Historical Characters. Henry Bulwer
former authority; nor could a people be ever wholly without suspicion of a prince who had to forget the ideas with which he had received the sceptre before he could respect those which restricted the use of it.
Louis XVI., moreover, had attempted to escape from his palace, as a prisoner escaping from his gaol, and as a prisoner thus escaping he had been caught and brought back to his place of confinement.
It was difficult to make anything of a sovereign in this condition save a puppet, to be for a while the tool, and ere long the victim, of contending parties.
Now, M. de Talleyrand had always a leaning to the Orleans branch of the House of Bourbon: neither did he think so ill of the notorious personage who was then the representative of the Orleans family, as the contemporaries from whose report posterity has traced his portrait.
Of this prince he once said, in his own pithy manner, “Le duc d’Orléans est le vase dans lequel on a jeté toutes les ordures de la Révolution;”26 and this was not untrue.
Philippe d’Orléans, indeed, who has figured in history under the nickname or sobriquet of “Egalité,” was neither fitted for the part of a great sovereign in turbulent times nor for that of a quiet and obscure citizen at any more tranquil period. Nevertheless, he was not so bad a man as he has been represented; for both Legitimists and Republicans have been obliged to blacken his character in order to excuse their conduct to him.
His character has, furthermore, been mystified and exaggerated, as we have looked at it by the lurid glare of that unnatural vote which brings the later period of his life always prominently and horribly before us. Still, in reality, he was rather a weak man, led into villainous deeds by want of principle, than a man of a strong and villainous nature, who did not scruple at crimes when they seemed likely to advance his ambition. His only one strong passion was a desire to be talked about.
It is possible that the King, by skilful management, might have turned this ruling wish of his most powerful subject to the profit of his monarchy: for the young Duc de Chartres was at one time anxious to shine as an aspirant to military fame. The government, however, denied his request to be employed as became his rank; and when, despite of this denial, he engaged in a naval combat as a volunteer, the court unjustly and impoliticly spread reports against his courage. To risk his life in a balloon, to run riot in every extravagance of debauch, to profess the opinions of a republican though the first prince of the blood royal, were demonstrations of the same disposition which might have made him a gallant soldier, a furious bigot, a zealous royalist, and even a very tolerable constitutional monarch.
As to the various stories of his incessant schemes and complicated manœuvres for exciting the populace, debauching the soldiery, and seizing the crown, they are, in my opinion, no more worthy of credit than the tales which at the same period were equally circulated of Louis XVI.’s drunkenness, and Marie-Antoinette’s debaucheries. Belonging to those whom Tacitus has described as “men loving idleness – though hating quiet,” seeking popularity more than power, and with a character easily modelled by circumstances, I am by no means certain, that if M. de Talleyrand did think of bestowing on him what was afterwards called a “citizen crown,” (it must be remembered that he had not then been lowered and disgraced by the follies or crimes into which he was subsequently led), the plan was not the best which could have been adopted. But there was one great and insurmountable obstacle to this design.
General Lafayette commanded the National Guard of Paris, and although his popularity was already on the wane, he was still – Mirabeau being dead – the most powerful citizen that had been raised up by the Revolution. He did not want to run new risks, nor to acquire greater power, nor to have a monarch with more popularity or more authority than the runaway king.
Courageous rather than audacious, more avid of popularity than of power, a chivalric knight-errant, an amiable enthusiast, rather than a great captain, or a practical politician, the part which suited him was that of parading himself before the people as the guardian of the constitution, and before the sovereign as the idol of the nation. To this part he wished to confine himself; and the monarch under whom he could play it most easily was Louis XVI. Nor was this all.
Ambitious men may agree as to sharing the attributes of office; vain men will not agree as to sharing the pleasure of applause: and it is said that Lafayette never forgot that there was another bust, that of the Duc d’Orléans, carried about the streets of Paris together with his own, on the memorable day which saw the destruction of the Bastille. To any idea, therefore, of the Duc d’Orléans as King of France, he was decidedly opposed.
Thus, after making just that sort of effort in favour of the younger branch of the Bourbons which left him free to support the elder one, if such effort proved abortive, M. de Talleyrand finally declared for Louis XVI., as the only person who could be monarch, if a monarchy could be preserved; and was also for giving this prince such a position as he might honourably accept, with functions that he might really fulfil.
The King himself, it must be added, was now in a better disposition than he had hitherto been for frankly accepting the conditions of the new existence proposed to him.
A hero, or rather a saint, when it was required of his fortitude to meet danger or to undergo suffering, his nature was one of those which shrink from exertion, and prefer endurance to a struggle for either victory or escape.
It was with difficulty that he had been so far roused into action as to attempt his recent expedition; he had been disgusted with its trouble, more than awed by its peril. Death itself seemed preferable to another such effort.
He had seen, likewise, from the feeling of the provinces, and even from the infidelity of the troops, who, sent to escort him, might have attempted his rescue; but who, when told to cry, “Vive le Roi!” cried, “Vive la Nation!” that, even if he had reached M. de Bouillé’s camp, it would have been difficult for that general, notwithstanding his firmness of character and military ability, to have placed the sovereign of France in any position within the French territory from which he might have dictated to, or even treated with, the French people. To quit Paris, therefore, a second time was evidently to quit France and to unite himself with, and to be subordinate to, that party of émigrés which had always preferred his younger brother, whose presumption had become insulting to his authority and offensive to Marie-Antoinette’s pride.
On the other hand, many persons of note in the Assembly who had hitherto employed their talents and their popularity towards the weakening of the monarchical power, were at this juncture disposed to strengthen it.
Amongst the commissioners sent to conduct Louis XVI. from Varennes to Paris, was Barnave, an eloquent young lawyer, who, from a desire to distinguish himself in a glorious rivalry with Mirabeau, had adopted that party in the Assembly which, whilst declaring itself against a republic, contended in all discussions, and especially in the famous discussion on the veto, for abridging and in fact annihilating the royal authority. Struck by the misfortunes of Marie-Antoinette, – beauty never appearing so attractive to a generous heart as in the hour of distress, – and convinced, perhaps, by his own personal observations that Louis XVI. had in many respects been grossly calumniated, Barnave had at last adopted the views which had previously been formed by his great rival, whose ashes then slept in the Pantheon.
The two Lameths also, officers of noble birth, possessing some talent and more spirit, perceiving that by the course they had hitherto pursued they had raised up at each step more formidable rivals amongst the lower classes of society than any they would otherwise have had to encounter amongst the leaders of the nobility or the favourites of the court, were now as anxious to restrain the democracy which they hated, as Barnave was to assist the queen whom he loved; whilst many of all ranks, conscientiously in favour of liberty, but as justly alarmed at anarchy, beginning to consider it more important to curb the license of the mob and the clubs than that of the King and the government, were for rallying round the tottering throne and trying to give it a tolerable foundation of security.
For these reasons, then, there was a combination of interests, desires, and abilities, in favour of establishing Louis XVI. at the head of such a constitution, as, if not the best possible, would have been the best possible at
“The Duc d’Orléans is the vase into which people have thrown all the filth of the Revolution.”