Historic Doubts Relative To Napoleon Buonaparte Part 3

About this juncture it was that the public attention was first invited, by these pages, to the question as to the real existence of Napoleon Buonaparte. They excited, it may be fairly supposed, along with much surprise and much censure, some degree of doubt, and probably of consequent inquiry. No fresh evidence, as far as I can learn, of the truth of the disputed points, was brought forward to dispel these doubts. We heard, however, of the most jealous precautions being used to prevent any intercourse between the formidable prisoner, and any stranger who, from motives of curiosity, might wish to visit him. The "man in the iron mask" could hardly have been more rigorously secluded: and we also heard various contradictory reports of conversations between him and the few who were allowed access to him; the falsehood and inconsistency of most of these reports being proved in contemporary publications.

At length, just about the time when the public scepticism respecting this extraordinary personage might be supposed to have risen to an alarming height, it was announced to us that he was dead! A stop was thus put, most opportunely, to all troublesome inquiries. I do not undertake to deny that such a person did live and die. That he was, and that he did, _everything_ that is reported, we cannot believe, unless we consent to admit contradictory statements; but many of the events reported, however marvellous, are certainly not, when taken separately, physically impossible. But I would only entreat the candid reader to reflect what might naturally be expected, on the supposition of the surmises contained in the present work being well founded.

Supposing the whole of the tale I have been considering to have been a fabrication, what would be the natural result of such attempt to excite inquiry into its truth? Evidently the shortest and most effectual mode of avoiding detection, would be to _kill_ the phantom, and so get rid of him at once. A ready and decisive answer would thus be provided to any one in whom the foregoing arguments might have excited suspicions: "Sir, there can be no doubt that such a person existed, and performed what is related of him; and if you will just take a voyage to St. Helena, you may see with your own eyes,-not him, indeed, for he is no longer living,-but his _tomb_: and what evidence would you have that is more decisive?"

So much for his _Death_: as for his _Life_,-it is just published by an eminent writer: besides which, the shops will supply us with abundance of busts and prints of this great man; all striking likenesses-of one another. The most incredulous must be satisfied with this! "Stat magni NOMINIS umbra!"

KONX OMPAX.

POSTSCRIPT TO THE SEVENTH EDITION.

Since the publication of the Sixth Edition of this work, the French nation, and the world at large, have obtained an additional evidence, to which I hope they will attach as much weight as it deserves, of the reality of the wonderful history I have been treating of. The Great Nation, among the many indications lately given of an heroic zeal like what Homer attributes to his Argive warriors, t?sas?a? ?????S ???at?

te st??a??? te, have formed and executed the design of bringing home for honourable interment the remains of their ill.u.s.trious Chief.

How many persons have actually inspected these relics, I have not ascertained; but that a real coffin, containing real bones, was brought from St. Helena to France, I see no reason to disbelieve.

Whether future visitors to St. Helena will be shown merely the identical _place_ in which Buonaparte was (_said_ to have been) interred, or whether another set of real bones will be exhibited in that island, we have yet to learn.

This latter supposition is not very improbable. It was something of a credit to the island, an attraction to strangers, and a source of profit to some of the inhabitants, to possess so remarkable a relic; and this glory and advantage they must naturally wish to retain. If so, there seems no reason why they should not have a Buonaparte of their own; for there is, I believe, no doubt that there are, or were, several Museums in England, which, among other curiosities, boasted, each, of a genuine skull of Oliver Cromwell.

Perhaps, therefore, we shall hear of several well authenticated skulls of Buonaparte also, in the collections of different virtuosos, all of whom (especially those in whose own crania the "organ of wonder" is the most largely developed) will doubtless derive equal satisfaction from the relics they respectively possess.

POSTSCRIPT TO THE NINTH EDITION.

The Public has been of late much interested and not a little bewildered, by the accounts of many strange events, said to have recently taken place in France and other parts of the Continent. Are these accounts of such a character as to allay, or to strengthen and increase, such doubts as have been suggested in the foregoing pages?

