Chapter 29

The time had now arrived when the English Cabinet believed that an attempt might be made to negotiate for peace, without compromising its honour. In the preceding March, the ambassador to the Helvetic States had been authorized to inquire of the Government of France, through the medium of their representative, whether they were disposed to entertain such a negotiation. The answer was so unsatisfactory, laying down as a peremptory condition the retention of all those conquests which, during the course of the war, had been annexed to the republic, that nothing more was then done in the matter. The subject was resumed in September, and, the Directory having signified their readiness to grant passports to any persons who should be furnished with full powers and official papers, Lord Malmesbury was appointed as plenipotentiary on the part of His Britannic Majesty to treat for peace with the French Republic. On the 22nd of October his Lordship announced to M. de la Croix, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, his arrival in Paris in that capacity. The negotiations occupied nearly two months, and the main point of difficulty turned upon the Netherlands, Lord Malmesbury, who acted strictly on his instructions, making the restoration of the Netherlands a _sine qua non_, and M. de la Croix repeatedly stating that this difficulty was one which could not be overcome. The negotiations had arrived at that stage which made this insuperable difficulty perfectly clear and unmistakeable on both sides, when Mr. Talbot, a gentleman connected with Lord Malmesbury's embassy, addressed the following letter to Lord Buckingham. No allusion will be found in it to the pending negotiations, which were of too delicate and important a nature to be touched upon in a private letter; but it is very curious and interesting, as presenting a picture of the state of France at that period.

MR. TALBOT TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Paris, Dec. 18th, 1796. MY LORD,

Your Lordship, I trust, is aware of my motives for not having written to you since I left England; I shall, therefore, make no apologies for my neglect; but I must beg leave to assure your Lordship that I am, notwithstanding the urgency of my reasons, so much ashamed of the omission, that I now feel much embarrassed in taking up my pen.

The only letters I have hitherto sent to England have been to Lord Grenville, in answer to those he has done me the honour to write; and to Mr. B. Taylor, his secretary, for some articles which I stood in need of.

Your Lordship has without doubt received much better accounts of the appearance and state of things in this country than it is in my power to communicate; however, I will attempt a description of what has struck me as worthy of notice, and rely upon your kind indulgence for my errors.

Our first entrance into France was certainly not attended with the reception which might have been expected, under the particular circumstances in which we came. It is true a good many people of all sorts were upon the quay at Calais when we arrived, but they showed no signs of joy or any other feeling more than the arrival of an indifferent vessel would have occasioned; and very shortly after we had landed, and gone to the inn, the crowd was dispersed, and everything seemed as silent as if nothing had happened. Indeed, all those we conversed with expressed their happiness at seeing us, and wished success to the negotiation; and all the principal officers of the Government stationed there waited upon Lord Malmesbury with the utmost civility; but the bulk of the inhabitants--whether they were ignorant of the arrival of an envoy to propose peace, or whether they were afraid to express their satisfaction in any public manner, I cannot say--manifested not the least sign of rejoicing.

Nothing very material occurred between this place and Paris. The aubergistes and post-masters were almost the only persons with whom we had any conversation, and their language uniformly was that France was most anxiously desirous for the restoration of peace; that their sufferings had been more than they could describe, but that latterly their situation was much mended by the diminution in the price of provisions. But I was not inclined to give much credit to them, imagining that this language was intended to flatter us, and coming from those who had suffered more than any of their description in France, from the intercourse between the two countries being stopped. It must, however, be allowed that a general gloom seemed to prevail; and very little of that gaiety for which this nation was formerly remarkable was to be observed. At Amiens, I remember, the people of the inn where we supped entered more fully and with less reserve into the detail of their calamities. There had been a considerable manufacture of woollen cloths in this town, in which at this time no more than two hundred people were employed.

I profited of the opportunity which the changing horses afforded me to see the Chateau of Chantilly. I found it totally stripped of its furniture, and every decoration that bore the smallest reference to armorial bearings was defaced; but otherwise the building has not suffered much injury. The statue of the great Conde on the principal staircase remains, but the head is cut off. The barbarians were not content with beheading the statues of men, but they have likewise done so to all the busts of stags placed over the stalls in the stables. The chateau was used as a prison in the time of Robespierre, and almost all the apartments continue still divided into small spaces for that purpose. The gardens are totally destroyed, but the park has met with no injury further than the almost total destruction of the game. There is a keeper appointed by the nation for the protection of the wood. The timber on the opposite side of the river is chiefly cut down, the land having been sold.

