That the young national guards, who were desirous of forming a part of the acting army, should be armed and accoutred, and sent to the parts that were threatened.
That to render useful the services of those brave Frenchmen, who on all sides were demanding to be led against the enemy, battalions of royal volunteers should be formed, and make a part of the army of the Duke of Berri.
Marshal Ney, whose popularity and influence were well known, was appointed to take the command of the troops of the east.
The Duke de Feltre took the place of Marshal Soult.
In short, the King omitted nothing, that could concur in protecting his throne from the dangers, with which it was threatened.
Such measures, sufficient to stop an army of three hundred thousand men, could only attest the success of Napoleon; and yet the ministry daily caused the most encouraging reports to be spread among the people, and confirmed by the newspapers.
M. de Montesquiou, faithful to the system of deception he had adopted, continued to mislead the deputies, cheating them by false intelligence, and lulling them with hopes, which he himself no longer entertained. He knew the intoxication, which was excited in every place by the approach and pa.s.sage of Napoleon. He knew, that he was master of Gren.o.ble and Lyons; that the troops attempted to be opposed to him had joined his with enthusiasm: and nevertheless he announced to the chamber, "that the population of all the departments invaded by the adventurer of the island of Elba loudly manifested their indignation against this audacious robber; that they may have been surprised, but not subjugated; that all his summonses of places, and the orders he had attempted to issue to the local authorities, had been rejected with firmness; that the Lyonese had displayed the attachment, that was to be expected from their n.o.ble character; that the departments of Burgundy, Franche Comte, Lorraine, Champagne, Picardy, &c. &c. rivalled each other in their attachment and energy; that the good disposition of the troops was answerable to that of the citizens; and that all together, generals, officers, soldiers, and citizens, concurred in the defence of their country and of their King."
These political juggleries were not without effect. They satisfied some credulous men, and inflamed the courage and imaginations of a few youths. The enrolments of volunteers were more numerous: a certain number of pupils of the schools of law and physic offered their services, and traversed the streets of Paris, shouting "Long live the King! Down with the Corsican! Down with the tyrant! &c."
This effervescent movement could not be durable; and whatever pains were taken to deceive the metropolis, the truths announced by travellers and private letters opposed these ministerial falsehoods.
The defection of Marshal Ney soon came to tear off the veil, and spread affright and consternation among the ministers and their partisans.
The King repaired to the Chamber of Deputies, in the hope of confirming their attachment, and of dissipating by a solemn oath those doubts of his adherence to the charter, and of his intention to maintain it, which his ministers occasioned. Never was a more imposing and pathetic spectacle exhibited. What heart could steel itself against the sorrows of that august and aged man, against the sound of his mournful voice? Those prophetic words, "I fear nothing for myself, but I fear for France: at sixty years of age can I better close my career, than by dying in defence of the state?" These words of the King excited the most lively emotion, and tears in abundance fell from every eye.
The oath p.r.o.nounced by the King, to maintain the charter, was immediately repeated by the Count d"Artois, who had hitherto refrained from it. "We swear," said he, "on our honour, I and my family, to live and die faithful to our King, and to the const.i.tutional charter, which a.s.sures the happiness of France." But these tardy protestations could not repair the mischief, that the disloyal conduct of the government had done to the Bourbons and their cause.
In vain did the words country, liberty, and const.i.tution, recur in every discourse, and in every proclamation.
In vain was it solemnly promised, that France, as soon as it was delivered, should receive all the securities claimed by the public voice, and that the press should recover perfect freedom.
In vain was the l.u.s.tre and the prerogative, of which the legion of honour had been despoiled, offered to be restored to it.
In vain were pompous eulogies and brilliant promises lavished on the army.
The time was past.
The minister had robbed the King of confidence, which is the prime agent of the ascendancy of princes over the people; and of strength, which can alone supply the place of confidence, and command fear and obedience.
The approach of Napoleon;
The desertion of Marshal Ney;
The declaration made by those generals, who still retained their fidelity, that the troops would not fight against the Emperor, left the government no doubt of the fate that awaited it.
From that moment there was no longer harmony in their designs, or concert in the means of executing them.
