The çoisRenéresignations of Messieurs de Villèle and de Corbière were not long in bringing about the dissolution of the Cabinet and the return of my friends to the Council, as I had foreseen: M. le Vicomte de Montmorency was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs, M. de Villèle Minister of Finance, M. de Corbière Minister of the Interior[155]. I had played too great a part in recent political movements and exercised too great an influence on public opinion to be left on one side. It was resolved that I should replace M. le Duc Decazes at the London Embassy. Louis XVIII. always consented to send me away. I went to thank him; he spoke to me of his favourite with a constancy of attachment rare in kings; he "begged" me to remove from the mind of George IV. the prejudice which that sovereign had conceived against M. Decazes, and myself to forget the differences which had existed between me and the former Minister of Police. That monarch, from whom so many misfortunes had been unable to draw a tear, was moved by a few sufferings which may have afflicted the man whom he had honoured with his friendship.
My nomination reawoke my memories: Charlotte returned to my thoughts; my youth, my emigration appeared before me, with their sorrows and their joys. Human weakness also made it a pleasure to me to reappear, well-known and powerful, there where I had been unknown and powerless. Madame de Chateaubriand, fearing the sea, dared not cross the Channel, and I set out alone. The secretaries of the Embassy had gone before me.
[Footnote 61: This book was written in 1839 and revised in December 1846.--T.]
[Footnote 62: Lycurgus (_circa_ 880 B.C.), the Spartan legislator, after making his fellow-citizens swear to make no changes in his laws during his absence, set out on a long journey, but never returned.--T.]
[Footnote 63: The Battle of Jena, won by Napoleon, and of Auerstädt, a few miles distant, won by Davout on the same day, 14 October 1806.--T.]
[Footnote 64: Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832) lived eleven years longer, dying at Weimar at the age of 83.--T.]
[Footnote 65: Martin Luther (1483-1546). His monument at Wittenberg was erected in this year, 1821, of which Chateaubriand speaks. Until then, his tomb was shown in the church of the University.--T.]