it as difficult to comply with as to refuse their individual extravagant demands. The time is gone by for radical reforms. 'You cannot swap horses while crossing a stream,' said Abraham Lincoln; and we are crossing a dangerous stream.

The Emperor has, besides, a horror of new faces around him, and to extirpate the evil radically he would have to make a clean sweep of his military household."

I must preface the following notes by a personal remark. For private reasons, which I cannot and must not mention, I have decided not to put my name to these jottings, whether they are published before or after my death. I am aware that by doing this I diminish their value; because, although I never played a political or even a social part in France, I am sufficiently well known to inspire the reader with confidence. As it is, he must take it for granted that I was probably the only foreigner whom Frenchmen had agreed not to consider an enemy in disguise.

While my relative was giving me the above resume, I was already aware that there existed in the French War Office a scheme of mobilization and a plan of campaign elaborated by Marshal Niel, the immediate predecessor of Marshal Leboeuf. I knew, moreover, that this plan provided for the formation of three armies, under the respective commands of Marshals MacMahon, Bazaine, and Canrobert, and that the disposition of these three armies had been the basis of negotiations for a Franco-Austrian alliance which had been started six weeks previous to the declaration of war by General Lebrun in Vienna. Up till the 22nd or 23rd of July the preparations were carried out in accordance with that original project; the respective staffs that had been appointed, the various regiments and brigades distributed long ago, were already hurrying to the front, when all of a sudden the whole of this plan was modified; the three armies were to be fused into one, to be called "l'armee du Rhin," under the sole and exclusive command of the Emperor.

Whence this sudden change? The historians, with their usual contempt for small causes, have endeavoured to explain it in various ways. According to some, the change was decided upon in order to afford the Emperor the opportunity of distinguishing himself; the "armee du Rhin" was to revive the glories of the "grande armee;" there was to be a second edition of the Napoleonic epic. After the first startling successes, the Emperor was to return to the capital, and Marshal Niel's plan was, if practicable, to be taken up once more,--that is, the French troops, having established a foothold in the enemy's country, were to be divided again under so many Klebers, Soults, and Neys.

According to others, the Emperor, who until then had been living in a fool's paradise with regard to the quant.i.ty, if not with regard to the quality, of the forces at his disposal, suddenly had his eyes opened to the real state of affairs. The six hundred and fifty thousand troops supposed to be at his disposal had their existence mainly on paper: the available reality did not amount to more than a third; _i. e._ to about two hundred and fifteen thousand troops of all arms.

The facts advanced by these historians are true, but they did not determine the change referred to--at any rate, not so far as the a.s.sumption of the supreme command by the Emperor himself was concerned.

Anxious as the latter may have been, in the interest of his dynasty, to reap the glory of one or two successful battles fought under his immediate supervision, he was fully aware of his unfitness for such a task, especially in his actual state of health. Louis-Napoleon believed in his star, but he was not an idiot who counted upon luck to decide the fate of battles. If he had ever fostered such illusions, the campaign of 1859 must have given a rude shock to them, for there he was, more than once, within an ace of defeat; and no one knew this better than he did.

The fusing of the three armies into one was due, first, to the difficulty, if not impossibility, of const.i.tuting three armies with considerably less than three hundred thousand troops; secondly, to the inveterate jealousy of his marshals of one another. Napoleon feared, and justly, that if those three armies went forth under three separate commands, there would be a repet.i.tion of the quarrels that had occurred during the Austro-Franco war, when Niel accused Canrobert of not having properly supported him at the right time, and so forth. It will be remembered that the Emperor himself had to intervene to heal those quarrels. Under those circ.u.mstances, the Emperor thought it better to risk it, and to take the whole responsibility upon himself.

The Emperor left St. Cloud on the 28th of July. It is very certain that, even before his departure, his confidence in the late Marshal Niel as an organizer must have been considerably shaken, and that the words of Leboeuf, "We are ready, more than ready," sounded already a hollow mockery to his ear. Here are some of the telegrams which, after the 4th of September, were found among the papers at the Tuileries. They were probably copies of the originals, though I am by no means certain that they were forwarded to St. Cloud at the time of their reception. It would have been better, perhaps, if they had been.

