D’ESTAINGD’ESTAING
D’ESTAING
Louis XVI, very soon after this, hastened to make amends in the noblest manner and the one most worthy of a sovereign who felt that he had done wrong. “Le Barbier de Séville,”says Grimm, “was given at the little theater of the Trianon, and the very distinguished favor was accorded the author to be present at the performance.”
In the chapter on theBarbierwe have spoken already of this striking scene, where the queen herself, the Comte d’Artois, M. de Vaudreuil, etc., were the actors. There is one more line to this touching picture which we have from the pen of Gudin.
“A zealous partisan of royalty, after making himself trusted by those in power and in the guise of a Sans-culotte, had penetrated to the presence of the unhappy queen, then prisoner in the Temple. He was able to speak to her and asked if there were anyone of whom she could think who might help her, and he suggested Beaumarchais. The queen’s countenance instantly fell.
“‘Alas,’ she said, ‘he now has it in his power to avenge himself for the insult once offered him.’” And Gudin adds, “She did not know the heart of Beaumarchais or that if it had been possible, now that she was in trouble, he would have come to her relief with far more alacrity than in the hey day of her power.”
But the storm now gathering, that was to sweep the mighty from their seats, was destined also to vent its fury upon the man of the people whose riches and honors long had been the objects of their jealous rage. Twice he owed his safety to the poor whom he had assisted, but in the generaldébâclewhich followed there was no opportunity for his wit or his ingenuity to save him; the author of theMariage de Figaroand theBarbierwas forced himself to bend before the storm.
“In my feeble childhood I was always astonished to see that the cheval de bronze had its foot in the air, but never advanced.... Sad emblem of my affairs, which like this image seem always to march, but which have no movement.”
Beaumarchais to Ramel, Minister of Finance.
The Marine of Beaumarchais—Success of His Business Undertakings—His Wealth—Ringing Plea of Self-Justification in the Cause of America, Addressed to the Commune of Paris, 1789—The Beautiful House Which He Built in Paris—His Liberality—His Friends—His Home Life—Madame de Beaumarchais—His Daughter, Eugénie.
SINCE the official declaration made by the French Government to the Court of London, recognizing the independence of the United States, England had considered that war had been declared, and on June 18, 1778, she struck the first blow.
“Beaumarchais,” says Loménie, “disposed himself to make war as well as to carry on commerce. See him now demanding sailors from the Minister of the Navy, M. de Sartine, for the service of his great vessel,le fier Roderigue!
“‘Paris, the 12th of December, 1778.
“‘Monsieur:
“‘If I presented myself to-day before you, and if I had the honor to propose to you to construct and arm a vesselof this importance, as one able to take the place of a vessel of the King, wherever I should send it, do you think, Monsieur, that you would refuse cannon and the title of Captain of a battleship to its Commander? How then can it be less precious when all is ready than if it were still to be built?
“‘I beg your pardon; but the multiplicity of objects which occupy you may very easily hide from you the importance of my armament, consecrated to the triple employment of encouraging the commerce of France by my example and my success, of promising to provision the islands most in need, and of conducting to the continent of America, in the most stormy times, a French merchant fleet important enough to convince the new states by this effort of the great desire of France to support the new commercial bond that already joins us....
“‘It is to your wisdom that I present these serious matters, and I dare say that there are none more worthy of the attention and protection of an enlightened minister such as you.
“‘Caron de Beaumarchais.’
“Le Fier Roderigue,” continues Loménie, “set sail, with her sixty cannon, convoying ten merchantmen. At the Isle of Granada it encountered the fleet of the Admiral d’Estaing, which prepared to give battle to that of the English Admiral Biron. Sighting the beautiful vessel of Beaumarchais passing in the distance, the admiral made a sign for it to come. Seeing that it belonged to His Majesty, Caron de Beaumarchais, he assigned it to its post of battle without the authorization of its proprietor, allowing the unfortunate merchantmen which this vessel was protecting to go on at the mercy of the seas and of the English.Le Fier Roderigueresigned itself bravely to its fate, and took a glorious part in the Battleof Granada and contributed its part to making the English Admiral retire, but its captain was killed and it was riddled with bullets. The evening of the combat the Comte d’Estaing, feeling the need of consoling Beaumarchais, wrote to him a letter, which he sent through the Minister of the Navy, the like of which is not often found in the archives of a dramatic poet:
“‘On board the Languedoc, the 12th of July, 1779.
“‘I have only the time to write you thatle Fier Roderiguehas held her post in line, and contributed to the success of the arms of the king. You will pardon me all the more readily for having used her, since your interests will not suffer from it, be sure of that. The brave M. de Montaut unfortunately was killed. I will urge the minister without ceasing for the favor of the state, and I hope you will aid me in soliciting that which your navy has very justly merited.
“‘I have the honor to be, with all the sentiments which you have so well known how to inspire, Monsieur, your very humble and obedient servant,
“‘Estaing.’
“The minister hastened to send the letter to Beaumarchais, who replied as follows:
“‘Paris, September 7, 1779.
“‘Monsieur:
“‘I thank you for having sent me the letter of the Comte d’Estaing. It is noble of him, in the moment of his triumph, to have thought that a word from his hand would be very agreeable to me.... Whatever may happen for my affairs, my poor friend Montaut died on the bed of honor, and I feel the joy of a child to know that my vessel has contributedto take from the English the most fertile of their possessions....
“‘You know my tender and respectful devotion,
“‘Beaumarchais.’
“However, the joy of the patriot,” continued Loménie, “was somewhat mitigated by the distress of the merchant. The report of the captain, second in command of theFier Roderigue, arrived at the same time, and though it contributed equally to the glory of Beaumarchais, it was very disastrous from the point of view of his coffer. He, therefore, addressed a vigorous appeal to the King, asking for an indemnity which would save him from ruin.” That the request was subsequently granted, we may judge from the following extract from a letter to Necker, written a little more than a year after the date of the battle, and given by Gudin:
“Paris, July 18th, 1780.
“You have rendered, Monsieur, an act of justice in my regard, and you have done it with grace, which has touched me more than the thing itself. I thank you for it; but I owe you more important thanks upon the indemnity, which the King has been so good as to offer me for the enormous losses which the campaign with d’Estaing has caused me.”
Loménie asserts that the indemnity had been fixed at 2,000,000 francs, and was to be paid in installments, the last coming to him in 1785.
