CHAPTER III

Bonaparte's landing at the Gulf of Juan--Proclamations and Ordonnances--Louis XVIII. and M. de Vitrolles--Cornu the hatter--Newspaper information.

Bonaparte had landed on the noon of the 1st March, at the Gulf of Juan, and was marching on Paris.

People of another generation, who were not alive at that period, can form no idea of the effect this news produced when on the morning of the 7th March we read the following lines in the _Moniteur_:--

"PROCLAMATION.

"We adjourned the Chambers on the 31st of last December until the Session of May 1st, during which interval we have striven unceasingly in every way that could contribute to the tranquillity and the welfare of our peoples. That tranquillity is threatened, and that welfare may be compromised by _malevolence_ and _treachery._"

Imagine, dear readers, one of those worthy citizens who subscribe to the _Moniteur_,--there are some who do, although not many,--imagine a mayor, a magistrate, a deputy magistrate; anyone, in fact, who by duty, by position, or by a sense of responsibility, is obliged to read Government prose: imagine one of these men, carelessly opening his official news-sheet, which he reads every morning from conscientious motives, falling upon this first paragraph, with its final disturbing expressions of _malevolence_ and _treachery._

"Dear, dear, dear, whatever is the matter now!"

And he goes on:--

"If the enemies to our country have founded their hopes in its divisions, which they are ever seeking to foment, its supporters, its legitimate upholders, will cancel that criminal hope by the invulnerable strength of an indestructible union."

"By all means let us crush such a criminal hope," says the worthy citizen, who does not yet know what they are driving at.

"By all means let us crush such a criminal hope," says the public functionary, who imagines it means some conspiracy among subordinate officers.

And the citizen turns to his wife, nods his head, and repeats--

"... 'By the invulnerable strength of an indestructible union! '"adding, "How well the Government puts it!"

Then the reader, whether citizen or public functionary, reads as follows:--

"Acting upon the advice of our well-beloved and faithful chevalier, Sieur Dambray, Lord Chancellor of France, whom we charge to carry out our orders, we hereby command as follows ..."

"Ah! now let us see what the king orders," says the reader.

"_Article 1._

"The Chamber of Peers and that of the Deputies of Departments are specially convoked to meet at the usual place where their sittings are held.

"_Article 2._

"Those Peers and Deputies of Departments who are absent from Paris must at once proceed there as soon as they become aware of this Proclamation.

"Issued from the Château of the Tuileries on March 6, 1815, twentieth year of our reign.

(Signed) LOUIS."

"Well!" says the citizen, "it is odd that they do not state why the Chambers are convoked."

"Ah!" says the public functionary, "they convoke the Chambers specially, and do not indicate the day for meeting. Deuce take it! the situation must be very grave to cause such an omission."

"Ah!" they both exclaim, "here is an Ordonnance! let us read the Ordonnance, and perhaps that will enlighten us somewhat."

"ORDONNANCE.

"Acting upon the advice of our well-beloved and faithful chevalier, Sieur Dambray, Lord Chancellor of France, whom we charge to carry out our orders, we hereby command and declare as follows:--

"_Article 1._

"Napoleon Bonaparte is declared a traitor and a rebel _for attaching himself to the main army_ in the Department of Var."

"Oh! oh!" says the citizen, "what do they imply by that? They are deceived! Is not Napoleon confined to an island?"

"Why, of course," replies his wife "in an island called Elba."

"Very well, then, how could he get into the Department of Var; there is probably an _erratum_ further on. Let us continue."

"What!" exclaims the public functionary, "what are they talking of? Napoleon has attached himself to the main army in the Department of Var? Goodness me! that is serious news; fortunately my wife's cousin is related to the usurper's valet de chambre, so that, if by any chance.... Let us read on."

And both continue:--

"It is therefore urged upon all Governors, Commanders of armed forces, National Guards, Civil Authorities, and even upon Private Citizens, to _seize him..."_

"To _seize him_," the citizen's wife here interrupts; "what does that mean? to seize him?"

"Why, it is plain enough; it means ... it means to seize him.... But you interrupt me just at the most interesting point."

"To seize him!" murmurs the public functionary; "I am glad I am not mayor, or deputy, or magistrate in the Department of Var."