"Metz, 20 July, 1870, 9.50 a.m. From Chief of Commissariat Department to General Blondeau, War Office, Paris. There is at Metz neither sugar, coffee, rice, brandy, nor salt. We have but little bacon and biscuit.

Despatch, at least, a million rations to Thionville."

"General Ducrot to War Office, Paris. Strasburg, 20 July, 1870, 8.30 p.m. By to-morrow there will be scarcely fifty men left to guard Neuf-Brisach; Fort-Mortier, Schlestadt, la Pet.i.te-Pierre, and Lichtenberg are equally deserted. It is the result of the orders we are carrying out. The Garde Mobile and local National Guards might easily be made available for garrison duty, but I am reluctant to adopt such measures, seeing that your excellency has granted me no power to that effect. It appears certain that the Prussians are already masters of all the pa.s.ses of the Black Forest."

"From the General commanding the 2nd Army Corps to War Office, Paris.

Saint-Avold, 21 July, 1870, 8.55 a.m. The depot sends enormous parcels of maps, which are absolutely useless for the moment. We have not a single map of the French frontier. It would be better to send greater quant.i.ties of what would be more useful, and which are absolutely wanting at this moment."

"From General Michael to War Office, Paris. Belfort, 21 July, 1870, 7.30 a.m. Have arrived at Belfort; did not find my brigade, did not find a general of division. What am I to do? Do not know where are my regiments."

"From General commanding 4th Army Corps to Major-General, Paris.

Thionville, 21 July, 9.12 a.m. The 4th Corps has as yet neither canteens, ambulances, nor baggage-waggons, either for the troops or the staff. There is an utter lack of everything."

I need quote no further; there were about two hundred missives in all, all dated within the week following the official declaration of war. It would be difficult to determine how many of these the Emperor was permitted to see, but there is no doubt that he had a pretty correct idea of the state of affairs, for here is a fact which I have not seen stated anywhere, but for the truth of which I can vouch. For full two years before the outbreak of hostilities, the Legislature seemed bent upon advocating all kinds of retrenchment in the war budget. During the first six months of 1870, the thing had almost become a mania with them, and the Emperor appealed to M. Thiers, through the intermediary of Marshal Leboeuf himself, to help him stem the tide of this pseudo-economy. Thiers promised his support, and faithfully kept his word; but his aid came too late. The Emperor, however, felt grateful to him, and, only thirty-six hours before his departure for the seat of war, he offered him the portfolio of war, again through the intermediary of Marshal Leboeuf. The offer was respectfully declined, but what must have been the state of mind of Louis-Napoleon with regard to his officers, to prefer to them a civilian at such a critical moment? I may state here that it was always the height of M. Thiers' ambition to be considered a great strategist and tactician, and also a military engineer. "Jomini was a civilian," he frequently exclaimed. Those who were competent to judge, have often declared that Thiers' pretensions in that direction were, to a certain extent, justified by his talents.

Curiously enough, M. de Freycinet is affected by a similar mania.

Here is a certain correlative to the above-mentioned fact. When, a few months after the Commune, things were getting ship-shape in Paris, a large bundle of printed matter was unearthed in the erstwhile Imperial (then National) Printing Works. It contained, amongst others, a circular drawn up by the Emperor himself, ent.i.tled "A Bad Piece of Economy;" it was addressed to the deputies, and dated May, 1870; it showed the presumptive strength of the army of the North-German Confederation as compared with that of France, and wound up with the following sentence: "If we compare the military condition of North-Germany with ours, we shall be able to judge how far those who would still further reduce our national forces are sufficiently enlightened as to our real interests."

