I believe I rid myself of another great big fellow next, and then, the first start having been given, there was a general rout, and I found myself in another room at the end of which I saw several officers, one a general, standing together very calmly, with their swords sheathed. I rushed forward with the boatswain Jadot, to protect them from my men, who were somewhat excited, and the fight was over. The name of the general, a tall fair handsome fellow, was Arista. In later days he became President of the Mexican Republic. He surrendered his sword to me, and I had him taken downstairs, and left him in the hands of artillery Commandant Colombel, who sent him to the fort. As for Santa Anna, we could not find him, though his bed was still warm. We took his epaulettes, and his commanding officer's baton, and Jadot the boatswain, who had lost his own straw hat in the scuffle, put on his gold tipped one.
I lost no time in quitting the house, which was full of blood, and where I was sickened by the sight of the bodies of two wretched women who had been killed by the fire through the doors Once outside I met Captain Laine, coming by the ramparts, and carrying out his task of destruction as he went. He urged me to march with my company on a point in the town where Parseval's column was keeping up a steady fire, keeping an eye meanwhile on the churches, the towers of which were reported to be armed with cannon. I set out on this true "course au clocher" and presently got to a large building from which we were fired upon.
We entered. It was the hospital. There was another shindy in a big room on the ground floor, full of sick, standing up or kneeling on their beds, scantily covered with red blankets, and all shouting "Gracia!" "Mercy!" It was a horrible sight. All the poor wretches were more or less far gone in yellow fever. We went in at one door and hurried out at the other, and at last we got into a long straight street, at the end of which we saw a large house with musketry fire crackling from every window like a great set piece of fireworks. This huge and solid building, set astride on the ramparts, with doors on to the town, and doors into the country, was called the "la Merced barracks. Full of troops as it was, and with reinforcements constantly coming in from outside, it had stopped Parseval's column ever since the morning, and was soon to stop Laine's as well. One great door faced the street up which we were going. Of course it was shut. We brought a gun to bear on it, and sent a shell into it. Amid the smoke of the discharge, mingled with the sort of fog that was still hanging, we thought the door was broken in, and rushed forward. But when we got near we found the cursed thing was intact, and we were forced to throw ourselves back into the side streets for shelter, for in one instant the whole head of our column, six or seven being officers, had been killed or wounded. We then set to work, sappers, artillerymen, sailors, and all, to throw up a barricade across the street, so as to bring up a battery of guns, and break that door right down before beginning the attack afresh. But just on this the admiral arrived and the chiefs in command took counsel with him. Considering half our crews were on shore and that the slightest change in the weather might prevent their getting back on board ship, and considering too that the admiral's object had been attained, he gave orders for us to re-embark. The return journey offered no difficulty, except at the very last moment, when nobody was left on the mole but the admiral and a few officers. Then, a great sound of cheering and of warlike music was heard in the town. It was Santa Anna coming to drive the Frenchmen into the sea. Out he came, on horseback, on to the mole, at the head of his men, but the launches from the frigates which were still lying on each side of the jetty fired grape shot into the head of the column, and laid everybody low,—Santa Anna and the rest of them. Some fanatics rushed to the end of the mole in spite of this, to try and shoot the admiral point blank, and he was in great danger. His coxswain and the midshipman on duty, Halna Dufretay (an admiral and a senator when he died), covered him with their own bodies and were both severely wounded. His secretary, who was with him, and who carried a double-barrelled rifle, killed two Mexicans in two shots. A great friend of mine was killed there too, a charming young fellow who had a great future before him—Chaptal, a first-class cadet. It was known that I was much attached to him and I was given his aiguillettes (which I sent to his family) as a remembrance of him. When I got back to the Creole, bringing two of my midshipmen, Magnier de Maisonneuve and Gervais, with me, both severely wounded, the admiral sent me orders to fire a shell into the "la Merced" barracks every five minutes. This closed the day of my baptism of fire. The military operations of the campaign were over. The fort of Saint Juan d'Ulloa remained in our hands in pledge. It was the diplomats' business to complete the work. The admiral dismissed the greater number of his ships and soon sent me off to Havana, which place I did not reach without falling in with two of those violent squalls which are called norte in the Gulf of Mexico. I was to lie there on the watch, ready to attack privateers if the Mexican Government should resort to that form of warfare—the fleetness of the Creole fitting her specially for such service. Meanwhile my visit was very pleasant to me, after the horrors of Sacrificio and the yellow fever. The commander of an English corvette, the Satellite, gave a dinner to M. de Parseval, two other captains and myself, which was so cordial that towards dessert one of the captains, who shall be nameless, passed his hand gently across his brow and, murmuring "I don't feel very well," sank straightway underneath the table. We took him by the legs and shoulders, Parseval and the English captain and I, but Parseval and the Englishman laughed so much that we had some trouble in getting him to a bed, on which we laid him and where he slept till morning. I know not whether it was for this wound and feat of arms that his native town raised a statue in his honour.
Of course I sought and found all my former Havanese acquaintances. One alone was invisible, the lady of the cigarette. In vain I placed myself night after night before her box. Nobody there! In vain I paid visits to houses I knew she frequented. The covers were all blank. I was sorely grieved. So then I bethought me of a stratagem. The Creole set sail hurriedly, with much bustle, to go and look for a Mexican ship, reported, so they said, to be at sea. As soon as the day closed in I made all sail for the port, and leaving my second officer in command, with orders to pick me up at four o'clock next morning at a certain distance and in a certain line from the harbour lights, I jumped into my boat and went ashore. With a bound I was in the theatre. There she was! And I laugh still when I think of her grandparents' faces when they saw me appear; but they raised the quarantine forthwith, and when, soon after, I gave a ball on board the Iphigenie, that charming young lady was its chief ornament. Beautiful and quaint that ball was, breezy with victory and duty well performed, the glorious scars of the old Iphigenie mingling with the splendour of the flowers and the lights.
After staying a month at Havana, as there was no question of pirates, I was ordered to take the Creole back to Brest, where I arrived in March, 1839. My monkey was the first to see and point out the land from the top of the rigging. I had hardly got into the roadstead before the maritime prefect boarded me to tell me I was made a knight of the Legion of Honour. The worthy admiral insisted on receiving me as such before the guard, which had been turned out. He drew his sword to give me the accolade, and made me a little speech, under the fire of which I did not flinch, though he was deeply moved.
1839
Scarcely had I landed from the Creole when I received the distressing news of the death of my sister Marie, Duchess of Wurtemberg. It was the first mourning in our family, the first break in that numerous circle of tenderly attached brothers and sisters. I adored my sister, who was a most remarkable woman, witty, as passionate in her antipathies as in her affections, an artist to the very tips of her fingers. Her death was a deep sorrow to me, and it saddened my short stay among my own people. A short stay it was indeed, for I only came ashore in March, and June found me at the entrance of the Dardanelles, attached to the staff of Admiral Lalande, commanding our squadron in the Levant.
I had rather a funny little adventure on my way to take up my duty. I had asked the then Minister of the Interior, M. Duchatel, to give orders that there should be no official reception when I passed through Toulon—no firing of guns, nor authorities waiting at the city gates, nor troops drawn up, all that wearisome and commonplace ceremonial which I had been through I know not how many times already. The minister had given his promise, and, strong in his assurance, I was just getting there quietly in my travelling-carriage, when the sight of a mounted gendarme, who galloped off the moment he caught sight of us just after we got through the pass of Ollioules, made me suspect some treachery or other. Without a second's hesitation I jumped out of the carriage, the moment the gendarme was out of sight, and desiring my valet to go on with it, struck across the fields on foot to the harbour. I had not been mistaken, for soon I heard twenty-one guns greeting the entrance of my empty vehicle into Toulon, doubtless amid what the stereotyped official phrase would call, and with good reason this time, a scene of indescribable enthusiasm.
