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THE

SECOND FUNERAL OF NAPOLEON.

I.

luminous works of Hume and Smollett. The first and the last-named

ON THE DISINTERMENT OF NAPO- authors, dear Miss Smith, have

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LEON AT ST. HELENA.

Y DEAR, It is no easy task in this world to distinguish between what is great in it, and what is mean; and many and many is the puzzle that I have had in reading History (or the works of fiction which go by that name), to know whether I should laud up to the skies, and endeavor, to the best of my small capabilities, to imitate the remarkable character about whom I was reading, or whether I should fling aside the book and the hero of it, as things altogether base, unworthy, laughable, and get a novel, or a game of billiards, or a pipe of tobacco, or the report of the last debate in the House, or any other employment which would leave the mind in a state of easy vacuity, rather than pester it with a vain set of dates relating to actions which are in themselves not worth a fig, or with a parcel of names of people whom it can do one no earthly good to remember. It is more than probable, my love, that you are acquainted with what is called Grecian and Roman history, chiefly from perusing, in very early youth, the little sheepskin-bound volumes of the ingenious Dr. Goldsmith, and have been indebted for your knowledge of our English annals to a subsequent study of the more vo

written each an admirable history,

that of the Rev. Dr. Primrose, Vicar of Wakefield, and that of Mr. Robert Bramble, of Bramble Hall, in both of which works you will find true and instructive pictures of human life, and which you may always think over with advantage. But let me caution you against putting any considerable trust in the other works of these authors, which were placed in your hands at school and afterwards, and in which you were taught to believe. Modern historians, for the most part, know very little, and, secondly, only tell a little of what they know.

As for those Greeks and Romans whom you have read of in "sheepskin," were you to know really what those monsters were, you would blush all over as red as a hollyhock, and put down the history-book in a fury. Many of our English worthies are no better. You are not in a situation to know the real characters of any one of them. They appear before you in their public capacities, but the individuals you know not. Suppose, for instance, your mamma had purchased her tea in the Borough from a grocer living there by the name of Greenacre: suppose you had been asked out to dinner, and the gentleman of the house had said, "Ho! François! a (401)

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glass of champagne for Miss Smith;' Courvoisier would have served you just as any other footman would; you would never have known that there was any thing extraordinary in these individuals, but would have thought of them only in their respective public characters of Grocer and Footman. This, Madam, is History, in which a man always appears dealing with the world in his apron, or his laced livery, but which has not the power or the leisure, or, perhaps, is too high and mighty, to condescend to follow and study him in his privacy. Ah, my dear, when big and little men come to be measured rightly, and great and small actions to be weighed properly, and people to be stripped of their royal robes, beggars' rags, generals' uniforms, seedy outat-elbowed coats, and the like- - or the contrary say, when souls come to be stripped of their wicked, deceiving bodies, and turned out stark naked as they were before they were born what a strange startling sight shall we see, and what a pretty figure shall some of us cut! Fancy how we shall see Pride, with his Stultz clothes and padding pulled off, and dwindled down to a forked radish! Fancy some Angelic Virtue, whose white raiment is suddenly whisked over his head, showing us cloven feet and a tail! Fancy Humility, eased of its sad load of cares, and want, and scorn, walking up to the very highest place of all, and blushing as he takes it! Fancy-but we must not fancy such a scene at all, which would be an outrage on public decency. Should we be any better than our neighbors ? No, certainly. And as we can't be virtuous, let us be decent. Figleaves are a very decent, becoming wear, and have been now in fashion for four thousand years. And so, my dear, History is written on figleaves. Would you have any thing further? O fie!

Yes, four thousand years ago, that famous tree was planted. At their very first lie, our first parents made

for it, and there it is still the great Humbug Plant, stretching its wide arms, and sheltering beneath its leaves, as broad and green as ever, all the generations of men. Thus, my dear, coquettes of your fascinating sex cover their persons with figgery, fantastically arranged, and call their masquerading, modesty. Cowards fig themselves out fiercely as "salvage men," and make us believe that they are warriors. Fools look very solemnly out from the dusk of the leaves, and we fancy in the gloom that they are sages. And many a man sets a great wreath about his pate, and struts abroad a hero, whose claims we would all of us laugh at, could we but remove the ornament and see his numskull bare.

