stood with regard to the persons of his court. We transcribe

one or two.

The frankness and kindness of Henry's mind were particularly conspicuous in his intimacy with Sully. All his letters to that minister bear the stamp of warm affection, and of an attention to him even in trifling matters. He wrote a note to him, in 1601, in these words, "You will gratify me much by coming to pass the night at Puizeaux, where I now am, and where you have no occasion to make any arrangements for your accommodation, as I have given directions to put up my hunting-bed in the apartment intended for you, and have likewise settled matters for your supper and for breakfast next morning; after which you shall be at liberty to depart."

Henry was of a warm temper: but his goodness of heart, joined to the exercise of reflection, enabled him to moderate his effusions so that they shewed themselves but slightly in his words and gestures. One day, Crillon, having come into his room to apologize for some things for which he had been blamed, proceeded from apology to argument, and from argument to vehemence. The King, irritated at his continuing so long in the same tone, ordered him to go out; but Crillon came back repeatedly from the door; and, as the King had evidently changed colour with impatience and anger, the attendants were afraid that he would lay hold of a sword, and inflict a blow on this insolent fellow. On his going out at last, the King composed himself; and, turning round to the gentlemen who had wondered at his forbearance under such provocation, he said to them, "I was naturally very choleric, but, since I have learned to understand my own dispo sition, I have made it a rule to watch the impulse of a passion to which it is so dangerous to yield. Experience has taught me that anger is a bad counsellor, and I am very glad to have such good witnesses of my moderation."

On another occasion, after having allowed a female favourite to exercise some improper influence in public matters, Henry had occasion to give Sully a private audience at the Arsenal on confidential business; and the minister embraced this opportunity of keenly remonstrating with Henry on the imprudence of allowing himself to be influenced in a way so contrary to his true glory. Henry, being much attached to the female in question, took this remonstrance in very bad part, and even left the room precipitately, saying aloud, "This man does nothing but contradict me and disapprove of all that I desire: but I shall make a point of being obeyed, and I will not see him again for a fortnight." On the next day, however, at seven in the morning, a carriage was observed to come to the Arsenal with the King and five or six gentlemen of his suite. The monarch went up, without any previous notice, to Sully's room, and knocked at the door. Sully, having called out, "Who is there?" was much surprized on receiving for answer, "It is the King," and on recognizing his master by the sound of his voice. When he had opened the door, Henry stepped in, with Racquelaure and the others; saying to Sully, "Well, my friend, what are you employed about here?" "I am writing letters," said Sully, and preparing work for the chief APP. REV. VOL. LXXVI,

LI

clerks."

clerks." "And how long have you been so engaged?” “Since three in the morning," replied Sully. "Ah!" said the King, turning to Rocquelaure, "what would you take to lead such a life as that?" Henry, having desired every body to go out, then began to converse with Sully on public affairs: but, finding him distant in his manner, he said, smiling and giving him a pat on the cheek, "Oh! oh! you are still on the reserve, and have not forgotten what happened yesterday. Now I think no more about it, and wish that we may go on in the same free way as formerly. I know you well; and, were you to act otherwise than you do, I should consider it as a mark of indifference about my concerns. Although I sometimes get angry, I wish you to put up with it, and to be assured that I do not love you the less; on the contrary, from the moment at which you were to cease to differ from me in points which I know to be against your inclination, I should imagine that your affection was not so great as it had been." After a long conversation, the King departed; and, on taking leave of Sully, he said to those about him, "There are some persons foolish enough to imagine that, when I grow angry with Sully, it is done deliberately, and is likely to last: but, on the contrary, when I come to consider that his remonstrance or opposition arises only from a solicitude for my honour, and never with any views of his own, I like him more and more, and become impatient to tell him so."'

The general tendency of the anecdotes here detailed is to illustrate the amiable part of Henry's character in the way of which the above extracts afford an example.

ART. XIII. Procès celèbres, &c.; i. e. Remarkable Trials during the French Revolution; or, an Historical Sketch of several celebrated Processes connected with the principal Events of the Revolutionary Interregnum; particularly the Trial of the Royalist Agents arrested in 1795; that of Arena Demerville; the Trial relative to the infernal Machine; that of Georges, Pichegru, and Moreau; that of a pretended Conspiracy of the Queen of Etruria; that of Malet, and others. By M. G. Advocate. 2 Vols. 8vo.

PP. 742. Paris. 1814.

THE

HE editor of these volumes appears to have considered the last year as a fit season for bringing before the public, in a compact shape, the principal trials connected with attempts to restore the Bourbons to the throne of France; and he has followed the convenient plan of extracting and abridging from other works, without giving himself much trouble to insert original observations. The largest portion of space is occupied by the trial of Georges and Moreau for the conspiracy of 1804: but the name of Pichegru is inserted in the proceedings only as connected with the charges against his associates, that lamented commander having been assassinated previously to the judicial investigation. His fate had been accelerated not on account of

any

any deficiency of evidence, since the proofs of conspiracy would have been as clear against him as against Georges, but because Bonaparte felt all the odium attached to the public execution of a man who still retained a hold on the affection of the French nation, and whose undaunted courage would have been displayed as strongly before a tribunal and on the scaffold, as it had formerly been manifested on the field of battle.

