Hitherto, as we have prosecuted our task, each year has been a history which we have found it difficult to contain within the limits of half a volume; remaining besides conscious, that, in the necessary compression, we have been obliged to do injustice to the importance of our theme. But the years of imprisonment which pass so much more slowly to the captive, occupy, with their melancholy monotony, only a small portion of the page of history; and the tale of five years of St. Helena, might, so far as events are concerned, be sooner told than the history of a single campaign, the shortest which was fought under Buonaparte's auspices. Yet these years were painfully marked, and indeed embittered, by a train of irritating disputes betwixt the prisoner and the officer to whom was committed the important, and yet most delicate, task of restraining his liberty, and cutting off all prospect of escape; and whose duty it was, at the same time, to mix the necessary degree of vigilance with as much courtesy, and we will add kindness, as Napoleon could be prevailed on to accept.

We have had considerable opportunity to collect information on this subject, the correspondence of Sir Hudson Lowe with his Majesty's Government having been opened to our researches by the liberality of Lord Bathurst, late secretary of state for the colonial department. This communication has enabled us to speak with confidence respecting the general principles by which the British Government were guided in their instructions to Sir Hudson Lowe, and the tenor of these instructions themselves. We therefore propose to discuss, in the first place, the alleged grievances of Napoleon, as they arose out of the instructions of the British Government; reserving as a second subject of discussion, the farther complaints of the aggravated mode in which these instructions are alleged to have been executed by the Governor of St. Helena. On the latter subject our information is less perfect, from the distance of Sir Hudson Lowe from Europe precluding personal inquiry, and the impossibility of producing impartial evidence on the subject of a long train of minute and petty incidents, each of which necessarily demands investigation, and is the subject of inculpation and defence. We have, however, the means of saying something upon this subject also.

We have already discussed the circumstances of Napoleon's surrender to the British, without reserve, qualification, or condition of any kind; and we have seen, that if he sustained any disappointment in being detained a prisoner, instead of being considered as a guest, or free inmate of Britain, it arose from the failure of hopes which he had adopted on his own calculation, without the slightest encouragement from Captain Maitland. We doubt greatly, indeed, if his most sanguine expectations ever seriously anticipated a reception very different from what he experienced; at least he testified little or no surprise when informed of his destiny. But, at any rate, he was a prisoner of war, having acquired by his surrender no right save to claim safety of life and limb. If the English nation had inveigled Napoleon into a capitulation, under conditions which they had subsequently broken, he would have been in the condition of Toussaint, whom, nevertheless, he immured in a dungeon. Or, if he had been invited to visit the Prince Regent of England in the character of an ally, had been at first received with courteous hospitality, and then committed to confinement as a prisoner, his case would have approached that of Prince Ferdinand of Spain, trepanned to Bayonne. But we should be ashamed to vindicate our country by quoting the evil example of our enemy. Truth and falsehood remain immutable and irreconcilable; and the worst criminal ought not to be proceeded against according to his own example, but according to the general rules of justice. Nevertheless, it greatly diminishes our interest in a complaint, if he who prefers it has himself been in the habit of meting to others with the same unfair weight and measure, which he complains of when used towards himself.

Napoleon, therefore, being a prisoner of war, and to be disposed of as such, (a point which admits of no dispute,) we have, we conceive, further proved, that his residence within the territories of Great Britain was what could hardly take place consistently with the safety of Europe. To have delivered him up to any of the other allied powers, whose government was of a character similar to his own, would certainly have been highly objectionable; since in doing so Britain would have so far broken faith with him, as to part with the power of protecting his personal safety, to which extent the country to which he surrendered himself stood undeniably pledged. It only remained to keep this important prisoner in such a state of restraint, as to ensure his not having the means of making a second escape, and again involving France and Europe in a bloody and doubtful war. St. Helena was selected as the place of his detention, and, we think, with much propriety; since the nature of that sequestered island afforded the means for the greatest certainty of security, with the least restriction on the personal liberty of the distinguished prisoner. Waves and rocks around its shores afforded the security of walls, ditches, bars, and bolts, in a citadel; and his hours of exercise might be safely extended over a space of many miles, instead of being restrained within the narrow and guarded limits of a fortress.

The right of imprisoning Napoleon being conceded, or at least proved, and the selection of St. Helena, as his place of residence, being vindicated, we have no hesitation in avowing the principle, that every thing possible ought to have been done to alleviate the painful feelings, to which, in every point of view, a person so distinguished as Napoleon must have been subjected by so heavy a change of fortune. We would not, at that moment, have remembered the lives lost, fortunes destroyed, and hopes blighted, of so many hundreds of our countrymen, civilians travelling in France, and detained there against every rule of civilized war; nor have thought ourselves entitled to avenge upon Napoleon, in his misfortunes, the cruel inflictions, which his policy, if not his inclination, prompted him to award against others. We would not have made his dungeon so wretched, as that of the unhappy Negro chief, starved to death amidst the Alpine snows. We would not have surrounded him, while a prisoner, with spies, as in the case of the Earl of Elgin; or, as in that of Prince Ferdinand, have spread a trap for him by means of an emissary like the false Baron Koli, who, in proffering to assist his escape, should have had it for an object to obtain a pretence for treating him more harshly. These things we would not then have remembered; or, if we could not banish them from our recollection, in considering how far fraud and ignoble violence can debase genius, and render power odious, we would have remembered them as examples, not to be followed, but shunned. To prevent the prisoner from resuming a power which he had used so fatally, we would have regarded as a duty not to Britain alone, but to Europe and to the world. To accompany his detention with every alleviation which attention to his safe custody would permit, was a debt due, if not to his personal deserts, at least to our own nobleness. With such feelings upon the subject in general, we proceed to consider the most prominent subjects of complaint, which Buonaparte and his advocates have brought against the Administration of Great Britain, for their treatment of the distinguished exile.