We are told that there is now a Napoleon Buonaparte at the head of the government of France. It is not, indeed, a.s.serted that he is the very original Napoleon Buonaparte himself. The death of that personage, and the transportation of his genuine bones to France, had been too widely proclaimed to allow of his reappearance in his own proper person. But "uno avulso, non deficit alter." Like the Thibetian wors.h.i.+ppers of the Dalai Lama, (who never dies; only his soul transmigrates into a fresh body), the French are so resolved, we are told, to be under a Buonaparte-whether that be (see note to p. 56) a man or "a system"-that they have found, it seems, a kind of new incarnation of this their Grand Lama, in a person said to be the nephew of the original one.

And when, on hearing that this personage now fills the high office of President of the French Republic, we inquire (very naturally) _how he came there_, we are informed that, several years ago, he invaded France in an English vessel, (the _English_-as was observed in p.

52-having always been suspected of keeping Buonaparte ready, like the winds in a Lapland witch's bag, to be let out on occasion,) at the head of a force, not, of six hundred men, like his supposed uncle in his expedition from Elba, but of fifty-five,(!) with which he landed at Boulogne, proclaimed himself emperor, and was joined by no less than _one_ man! He was accordingly, we are told, arrested, brought to trial, and sentenced to imprisonment; but having, some years after, escaped from prison, and taken refuge in England, (_England_ again!) he thence returned to France: AND SO the French nation placed him at the head of the government!

All this will doubtless be received as a very probable tale by those who have given full credit to all the stories I have alluded to in the foregoing pages.

POSTSCRIPT TO THE ELEVENTH EDITION.

When any dramatic piece _takes_-as the phrase is-with the Public, it will usually be represented again and again with still-continued applause; and sometimes imitations of it will be produced; so that the same drama in substance will, with occasional slight variations in the plot, and changes of names, long keep possession of the stage.

Something like this has taken place with respect to that curious tragi-comedy-the scene of it laid in France-which has engaged the attention of the British public for about sixty years; during which it has been "exhibited to crowded houses"-viz., coffee-houses, reading-rooms, &c., with unabated interest.

The outline of this drama, or series of dramas, may be thus sketched:

_Dramatis Personae._

A. A King or other Sovereign.

B. His Queen.

C. The Heir apparent.

D. E. F. His Ministers.

G. H. I. J. K. Demagogues.

L. A popular leader of superior ingenuity, who becomes ultimately supreme ruler under the t.i.tle of Dictator, Consul, Emperor, King, President, or some other.

Soldiers, Senators, Executioners, and other functionaries, Citizens, Fishwomen, &c.

_Scene_, Paris.

(1.) The first Act of one of these dramas represents a monarchy, somewhat troubled by murmurs of disaffection, suspicions of conspiracy, &c.

(2.) Second Act, a rebellion; in which ultimately the government is overthrown.

(3.) Act the third, a provisional government established, on principles of liberty, equality, fraternity, &c.

(4.) Act the fourth, struggles of various parties for power, carried on with sundry intrigues, and sanguinary conflicts.

(5.) Act the fifth, the re-establishment of some form of absolute monarchy.

And from this point we start afresh, and begin the same business over again, with sundry fresh interludes.

All this is highly amusing to the English Public to _hear_ and _read_ of; but I doubt whether our countrymen would like to be actual _performers_ in such a drama.

Whether the French really are so, or whether they are mystifying us in the accounts they send over, I will not presume to decide. But if the former supposition be the true one,-if they have been so long really acting over and over again in their own persons such a drama, it must be allowed that they deserve to be characterized as they have been in the description given of certain European nations: "An Englishman," it has been said, "is never happy but when he is miserable; a Scotchman is never at home but when he is abroad; an Irishman is never at peace but when he is fighting; a Spaniard is never at liberty but when he is enslaved; and a Frenchman is never settled but when he is engaged in a revolution."

POSTSCRIPT TO THE TWELFTH EDITION.

"Time" says the proverb, "rings Truth to light." But the process is gradual and slow. The debt is paid, as it were, by instalments. It is only bit by bit, and at considerable intervals, that Truth comes forth as the morning twilight to dispel the mists of fiction.

It is above forty years that men have been debating the question:-Who were the parties that burned the city of Moscow?-without ever thinking of the preliminary question, whether it ever was burnt at all. And now at length we learn that it never was.

The following extract from a New Orleans paper contains the information obtained by an American traveller-one of that great nation whose accuracy as to facts is so well known-who visited the spot.