Then both resume their reading:--

"...to seize and arrest him, to cause him immediately to be brought before a court-martial, which, after having proved his identity, shall _sentence_ him according to the law.

"_Article 2._

"Soldiers or _employés_ of any rank who shall have accompanied or followed the above-mentioned Bonaparte shall be visited with the same punishment, and held guilty of the same crimes, unless they make their submission within a period of eight days.

"_ Article 3._

"All civil and military rulers, heads or employers of labour, or receivers of public trusts, or even private citizens, who shall offer assistance or help of any kind, whether directly or indirectly, to Bonaparte, shall be equally proceeded against and punished as abettors and accomplices in this rebellion.

"_Article 4._

"Also all those shall be punished in the same way, who, by holding discourse in public places, or by issuing placards, bills, or printed matter, shall take part in, or incite citizens to take part in, the rebellion, or who shall abstain from repressing the revolt.

"Issued from the Château of the Tuileries, March 6, 1815, twentieth year of our reign. (Signed) Louis."

The citizen re-reads it, and still he is in the dark.

The public functionary does not need to read it twice, he understands it all.

Imagine news like this, announced to France in such a fashion!

Whether the subscribers to the _Moniteur_ understood it at first glance, or had to re-read it twice, the shock was just as startling and sudden in its character.

Ten minutes after the _Moniteur_ had been opened by the Mayor of Villers-Cotterets, the event was known throughout the town, and every house divested itself of its inmates, who rushed out into the streets.

Every other journal kept silence.

This is how the news reached Paris, and led to the Proclamation and Ordonnance we have just read.

From Lyons, on the morning of March 5th, the news of the landing of Napoleon in the Gulf of Juan had been transmitted to Paris by telegraph.

The delay was explained by the telegraph lines stopping short at that period at Lyons. A courier had been sent off post haste from Marseilles on the 3rd, by the military commander, and had brought the news to his colleague of the Department of the Rhone during the night of the 4th and 5th.

The telegraph was under the jurisdiction of M. de Vitrolles, cabinet minister and State secretary. He it was who received the despatch, in the place Vendôme, where his offices were situated: he did not even wait to have his horses put to his carriage, but ran on foot to the Tuileries, to communicate the despatch to the king.

It was worded thus:--

"Bonaparte landed on the 1st March, near Cannes, in the Department of Var, with 1200 men and four pieces of cannon. He is marching in the direction of Digne and Gap, as though to take the road to Grenoble; all measures are being adopted to arrest and thwart this mad attempt. The utmost loyalty prevails in the Southern Departments, and public tranquillity is assured."

Louis XVIII. took the despatch out of M. de Vitrolles' hands and read it with the greatest calmness.

Then, when he had read it, he said:--

"Well?"

"Well, sire, I await your Majesty's commands," said M. de Vitrolles.

Louis XVIII. made a gesture with his shoulders as though to say, "Why should I be troubled over the matter?" Then aloud he said:--

"Go and see Marshal Soult, and tell him to do what is necessary."

M. de Vitrolles ran towards Marshal Soult's, but he did not need to go as far as the War Office, he met Marshal Soult on the _pont Royal._

They both returned to the Tuileries.

The marshal doubted the truth of the news; and doubted it so thoroughly that he told the military commander he should receive his orders next day.

So one day--one whole day--was lost, when not one second should have been lost.

However, towards ten that night, it was decided that M. le count d'Artois should set off for Lyons, and M. le duc de Bourbon for la Vendée.

Next day, the 6th, the papers were silent; but the telegraph spoke again. It announced that Napoleon was definitely advancing towards Grenoble and Lyons _via_ Digne and Gap.

It was only then at about two o'clock in the afternoon that it was decided to summon the Chambers and to draw up the Proclamation and Ordonnance we read in the _Moniteur._

Villers-Cotterets was more inclined to Royalist than to Bonapartist feeling. The château which, under Louis XV. and Louis XVI., had been occupied by the duc d'Orléans and by Madame de Montesson and their court; the château where Philippe-Égalité spent his frequent exiles and pursued his finest hunting expeditions; the forest to which half the working population owed its livelihood, in which they worked, and from which three-quarters of the poor people got their beech-nuts and firewood; the forest which was part of the estates of the House of Orléans, since the marriage of Philippe, brother of Louis XIV., with Madame Henriette; the château and forest, we reiterate, had spread aristocratic traditions in the town, which the Revolution had done very little to efface, although it had placed its soldiers, and the Empire its beggars, in the dwelling-house of an ancient line of princes.