Important events were occurring in the east in rapid succession at the time I joined Lalande's squadron. The recommencement of the struggle between ancient Turkey and that youthful Egypt which the genius of Mehemet Ali had created, had just ended in the final defeat of the Turks in the battle of Nezib—a defeat which was closely followed by the death of Sultan Mahmoud, the last of the determined autocrats of the race of Othman. Action on the part of the European fleet might arise at any moment, owing to these complications and the rivalries thereby excited between England and Russia—great Eastern powers both of them. Our sole preoccupation therefore during our cruise in the Dardanelles was to get our ships into such condition that they might make a good show in the event of anything of the kind occurring. I have related elsewhere how we succeeded, under the powerful will of Admiral Lalande, in reconstituting such a fighting fleet as we had never possessed since the Revolution swept away at one fell swoop the whole of the navy of Louis XVI., with its body of first-class officers, and all that collection of traditions both as to discipline and knowledge which it had gradually acquired.
The admiral's great merit lay in reconstituting these traditions, which have taken deep root and are carefully treasured still. And the curious thing, the peculiar trait, about him was that, though he desired certain results, he would have nothing to do with the means to attaining them. This state of warlike efficiency was not obtained without trouble. Constantly under sail, and overtaxed with rough and unaccustomed forms of drill as the crews were, demoralized too by accidents—men killed or arms and legs broken—the result insisted on by the chief in command was only reached by treating them with extreme severity. On board the Jena, the flagship, corporal punishment—nowadays found useless, and therefore very properly abolished—was of daily occurrence. But the admiral ignored it, never would have it even mentioned to him. He left all that to his flag captain, my friend Bruat, a most energetic officer. I never heard one word of reprimand from Admiral Lalande's lips, and once I saw him get into a fury with one of his captains, who had appealed to his disciplinary authority. The scene is worth describing.
This worthy captain (his name was Danican) commanded the ship Jupiter, on which I had taken passage from Toulon to join the squadron, and one of my earliest duties was to present the new comer, with his staff, to the admiral. These gentlemen stood in a circle in the great cabin round Captain Danican, armed to the teeth, cocked hat in hand, and his sword-belt buckled high up round his little body. There they waited. "Pere Danican,' as he was familiarly called, a veteran sailor, whose name is borne by one of the streets in St. Malo, had the most splendid service record, with this item in particular, that he had been reported as killed in a fight with the English. He had been struck in the belly by grape-shot, lost consciousness, and laid out with the rest of the dead, of whom a list was being made before throwing them overboard one after the other, when the battle was over They were actually swinging him backwards and forwards to heave him over the side, when one of his comrades called out, "Hold on. Let Danican alone. We'll give him a funeral"—to which ceremony the old Breton owed his life, though it did not soften the by no means placid character of the strict old disciplinarian.
And accordingly, something in his eye, when the admiral came skipping in smilingly, with a commonplace "Good-day, Danican" "Good-day gentlemen," warned me we were going to have a scene. "Admiral," he shouted in a voice of thunder, "I have the honour to present the staff of the ship Jupiter to you—and I take this opportunity, Admiral, of telling you that it would be impossible to be more dissatisfied with these gentlemen than I am!" This tirade concluded by a violent wave of his cocked hat, while the officers stood motionless and stared at the deck. A thunderbolt falling out of heaven would not have startled the admiral more than this speech. I never saw any man so put out of countenance. He shuffled his feet, gave a forced laugh, and not finding anything to say, stammered some disconnected words, "I trust . . . my dear. . . Danican …. a regard for duty . . . these gentlemen ….!" We put a stop to the distressing scene by low bows of dismissal, and everybody went off in a rage—the officers with their captain, the captain with the admiral for not supporting discipline, and the admiral with everybody, including, it may be, his own self.
Nobody was satisfied, which is indeed the invariable consequence of weakness, for the love of vulgar popularity was the weakness of our eminent chief, so deeply respected on other accounts. This same weakness caused him to end his days as a Deputy of the most colourless opinions.
I cruised for six months outside the Dardanelles, first with the Iena and afterwards with the Belle-Poule, which had joined the squadron and of which I had been given command—six months which offered nothing in the way of wild gaiety, beyond the routine of my duty. True, we saw the sun rise over Mount Ida every morning, but we never saw the shadow of a goddess. The utmost we did in the short breathing spaces between our drills and cruises between Cape Baba and the Isles of Tenedos, Lemnos and Imbro, was to land at the slaughter-house of the contractor to the squadron, irreverently styled Charognopolis, for an excursion to the ruins of Troy, to shoot snipe in the marshes of Simois, or get a hare on the tomb of Patroclus.
This monotony was broken, however, by the appearance of the Turkish fleet, which we saw issuing, forty strong, from the Dardanelles, sailing along in confusion, driving before a strong breeze—altogether a most stately sight.
We took station abreast of the squadron, saluting the Capitan Pasha, who on his side ordered his fleet to heave to—a manoeuvre which was performed amid a fine confusion. A steam launch at once came towards us. It bore the second in command of the fleet, Osman Pasha, sent by the Capitan Pasha to request an interview with Admiral Lalande. He consented and boarded the Turkish ship, taking me with him.
During our passage to the Capitan Pasha's flag-ship, Osman Pasha led us below, closed all the cabin doors with an air of mystery, and with the help of a young Armenian dragoman he told us a long story, which I will sum up in a few words. Constantinople, so he said, was being laid waste by fire and sword. On the death of Sultan Mahmoud, Kosrew Pasha, who was no better than a Russian agent, had seized the reins of power. He stuck at nothing, so long as he kept them. The real Turks, the faithful Mussulmans, were losing their heads by the hundred; the head of the faith himself, the Sheik el Islam, had not been spared. He refused to consecrate the new Sultan until he wore the venerated turban of Othman upon his head instead of the revolutionary fez, and for this he was strangled at midnight, with great pomp it is true, and amid the salvos of artillery due to his exalted rank (a poor consolation, I thought to myself!). The lives of Osman Pasha himself and of his chief, the Capitan Pasha, hung by a thread. Wherefore they had both resolved, instead of fighting against Mehemet Ali, as everybody believed they would, to make common cause with him, so as to unite all the Mussulman strength in one single alliance, and make one of those concentrated efforts which have been the dream of every period and every country which has been torn by revolution. In plain English, the two chiefs in command were carrying the unconscious fleet into an act of defection which was intended to save their own heads. They wanted the admiral's approbation, which he refused. Then they asked for a French warship to go with them as a sort of lifeboat, which he promised them, and above all, they begged that no word, glance, or gesture of ours, during the visit we were about to pay, might betray the secret confided to us. We then boarded the Capitan Pasha's flagship, where we had a reception that was truly oriental in its mingled pomp and duplicity—we alone, amidst the crowd of courtiers, officers, and foreign representatives surrounding this commander-in-chief, about to turn traitor, being possessed of his secret. Not to mention that as we went along the gun decks, we saw the Turkish gunners smoking their pipes beside the heaps of cartridges piled between the guns. A highly oriental sight also, and far from tranquillizing!
By evening the Turkish fleet had disappeared over the horizon, and the only other recollection my memory holds of this period is that of a reconnaissance along the northern coast of the Dardanelles, and the peninsula between Gallipoli and the Gulf of Saron, which reconnaissance I made with several other officers, under colour of a sporting expedition in a Turkish boat called a sakoleve and with a view to an ultimate military occupation of the peninsula. Mayhap the notes made during this expedition were of use when Gallipoli was occupied in 1854, at the beginning of the Crimean War.
In the course of the autumn, I beheld Constantinople, that most wonderful of landscapes, for the first time in my life. And to begin with, the thing which struck me most were the sunsets over the huge city. Nothing can give any idea of how magnificent they are, with the towers and thousand mosques of Stamboul standing out like a mysterious vision in the misty golden haze, an enchanted city of aerial palaces hanging in mid-air. In those days the soft evening mists I speak of were ideal in their transparence, which no smoke ever dimmed, for the factories and steamboats which now hang their black plumes over Constantinople were then unknown. Instead of steamers, there were only those delightful caiques, laden with brightly-dressed passengers, gliding silently along in their thousands, and leaving as it were tracks of glistening spangles in their wake. Nothing can ever efface that sight from my recollection.
