1201. Benjamin Robert Haydon to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 7, 49–52.
London
April 3rd 1843.
There never was a more desperate and daring attempt to enslave the intellectuality of Man, than that made by Napoleon—nothing, holy,—nothing, sacred, but he wielded to make available to his desire!– I saw in Notre Dame round a statue of Jesus Christ, at the points of the golden Glory N.N.N. [1] in gold letters– N.N.N. glittered outside & inside Palaces & Halls—Altars & Churches; you felt haunted by his influence, the Eternal N.N.N. pursued your imagination[;] it mingled in prayer, in confession, in the innocence of the baptismal sprinkling, or the last awful ceremony of Death!– Napoleon determined to master the human will, & began at the earliest period of human perception, the budding boy– Did you ever see his Catechism? [2]
“I believe Napoleon to be an engine of God” & &c &c[.] [3] You were a Baby or not born, you see now only the Romance, the mystery, the heroism, the daring, the Grandeur, the Eclat of his Life—as [I] saw & felt & remember, all its power, & terror, and diabolism, his mysterious murders, his hideous and iron vigor, his heartless despotism!—his wanton dishonor!——
Ah my sweetest Friend, you do not know what the World escaped!– I do– An old Aide-camp of his Russian Campaigns, said, he wanted to establish a new Religion & I believe it—he was going to work when he was checked.
Jamais La Providence ne planait si proche de la terre, I think Madam de Stael said [4] —it is not to be questioned—the Winter set in a Month earlier than the oldest Russian ever remembered, and was the severest ever known—this I had from my Uncle Mordwinoff a Russian, who married my dear Mother’s Sister– [5]
You should have seen Paris, that city of Splendor & blood & Cotillon in 1814—you should have seen, as I saw but which as a Woman you never could see, the Palais Royal at midnight, with the fragments of his Officers, reckless, sacrilegious, blasphemous, abandoned, Youths, seeking for revenge, & vicious & debauched from spite & mortification—longing for blood, & to murder something or somebody to regain their self Estimation! you should have heard them shout
Vive Napoleon,
Vive ce grand conquerant
Ce diable de Napoleon
A beaucoup plus de talent
Que votre Henry quatre
Et tous ses descendans. [6]
You should as I did have followed them to the gambling tables, theatres, & streets, got into talk, praise Napoleon, swear they were never beaten, but toujours trahis! [7] —you should have shared their confidences[,] extracted their secrets, their hopes, their desires, their passions—you should have done all this before you could judge Napoleon– I did all this[.] I have cursed him, & his heartless power, so to eradicate, so to corrupt, so to destroy for ever (for the age of education was passed) the feelings, the purity, & the Minds of the Youth of so great a Country.
It is all very fine to read Madame La Duchesse [8] & think him très aimable &
De Stael said Napoleon was a system not a Man, [9] I say the Duke & he were two systems[;] it was only necessary for a collision to take place for one to destroy the other–
You never saw the Napoleon I painted for Sir Robert Peel—musing at St Helena– I will lend it to you—the origin of Wordsworth’s sublime sonnet– [10]
It was a melancholy & awful sight, to watch his officers,—they looked, like the cinders of an extinct Volcano,—black, dingy, & fierce!– Their native politeness never forsook them to me, & I have had long, touching, & romantic Conversations with them–
The morning the Russians were breaking up from the Champs Elisées, an old Marengo officer, with one leg, came up to me,—he shook his head & pointed to the destruction of the trunks of the Trees[,] the ruin of the Walks, the filth of the relics they had left behind!–
We did’nt speak for a little time, when, I said, Depuis quand, avez vous perdu cette affaire? [11] pointing to his leg—the old Moustache turned round, & said with fierce pride ‘à Marengo! [12] —Monsieur[’]—we were then silent—& he turned again as the Russians were filing away—“Ah—Why did he go so far?”