The adjacent chateau of the Duc d'Angouleme, his son, as far as the walls, remains perfect; I had not time to see the inside of it. The care of the chateau has lately been given in charge to one of the former servants of the Prince de Conde.

The roads were in general in excellent condition, and the post-horses tolerably good; but we were in several places kept some time waiting for them. This is not to be wondered at, if we consider how little they have been accustomed to travellers for some years past.

A great number of the best houses by the roadside and in the towns were shut up, and seemed to be abandoned. Very few of the churches appeared to be open, many of them were pulled down, and none that were not considerably damaged; but the country was throughout in a state of high cultivation, although there was apparently a scarcity of men at work. This is to be accounted for by the encouragement which the late dearness of bread has given to the farmers, who are become, by a variety of circumstances, extremely wealthy. They are one of the very few descriptions of people who have profited by the Revolution. Very many of them have purchased lands, and this they were enabled to do almost for nothing by the depreciation of assignats, for an enormous nominal value of which they sold the produce of their farms; and this paper was received from them for the sum it represented, in payment for the estates of the _ci-devant_ seigneurs and other confiscated property. I am told there have been repeated instances of the basest ingratitude on their part, in denouncing their landlords; and, on the contrary, that many of them have given proofs of the strongest attachment to them.

Provisions are in abundance, and at a very moderate price. Common bread is little more than two sous, and butchers' meat from five to eight sous the pound.

I have not observed any want of specie in circulation; never yet have I found any difficulty in getting change upon the purchase of any article, nor any such thing as paper money produced in such transactions. The exhausted state and the degree of distress which I could discover in this country, I must confess, fell short of the expectation which the various species of plunder, exaction, and cruelty, which it has for several years submitted to, had impressed upon my mind.

Between Calais and Paris, scarcely any troops were to be met with.

The scene being so perfectly new to me, and having little or no intercourse with any one here, except our own society, I was some time in Paris before I could form any opinion of the state of affairs, and the sentiments of the people. The streets seemed crowded, the shops tolerably well supplied, the theatres well attended, some private and a great number of public carriages to be met with; all this brought to my reflection how very difficult a matter it must be to destroy a great country, considering that all the pains which have been taken to ruin this have left so much undone. But the first fortnight we lived in the most populous part of the town, near the Palais Royal, and therefore the last place where distress would be evident.

There are few parts of Paris I have not since been in, and I find in many of them, the outlets particularly, the greatest wretchedness to prevail, and to be very thin of inhabitants. A great part of the Faubourg St. Germain, near the Boulevards, is in a great measure deserted; but this quarter was formerly inhabited principally by the noblesse. There is scarcely a street in Paris where there are not several houses written upon, _Propriete nationale a vendre_, and sometimes in addition, _ou a louer_; and in many places a great part of the street is in the same manner advertised for sale.

The names of many of the streets are, as your Lordship must know, entirely changed; but where they are not, and began with _Saint_, that word is invariably defaced, and the remainder of the name is left untouched. But, notwithstanding that, most places are commonly called as formerly; and this practice is becoming more general every day.

The hotels of many of the _ci-devant_ noblesse are inhabited by the Ministers and other members of the Government. Many of them are converted into public offices and others of them into _hotels garnis_, &c.; besides, a prodigious number of them remain unoccupied, and offered for sale by the nation.

The Luxembourg is divided into five separate habitations for the Directory, besides the apartments that are used for their sittings, audiences, and other public business.

The Council of Ancients hold their sittings in the Palace of the Tuileries, and the Council of Five Hundred meet in what was formerly the riding-house of the King; but this is considered as merely a temporary chamber for this last body, until the Palais Bourbon, which is now undergoing great alterations and additions, is ready for their reception. This building is in the Faubourg St. Germain, in front of the new bridge called Pont de la Revolution. I shall take an opportunity hereafter of giving your Lordship a description of the interior of these several places.

The scene of any great revolutionary event continues still decorated with the national flag and other emblems of their _glorious_ Revolution, accompanied with an inscription; that where the Bastille stood is, _14 Juillet 1789, la Bastille detruite, et elle ne se relevera jamais_; and that in the Place du Carrousel, opposite the Tuileries, is, _10 Aout 1792, La Royaute francaise est abolie, et elle ne se relevera jamais_. There are several marks of cannon-balls, but they have made but little impression on this front of the Tuileries; and under each of them is written, _10 Aout 1792_.