Among the caiques, which are quite peculiar to the Bosphorus, was one I met many a time, and which was indeed well known to everybody. It belonged to a sister of the late Sultan Mahmoud, celebrated in Constantinople for her love affairs—a sort of Marguerite de Bourbon, for whose fleeting favours several people had paid with their heads. Three oarsmen, splendid white-skinned fellows with long fair moustaches, and athletic frames scarcely concealed beneath their white drawers and striped silk gauze shirts, sent their mistress's caique flying through the water. She was a tall woman, with piercing eyes and an aristocratic air—always seated between two lovely maids of honour. I say lovely, for the Turkish woman, when she is unobserved, when she knows her own beauty and meets eyes whose admiration she desires to rouse, always finds means of permitting her veil the most delightful if indiscreet revelations. Consequently I was always on the look-out to try and get a sight of the Sultana's caique. It must be remembered I was just off a cruise after long months spent in warlike solitude on board ship. So, though St. Sophia, with its size and its legend, had struck me as being the most profoundly devotional edifice I had ever seen—an impression which the sight of St. Peter's at Rome and of the Cathedral of Seville has never removed—my attention and curiosity were much more drawn to the earthly representatives of the houris promised to the faithful, than to the monuments of the Faith.
The curiosity I speak of led me on a certain Friday to the Sweet Waters of Asia. I found the loveliest of scenes lying before my eyes that delicious afternoon towards the end of August. Imagine an immense meadow, broken up by clumps of trees, sloping down to the swift blue waters of the Bosphorus, on the other side of which ran wooded hills dotted with mosques and minarets and gaily painted country houses. Close to the edge of the water stands a kiosk, and an elegantly-carved marble fountain. And around the kiosk is a sort of promenade shaded by huge plane-trees. Under these plane-trees a hundred, or thereabouts, gaily adorned and plumed arabas, now standing unharnessed in the meadow, had deposited an army of the smartest Turkish ladies. Some of them sat beside the water, others round the fountain, others again followed little pashas mounted on ponies led by eunuchs. What with the richness of the landscape, the truly oriental light, and the variety and splendour of the dresses, the whole sight was really fairy-like. We were very desirous of studying it in detail, and at close quarters. A line of soldiers cut off the portion of the grove of plane-trees reserved to women only. But our ambassadress and her daughters, who had come at the same time as ourselves, had a right to enter it, and we hurried after them. At first the officer commanding the guard tried to stop us. However, after a colloquy with the dragoman of our Embassy, he contented himself with begging us to go through quickly. The ladies of the Embassy having seated themselves among the Turkish ladies, we did likewise, and, in spite of the angry glances of the eunuchs, by dint of mutual curiosity and a little flirtation we spent several hours quite delightfully. Lots of pretty women, and forbidden fruit into the bargain. No more veils, no more feredjes. We could scrutinize the exquisite costumes at our leisure.
When I say "No more veils" I ought rather to say nothing but an excuse for a veil—a gauze chin covering leaving nose and eyes and eyebrows bare, and so transparent across the mouth, that where that mouth was a pretty one, to cover it at all was but an extra piece of coquetry.
All these women were chatting, eating, amusing themselves, some sitting, some lying down, going and coming, hanging about near the ladies of the Embassy, to examine the details of their dresses too. If instantaneous photography had existed in those days, what an infinity of charming and picturesque groups might have been snatched. I did venture to make one or two rapid sketches on the sly; but there were too many eyes upon me, and besides it was an abuse of the toleration which was being shown us. I could not tear myself away from this most exceptional sight, which will never be seen again, now the Turkish ladies have adopted European fashions—boots and petticoats, and stays, deceiving stays!
But every good thing comes to an end, and besides, as the day wore on, a great cloud of smoke rose over Constantinople, and steadily increased in volume. It was evidently a fire. In that country, where all the buildings except the mosques and a house here and there are wooden—a fire is a terribly serious thing. Was it Stamboul, or was it Pera, and with Pera our hotel, that was blazing? Carried along by the sinewy strokes of our caiqchis, and aided by the current, we went swiftly down the Bosphorus, landed at Dolma-Batche, and rapidly climbed the Cemetery Hill. Thence I saw a striking sight. The whole quarter below, called Kassim Pasha, lying between Pera and Galata, was in flames. Over three hundred houses were sparks, already burnt out. The wooden houses, kindled by falling crackled like faggots, and we could see the conflagration spreading like a spot of oil. Fifty houses away from those actually on fire, people were turning out, throwing doors and windows and furniture into the streets, without warning of any kind. Drawing nearer the scene of the fire, we came upon a troop of vile-looking fellows, the rioters of our country, grafted onto the Mussulman fanatic—kavasses were raining blows with their sticks on this crowd of volunteers (or thieves); firemen, bare-armed and turbanless, hurried along, with their fire pumps on their shoulders, shouting shrilly and knocking over people as they went; troops kept coming up from all quarters, horsemen trotted up at full speed, and packs of terrified dogs tore wildly through the streets, howling with pain. It was a singular sight indeed.
Seeing the flames kept gaining ground, and were already licking the first houses in the European quarter in Pera, I sent orders for the crews of two of our ships, anchored at Tophana, to land, slipped on my uniform, and put myself at their head, resolved to try and save the Frank town. Luckily it was calm, or the attempt would have been quite hopeless. But the sun had set red, and that presaged wind. There was no time to be lost. I hurried up with a hundred and fifty sailors. The first houses on each side of the street of Pera were in flames, but a spot was pointed out to me, twelve or fifteen houses off, where, the street narrowing between a stone mosque and some gardens, one might hope to clear a space to stop the fire, by pulling down the five or six intervening houses. I had no hesitation in giving the order for this, my men set eagerly to work, and all the active portion of the Frank population of Pera were seconding our efforts, when one of the generals of the garrison, Selim Pasha, came up with his men, and fell into a fury at the sight of what we were doing. I forthwith seized him by the hand and dragged him, the dragoman of the Embassy, M. Lauxerrois, following us, to the top of the minaret of the mosque. Here I said to the dragoman, "Do show this fool of a pasha that the clearing we are making is our only chance of saving Pera;" and as M. Lauxerrois began to translate this into Turkish, "Don't trouble," said Selim Pasha, in very good French, "I understand." I begged his pardon for the epithet, but he had passed suddenly already from rage to enthusiasm. He tore down stairs four steps at a time, and I shortly saw him without his coat, in trousers and list braces, helping us to pull down the houses, and setting an example of the utmost activity to his own men.
Down came the houses, one after the other. Our sailors behaved splendidly. They climbed up on to the roofs and fastened ropes, to which we harnessed the whole of the population, while the frameworks were being sawn through below till the whole thing came down with a crash. Indeed I saw one house come down with five or six sailors perched on its roof. I rushed forward in horror, thinking they must all be maimed or killed. Not a bit of it! Only a few hands and feet torn by nails! Truly God watches over the brave! The fall of one Turkish house caused a pretty scene! The proprietor was determined to prevent it. He struck and swore at us,—pulling out his beard. The anticipation of the destruction of his property drove him wild. Finding nobody paid any attention to him, he called his women folk to his assistance. They hastened up like furies, at first. Then, changing their tactics, they cast themselves on my officers, clasping them in their arms, covering them with kisses and caresses, and trying "the power of their charms on them in every imaginable way. It was a curious sight truly to watch by the light of the flames, and amidst such a cacophony of races, a handful of sailors stopping the passers-by, Turks as well as the rest, setting them to work, snatching the fire-pumps from the firemen, carrying soldiers and generals too along with them, and in fact ruling the roast in the very middle of Constantinople.