But to return to the American Congress. After long debates a reversal of parties had placed at the head of that body the honorable John Jay, who hastened to address Beaumarchais with the first letter which came to him from Congress, although his earliest shipment of supplies had been made almost two years previously:
“By express order of Congress, sitting in Philadelphia, to M. de Beaumarchais.
“January 15, 1779.
“Sir:
“The Congress of the United States of America, recognizing the great efforts which you have made in their favor, presents to you its thanks, and the assurance of its esteem. It laments the disappointments which you have suffered in the support of these States. Disastrous circumstances have prevented the execution of its desires; but it will take the promptest measures to acquit itself of the debt which it has contracted towards you. The generous sentiments and the breadth of view, which alone could dictate a conduct such as yours, are the eulogy of your actions, and the ornament of your character. While, by your rare talents, you have rendered yourself useful to your prince, you have gained the esteem of this young Republic and merited the applause of the New World.
“John Jay, President.”
This beautiful expression of the best feeling in the States must have been soothing to the heart of Beaumarchais. That he understood the attitude of America and knew very well the complexity of the situation in which the young republic found itself involved, may be judged from the following extract from hisMémoire justicative à la cour de Londres, printed in the first collection of his works and written in 1779. He says:
“In truth, my ardent zeal for my new friends might well have been a little wounded at the cold reception which was made to brave men whom I had myself brought to expatriate themselves for the service. My pains, my work, and my advances were immense in this respect. But I am afflictedonly for our unhappy officers, because even in the very refusal of the Americans, I don’t know what exultation, what republican pride attracted my heart, and showed me a people so ardent to conquer their liberty, that they feared to diminish the glory of success in allowing strangers to divide with them the perils. My soul thus is composed; in the greatest evils it searches with care, and consoles itself with the little good which it encounters. And so, while my efforts had so little fruit in America ... sustained by my pride, I disdained to defend myself, leaving the evil-minded to their proper channel.
“The idle of Paris envied my happiness, and were jealous of me as a favorite of fortune and of power; and I, sad plaything of events, alone, deprived of rest, lost for society, exhausted by insomnia and troubles,tour à tourexposed to the suspicions, the ingratitude, anxieties, to the reproaches of France, England and America; working day and night and running to my goal by constant effort across a thorny land—I exhausted myself with fatigue and advanced little. I felt my courage revived when I thought that a great people would soon offer a sweet and free retreat to all the persecuted of Europe; that my fatherland would be revenged for the humiliation to which it had been subjected by the treaty of 1763; in a word, that the sea would become open to all commercial nations; I was supported by the hope that a new system of politics would open in Europe.”
But notwithstanding all his difficulties and losses, the affairs of Beaumarchais were advancing steadily. His merchant fleet, after the Treaty of Paris, signed in September, 1783, was no longer subject to the risks of war, and soon began to bring him in vast returns. But as late as March of this same year, we find him writing to Vergennes, in a letter quoted by Gaillardet:
“The taking of my two vessels cost me more than 800,000 livres, and since the publicity of my losses I have been drawn upon, through fear, for a similar sum. Remittances have come to me from America, and now unfortunately their payment is suspended. I have two new vessels at Nantes, one of 12,000 tons, which I destined for China, and which I am now unable to sell.
“I have 80,000 livres worth of bales of merchandise on theAigle, destined for Congress, and theAiglehas been taken. A sudden inundation, which happened at Morlaige, has submerged two warehouses where I had 1,000,000 pounds of tea. The whole is damaged to-day.
“Day before yesterday, at the instant of payment, the exchange agent of Girard by his fraudulent bankruptcy carried off near 30,000 livres.
“Two vessels must be sent to the Chesapeake before the middle of May if I am not to lose all the miserable remains of the tobacco of my stores in Virginia, the main part of which was burned by the English, because for four yearsle Fier Roderiguehas been detained at Rochefort, where it has at last decayed. This is the most trying time of my life; and you know M. le Comte that for three years I have had over 200,000 livres in disuse, because of the enormous mass of parchments which M. de Maurepas ordered me secretly to buy, wherever I found them. I shall perish if M. de Fleury does not promptly arrange with you to throw me the ‘on account’ which I demand, as one throws a cable to him whom the current carries away. I always have served my country well, and I will serve it still without recompense; I wish none. But in the name of Heaven, of the King, of compassion and of justice, prevent me from perishing or from hiding shamefully in a foreign country the little courage and talent which I always have sought to render usefulto my country and to my King. What I ask is of the most rigorous equity and I will receive it as a favor.
“I present to you the homages of him who has not slept for two months, but who is none the less, with the most respectful devotion, M. le Comte, your very humble and very obedient servitor,
“Caron de Beaumarchais.”
THE BASTILLETHE BASTILLE
THE BASTILLE
But let us now turn from this gloomy picture and cast a glance at the home life of this man so buffeted before the world.
Bonneville de Marsangy, in his life of Madame de Beaumarchais has drawn the picture for us. He says:
“Beaumarchais, in consequence of the noise which continued to be made about his name, was none the less one of the personages the most sought after of the capital. Whatever he says about it, the fact is that he lived in great style. His stables contained as many as ten horses. He kept open table; strangers of distinction, desirous of knowing the popular author of so many celebrated works, solicited the honor of being presented to him. He received men of distinction in politics, in letters and arts, and women the most sought after, in the midst of whom the mistress of the house shone in the first rank by heresprit, her education, and her charms.... Nearly every evening in the Hotel Boulevard St. Antonie, there was talking, music, playing, although the master never took part in play. Hisespritwas equally free, equally alert, his fancy inexhaustible. It is there he loved to read his new productions, and he excelled at that. Arnault recounts one of these literary reunions at which he assisted, ‘in a great circular salon, partly ornamented with mirrors, partly with landscapes of vast dimensions, and half of which was occupied by seats for placing the auditors. Upon an estrade, furnished with a desk, stood the armchairof the reader. There, as in a theatre, Beaumarchais read, or rather played his dramas; because it is to play, if one delivers a piece in as many different inflexions of the voice as there are different personages in the action; because it is to play if one gives to each one of the personages the pantomime which should characterize him.’” (Arnault,Souvenirs d’un sexagénaire, Vol. IV.)
And Gudin adds another touch to the portrait of this many-sided man; after speaking of the loss of his mother, dying in her eighty-third year, he said:
“Beaumarchais came at once to see me, offered me all the consolations of friendship, and reclaimed the promise which we had given one another long ago, to unite the rest of the days which nature reserved to us.
