TRAVELS IN 
at the time when ihe definitive treaty of peace was figned, 
made application to the State Directory for a very high fitua- 
tion at the Cape, w^hich, however, they thought proper to re- 
fufe. He went to Paris j obtained an audience of Buonaparte, 
or his minifter, in confequence of which a.n order was fent to 
the State Government to revife their motives of rcfufal. 
Another inftance of French influence prevailing at the Cape 
was too llriking to be overlooked. A Swifs gentleman, who 
had filled a high and honourable ftation in the fervice of the 
Engllfh Eaft India Company in Bengal, but for fome reafon 
or other had been difmilTed, palTed through the Cape on his 
return to England, and became enamoured of its attractions. 
His wife, in his abfence, being handfome and much younger 
than himfelf, engaged the attention of Mr. Talleyrand, and 
lived with him as his miftrefs, until the French government 
had found it convenient to pafs a refolution that there was a 
God, and therefore that there ought to be a religion, when the 
former Bifhop of Autun found no difficulty in obtaining a dif- 
penfation from the Pope to marry her. The hufband, on his 
return to Europe, proceeded to Paris, where Mr. Talleyrand, 
to prevent his becoming troublefome, recommended him to 
accept of a high appointment at the Cape of Good Hope, 
where, I underftand, he arrived within a month after the eva- 
cuation, not as plain Mr. G — ' — , late of the Englifh Eafl; India 
Company's fervice, but Monfieur Le G , Confeiller prive 
et intime de la Republique Batave aupres du Governeur et Confeil 
au Cap de Bonne Efperance, 
It 
