Beaumarchais and the War of American Independence Volume I Part 19

Beaumarchais and the War of American Independence Volume I Part 19

But it is impossible without becoming wearisome to draw forth all the characters and to allow them to pa.s.s in review. Let us turn our attention for a few moments to the sublime invocation of the fourth memoir, and with it a few observations of M. de Sainte-Beuve, taken from his admirable criticism of the memoirs of Beaumarchais in his famous ?_Causeries de Lundi_.?

In this invocation the orator supposes himself to be speaking with G.o.d, ?that Beneficent Being who watches over all.? The Supreme Being deigns to speak even to him, saying, ?I am He who is all. Without me thou didst not exist. I gave thee thy body, healthy and strong, I placed in it the most active of souls. Thou knowest the profusion with which I have poured sensibility into thy heart, and gaiety into thy character; but, filled as I see thee with the happiness of thinking, of feeling, thou wouldst be too happy if some sorrow did not balance the state of thy fortune, therefore I will overwhelm thee with calamities without number, thou shalt be torn by a thousand enemies, deprived of liberty, of thy property, accused of rapine, of forgery, of imposture, of corruption, of calumny, groaning under the opprobrium of a criminal lawsuit, attacked upon every point of thy existence by absurd, ?they say? and tossed about to the scrutiny of public opinion....?

Then he prostrates himself before the Supreme Being accepting his whole destiny and saying, ?Being of all Beings, I owe to Thee all things, the happiness of existence, of thinking, of feeling. I believe that Thou hast given us the good we enjoy and the evil we suffer in equal measure; I believe that Thy justice has wisely compensated all things for us and that the variety of pains and pleasures, fears and hopes, is the fresh wind which sets the vessel in motion and causes it to advance upon its way....?

In relation to the above Sainte-Beuve says: ?I have wished to cite this fresh and happy image which impresses us like a morning breeze, which in spite of everything reached him across the bars of his prison. This was the true Beaumarchais, truer than he ever painted himself elsewhere.

?In his invocation he continues to address himself humbly to the Supreme Being, begging, since he must have enemies that they be given him according to his choice, with the faults, the stupid and base animosities which he designates, and then with admirable art and vivifying brush, he sketches one after another all his adversaries, giving them an unmistakable resemblance. ?If,? he says, ?my misfortune must begin by an unforeseen attack by a greedy legatee, for a just debt, for an act founded on the reciprocal esteem and the equity of the contracting parties, accord me for adversary, a man, miserly, unjust and known so to be?--and he designates the Comte de la Blache so vividly that every one has named him already. It is the same for the counsellor Go?zman, for his wife, and for their acolytes, but here his ardent spirit outstrips its bounds, it can no longer be contained--at the end of each secondary portrait the name escapes of itself and this name is an additional comic touch, ?Supreme Goodness--Give me Marin! Give me Bertrand! Give me Baculard!?

?The whole idea,? says Sainte-Beuve, ?the manner of its conception and execution, with so much breadth, superiority of gaiety and irony, all with one stroke, one breath, composes one of the most admirable pieces of eloquence which our oratorical literature can offer.?

It was by such outbursts as these, that the nation was aroused from the semi-torpor into which it had fallen after the subsidence of the resistance offered to the establishment of the new parliament. With one voice Beaumarchais was hailed as the deliverer of the rights of the people, and the saying, ?_Louis the XV_ founded the parliament which _fifteen louis_ destroyed,? was the slogan of a new era of public acclaim for justice and equity. In every country of Europe Beaumarchais?s memoirs were read, and they excited the liveliest admiration. In the memoirs of Goethe it is told how at a social gathering where those of Beaumarchais were being read aloud, a young woman suggested to the poet that the incident of Clavico might be converted into a drama, where Beaumarchais should come upon the scene. From Philadelphia even came warm expressions of interest, while from every corner of France letters of congratulation, of sympathy and admiration poured upon the hero of the hour.

A few extracts will be sufficient to give an idea of the reigning enthusiasm. The wife of one of the presidents of the ancient parliament, Madame de Meini?res, wrote after reading the fourth memoir: ?I have finished, Monsieur, that astonishing memoir. I was angry yesterday at the visits which interrupted that delicious reading and when the company was gone, I thanked them for having prolonged my pleasures by interrupting them. On the contrary, blessed forever be _le grand cousin_, the sacristan, the publicist and all the respectables who have been worth to us the relation of your trip to Spain. You really owe a reward to those people. Your best friends could never have done for you, by their praises or their attachment, what your enemies have done in forcing you to talk about yourself. Grandison, the hero of the most perfect of romances, does not come to your foot. When one follows you to the home of that Clavico, that M. Whall?s, to the amba.s.sador?s, to the King?s presence, the heart palpitates and one trembles and grows indignant with your indignation.