One of the great objects of Bonaparte, in managing the prosecution of the parties accused in 1804, was to get rid of Moreau; or at least so to disparage him in the eyes of the French nation, as to make him no longer a dangerous rival. The connection between Moreau and Pichegru had, as far as this conspiracy was concerned, been extremely slight; the former having been desirous to avoid interviews with the latter, and having even gone so far as to declare that he could not take a part in any project for the restoration of the Bourbons. The evidence amounted, therefore, to very little more than that Moreau had been apprized of certain persons being in Paris with intentions inimical to the existing government, and had not communicated this knowlege to the persons in office. He had, in all, three or four short meetings with Pichegru, in one of which the conversation was distant and general, on account of the presence of Georges, with whom Moreau had no previous acquaintance; another interview lasted but a very short time; while a third seemed to lead to nothing more than a negative given, on the part of Moreau, to the course that was then contemplated by the conspirators. The death of Pichegru having put an end to the existence of evidence respecting any thing that passed privately between them, the only direct charge against Moreau proceeded from Roland, an inferior agent in the conspiracy; who deposed that Moreau, after having condemned the plan of bringing forwards the Bourbons, had expatiated on the strength of his party in the senate, and had hinted at a disposition to co-operate in the attempts against the existing government, provided that the disposal of affairs was vested, for a limited time, in himself. The speech of Moreau's council is directed in a great measure to invalidate this evidence: but it is worthy of remark that the General himself, in his address to the court, does not choose to take any notice of this matter, nor indeed of any transaction connected with the conspiracy, but rests his defence on the merits of his military career.

Although Moreau had obtained, so far back as 1797, a knowlege of a correspondence of some kind subsisting between Pichegru and the Bourbons, and had even chosen to write to the Directory a letter expressive of his loss of esteem for his former commander, we cannot doubt that he still retained a considerable

L1 2

considerable share of attachment to him. He had owed to Pichegru, in a great measure, the opportunity of acquiring his early reputation; and the frank and manly character of that chief was calculated to make on a brother-soldier an impression not easily effaced by any subsequent difference in political opinions. Every succeeding year also shewed more clearly the duplicity of Bonaparte, and his determination to absorb permanently in himself all that power which he had professed to take only with a view of holding it while the public was in danger. A marked preference was given, in military arrangements, to the officers of the Italian army, over those who had served in Germany; and, if Moreau was too popular to be neglected, his influence was evidently impaired by the discouragement of those who were attached to him, and had acquired their rank and reputation under his command. These circumstances leave little doubt of the reality of the overtures to accommodation between Pichegru and Moreau, conducted in the way set forwards in the charge; viz. by the intervention at first of one David, and subsequently of General Lajollais, the friend of both commanders. It appears, however, that much less had passed between them than Bonaparte endeavoured to insinuate, or than the public on such occasions is disposed to believe the habitual caution of Moreau, the difficulty of eluding the scrutiny of the French police, and the impediments to intercourse with England, where Pichegru then was, being all calculated to confine their communications to verbal and ge'neral assurances. Hence the evident want of concert with Moreau, after the conspirators had actually come to Paris, and placed themselves in a situation into which it was extremely hazardous to venture until every thing had been arranged and prepared. The result proved exactly what will generally be the case when a government is backed by a vigilant police, and stops at nothing to accomplish its object. The conspirators had no chance of success, and could scarcely in any instance make their escape; while Bonaparte obtained all the credit attached to the defeat of an attempt against his life, and turned it to an immediate account by vesting in himself and his family the hereditary sovereignty, on the convenient plea that such a change was the only effectual mode of preventing conspiracies in future, and securing to the people the blessings of tranquil government.

Another trial, of much less notoriety, is that in which the name of the Queen of Etruria was involved. On the 15th April 1811, at six o'clock in the morning, the inn at Amsterdam called the Groote Doele was suddenly invested by policeagents, accompanied by a military force, who went up to the

apartment

apartment of an Italian residing there for several months, and took possession of his papers and effects. This foreigner was called Sassi, a native of Florence, and in the employment of the Queen of Etruria; who, our readers will remember, was of the royal family of Spain, and, having been stripped of her sovereignty in Italy, was then in confinement at Nice by Bonaparte's orders. Among Sassi's papers were official documents constituting him her agent at the British court, for the purpose of urging a claim to some settlement that might be exempt from the alarms inseparable from a dependence on Bonaparte; as also a number of letters from the Princess to Sassi, all expressive of anxiety to hear that he had reached his destination, and of a solicitude to be delivered from the situation in which she was placed. The following is printed without a date :

"My dear Sassi,

"I have received to-day your letter of the 6th from Antwerp; it grieves me much; since it leads me to apprehend that you are either intimidated, or deterred by some well founded motives, from entertaining hopes of the success of our project. Lose no time in tran quillizing me, and in sending me an answer. - I am now to reply to your inquiries: my wish is to have a sovereignty in Europe, in India, or in America. This, and the arrangements about the marriage, are the leading points. If you do not succeed in them, at least prevail on the English court to give us an honourable retreat; or, if you cannot obtain that, let us be withdrawn from this place, with an income sufficient to live quietly in England or at Cadiz, where I should place myself, with the other Spaniards, in expectation of better times. The main point is to get out of this residence, which is insupportable You have made courageous sacrifices for me; and I bear, in like manner, my misfortunes with a firm but painful resignation. You will be a powerful witness of my courage, and of my zeal for the welfare of my sons: but, my dear friend, why dwell on gloomy subjects, and why not assure me that you will sacrifice every thing for the purpose of rendering me free at least, if I cannot be happy? Take courage, dear Sassi; my thoughts are always on you and your motions."

to me.

"My dear Sassi,

(Another Letter.)

"I have received your cyphers with pleasure, and have been able to make them out. Your intelligence is flattering. The English go on well. We are told that Prince Augustus is with the Spanish regency. I recommend my affairs to your care. Procure something for us in Brazil, where Don Pedro, the Spanish Infanta, is at present."

In another letter, the Princess mentions the return of one Chiffenti from a secret mission to the court of Sicily, where