"'If M. de Chateaubriand had come at once to Paris,çoisRené it would have been rather annoying for him to be obliged to leave again for London.'
"We therefore expect to make this important nomination on the return from Edinburgh. The Chevalier Stuart[218] said yesterday that surely the Duke of Wellington would go to the Congress; it is important that we should know this at the earliest possible moment. M. Hyde de Neuville arrived yesterday in good health. I was delighted to see him. I renew to you, noble viscount, all my inviolable sentiments.
This new letter from M. de Montmorency, mingled with some ironical phrases, fully confirmed my impression that he did not want me at the Congress.
I gave a dinner on St. Louis' Day[219], in honour of Louis XVIII., and I went to visit Hartwell in remembrance of the King's exile; I was fulfilling a duty rather than enjoying a pleasure. Royal misfortunes are so common nowadays that one feels but little interest in spots that have not been inhabited by genius or virtue. All that I saw in the sad little park at Hartwell was the daughter of Louis XVI.
At last, I suddenly received from M. de Villèle an unexpected note which gave the lie to my previsions and put an end to my uncertainties:
"It has just been decided that, so soon as the proprieties relating to the King's return to London permit you, you will be authorized to come to Paris, thence to proceed to Vienna or Verona, as one of the three plenipotentiaries charged to represent France at the Congress. The two others will be Messieurs de Caraman[220] and de La Ferronnays; which does not prevent M. le Vicomte de Montmorency from leaving the day after to-morrow for Vienna, in order to assist at the conferences which may take place in that city before the Congress. He is to return to Paris when the sovereigns leave for Verona.
"This for yourself alone. I am glad that this matter has taken the turn which you desire. Cordially and entirely yours."
The thunder-bolt which incessantly falls at my feet followed me everywhere. With Lord Londonderry died old England, which had struggled on till then in the midst of growing innovations. Supervened Mr. Canning: self-love carried him so far as to talk the language of the propagandist from his place in Parliament After him appeared the Duke of Wellington, a Conservative who came to pull down: when the sentence of societies is pronounced, the hand which was to build knows only how to demolish. Lord Grey[221], O'Connell[222], all those labourers at ruins were working successively at the overthrow of the old institutions. Parliamentary reform, Irish emancipation, all things excellent in themselves, became, thanks to the insalubrity of the time, causes of destruction. Fear increased the evils: if men had not been so greatly terrified at the threats, they would have been able to resist with a certain success.