What magic brush is yours, Monsieur! What energy of soul and of expression, what quickness of _esprit_! What impossible blending of heat and prudence, of courage and of sensibility, of genius and of grace!

?When I saw you at Madame de Sainte-Jean?s you seemed to me as amiable as the handsome man that you are, but these qualities are not what make a man attractive to an old woman such as I. I saw too that you had gifts and talents, that you were a man of honor and agreeable in every way, but I would never have dreamed, Monsieur, that you were also a true father of your family, and the sublime author of your four memoirs. Receive my thanks for the enthusiasm into which your writings have thrown me and the a.s.surances of the veritable esteem with which I have the honor to be, Monsieur, etc.

?Guichard de Meini?res.

This 18th of February, 1774.?

A second letter from the same pen, speaks in even stronger terms.

?Whatever the result of your quarrel with so many adversaries, I congratulate you, Monsieur, to have had it. Since the result of your writings is to prove that you are the most honest man in the world, in turning the pages of your life no one has been able to prove that you have ever done a dishonorable deed, and a.s.suredly you have made yourself known as the most eloquent man, in every species of eloquence which our century has produced. Your prayer to the Supreme Being is a chef-d?oeuvre, the ingenious and astonishing blending of which produces the greatest effect.

I admit with Madame Go?zman that you are a little _malin_ and following her example, I pardon you, because your _malice_ is so delicious. I hope, Monsieur, that you have not a sufficiently bad opinion of me to pity me for having read eight hundred pages when you have written them. I begin by devouring them, and then return on my steps. I pause, now at a pa.s.sage worthy of Demosthenes, now at one superior to Cicero, and lastly a thousand quite as amusing as Moli?re; I am so afraid of finishing and having nothing more to read afterwards, that I recommence each paragraph so as to give you time to produce your fifth memoir, where without doubt we shall find your confrontation with M. Go?zman; I beg you simply to be so good as to notify me by _la pet.i.te poste_ the day before, that the publisher may send copies to the widow Lamarche; it is she who furnishes them to me. I always take a number at a time for us and for our friends, and I am furious always, when, not knowing in time of their publication, I send too late, and word is brought me that I must wait until the next day.?

CHAPTER XI

_?Apr?s le bonheur de commander aux hommes, le plus grand honneur, Monsieur, n?est-il pas de les juger??_

_Pr?face du Barbier de S?ville._

The Preparation of the Memoirs--Aid Rendered by Family and Friends--The Judgment--Beaumarchais _Bl?m?_--Enters the Secret Service of the King--Gudin Relates the Circ.u.mstances of the Meeting between the Civilly Degraded Man and Her Who Became His Third Wife--The P?re Caron?s Third Marriage.

But while public opinion was expressing itself so loudly in his favor, the situation of Beaumarchais was in reality cruel in the extreme.

The breaking up of his household had necessitated the separation of the members of his family. His father went to board with an old friend, while Julie retired temporarily to a convent. The two sisters whose acquaintance we made while Beaumarchais was in Madrid, had returned to France, the elder a widow with two children. All of these were dependent upon the generosity of the brother and uncle. Madame de Miron, the youngest sister, had died during the same year, so that it was at the home of the next to the oldest member of the family, Madame L?pine, that the family reunions were held.

M. de Lom?nie has drawn an admirable picture of these gatherings, where eager and devoted friends met to discuss, suggest, and criticise with Beaumarchais the composition of his memoirs.

He says: ?His coadjutors are his relatives and nearest friends. First of all it is the elder Caron, who with his seventy-five years of experience, gives his advice about the memoirs of his son. It is Julie, whose literary apt.i.tudes we are already acquainted with. It is M. de Miron, the brother-in-law of Beaumarchais, _homme d?esprit_, of whom we have spoken elsewhere, who furnishes notes for the satirical parts; it is Gudin, who very strong in ancient history, aids in composing several erudite portions and whose heavy and pale prose grows supple and takes color under the pen of his friend. It is a young and very distinguished lawyer named Falconnet who superintends the drawing up by the author of parts where it is as a question of law. It is at last a medical doctor from the Provence, named Gardanne, who especially directs the dissection of the _Proven?aux_ his compatriots, Marin and Bertrand.?

