ESTIMATION OF WATT'S MERITS. 459 



tary eloquence, of which he will for ever remain the 

 model." 



On the 28th of February, the day after the celebrated 

 sitting that I have just described, the Moniteur, with its 

 known fidelity, published an answer from the emperor to 

 Chenier's discourse. It was cold, laconic, unmeaning ; 

 it had, in short, all the characteristics that other people 

 would say are those of an official document. As to the 

 incident liat I recorded, there was no allusion to it ; a 

 wretched concession to predominant opinions, to the sus- 

 ceptibilities of a military etiquette ! The master of the 

 world, to use Pliny's expression, ceding for a moment to 

 his inward feeling, had not the less bowed his fasces to 

 the literary title awarded to him by an Academy. 



These reflections on the comparative merits of the 

 man of letters and the man of arms, although not chiefly 

 suggested by what is said, by what is done under our 

 ocular experience, would not be inapplicable to the 

 country of James Watt. I travelled not long since 

 through England and Scotland. The good will with 

 which I was received, authorized questions on my part, 

 as dry, as pointed, as direct, as might, under other cir- 

 cumstances, have come only from the president of a com- 

 mission of inquiry. Already fully preoccupied with the 

 obligation I should be under, at my return, to give a 

 judgment on the illustrious mechanic ; already feeling 

 uneasy at the solemn character of the meeting; before 



/ O 



which I am speaking, I had prepared the following 

 question : " What do you think of the influence that 

 Watt had on the riches, on the power, and on the pros- 

 perity of England ? " I do not exaggerate in saying 

 that I addressed this question to upwards of a hundred 

 persons belonging to all classes of society, to all varie- 