I visited the whole field of Battle of Paris, on entering a large Gentleman’s House at Pantin, I walked right into the Parlour, one old Butler was sweeping out the dung of the Cossacs’ Horses who had been bivouacked in the parlor, a hole being cut in the floor & stake driven in—the old boy looked up to me as he swept away the dirt—& said “Pour la belle Cause, Monsieur” oui Monsieur said I– Suivant vôtre exemple, dans tout L’Europe et Vous êtes Des imitateurs superbs,—par exemple– Monsieur said he—Les Francais inventent toujours, et les autres Nations, perfectionnent!– [13] You never saw such a scene, a 12 lb. Shot came in at the Corner of the roof & went diagonally through the whole House– Doors had been burnt, Wainscoats demolished, stalls thrown down—garden walls perforated, flowers crushed[,] glass broken—& every thing not absolutely requisite for Shelter, destroyed.
I went to seek the but[te] de Claumont [sic], [14] where the Ecole Polytechnique, [15] behaved so well. I could not find it but going into a Cottage, hollowed out, “ou est le but[te] de Chaumont–[”] Up started a little boy about 8 with a red night cap, & with all the air of a Frenchman, offered to be my guide–
On he marched, and when We came in sight, he turned round like a Grenadier & said—Monsieur Voila le but[te] de Chaumont—he then waited for my admiration—& seeing me musing, he turned round as if lost in thought, & said Quelle belle position! Quelle belle position!– [16]
I shall go on for ever, & tire you out– Fare thee well but not for ever– [17] My Saragossa is gone to the Academy today–
I have revised both my Cartoons—& am now going to fly at a Fresco, or Alexander killing a Lion. I do not know which.
My dear Frank has passed the second Examination (at Jesus[)] with Eclat & has only one more, & Capt. Phillott has taken my boy Fred with him on board the Howe 120 [guns] as the Impregnable is ordered home. [18]
I will send you sketches of their heads—all this does your mind good, as it amuses you[.]
B R Haydon
Address: Miss B. Barrett / 50 Wimpole St
Publication: EBB-BRH, pp. 62–66.
Manuscript: University of Vermont.
1. Here, and in the two following instances, Haydon printed these initials in a bold hand.
2. Catéchisme à l’Usage de Toutes les Églises de l’Empire Français (1808).
3. Cf. op. cit., p. 56.
4. Mme. de Staël’s comment was: “En effet, dans sa chute, la Providence s’est montrée de plus près à la terre que dans tout autre événement” (“Indeed, in his [Napoleon’s] fall, Providence manifested herself closer to the world than in any other event”). (Considérations sur les Principaux Événemens de la Révolution Françoise, 1818, pt. 4, ch. 19.)
5. Count Nikolai Semonovich Mordvinov (1754–1845), Alexander I’s Minister of Marine, had married Haydon’s maternal aunt, Harriet Cobley.
6. “Long live Napoleon / Hail this great conqueror / This devil Napoleon / Has much more talent / Than your Henry Fourth / And all his descendants.” Henri IV, who ascended the throne in 1589, was the founder of the Bourbon dynasty.
7. “Always betrayed.”
8. The Mémoires (1831–34) of Laure Junot, Duchess d’Abrantès, whose comments about Napoleon were somewhat sarcastic and spiteful.
9. Mme. de Staël actually wrote: “ce ne sont pas les hommes, mais les systèmes qui ébranlent ou qui garantissent le pouvoir. Napoléon, je l’avoue, est une exception à cette vérité” (“it is not men, but systems which shake or secure power. Napoleon, I confess, forms an exception to this truth”). (Considérations, pt. 5, ch. 8.)
10. “Napoleon Musing at St. Helena,” completed in June 1831, was bought by Peel for £136 10s (Pope, V, 591). The sonnet “To B.R. Haydon, On Seeing His Picture of Napoleon Bonaparte on the Island of St. Helena” was written by Wordsworth in 1831, and published in 1832.
11. “Since when have you lost that affair?”
12. The Battle of Marengo, in northern Italy, was fought on 14 June 1800.
13. “‘For the glorious cause, Sir’; ‘yes Sir’ said I. ‘Following your example, in all Europe and you are splendid imitators’; ‘for example, Sir’ said he ‘the French constantly invent, and other nations perfect!’”
14. Chaumont Hill.
15. The École Polytechnique, founded in 1794, was France’s military college.
16. “What a fine position! What a fine position!”
17. Cf. Byron, “Fare Thee Well!” (1816), lines 1–2.
18. Charles George Rodney Phillott, in command of H.M.S. Howe, was gazetted captain on 7 December 1818.
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