“It is thus that I found in the family of my friend all those attentions which could sweeten the irreparable loss of the tenderest mother and one whom I had quitted almost never.”
In 1787 Beaumarchais had accumulated a sufficient fortune to contemplate the building of a superb residence, for which he already had bought the land in that section of the City of Paris now occupied by the Boulevard which bears his name. It was directly opposite the Bastille, and was not yet completed on the memorable 14th of July, 1789, when the ancient fortress was destroyed. This residence cost the owner one million six hundred and sixty-three thousand francs. “Une folie,” Napoleon called it. When in 1818, the government bought the property so as to make way for the new boulevard, they paid the heirs of Beaumarchais only five hundred thousand francs. As an investment, therefore, it was far from successful; but as a residence, it was, while it lasted, one of the sights of the city, and was regarded as such. It was the very last word in elegance and comfort,and rivaled the most sumptuous palaces of the capital. In the beginning, it was always open to the public, but so vast became the horde of visitors, that very soon entrance was obtainable only by tickets (though these were never refused to anyone who asked politely for them).
Although the storm of the Revolution was gathering already, its shadow had not yet fallen upon Beaumarchais, who did not foresee either its fury or the extent of the devastation it was to carry in its train.
After the fall of the Bastille he had been appointed by theMaireof Paris to superintend the demolition of the structure so as to prevent damage to buildings in the neighborhood. Soon after he was named member of the Municipal Council, but, says Loménie, “denunciations soon began to rain upon him. All the adversaries of his numerous lawsuits and all those whom his riches irritated denounced him to the fury of the masses, as one who upheld authority, or who was hoarding wheat or arms. His house, situated at the very entrance to that terrible suburb, the center of the mob, presented itself as a sort of insolent provocation, which naturally called for the visits of the people.” To rid himself of these dangerous visits became his constant preoccupation; first demanding official visits, then placarding about him the results of these visits, stating that nothing suspicious had been found in his possession, again distributing about him all the money possible, and suggesting to the municipality all sorts of charitable institutions, because “disorder and misery always march in company.” Among the accusations persistently made against him was that he had enriched himself at the expense of the American people, and that he had sent them arms and munitions for which he charged them a hundred times their value. Stung to the quick by the falsehood of these accusations, coming as theydid from his own countrymen, he made a ringing protest of self-defense to the commune of Paris in September, 1789, in which he said:
“You condemn me to speak well of myself by speaking so ill of me.... Attacked by furious enemies, I have gained, perhaps with too much brilliancy, all the lawsuits undertaken against me, because I never have brought an action against anyone, although for the greatest benefits I have received almost universally, I dare say it, unheard of and constant ingratitude....
“Since I have been attacked upon this point I am going to state before you all the unheard of labors, which a single man was able to accomplish in that great work. Frenchmen, you who pride yourselves to have drawn the desire and ardor of your liberty from the example of the Americans, learn that that nation owes me very largely her own. It is time that I should say it in the face of the universe, and if anyone pretends to contest what I say, let him rise and name himself; my proofs will reply to the imputations which I denounce....
“These accusations, as vague as despicable, relate to the Americans whom I served so generously; I, who would be reduced to the alms which I scatter, had not noble foreigners, taken in a free country, associated me with the gains of a vast commerce, while I associated them to my constant losses with America! I, who dared form all the plans of help necessary to that people, and offered them to our ministers; I, who dared blame their indecision, their weakness, and so loudly reproach them with it, in my proud reply to the English manifest by Gibbon; I, who dared promise a success which was very far from being generally admitted....
“All that I could obtain after a great deal of trouble ... was to be allowed to proceed on my own responsibility without the assistance of the government in any way, oncondition of being stopped if the English made the least complaints, and of being punished if they produced proofs—which put so many hindrances in the way of my maritime operations, that to help the Americans, I was obliged to mask and to disguise my works in the interior; the expeditions, the ships, the manufactures of the contractors, and even to the reason of trade, which was a mask like the rest.
“Shall I say it, Frenchmen? The King alone had courage, and as for me I worked for his glory, wishing to make him the prop of a proud people who burned to be free; because I had an immense debt to fulfil towards that good king.... Yes, the King, Louis XVI, who assured to the Americans their liberty, who gives you yours, Frenchmen, gave back to me also my estate. Let his name be honored in all the centuries. Then, leaving aside the labors which I am ready to expose in a work where I will prove that I sent at my risks and perils, whatever could be had of the best in France, in munitions, arms, clothing, etc., to the insurgents who needed everything, on credit, at the cost price, leaving them masters to fix the commission which they would one day pay to their friend (for so they called me); and that after twelve years, I am still not paid. I declare that the measures which I am making at this moment before their new federal court, to obtain justice of them,—faithful report which a committee of the Treasury has just given of what is due me, is the last effort of a very generous creditor. But I will publish everything, and the universe shall judge us. Omitting, I say, all the details of my work, of my services towards that people, I will pass to the testimony which was given me by the agent, the minister of America, before he left France. His letter of March 18th, 1778, bears these words: ‘After the perplexing and embarrassing scenes you have had to pass through, it must give you the most solid joy to see an armament goingout to America.... I again congratulate you on this great and glorious event, to which you have contributed more than any other person.
‘Silas Deane.’
“Alas, that was the last of my successes. A minister of the department to whom I showed that letter, alas, though up to that time he had treated me with the greatest kindness, suddenly changed his tone, and his style. I did my best to persuade him that I did not pretend in any way to appropriate to myself that glory, but to leave it entirely to him. The blow had carried, he had read the praise; I was lost in his favor. It was to take from him all idea of my ambition, to avert the storm, that I recommenced to amuse myself with frivolous theatrical plays, while keeping a profound silence upon my political actions. But that helped nothing. It is very true that a year later, the general Congress, having received my vivid complaints upon the delay of payment, wrote me the ... letter by the Honorable Mr. John Jay, their president, the 15th of Jan. 1779....
“If it was not money, it was at least gratitude. America, nearer the great services which I had rendered her, was not yet where she disputed her debts, fatiguing me with injustice, to wear out my life, if possible, and succeed in paying nothing. It is also true that the same year, the respectable Mr. Jefferson, to-day their minister in France, then Governor of Virginia, struck by the fearful losses which the depreciation of paper money would inflict upon me, wrote, to my general agent in America, M. de Francy, in these terms:
“‘December 17, 1779.