The first loud subject of complaint has been already touched upon, that the imperial title was not given to Napoleon, and that he was only addressed and treated with the respect due to a general officer of the highest rank. On this subject Napoleon was particularly tenacious. He was not of the number of those persons mentioned by the Latin poet, who, in poverty and exile, suited their titles and their language to their condition.[219] On the contrary, he contended with great obstinacy, from the time he came to Portsmouth, on his right to be treated as a crowned head; nor was there, as we have noticed, a more fertile source of discord betwixt him and the gentlemen of his suite on one side, and the Governor of St. Helena on the other, than the pertinacious claim, on Napoleon's part, for honours and forms of address, which the orders of the British Ministry had prohibited the governor from granting, and which, therefore, Napoleon's knowledge of a soldier's duty should have prevented his exacting. But, independently of the governor's instructions, Buonaparte's claim to the peculiar distinction of a sovereign prince was liable to question, both in respect of the party by whom it was insisted on, and in relation to the government from whom it was claimed.

Napoleon, it cannot be denied, had been not only an Emperor, but perhaps the most powerful that has ever existed; and he had been acknowledged as such by all the continental sovereigns. But he had been compelled, in 1814, to lay aside and abdicate the empire of France, and to receive in exchange the title of Emperor of Elba. His breach of the treaty of Paris was in essence a renunciation of the empire of Elba; and the reassumption of that of France was so far from being admitted by the allies, that he was declared an outlaw by the Congress at Vienna. Indeed, if this second occupation of the French throne were even to be admitted as in any respect re-establishing his forfeited claim to the Imperial dignity, it must be remembered that he himself a second time abdicated, and formally renounced a second time the dignity he had in an unhappy hour reassumed. But if Napoleon had no just pretension to the Imperial title or honours after his second abdication, even from those who had before acknowledged him as Emperor of France, still less had he any right to a title which he had laid down, from a nation who had never acquiesced in his taking it up. At no time had Great Britain recognised him as Emperor of France; and Lord Castlereagh had expressly declined to accede to the treaty of Paris, by which he was acknowledged as Emperor of Elba.[220] Napoleon, indeed, founded, or attempted to found, an argument upon the treaty of Amiens having been concluded with him, when he held the capacity of First Consul of France. But he had himself destroyed the Consular Government, of which he then constituted the head; and his having been once First Consul gave him no more title to the dignity of Emperor, than the Directorship of Barras invested him with the same title. On no occasion whatever, whether directly or by implication, had Great Britain recognised the title of her prisoner to be considered as a sovereign prince; and it was surely too late to expect acquiescence in claims in his present situation, which had not been allowed when he was actually master of half the world.

But it may be urged that, admitting that Napoleon's claim to be treated with royal ceremonial was in itself groundless, yet since he had actually enjoyed the throne for so many years, the British ministers ought to have allowed to him that rank which he had certainly possessed de facto, though not de jure. The trifling points of rank and ceremonial ought, it may be thought, according to the principles which we have endeavoured to express, to have been conceded to eclipsed sovereignty and down-fallen greatness.

To this it may be replied, that if the concession recommended could have had no further consequences than to mitigate the repinings of Napoleon—if he could have found comfort in the empty sound of titles, or if the observance of formal etiquette could have reconciled his feelings to his melancholy and dethroned condition, without altering the relative state of the question in other respects—such concession ought not to have been refused to him.

But the real cause of his desiring to have, and of the British Government's persisting in refusing to him, the name and honours of a sovereign, lay a great deal deeper. It is true, that it was a foible of Buonaparte, incident, perhaps, to his situation as a parvenu amongst the crowned heads of Europe, to be at all times peculiarly and anxiously solicitous that the most strict etiquette and form should be observed about his person and court. But granting that his vanity, as well as his policy, was concerned in insisting upon such rigid ceremonial as is frequently dispensed with by sovereigns of ancient descent, and whose title is unquestionable, it will not follow that a person of his sense and capacity could have been gratified, even if indulged in all the marks of external influence paid to the Great Mogul, on condition that, like the later descendants of Timur, he was still to remain a close prisoner. His purpose in tenaciously claiming the name of a sovereign, was to establish his claim to the immunities belonging to that title. He had already experienced at Elba the use to be derived from erecting a barrier of etiquette betwixt his person and any inconvenient visitor. Once acknowledged as Emperor, it followed, of course, that he was to be treated as such in every particular; and thus it would have become impossible to enforce such regulations as were absolutely demanded for his safe custody. Such a status, once granted, would have furnished Napoleon with a general argument against every precaution which might be taken to prevent his escape. Who ever heard of an emperor restricted in his promenades, or subjected, in certain cases, to the surveillance of an officer, and the restraint of sentinels? Or how could these precautions against escape have been taken, without irreverence to the person of a crowned head, which, in the circumstances of Napoleon Buonaparte, were indispensably necessary? Those readers, therefore, who may be of opinion that it was necessary that Napoleon should be restrained of his liberty, must also allow that the British Government would have acted imprudently if they had gratuitously invested him with a character which they had hitherto refused him, and that at the very moment when their doing so was to add to the difficulties attending his safe custody.

The question, however, does not terminate even here; for not only was Great Britain at full liberty to refuse to Buonaparte a title which she had never recognised as his due—not only would her granting it have been attended with great practical inconvenience, but farther, she could not have complied with his wishes, without affording the most serious cause of complaint to her ally the King of France. If Napoleon was called emperor, his title could apply to France alone; and if he was acknowledged as Emperor of France, of what country was Louis XVIII. King? Many wars have arisen from no other cause than that the government of one country has given the title and ceremonial due to a sovereign, to a person pretending to the throne of the other, and it is a ground of quarrel recognised by the law of nations. It is true, circumstances might have prevented Louis from resenting the supposed recognition of a royal character in his rival, as severely as Britain did the acknowledgment of the exiled Stuarts by Louis XIV., yet it must have been the subject of serious complaint; the rather that a conduct tending to indicate England's acquiescence in the imperial title claimed by Napoleon, could not but keep alive dangerous recollections, and encourage a dangerous faction in the bosom of France.

