Read Ebook: Correspondence & Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834 to 1859 Volume 2 by Senior Nassau William Tocqueville Alexis De Simpson M C M Mary Charlotte Mair Editor

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'Two days after, came a long remonstrance from Lord Palmerston, which Lord Bloomfield was desired to read to Nesselrode, and leave with him. A man of the world, seeing that the thing was done, would have withheld an irritating document. But Bloomfield went with it to Nesselrode. Nesselrode would have nothing to say to it. "Mon Dieu!" he said, "we have given up all our demands; why tease us by trying to prove that we ought not to have made them?" Bloomfield said that his orders were precise. "Lisez donc," cried Nesselrode, "mais il sera tr?s-ennuyeux." Before he had got half through Nesselrode interrupted him. "I have heard all this," he said, "from Lamorici?re, only in half the number of words. Cannot you consider it as read?" Bloomfield, however, was inexorable.'

I recurred to a subject on which I had talked to both of them before--the tumult of January 29, 1849.

'George Sumner,' I said, 'assures me that it was a plot, concocted by Faucher and the President, to force the Assembly to fix a day for its dissolution, instead of continuing to sit until it should have completed the Constitution by framing the organic laws which, even on December 2 last, were incomplete. He affirms that it was the model which was followed on December 2; that during the night the Palais Bourbon was surrounded by troops; that the members were allowed to enter, but were informed, not publicly, but one by one, that they were not to be allowed to separate until they had fixed, or agreed to fix, the day of their dissolution; and that under the pressure of military intimidation, the majority, which was opposed to such a dissolution, gave way and consented to the vote, which was actually carried two days after.'

'So enormous,' said Tocqueville, 'are the advantages of Louis Napoleon's situation, that he may defy any ordinary enemy. He has, however, a most formidable one in himself. He is essentially a copyist. He can originate nothing; his opinions, his theories, his maxims, even his plots, all are borrowed, and from the most dangerous of models--from a man who, though he possessed genius and industry such as are not seen coupled, or indeed single, once in a thousand years, yet ruined himself by the extravagance of his attempts. It would be well for him if he would utterly forget all his uncle's history. He might then trust to his own sense, and to that of his advisers. It is true that neither the one nor the other would be a good guide, but either would probably lead him into fewer dangers than a blind imitation of what was done fifty years ago by a man very unlike himself, and in a state of society both in France and in the rest of Europe, very unlike that which now exists.'

Lanjuinais and Madame B., a relation of the family, came in.

Kissileff says that all this is false, that neither Order nor letter has been sent, but he has been trying in vain to get a newspaper to insert a denial. It will be denied, he is told, when the proper moment comes.

'It is charming,' said Madame de Tocqueville, 'to see the Emperor of Russia, like ourselves, forced to see his name usurped without redress.'

'Our regiments,' said Lanjuinais, 'are a kind of convents. The young men who enter them are as dead to the world, as indifferent to the events which interest the society which they have left, as if they were monks. This is what makes them such fit tools for a despot.'

'In this darkness,' he said, 'when no one dares to print, and few to speak, though we know generally that atrocious acts of tyranny are perpetrated everyday, it is difficult to ascertain precise facts, so I will give you one. A young man named Hypolite Magin, a gentleman by birth and education, the author of a tragedy eminently successful called "Spartacus," was arrested on the 2nd of December. His friends were told not to be alarmed, that no harm was intended to him, but rather a kindness; that as his liberal opinions were known, he was shut up to prevent his compromising himself by some rash expression. He was sent to Fort Bic?tre, where the casemates, miserable damp vaults, have been used as a prison, into which about 3,000 political prisoners have been crammed. His friends became uneasy, not only at the sufferings which he must undergo in five weeks of such an imprisonment in such weather as this, but lest his health should be permanently injured. At length they found that he was there no longer: and how do you suppose that his imprisonment has ended? He is at this instant at sea in a convict ship on his way to Cayenne--untried, indeed unaccused--to die of fever, if he escape the horrors of the passage. Who can say how many similar cases there may be in this wholesale transportation? How many of those who are missing and are supposed to have died at the barricades, or on the Boulevards, may be among the transports, reserved for a more lingering death!'

I left Paris next day.

CORRESPONDENCE.

Kensington, January 5, 1852.

My dear Tocqueville,--A private messenger has just offered himself to me, a Mr. Esmeade, who will return in about a fortnight.

The debate on Tuesday night on the Palmerston question was very satisfactory to the Government. Lord John's speech was very well received--Lord Palmerston's very ill; and though the constitution of the present Ministry is so decidedly unhealthy that it is dangerous to predict any length of life to it, yet it looks healthier than people expected. It may last out the Session.

The feeling with respect to Louis Napoleon is stronger, and it tends more to unanimity every day. The Orleans confiscation has, I think, almost too much weight given to it. After his other crimes the mere robbery of a single family, ruffian-like as it is, is a slight addition.

The feeling of the people in Belgium is excellent.

Mr. Banfield, who has just returned from the Prussian provinces, says the same with respect to them--and Bunsen assures me that his Government will perish rather than give up a foot of ground. I feel better hopes of the preservation of peace.

These follies, however, are not worth reading; but his constitutional theories--his belief, for instance, that Parliamentary Government is the curse of Europe--are curious.

The last number of the 'Edinburgh Review' contains an article on Reform well worth reading. It is by Greg. He wrote an admirable article in, I think, the April number, on Alton Locke and the English Socialists, and has also written a book, which I began to-day, on the Creed of Christendom. I have long been anxious to get somebody to do what I have not time to do, to look impartially into the evidences of Christianity, and report the result. This book does it.