It has always been a mystery to me, and to those who were aware of its existence, why this circular was not distributed at the proper time; though, by the light of subsequent events, one fails to see what good it could have done then. Were these events foreseen at the Tuileries as early as May? I think not. The majority of the Emperor's entourage were confident that war with Germany was only a matter of time; very few considered it to be so imminent. One cannot for a moment imagine that the suppression of this circular was due to accidental or premeditated neglect; for the sovereign, though ailing and low-spirited, was still too mindful of his prerogatives not to have visited such neglect of his wishes, whether intentional or not, with severe displeasure. Nor can one for a moment admit that the Emperor was hoodwinked into the belief that the circular had been distributed. His so-called advisers probably prevailed upon him to forego the distribution of the doc.u.ment, lest it should open the eyes of the nation to the inferiority of France's armaments. The only man who had dared to point out that inferiority, three years previously, was General Trochu, and his book, "l'Armee Francaise," had the effect of ostracizing him from the Tuileries. The smart and swaggering colonels who surrounded the Empress did not scruple to spread the most ridiculous slanders with regard to its author; but the Emperor, though aware that Trochu was systematically opposed to his dynasty, also knew that he was an able, perhaps the ablest soldier in the country. The subsequent failure of Trochu does not invalidate that judgment. "I know what Trochu could and would do if he were unhampered; but I need not concern myself with that, seeing that he will be hampered," said Von Moltke at the beginning of the siege. Colonel Stoffel, the French military attache at Berlin, was severely reprimanded by Marshal Niel and by Leboeuf afterwards for his constant endeavours to acquaint the Emperor with the magnificent state of efficiency of the Prussian army and its auxiliaries. Ostensibly, it was because he had been guilty of a breach of diplomatic and military etiquette; in reality, because the minister for war and his "festive" coadjutors objected to being constantly hara.s.sed in their pleasures by the sovereign's suspicions of their mental nakedness. "Nous l'avons eu, votre Rhin allemand.... Ou le pere a pa.s.se, pa.s.sera bien l'enfant," was their credo; and they continued to dance, and to flirt, and to intrigue for places, which, in their hands, became fat sinecures. They would have laughed to scorn the dictum of the first Napoleon, that "there are no bad regiments, only bad colonels;" in their opinion, there were no bad colonels, except those perhaps who did not constantly jingle their spurs on the carpeted floors of the Empress's boudoir, and the parqueted arena of the Empress's ball-room. The Emperor was too much of a dreamer and a philosopher for them; he could not emanc.i.p.ate himself from his German education. The best thing to do was to let him write and print whatever he liked, and then prevail upon him at the last moment not to publish, lest it might offend national vanity. Contemptuous as they were of the German spirit of plodding, they had, nevertheless, taken a leaf from an eminent German's book. "Let them say and write what they like, as long as they let me do what I like," exclaimed Frederick the Great, on one occasion. They slightly reversed the sentence. "Let the Emperor say and write what he likes, as long as he lets us do what we like; and one thing we will take care to do, namely, not to let him publish his writings." They had forgotten, if ever they knew them--for their ignorance was as startling as their conceit--the magnificent lines of the founder of the dynasty which they had systematically undermined for years by their dissipation, frivolity, and corruption: "The general is the head, the all in all of the army. It was not the Roman army that conquered Gaul, but Caesar; it was not the Carthaginian army that made the republican army tremble at the very gates of Rome, but Hannibal; it was not the Macedonian army that penetrated to the Indus, but Alexander; it was not the French army which carried the war as far as the Weser and the Inn, but Turenne; it was not the Prussian army which defended, during seven years, Prussia against the three greatest powers in Europe, but Frederick the Great."

And she who aspired to play the role of a Maria-Theresa, when she was not even a Marie-Antoinette, and far more harmful than even a Marie-Louise, applauded the vapourings of those misguided men. "Le courage fait tout," had been the motto for nearly a score of years at the Tuileries. It did a good deal in the comedies a la Marivaux, in the Boccacian charades that had been enacted there during that time; she had yet to learn that it would avail little or nothing in the Homeric struggle which was impending.

CHAPTER XX.