Yet, notwithstanding all we have said, we feel there was an awkwardness in approaching the individual who had been so preeminently powerful, with the familiarity applicable to one who had never stood more high above others than he would have done merely as General Buonaparte. A compromise was accordingly offered by Sir Hudson Lowe, in proposing to make use of the word Napoleon, as a more dignified style of addressing his prisoner. But an easy and respectable alternative was in the prisoner's own power. Napoleon had but to imitate other sovereigns, who, either when upon foreign travel, or when other circumstances require it, usually adopt a conventional appellative, which, while their doing so waves no part of their own claim of right to royal honours, is equally far from a concession of that right on the part of those who may have occasion to transact with them. Louis XVIII. was not the less the legitimate King of France, that he was for many years, and in various countries, only known by the name of the Comte de Lille. The conveniency of the idea had struck Napoleon himself; for at one time, when talking of the conditions of his residence in England, he said he would have no objection to resume the name of Meuron, an aide-de-camp who had died by his side at the battle of Arcola.[221] But it seems that Napoleon, more tenacious of form than a prince who had been cradled in it, considered this vailing of his dignity as too great a concession on his part to be granted to the Governor of St. Helena. Sir Hudson Lowe, at one time desirous to compromise this silly subject of dispute, would have been contented to render Napoleon the title of Excellency, as due to a field-mareschal, but neither did this meet with acceptation. Napoleon was determined either to be acknowledged by the governor as Emperor, or to retain his grievance in its full extent. No modifications could be devised by which it could be rendered palatable.

Whether this pertinacity in claiming a title which was rendered ridiculous by his situation, was the result of some feelings which led him to doubt his own title to greatness, when his ears were no longer flattered by the language of humility; or whether the political considerations just alluded to, rendered him obstinate to refuse all epithets, except one which might found him in claims to those indemnities and privileges with which so high a title is intimate, and from which it may be said to be inseparable, it is impossible for us to say; vanity and policy might combine in recommending to him perseverance in his claim. But the strife should certainly, for his own sake, have been abandoned, when the point remained at issue between the governor and him only, since even if the former had wished to comply with the prisoner's desires, his instructions forbade him to do so. To continue an unavailing struggle, was only to invite the mortification of defeat and repulse. Yet Napoleon and his followers retained so much sensibility on this subject, that though they must have been aware that Sir Hudson Lowe only used the language prescribed by his government, and indeed dared use no other, this unfortunate phrase of General Buonaparte occurring so often in their correspondence, seemed to render every attempt at conciliation a species of derogation and insult, and made such overtures resemble a coarse cloth tied over a raw wound, which it frets and injures more than it protects.

Whatever might be the merits of the case, as between Napoleon and the British Ministry, it was clear that Sir George Cockburn and Sir Hudson Lowe were left by their instructions no option in the matter at issue. These instructions bore that Napoleon, their prisoner, was to receive the style and treatment due to General Buonaparte, a prisoner of war; and it was at their peril if they gave him a higher title, or a different style of attention from what that title implied. No one could know better than Napoleon how strictly a soldier is bound by his consigne; and to upbraid Sir Hudson Lowe as ungenerous, unmanly, and so forth, because he did not disobey the instructions of his government, was as unreasonable as to hope that his remonstrances could have any effect save those of irritation and annoyance. He ought to have been aware that persisting to resent, in rough and insulting terms, the deprivation of his title on the part of an officer who was prohibited from using it, might indeed fret and provoke one with whom it would have been best to keep upon civil terms, but could not bring him one inch nearer to the point which he so anxiously desired to attain.

In fact, this trivial but unhappy subject of dispute was of a character so subtle, that it penetrated into the whole correspondence between the Emperor and the governor, and tended to mix with gall and vinegar all attempts made by the latter to cultivate something like civil intercourse. This unlucky barrier of etiquette started up and poisoned the whole effect of any intended politeness. While Sir George Cockburn remained on the island, for example, he gave more than one ball, to which General Buonaparte and his suite were regularly invited. In similar circumstances, Henry IV. or Charles II. would have attended the ball, and to a certainty would have danced with the prettiest young woman present, without dreaming that, by so doing, they derogated from pretensions derived from a long line of royal ancestors. Buonaparte and Las Cases, on the contrary, took offence at the familiarity, and wrote it down as a wilful and flagrant affront on the part of the admiral. These were not the feelings of a man of conscious dignity of mind, but of an upstart, who conceives the honour of preferment not to consist in having enjoyed, or in still possessing, a high situation, gained by superiority of talent, so much as in wearing the robes or listening to the sounding titles, which are attached to it.

A subject, upon which we are called upon to express much more sympathy with the condition of Napoleon, than moves us upon the consideration of his abrogated title, is, the screen which was drawn betwixt him, and, it may be said, the living world, through which he was not permitted to penetrate, by letter, even to his dearest friends and relatives, unless such had been previously communicated to, and read by, the governor of the island.

It is no doubt true, that this is an inconvenience to which prisoners of war are, in all cases, subjected; nor do we know any country in which their parole is held so sacred as to induce the government to dispense with the right of inspecting their letters. Yet the high place so lately occupied by the fallen monarch might, we think, have claimed for him some dispensation from a restriction so humiliating. If a third person, cold-blooded at best, perhaps inclined to hold up to scorn the expressions of our grief or our affection, is permitted to have the review of the effusions of our heart towards a wife, a sister, a brother, or a bosom-friend, the correspondence loses half its value; and, forced as we are to keep it within the bounds of the most discreet caution, it becomes to us rather a new source of mortification, than the opening of a communion with those absent persons, whose friendship and attachment we hold to be the dearest possession of our lives. We the rather think that some exercise of this privilege might have been left to Napoleon, without any risk of endangering the safe custody of his person; because we are pretty well convinced that all efforts strictly to enforce this regulation did, and must have proved, ineffectual, and that in some cases by means of money, and at other times by the mere influence of compassion, he and his followers would always acquire the means of transmitting private letters from the island without regard to the restriction. Whatever, therefore, was to be apprehended of danger in this species of intercourse by letter, was much more likely to occur in a clandestine correspondence, than in one carried on even by sealed letters, openly and by permission of the government. We cannot help expressing our opinion, that, considering the accurate attention of the police, which would naturally have turned in foreign countries towards letters from St. Helena, there was little danger of the public post being made use of for any dangerous machinations. Supposing, therefore, that the Exile had been permitted to use it, it would have been too dangerous to have risked any proposal for his escape through that medium. A secret correspondence must have been resorted to for that purpose, and that under circumstances which would have put every well-meaning person, at least, upon his guard against being aiding in it; since, if the ordinary channels of communication were open to the prisoner, there could have been no justifiable reason for his resorting to private means of forwarding letters from the island. At the same time, while such is our opinion, it is founded upon reasoning totally unconnected with the claim of right urged by Napoleon; as his situation, considering him as a prisoner of war, and a most important one, unquestionably entitled the government of Britain to lay him under all the restrictions incident to persons in that situation.