Orders and counter-orders were given on the one hand, and revoked on the other. Schemes of every kind, all equally inconsiderate and impracticable, were approved and rejected, resumed and abandoned.
The chambers and the government had ceased to act in unison. The ministers complained of the deputies; the deputies publicly demanded of the King the dismissal of his ministers, and that he would place around himself men, "who have been the constant defenders of justice and liberty, and whose names shall be a guarantee for the interest of all[50]."
[Footnote 50: It is a.s.serted, that on this occasion a conference took place, at which M. Laine, MM. de Broglie, la Fayette, d"Argenson, Flaugergue, Benjamin Constant, &c. were present, where it was decided, that the King should be required in the name of the public safety:
1. To dismiss MM. de Blacas, Montesquiou, Dambray, and Ferrand:
2. To call to the Chamber of Peers forty new members, chosen exclusively from men of the revolution:
3. To confer on M. de la Fayette, the command of the national guard: and
4. To despatch patriotic commissioners, to stimulate the attachment, the zeal, and the fidelity of the troops.]
The same disorder, the same disunion, manifested themselves every where at the same time: there was only one point in which people agreed; that all was lost.
In fact so it was.
The people, whom the n.o.bles had humbled, vexed, or terrified by haughty and tyrannical pretensions;
They who had acquired national domains, whom they had wished to dispossess;
The protestants, who had been sacrificed;
The magistrates, who had been turned out;
The persons in office, who had been reduced to want;
The soldiers, officers, and generals, who had been despised and ill-treated;
The revolutionists, who had been incessantly insulted and menaced;
The friends of justice, and of liberty, who had been abused;
All the French, whom the government had reduced, as it were, in spite of themselves, to wish for another order of things; eagerly embraced the cause of Napoleon, which had become the national cause through the faults of the government.
Royalty had no defenders left but women _and their handkerchiefs_; priests without influence; n.o.bles without courage; body guards without youth, or without experience.
The legions of the national guard, on which such great reliance had been placed, were reviewed by their colonel-general: he harangued them on the charter, and the tyranny of Bonaparte; he told them, that he would march at their head, and said: "Let those, who love their King, come out from their ranks, and follow me." Scarcely two hundred obeyed the order.
The royal volunteers, who had made so much noise, when they expected to be victors without incurring any peril, had gradually dispersed; and those, whom the approach of danger had neither intimidated nor cooled, were too few to have any weight in the balance.
The government had one sole and last hope remaining: it was, dare I say it? that Napoleon would be a.s.sa.s.sinated.
The same men who had preached up a civil war, _and declared, that it would be shameful not to have one_; soiled the walls of Paris with provocations to murder, and fanatic praises bestowed beforehand on murderers. Emissaries, mixing in the various groups of the people, endeavoured to put the poniard into the hands of the new Jacques Clements. A public act had proscribed Napoleon; a reward was publicly offered for his head. This call for a crime, which indignant France first heard from the a.s.sa.s.sins of Coligny, was repeated by men, who, like them, had the sacred words of morality, humanity, and religion, continually in their mouths, and who, like them, thirsted only after vengeance and blood.
But while they were conspiring at Paris to a.s.sa.s.sinate Napoleon, he peaceably pursued his triumphant march.
Quitting Gren.o.ble on the 9th, he came that night and slept at Burgoing. [51]""The crowd and the enthusiasm continued to increase: "We have long expected you," said all these brave fellows to the Emperor; "at length you are come, to deliver France from the insolence of the n.o.bility, the pretensions of the priests, and the disgrace of a foreign yoke."
[Footnote 51: The double sets of inverted commas are still used to distinguish pa.s.sages extracted from the official account.]
""The Emperor, being fatigued[52], was in his calash, the horse walking, surrounded by a crowd of peasants, singing songs, that expressed the n.o.ble sentiments of these brave Dauphinese. "Ah!" said the Emperor, "I here find again the sentiments, which twenty years ago led me to hail France by the name of the great nation! Yes, you are still the great nation, and you shall ever be so."""
[Footnote 52: He had travelled from Cannes to Gren.o.ble partly on horseback, but chiefly on foot.]