The garden of the Tuileries is, I am told, kept as well as ever it was; some of the largest trees in it, however, have been cut down since our arrival, but they were chiefly decayed. Of the Bastille nothing remains, except a very small part of the foundations; and near it is a newly-erected powder magazine, and much of the remainder of the space is a depot for firewood.

The churches are many of them open, and have Divine service performed in them without restraint; but a great many more of them are shut, and some used as _casernes_, storehouses, &c.; but they have all been stripped of every internal decoration, and nothing suffered to remain but the bare walls. Sometimes, indeed--and it appears to be by an oversight--a piece of painting, or perhaps a little image, may have escaped injury; but such a thing is a curiosity, and to be found in a situation not readily to be observed, or difficult to be reached. The favourite mode of mutilating a statue seems to have been to break off the head. In the church of St. Sulpice there is a tolerably good statue of a Virgin and Child remaining, but of this the Child's head is taken off, and that of the Virgin seems to have met with the same fate, but to have been restored. It is wonderful the industry that has been used in the destruction of everything in the way of inscription, of sculpture, or coats of arms, which could possibly remind the people of the _ancien regime_; and I cannot help being much surprised that all this was done with so much care as to remove merely these particular objects of their enmity, without in the least damaging the adjacent parts. In defacing armorial bearings and things of this sort, the reformers have been at the trouble of cutting them away, so as to leave the shield quite plain, although they were carved in stone. I should have supposed that mischief done in the moment of frenzy would not have been so methodical.

Upon all the public buildings, the public offices, and many others, is written in large characters--_Unite indivisibilite de la republique, liberte, egalite, fraternite, ou la mort_; but in general the last word is rubbed out. The nation took it into their heads not to like death upon the downfall of Robespierre. Upon many of the churches is this inscription--_Le peuple francais reconnait l'etre supreme et l'immortalite de l'ame._ This was a decree of the Convention for the people at large, and your Lordship will allow that this must have a ridiculous effect upon the walls of a church entirely in ruins, as is often the case. Another modern inscription is--_Citoyens, respectez le bien d'autrui, c'est le fruit de son travail et de son industrie_; and perhaps close by it you may read _propriete nationale a vendre_, in direct violation of the other, offering to sell property of which some unfortunate person has been robbed by the very preachers of this doctrine.

I am obliged to break off suddenly, for reasons which will be very soon known to your Lordship.

I have the honour to be your Lordship's most obedient, faithful, humble servant,

JAMES TALBOT.

The last line of this letter is written in an agitated hand, which the circumstance that compelled Mr. Talbot to break off so abruptly sufficiently accounts for. At that moment a note had arrived at the embassy from M. de la Croix, giving Lord Malmesbury notice to depart from Paris in eight-and-forty hours, adding that if the British Cabinet were desirous of peace, the Executive Directory were ready to carry on the negotiations, on the basis they had already laid down, by the reciprocal channel of couriers.

1797.

DISCONTENTS IN ENGLAND--THE BREST SQUADRON--MOTION ON THE STATE OF IRELAND--AFFAIRS OF THE CONTINENT--LORD MALMESBURY'S MISSION TO LISLE.

The result of Lord Malmesbury's mission was communicated to Parliament as soon as it became known in London, by a message from the King, and addresses were moved approving of the conduct of Ministers. Amendments, condemning their policy, and demanding an investigation, were proposed in both Houses, and rejected by large majorities. In the House of Commons, notwithstanding an appeal of extraordinary eloquence and power from Mr. Fox, the address was carried by a majority of 212 to 37. Mr. Pitt's position, perhaps, was never stronger than at this moment, although the affairs of the Bank of England, in consequence of repeated loans to Government, were reduced to the most desperate condition, and the lower classes of the population, feeling heavily the burthens of the war, began to clamour against its prosecution. But the national spirit sustained the Government. Possessing the implicit confidence of the King, the two Houses of Parliament, the heads of the Church, the landed interest, and the monied and commercial classes, Mr. Pitt persevered. The greatest efforts were made out of doors to induce His Majesty to remove his Ministers. Public meetings were held in several places to get up petitions on the subject; and the energies of the Opposition were incessantly employed in spreading alarm and discontent through the country. Several unfortunate circumstances concurred to give effect to these movements. The war had reached its most disastrous point. England was left alone in the field to contend against the power of France, now grown haughty and formidable by a long course of successes. The credit of the country, under this pressure of events, was seriously affected. The Bank had stopped payment. Two mutinies had broken out in the fleet, one at Spithead, and another at the Nore. An organization of malcontents had been formed in Ireland under the name of "the United Irishmen," and had carried their insurrectionary views so far as to send deputies to treat with the French for assistance to enable them to throw off the English yoke. The year opened with the most gloomy prospects on all sides; but the firmness of Ministers triumphed over all difficulties, and conducted them to its close with the happiest results.