Another especial subject of complaint pleaded upon by Napoleon and his advocates, arose from a regulation, which, we apprehend, was so essential to his safe custody, that we are rather surprised to find it was dispensed with upon any occasion, or to any extent; as, if fully and regularly complied with, it would have afforded the means of relaxing a considerable proportion of other restrictions of a harassing and irritating character, liable to be changed from time to time, and to be removed and replaced in some cases, without any very adequate or intelligible motive. The regulation which we allude to is that which required that Buonaparte should be visible twice, or at least once, in the day, to the British orderly officer. If this regulation had been submitted to with equanimity by the Ex-Emperor, it would have given the strongest possible guarantee against the possibility of his attempting an escape. From the hour at which he had been seen by the officer, until that at which he should again become visible, no vessel would have been permitted to leave the island; and supposing that he was missed by the officer at the regular hour, the alarm would have been general, and, whether concealed in the town, or on board any of the vessels in the roadstead, he must necessarily have been discovered. Indeed, the risk was too great to induce him to have tried an effort so dangerous. It might easily have been arranged, that the orderly officer should have the opportunity to execute his duty with every possible respect to Napoleon's privacy and convenience, and the latter might himself have chosen the time and manner of exhibiting himself for an instant. In this case, and considering how many other precautions were taken to prevent escape—that every accessible path to the beach was closely guarded—and that the island was very much in the situation of a citadel, of which soldiers are the principal inhabitants—the chance of Napoleon's attempting to fly, even if permitted the unlimited range of St. Helena, was highly improbable, and the chance of his effecting his purpose next to an impossibility. But this security depended upon his submitting to see a British officer at a fixed hour; and, resolute in his plan of yielding nothing to circumstances, Napoleon resisted, in every possible manner, the necessity of complying with this very important regulation. Indeed, Sir Hudson Lowe, on his part, was on many occasions contented to wink at its being altogether neglected, when the orderly officer could not find the means of seeing Napoleon by stealth while engaged in a walk, or in a ride, or as it sometimes happened, through the casement. This was not the way in which this important regulation ought to have been acted upon and enforced, and the governor did not reap a great harvest of gratitude from his conduct in dispensing with this act of superintendence upon his own responsibility.

We have seen that a circuit of twelve miles and upwards was laid off for Buonaparte's private exercise. No strangers entered these precincts without a pass from Bertrand, and the Emperor had uninterrupted freedom to walk or ride within them, unaccompanied by any one save those in his own family. Beyond these privileged bounds, he was not permitted to move, without the attendance of a British officer; but under the escort of such a person he was at liberty to visit every part of the island. To this arrangement Napoleon was more averse, if possible, than to that which appointed that a British officer should see him once a-day.

Other subjects of complaint there were; but as they chiefly arose out of private discussions with Sir Hudson Lowe—out of by-laws enacted by that officer—and restrictions of a more petty description, we limit ourselves for the present to those of a general character, which, however inconvenient and distressing, were, it is to be observed, such as naturally attached to the condition of a prisoner; and which, like the fetters of a person actually in chains, are less annoying when submitted to with fortitude and equanimity, than when the captive struggles in vain to wrench himself out of their gripe. We are far, nevertheless, from saying, that the weight of the fetters in the one case, and the hardship of the personal restrictions in the other, are in themselves evils which can be easily endured by those who sustain them. We feel especially how painful the loss of liberty must have been to one who had not only enjoyed the freedom of his own actions, but the uncontrolled right of directing those of others. Impatience, however, in this, as in other instances, has only the prerogative of injuring its master. In the many hours of meditation which were afforded to Buonaparte by his residence in St. Helena, we can never perceive any traces of the reflection, that he owed his present unhappy situation less to the immediate influence of those who were agents in his defeat and imprisonment, than to that course of ambition, which, sparing neither the liberties of France, nor the independence of Europe, had at length rendered his personal freedom inconsistent with the rights of the world in general. He felt the distresses of his situation, but he did not, or could not, reason on their origin. It is impossible to reflect upon him without the idea being excited, of a noble lion imprisoned within a narrow and gloomy den, and venting the wrath which once made the forest tremble, upon the petty bolts and bars, which, insignificant as they are, defy his lordly strength, and detain him captive.

The situation was in every respect a painful one; nor is it possible to refuse our sympathy, not only to the prisoner, but to the person whose painful duty it became to be his superintendent. His duty of detaining Napoleon's person was to be done most strictly, and required a man of that extraordinary firmness of mind, who should never yield for one instant his judgment to his feelings, and should be able at once to detect and reply to all such false arguments, as might be used to deter him from the downright and manful discharge of his office. But, then, there ought to have been combined with those rare qualities a calmness of temper almost equally rare, and a generosity of mind, which, confident in its own honour and integrity, could look with serenity and compassion upon the daily and hourly effects of the maddening causes, which tortured into a state of constant and unendurable irritability the extraordinary being subjected to their influence. Buonaparte, indeed, and the followers who reflected his passions, were to be regarded on all occasions as men acting and speaking under the feverish and delirious influence of things long past, and altogether destitute of the power of cool or clear reasoning, on any grounds that exclusively referred to things present. The emperor could not forget his empire, the husband could not forget his wife, the father his child, the hero his triumphs, the legislator his power. It was scarce in nature, that a brain agitated by such recollections should remain composed under a change so fearful, or be able to reflect calmly on what he now was, when agitated by the extraordinary contrast of his present situation with what he had been. To have soothed him would have been a vain attempt; but the honour of England required that he should have no cause of irritation, beyond those which severely enough attached to his condition as a captive.

From the character we have given of Sir George Cockburn, it may be supposed that he was attentive, as far as his power extended, and his duty permitted, to do all that could render Napoleon's situation more easy. The various authors, Dr. O'Meara, Las Cases, Santini, and others, who have written with much violence concerning Sir Hudson Lowe's conduct, have mentioned that of Sir George as fair, honourable, and conciliatory. No doubt there were many occasions, as the actual inconveniences of the place were experienced, and as the rays of undefined hope vanished from their eyes, when Napoleon and his followers became unreasonably captious in their discussions with the admiral. On such occasions he pursued with professional bluntness the straightforward path of duty, leaving it to the French gentlemen to be sullen as long as they would, and entering into communication again with them whenever they appeared to desire it. It was probably this equanimity, which, notwithstanding various acknowledgments of his good and honourable conduct towards them, seemed to have drawn upon Sir George Cockburn the censure of M. Las Cases, and something that was meant as a species of insult from Napoleon himself. As Sir George Cockburn is acknowledged on the whole to have discharged his duty towards them with mildness and temper, we are the rather tempted to enter into their grounds of complaint against him, because they tend to show the exasperated and ulcerated state of mind with which these unfortunate gentlemen regarded those, who, in their present office, had no alternative but to discharge the duty which their sovereign and country had imposed upon them.