At last, thanks to the fire-pump and thanks to our own selves, the fire stopped just where we had fought it. I went off then towards the cemetery, where it was still burning, and where the sight was most singular. An immense crowd of people, the whole population of the burnt-out quarters of the town, in every imaginable costume, and silent like true fatalists, herded on the hill and the plateau, together with whatever had been saved out of the disaster. Under the red light of the conflagration, the flames of which shot up in great jets into the skies, the huge bivouac made a splendid picture, reminding one of the works of the English painter Martyn, the Last Judgment, Belshezzar's Feast, and so forth. Stamboul, with her forest of minarets and her thousands of lights, stood out on the horizon against a lovely starry sky, and in the foreground the Seraskier sat in a big armchair, surrounded by an immense staff, seeming very philosophically resigned to the catastrophe over which he appeared to be presiding. In one hand he held his pipe, and in the other a slice of melon. We were already well acquainted, and when he saw me coming up, all blackened with smoke and ashes, he roared with laughter. But he gave me a slice of his melon, and very grateful it was to my parched throat.
The fire was under control—that is to say, there was only one block of houses left burning, and this had no communication with either Galata or Pera. But the disaster was a great one. Over fifteen hundred houses had been burnt. The exact number was never known. First because nobody counted them—that would have been quite contrary to oriental indifference and fatalism—and then because it would have been excessively difficult to make them out, in the confused ash heap which had taken their place. The number of families reduced to destitution must have been very considerable, but individual charity is very liberal amongst the Mussulmans, as indeed amongst all people possessed of religious faith. I got home, at one o'clock in the morning, worn out. Shortly afterwards the wind rose. If it had begun to blow a little earlier, nothing would have remained of Pera, of the Frankish town, nor of the Embassies.
A very few days had gone by when I was bidden to quite a different sort of entertainment. After the disease of adopting the Gentile's trousers and frock-coat, yet another disease seized upon Turkey—that of having a constitution in imitation of the constitutions in vogue amongst the Giaours, and the Sultan had the kindness to ask me to see one proclaimed. Concerning the constitution itself, which bore the altogether Turkish name of "Hatti Schereef de Gulhane," I will say nothing. First of all because I never read it, and secondly because I have been told it was "liberal," that is to say, fitted, like M. Prudhomme's sword, to organize government, and if necessary to destroy it, this last more frequently—and that is quite enough for me. But the proclamation ceremony was likely to be curious. So on the appointed day I started forth in full uniform, to be present at it. It was to take place within the Seraglio. The first incident in the day was that my boat met the Russian Minister's caique at the landing-stage, and as neither of our coxswains would yield to the other there was an awful bump, which damaged the dignity of our attitudes by knocking us down like card houses. Then we had to ride rather frisky horses in Turkish saddles, and this, what with our cocked hats, dangling swords, and unstrapped trousers, was yet another trial to the dignity of some of my sailor comrades. Nevertheless, we got without hindrance to a kiosk, the upper story of which was to be occupied by the Sultan and his harem, and the lower by the diplomatic corps. A special window had been reserved for me. Bands began to play, loud shouts were heard. The Sultan was coming, on horseback, preceded by a crowd of officers and pashas, in full dress. Between him and them, dressed in a sort of blue blouse with epaulettes, hobbled a little lame man with a big red head, a white beard, and a spiteful-looking face. It was Kosrew Pasha, the Grand Vizier, he who had caused so many heads to fall, the strangler of the Sheik el Islam. He bowed low several times as he passed me. After him came the Sultan's pages, handsome young fellows, carrying halberts and wearing gilt shakos with immense plumes of peacocks' feathers, aigrettes, or birds of Paradise. In the centre of them was the Sultan himself, almost hidden by their plumes. He kept his head thrown back and wore a black cloak trimmed with diamonds and a fez with an aigrette adorned with the same stones. He dismounted. The Grand Vizier and the new Sheik el Islam held up the corners of his cloak, while a hideous negro, with hanging lips and haunches like a woman, covered with embroideries, advanced to receive him. This was Kislar Aga, chief eunuch and governor of the harem.
And now everybody has come, "Let the sport begin." From my window I look out on a broad space, surrounded by beautiful umbrella pines and sloping gently down to the sea. Beyond is the Asiatic shore of the Bosphorus and the pretty village of Kadi-Keni. This space is full of troops, twelve splendid battalions of the Imperial Guard, Lancers and Artillery. These form a circle, in the centre of which rises a pulpit covered with some yellow stuff, and around it the pashas and the whole body of Ulemas and Mollahs, wearing the ancient costume—coloured kaftans, and big white or green turbans crossed with broad gold bands—shortly collect. The chief dervishes and the heads of all the religious sects are there also. All this clergy stands there motionless, impassive, with lowered eyes, not over pleased, I fancy, at bottom. Then the crowd makes a rush, which infuriates the Grand Vizier. He makes towards it, lifting his little leg very high and waving his handkerchief. At the very sight of him everybody flees, and retires humbly within bounds. Then the manuscript of the Hatti-Schereef is brought to him. He carries it respectfully to his lips and forehead, and hands it over to Reschid Pasha, who ascends the pulpit and reads it out. That over and finished midst the deepest silence, an Imaum takes Reschid Pasha's place in the pulpit. He stretches out his arms. All present do the same, the soldiers stretching out but one on account of their weapons, and he intones the prayer for the Sultan, which every one repeats in chorus. After which every man passes his hand across his eyes and beard and the troops shout "Allah" three times, with unequalled fervour and passion. Hundreds of cannon are fired in all directions, and the beautiful sight, lighted up by the most brilliant of sunshine, has come to an end. The Sultan has departed. The Sultana Valide sends me a posse of officials, bearing cakes and sweetmeats. I take leave of Kosrew Pasha and depart also, thinking sadly that if this Turkish people, so brave on the field of battle and apparently still so devoted to its sovereign, and so firm in its religious faith, is truly, in spite of all, a rapidly decaying nation, the miserable rag of paper read out this day will certainly not save it.
The Sultan gave me an uninteresting audience in the pretty Top-Kapou Palace—now burnt down, I believe—which stood on the extreme end of the Seraglio point. I had visited the palace, which was then unoccupied, with a very witty Pasha who spoke French admirably well—and whom I had known in Paris—Namick Pasha, commander of the Imperial Guard. We had gone over all the rooms in the harem, and this visit, with the explanations and commentaries given me by such a guide, had been most interesting. One room was a perfect gem, and I cannot resist the pleasure of describing it. It was very large, circular, the floor covered with very fine matting. All round it was a little raised platform, covered with divans. The walls were entirely formed of great mirrors, in splendid rococo frames of carved wood, gilt. It was evidently the room in which the harem festivals were held. Between the mirrors were eight little doors, every one leading to a small apartment for one woman, fitted with mirrors and divans and each hung with a different stuff. To complete the whole thing, there was a passage leading to a bath-house, consisting of several very pretty marble bath-rooms. The master of all this must have had a good time! All sorts of details were given me while I was there. The Sultan had no legitimate wives except those who bear children—so the competition may be imagined. Mahmoud had had thirty-five children, but only five were left, two sons and three daughters. The rest had died in infancy. The actual Sultan, Abdul-Medjid, who was very young at the time of my visit, had only one wife with child, but his mother, the Sultana Valide, had just presented him with six young ladies, said to be charming, as an encouragement. Besides this, every year, at the Feast of Bairam, the Sheik el Islam gives the Sultan a beautiful slave to whom he is compelled by the Law and the Prophet to give proofs of his affection, that very day, on pain of incurring the wrath of Allah. Only nobody knows whether Allah, up in his celestial home, has reason to be pleased or not.