And such-(excuse my sermonizing) — such is the constitution of mankind, that men have, as it were, entered into a compact among themselves to pursue the fig-leaf system à l'outrance, and to cry down all who oppose it. Humbug they will have. Humbugs themselves, they will respect humbugs. Their daily victuals of life must be seasoned with humbug. Certain things are there in the world that they will not allow to be called by their right names, and will insist upon our admiring, whether we will or no. Woe be to the man who would enter too far into the recesses of that magnificent temple where our Goddess is enshrined, peep through the vast embroidered curtains indiscreetly, penetrate the secret of secrets, and expose the Gammon of Gammons ! And as you must not peer too curiously within, so neither must you remain scornfully without. Humbug-worshippers, let us into our great temple regularly and decently take our seats, and settle our clothes decently; open our books, and go through the service with decent gravity; listen, and be decently affected by the expositions of the decent priest of the place; and if by chance some straggling vagabond, loitering in the sunshine out of doors,

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dares to laugh or to sing, and disturb the sanctified dulness of the faithful; quick! a couple of big beadles rush out and belabor the wretch, and his yells make our devotions more comfortable.

Some magnificent religious ceremonies of this nature are at present taking place in France; and thinking that you might perhaps while away some long winter evening with an account of them, I have compiled the following pages for your use. Newspapers have been filled, for some days past, with details regarding the Saint Helena expedition, many pamphlets have been published, men go about crying little books and broadsheets filled with real or sham particulars; and from these scarce and valuable documents the following pages are chiefly compiled.

We must begin at the beginning; premising, in the first place, that Monsieur Guizot, when French Ambassador at London, waited upon Lord Palmerston with a request that the body of the Emperor Napoleon should be given up to the French nation, in order that it might find a final resting-place in French earth. To this demand the English Government gave a ready assent; nor was there any particular explosion of sentiment upon either side, only some pretty cordial expressions of mutual good-will. Orders were sent out to St. Helena that the corpse should be disinterred in due time, when the French expedition had arrived in search of it, and that every respect and attention should be paid to those who came to carry back to their country the body of the famous dead warrior and sovereign.

This matter being arranged in very few words (as in England, upon most points, is the laudable fashion), the French Chambers began to debate about the place in which they should bury the body when they got it; and numberless pamphlets and newspapers out of doors joined in the talk. Some people there were who had fought

and conquered and been beaten with the great Napoleon, and loved him and his memory. Many more were there who, because of his great genius and valor, felt excessively proud in their own particular persons, and clamored for the return of their hero. And if there were some few individuals in this great hot-headed, gallant, boasting, sublime, absurd French nation, who had taken a cool · view of the dead Emperor's character; if, perhaps, such men as Louis Philippe, and Monsieur A. Thiers, Minister and Deputy, and Monsieur François. Guizot, Deputy and Excellency, had, from interest or conviction, opinions at all differing from those of the majority; why, they knew what was what, and kept their opinions to themselves, coming with a tolerably good grace and flinging a few handfuls of incense upon the altar of the popular idol.

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In the succeeding debates, then, various opinions were given with regard to the place to be selected for the Emperor's sepulture. "Some demanded," says an eloquent anonymous Captain in the Navy who has written an 'Itinerary from Toulon to St. Helena," "that the coffin should be deposited under the bronze taken from the enemy by the French army - under the Column of the Place Vendôme. The idea was a fine one. This is the most glorious monument that was ever raised in a conqueror's honor. This column has been melted out of foreign cannon. These same cannons have furrowed the bosoms of our braves with noble cicatrices; and this metal-conquered by the soldier first, by the artist afterwards has allowed to be imprinted on its front its own defeat and our glory. Napoleon might sleep in peace under this audacious trophy. But, would his ashes find a shelter sufficiently vast beneath this pedestal? And his puissant statue dominating Paris, beams with sufficient grandeur on this place: whereas the wheels of carriages and the feet of passengers

would profane the funereal sanctity of the spot in trampling on the soil so near his head."

You must not take this description, dearest Amelia, "at the foot of the letter," as the French phrase it, but you will here have a masterly exposition of the arguments for and against the burial of the Emperor under the Column of the Place Vendôme. The idea was a fine one, granted; but, like all other ideas, it was open to objections. You must not fancy that the cannon, or rather the cannonballs, were in the habit of furrowing the bosoms of French braves, or any other braves, with cicatrices: on the contrary, it is a known fact that cannon-balls make wounds, and not cicatrices (which, my dear, are wounds partially healed); nay, that a man generally dies after receiving one such projectile on his chest, much more after having his bosom furrowed by a score of them. No, my love; no bosom, however heroic, can stand such applications, and the author only means that the French soldiers faced the cannon and took them. Nor, my love, must you suppose that the column was melted: it was the cannon was melted, not the column; but such phrases are often used by orators when they wish to give a particular force and emphasis to their opinions.

Well, again, although Napoleon might have slept in peace under "this audacious trophy," how could he do so, and carriages go rattling by all night, and people with great iron heels to their boots pass clattering over the stones? Nor indeed could it be expected that a man whose reputation stretches from the Pyramids to the Kremlin, should find a column, of which the base is only five and twenty feet square, a shelter vast enough for his bones. In a word, then, although the proposal to bury Napoleon under the column was ingenious, it was found not to suit; whereupon somebody else proposed the Madelaine.