“‘Monsieur:
“‘I am very much mortified that the depreciation of paper money, of which no one, I think, had the least idea at the timeof the contract, passed between the supercargo of theFier Roderigue(war vessel of mine, very richly charged, the cargo of which had been delivered on credit to Virginia, which state owes me still almost the whole, after more than twelve years have passed), and that state has enveloped in the general loss M. de Beaumarchais, who has merited so well of us, and who has excited our greatest veneration by his affection for the true rights of man, his genius, his literary reputation, etc.
Signed, “‘Thomas Jefferson.’
“In the work, which I am going to publish, where I will show the proofs of the excellence of all my shipments to that people, after exact inspection which they themselves made, before the departure of my vessels, well attested by their ministers, and the excuses which he made me, of which I have all the originals, the surprise will be to see the patience with which I have supported all the invectives of my enemies. But it would have been to disgracethe greatest act of my life, the honorable part which I had in the liberty of America, if I had mingled it with the discussions of a vile law suit.... It was my scorn, my indignation, which made me keep silence. It is broken; I will hold my tongue no more on that great object,the glory of my entire life. They say that my sordid avarice has been the cause of the misfortunes of the American people.Myavarice, mine, whose life is only a circle of generosity, of benevolence. I will not cease to prove it, since their savage libels have rendered so many men unjust. Not a single being, who went at that time from Europe to America, without having pecuniary obligations to me, of which nearly all are due me still; and no Frenchman has suffered in that country whom I have not aided with my purse. I invoke a witness, whom it does you honor to respect, the very valiant general of your troops. Ask him if my services did not hunt out unfortunate Frenchmen in every corner of America.
“Render justice to my good heart, noble Marquis de Lafayette; Your glorious youth, would it not have been ruined without my wise counsel and the advances of my money? You have very well repaid all that was loaned you by my orders; and I say it to your glory, you have added fifty louis more than were due to me, to join that money to the charitable institution which I was founding of thepauvres mères nourrices....
“And you, Baron von Steuben, Comtes Pulasky, Bienousky, you, Tronçon, Prudhomme, and a hundred others, who have never acquitted their debts to me, come out of your tombs and speak!
“Fifteen hundred thousand francs at least, of services rendered, fill a portfolio, which probably will never be acquitted by anyone, and more than a thousand unfortunates whose needs I have anticipated are ready to raise their voice in my favor.... The third of my fortune is in the hands of my debtors, and since I have aided the poor of Sainte-Marguerite, four hundred letters at least are on my desk from unfortunates, raising their hands to me.... My heart is torn, but I cannot reply to all.
“September 2, 1789.”
But from the accusations of his enemies, and the pleadings of his own cause, let us turn, before worse calamities overtake him, to contemplate anew the charming picture, which the interior of his home presents.
It was in 1791 that he took his family to occupy the splendid new residence which we have just now mentioned. Its mistress Madame de Beaumarchais was a woman of rare intelligence and energy of character; “her physiognomy,” says Bonneville, “offered an expression full of vivacity and intelligence. The eye is superb, tempered by long lashes,heightened by the daring arch of the brows; the mouth is admirably well formed; the chin full, the complexion brilliant.... The reputation for beauty of Madame de Beaumarchais was general. The public ratified on all occasions, the praise of her friends. It is traditional in her family that she rarely left her home without being recognized and followed at a distance by a cortège of admirers, drawn not only by the celebrity of the name she bore, but also by the prestige of her bearing. Often, even, she was obliged to gain her carriage to avoid the importunity of the too flattering attentions.
“Beaumarchais, as he confesses perhaps superfluously, was far from being a devotee; still he respected the beliefs of others; he had desired especially that his daughter should be brought up piously. Eugénie was at this moment a pupil at the convent of Bon Secours; her father often went there to visit her. The Superior, who had had proof of the generous and good heart of the father of her pupil, permitted herself to speak of one of the school-mates of Eugénie who was unable to pay the expenses of her education. The author of theMariage de Figaroreplied at once in the following delicate manner:
“‘July 27, 1790.
“‘I send you, Madame, a bill of 200 livres for your unfortunate pupil. This is for the year. I will have the honor of giving to you or to her, in money, the first time I go to the convent, three louis, which will make six francs a month for this year, the same as I give to my daughter; but I conjure you, Madame, that my help does not force or press her vocation. I should be distressed if she were in any way thwarted as to her future. I have not the honor of knowing her; it is the good which you have said of her which determined me. That she remains free, and less unhappy, this is all the thanks I ask; keep the secret for me. I am surroundedwith virulent enemies.’
“One cannot,” continues Bonneville, “hide oneself more gallantly, to do good.
“The prioress hastened to divulge the secret; and to the rough draft of the letter of Beaumarchais found among his papers, is attached a note in which his young protégée expressed with emotion all her gratitude to her benefactor.”
The violences directed against the religious establishments soon forced Beaumarchais to bring his daughter home. It was about this time that we find a letter, addressed by the author of theMariage de Figaro, to the Municipal officers of Paris, begging, with his characteristic energy, that the churches be opened, and more masses be said in the Quartier-Vieille-rue-du-Temple.
“In this letter,” says Loménie, “it is the husband, the brother, but especially the father who speaks. The author of theMariage de Figaroadored his only daughter, he had just brought her home from the convent, and if he went himself very little to mass, he was not sorry to have her go for him. It is this side of Beaumarchais, so good, so simple, so jovial, so gay, that makes us love him, and which comes out with special force in a song which he wrote to celebrate the young girl’s return under her father’s roof. This song has been classed as one of the best of the poetic inspirations of Beaumarchais. The turnnaïfof the old popular songs is found in it, combined with a graceful mixture of friendliness, finesse and gaiety.”
The charm of these verses, which it is impossible to render into English, gave the song a great popularity, and it circulated widely.
In it, there was question of the marriage of Mlle. Eugénie, where the father jestingly says: “Mygentilhomme, is that all you are?
“Parchment and blazonry will never open my house.
“If someone really tender,Sings thee songs in the air,Let me hear themFor thy Father sees clearAnd I will say if there is reasonThat he should enter here.“Should some excellent young manSee heaven in thy eyes,Say to him ‘Beautiful astronomer,Speak to that good old man,He is my father, and there is reasonThat he should choose his son-in-law.’“If he has some talentWhat matters his fortune?Judge, writer, soldier,Esprit, virtue, sweet reason—These are the titles valued here.”