At the risk of being thought trifling with our readers' patience, we shall recapitulate the grievances complained of by Las Cases, who frankly admits, that the bad humour, arising out of his situation, may have in some degree influenced his mind in judging of Sir George Cockburn's conduct, and shall subjoin to each charge the answer which seems to correspond to it.

1st, The admiral is accused of having called the Emperor Napoleon, General Buonaparte; and to have pronounced the words with an air of self-satisfaction, which showed that the expression gratified him. It is replied, that Sir George Cockburn's instructions were to address Napoleon by that epithet; and the commentary on the looks or tone with which he did so, is hypercritical.—2d, Napoleon was quartered in Briars for two months, while the admiral himself resided in Plantation-house. Answered, that the instructions of Government were, that Napoleon should remain on board till his abode was prepared; but finding that would occupy so much more time than was expected, Sir George Cockburn, on his own responsibility, placed him on shore, and at Briars, as being the residence which he himself preferred.—3d, The admiral placed sentinels under Napoleon's windows. Replied, it is the usual practice when prisoners of importance are to be secured, especially if they do not even offer their parole that they will make no attempt to escape.—4th, Sir George did not permit any one to visit Napoleon without his permission. Replied, it seemed a necessary consequence of his situation, until Sir George should be able to distinguish those visitors who might be with propriety admitted to an unlimited privilege of visiting the important prisoner.—5th, He invited Napoleon to a ball, by the title of General Buonaparte. The subject of the title has been already discussed; and it does not appear how its being used in sending an invitation to a convivial party, could render the name by which the admiral was instructed to address his prisoner more offensive than on other occasions.—6th, Sir George Cockburn, pressed by Bertrand's notes, in which he qualified the prisoner as an emperor, replied sarcastically, that he knew of no emperor at St. Helena, nor had heard that any European emperor was at present travelling abroad. Replied, by referring to the admiral's instructions, and by the fact, that if an emperor can abdicate his quality, certainly Napoleon was no longer one.—7th, Sir George Cockburn is said to have influenced the opinions of others upon this subject, and punished with arrest some subordinate persons, who used the phrase of emperor. Answered as before, he had orders from his government not to suffer Buonaparte to be addressed as emperor, and it was his duty to cause them to be obeyed. He could not, however, have been very rigorous, since Monsieur La Cases informs us that the officers of the 53d used the mezzotermine Napoleon, apparently without censure from the governor.—Lastly, There remains only to be added the complaint, that there was an orderly officer appointed to attend Napoleon when he went beyond certain limits, a point of precaution which must be very useful, if not indispensable, where vigilant custody is required.

From this summary of offences, it must be plain to the reader, that the resentment of Las Cases and his master was not so much against Sir George Cockburn personally, as against his office; and that the admiral would have been very acceptable, if he could have reconciled it to his duty to treat Napoleon as an emperor and a free man; suffered himself, like Sir Niel Campbell, to be admitted or excluded from his presence, as the etiquette of an imperial court might dictate; and run the risk of being rewarded for his complaisance by learning, when he least looked for it, that Napoleon had sailed for America, or perhaps for France. The question how far Britain, or rather Europe, had a right to keep Napoleon prisoner, has already been discussed. If they had no such right, and if a second insurrection in France, a second field of Waterloo, should be hazarded, rather than that Napoleon Buonaparte should suffer diminution of dignity, or restraint of freedom, then Napoleon had a right to complain of the ministry, but not of the officer, to whom his instructions were to be at once the guide and vindication of his conduct.

While these things passed at St. Helena, the ministry of Great Britain were employed in placing the detention of the Ex-Emperor under the regulation of an act of Parliament, which interdicted all intercourse and commerce with St. Helena, excepting by the East India Company's regular chartered vessels. Ships not so chartered, attempting to trade or touch at St. Helena, or hovering within eight leagues of the island, were declared subject to seizure and confiscation. The crews of the vessels who came on shore, or other persons visiting the island, were liable to be sent on board, at the governor's pleasure; and those who might attempt to conceal themselves on shore, were declared subject to punishment. Ships were permitted to approach upon stress of weather, but it was incumbent on them to prove the indispensable necessity, and while they remained at St. Helena, they were watched in the closest manner. A clause of indemnity protected the governor and commissioners from any act transgressing the letter of the law, which they might already have committed, while detaining Napoleon in custody. Such was the act 56 George III. ch. 23, which legalized the confinement of Napoleon at St. Helena.[222]

Another convention betwixt the principal powers of Europe, at Paris, 2d August, 1815, had been also entered into upon the subject of Napoleon, and the custody of his person. It set forth, I. That, in order to render impossible any further attempt on the part of Napoleon Buonaparte against the repose of the world, he should be considered as prisoner to the high contracting powers, the King of Great Britain and Ireland, the Emperor of Austria, the Emperor of Russia, and the King of Prussia. II. That the custody of his person was committed to the British Government, and it was remitted to them to choose the most secure place and mode of detaining him in security. III. That the courts of Austria, Russia, and Prussia, were to name commissioners who were to inhabit the same place which should be assigned for Napoleon Buonaparte's residence, and who, without being responsible for his detention, should certiorate themselves that he was actually present. IV. His Most Christian Majesty was also invited to send a commissioner. V. The King of Great Britain engaged faithfully to comply with the conditions assigned to him by this convention.[223]

Of these powers, only three availed themselves of the power, or privilege, of sending commissioners to St. Helena. These were Count Balmain, on the part of Russia, Baron Sturmer for Austria, and an old emigrant nobleman, the Marquis de Montchenu, for France. Prussia seems to have thought the expense of a resident commissioner at St. Helena unnecessary. Indeed, it does not appear that any of these gentlemen had an important part to play while at St. Helena, but yet their presence was necessary to place what should pass there under the vigilance of accredited representatives of the high powers who had engaged in the Convention of Paris. The imprisonment of Napoleon was now not the work of England alone, but of Europe, adopted by her most powerful states, as a measure indispensable for public tranquillity.