So the first impression this news of Napoleon's landing in the Gulf of Juan produced at Villers-Cotterets was more hostile than joyous.

The women specially distinguished themselves by a fiery outbreak of threats, which tended even towards imprecations.

Among these women there was one more fiery and energetic than all the rest: she was the wife of a hatter called Cornu.

Those, then, to whom this return of Napoleon was a hope (I will not say a delight, for at that period no one could guess the rapidity of the march which, thirteen days after the day on which we had learnt of his landing on the most distant point in France, was to take him to the Tuileries), instead of rejoicing, seemed more melancholy than ever, and entered their houses with lowered heads.

My mother was not, nor could she be, one of their number. Napoleon had not been so benevolent to us that his return could afford us the slightest pleasure; but we were perfectly well aware, both of us, that we were among the people who were menaced. What could a woman and a child do against these menaces?

We therefore entered our home with heads as bowed as though we were Bonapartists.

And indeed, from that time forth, so we were in the eyes of the inhabitants.

The situation was not exactly cheerful, and our position anything but reassuring.

It was true that not only the _Journal des Débats_, but all the other papers, spoke of Napoleon as a fugitive bandit driven back into the mountains, tracked by the inhabitants like a wild beast; who had failed in his attempt upon Antibes, and was repulsed by Digne, which had shut its gates against him; who was already repenting having risked such a senseless act as trying to reconquer France with only 1200 men, he who had lost it with 600,000!

All awaited, then, with impatience the papers of the 9th and of the 10th, when, no doubt, we should learn that the usurper had been taken, as the _Journal des Débats_ desired, and, in accordance with the instructions of the Proclamation inserted in the _Moniteur_, a Court-martial had begun to try him.

Should it so happen, he would have been shot, twenty-four hours later, in a courtyard, a farmyard, a ditch, and all would be at an end.

Why, indeed, should his court-martial take longer than that of the duc d'Enghien?

The paper of the 9th came: but instead of the paragraphs we expected to find, we read that the fugitive had been at Castellane, at Barême, and for a short while at Martigny, where he had issued a proclamation to the inhabitants of Hautes-Alpes.

Incredible as the step might seem, when one considered that it was taken by so great a strategist as Napoleon, the fugitive was fleeing to Paris!

Meanwhile, M. le comte d'Artois had gone to Lyons.

It was indeed an honour to send the first prince of the blood to block the advance of such a man.

He was accompanied by the duc d'Orléans and the marshal duc de Taranto.

And, in addition to this, a royal proclamation, upon the advice of the duc de Dalmatia, minister of war, had called up the Royal Standard officers on half-pay in order to form a select corps, in all the principal places of each Department.

Another mandate, issued the same day, mobilized the Parisian National Guards.

On the 10th the news of a grand victory gained by the duc d'Orléans over the usurper spread over Paris, and so into the provinces. An officer of the king's household appeared on the balcony of the Tuileries, and, waving his hat, announced that the king had just received official information that the duc d'Orléans had attacked the usurper at the head of 20,000 men of the National Guard, in the direction of Bourgoin, and had completely beaten him.

Unluckily the papers of the 12th announced the return to Paris of the would-be conqueror.

The _Moniteur_ even gave out that Napoleon had slept at Bourgoin on the night of the 9th; and that they expected he might _perhaps_ enter Lyons on the evening of the 10th of March, but that it seemed certain Grenoble had not yet opened its gates to him.

This was the extent of our news at Villers-Cotterets, which was a day behind that of Paris, when a conspiracy broke out which, without seeming to be connected therewith in any way, yet gave rise to the feeling that there was an extraordinary coincidence between it and Napoleon's landing and march towards Paris.

We shall see in what fashion, child though I was, I was to be mixed up in this great affair, a matter of life and death.