The first incident of the year to which allusion is made in these letters, is the appearance in British waters of a French squadron. It consisted of two frigates and two sloops, and its insignificance, compared with the demonstration that was anticipated from the loud threats of invasion by which it was heralded, excited ridicule rather than alarm.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Wednesday, Jan. 4th, 1797. MY DEAREST BROTHER,

A little after eleven this morning came an account of Elphinston's being arrived with the 'Monarch' (I believe at Spithead). He had letters from General Dalrymple of the 31st, by which it seems probable that the French fleet is, if not entirely, certainly in great part, broken to pieces. Two French seventy-fours and a frigate had put into Bantry Bay, one without a bowsprit, and all of them damaged, and were lying within mortar reach of Bantry when Dalrymple wrote: other vessels were seen also trying to get into Bantry Bay. The 'Impatiente,' a very fine frigate of forty-four guns, just reached Cuxhaven, and foundered there, the whole crew going down with her except a pilot and four men, who were saved. By their report twelve thousand men only were on board, and provisions so scarce from the first, that they were put upon short allowance the day that they left Brest. Another French frigate was seen driving up St. George's Channel, and is said to have gone to pieces upon the Welsh coast. A Barbadoes ship saw a large ship, supposed to be one of the flutes, struggle some time, and then founder; another of the flutes was seen to founder off the Lizard; and great traces of wreck are thrown upon the Irish coast.

Lord Bridport sailed very early yesterday morning, and met Elphinston, who gave him all this intelligence. I presume that he will probably detach part of his squadron towards Ireland, and part towards Brest; besides which, I believe he has power to take with him whatever he meets.

Kingsnill was indefatigable in collecting his frigates, which, with his two sixty-fours, will count heavily upon this shattered and disabled force of the enemy. Meantime, the greatest part of the Oporto fleet is come in, and very good accounts are received from the West Indies, where a strong naval force is gone down to the protection of Jamaica. One of the frigates, too, upon that station has taken a rich Spanish prize. Of the four ships out belonging to Colpoys' fleet, all are come in except the 'Powerful,' which is thought to have made Ireland. Upon the whole, therefore, you will admit that I send you to-day a very prosperous naval budget. In truth, I do think that, if the ruin of this French expedition be as complete as it promises to be from these circumstances, the security of Ireland, and of England too, has been more promoted by it than by any event which has happened during the war; and much as I applaud your manly and forward zeal in your military offer, I doubt whether the occasion for it will again be renewed. I ought to have mentioned to you that the four men saved from the 'Impatiente' describe the troops on board as having been from the first highly dissatisfied and discontented with the expedition, and that twelve thousand, instead of twenty thousand, sailed, because it was found difficult to persuade the troops in general to embark in the enterprise. The result will therefore add to the ill-temper upon this subject, and Irish invasion will for a long time be no popular measure in the harbour of Brest. Stay then at Stowe, my dear brother, and enjoy the satisfaction which you will feel in the prompt and handsome service which you were ready to have done. _Laudo momentem_--not so (_between ourselves_)--do I say to Elphinston. I do not know what is his pretence for coming away with the 'Monarch' in such a moment, but I shrewdly suspect his Cape treasure to have been on board and to have influenced his decision; if that is the case, of which I know nothing, I do think it will be disgraceful beyond all measure, but I am speaking my own conjectures only, for I have not had time yet to ask more. God bless you.

The sequel of the expedition was sufficiently ludicrous. Having effected a landing of some fifteen hundred men on the shore of the Bay of Cardigan on the 23rd of February, the militia, fencibles, and peasantry of the neighbourhood immediately collected; but the invaders saved them the trouble of an engagement, by laying down their arms, and surrendering themselves prisoners of war. The frigates were captured on their return to Brest; and thus terminated an enterprize, which was so inadequately planned, as to create universal astonishment that it was ever undertaken.

The state of Ireland offered a favourable opportunity to the Opposition for an attack upon Ministers; and Lord Fitzwilliam, having failed in his attempts to bring them into discredit in reference to his own case, now extended the grounds of accusation to the general discontents of the country. Lord Moira, who undertook to bring forward the motion, appears to have had no other object in view than to trace all these disorders to the recal of Lord Fitzwilliam.