Lord Normanby does not return to Paris, as you probably know. No explanation is given, but it is supposed to be in compliance with the President's wishes.

I have just sent to the press for the 'Edinburgh Review,' an article on Tronson du Coudray and the 18th fructidor, which you will see in the April number. The greater part of it was written this time last year at Sorrento.

Gladstone has published a new Neapolitan pamphlet, which I will try to send you. It is said to demolish King Ferdinand.

Kindest regards to Madame de Tocqueville. We hope that you will come to us as soon as it is safe.

Ever yours,

N.W. SENIOR.

Bunsen tells me that in October his King was privately asked whether he was ready to destroy the Prussian Constitution--and that he peremptorily refused.

I have begged Mr. Esmeade to call on you--you will like him. He is a nephew of Sir John Moore.

Kensington, March 19, 1852.

My dear Tocqueville,--I was very glad to see your hand again--though there is little in French affairs on which liberals can write with pleasure.

Ours are become very interesting. Lord John's declaration, at the meeting the other day in Chesham Place, that he shall introduce a larger reform, and surround himself with more advanced adherents, and Lord Derby's, on Monday, that he is opposed to all democratic innovation, appear to me to have changed the position of parties. The question at issue is no longer Free-trade or Protection. Protection is abandoned. It is dead, never to revive. Instead of it we are to fight for Democracy, or Aristocracy. I own that my sympathies are with Aristocracy: I prefer it to either Monarchy or Democracy. I know that it is incident to an aristocratic government that the highest places shall be filled by persons chosen not for their fitness but for their birth and connections, but I am ready to submit to this inconvenience for the sake of its freedom and stability. I had rather have Malmesbury at the Foreign Office, and Lord Derby first Lord of the Treasury, than Nesselrode or Metternich, appointed by a monarch, or Cobden or Bright, whom I suppose we should have under a republic. But above all, I am for the winning horse. If Democracy is to prevail I shall join its ranks, in the hope of making its victory less mischievous.

I wish, however, that the contest had not been forced on. We were very well, before Lord John brought in his Reform Bill, which nobody called for, and I am not at all sure that we shall be as well after it has passed.

As to the immediate prospects of the Ministry, the next three weeks may change much, but it seems probable that they will be forced to dissolve in April, or the beginning of May, that the new Parliament will meet in July, and that they will be turned out about the end of August. And that this time next year we shall be discussing Lord John's new Reform Bill.

I doubt whether our fears of invasion are exaggerated. At this instant, without doubt, Louis Napoleon is thinking of nothing but the Empire; and is kind to Belgium, and pacific to Switzerland in the hope of our recognition.

What are your studies in the Biblioth?que Royale? I have begun to read Bastide, and intend to make the publication of my lectures on Political Economy my principal literary pursuit. I delivered the last on Monday.

I shall pass the first fifteen days of April in Brussels, with my old friend Count Arrivabene, 7 Boulevard du R?gent.

Ever yours,

N.W. SENIOR.

March 25, 1852.

I send you, my dear Senior, an introduction to Lamorici?re. This letter will be short: you know that I do not write at any length by the post.

It will contain nothing but thanks for your long and interesting letter brought by Rivet, who returned delighted with the English in general, and with you in particular.

I see that the disturbed state of politics occasioned by Sir Robert Peel's policy, is passing away, and that your political world is again dividing itself into the two great sects, one of which tries to narrow, the other to extend, the area of political power--one of which tries to lift you into aristocracy, the other to depress you into democracy.

The political game will be simpler. I can understand better the conservative policy of Lord Derby than the democratic one of Lord John Russell. As the friends of free-trade are more numerous than those of democracy, I think that it would have been easier to attack the Government on its commercial than on its political illiberality.

Then in this great nation, called Europe, similar currents of opinions and feelings prevail, different as may be the institutions and characters of its different populations. We see over the whole continent so general and so irresistible a reaction against democracy, and even against liberty, that I cannot believe that it will stop short on our side of the Channel; and if the Whigs become Radical, I shall not be surprised at the permanence in England of a Tory Government allied to foreign despots.

A. DE TOCQUEVILLE.

Friday evening, April 17, 1852.

My dear Tocqueville,--My letter is not likely to be a very amusing one, for I begin it on the dullest occasion and in the dullest of towns, namely at Ostend, while waiting for the packet-boat which is to take me to London.

A thousand thanks for your letter to Lamorici?re. He was very kind to me, and I hope hereafter, in Paris or in London, to improve the acquaintance.

I saw no other French in Brussels. The most interesting conversation that I had was with the King.

I found him convinced that the decree annexing Belgium to France had been drawn up, and that it was the interference of Nicholas, and his expression of a determination not to suffer the existing temporal limits to be altered, that had occasioned it to be withdrawn. I am happy, however, to think, as you also appear to think, that your great man is now intent on peaceful triumphs.

He would scarcely have created such a mass of speculative activity in France if he intended suddenly to check it by war. I hope that by the time Masters in Chancery are abolished, I shall find France intersected by a network of railroads and run from Paris to Marseilles in a day.

I venture to differ from you as to the probable progress of reaction in England. I see no symptom of it; on the contrary, democracy seems to me to continue its triumphant march without a check. The Protectionists are in power, they take for their leader in the House of Commons a man without birth or connection, merely because he is a good speaker. This could not have been done even ten years ago. They bow to the popular will as to free-trade, and acknowledge that, even if they have a majority in the Houses of Lords and Commons, they will not venture to re-impose a Corn-law if the people do not ask for it. Never was such a homage paid to the world 'without doors.'

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