The war -- Reaction before the Emperor's departure -- The moral effects of the publication of the draft treaty -- "Bismarck has done the Emperor" -- The Parisians did not like the Empress -- The latter always anxious to a.s.sume the regency -- A retrospect -- Crimean war -- The Empress and Queen Victoria -- Solferino -- The regency of '65 -- Bismarck's millinery bills -- Lord Lyons -- Bismarck and the Duc de Gramont -- Lord Lyons does not foresee war -- The republicans and the war -- The Empress -- Two ministerial councils and their consequences -- Mr.

Prescott-Hewett sent for -- Joseph Ferrari, the Italian philosopher -- The Empress -- The ferment in Paris -- "Too much prologue to 'The Taming of the German Shrew'" -- The first engagement -- The "Ma.r.s.eillaise" -- An infant performer -- The "Ma.r.s.eillaise" at the Comedie-Francaise -- The "Ma.r.s.eillaise" by command of the Emperor -- A patriotic ballet -- The courtesy of the French at Fontenoy -- The Cafe de la Paix -- General Beaufort d'Hautpoul and Moltke -- Newspaper correspondents -- Edmond About tells a story about one of his colleagues -- News supplied by the Government -- What it amounted to -- The information it gave to the enemy -- Bazaine, "the glorious" one -- Palikao -- The fall of the Empire does not date from Sedan, but from Woerth and Speicheren -- Those who dealt it the heaviest blow -- The Empress, the Empress, and no one but the Empress.

Even before the Emperor started for the seat of war it was very evident, to those who kept their eyes open, that a reaction had set in among the better cla.s.ses. They were no longer confident about France's ability to chastise the arrogance of the King of Prussia. The publication of the famous "draft treaty" had convinced them "que Bismarck avait roule l'empereur,"--_anglice_, "that the Emperor had been bone;" and, notwithstanding their repeated a.s.sertions of being able to dispense with the moral support of Europe, they felt not altogether resigned about the animosity which the revelation of that doc.u.ment had provoked. Honestly speaking, I do not think that they regretted the duplicity of Louis-Napoleon in having tried to steal a march upon the co-signatories of the treaty guaranteeing the protection of Belgium; but it wounded their pride that he should have been found out to no purpose. The word "imbecile" began to circulate freely; and when it became known that he had conferred the regency upon the Empress, the expression of contempt and disapproval became stronger still. In spite of everything that has been said to the contrary, the Parisians did not like the Empress. I have already noted elsewhere that those frankly hostile to her did not scruple to apply the word "l'Espagnole" in a depreciating sense; those whose animosity did not go so far merely considered her "une femme a la mode," and by no means fitted to take the reins of government, especially under circ.u.mstances so grave as the present ones. On the other hand, the Empress always showed herself exceedingly anxious to exercise the functions of regent. The flatterers and courtiers around her had imbued her with the idea that she was a kind of Elizabeth and a Catherine in one, and the clerical element in her entourage was not the least blamable in that respect.

During the Crimean war, Lord Clarendon had already been compelled to combat the project, though he could not do so openly. Napoleon III. had several times expressed his intention of taking the command of the army.

His ministers, and especially MM. Troplong and Baroche, begged of him not to do so. Even Queen Victoria, to whom the idea was broached while on her visit to Paris, threw cold water upon it as far as was possible.

But the Empress encouraged it to her utmost. "I fail to see," she said to our sovereign, "that he would be exposed to greater dangers there than elsewhere." It was the prospect of the regency, not of the glory that might possibly accrue to her consort, that appealed to the Empress; for in reality she had not the least sympathy with the object of that war, any more than with that of 1859. Russia was ostensibly fighting for the custody of the Holy Sepulchre; and the defeat of Austria, she had been told by the priests, would entail the ruin of the temporal power of the pope. And Empress Eugenie never attained to anything more than parrot knowledge in the way of politics.

However, in 1859 she had her wish, and, before the opening of the campaign, she declared to the Corps Legislatif that "she had perfect faith in the moderation of the Emperor when the right moment for peace should have arrived." Her ladies-in-waiting and the male b.u.t.terflies around her openly discounted the political effects of every engagement on the field of battle. The Emperor, according to them, would make peace with Austria with very few sacrifices on the latter's part, for it was a Conservative and Catholic power, which could not be humiliated to the bitter end, while Italy was, after all, but a hotbed of conspiracy, revolutionary, anti-Catholic, and so forth.

