The Rose of Old St. Louis Part 25

Mr. Meriwether Lewis was waiting to conduct me to the President's office, and he stayed and talked with me pleasantly until the President arrived; laughing with me at my _faux pas_, but telling me I had nothing to fear from the President's displeasure, as he was not the man to harbor a grudge on so slight a matter, and he (though, to be sure, he was a lifelong friend) had ever found him to be kind, considerate, and genial.

And such I found him in our brief interview. He went directly to the point with me, which always goes far toward winning my liking.

"I know your family," he said, "have ever been friends of Mr.

Hamilton, and so not particularly friendly to me in a political way; but your father and I have been a.s.sociated much in scientific pursuits, and we have ever been congenial friends in our love of botanical research. He has sent me many rare plants and seeds to Monticello, and now he shows me the further courtesy of reposing a confidence in me, and I hope you will express to him my appreciation, which I will prove by reposing a like confidence in you. Your father writes me that a letter has just been received from your uncle, Monsieur Barbe Marbois, inviting you to spend some time with him in Paris. He says that both he and your mother think it much to be desired that you should improve this opportunity for completing your education. He says, further, that a s.h.i.+p sails from New York early next week, and requests me, if you should be in Was.h.i.+ngton when I receive this letter, as he suspects, that I will instruct you to lose no time in reaching home. Indeed, so urgent is he, and the time is so short, I think, without doubt, you should set off by daybreak to-morrow morning.

"Now, as I said before, I am going also to repose a confidence in you.

It is not generally known, nor do I wish it known for the present (therefore I speak in confidence), that I have decided to send an envoy extraordinaire to Paris for the purpose of discussing with the French government the possibility of purchasing New Orleans. I communicated this to the Senate to-day in secret session, and I now communicate it to you, also in 'secret session'"--with a genial smile.

"I have asked Mr. Monroe to undertake this delicate mission, and he has to-day consented, and is here arranging his plans and discussing with me and with Mr. Madison the points involved. He will not be able to set out for some weeks, but we hope now that he can sail by the eighth of March, reaching Paris somewhere near the twelfth of April.

Mr. Livingston naturally knows nothing of this, and the favor I have to ask of you is that, immediately upon your arrival in Paris, you call upon him and deliver to him a note which I shall give you, and also explain fully to him all that I have said to you, all that you have heard at dinner this evening, and particularly repeat to him as much as you can hold in memory of the debate you listened to in the Senate to-day."

The President paused for a moment, and then, with a smile of rare sweetness, he added:

"Is the ardent young friend of Hamilton willing to put the President under such a load of obligations?"

For a moment I hardly knew what response to make. Not that I dreamed of denying his request: I was only too proud and happy that he should have made it. But that he should have reposed such a confidence in me, when he knew me scarcely at all, seemed incomprehensible. I made but a stammering reply.

"Your Excellency," I said, "I fear I have given you but a poor idea of my discretion, but since you trust me in spite of my blunder, I am very proud to be of service to you."

It took but a minute for the President to give me his note to Mr.

Livingston, and a few further instructions, and then he bade me G.o.d-speed with a warmth and cordiality I had never expected and certainly never deserved at his hands.

There was but little sleep for me that night. As Fatima clattered into the stony courtyard of my inn, I called loudly for Bandy Jim; and when the poor old man came stumbling out of some inner retreat, half blinded with sleep, I begged him to look after Fatima himself, and see that she was well rubbed down and ready for an early morning start, and that I was called and breakfast ready by six.

In my own room I spent not much time in packing my saddle-bags, but it took me a good half-hour to write a brief note to mademoiselle, explaining why I was compelled to cancel my engagement with her for the next day, and bidding her good-by in such fas.h.i.+on that, without seeming presumptuous, she might read between the lines how much of my heart I had put into it.

I had said nothing in my note about going to Paris. I very much desired to keep that for a surprise when I might some day meet her there. And, lest she should hear it from others, I wrote also a note to Meriwether Lewis, asking him to say nothing about it to any one, and to request the President to keep my secret for me.

Then, putting a bright new gold piece with the two notes to be delivered by the trusty hands of Bandy Jim in the morning, I lay down to get a brief sleep, if possible--but, sleeping or waking, to dream of Paris and the Comtesse de Baloit.

CHAPTER XIX

CHECK TO THE ABBe!

"When Greeks joined Greeks, then was the tug of war."