This is the little phalanx that Madame Go?zman, in her memoirs, calls a ?_clique infame_? and which the _grand Bertrand_, less ferocious and more reasonable names simply, _la bande joyeuse_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Figaro]

They were in fact very joyful, all those _spirituals bourgeois_, grouped around Beaumarchais, combating with him a crowd of enemies, and not without running personal risk, because Julie notably was formally denounced by Go?zman. There was a printed pet.i.tion of this judge directed especially against her, although it had no consequences. All of them, however, underwent interrogations, confrontations, and verifications, but they came out none the worse for it and their gaiety supported the courage and the ardor of the man to whom they were devoted heart and soul.

Beaumarchais, forced to live _en camp volant_ at the mercy of the sheriffs of the Comte de la Blache and the persecutions of the judge Go?zman, was always on the wing but he came to the home of Madame L?pine near the Palais de Justice to prepare with his friends his means of defense and attack. It is in this house that the elements of each memoir were discussed. All the first draughts were written by the hand of Beaumarchais, all the brilliant portions are rewritten by him three or four times. Like all who wish to write well, he corrects and rewrites many times, he cuts out, amends, concentrates and purifies. If at times he allows himself to be too easily satisfied, he has friends prompt to censure him who do not spare him.

M. de Miron especially criticises in detail and with persistent candor.

?Beaumarchais profited from all these aids, so that if his memoirs against Go?zman do not present from the nature of the subject all the interest of the ?_Barbier de S?ville_? or the ?_Mariage de Figaro_,? they are none the less, so far as style is concerned, the most remarkable of all his works, the one where the good qualities of the author are the least mixed with faults. They contain portions of a really finished perfection.?

Monsieur de Lom?nie a.s.sures us further, that a certain pa.s.sage, which is cited at times as being one of the most graceful of the memoirs, is due largely to Julie. He quotes at length the rough draughts of the pa.s.sage in question as it appeared in its different stages, at first rather dry as written by Beaumarchais, then colored and animated by the brush of Julie, finally very skillfully retouched by her brother. It is where the _plaideur_ replies to the attack of Madame Go?zman upon the ancestry and profession of his father. The printed text is as follows:

?You begin your chef-d?oeuvre by reproaching me with the condition of my ancestors; alas madame, it is too true that the last of all united to several branches of industry a considerable celebrity in the art of watchmaking. Forced to pa.s.s condemnation on that article I admit with sorrow that nothing can wash from me the just reproach which you make me of being the son of my father.... But I pause, because I feel him behind me, who, watching while I write, laughs while he embraces me. Oh you, who reproach me with my father, you have no idea of his generous heart. In truth, watchmaking aside, there is no one for whom I would exchange him; but I know too well the value of time which he taught me to measure to waste it by similar trifling.?

Supported as Beaumarchais was by the constant affection of those nearest to him the loss of his fortune and the dissolution of his household were the least of the calamities weighing upon him. He had known, as we have seen, how to gain the support of the nation at large, but he remained still completely at the mercy of the parliament which he had so hopelessly offended in daring to open up before the whole world those proceedings which it was never intended should be exposed to the light of day. It was of this period that La Harpe says, ?Afterwards prosperity came of itself, it was during the combat and the oppression that his glory was gained.?

The unique character of this contest as well as its sublimity lies in this, that it is not simply a personal matter in which he was engaged. The blows he dealt so deftly had behind them the force of a nation eager to avenge itself, a nation whose favorite weapon was ridicule. Never was that weapon wielded by ?a hand more intrepid and light. It seemed to amuse him to lead before the public so many personages like animals for combat.?

?Simpletons,? says La Harpe, ?are by no means rare and they bore us; to put them before us in a way to make us laugh so heartily and so long, to make them amusing to the point of finding pleasure in their stupidity, is surely no common talent, it is that of good satire and good comedy.?

This was the talent of Beaumarchais. The public laughed, it is true, but the simpletons thus led forward did not laugh, nor did the chancellor Maupeou. They were waiting, rage in their hearts, for the day of vengeance which was not far off.

Begun in August, 1773, the suit had gone on until February of the following year. ?The day of judgment,? says Lom?nie, ?arrived on the 26th of February, 1774, in the midst of universal interest.

