1S30.] France, Wellington, and Europe. 377 



to serve against France. The Prince of Cobourg, the Austrian general, 

 offered him the command of a division as lieutenant-general. This he 

 declined; and,, proscribed by his country, separated from all means of 

 income, and with nothing but his education, his activity, and his honesty, 

 he went to make his way through the world. 



Such are the vicissitudes from which at times no rank is exempted. But 

 the duke had more than the ordinary aggravations of a fall from splendid 

 fortune. He was in terror for every member of his family. His father 

 and two brothers were in the dungeons of the Committee of Public 

 Safety, dungeons from which there was scarcely an instance of liberation, 

 and from which his father was taken but to die. His mother and sister 

 had fled from France, and he had no intelligence of them, except that 

 they were separated ! He was personally obnoxious to the emigrants, 

 from his Republican services, and the Republicans would have seen 

 him only to send him to the guillotine. In this emergency he made his 

 escape to Switzerland. It seems unfortunate that he did not come to 

 England, where he would have been secure, and highly received. But 

 probably he might have been reluctant to meet the multitude of emi- 

 grants here, and, probably too, his proud spirit would have been 

 unwilling, either to appear as a pensioner of the country, or to take 

 the humble means which he must have found necessary for indepen-> 

 dence. 



But in Switzerland he had the satisfaction of finding his sister, whom 

 he placed in the convent of Bremgarten. As soon as his presence was 

 known he was persecuted, and obliged to fly to the Alps from the pursuit 

 of Robespierre. During four months which he passed in this wild 

 country, he and his valet lived on thirty sous, or Is. 5d. a day. At 

 length, even this failed; he was obliged to dismiss his valet, and 

 assuming the name of M. Corby, he offered himself as teacher of ma- 

 thematics at the college of the Grisons at Coire. Here he subsisted for 

 eight months. The death of Robespierre, in 1794, made this retire- 

 ment unnecessary. He received some money from France, and hired a 

 cottage in a Swiss village. He then set out on a tour through the 

 north, and went as far as Lapland. 



In an account by Tweddale, the Greek traveller, of his visit to the 

 duke, in Switzerland, he says : - 



" The duke is at present determined to proceed to North America, to 

 enjoy that liberty for which he has suffered so much. There, in the 

 midst of forests, he will complete an education so auspiciously com- 

 menced by adversity. I doubt not that he will still display that unaf- 

 fected magnanimity which has hitherto rendered him superior to good 

 and to bad fortune. The same greatness of soul has marked him 

 throughout. A prince, at sixteen, without the least touch of pride; 

 at seventeen, a general rallying his division three times under the fire 

 of Gemappe ; a professor of geometry at twenty, as competent as if he 

 had devoted to it long years of study ; and in each condition, as if he 

 hkd been born to fulfil its duties, To conclude, I cannot give you a 

 better idea of the union of strength and moderation in his character, 

 than by a copy of a letter which he wrote a few days ago to aix 

 American, who had offered him some waste land to clear. ' I am 

 heartily disposed to labour for the acquisition of an independence. Mis-, 

 fortune has smitten, but, thank God, it has not prostrated me. More 

 than iiappy in my misfortunes, that youth prevented . the formation of 



M.M. New Series- VOL. X. No. 58. 3 B 



