AN AUDIENCE AT THE TUILERIES 165 impact of the world in arms, and was never more glorious or more formidable than in its fall. Its splendid legend long survived it, and, as narrated by Thiers and illustrated by Vernet, kept for it a living place in the hearts of the people. The Second Empire crumbled to pieces in single combat, almost at the first touch of an adversary it affected to despise while each succeeding day has revealed more of its hollowness and delusive mirage. Its restoration appears to me a moral impossibility. A few days after the proclamation of the new régime Lord Cowley had an audience to present his credentials to the Emperor, and he took with him on the occasion the whole of his staff. We stood in a row behind the Ambassador, and were much struck by the emphasis with which Napoleon, on receiving the Queen's letter from Lord Cowley's hands, said: "Je suis heureux, milord, que l'Angleterre soit la première Puissance à me reconnaître." We all knew that Antonini, Minister from the Two Sicilies, had succeeded, by sheer importunity, in getting his sovereign to recognise the Empire as soon as proclaimed, and that, alone of all the foreign representatives, he had presented his letters a day or two before. The première puissance must have been very galling to him. But then "Bomba" never was a Power, except it be the evil one. After the formal delivery of his credentials, Lord Cowley had a long private audience, during which much was no doubt said of the desire of the new sovereign to cultivate the most friendly relations with us. A thoroughly good understanding with England was the cardinal principle upon which Napoleon III. based his foreign policy, and it must be confessed that, while making skilful use of it for his own ends, as in the Crimean War, he was on the whole the staunchest friend we ever had on the French throne. Louis Philippe, too, at the commencement of his reign, had looked to the British Government for his main support against the great Continental monarchies, and more especially Russia, who gave him the cold shoulder as an unprincipled usurper. But, in the case of the Emperor, a sincere liking for England and English ways and ideas imparted a personal value and cordiality to the agreement with us. Nor did he ever play us false like Louis Philippe in Egyptian affairs and in the Spanish marriages. At the same time it may well be asked whether this leaning towards us did not distinctly detract from the popularity of both sovereigns with their subjects, so strong was, and still is, the prejudice harboured by the great majority of Frenchmen against the old hereditary foe. About Christmas 1852, just as I was getting into the full swing and enjoyment of Paris life, I was suddenly, and, I think, somewhat arbitrarily, transferred to the Legation at Frankfort. I was under the impression at the time that my chief might have contributed to my removal, but as I am not conscious of having done anything to offend him, and as, moreover, he and Lady Cowley afterwards always showed me great kindness and hospitality, I can only ascribe the change to one of those small jobs, not unfamiliar to the Foreign Office, perpetrated on this occasion to please the friends of those who were appointed to Paris in my stead. For Paris, as Lord Palmerston used to say, "happens to be the only place that agrees with every one's health." CHAPTER VIII FRANKFORT, 1852-1854 I LEFT Paris in very cold weather in the Christ week, greatly out of sorts at my change of post. "Im traurigen Monat November war's, Die Tage wurden trüber, Der Wind riss von den Bäumen das Laub, sings Heine in the opening lines of a poem whic the quintessence of bitterness and disenchantm every word of it seeming to be written with gal corrosive acid1 in lieu of ink; and, by simply al ing the name of the month, the description exa fits my mood and journey. Sleeping at Metz, I reached my destination the afternoon of the second day. It was a cur sensation, after leaving French soil at Forbach find myself for the first time in the midst of a guage so familiar to me from my childhood, yet among scenes utterly new and strange. Heine again "als ich die deutsche Sprache vernahm, Da ward mir seltsam zu Muthe." How distinctly I remember the first impression of 1 Deutschland, ein Wintermärchen. 168 neat, trim railway stations, with their names written up in German characters; the Restaurationen with their foaming tankards and greasy sausage loaves; the students' caps and Berenicean locks; the greetings and kissings of the male Teutons, and the guttural gushings and general joviality of my fellowtravellers on this my first Sunday's journey through the Vaterländsche Gauen! I put up at the Hôtel de Russie in the Zeil, kept in those days by Sarg, and one of the most comfortable houses in Germany. Sir Alexander and Lady Malet gave me a kind welcome. His friendliness and easy good-nature tempered, so to speak, an atmosphere which her brilliant wit and inclination to sarcasm made at first rather formidable to commonplace mortals. I had the good fortune to stand well with Lady Malet, but somehow never felt quite at ease in her society. Like her illustrious step-father she could be a hard hitter, and was occasionally too heedless perhaps of the feelings aroused by her downright thrusts. I remember her on one occasion incautiously observing, within hearing of the individual concerned (the Minister from Oldenburg to the Diet, who certainly was what the Yankees term "a mean-looking cuss"): "Ce Monsieur Eisendecher a l'air d'un coquin! L'est-il?" From this sample it may be gathered that Lady Malet was on the whole rather dreaded by the ordinary run of the Frankfort world, which she on her side-brought up as she had been amid the most |