I had been in Paris three weeks, and they had been weeks of unalloyed delight. The life and gaiety of the brilliant capital, the streets lined with handsome houses and thronged with gay equipages, richly dressed people, soldiers wearing the tricolored c.o.c.kade, students, artists, workmen, blanchisseuses, and nursery-maids in picturesque costumes tending prettily dressed children, made a moving panorama I never tired of. Even the great palaces and the wonderful works of art scarcely interested me as did this s.h.i.+fting kaleidoscopic picture, and I looked back at life in my native town on the banks of the Delaware as belonging to another world, incomparably tame and dull by comparison.

Every morning I accompanied my uncle, Monsieur Barbe Marbois, to the Treasury office, and left him at the door, to roam around the streets and watch the life of the town. I was at home again in time for midday dejeuner, and then on Fatima's back (for I had brought Fatima with me; no persuasion of friends could induce me to leave her behind, since she had twice rescued mademoiselle and so become my most trusted friend)--on Fatima's back I dashed out the Avenue to the beautiful Wood of Boulogne, sometimes racing with the young bloods to whom my uncle had introduced me, sometimes checking my horse to a gentle canter beside a coachful of Faubourg St. Germain beauties, exchanging merry compliments with the brilliant and witty mothers while I looked at the pretty daughters, who, for aught I knew, were as stupid as their mothers were brilliant, since they never opened their mouths.

And so back to my aunt's in time to make a careful toilet for the four-o'clock dinner, when there were sure to be guests, more or less distinguished, but always interesting.

I had delivered my message and my note from the President to Mr.

Livingston on the day of my arrival, and it seemed to me that it did not please him overmuch that an envoy extraordinaire should be sent to attend to his affairs; but he said nothing, and received me most graciously, both as a messenger from the President and because I was the son of his old friend.

Several times since my arrival at my uncle's house, both Mr.

Livingston and his son the colonel had been guests there, and always the talk had turned on what most interested me, the purchase of New Orleans and the Floridas. At one of these dinners, Monsieur Talleyrand, the Minister of Foreign Relations, was also guest, and while there was but little reference to Louisiana at table, I was, with no intention on my part, a listener later to a most interesting conversation between Monsieur Talleyrand and Mr. Livingston that was no doubt intended to be strictly private.

Thinking that it was very likely the three gentlemen--- the Minister of Foreign Relations, my uncle the Secretary of the Treasury, and the United States minister--might have matters of importance to discuss where my absence would be more desirable than my presence, I left the salon immediately after dinner, and went out into the garden, taking with me a Philadelphia paper that had arrived by that morning's express and that I had not yet seen. I took my paper into the little summer-house at the farther end of the garden, and was soon engrossed reading the debates in Congress. I found there had been another of great interest on the same Louisiana subject, and so deeply immersed was I in my paper that I did not notice that any one had entered the garden until the sound of voices quite close to me roused me. A small table with several garden-chairs surrounding it stood under a spreading horse-chestnut tree, and there we often took our morning coffee, if the weather was fine, or smoked our evening cigars. At this table Monsieur Talleyrand and Mr. Livingston had seated themselves, and how long they had been talking I did not know, so absorbed was I in my paper, when Mr. Livingston's voice, a little raised above its usual even tenor, roused me.

I sprang to my feet, realizing that I must seem like an eavesdropper, should any one discover me there, even though I had not heard a word.

Mr. Livingston was facing the door of the summer-house, and as he saw me he nodded pleasantly to me to come forward.

"Here, Citizen Minister," he said to Mr. Talleyrand, "is a young man whose father would like to train him for the profession of diplomacy.

Perhaps he could not begin his apprentices.h.i.+p better than by being present at our interview, and, if you have no objections, I will ask him to remain. He can act as secretary and take notes for the future reference of us both, if you like."

I rather thought Mr. Talleyrand did _not_ quite like, though he a.s.sented to Mr. Livingston's proposal, but with such cold politeness as made me exceedingly uncomfortable, and I would have been very glad to make my escape to the house. But, for some reason, Mr. Livingston seemed to especially desire me to remain, and I saw no help for it but to sit down at a respectful distance, take my memorandum-book out of my pocket, and prepare, ostensibly at least, to take notes.

I was much concerned, also, at what Mr. Livingston had said about my father desiring to train me for diplomacy. He had never said anything to me about it, and I determined on the instant I would never be a diplomat. "The life of a soldier for me!" I said to myself, and then suddenly realized that Mr. Livingston was talking, and it behooved me to listen carefully if I was to play the secretary.