“If someone really tender,Sings thee songs in the air,Let me hear themFor thy Father sees clearAnd I will say if there is reasonThat he should enter here.“Should some excellent young manSee heaven in thy eyes,Say to him ‘Beautiful astronomer,Speak to that good old man,He is my father, and there is reasonThat he should choose his son-in-law.’“If he has some talentWhat matters his fortune?Judge, writer, soldier,Esprit, virtue, sweet reason—These are the titles valued here.”
“The result of all this was that Beaumarchais was deluged,” says Loménie, “with the most singular demands in marriage for his daughter. Here it is from a nobleman, but one who makes no point of his blazon, who despises the fortune which he has not, who esteems only virtue, and who aspires to marry Mlle. Eugénie and her dot; there, from a father, perfectly unknown to Beaumarchais, who begs him to keep the daughter for his son, still in college; farther on it is a captain, who has only his sword, but who is worthy of being a Marshal of France. Politely to turn aside this avalanche of virtuous and disinterested suitors, the father ofEugénie wrote a letter which, with slight modifications, serves him for all, and of which the following is a sample:
“Paris, May 21, 1791.
“Although your letter, Monsieur, appears to have its origin in a simple jest, since it is serious and honest, I owe you a reply.
“You have been deceived regarding my daughter. Scarcely fourteen years old, she is far from the time when I will allow her to choose a master, reserving for myself in this only, the right to advise. Perhaps you are quite ignorant of the exact situation. I have only lately taken my daughter from the convent; the joy of her return drew from my indolence a song, which after having been sung at my table, went the rounds. The tonebonhommewhich I there took, joined to the jest of her future establishment, has made many persons think that I already thought of her settlement.
“But may I be preserved from engaging her before the time when her own heart will give her a consciousness of what it all means, and Monsieur, this will be an affair of years, not of months.
“What the song says jestingly, however, will certainly be my rule to enlighten her young heart. Fortune touches me less than talents and virtue, because I wish her to be happy....
“Beaumarchais.”
But the young girl’s presence under her father’s roof was to be of short duration. Very soon, his anxiety for their safety led him to dispatch his family to Havre. For, says La Harpe,
HOUSE OF BEAUMARCHAISHOUSE OF BEAUMARCHAIS
HOUSE OF BEAUMARCHAIS
“His house was placed at the entrance of that terrible faubourg like the Palace of Portici at the foot of Vesuvius....The eruption of the volcano was as yet only at rare intervals; that of the faubourg was at every moment. It is inconceivable that under the lava always boiling, that house was not engulfed.”
So it is here we will leave him to await alone,—except for his faithful Gudin—the coming of the storm, which his own writings had done so much to rouse, but which he neither desired, nor, to the end, comprehended.
“I know very well to live is to combat, and perhaps I should be afflicted at this if I did not know that in return to combat is to live.”
Caron de Beaumarchais.
“—Often broken-hearted, always consoled by the sublime principle of the compensation of good and evil—which was the ground of his optimism...”
Lintilhac in Beaumarchais et Ses Œuvres.
House of Beaumarchais Searched—The 10th of August—Letter to his Family in Havre—Letter of Eugénie to her Father—Commissioned to Buy Guns for the Government—Goes to Holland as Agent ofComité de Salut Public—Declared an Emigré—Confiscation of his Goods—Imprisonment of his Family—The Ninth Thermidor Comes to Save Them—Life During the Terror—Julie again in Evidence—Beaumarchais’s Name Erased From List of Emigrés—Returns to France.
EARLY in 1792, Beaumarchais embarked in a new political and commercial operation which, says Loménie, “was destined to embarrass his fortune and to be the torment of his latter days. France was without arms and he undertook to procure them for her. It is difficult to understand that a man sixty years old, rich, fatigued by a most stormy existence, afflicted with increasing deafness, surrounded254with enemies, and desirous only of repose should have allowed himself to be induced to attempt to bring into France sixty thousand guns detained in Holland under circumstances which rendered this operation as dangerous as it was difficult.”
However, Gudin tells us, “he had only the choice of dangers. To have refused to procure the arms would have marked him for disfavor. He therefore chose the danger of being useful to his country. This resolution exposed him to the risk of being pillaged and assassinated, but in the end it saved his life.... During the days of frenzy which preceded the overthrowing of the throne, the most hostile menaces sounded around his house.”
The populace insisted that he had stored it with wheat and guns. In vain Beaumarchais protested, in vain he placarded the walls of his garden with official statements proving that the house had been searched and that nothing had been found. The fury of the mob was not to to be appeased. Finally on the 8th of August, the threatenings became so ominous that he was persuaded to spend the night in the home of a friend, who had sought safety outside Paris, leaving an old domestic alone in charge. Beaumarchais says:
“At midnight the valet, frightened, came to the room where I was, ‘Monsieur,’ he said to me, ‘get up, the people are searching for you, they are beating the doors down, someone has turned traitor, the house will be pillaged.’ ... The frightened man hid in a closet while the mob searched the house.” When morning came, he returned to his own home, around which the threatenings still continued without ceasing.
Gudin says: “He received the most alarming notices, and the day after the imprisonment of the king, August 10th, a great multitude set out in the direction of his house, threateningto break down the iron gates if they were not immediately opened. I and two other persons were with him.
“At first his desire was to open the doors and to speak to the multitude. But persuaded that secret enemies conducted the crowd, and that he would be assassinated before he could open his mouth, we induced him to leave the house by a side entrance.... As we were but four we decided to separate in the hope of deceiving those who sought him....
“Whatever the cause, once admitted and masters of the situation, someone proposed to swear that they would destroy nothing. The populace swore and kept its word. Always extreme, it even swore to hang anyone who stole anything. It visited the whole house, the closets, the granaries, the cellars, and the apartments of the women and my own. They wished to hang my own domestic, who seeing the crowd, ran from room to room with some of my silver hidden in her pocket; they thought she was stealing, and she was forced to call in the other domestics as witnesses. They searched everywhere and found only the gun, hunting case, and sword of the master of the house, these they did not disturb.
“Thirsty from excitement and fatigue, that breathless troop, instead of opening a cask of wine, satisfied itself with water from the fountain. They even left the master’s watch hanging at the head of his bed, and other articles of jewelry about the rooms.... A troup conducted by a magistrate would not have been more exact in its perquisition, or more circumspect in its conduct.