Having still a few spare days before I rejoined the squadron, I took advantage of an Austrian steamer to cross the Black Sea as far as Trebizond, whence I gazed admiringly on the splendid chain of the snowy Caucasian peaks. I should much have liked to get as far as Erzeroum, in the heart of Asia Minor. But as time failed me I contented myself with travelling at full speed for one day, along the road leading thither, with the Tartar or postman who carried the mails, so as to obtain some idea of the country. When I say road I speak figuratively. It was not even a path. It was a mere track across the woods and rocks and ravines of that mountainous region, but along that track the Tartar galloped imperturbably, never stopping however terrible the ground might be. When the post-carrying experience was over, my comrades and I were more done up than we had ever been in our lives. The least weary of the party was the son of our consul at Trebizond, Maxime Outrey, a charming lad, brought up and dressed a l'orientale, whom we had taken with us as our dragoman, and who vied with the Tartar in speed and boldness the whole day long like one possessed. On the way back from Trebizond our steamer was crammed with passengers coming from every corner of Asia, the strangest medley of Circassians, Persians, and cat merchants, and one pasha. I bought a splendid Angora during the passage, and the pasha bought himself a wife. The whole of the negotiations for the latter acquisition, the discussions, the examination and verification of the merchandize, took place in our cabin, and very amusing it was. The young lady belonged to a Tcherkess family which had eluded the Russian cruisers, and come alongside of us at Trebizond in big boats with triangular sails, spotted like a tiger's hide. The head of the family, a tall old man, was going to Mecca, to seek a cure there for the horrible agony caused by a Russian bullet which was still in his head. His sons, handsome fellows in splendid costumes, with fine features and shoulders broad out of all proportion to waists that were like girls', were going with him. There were a dozen women besides, and do you know, my reader, what that pack of women was? Letters of credit, bank notes, by means of which the old man with his wound expected to pay the expenses of his journey! Having no cash, he had brought the twelve best-looking girls in his family with him. He had just disposed of one on board, and he reckoned on doing the same with the rest all along the road. We soon made the acquaintance of the party. The girls were huddled together on deck in a sort of cage or trelliswork, where they remained, drenched by the sea, four days and three nights, without their chatter and their outbursts of merriment ever ceasing for a single instant. They all dreamt of becoming the wives of sultans or pashas and of living in palaces. As the old man fed them with nothing but millet, to fatten them, we used to bring them our dessert after each meal, and so we were soon good friends. Thanks to some trifling service I rendered the old man, he consented to bringing the prettiest girl into my cabin, and allowing her to unveil, so that I might do her picture. I thought the model and her costume both equally lovely, but the sitting was a very short one. Whether it was shyness or sea-sickness I know not. But she complained of the heat, began to cry, and I had to send her away.
I merely passed through Constantinople on my way back. It was the middle of Ramadan, all the mosques lighted up at night, and the women promenading in the square of the Seraskier in the daytime—a regular persil. I went there one day with Paul Daru, Lavalette and Cyrus Gerard, all members of the embassy M. de Sercey was taking to Persia. They came from Paris and told me the news from there. In my turn I told them all about the battle of Nezib, a very interesting description of which I had had the good luck to hear from two young Prussian officers, eye-witnesses of it, one of whom became the celebrated Marshal von Moltke; and also all I learnt about the Eastern question on my visits to the Embassies, to Therapia and Buyukdere. There I had met all the chief members of the diplomatic corps, which consisted during my stay of two French ambassadors, succeeding each other, both of them instability personified—one was Admiral Roussin, a distinguished sailor, the other M. de Pontois, a professional diplomat—both of them very kind, but neither, as a result of their instability, having any real influence. Beside them two men of tenacity and steadfastness admirably personified two great powers. Lord Ponsonby, a tall, blunt, haughty, unsociable old man, represented British perseverance and Lord Palmerston's prejudices, while M. de Boutenieff, a charming, kindly, and witty man, liked by everybody and making game somewhat of all, stood for the great destinies of the Russian people, and the mighty will of the Emperor Nicholas. An armed Russian intervention in the Bosphorus was no longer in question, but it was unforeseen as yet that Russia and England would agree to ruin the work of Mehemet Ali, the last strength in reality of the Mussulman world, and that the whole of Europe would join these two powers in their willing alliance for the isolation and humiliation of France, revolutionary France! No more allies for us, since we have gone into that mill! We sacrificed 200,000 men in the Crimea. What did we get by it? The garter for Napoleon III. One word or deed of sympathy for all our reverses? Not the shadow of one! Revolutionary France has been asked for help. But none has ever been given her. Would it be rendered her now? God grant it!
1840-1841
I left Constantinople with a farewell glance, full of pleasant memories, over its forest of minarets, over the Bosphorus and the smiling Princes Islands, and at the snowy peak too of Mount Olympus, which, with my taste for mountaineering, I had climbed but a short time previously. An interesting ascent it had been, first of all through that Eastern Switzerland around the pretty town of Broussa, and then over the snow and rocky debris to the summit, whence a matchless panorama is to be seen. The squadrons, one French and one English, forming a strong force of ships, were at that time on guard at the mouth of the Dardanelles. I went back to my duty in ours, which was still as active and incessantly drilled as ever. The English squadron, commanded by Sir Robert Stopford, a handsome white-haired old man, was less restless. But the fleets dispersed before long. Ours sailed for Smyrna, whence the Admiral sent the Belle-Poule under my command, and the Triton, Captain Hamelin, back to France. We sailed in company, and after a somewhat lengthy winter passage, we got to Toulon only to find ourselves put into thirty-five days of quarantine. Five and thirty days of prison and solitude and uselessness imposed on a crew without a single sick man, which was daily inspected by its officers as to cleanliness, whose health was looked after by three doctors, and which had just gone through the best and safest of purifying operations—a long sea voyage. Five and thirty days during which 400 men ate and drank and lived at the expense of the National Budget without doing the smallest work for the country—the whole thing inflicted by the Sanitary Board—a purely local and irresponsible body, with its eternal round of red tape. A good thing it is indeed that such a monstrous and intolerable abuse should have been abolished! The only reason it lasted so long is, that it brought in a revenue to the members of the board. To begin with, they filled the inn they kept under the title of "Lazaretto" by force, and then they sold the disinfectants. "Gentlemen," the sanitary officer would say, with his provencal accent—"Nous allons faire le parfum." The crew were shut up below, the officer lighted a sort of pastille which made a great smoke, everybody pretended to sneeze at once … and we were disinfected! The farce was over! There was a great dinner too, which the board gave itself at Saint Roch, at the expense of the persons in quarantine, which put the finishing touch to the scandal. Wherefore, during my own detention, I always had the band on deck as soon as the boat belonging to the board appeared in the port, and greeted it with the most horrible and discordant of music. Further, I asked guilelessly for leave to carry on my ship's firing drill in the Lazaretto Bay, and I took care to open fire so close to the Lazaretto itself that I heard all the glass in the windows fall out with a crash. As I expected, I was forbidden to do it again, the board being furious, and having lodged a complaint, stating that I used bad cartridges, but I had a delicious moment of vengeance all the same.
The quarantine came to an end at last, I was given leave, and once more, with joy, beheld my family, and Paris too. I had spent the greater part of my existence for the past four years at sea, and I confess I thirsted somewhat for Paris, dear unrivalled Paris! I got there in the heart of the winter of 1839, and left it in the first days of June of the same year. What recollections have I of those four months of repose? In vain I tax my memory, I can find nothing, or hardly anything at all. As far as exterior events go, none but the most infinitesimally small—the eternal wearying struggle between ministers in esse and in posse, which left the bulk of the public exceedingly indifferent. If the situation from the external point of view had grown more serious, at all events it did not inspire anxiety. The strength of the monarchical principle still made itself felt, in spite of the hitch in 1830. People reckoned on the King, on his wisdom and farsighted patriotism, to ward off the dangers, present and future, with which the ambition of the permanent and persevering governments around us threaten us, but of which our short-sighted democracy takes so little account. The King was indeed shortly to justify this confidence by saving France from a war with a European coalition, about the Eastern question—a war into which we were being led by the imprudence of M. Thiers and the bragging of our press and which could have ended in nothing but disaster.
