A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to Switzerland — John Shaqi
A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to SwitzerlandCooper, James Fenimore
History
A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to Switzerland
Cooper, James Fenimore
France -- Description and travel; Germany -- Description and travel; Switzerland -- Description and travel
All this time, the conversation is on what has transpired in the
Chambers during the day, the politics of Europe, nullification in
America, or the gossip of the chateau, of which he is singularly well
informed, though he has ceased to go there.
The last of these informal interviews with General Lafayette, was one of
peculiar interest. I generally sit but half an hour, leaving him to go
to his evening engagements, which, by the way, are not frequent; but, on
this occasion, he told me to remain, and I passed nearly two hours with
him.
We chatted a good deal of the state of society under the old regime.
Curious to know his opinions of their private characters, I asked a good
many questions concerning the royal family. Louis XVI. he described as
a-well-meaning man, addicted a little too much to the pleasures of the
table, but who would have done well enough had he not been surrounded
by bad advisers. I was greatly surprised by one of his remarks. "Louis
XVI," observed Lafayette, "owed his death as much to the bad advice of
Gouverneur Morris, as to any one other thing." You may be certain I did
not let this opinion go unquestioned; for, on all other occasions, in
speaking of Mr. Morris, his language had been kind and even grateful. He
explained himself, by adding, that Mr. Morris, coming from a country
like America, was listened to with great respect, and that on all
occasions he gave his opinions against democracy, advising resistance,
when resistance was not only too late but dangerous. He did not call in
question the motives of Mr. Morris, to which he did full justice, but
merely affirmed that he was a bad adviser. He gave me to understand that
the representatives of America had not always been faithful to the
popular principle, and even went into details that it would be improper
for me to repeat. I have mentioned this opinion of Mr. Morris, because
his aristocratical sentiments were no secret, because they were mingled
with no expressions of personal severity, and because I have heard them
from other quarters. He pronounced a strong eulogium on the conduct of
Mr. Crawford, which he said was uniformly such as became an American
minister.
There is nothing, however, novel in these instances, of our
representatives proving untrue to the prominent feeling of the country,
on the subject of popular rights. It is the subject of very frequent
comment in Europe, and sometimes of complaint on the part of those who
are struggling for what they conceive to be their just privileges; many
of them having told me, personally, that our agents frequently stand
materially in their way.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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