“Truth here resembles fable,—something extraordinary always mingled itself with the events which came to Beaumarchais. This conduct of the populace was the fruit of the benefits which he had poured upon the poor of his neighborhood. If he had not been loved, if he had not been dear to his domestics, all his goods would have been dissipatedby pillage.”
The next day Beaumarchais wrote to his daughter in Havre:
“August 12, 1792.
“... My thoughts turned upon thy mother, and thee and my poor sisters. I said with a sigh, ‘My child is safe; my age is advanced; my life is worth very little and this would not accelerate the death by nature but by a few years. But my daughter! Her mother! They are safe? Tears flowed from my eyes. Consoled by this thought I occupied myself with the last term of life, believing it very near. Then, my head hollow through so much contending emotion, I tried to harden myself and to think of nothing. I watched mechanically the men come and go; I said, ‘The moment approaches,’ but I thought of it as a man exhausted, whose ideas begin to wander, because for four hours I had been standing in this state of violent emotion which changed into one like death. Then feeling faint, I seated myself on a bank and awaited my fate, without being otherwise alarmed.”
“When the crowd had retired,” says Gudin in his narrative, “Beaumarchais returned and dined in his home, more astonished to find all undisturbed than he would have been to have seen the whole devastated....”
“And so we continued to live alone in that great habitation, occupied in meditating on the misfortunes of the state and sometimes upon those which menaced us....
“On the 23rd of August, upon awakening I perceived armed men in the streets, sentinels at the doors and under the windows. I hastened to the apartment of my friend—I found him surrounded by sinister men occupied in searching his papers and putting his effects under seal. Tranquil in the midst of them, he directed their operations. When they were through, they took him with them and I wasleft alone in that vast palace, guarded bysans culotteswhose aspect made me doubt whether they were there to conserve the property, or to give the signal for pillage.”
Beaumarchais had been carried off to themairie(police court) “where he defended himself so perfectly,” continues Gudin, “that his denouncers were confounded and about to liberate him when Marat denounced him anew.... He was sent to l’Abbaye along with others whose virtues were a title of proscription.
“At the end of a week his name was called. General consternation in the prison.
“‘You are called for.’
“‘By whom?’
“‘M. Manuel. Is he your enemy?’
“‘I never saw him.’ Beaumarchais went out. All the assembly sat silent.
“‘Who is M. Manuel?’ demanded Beaumarchais.
“‘I am he. I come to save you. Your denouncer, Colmar, is declared culpable—he is in prison—you are free.’...
“Two days later came the September massacres. And thus a second time his life was saved. ‘Long afterwards he learned that a woman to whom he had rendered an eminent service had solicited Manuel to obtain the liberty of her benefactor.’” (Gudin, p. 430.)
“It would seem natural,” says M. de Loménie, “that in such a moment, the author of theMariage de Figarowould consent to set aside the matter of the guns and occupy himself with his own personal safety.”
He consented, however, to hide himself during the day outside Paris, but every night he returned on foot by byways and across ploughed fields, to urge the ministers to make good the promises of their predecessors and makeit possible for him to obtain the sixty-thousand guns from Holland which he had promised the nation.
“The fact was,” says Loménie, “that on the one hand, until those guns were delivered, he remained an object of suspicion to the people, while on the other he believed that the minister Lebrun was trying to exploit the matter to his own credit while leaving to Beaumarchais, if necessary, all the responsibility of failure. This was what rendered him so tenacious, that he tormented even Danton who, by the way, could not help laughing to see a man so badly compromised who should be thinking only of his safety, obstinately returning every night to demand the money which had been promised as a deposit, and to obtain a commission for Holland.”
Finally Lebrun consented to give the author of theMariage de Figaroa passport to Holland and promised to have the necessary money ready for him at Havre.
“He set out,” says Lintilhac, “on the 22nd of September, 1792, with Gudin, directing himself toward Havre, where, after so many emotions, he wished to press his wife and his daughter in his arms. From there, he passed to England where he was arrested, imprisoned, then set free. As soon as Madame de Beaumarchais knew that her husband was safe, she returned to Paris to be nearer, so as to defend his interests. A noble task which she accomplished at the peril of her life.
“The departure of Beaumarchais, the motive of which remained a secret, emboldened his enemies who renewed their accusations. The 28th of November a second decree was rendered against him as suspected. Immediately seals were placed upon all the houses which he owned in Paris. Madame de Beaumarchais hastened to protest the accusations against her husband and against the placing of theseals. With great difficulty she finally obtained a decree dated February 10, 1793, which accorded to her husband a delay of two months to present his defense and at the same time the immediate removal of the seals. He wrote from London, December 9, 1792, to his family:
“‘My poor wife and thou, my dear daughter. I do not know where you are, nor where to write to you, neither by whom to give you news. Still I learn by the gazette that seals have been placed for the third time on my property and that I am decreed, accused for this miserable affair of the guns of Holland.... Be calm, my wife and my sisters. Dry thy tears, my sweet and tender child! they trouble the tranquillity of which thy father has need to enlighten the National Convention upon grave subjects which it is important it should know.’”
Beaumarchais returned immediately to France, drew up a memoir for his justification, secured the removal of the seals at Paris; but the municipality of Strausborg maintained those which it had imposed. Beaumarchais grew impatient, addressed a petition to the minister of the interior who sent a dispatch to the administrator of that department of the Bas-Rhein. Again, the author of theMariage de Figarois vindicated and absolved.
The troubles of Beaumarchais showed no signs of diminishing either in number or perplexity. In the month of January, 1793, the English government, having joined the coalition against France, was on the point of herself taking possession of the sixty-thousand guns for which Beaumarchais had so long been negotiating.
“He, however,” says Loménie, “did not lose his head, having already had wind of the project. At the very time whenhe was imprisoned in London he had induced an English merchant ... by means of a large commission ... to become the purchaser of those same guns and to maintain them in his name at Tervère as English property, until the real owner could dispose of them. But the fictitious owner could not hold them long, because the English ministers said to him, ‘Either you are the real owner or you are not; if you are, we are ready to pay for them; if you are not, we intend to confiscate them.’...
“The English merchant remaining faithful to the engagement with Beaumarchais, resisted; affirmed the guns to be his property, invoked his right to dispose of them as he pleased, and this respect for law which distinguishes the English Government above all other governments, left the question undecided. The guns remained at Tervère under guard of an English battleship.” (Loménie, Vol. II, p. 424.)
“Things were at this pass when the committee of public safety informed Beaumarchais that he must secure the arms, or else prevent their falling into the hands of the English; failing which his family and goods in default of his person would answer for the success of the operation.” And so, early in June, 1793, again he left France on this most difficult mission.