Several months before the arrival of the commissioners, Sir George Cockburn was superseded in his anxious and painful office by Sir Hudson Lowe, who remained Governor of St. Helena, and had the charge of Napoleon's person, until the death of that remarkable person. The conduct of this officer has been censured, in several of the writings which have treated of Napoleon's confinement, with such extremity of bitterness as in some measure defeats its own end, and leads us to doubt the truth of charges which are evidently brought forward under deep feelings of personal animosity to the late Governor of St. Helena. On the other hand, it would require a strong defence on the part of Sir Hudson Lowe himself, refuting or explaining many things which as yet have neither received contradiction nor commentary, to induce us to consider him as the very rare and highly exalted species of character, to whom, as we have already stated, this important charge ought to have been intrusted.

Sir Hudson Lowe had risen to rank in the army while serving chiefly in the Mediterranean, in a foreign corps in the pay of England. In this situation he became master of the French and Italian languages, circumstances which highly qualified him for the situation to which he was appointed. In the campaign of 1814, he had been attached to the army of the allies, and carried on a correspondence with the English Government, describing the events of the campaign, part of which was published, and intimates spirit and talent in the writer. Sir Hudson Lowe received from several of the allied sovereigns and generals the most honourable testimonies of his services that could be rendered. He had thus the opportunity and habit of mixing with persons of distinction in the discussion of affairs of importance; and his character as a gentleman and a man of honour was carefully inquired into, and highly vouched, ere his nomination was made out. These were points on which precise inquiries could be made, and distinct answers received, and they were all in favour of Sir Hudson Lowe.

But there were other qualifications, and those not less important, his possession of which could only be known by putting him upon trial. The indispensable attribute, for example, of an imperturbable temper, was scarce to be ascertained, until his proceedings in the office intrusted to him should show whether he possessed or wanted it. The same must be said of that firmness and decision, which dictate to an official person the exact line of his duty—prevent all hesitation or wavering in the exercise of his purpose—render him, when it is discharged, boldly and firmly confident that he has done exactly that which he ought—and enable him fearlessly to resist all importunity which can be used to induce him to change his conduct, and to contemn all misrepresentations and obloquy which may arise from his adhering to it.

Knowing nothing of Sir Hudson Lowe personally, and allowing him to possess the qualities of an honourable, and the accomplishments of a well-informed man, we are inclined, from a review of his conduct, divesting it so far as we can of the exaggerations of his personal enemies, to think there remain traces of a warm and irritable temper, which seems sometimes to have overborne his discretion, and induced him to forget that his prisoner was in a situation where he ought not, even when his conduct seemed most unreasonable and most provoking, to be considered as an object of resentment, or as being subject, like other men, to retort and retaliation. Napoleon's situation precluded the possibility of his inflicting an insult, and therefore the temper of the person to whom such was offered, ought, if possible, to have remained cool and unruffled. It does not seem to us that this was uniformly the case.

In like manner, Sir Hudson Lowe appears to have been agitated by an oppressive sense of the importance and the difficulties of his situation, to a nervous and irritating degree. This over-anxiety led to frequent changes of his regulations, and to the adoption of measures which were afterwards abandoned, and perhaps again resumed. All this uncertainty occasioned just subject of complaint to his prisoner; for, though a captive may become gradually accustomed to the fetters which he wears daily in the same manner, he must be driven to impatience if the mode of adjusting them be altered from day to day.

It is probable that the warm temper of Sir Hudson Lowe was in some degree convenient to Napoleon, as it afforded him the means of reprisals upon the immediate instrument of his confinement, by making the governor feel a part of the annoyance which he himself experienced. Sir George Cockburn had been in seipso totus, teres, atque rotun dus. He did what his duty directed, and cared little what Napoleon thought or said upon the subject. The new governor was vulnerable; he could be rendered angry, and might therefore be taken at advantage. Thus Napoleon might enjoy the vindictive pleasure, too natural to the human bosom, of giving pain to the person who was the agent, though not the author, in the restrictions to which he himself was subjected. But Napoleon's interest in provoking the governor did not rest upon the mere gratification of spleen. His views went far deeper, and were connected with the prospect of obtaining his liberty, and with the mode by which he hoped to accomplish it. And this leads us to inquire upon what these hopes were rested, and to place before our readers evidence of the most indisputable credit, concerning the line of policy adopted in the councils of Longwood.

It must be premised that the military gentlemen, who, so much to the honour of their own fidelity, had attended on Buonaparte, to soften his calamity by their society and sympathy, were connected by no other link than their mutual respect for the same unhappy master. Being unattached to each other by any ties of friendship, or community of feelings or pursuits, it is no wonder that these officers, given up to ennui, and feeling the acidity of temper which such a situation is sure to cause, should have had misunderstandings, nay, positive quarrels, not with the governor only, but with each other. In these circumstances, the conduct of General Gourgaud distinguished him from the rest. After the peace of Paris, this officer had been aide-de-camp to the Duke of Berri, a situation which he abandoned on Napoleon's return at the period of the Hundred Days. As he was in attendance upon the Ex-Emperor at the moment of his fall, he felt it his duty to accompany him to St. Helena. While upon that island, he took less share in Napoleon's complaints and quarrels with the governor, than either Generals Bertrand and Montholon, or Count Las Cases, avoided all appearance of intrigue with the inhabitants, and was regarded by Sir Hudson Lowe as a brave and loyal soldier, who followed his emperor in adversity, without taking any part in those proceedings which the governor considered as prejudicial to his own authority. As such, he is characterised uniformly in Sir Hudson's despatches to his Government.