The governmental machine worked meanwhile, as a whole, with tolerable smoothness. The House of Peers, the members of which were permanent, and therefore strangers to electoral compromise, discussed with weight and authority laws which were really progressive, respecting as they did the interests and liberties of all concerned; while the Chamber of Deputies, consisting of unpaid members, voted with much more care for the public weal than is possible in an assembly of men enslaved by their election committees, and perpetually haunted by the nightmare of re-election. An independent magistracy, according to President Seguier's fine expression, gave sentences, not services, "rendait des arrets, et non pas des services" while the administration, which was almost as permanent as the magistracy, had time to do good work and did it. In short, except for the criminal classes, and those incorrigible revolutionists who ask perpetually for the impossible, everybody felt that his security, his liberty, and his faith, were well protected, and, as I heard said on all sides when I came back from my voyages, people felt they were well governed. It is true that if I opened the newspapers I generally read to the contrary in them—but if there were some few serious organs of public opinion among these journals, edited by courageous and talented men, who did their best to serve their country by their writings, whatever their opinions might be, how many more had editors who were mere slander-mongers, and columns all the more eagerly read, the more calumnious they were, and the more they pandered to every envious and subversive passion. Such men were the spokesmen of that increasingly numerous class of speculators, who relinquish any useful career to seek fortune in the chances of politics. According to them, oppression and corruption had grown intolerable, and would never cease until power passed into their own immaculate hands. They alone possessed the secret for turning France into a terrestrial Paradise, by applying in all SINCERITY the great and high-sounding principles, liberty, equality and fraternity. This SINCERITY of application, which has been so frequently announced, dallies somewhat in its coming, especially as regards equality, which to so many people merely means, "That which I have not nobody else shall have." The word equality is seductive truly, and in every self-respecting community equality before the law must be utterly absolute for all men. But so long as science discovers no means for making all men equally intelligent and all women equally beautiful, I shall continue to look upon universal and blind equality as the most absurd and the most dangerous of chimeras. These reflections did not occur to me at the period I speak of. I was far too careless in the year 1840 to bother my head about the conundrums set by our office-seekers, "place-hunters" as the Americans call them. While they were amusing themselves with the fancies, envious, irreligious, unhealthy, and above all self-interested, which they posed as deducing from the principles of 1789, a far more terrible revolution than the French one—for it was to strike the poor as well as the rich—was shortly to burst upon us; the revolution brought about by the use of steam and electricity and rapidity of communication. Few people in those days foresaw the complete subversion of all the conditions of labour and food supply and life itself, which was to overtake all the peoples gathered together in old-established communities on worn-out soil, a subversion which is only in its beginning as yet, and the remedy for which we cannot discover.
One of the first results of the use of steam was to make it essential for all nations having war fleets to transform their arsenals and their naval stores. It was absolutely necessary to be able to oppose an enemy, whose means of attack could overcome wind and tide, with defensive means of equal power. That was as clear as A B C. This transformation interested me keenly—for the future of the arm of the service to which I had fervently devoted my whole life, and which I desired to see become once more a redoubtable weapon of our country's power, was bound up with it. But, to carry it through, we had to war with routine, with the obstinacy bred of old habit, and with the narrow ideas which were taught in the naval schools. It was a continuous daily struggle in which I bore an assiduous part.
Apart from this naval question, my time was spent between my home life, my worship for the fine arts, and the theatre, and also in boar-hunting, of which I grew passionately fond; and what makes this curious is that before I tried it I scorned the idea to such an extent that my brothers tied me up and took me by force the first time. Every incident of the hunt, the attack, the pursuit, all the unforeseen occurrences of the chase, leading you nobody knows whither, so that you even lose yourself in the dark sometimes in strange places, has still all the charm of struggle and action to me. And what a pleasant party of sportsmen we used to be, during our visits to Compiegne, to Chantilly, and above all to Fontainebleau! My brothers and I, the two Greffuhles, Caumont, Morny, Valewski, Edgard Ney, La Rochette, Casimir Perier, d'Albufera, Wagram, the de l'Aigles; foreigners too, Bedmar, d'Ossuna—and officers—and some ladies,—amongst these the beautiful Duchess of Somerset, who always hunted in a mask, and was invariably escorted by the charming Prince Labanoff. There were painters too amongst the most assiduous sportsmen—Jadin and Decamps. Decamps, of whom I was a fanatical admirer, was just in his best period—so too were Delacroix and M. Ingres; and all that pleiad of great artists, young then and in the full flush of their powers—Leopold Robert, Horace Vernet, Delaroche, my own master Ary Scheffer, Flandrin, and the landscape painters Marilhat and Corot—this last, in his first manner, dry and rectilinear, like that of Poussin. Nobody nowadays has any idea of the eager discussions aroused by the opening of the Salon and the superior merit of such a picture or statue. Nobody was indifferent: everybody was either for or against; each man either attacked the artist or lauded him to the skies. Works of art bring more money now, according as they are produced by this man or that, but they are less discussed. Which is the best inspiration for an artist, money or passion?
The theatres too, the Vaudeville, Varietes, Francais, the Opera, were delightful. At the Vaudeville, which had migrated after the fire in the Rue de Chartres to the Boulevard Bonne Nouvelle, Arnal, the inimitable, quaintest and cleverest of comic actors, was playing. At the Varietes they were acting the Saltimbanques, a play every line of which has passed into proverbs, which all my generation have been repeating for the last forty years. A woman of genius, Mademoiselle Rachel, had brought back its long forgotten glory to the Theatre Francais. For my part I never saw anything so absolutely perfect on the stage. With hardly any gesture, simply by the play of her countenance, her expressive glance, and the intonation of her voice, she expressed all the passions with an intensity that affected all her audience. She had a genius for dress and drapery. In her peplum she might have been taken for an antique statue, and she knew how to endue herself with the most incomparable womanly charm in all her parts, even the most savage ones. If she had committed murder you would have loved the murderess, and, strangely enough, this extraordinary woman was never witty except with her pen.
As for the Opera, the production of the great composers who had made its glory some years before had ceased. Of that trio of wonderful artists, Nourrit, Levasseur, and Mdlle. Falcon, only one, Levasseur, remained. The art of music was taking a rest. To make amends for this, the opera shone in ballet, fairy-like performances in which pantomime and trap-doors played as important a part as the actual dancing. Nothing could have been more enchanting than the Diable Boiteux with its many and various tableaux and its dresses, and Fanny Elsler dancing the "cachucha," or the Sylphide or the Revolte du Serail with Taglioni. I saw my brother Nemours in great danger during a performance of this last-named ballet. At a certain point the dancers, representing the revoltees, armed themselves with bows and shot a cloud of arrows into the wings. Now in the heat of action one of these arrows, launched with extraordinary vigour but uncertain aim by a charming young lady, one of the principal dancers, Mcllle. Duvernay, stuck in the column which separated the Royal Box in the old Le Pelletier house from that of the Marquis du Hallay, only a few inches from my brother's head. There was an exclamation from all parts of the house, great confusion on the stage and many comments made. But "all's well that ends well." That happy time of youth and carelessness and hunting and theatre-going was not to last long. Two of my brothers started for Africa—Chartres (as we always called our eldest brother the Due d'Orleans) was to take over the command of a division in the column which, under the orders of Marshal Vallee, was to check the rising prestige of Abd el Kader for ever at the Mouzaia Pass. My younger brother Aumale, was to have the opportunity during this expedition of breaking his first lance right brilliantly. I saw them depart with envy, and to add to my annoyance I shortly fell ill of a violent attack of measles. One day, as I lay in high fever, I saw my father appear followed by M. de Remusat, then Minister of the Interior. This unusual visit filled me with astonishment, and my surprise increased when my father said, "Joinville, you are to go out to St. Helena and bring back Napoleon's coffin." If I had not been in bed already I should have fallen down flat, and at the first blush I felt nowise flattered when I compared the warlike campaign my brothers were on with the undertaker's job I was being sent to perform in the other hemisphere. But I served my country and I had no right to discuss my orders. And there were two sides to the question, besides. Above Napoleon, the enemy of my house, the murderer of the Duc d'Enghien, who at his fall had left that dangerous game of chance wherein the ignorant herd is so often the dupe of the political croupier—universal suffrage—as his legacy to ruined and dismembered France,—there was the matchless warrior whose genius, even in defeat, had shed immortal glory on our arms. To fetch his ashes from a foreign land was in a manner to wave the flag of vanquished France aloft once more—that at least was what we hoped for—and this view of the case reconciled me to my mission. As soon as I was on my legs again I started for Toulon, provided with full orders and instructions, both royal and ministerial, and re-took command of the Belle-Poule, a command I was to hold in many seas, during three consecutive years. I felt some regret at leaving Paris, but the delight at being back amongst the faithful and worthy fellows who made up my crew, my second family, soon made me forget what I had left behind me. Presently a certain number of passengers came on board. They formed what was called the St Helena Mission. Almost all of them had been comrades of Napoleon in his greatness and in his misfortunes. There were Generals Bertrand and Gourgaud, M. de las Cazes, &c., &c. During the long passages of the voyage, the conversation of these gentlemen, who had been present at so many events and followed the Emperor through so many adventures, was most deeply interesting. Every day there was a running fire of anecdote and traits of character, much closer to the truth doubtless than many a leisurely prepared history. I have often regretted we had no shorthand writer with us.
