Scarcely any quarrels, I believe, take place between the English and
French, nor did I hear of any violent fracas but one. In this instance, the
English officers concerned must have been sad, brutal, vulgar fellows.
They, however, after behaving in a most gross insulting manner, were
compelled by some Frenchmen not to eat but to drink their words, and that
out of a vessel not usually employed in drinking. I shall not repeat the
contemptible affair, but it furnished the subject of a caricature.
The English officers in general behave in a handsome and liberal manner,
and their conduct was spoken of in high terms of encomium by very many of
the French themselves. I regret however exceedingly that any of the British
officers should have imbibed the low prejudices and vulgar hatred against
the French, which certain people preach up in England to cover their own
peculations and interested views. A young friend of mine, with whom I was
one day talking on political subjects, said to me: "I cannot help agreeing
with you in many things, but I am staggered when I think that your ideas
and reasoning are so contrary to the ideas in which I have been brought up;
so that I rather avoid entering at all on political questions."
I do not wonder at all at this, for I recollect when I was at school at
Eton, the system was to drill into the heads of the boys strong
aristocratic principles and hatred of Democracy and of the French in
particular; we were ordered to write themes against the French Revolution
and verses of triumph over their defeats, with now and then a sly theme on
the great advantage of hereditary nobility; in these verses God Almighty
was to be represented as closely allied to the British Government and a
sleeping partner of the Administration. One of the fellows of Eton
College actually told the late Mr Adam Walker, the celebrated lecturer on
natural and experimental philosophy, who was accustomed to give lectures
annually to the Etonians, that his visits were no longer agreeable and
would be dispensed with in future; as "Philosophy had done a great deal of
harm and had caused the French Revolution."
With respect to my visit to Versailles, I was much struck with the vast
size and magnificence of the buildings and with the ingenuity displayed in
the arrangement of the grounds and the numerous groups of statues,
grottos, aqueducts, fountains and ruins. Still it pleases me less than St
Cloud, for I prefer the taste of the present day in gardening and the
arrangement of ground, to the ponderous and tawdry taste of the time of
Louis XIV, and I prefer St Cloud to Versailles, just as I should prefer a
Grecian Nymph in the simple costume of Arcadia to a fine court lady rouged
and dressed out with hoops, diamonds, and headdress of the tune of Queen
Anne. Napoleon must have had an exquisite taste.
[32] Exceptions to this are, I understand, the Gallery at Florence, and the
Museo Vaticano at Rome, which are both open to all and no fees allowed.
[33] Johann Wilhelm Archenholz (1743-1812), author of the Geschichte des
Siebenjaehrigen Krieges, 1789. - ED.
[34] In February, 1781, before the declaration of war was generally known
in the West Indies, Rodney's fleet surrounded the Dutch island of
Eustatius, which had become a sort of entrepot for supplying America
with British goods; two hundred and fifty ships, together with several
millions worth of merchandise, were seized and sold at a military
auction. The plunder of Eustatius was bitterly commented upon In the
British House of Commons. - Lee Richard Hildreth, The History of the
United States, vol. III, p. 335. - ED.
[35] The name is in blank. Major Frye may have meant Beauchamp Bagenal
Harvey (1762-1798), the squire of Wexford who deserted to the Irish
rebels. - ED.
[36] Tasso, Jerusalemme liberata, canto XVI, ottava 15. - ED.
[37] For instance, a Cuirassier, a Dragoon, a Grenadier, a Tirailleur, an
Artilleryman.
[38] Major G. Colclough, senior major of the 33rd Regt. - ED.
[39] Virgil, Aen., II. 325. - ED.
[40] La Bedoyere (Charles Huchet, Comte de) distinguished himself in
several of the Napoleonic wars, in particular at Ratisbonne and
Borodino. Being a colonel at Grenoble, in March, 1815, he deserted to
Napoleon's cause and was nominated by him general and pair de
France. In July, 1815, he was arrested in Paris, tried for high
treason and shot, August 19, in spite of Benj. Constant's efforts to
save him. - ED.
[41] Charlotte Smith (1749-1806), author of Emmeline, or the Orphan of the
Castle (1788), Celestina (1792), The Old Manor House (1793),
etc. - ED.
CHAPTER IV
From Paris to Bruxelles - Visiting the plains of Waterloo - The Duke de Berri
at Lille - Beauvais - Return to Paris - Remarks on the French theatre -
Talma - Mlle Duchesnois - Mlle Georges-French alexandrine verse - The Abbe
Delille - The Opera Comique.
I met with my brother-in-law and his nephew at Paris, and hearing from them
that they had an intention of returning to England by the way of Bruxelles,
with the idea of visiting the plains of Waterloo, I was induced to
accompany them. We started on the 18th August, taking the exact route from
Paris that was taken by Napoleon. Passed the first night at St Quentin; the
second at a small village on the line between Mons and Charleroy in the
Belgian territory. The next morning, after breakfasting at Nivelles, we
proceeded to Quatre Bras and Mont St Jean. At the little cabaret called a
la belle Alliance we met a host of Englishmen who had been to behold the
field of battle; Lacoste, the peasant who was Napoleon's guide on the day
of battle, was about to conduct them across the fields to Hougoumont.