Mr. Livingston was saying:

"Be a.s.sured, sir, that even were it possible that the government of the United States could be insensible to the sufferings of the Western people, they would find it as easy to prevent the Mississippi from rolling its waters into the ocean as to control the impulse of the people to do themselves justice. Sir, I will venture to say that were a fleet to shut up the mouths of the Chesapeake, the Delaware, and the Hudson, it would create less sensation in the United States than the denial of the right of deposit at New Orleans has done."

I liked the ring in Mr. Livingston's voice, and his words sounded very stirring to me; but I could not see that they made any impression on the impa.s.sive countenance of Monsieur Talleyrand. He was reclining in his garden-chair, and I could see that as Mr. Livingston spoke he was regarding him intently through half-shut eyes. His tones were of the sweetest and blandest as he replied:

"The First Consul, Mr. Livingston, has asked me to say to you that he proposes to send General Bernadotte as envoy to the United States to acquire such information as he may deem necessary, previous to his taking any measure relative to the situation in which the acquisition of Louisiana will place France with respect to the United States. I hope, moreover, that this measure on the part of the First Consul will prove satisfactory both to you and to your government."

Now I cannot but think that Mr. Talleyrand is too astute a man to have thought for an instant that this would prove satisfactory, and so, I have no doubt, he was quite prepared for Mr. Livingston's indignant outburst:

"Satisfactory, sir! If, sir, the question related to the forming of a new treaty, I should find no objection to this measure. On the contrary, I should readily acquiesce in it as that which would be best calculated to render the treaty mutually advantageous. But, sir, it is not a new treaty for which we now press, but the recognition of an old one, by which the United States have acquired rights that no change in the circ.u.mstances of the country obliges them to relinquish, and which they never will relinquish but with their political existence!"

It was hard for me to sit still under such ringing sentences. I wanted to clap my hands and cry "Bravo!" For a moment all the glories of Paris turned dull and insipid; I would have given them all to be in Kentucky on Fatima's back, marching down the river to capture New Orleans.

But Mr. Livingston had not finished. Mr. Talleyrand made a slight movement as if to speak, but, with uplifted hand to prevent him, Mr.

Livingston hurried on:

"In what situation, sir, are we now placed? An armament is about sailing for New Orleans. That port has been shut by the order of Spain. The French commandant will find it shut. Will he think himself authorized to open it? If not, it must remain shut until the envoy of France shall have arrived in America, made the necessary inquiries, and transmitted the result of those inquiries to the First Consul. In the meantime all the produce of five States is left to rot upon their hands. There is only one season in which the navigation of the Mississippi is practicable. This season must necessarily pa.s.s before the envoy of France can arrive and make his report. Is it supposable, sir, that the people of the United States will tranquilly await the progress of negotiations, when the ruin of themselves and their families will be attendant on the delay? I can never bring myself to believe that the First Consul will, by deferring for a moment the recognition of a right that admits of no discussion, break all those ties which bind the United States to France, obliterate the sense of past obligations, change every political relation that it has been, and still is, the earnest wish of the United States to preserve, and force them to connect their interests with a rival power! And this, too, for an object of no real moment in itself. Louisiana is, and ever must be, from physical causes, a miserable country in the hands of an European power."

Mr. Talleyrand's eyes had not moved from Mr. Livingston's face during this long speech, but at his last words I saw a sudden spark leap into them.

"You no doubt think, sir," he said in his low, even tones, "that Louisiana would be a much better country in the hands of the United States. Would your government like to buy it from us?"

"You know, sir, and have known for some time," replied Mr. Livingston, "that we are ready to make an offer for New Orleans and the Floridas as soon as you are ready to listen to it."

"But would you not rather have the whole of Louisiana? The rest of it, without New Orleans, would be of little value to us. What would you give for the whole?"

Mr. Livingston looked bewildered for an instant; it was almost more than he could take in at once. But after a moment's thought he replied:

"It is a subject, sir, I have not considered; but I suppose we shall not object to twenty million francs, provided our citizens are paid."

"That is much too low an offer, my dear sir," responded Talleyrand, "but I see the idea is new to you. I would be glad if you would reflect upon it, and tell me to-morrow the result of your reflections."

"Mr. Monroe will be in town in a day or two." (My heart gave so great a thump when Mr. Livingston said that, I feared they might hear it--for would not the Comtesse de Baloit be with him?) "And I would like to delay any further offer until I shall have the pleasure of introducing him."