During the first days of our voyage we touched at Cadiz to get our last despatches before starting across the ocean. I was as glad as ever to see the white walls of Cadiz again, and I made a pilgrimage to the Cortadura, to the Trocadero (this in memory of the brilliant exploits of the Royal Guard in 1823), and also to the battle-field of Chiclana, which witnessed a terrible struggle between ourselves and the English in February 1811, some of the actors in which I had known. Coming back from Chiclana after a somewhat cheery luncheon, Arthur Bertrand, the general's son, well known at that time in the gay world of Paris, gave us a specimen of the maddest equestrian prowess. He galloped at full speed across the Alameda at Chiclana, which was paved with slippery flags, standing upright on his English saddle. There is a providence that watches over madmen!
A characteristic incident occurred on leaving Cadiz. In case of delicate negotiations with the English authorities at St. Helena, and also in order to draw up the protocol for the surrender of the body, a young diplomat, the Comte Philippe de Rohan Chabot,[Footnote: This gentleman died in London as French Ambassador, under the title of Comte de Jarna] had been associated with me.
We had hardly got out of the port of Cadiz, and cut our last communications with France, when I saw him approach me, looking very much embarrassed. He offered me a paper to read, saying it was only on account of his orders he had not communicated it to me before. I cast my eye over the signature at the foot of the paper and saw the name of M. Thiers, President of the Council. By these secret instructions, which were not to be imparted to me till we got to sea, M. Thiers informed M. de Chabot that he, Chabot, was his direct agent and that he invested him with superior authority to mine for as long as the mission should last. Such was the strange missive, aimed not only at the captain in command of the ship, but also, with an evident intention to wound, at the King's son—an application in a very small way of that maxim so dear to M. Thiers, "the King reigns but he does not govern." Stranger still was the care he took to keep it secret until, being cut off from France, I was no longer in a position to make any observation on the contradiction between these fresh instructions and the precise orders I had received previously. Friends from childhood as we were, Philippe and I, no idea of conflict between us was admissible. I made no complaint to any one and treated M. Thiers' behaviour to me with contempt, but from that day the sympathetic and almost affectionate relations I had previously lived in with that statesman came to an end—they were replaced by a sense of deep distrust and a scanty esteem for his character.
The Belle-Poule put in at Teneriffe to take in provisions and water, and I took advantage of this stoppage to finish the ascent of the famous Peak which I had had to break off in 1837. The last cone, all of crumbly pumice stone, and at a very acute angle, is tolerably tiring. On the summit is a small plateau, the soft soil of which is covered with flowers of sulphur and creviced with smoke holes from which scalding steam keeps escaping. Having got up in two days, we descended rapidly to the smiling little town of Orotava, built amidst the most lovely vegetation in a sort of ravine opening out on the sea. The female population of Orotava has a well-deserved reputation for beauty, and we were very kindly met by an invitation to make sure of the fact by being present at an afternoon dance, a sort of "garden party" got up in our honour—a great temptation truly, but a great perplexity as well! People coming back off a mountain climb, including two waterless bivouacs and a pull through the smoke and ashes of a volcano, are not in ball trim, either as to costume or to cleanliness. After a hasty council of war, it was decided that we should draw lots for the names of three of our party, who were to wash themselves, and to whom each of the non-chosen should furnish the least damaged articles of his own clothing, so as to put them in proper condition to go to the ball and keep up the honour of our flag before the belles of Orotava. We retired into a wood to proceed to draw lots and embellish the elect Fate did not favour me. I did not go to the ball, but my boots did, and our comrades came back full of admiration of all they had seen.
From Teneriffe our passage was a slow one. We had calms, storms, even gales, and then a fresh delay in port at Bahia in Brazil. I had been advised on leaving Paris to arrange the progress of the mission so as to make the return of the ashes of the Emperor to Europe coincide with the opening of the Chambers in the end of December. Indeed I believe the chief importance of the return of the ashes of Napoleon, in M. Thiers' mind, lay in this coincidence. It was the tom-tom by beating which he hoped to drown all those reports and inklings of ministerial changes which always sprout at such moments in the parliamentary soil. But it was somewhat difficult to time our arrival to a given moment, with a sailing ship, and after such a long voyage. Originally I was to have called at the Cape before going to St. Helena. I thought it better to replace our stoppage at the Cape by one at Bahia, so as to shorten the journey and save time. Very uninteresting our stay at Bahia was, save for the following picturesque incident.
I had chartered a small steamer on which I used to go on sporting expeditions with some of the officers. They were somewhat in the nature of voyages of discovery up the rivers which fall into Bahia Bay. During one of these excursions we had got some considerable distance up the Cachoeira without seeing a sign of any inhabitants, and leaving our boat at anchor, we had landed and spent our day in slaying toucans, parrokeets of all colours, and all the strange birds and beasts peopling the virgin forest, when at sunset we fell upon a cleared path, which led us to a wide glade and then to a village, the existence of which had been hitherto quite unsuspected by us. We entered it and found it deserted, the doors of all the houses shut. We went towards a very large square in the middle of the "Pueblo"—it was deserted too. We entered a fine church, the door of which stood open—not a soul within it, though the smell of the incense at some recently performed religious ceremony still hung in the air. In the middle of the square stood a kiosk, evidently intended for concerts; the instruments of an orchestra were still there, lying on the chairs before the desks, as if the music had only been broken off a few minutes previously. This suddenly deserted village rather puzzled us. But in the hope of bringing the population back to life, and with a certain spice too of mischief, we laid down our guns, and seizing on the big drum, and the abandoned trombones and clarionets, we raised a most alarming noise. It was mere waste of time, nobody came. The evening was falling, it was time to get back on board our steamer, and we quietly retook our way towards her. Night—a moonlight night it was—had completely closed in, when we got to the mangrove creek, where we had left the small boat which was to bring us back on board. We were crowding into the little craft, half aground on the mud, when a great clamour rose from the forest, and we saw weapons glint through the foliage on all sides. In the twinkling of an eye, before we had time to get over our surprise, a crowd of people armed with guns, swords, and pikes, rushed up at top speed, yelling loudly, and surrounded us, some remaining on shore and others throwing themselves into the water. We were instantly carried off, disarmed, separated, soundly thrashed, and dragged into the forest. Anybody who has looked at the picture of the savages attacking Captain Cook, in the history of his voyage, will have an exact idea of the scene. It was not otherwise than picturesque in the moonlight, and under that tropical vegetation; and it really was an attack by savages too, most of them negroes, and the rest mulattoes. Very luckily for us, our surprise and our unloaded guns, and the way we were crowded into the boat, prevented our making any resistance, otherwise we should certainly have been massacred, surrounded as we were by 200 armed men. Each of us had his own little experience in the scuffle. I, for my part, jumped into the water, knocking up the pikes of two negroes, who looked as if they were going to spit me, with my gun, and hurriedly caught a man—with a civilian's hat on his head, a sash over his shoulder, and a big sword in his hand, who seemed to me to be the leader of the band—round the waist. I gave him to understand, in a few words, in bad Portuguese, that I commmanded the French warships anchored at Bahia, and that if harm came to any of us, he and his fellows would live to repent it. But before I could finish my speech the angry crowd fell on me, carried me off, and dragged me to a mound, against which, as I seemed to understand, they meant to back me and shoot me. Indeed five or six negroes stationed in front of me hastily loaded their guns. The situation was far from pleasant, for those who know the negro race know what they are capable of when swayed by the paroxysms of excitement into which they work themselves, whether from drunkenness, or rage, or fear. Fouchard, whom two or three men were holding a few steps off from me, seeing what was happening, threw off his captors by a superhuman effort and sprang to my side. We clung fast to each other, and this caused a fresh struggle and a respite of a minute's duration, during which the man in the sash, who had quickly understood this was becoming a bad business for himself, charged at the head of the most reasonable of his mulattoes. We were captured and recaptured several times, but victory at last rested with the man in the scarf, and an explanation became possible. It appears there had been an election, with considerable disturbances—blessed be elections in all places and countries!—in the village, on the preceding day. The inhabitants, in their over-excitement, had been struck first with surprise, and afterwards with terror on hearing us firing at the parrokeets. Their terror reached its height when seven or eight white-skinned men, oddly armed and accoutred, were seen to enter the village. The whole population fled into the woods. Then noting from afar how small our number was, and more especially observing our retreat, valour took the place of fright, and arming itself, it rushed to the enemy's pursuit! We were set at liberty of course, and apologies were duly made; but that did not mend the blows received, especially by one of the lieutenants of the Belle-Poule, Penhoat, who had been half murdered. We boarded our steamer, and found the English engineer in charge of her completely drunk. When we told him our story he rushed below to his engine-room, and fetched out a huge pistol that must have dated from Cromwell's time; and we had all the trouble in the world to prevent him from going on shore alone to take signal vengeance on "those damned niggers."