“To enter into all the details of his interminabletours et détours, going from Amsterdam to Basle, from Basle to Hamburg, from Hamburg to London ... all which he directed like a very ingeniousintrigue de comédie... would be too long. He was able to keep the guns at Tervère and when the moment seemed to him favorable, he supplicated the committee of public safety with loud cries, to order the General Pichegru to come and carry off the guns; but the committee absorbed by a thousand things made noreply.... The only missive he ever received from them was the following, dated,5 pluviose, An II(January 26, 1794), written by Robert Lindet, ‘You must be quick, do not await events. If you defer too long, your service will not be appreciated. Great returns are necessary and they must be prompt. It is of no use to calculate the difficulties, we consider only results and success.’”
“Not only,” continues Loménie, “did the Committee abandon Beaumarchais to himself, but with a thoughtlessness which is another sign of the times, they allowed their agent to be put upon the lists as anémigré, which act entailed the confiscation of his property.
“Madame de Beaumarchais went at once to the committee of public safety, explained that her husband wasnotanémigré, since he had left the territory of the republic because of an official mission, and provided with a regular passport, and her proof in her hand, she succeeded in having the decree withdrawn and the seals removed from the property. Beaumarchais had at this time taken refuge in Hamburg.
“He found himself,” says Loménie, “in the most cruel situation both materially and morally. He knew that the revolutionary tribunal was fixed permanently at Paris, that it struck without pity mothers, wives, and daughters of the absent ones, and that the bloody knife never ceased to fall. The unfortunate man was in torture. Eugénie tried to comfort her father in the unconscious tranquillity of a young girl. Every precaution had been taken to hide from her the horrible tragedy which was being enacted about her; she presented a striking contrast with the terrible reality of the times.
“She walked alone and melancholy in the lovely garden, while the dismal car passed along the terrace perhaps. Butin her sad dreaming, she did not turn her head; she admired the earliest advances of spring. On March 11th, she wrote to her father,
“‘The verdure of our trees is beginning to appear, the leaves develop from day to day, and flowers already beautify thy garden. It would be very lovely, if we could walk here with thee. Thy presence would add a charm to everything which surrounds us. There is no happiness for me but what thou partakest in. We are only happy through thee, oh my tender father!’”
The very next day measures were taken which ended in the annulling of the decree rendered by thecomité de salut publicin which thecomité de sûreté générale, which had taken its place, once more declared Beaumarchais to be anémigré, replaced the seals upon his property, confiscated his revenues and on the 5th of July, 1794, arrested his wife, his two sisters, and his daughter.
They were shut up in the convent of Port-Royal which had been changed into a prison and which, says Loménie, “by an atrocious irony was calledPort-Libre, where they waited their turn to mount the fatal cart that should conduct them to the guillotine.” The ninththermidorecame to put an end to these butcheries. Eleven days later, another decree of thecomité de sûreté générale, again established, gave to theCitoyennesCaron their liberty.
During this frightful period of the terror, Beaumarchais, still at Hamburg, deprived of all communication with his family, was a prey to the most terrible mental agony. His correspondence shows that he had moments of the deepest despair when he asked himself if he were not losing his mind.
“Where shall I address thee?” he wrote his wife. “Under what name? What shall I call thee? Who are thy friends? Whom can I consider mine? Ah, without the hope of savingmy daughter, the atrocious guillotine would be sweeter to me than my horrible condition.”
It was at this period that the following address to the American people was written.
“Americans: Though I have served you with an indefatigable zeal, I have in my life received only bitterness for recompense, and I die your creditor. Permit then in dying that I will to my daughter the debt which you owe me. Perhaps after I am gone, other injustices, from which I cannot defend myself, will rob me of all I possess so nothing will be left for her, and perhaps Providence has ordained by your delay in paying me, that through you she will be spared absolute want. Adopt her as a worthy child of the state. Her mother, equally unfortunate, and my widow, will conduct her to you. Let her be looked upon as the daughter of a citizen! But if after these last efforts, if after all has been said, I must still feel that you will reject my demands—If I am to fear that you will refuse her arbitrators; at last, desperate, ruined in Europe as well as by you, your country being the only one in which I could beg without shame—what would remain for me to do, but to supplicate Heaven to give me the strength to take the voyage to America?
“Arrived in your midst, mind and body weakened, unable to maintain my rights, should I there be forced, my proofs in my hand, to have myself carried to the doors of your National Assembly, and, holding aloft the cap of liberty, with which I helped as much as anyone to adorn your heads—to cry out ‘Give an alms to your friend, whose accumulated services have only had this recompense,date obolum Belisario!’
“Pierre-Augustin Caron Beaumarchais.”
It was precisely to save her daughter, that Madame de Beaumarchais had broken all communication with her husband, retaken her family name and thought only of making herself forgotten.
“The Revolutionary laws,” says Gudin, “ordained the divorce of the wives ofémigrés, under pain of being suspected and of running the risk of death that could not be inflicted upon their husbands. Madame de Beaumarchais, worthy of the courageous man whose hand she had received, went to the Revolutionary Committee and with that firmness which inspired respect and that grace which embellished every action, said, ‘Your decrees oblige me to demand a divorce. I obey, although my husband, charged with a commission is not anémigréand never had the thought: I attest it and I know his heart. He will justify himself of this accusation, as he has of all the rest, and I shall have the satisfaction of marrying him a second time, according to your new laws.’”
“Such was the effect of his destiny,” observes this eighteenth century philosopher, “that he was obliged to renew the knot of his own marriage at the same time that he occupied himself with the marriage of his daughter.”
The condition of the family of Beaumarchais when they found themselves once more free, was far from enviable. Their revenues had been seized and their beautiful home was ordered to be sold. Eugénie felt only horror for the place and persuaded her mother to live in a small house. Gudin had gone into the country and Julie, the faithful sister of Beaumarchais, went to live alone with an old servant in the deserted palace of her brother, which was now guarded by agents of the Republic and which bore written upon its walls, “Propriété nationale.”
“If, as I hope,” says Loménie, “the reader has retained an agreeable impression of Julie, it will be a pleasure perhapsto see again that intelligent, merry, courageous face which neither age, privations, nor dangers had been able to change.
“A picture of the domestic and inner life of three women, once rich, forced to face the difficulties of a fearful epoch will give details of interest to that period which history itself cannot furnish.