This officer had left in France a mother and sister, to whom he was tenderly devoted, and who loved him with the fondest affection. From attachment to these beloved relatives, and their affecting desire that he should rejoin them, General Gourgaud became desirous of revisiting his native country; and his resolution was the stronger, that considerable jealousies and misunderstandings arose betwixt him and Count Bertrand. In these circumstances, he applied for and obtained permission from the governor, to return to London direct. Before leaving St. Helena, he was very communicative both to Sir Hudson Lowe and Baron Sturmer, the Austrian commissioner, respecting the secret hopes and plans which were carrying on at Longwood. When he arrived in Britain in the spring 1818, he was no less frank and open with the British Government; informing them of the various proposals for escape which had been laid before Napoleon; the facilities and difficulties which attended them, and the reasons why he preferred remaining on the island, to making the attempt. At this period it was supposed that General Gourgaud was desirous of making his peace with the King of France; but whatever might be his private views, the minutes of the information which he afforded to Sir Hudson Lowe and Baron Sturmer at St. Helena, and afterwards at London to the Under Secretary at War, are still preserved in the records of the Foreign Office. They agree entirely with each other, and their authenticity cannot be questioned. The communications are studiously made, with considerable reserve as to proper names, in order that no individual should be called in question for any thing which is there stated; and in general they bear, as was to be expected, an air of the utmost simplicity and veracity. We shall often have occasion to allude to these documents, that the reader may be enabled to place the real purposes of Napoleon in opposition to the language which he made use of for accomplishing them; but we have not thought it proper to quote the minutes at length, unless as far as Napoleon is concerned. We understand that General Gourgaud, on his return to the continent, has resumed that tenderness to Napoleon's memory, which may induce him to regret having communicated the secrets of his prison-house to less friendly ears. But this change of sentiments can neither diminish the truth of his evidence, nor affect our right to bring forward what we find recorded as communicated by him.

Having thus given an account of the evidence we mean to use, we resume the subject of Napoleon's quarrels with Sir Hudson Lowe.

It was not, according to General Gourgaud, for want of means of escape, that Napoleon continued to remain at St. Helena. There was one plan for carrying him out in a trunk with dirty linen; and so general was the opinion of the extreme stupidity of the English sentinels, that there was another by which it was proposed he should slip through the camp in disguise of a servant carrying a dish. When the Baron Sturmer represented the impossibility of such wild plans being in agitation, Gourgaud answered, "There was no impossibility to those who had millions at their command. Yes, I repeat it," he continued, "he can escape from hence, and go to America whenever he has a mind."[224]—"Why, then, should he remain here?" said Baron Sturmer. Gourgaud replied, "That all his followers had urged him to make the experiment of escape; but he preferred continuing on the island. He has a secret pride in the consequence attached to the custody of his person, and the interest generally taken in his fate. He has said repeatedly, 'I can no longer live as a private person. I would rather be a prisoner on this rock, than a free but undistinguished individual in the United States.'"[225]

General Gourgaud said, therefore, that the event to which Napoleon trusted for liberty, was some change of politics in the court of Great Britain, which should bring into administration the party who were now in opposition, and who, he rather too rashly perhaps conceived, would at once restore to him his liberty. The British ministers received the same assurances from General Gourgaud with those given at St. Helena. These last are thus expressed in the original:—

General Gourgaud's communications further bear, what, indeed, can be collected from many other circumstances, that as Napoleon hoped to obtain his liberty from the impression to be made on the minds of the English nation, he was careful not to suffer his condition to be forgotten, and most anxious that the public mind should be carefully kept alive to it, by a succession of publications coming out one after another, modified according to the different temper and information of the various authors, but bearing all of them the stamp of having issued in whole or in part from the interior of Longwood. Accordingly, the various works of Warden,[226] O'Meara,[227] Santini,[228] the letter of Montholon,[229] and other publications upon St. Helena,[230] appeared one after another, to keep the subject awake; which, although seemingly discharged by various hands, bear the strong peculiarity of being directed at identically the same mark, and of being arrows from the same quiver. Gourgaud mentioned this species of file-firing, and its purpose. Even the Manuscrit de St. HÉlÈne, a tract, in which dates and facts were misplaced and confounded, was also, according to General Gourgaud, the work of Buonaparte, and composed to puzzle and mystify the British public. He told Sir Hudson Lowe that he was not to consider the abuse in these various pamphlets as levelled against him personally, but as written upon political calculation, with the view of extorting some relaxation of vigilance by the reiteration of complaints. The celebrated Letter of Montholon was, according to the same authority, written in a great measure by Napoleon; and the same was the case with Santini's, though so grossly over coloured that he himself afterwards disowned it.[231] Other papers, he said, would appear under the names of captains of merchantmen and the like, for Napoleon was possessed by a mania for scribbling, which had no interruption. It becomes the historian, therefore, to receive with caution the narratives of those who have thus taken a determinedly partial part in the controversy, and concocted their statements from the details afforded by the party principally concerned. If what General Gourgaud has said be accurate, it is Napoleon who is pleading his own cause under a borrowed name, in the pages of O'Meara, Santini, Montholon, &c. Even when the facts mentioned in these works, therefore, are undeniable, still it is necessary to strip them of exaggeration, and place them in a fair and just light before pronouncing on them.

The evidence of O'Meara, as contained in a Voice from St. Helena, is that of a disappointed man, bitterly incensed against Sir Hudson Lowe, as the cause of his disappointment. He had no need to kindle the flame of his own resentment, at that of Buonaparte. But it may be granted that their vindictive feelings must have strengthened each other. The quarrel was the more irreconcilable, as it appears that Dr. O'Meara was originally in great habits of intimacy with Sir Hudson Lowe, and in the custom of repeating at Plantation-house the gossip which he had heard at Longwood. Some proofs of this were laid before the public, in the Quarterly Review;[232] and Sir Hudson Lowe's correspondence with government contains various allusions to Mr. O'Meara's authority,[233] down to the period when their mutual confidence was terminated by a violent quarrel.[234]

Count Las Cases is not, in point of impartiality, to be ranked much above Dr. O'Meara. He was originally a French emigrant, a worshipper by profession of royalty, and therefore only changed his idol, not his religion, when he substituted the idol Napoleon for the idol Bourbon. He embraces with passive obedience the interests of his chief, real or supposed, and can see nothing wrong which Napoleon is disposed to think right. He was also the personal enemy of Sir Hudson Lowe. We have no idea that he would falsify the truth; but we cannot but suspect the accuracy of his recollection, when we find he inserts many expressions and incidents in his Journal, long after the period at which it was originally written, and it is to be presumed from memory. Sir Hudson Lowe had the original manuscript for some time in his possession, and we have at present before us a printed copy, in which Sir Hudson has, with his own hand, marked those additions which had been made to the Journal since he saw it in its primitive state. It is remarkable that all, or almost all, the additions which are made to the Journal, consist of passages highly injurious to Sir Hudson Lowe, which had no existence in the original manuscript. These additions must therefore have been made under the influence of recollection, sharpened by angry passions, since they did not at first seem important enough to be preserved. When memory is put on the rack by passion and prejudice, she will recollect strange things; and, like witnesses under the actual torture, sometimes avow what never took place.