And I know, for a positive fact, that the Emperor was, as it were, compelled to suspend operations after Solferino, because the Minister for War had ceased to send troops and ammunitions "by order of the regent." The Minister for Foreign Affairs endeavoured by all means in his power to alarm his sovereign.

Nevertheless, in 1865, when he went to Algeria to seek some relief from his acute physical sufferings, Napoleon III. was badgered into confiding the regency once more to his wife. There is no other word, because there was no necessity for such a measure, seeing that he did not leave French territory. We have an inveterate habit of laughing at the "henpecked husband," and no essayist has been bold enough as yet to devote a chapter to him from a purely historical point of view. The materials are not only at hand in France, but in England, Germany, and Russia also; above all, in the latter country. He, the essayist, might safely leave Catherine de Medici out of the question. He need not go back as far. He might begin with Marie de Medici and her daughter, Henrietta-Maria.

Sometimes the "henpecking" turns out to be for the world's benefit, as when Sophie-Dorothea worries her spouse to let her first boy wear a heavy christening dress and crown, which eventually kill the infant, who makes room for Frederick the Great. But one could have very well spared the servant-wench who henpecked Peter the Great, and Scarron's widow who henpecked Louis XIV., and Marie-Antoinette and the rest.

The regency of '65, though perhaps not disastrous in itself, was fraught with the most disastrous consequences for the future. It gave the Empress the political importance which she had been coveting for years; henceforth she made it a habit to be present at the councils of ministers, who in their turn informed her personally of events which ought to have remained strictly between them and the chief of the State.

This went on until M. emile Ollivier came into power, January 2, 1870.

The Italian and Austrian amba.s.sadors, however, continued to flatter her vanity by constantly appealing to her; the part they played on the 4th of September shows plainly enough how they profited in the interest of their governments by these seemingly diplomatic indiscretions on their own part.

As for Bismarck, as some one who was very much behind the political scenes in Berlin once said, "His policy consisted in paying milliners'

and dressmakers' bills in Paris for ladies to whose personal adornment and appearance he was profoundly indifferent." I am bound to say that Lord Lyons courteously but steadfastly refused to be drawn out "diplomatically" by the Empress. While paying due homage to the woman and to the sovereign, he tacitly declined to consider her a p.a.w.n in the political game, and, though always extremely guarded in his language, could scarcely refrain from showing his contempt for those who did. I do not know whether Lord Lyons will leave behind any "memoirs;" if he do, we shall probably get not only nothing but the truth, but the whole truth, with regard to the share of the Empress in determining the war; and we shall find that that war was not decided upon between the Imperial couple between the 14th and 15th of July, '70, but between the 5th and 6th of July. Meanwhile, without presuming to antic.i.p.ate such revelations on the part of our amba.s.sador, I may note here my own recollections on the subject.

On Tuesday, the 5th of July, about 2.30 p.m., I was walking along the Faubourg Saint-Honore, when, just in front of the Emba.s.sy, I was brought to a standstill by Lord Lyons' carriage turning into the courtyard from the street. His lordship was inside. We were on very good terms, I may say on very friendly terms, and he beckoned me to come in. I was at the short flight of steps leading to the hall almost as soon as the carriage, and we went inside together. I do not suppose I was in his private room for more than ten minutes, but I brought away the impression that, although the Duc de Gramont and M. emile Ollivier might think it necessary to adopt a bellicose tone in face of the Hohenzollern candidature, there was little or no fear of war, because the Emperor was _decidedly_ inclined to peace. I remember this the more distinctly, seeing that Lord Lyons told me that he had just returned from an interview with the Minister for Foreign Affairs. I am not certain of the exact words used by his lordship, but positive as to the drift of one of his remarks; namely, that the Duc de Gramont was the last person who ought to conduct the negotiations. "There is too much personal animosity between him and Bismarck, owing mainly to the latter having laughed his pretensions to scorn as a diplomatist while the duke was at Vienna." I am certain the words were to that effect. Then he added, "I can understand though I fail to approve De Gramont's personal irritation, but cannot account for Ollivier's, and he seems as pugnacious as the other. Nevertheless, I repeat, the whole of this will blow over: William is too wise a man to go to war on such a pretext, and the Emperor is too ill not to want peace. I wish the Empress would leave him alone. I am going to Ollivier's to-night, and I'll know more about it by to-morrow morning."