??We are expecting to-morrow,? wrote Madame du Deffand to Horace Walpole, ?a great event, the judgment of Beaumarchais.... M. de Monaco has invited him for the evening to read us a comedy _de sa fa?on_, which has for the t.i.tle _le Barbier de S?ville_.... The public is crazy over the author who is being judged while I write. It is supposed that the judgment will be rigorous and it may happen that instead of supping with us he will be condemned to banishment or to the pillory; this is what I will tell you to-morrow.?

?Such is the _dose_ of interest which Madame du Deffand takes in people.

What a pity for her if the accused had been condemned to the pillory. She would have lost the reading of the _Barbier_. She lost it anyway. For twelve hours the deliberation of the judges prolonged itself. Beaumarchais addressed to the prince of Monaco the following note which belongs with the letter of Madame du Deffand.

??Beaumarchais, infinitely sensible of the honor which the Prince of Monaco wishes to do him, replies from the Palace where he has been nailed since six o?clock this morning, where he has been interrogated at the bar of justice, and where he waits the sentence which is very long in coming; but, in whatever way things turn, Beaumarchais who is surrounded by his family at this moment cannot flatter himself to escape them until he has received either their congratulations or their condolence. He begs therefore that the Prince of Monaco will be so good as to reserve him his kindness for another day. He has the honor of a.s.suring him of his very respectful grat.i.tude.

??This Sat.u.r.day, February 26th, 1774.??

?The evening before the judgment,? says Gudin, ?he arranged his private affairs, pa.s.sed the night at work, and went to the gate of the palace before it was day, saw the judges pa.s.s before him and submitted to his last interrogation. When it was finished and it only remained to the judges to decide, Beaumarchais returned to the home of his sister who lived near the Palais de Justice. Fatigued from so much labor and very certain that there was nothing left for him to do in that critical time, he went to bed and slept as profoundly as though no one in the universe were occupied with the thought of him. I arrived and found him sunk in a sleep such as only comes to a pure, strong soul, and a truly superior mind, because at such a moment it would have been considered pardonable in anyone to have felt the anguish of anxiety. He slept while his judges watched, tormented by the furies. Divided among themselves, they deliberated in tumult, spoke in rage, wishing to punish the author of the memoirs but foreseeing the clamor of the public ready to disavow them. At last after almost fifteen hours of contradictory opinions and violent debates, they abandoned reciprocally their victims.

?The lady of the fifteen louis was _bl?m?e_ and Beaumarchais was condemned also to _bl?me_ which seemed a contradiction. The magistrate, husband of the woman, was put out of court which was equivalent to _bl?me_ for a magistrate, who thus remained incapable of filling any function of the magistracy.

?I was by his side with all the family when a friend came running, terrified to tell him this absurd judgment. He did not utter an angry word or make a gesture of indignation. Master of all his movements as of his mind, he said, ?Let us see what there yet remains to be done.??

Lom?nie says: ?The penalty of _bl?me_ was an ignominious one which rendered the condemned incapable of occupying any public office, and he was supposed to receive the sentence on his knees before the court, while the president p.r.o.nounced the words, ?The court blames thee and declares thee infamous.??

Gudin says, ?This sentence had been so badly received by the mult.i.tude a.s.sembled at the doors of the chamber, the judges had been so hissed on breaking up the audience, although many of them took themselves out of the way by pa.s.sing through the long corridors unknown to the public, which are called les _d?tours du palais_, they saw so many marks of discontentment that they were not tempted to execute to the letter the sentence which attracted to them only the _bl?me universel_.?

Before speaking of the veritable triumph which the public accorded to Beaumarchais in return for this cruel sentence, let us finish with the parliament Maupeou.

?It was not destined,? says Lom?nie, ?long to survive this act of anger and vengeance. In striking with civil death a man whom public opinion carried in triumph, it had struck its own death-blow. The opposition which had slept, now roused, let itself loose upon the parliament with redoubled fury. Pamphlets in prose and verse took on a new virility, the end of the reign a.s.sured its fall, and one of the first acts of the new king, Louis XVI was to establish the old parliament.? Louis XV died in May, 1774, the old parliament was re-established in August of the same year.

?There were not lacking those,? says Bonnefon, ?who called the destruction of the parliament Maupeou, the Saint-Bartholomew of the ministers.?

The Spanish amba.s.sador, quick at repartee, added, ?that in any case it was not the ma.s.sacre of the Innocents.?

But to return to Beaumarchais. ?All the gentlemen at court,? says Gudin, ?all the most distinguished persons of Paris, inscribed themselves at his door. No one spoke of anything but of him.?