“During the time when the head of the household was proscribed, it was Madame Beaumarchais, a person of rare merit who joined to all feminine graces a truly virile energy of character, who bore the weight of the situation and while working on one hand to prevent the sale of her husband’s property, tried on the other, to have his name erased from the fatal list; and all the time was obliged to provide for her family with what she had been able to save from the wreck of their fortune. On her side Julie guarded the house of her brother, kept her sister-in-law in touch with events at the house, and urged her to resistance in the animated and original tone which characterised her.
“‘Morbleu! my child,’ she wrote her after the Terror, ‘let us quickly get the decree suppressed. Even the fruits, the same as last year, are requisitioned; the cherries being ripe, they are to be picked to-morrow and sold, and the rest as it ripens, and then close the garden to the profane and the gluttons! Isn’t it sweet to have lived here alone for six months, and only be allowed to eat the stones of the fruit? And even they are sold with the rest. It is for the birds that I am sorry ... nevertheless, it is a pity that the agency had to interfere this year;... See if thou cannot prevent this brigandage by a firm protest at the agency....
“‘And here a pound of veal has been brought me which costs twenty-eight francs, and at even that it is a bargain,for it might sell for thirty. Rage! Fury! Malediction! One cannot even live by ruining oneself and devouring three times one’s fortune. How happy those who have gone before! They feel neither the confusion in my head, nor my eye which weeps, nor the flame which devours me, nor my tooth which sharpens itself to eat twenty-eight francs worth of veal; they feel none of these evils.’
“Those twenty-eight francs worth of veal, which Julie consumed with humorous anger, bring us to say a word of the curious state of want which was produced by the constant depreciation of paper money after the Terror. It is still Julie who informs us how people lived at that time; her sister-in-law had just given her four thousand francs in paper money and she returned an account of the use to which she put them that December 1794.
“‘When you gave me those four thousand francs, my good friend, my heart beat fast. I thought you suddenly had lost your reason to give me such a fortune; I slipped them quickly into my pocket and spoke of other things, so that you would forget them.
“‘Returned home and quick, some wood, some provisions, before the prices go higher! And see Dupont (the old servant) who runs, exhausts herself! And lo, the scales fall from my eyes when I see the result of four thousand, two hundred, and seventy-five francs.
“‘One load of wood
Nine pounds of candles
Four pounds of sugar
Three litrons (six qts.), of grain
Seven pounds of oil
A dozen wicks
A bushel and a half potatoes
Laundry bill for one month
One pound of powder for the hair
Three ounces of pomade (that used to be three sous)
Over and above this is the provision for the month, butter, eggs, at 100 francs, as you know, and meat from 25 to 30 francs a pound and all else in proportion
Bread, there has been none for two days; we only get it every other day—for the last ten days I have only bought 4 pounds at 45 fr.
“‘When I think of this royal expenditure which costs me from eighteen to twenty thousand francs without allowing myself the least luxury,J’envoie au diable le régime.’
“Shortly after this the value of paper money decreased still more and the price of commodities increased in alarming proportion. In another letter to her sister-in-law Julie gave the following details:
“‘Ten thousand francs which I have scattered in the last two weeks, give me such a fright, seize me with such pity that I no longer know how to count my income. In the last three days, wood has risen from 4,200 francs to 6,500 and all the costs of transporting and piling are in proportion, so that my load of wood has cost me 7,100 francs. Every week it costs from 700 to 800 francs for apot-au-feu, and other meat without counting butter, eggs, and a thousand other details; laundry work has increased so that 8,000francs are not enough for one month. All this makes me impatient and I solemnly affirm that I have not for two years allowed myself a luxury, or gratified a single whim, or made any other expenditures but for the house; nevertheless the needs I have are urgent enough to make me need potfulls of money.’
“But if the sister of Beaumarchais is at the point of famine, the wife and the daughter are no better off; I see in the correspondence of Madame de Beaumarchais that one of her friends went the rounds of the neighborhood to try to obtain some bread which was becoming rarer than diamonds; ‘I am told,’ she wrote, the 5th of June 1795, ‘that at Briare, flour is to be had, if that is true I will make a bargain with some country man and send it direct to you by the barge which goes from Briare to Paris, but that will greatly increase the cost. Please tell me what you think, while waiting I still hope to get hold of a small loaf somewhere. Oh, if I had the gift of miracles, I would send you, not manna from heaven—but good bread and very white!’
“When Beaumarchais in exile, learned all the deprivations from which his family suffered he learned also that they had sufficient moral courage to support them. Gaiety had not wholly disappeared from that interior which used to be so joyous; even if exposed to starvation, the frightful guillotine no longer operated and one began to breathe more freely.”
One of his old friends wrote to him, “See now the soup tureen of the family arrive, that is to say, upon the mahogany table (there is no such thing as a cloth) is a plate of beans, two potatoes, a carafe of wine, with very much water. Thy daughter asks for a white poodle to use as a napkin and clean the plates—but no matter, come, come; if we have nothing to eat we have plenty to laugh about.Come, I tell thee, for thy wife needs a miller since thysalonis decorated with a flour mill; while thy Eugénie charms thee upon her piano, thou wilt prepare her breakfast, while thy wife knits thy stockings, and thy future son-in-law turns baker; for here everyone has his trade and that is why our cows are so well guarded.
“It is too droll to see our women, without perruque in the morning, filling each one her occupation, because you must know that each one of us is at their service and because in ourrégime, if there are no masters, there are at least valets. This letter costs thee at least a hundred francs counting the paper, pens, the oil of the lamp, because for economy’s sake I came to thy house to write it. We embrace thee with all our hearts.”
And his faithful Gudin wrote him, though in much more somber strain, from his retreat in the country: “My most ardent desire, my friend, is to see you again and to press you to my heart; but circumstances are such that I had to leave Paris where I could no longer subsist. I have taken refuge in a little hamlet fifty miles away, where there are thirteen peasant cabins. The house which I inhabit was a tiny priory, occupied once by a single monk.” And after a very long and profoundly pessimistic discourse upon the sad condition of affairs which he likens to the barbarity which formerly engulfed Greece and Egypt and Assyria, Sicily, and Italy, he terminates thus:
“Adieu my good friend, I would have wished to have talked to you of yourself, of your family, of those whom you love, the regrets which we feel to meet no more together. Our hearts like your own, are crushed with sorrow.... I embrace you and sigh for the happy moment that will unite us.
“Gudin.”