It is very evident from this that the historians were subsequently wrongly informed as to M. emile Ollivier's att.i.tude at that moment, which they have described as exactly the reverse from what Lord Lyons found it. I knew little or nothing of M. Ollivier, still he did not give me the impression of being likely to adopt a hectoring tone just in order to please the gallery, the gallery being in this instance the clientele of the opposition, whom the Emperor feared more than any one else. From all I have been able to gather since, Louis-Napoleon seemed racked with anxiety, but, as one of my informants, who was scarcely away from his side at the time, said afterwards, he was not pondering over the consequences of war which he fancied he was able to prevent, he was pondering the consequences of peace. Translated into plain language, it meant that the republican minority, with its recent accession of representatives in the chambers and its still more unscrupulous adherents outside, were striving with might and main, not to goad the Emperor into a war, but to make him keep a peace which, if they had had the chance, they would have denounced as humiliating to France.

Unfortunately for France, they found an unexpected ally in the Empress.

The latter urged on the war with Prussia, in order to secure to her son the imperial crown which was shaking on the head of her husband; the former were playing the game known colloquially as "Heads, I win; tails, you lose." Peace preserved by means of diplomatic negotiations would give them the opportunity of holding up the Empire to scorn as being too weak to safeguard the national honour; war would give them the opportunity of airing their plat.i.tudes about the iniquity of standing armies and the sacrifice of human life, etc. I go further still, and unhesitatingly affirm that, if any party was aware of the corruption in the army, it was the republican one. The plebiscite of May, with its thousands of votes adverse to the Imperial regime--among which votes there were those of a great many officers--had not only given them a chance of counting their numbers, but of obtaining information, not available to their adversaries in power. This is tantamount to an indictment of having deliberately contributed to the temporary ruin of their country for political purposes, and such I intend it to be. I am not speaking without good grounds.

On the day I met Lord Lyons, two ministerial councils were held at Saint-Cloud, both presided over by the Emperor. Between the first and the second, the peaceful sentiments of the chief of the State underwent no change. So little did the Emperor foresee or desire war, that on the evening of that same day, while the second council of ministers was being held, he sent one of his aides-de-camp to my house for the exact address of Mr. Prescott-Hewett, the eminent English surgeon. I was not at home, and on my return, an hour later, sent the address by telegraph to Saint-Cloud. I have since learnt that, on the same night, a telegram was despatched to London, inquiring of Mr. Hewett when it would be convenient for him to hold a consultation in Paris. An appointment was made, but Mr. Hewett eventually went in August, to the seat of war, to see his ill.u.s.trious patient. I believe, but am not certain, that he saw him at Chalons.

On the 6th of July, there was a third council of ministers at Saint-Cloud, at ten o'clock in the morning, in order to draw up the answer to M. Cochery's interpellation on the Hohenzollern candidature.

The latter was supposed to have been inspired by M. Thiers, but I will only state what I know positively with regard to the Emperor. At a little after two that afternoon, I happened to be at the Cafe de la Paix, when my old friend, Joseph Ferrari, came up to me.[77] He was a great friend of Adolphe and elysee, the brothers of emile Ollivier. He looked positively crestfallen, and, knowing him to be a sincere advocate of peace, I had no need to ask him for the nature of the news he brought. I could see at a glance that it was bad. He, however, left me no time to put a question.

[Footnote 77: Joseph Ferrari was an Italian by birth, but spent a great part of his time in France. He is best known by his "Philosophes Salaries," and died in Rome, 1876.--EDITOR.]