Leaving Bahia, we had to go a long way down the Southern Atlantic before we got a favourable wind. We reached St. Helena at last—a great black rock, a jagged volcanic island resembling Martinique, minus its splendid vegetation—a scrap of Scotland set in mid-ocean, and swept incessantly by the Trade wind, which blows with wearisome continuance and gathers a thick and permanent cloud-clap above the isle. It looked gloomy from the sea, and the impression on arrival there was gloomy too. James Town, the capital, is simply a wretched village, stretching along a narrow valley, shut in by dreary-looking rocks crowned by forts, to which you climb by staircases counting six hundred steps. The country around Plantation House, the Governor's residence, the valley of the Tomb, the Tomb itself with the legendary willows, and Longwood, the prison house, all are equally gloomy, and equally calculated to kill the great genius banished thither, by inches.
The business which had brought me was quickly settled between myself and the Governor, General Middlemore. The orders of the British Government were clear and precise, and the local authorities showed great goodwill in carrying them out. They undertook the exclusive care of the exhumation and transport of the remains over British territory, and it was all done with the utmost propriety. The only request I made and obtained was, that the coffin should be opened before it was handed over to us, so as to be sure that we were taking neither a hotbed of infection nor an imaginary corpse on board. The Governor himself being ill I saw but little of him. He commissioned the officer in command of the troops, Colonel Trelawny, of the Royal Artillery, to represent him. He was a pleasant man, but decidedly eccentric. His great mania was the study of genealogy, and he never failed to explain when we met that he was my cousin, and that we were both related to the late Sultan Mahmoud on the female side!
When all was ready the exhumation took place, and very imposing it was. Everybody felt impressed when the coffin was seen coming slowly down the mountain side, to the firing of cannon, escorted by British infantry with arms reversed, the band playing, to the dull rolling accompaniment of the drums, that splendid funeral march which English people call The Dead March in Saul, but which is really no other than the ancient Catholic chant of Adeste Fideles. General Middlemore, dropping with fatigue, formally handed over the body to me; and the coffin was lowered into the long-boat of the Belle-Poule, which then started for the ship. The scene at that moment was very fine. It was a striking moment A magnificent sunset had been succeeded by a twilight of the deepest calm. The British authorities and the troops stood motionless on the beach, while our ship's guns fired a royal salute. I stood in the stern of my long-boat, over which floated a magnificent Tricolour flag worked by the ladies of St Helena. Beside me were the generals and superior officers, M. de Chabot and M de las Gazes. The pick of my topmen, all in white, with crape on their arms, and bareheaded like ourselves, rowed the boat in silence, and with the most admirable precision We advanced with majestic slowness, escorted by the boats bearing the staff. It was very touching, and a deep national sentiment seemed to hover over the whole scene.
Two days later we set sail for France, which was reached after a passage of forty-one days. During the passage, feeling anxious at having had no news from Europe for four months, I spoke several ships, and amongst others, south of the line, I spoke a Dutch man-o'-war on her way to Java, which gave us details of the coalition apparently directed against Mehemet Ali, the Egyptian Viceroy, but aimed, in reality, at France. Not knowing what might result from the performances of the allied naval forces on the Syrian coast, we on board the frigate and her consort, the Favorite, determined to take all usual precautions in case of war; and each of us made ready, after his own fashion, for his eventual departure to another world. There was, in most cases, a great destroying of souvenirs, papers, and compromising correspondence. General Gourgaud attracted our attention by the trembling care with which he re-read a perfect mountain of notes in a feminine hand, which he burnt one by one in a basin, gathering up the ashes and preserving them in a bottle—not a bad way of keeping tender memories quite safe from any inquisitiveness But all these warlike preparations were thrown away. When the Belle Poule cast anchor at Cherbourg on November 30th, the storm had passed by. My mission closed at Cherbourg, but I found orders there to tranship the coffin on to a steamboat, and then take it round to Paris by the Seine, my crew and that of the corvette Favorite to form the escort. I will not tell the story of this conveying of the body. At St Helena things had on the whole been done by the British army on the one part and our naval forces on the other, with all the chivalrous seriousness and dignity which always attend international relations when confided to those who wear the sword. In France the conveyance of the remains of Napoleon took on quite another character. It was first and foremost a show, in which, as always happens in our country, many people desired to play a part which was inappropriate and sometimes ridiculous. I had often to interfere to get things put to rights again. At La Bouille, for instance, which we reached at nightfall, to meet the river flotilla to which we were to be transferred, I was shown, as the vessel which was to receive the coffin and the staff of the escort, a frightful-looking boat on which a sort of hideous dais had been built, with all the frippery and plumes of the Pompes Funebres, an official catafalque worthy of Carpentras or of Brives-la-Gaillarde. I immediately gave orders for this masterpiece of bad taste to be destroyed, a coat of black paint given to the boat, and everything cleared forward, so as to place the coffin there well in sight, and covered with a violet velvet pall. My men at once fell to work at this transformation, when a gentleman in evening dress advanced, and in a tone of great authority, forbade my sailors to touch anything. "I got my orders from M. Cave (the Director of the Beaux Arts) and from the Minister. All the decoration was designed by me, and carried out under my direction, I hold to it, and I forbid anybody to touch it," he said. "But, my good sir," I replied, "my orders have been given, and will be carried out." My gentleman became so violent that I desired him to leave the vessel instantly. "But surely you are not going to put me ashore at this hour (it was almost dark) in the open fields? I don't know where I am; I don't see any houses." "That's nothing to me, you have been insolent, so it is your own fault. Put this gentleman ashore." Four sailors advanced, but he gave in, and nobody ever heard of him again. By the following morning the transformation was complete, and the coffin moving unsheltered up the course of the river, as though to take possession of the stream, was much more striking than all the tinsel and canopies imaginable. The whole voyage up to Courbevoie, the point of arrival, was a mere classic reproduction of the usual official journey—flags, authorities girt with tricolour sashes, clergy pronouncing blessings, shaking with terror all the time, horses, gendarmes, curious crowds of holiday makers, the only thing lacking being the speeches. From Courbevoie the body was taken in procession through the Champs Elysees to the Invalides, with the usual ceremonial, which I had already witnessed in the cases of Charles X. and the Duchesse d'Orleans, but with one extra point, the cold, and it was terrible.