THREE:He had been able to borrow a hundred and eighty thousand livres from two of his adherents, had made serious exertions to raise arms, and though he had kept his project profoundly secret from the French King and Ministry, lest they might forcibly detain him, he had managed to engage a French man-of-war called the Elizabeth, carrying sixty-seven guns, and a brig of eighteen guns called the Doutelle, an excellent sailer. On the 2nd of July the Doutelle left St. Nazaire, at the mouth of the Loire, and waited at Belleisle for the Elizabeth, when they put forward to sea in good earnest. Unfortunately, only four days after leaving Belleisle, they fell in with the British man-of-war the Lion, of fifty-eight guns, commanded by the brave Captain Butt, who in Anson's expedition had stormed Paita. There was no avoiding an engagement, which continued warmly for five or six hours, when both vessels were so disabled that they were compelled to put back respectively to England and France.
FORE:On the 2nd of May, two days only before Buonaparte entered his little capital of Elba, Louis made his public entry into Paris amid quite a gay and joyous-seeming crowd; for the Parisians are always ready for a parade and a sensation; and none are said to have worn gloomy looks on the occasion except the Imperial Guard, now, as they deemed themselves, degraded into the Royal Guardfrom the service of the most brilliant of conquerors to that of the most pacific and unsoldierlike of monarchs, who was too unwieldy even to mount a horse. For a time all appeared agreeable enough; but there were too many hostile interests at work for it to remain long so. In the new constitution, by which the Senate had acknowledged Louis, they had declared him recalled on the condition that he accepted the constitution framed for him; and at the same time they declared the Senate hereditary, and possessed of the rank, honours, and emoluments which Buonaparte had conferred on the members. Louis refused to acknowledge the right of the Senate to dictate a constitution to him. He assumed the throne as by his own proper hereditary descent; and he then gave of his free will a free constitution. This was the first cause of difference between the king and the people. The Royalists condemned the new constitution as making too much concession, and the Republicans resented his giving a charter of freedom, because it made them the slaves of his will. The Royalists soon began to monopolise offices and honours, and to clamour for the recovery of their estates, now in the hands of the people, and these were naturally jealous of their prevailing on the king and his family to favour such reclamations. The clergy, who, like the Noblesse, had been stripped of their property, and had now to subsist on annuities of five hundred livres, or about twenty-six pounds sixteen shillings and eightpence a-year, looked with resentment on those who were in possession of the spoil; and the well-known disposition of the king and his family to restore the status and the substance of the Catholic Church, made those who had this property, and thosethe greater part of the nationwho had no religion whatever, readily believe that ere long they would attempt to recall what the Revolution had distributed. These suspicions were greatly augmented by the folly and bigotry of the clergy. They refused to bury with the rites of the Church a Mademoiselle Raucour, simply because she was an actress. Great tumults arose on the occasion, and the Government was compelled to interfere and ensure the burial in due form. The more regular observance of the Sabbath was treated as bringing back the ancient superstitions; and the taking up of the remains of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette and conveying them to the royal place of sepulture in the Abbey of St. Denis was regarded as a direct censure of the Revolution. It was quite natural that Louis XVIII. should do this, and equally so that he should show some favour to the surviving chiefs of La Vende; but these things had the worst effect on the public mind, as tending to inspire fears of vengeance for the past, or of restoration of all that the past had thrown down. In these circumstances, the Royalists were discontented, because they thought Louis did too little for them, and the rest of the community because he did too much. The Jacobins, who had been suppressed, but not exterminated, by Buonaparte, now again raised their heads, under so mild and easy a monarch, with all their old audacity. They soon, however, despaired of reviving the Republic, and turned to the son of their old partisan, Philip galit, the Duke of Orleans, and solicited him to become their leader, promising to make him king. But the present dukeafterwards King Louis Philippewas too honourable a man for their purpose; he placed the invitation given him in the hands of Louis, and the Jacobins, then enraged, were determined to bring back Napoleon rather than tolerate the much easier yoke of the Bourbons. Carnot and Fouch soon offered themselves as their instruments. Carnot, who had been one of the foremost men of the Reign of Terror, had refused to acknowledge the rule of Buonaparte, who suppressed the Revolution, for a long time, but, so late as the present year, he had given in his adhesion, and was appointed engineer for carrying on the fortifications of Antwerp. He had now the hardihood to address a memorial to Louis XVIII., which, under the form of an apology for the Jacobins during the Revolution, was in truth a direct attack on the Royalists, describing them as a contemptible and small body, who had allowed Louis XVI. to be destroyed by[85] their cowardice, and now had brought back the king by the hands of Englishmen and Cossacks to endeavour to undo all that had been done for the people. He represented kings as naturally prone to despotism, and priests and nobles as inciting them to slaughter and rapine. The pretence was to lead the monarch to rely only on the people; the object was to exasperate the people against kings, nobles, and the Church.The next day the Great Mogul went over to the stronger party. He had no further hope of assistance from Sujah Dowlah, and so he rode, with a few followers, to the British camp. He was received most willingly, for, though the British had shown no disposition to recognise his authority, now he was in their hands they acknowledged him as the rightful sovereign of Hindostan, and lost no time in concluding a treaty with him; and, on condition of his yielding certain territories to them, they agreed to put him in possession of Allahabad and the other states of the Nabob of Oude. After this, Munro continuing the war against Sujah Dowlah, endeavoured to take the hill fort of Chunar, in which all the treasures of Cossim were said to be deposited, but failed. On his part, Sujah Dowlah had obtained the assistance of Holkar, a powerful Mahratta chief, and, with this advantage, endeavoured to make a better peace with Munro; but that officer declined treating, unless Cossim and the assassin, Sombre, were first given up to[318] him. Dowlah proposed, instead of this surrender of those who had sought his protection, the usually triumphant argument with the English, a large sum of money. But Munro replied that all the lacs of rupees in Dowlah's treasury would not satisfy him without the surrender of the murderers of his countrymen at Patna. Dowlah, though he would not surrender the fugitives, had no objection to give a secret order for the assassination of Sombre; but Munro equally spurned this base proposal, and the war went on. Munro was victorious, and early in 1765, having reduced the fort of Chunar and scattered Dowlah's army, he entered Allahabad in triumph, and put the Mogul in possession of it.
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