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"It was proposed," says the beforequoted author with his usual felicity, "to consecrate the Madelaine to his exiled manes - that is, to his bones when they were not in exile any longer. "He ought to have, it was said, a temple entire. His glory fills the world. His bones could not contain themselves in the coffin of a man in the tomb of a king!" In this case what was Mary Magdalen to do? "This proposition, I am happy to say, was rejected, and a new onethat of the President of the Council

adopted. Napoleon and his braves ought not to quit each other. Under the immense gilded dome of the Invalides he would find a sanctuary worthy of himself. A dome imitates the vault of heaven, and that vault alone" (meaning of course the other vault) should dominate above his head. His old mutilated Guard shall watch around him: the last veteran, as he has shed his blood in his combats, shall breathe his last sigh near his tomb, and all these tombs shall sleep under the tattered standards that have been won from all the nations of Europe."

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The original words are sous les lambeaux criblés des drapeaux cueillis chez toutes les nations; in English, "under the riddled rags of the flags that have been culled or plucked" (like roses or buttercups) "in all the nations." Sweet, innocent flowers of victory! there they are, my dear, sure enough, and a pretty considerable hortus siccus may any man examine who chooses to walk to the Invalides. The burial-place being thus agreed on, the expedition was prepared, and on the 7th July the "Belle Poule" frigate, in company with "La Favorite" corvette, quitted Toulon harbor. A couple of steamers, "The Trident" and "The Ocean," escorted the ships as far as Gibraltar, and there left them to pursue their voyage.

The two ships quitted the harbor in the sight of a vast concourse of people, and in the midst of a great roar

ing of cannons. Previous to the | and landed, in company with Generals departure of the "Belle Poule," the Bertrand and Gourgaud, Baron Las Bishop of Fréjus went on board, and Cases, M. Marchand, M. Coquereau, gave to the cenotaph, in which the the chaplain of the expedition, and Emperor's remains were to be depos- M. de Rohan Chabot, who acted as ited, his episcopal benediction. Na- chief mourner. All the garrison were poleon's old friends and followers, the under arms to receive the illustrious two Bertrands, Gourgaud, Emanuel Prince and the other members of the Las Cases, "companions in exile, or expedition-who forthwith repaired sons of the companions in exile of to Plantation House, and had a conthe prisoner of the infame Hudson," ference with the Governor regarding says a French writer, were passengers their mission. on board the frigate. Marchand, On the 10th, 11th, 12th, these conDenis, Pierret, Novaret, his old and ferences continued : the crews of the faithful servants, were likewise in the French ships were permitted to come vessel. It was commanded by his on shore and see the tomb of NapoRoyal Highness Francis Ferdinand | leon. Bertrand, Gourgaud, Las Cases, Philip Louis Marie d'Orleans, Prince wandered about the island and rede Joinville, a young prince two and visited the spots to which they had twenty years of age, who was already been partial in the lifetime of the Emdistinguished in the service of his peror. country and king.

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On the 8th of October, after a voyage of six and sixty days, the Belle Poule" arrived in James Town harbor; and on its arrival, as on its departure from France, a great firing of guns took place. First, the "Oreste French brig-of-war began roaring out a salutation to the frigate; then "The Dolphin" English schooner gave her one and twenty guns; then the frigate returned the compliment of "The Dolphin" schooner; then she blazed out with one and twenty guns more, as a mark of particular politeness to the shore which kindness the forts acknowledged by similar detonations.

These little compliments concluded on both sides, Lieutenant Middlemore, son and aide-de-camp of the Governor of St. Helena, came on board the French frigate, and brought his father's best respects to his Royal Highness. The Governor was at home ill, and forced to keep his room; but he had made his house at James Town ready for Captain Joinville and his suite, and begged that they would make use of it during their stay.

On the 9th, H. R. H. the Prince of Joinville put on his full uniform

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The 15th October was fixed on for the day of the exhumation: that day five and twenty years, the Emperor Napoleon first set his foot upon the island.

On the day previous, all things had been made ready; the grand_coffins and ornaments brought from France, and the articles necessary for the operation were carried to the valley of the Tomb.

The operations commenced at midnight. The well-known friends of Napoleon before named, and some other attendants of his, the chaplain and his acolytes, the doctor of the "Belle Poule," the captains of the French ships, and Captain Alexander of the Engineers, the English Commissioner, attended the disinterment. His Royal Highness Prince de Joinville could not be present because the workmen were under English com| mand.

The men worked for nine hours incessantly, when at length the earth was entirely removed from the vault, all the horizontal strata of masonry demolished, and the large slab which covered the place where the stone sarcophagus lay, removed by a crane. This outer coffin of stone was perfect, and could scarcely be said to be damp.

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