ART. V.-Congrès de Verone; Guerre d'Espagne, Négociations ; Colonies Espagnoles. Par M. de Chateaubriand. 2 tom. 8vo. Leipzig, 1838.* M. CHATEAUBRIAND must pardon us if in going through this his latest work, we do not always bear in mind that which is obviously its principal object, namely, to elevate the importance of M. Chateaubriand himself, and set forth the part which he has had in the great events of his time. We are obstinate Englishmen, and our purpose in examining this work is to see how it illustrates the policy and interests of England. We have adopted a tone, in treating of our affairs abroad, which repeated and anxious consideration satisfies us is the most conducive to the honour and advantage of England. One of our earliest efforts in this line had a special regard to the transactions which our French contemporary now relates, and of which our two countries took a different view; let us see whether the new light thrown upon them by him who was Minister of Foreign Affairs at Paris during the period, should alter the position in which we contemplate them. Our preliminary remarks shall be but few. One peculiarity in the events of 1822,-for that, as our title indicates, is the period to be considered,-is noticed, we believe, for the first time; the foreign ministers of the three countries, England, France, and Spain, were all poets. This is a bare fact, an unfruitful coincidence; we expected it to be followed up by an averment that the ministers took a poetical view of affairs, or that the similarity of their tastes led to an assimilation of their systems; but we are only told (from Montaigne) that a true poet would prefer to be the father of the Eneid than of the finest boy in Rome. Mr. Canning's poetry was a secondary qualification, and a secondary sentiment. His mind sometimes conceived very poetical images, but they are more striking in his speeches than in any poem which he wrote. If his prose was thus sometimes poetical, his verse was a litle prosaic. It had all the merits of his prose, -precision, vigour, point, and chasteness; but it had not the qualities which would lead one to say, this is indeed a poet. Although sensible that we are digressing, we will here mention one similarity in the histories of Chateaubriand and Canning,somewhat curious, and much more characteristic than their poetry. Chateaubriand was elected a member of the National Institute, * Sold in London by Black and Armstrong. † Vol. i. ch. ii. p. 37. VOL. XXI. NO, XLII. C C in the room of Chenier. The rules required that he should pronounce an eulogy upon his predecessor:-" reversing," as we have formerly said, "the disobedience of Balaam, he turned the panegyric into an anathema," and thereby lost the appointment. When Canning was at Christchurch, it was on some public occasion his duty to pronounce an oration in praise of the founder and benefactors of the College or University. By appointment or choice (we forget which) his hero was Daniel Finch, Earl of Nottingham. Our recollection of this youthful composition enables us to pronounce it full of all the merits which afterwards characterized his speeches; and it was in one sense a panegyric upon the memory of the pious founder, because it proved in forcible terms that the profligacy of Nottingham was not quite so eminent as that of Sunderland, and of other statesmen of his time, whose respective demerits were marked by epithets appropriate and severe. The big-wigs were shocked and offended,or pretended to be so; however, young Canning did not lose his studentship.+ Passing over a brilliant interval, let us now contemplate Mr. Canning addressing, not the doctors of Oxford, but the crowned heads of Europe, assembled in congress at Verona; where it was his task to oppose, and, so far as he could, to counteract the counsels of our present author. One object of the book before us is, to show that the French invasion of Spain was not the work of the allies, but of France alone, and most particularly and eminently of the Viscount de Chateaubriand. We have no desire to rob M. Chateaubriand of the glory of the Spanish war. M. Villele, we believe with him, was much more pacifically inclined. The Duc Mathieu de Montmorency, it is true, was even more chivalrously bent upon war than our viscount, and it was for some cause connected with these matters that he lost his office of Foreign Minister. M. Chateaubriand slid into it, with the same sentiments, at that time more cautiously disguised or managed; and unwilling perhaps to identify the dismissed with the promoted minister, he represents the cause of the dismissal as still a mystery. Chateaubriand furnishes no reason for disputing Mr. Canning's version,§ which was this: Montmorency wished to make the Spanish war an European concern; Chateaubriand certainly desired to make it Vol. X. p. 298. We are surprised that this paper, which we know to be extant, is not published. Ch. xiii. p. 50. Parl. Deb. viii. 1495. French. And it was because the former could not realize at Paris the expectations he had held out at Verona, that, with the honourable feeling of the Montmorencies, he resigned. Chateaubriand was not acceptable to Louis XVIII., and M. Marcellus, the French minister, has represented Mr. Canning as asking," M. de Chateaubriand, est-il aussi parvenu au ministère contre la volonté du roi ?"* We know that George IV. had some prepossessions against his new secretary, (to whom, however, he afterwards became warmly attached,) but we are slow to believe that Mr. Canning announced himself as minister against the king's will. Not a hint of this sort is to be found in his own letters, and it is very unlikely that he would say that to Marcellus which he would not say to Chateaubriand. It now fell to the lot of Chateaubriand to manage on the part of France the question of interference, to put down by force the constitutional or revolutionary government of Spain; nearly at the moment when it became the duty and the chosen purpose of Mr. Canning to prevent, if possible, France from interfering, but at all events to keep England out of the scrape. We have formerly shown that the neutrality of England had been determined upon before Mr. Canning returned to office. Lord Castlereagh was about to proceed to Verona, to announce and enforce that determination, when death interrupted him, and his friend the Duke of Wellington proceeded in his stead. Chateaubriand and Canning had formed, while the former was ambassador in London, something