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Page 17
When Cambaceres (who, with a slight reservation, had voted the death of
Louis XVI.) warmly opposed in the Council the Duc d'Enghien's arrest, the
First Consul observed to him, "Methinks, Sir, you have grown very chary
of Bourbon blood!"
Meanwhile the Due d'Enghien was at Ettenheim, indulging in hope rather
than plotting conspiracies. It is well known that an individual made an
offer to the Prince de Conde to assassinate the First Consul, but the
Prince indignantly rejected the proposition, and nobly refused to recover
the rights of the Bourbons at the price of such a crime. The individual
above-mentioned was afterwards discovered to be an agent of the Paris
police, who had been commissioned to draw the Princes into a plot which
would have ruined them, for public feeling revolts at assassination under
any circumstances.
It has been alleged that Louis XVIII.'s refusal to treat with Bonaparte
led to the fatal catastrophe of the Due d'Enghien's death. The first
correspondence between Louis XVIII. and the First Consul, which has been
given in these Memoirs, clearly proves the contrary. It is certainly
probable that Louis XVIII.'s refusal to renounce his rights should have
irritated Bonaparte. But it was rather late to take his revenge two
years after, and that too on a Prince totally ignorant of those
overtures. It is needless to comment on such absurdities. It is equally
unnecessary to speak of the mysterious being who often appeared at
meetings in the Faubourg St. Germain, and who was afterwards discovered
to be Pichegru.
A further light is thrown on this melancholy catastrophe by a
conversation Napoleon had, a few days after his elevation to the imperial
throne, with M. Masaias, the French Minister at the Court of the Grand
Duke of Baden. This conversation took place at Aix-la-Chapelle. After
some remarks on the intrigues of the emigrants Bonaparte observed, "You
ought at least to have prevented the plots which the Due d'Enghien was
hatching at Ettenheim."--"Sire, I am too old to learn to tell a
falsehood. Believe me, on this subject your Majesty's ear has been
abused."--"Do you not think, then, that had the conspiracy of Georges and
Pichegru proved successful, the Prince would have passed the Rhine, and
have come post to Paris?"
M. Massias, from whom I had these particulars, added, "At this last
question of the Emperor I hung down my head and was silent, for I saw he
did not wish to hear the truth."
Now let us consider, with that attention which the importance of the
subject demands, what has been said by the historians of St. Helena.
Napoleon said to his companions in exile that "the Due d'Enghien's death
must be attributed either to an excess of zeal for him (Napoleon), to
private views, or to mysterious intrigues. He had been blindly urged on;
he was, if he might say so, taken by surprise. The measure was
precipitated, and the result predetermined."
This he might have said; but if he did so express himself, how are we to
reconcile such a declaration with the statement of O'Meara? How give
credit to assertions so very opposite?
Napoleon said to M. de Las Casas:
"One day when alone, I recollect it well, I was taking my coffee,
half seated on the table at which I had just dined, when suddenly
information was brought to me that a new conspiracy had been
discovered. I was warmly urged to put an end to these enormities;
they represented to me that it was time at last to give a lesson to
those who had been day after day conspiring against my life; that
this end could only be attained by shedding the blood of one of
them; and that the Due d'Enghien, who might now be convicted of
forming part of this new conspiracy, and taken in the very act,
should be that one. It was added that he had been seen at
Strasburg; that it was even believed that he had been in Paris; and
that the plan was that he should enter France by the east at the
moment of the explosion, whilst the Due de Berri was disembarking in
the west. I should tell you," observed the Emperor, "that I did not
even know precisely who the Due d'Enghien was (the Revolution having
taken place when I was yet a very young man, and I having never been
at Court), and that I was quite in the dark as to where he was at
that moment. Having been informed on those points I exclaimed that
if such were the case the Duke ought to be arrested, and that orders
should be given to that effect. Everything had been foreseen and
prepared; the different orders were already drawn up, nothing
remained to be done but to sign them, and the fate of the young
Prince was thus decided."
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