Of Dr. Antommarchi it is not necessary to say much; he was a legatee of Buonaparte, and an annuitant of his widow, besides being anxious to preserve the countenance of his very wealthy family. He never speaks of Sir Hudson Lowe without rancour. Sir Hudson's first offence against him was inquiring for clandestine correspondence;[235] his last was, preventing the crowd at Napoleon's funeral from pulling to pieces the willow-trees by which the grave was sheltered, besides placing a guard over the place of sepulture.[236] What truth is there, then, to be reposed in an author, who can thus misrepresent two circumstances—the one imposed on Sir Hudson Lowe by his instructions; the other being what decency and propriety, and respect to the deceased, imperatively demanded?

The mass of evidence shows, that to have remained upon good, or even on decent terms with the governor, would not have squared with the politics of one who desired to have grievances to complain of; and who, far from having the usual motives which may lead a captive and his keeper to a tolerable understanding, by a system of mutual accommodation, wished to provoke the governor, if possible, beyond the extent of human patience, even at the risk of subjecting himself to some new infliction, which might swell the list of wrongs which he was accumulating to lay before the public.

What we have stated above is exemplified by Napoleon's reception of Sir Hudson Lowe, against whom he appears to have adopted the most violent prejudices at the very first interview, and before the governor could have afforded him the slightest disrespect. We quote it, because it shows that the mind of the prisoner was made up to provoke and insult Sir Hudson, without waiting for any provocation on his part.

The governor's first aggression (so represented,) was his requiring permission of General Buonaparte to call together his domestics, with a view to their taking the declaration required by the British Government, binding themselves to abide by the rules laid down for the custody of Buonaparte's person. This permission was refused in very haughty terms. If Napoleon had been at the Tuileries, such a request could not have been more highly resented. The servants, however, appeared, and took the necessary declaration. But the affront was not cancelled; "Sir Hudson Lowe had put his finger betwixt Napoleon and his valet-de-chambre." This was on the 27th April, 1816.[237]

Upon the 30th, the governor again paid his respects at Longwood, and was received with one of those calculated bursts of furious passion with which Napoleon was wont to try the courage and shake the nerves of those over whom he desired to acquire influence. He spoke of protesting against the Convention of Paris, and demanded what right the sovereigns therein allied had to dispose of one, their equal always, and often their superior. He called upon the governor for death or liberty—as if it had been in Sir Hudson Lowe's power to give him either the one or the other. Sir Hudson enlarged on the conveniences of the building which was to be sent from England, to supply the present want of accommodation. Buonaparte repelled the proposed consolation with fury. It was not a house that he wanted, it was an executioner and a line. These he would esteem a favour; all the rest was but irony and insult. Sir Hudson Lowe could in reply only hope that he had given no personal offence, and was reminded of his review of the domestics; which reproach he listened to in silence.[238]

Presently afterwards, Napoleon fell on a new and cutting method of exercising Sir Hudson's patience. A book on the campaign of 1814,[239] lay on the table. Napoleon turned up some of the English bulletins, and asked, with a tone which was perfectly intelligible, whether the governor had not been the writer of these letters. Being answered in the affirmative, Napoleon, according to Dr. O'Meara, told Sir Hudson they were full of folly and falsehood; to which the governor, with more patience than most men could have commanded on such an occasion, replied, "I believe I saw what I have stated;"[240] an answer certainly as temperate as could be returned to so gratuitous an insult. After Sir Hudson left the room in which he had been received with so much unprovoked incivility, Napoleon is described as having harangued upon the sinister expression of his countenance, abused him in the coarsest manner, and even caused his valet-de-chambre throw a cup of coffee out of the window, because it had stood a moment on the table beside the governor.[241]

Every attempt at conciliation on the part of the governor, seemed always to furnish new subjects of irritation. He sent fowling-pieces to Longwood, and Napoleon returned for answer, it was an insult to give fowling-pieces where there is no game; though Santini, by the way, pretended to support the family in a great measure by his gun. Sir Hudson sent a variety of clothes and other articles from England, which it might be supposed the exiles were in want of. The thanks returned were, that the governor treated them like paupers, and that the articles ought, in due respect, to have been left at the store, or governor's house, while a list was sent to the Emperor's household, that such things were at their command if they had any occasion for them. On a third occasion, Sir Hudson resolved to be cautious. He had determined to give a ball; but he consulted Dr. O'Meara whether Napoleon would take it well to be invited. The doctor foresaw that the fatal address, General Buonaparte, would make shipwreck of the invitation. The governor proposed to avoid this stumbling-block, by asking Napoleon verbally and in person. But with no name which his civility could devise for the invitation, could it be rendered acceptable. A governor of St. Helena, as Napoleon himself observed, had need to be a person of great politeness, and at the same time of great firmness.

At length, on 18th August, a decisive quarrel took place. Sir Hudson Lowe was admitted to an audience, at which was present Sir Pulteney Malcolm, the admiral who now commanded on the station. Dr. O'Meara has preserved the following account of the interview, as it was detailed by Napoleon to his suite, the day after it took place.

It is not surprising that this extreme violence met with some return on Sir Hudson's part. He told Napoleon that his language was uncivil and ungentlemanlike, and that he would not remain to listen to it. Accordingly, he left Longwood without even the usual salutation.

Upon these occasions, we think it is evident that Napoleon was the wilful and intentional aggressor, and that his conduct proceeded either from the stings of injured pride, or a calculated scheme, which made him prefer being on bad rather than good terms with Sir Hudson Lowe. On the other hand, we could wish that the governor had avoided entering upon the subject of the expenses of his detention with Napoleon in person. The subject was ill-chosen, and could produce no favourable result.

They never afterwards met in friendship, or even on terms of decent civility; and having given this account of their final quarrel, it only remains for us to classify, in a general manner, the various subjects of angry discussion which took place betwixt them, placed in such uncomfortable relative circumstances, and each determined not to give way to the other's arguments, or accommodate himself to the other's wishes or convenience.