"It's all over," he said at once, "and, unless a miracle happens, we'll have war in less than a fortnight." He immediately went on. "Wait for another hour, and then you'll see the effect of De Gramont's answer to Cochery's interpellation in the Chamber. Not only the Prussians, but the smallest nation in Europe would not stand it."

"But," I remarked, "about this time yesterday I was positively a.s.sured, and on the best authority, that the Emperor was absolutely opposed to any but a pacific remonstrance."

"Your informant was perfectly correct," was the answer; "and as late as ten o'clock last night, at the termination of the second council of ministers, his sentiments underwent no change. Immediately after that, the Empress had a conversation with the Emperor, which I know for certain lasted till one o'clock in the morning. The result of this conversation is the answer, the text of which you will see directly, and which is tantamount to a challenge to Prussia. Mark my words, the Empress will not cease from troubling until she has driven France into a war with the only great Protestant power on the Continent. That power defeated, she will endeavour to destroy the rising unity of Italy. She little knows that Victor-Emanuel will not wait until then, and that, at the first success of the French on the Rhine, he will cross the Alps at a sign of Prussia; that at the first success of Prussia, the Italian troops will start on their march to Rome. Nay, I repeat, it is the Empress who will prove the ruin of France."

That playful cry of the Empress, which she was so fond of uttering in the beginning of her married life, "As for myself, I am a Legitimist,"

without understanding, or endeavouring to understand its import, had gradually grafted itself on her mind, although it had ceased to be on her lips. Impatient of contradiction, self-willed and tyrannical, both by nature and training, her sudden and marvellous elevation to one of the proudest positions in Europe could not fail to strengthen those defects of character. Superst.i.tious, like most Spaniards, she was firmly convinced that the gipsy who foretold her future greatness was a Divine messenger, and from that to the conviction that she occupied the throne by a right as Divine as that claimed by the Bourbons there was but one short step. A corollary to Divine right meant, to her, personal and irresponsible government. That was her idea of legitimism. Though by no means endowed with high intellectual gifts, she perceived well enough, in the beginning, that the Second Empire was not a very stable edifice, either with regard to its foundations or superstructure, and, until England propped it up by an alliance, and a State visit from our sovereign, she kept commendably coy. But from that moment she aspired to be something more than the arbiter of fashion. As I have already said, she failed in prevailing upon the Emperor to go to the Crimea. In '59 she was more successful, in '65 she was more successful still. In the former year, she laid the foundation of what was called the Empress's party; in the latter, the scaffolding was removed from the structure, henceforth the work was done inside. She, no more than her surroundings, had the remotest idea that France was gradually undergoing a political change, that she was recovering her const.i.tutional rights. Her party was like the hare in the fable that used the wrong end of the opera-gla.s.s, and lived in a fool's paradise with regard to the distance that divided them from the sportsman, until he was fairly upon them, in the shape of the liberal ministry of the 2nd of January, 1870.

M. emile Ollivier, to his credit be it said, refused to be guided by his predecessors. He studiously avoided informing the Empress of the affairs of State, let alone discussing them with her. Apart from the small fry of the Imperial party, he made two powerful enemies--the Empress herself, and Rouher, who saw in this refusal to follow precedent an implied censure upon himself. Rouher, I repeat once more, was honest to the backbone, but fond of personal power. The Empire to him meant nothing but the Emperor, the Empress, and the heir to the throne; just as Germany meant nothing to Bismarck but the Hohenzollern dynasty. He was one of the first to proclaim, loudly and openly, that the plebiscite of the 8th of May meant an overwhelming manifestation, not in favour of the liberal Empire, but in favour of the Emperor; and when the latter, to do him justice, declined to look at it in that light, he deserted him for the side of his wife. It is an open secret that the first use the Empress meant to make of her power as regent, after the first signal victory of French arms, was to sweep away the cabinet of the 2nd of January. The Imperial decree conferring the regency upon her, "during the absence of the Emperor at the head of his army," and dated the 22nd of July, invested her with very limited power.