apparently more than a mere official intimacy. They had conversed perhaps of literature, as much as of politics, and had put off some of that stiffness which certain diplomates think it becoming to preserve. We know, moreover, that Mr. Canning at one time forwarded, or attempted to forward, the personal interests of Chateaubriand at his own court. There was thus, no doubt, a kindness between them, but as to any friendship, calculated in any degree to amalgamate political views, or even soften political asperity, there was none. Between a Frenchman and an Englishman, communicating upon politics, there is, to use an expressive word, often employed when its appropriate meaning is forgotten, and always must be, a misunderstanding. Very possibly we do not entirely comprehend the French policy, but of this we are certain, that no Frenchman can be brought to comprehend the simple views of a straightforward English politician. These letters of Mr. Canning, now first published, throw no new light upon the transactions of the time, because the frank * P. 422. + Vol. viii. p. 56. ness which they display on Mr. Canning's part was equally apparent in his public declarations. Notwithstanding a remark of his correspondent to the contrary, his point was distinct, and he never lost sight of it. If you ask me my opinion, says Mr. Canning in his first letter,* "I give it you in the words of our Lord Falkland in the time of Charles I., Peace! Peace! Peace! + . . . . . Am I for peace because I hate revolutions less than you do? you give me full credit for sharing your invincible hostility to them. But it is because the lovers of recolutions, in all countries, pray for war, that I am the most anxious for the prevention of it. . . . . A war in Europe, at this moment, against the revolutionary principle, would shake the monarchy of France and its yet unconfirmed institutions to their foundations. What shook so fearfully your institutions would no doubt try ours, but ours have root enough to stand the trial. And wrapping ourselves up as we should be wise enough to do, in a strict and IMPERTURBABLE NEUTRALITY, depend upon it, we might, if we were so disposed, turn your distractions to our own account, but, depend upon it, we have no such disposition. Rather, much rather, will we exhaust our efforts to preserve the peace on which we think your prosperity depends." Mr. Canning here takes the same view of the state of the political mind of Europe, which, when presented at a later period to the House of Commons, exposed him to so much misrepresentation. Ultra principles, on both sides ultra, prevailed throughout Europe; and Mr. Canning "much feared" that if the violent on both sides came into hostile conflict, England, if she took any part, would see "ranged under her banners the restless and dissatisfied of any nation with which she might come into conflict." This probability was, with Mr. Canning, an additional reason for not taking a part. Let it not be thought that we are unnecessarily reviving bygone controversies. There are those who now vindicate by Mr. Canning's precepts-we know not whether any one is hardy enough to cite his example-our officious inter-meddling with Spain. It is thus not only to exhibit the unvaried tone of Mr. Canning's neutral policy,§ that we call attention to this announcement of "imperturbable neutrality." We would willingly impress ment. January 11, 1823, p. 304. There is one previous, in French, merely a compli "When there was any overture or hope of peace, be (Falkland,) would be more erect and vigorous, and exceedingly solicitous to press any thing which he thought might promote it; and sitting among his friends, often, after a deep silence and many sighs, would with a shrill and sad accent ingeminate the word Peace, Peace."-Clarendon, iv. 255. See F. Q. R. vol. viii. 422-424. See F. Q. R. vol. viii. 406. it again and again upon those who, professing to admire and to follow Mr. Canning, have set at nought (as we shall presently show) his choicest principles. Chateaubriand in his reply* expressed his belief that the existing government of France would be exposed to more danger by the triumph of the revolution in Spain : "Si l'Espagne révolutionnaire peut se vanter d'avoir fait trembler la France monarchique, si la cocarde blanche, se retire devant les descamisados, on se souviendra de la puissance de l'empire, et des triomphes de la cocarde tricolore: or, calculez pour les Bourbons l'effet de ce souvenir. . . . . . Un succès rattacherait pour jamais l'armée au Roi, et ferait courir toute la France aux armes. Vous ne sauriez croire tout ce qu'on peut faire parmi nous avec le mot honneur; le jour où nous serions obligés de peser sur ce grand ressort de la France, nous remuerons encore le monde; personne ne profiterait impunément de nos dépouilles et de nos malheurs." Chateaubriand has here gone some way towards le fond of his pensée about the war in Spain. He desired to give employment to the army, and bulletins of victory to the people, and thus to feed the passion of Frenchmen for military glory; but his object was not merely to rally the army and people round the throne of the Bourbons. He tells us in his present book,† that he had a horror of the treaties of Vienna; and he hoped to raise up a victorious French army, which should recover for France the territory wrested from her by the Allies in 1814 and 1815. And it was for this reason that he was desirous that no other of the powers assembled at Verona should march troops into Spain. It was necessary, not only that the revolutionary government should be put down, but that it should be put down by France, and France alone, and by France wearing the white cockade. There is no important novelty in Chateaubriand's statement of the different views of the Allies at Verona. § Russia was the most warlike, and was well enough inclined to take a part, but had some jealousy of France. Austria had no mind to go to war, and was jealous both of Russia and France. Russia too was for confining herself to the appui moral. We know not whether this expression, so much a favourite with our present ministers, took its rise at Verona. Chateaubriand tells us that Austria, and the minister Metternich, were very much inclined to England; we fear that Mr. Canning did not reciprocate the feeling. We shall make no further remark upon these differences, than January, 14, p. 311. † I. ch. 19. See particularly his letter of 31 October, 1822, ch. 29, p. 98. |