536 The Life, Character, and Nav. 



enlightened men in Prance as to England and its concerns. Bonaparte's 

 idea of making Sir Francis Burdett Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the 

 hypothetical case of his having the direction of our affairs, and the other 

 gross absurdities imputed to him at St. Helena, evinced with what effect 

 he had lent himself to the study of the British temper and character 

 (and he certainly had not neglected the subject), and was really about 

 as good as Talleyrand's gravely observing, in 1814, " That Monsieur le 

 Due de Vilain-ton" it would be wanton cruelty to deprive our 

 neighbours of that cherished morsel of bad pronunciation ( ' aspired, as 

 he knew, to the crown of England." If the credit given at that time 

 to the prince of being the author of the assertion were well founded, 

 his embassy to England may be useful to him on other than public 

 grounds. 



This was not the only error into which he was led during that 

 troubled epoch ; for, when the restoration of the Works of Art in the 

 Louvre, which had been borrowed from other countries, was suggested, 

 it was sneeringly observed, " That it would require, at the least, fifty 

 thousand men, to see that they were not damaged." Blucher, however, 

 had less confidence in the prince's judgment than the pleased Parisians, 

 with whom the saying was repeated until the fatal day when two troops 

 of horse were found sufficient to serve as a cortege to the brazen steeds 

 of Venice, and the Apollo and Venus received their passports for the 

 Roman and Tuscan states. In the year 1816, it was generally reported 

 that the prince had been forbidden to appear at court, in consequence of 

 some uncomplimentary comments on ministerial influence in elections, 

 made to M. Pasquier, the then President of the Chamber of Deputies, at 

 the table of the British minister. It is little likely that the hospitality of 

 the representative of George III. should have been so liberally extended 

 as to cause a revolution of character in M. de Talleyrand, and drive 

 Prudence from her fast-hold. Human wit, however, is feeble : and 

 forbearance is not ever stronger than temptation as was exemplified at 

 the coronation of Charles X., when the ancient observance of letting 

 loose a number of birds was adhered to, the consequence of which 

 ingenious ceremony was their directing their flight to the blazing chan- 

 deliers, and falling, burnt and in agony, on the heads of the court and 

 spectators. " There is decidedly nothing wanting to our felicity," 

 exclaimed the prince, incautiously ; ' ( see the larks which are coming down 

 ready roasted." A look from the chief actor in that drama evinced that 

 the humour of the prince was scarcely relished : and the cubiculo regio 

 praepositus was taught to feel, that if the most difficult charge at court 

 (as Nell Gwyn said or swore,) was that of a maid of honour, that of 

 chamberlain was as sparingly allowed a lapsus linguae as a faux pas was 

 permitted to the honoraria regia?. assecla. 



Monsieur is now, however, like true Mocha, " little, old, and dry," 

 and experience like that which he has acquired may be rendered 

 useful at every period of life. In his novel character as ambassador 

 to the King of Great Britain, it is well that he can confidently rely 

 on the integrity of his memory, his judgment, and his tact ; as ordi- 

 nary mortals, after having had their fidelity and attachment appealed 

 to by thirteen different governments, might be apt to confound circum- 

 stances wholly distinct. But Monsieur, undoubtedly, provides ere he 

 goes to breakfast, to assure himself of the exact nature of the powers 

 that be, as of the precise quality of the duties of the day ; and if w^i are 

 apt, unflatteringly, to wonder at the facility with which the prince has 



