English Caricature and Satire on Napoleon I. Volume II (of 2)

The last caricature I shall reproduce is called ‘Fast Colours, Patience on a monument smiling at grief, or the Royal Laundress washing Boney’s Court dresses (G. H. invt, G. Cruikshank fect October 26, 1815).’ It shows the poor fatuous Bourbon trying to wash out the tricolour, thus bemoaning the task: ‘Bless me, how fast these colours are, I’m afraid I shall not get them white,63 altho’ I have got such a strong lather.’ Napoleon, seated on his rocky home, says, ‘Ha, ha! such an old woman as you, may rub a long while before they’ll be all white, for they are tricoloured in grain.’ There is another print of the same date and subject, uncoloured, which has the addition of Wellington, Russia, Prussia, and Austria stirring linen in a copper of Holy Water.

From this time the caricatures of Napoleon practically ceased; and, in the collection of prints in the British Museum, I can find but two more, published in 1816 – the ‘Mat de Cocagne’ and ‘Royal Christmas boxes’ – both of which are too silly to reproduce or describe. It is to the credit of the English, that, in this instance, they respected the fallen. Napoleon had been captured, disarmed, and held in safe durance, and from that time, until his death, we hear but very little of him, and none of that news is either satirical or spiteful. Clearly, therefore, this book ends here. It has nothing to do with the voyage to St. Helena, or with the perpetual squabbles of Napoleon and his suite with Sir Hudson Lowe, which are fully recorded by O’Meara and Las Cases. To all intents and purposes, Napoleon was dead to the English when he left our shores; and when he passed to his rest on May 5, 1821, all animosity died with him. Years had even tamed the bitter scribes of the ‘Times,’ as is evidenced by the leader in that paper (July 5, 1821) announcing and commenting on his decease: —

‘Thus terminates in exile, and in prison, the most extraordinary life yet known to political history. The vicissitudes of such a life, indeed, are the most valuable lessons which history can furnish. Connected with, and founded on, the principles of his character, the varieties of fortune which Buonaparte experienced are of a nature to illustrate the most useful maxims of benevolence, patriotism, or discretion. They embrace both extremes of the condition of man in society, and therefore address themselves to all ranks of human beings. But Buonaparte was our enemy – our defeated enemy – and, as Englishmen, we must not tarnish our triumphs over the living warrior by unmanly injustice towards the dead.

‘The details of his life are notorious, and we omit them. The community of which Buonaparte was in his early days a member, and the military education which he received, may, independently of any original bias of character, have laid the foundation of the greatness to which he attained, and of that mischievous application of unbridled power, through which he fell very nearly to the level whence he first had started. Nothing could be more corrupt than the morals of military society among the French before the Revolution – nothing more selfish, or contracted, than the views (at all times) of a thoroughbred military adventurer.

‘Buonaparte came into active life with as much (but we have no reason to think a larger share of) lax morality and pure selfishness as others of his age and calling. The public crisis into which he was thrown, gave to profound selfishness the form of insatiable ambition. With talents and enterprise beyond all comparison greater than any against which he had to contend, he overthrew whatever opposed his progress. Thus, ambition in him was more conspicuous than others, only because it was more successful. He became a sovereign. How, then, was this pupil of a military school prepared to exercise the functions of sovereignty? An officer, as such, has no idea of divided power. His patriotism is simply love of his troops and his profession. He will obey commands – he will issue them – but, in both cases, those commands are absolute. Talk to him of deliberation, of debate, of freedom of action, of speech, nay, of opinion – his feeling is, that the body to which any of these privileges shall be accessible, must fall into confusion, and be speedily destroyed.

‘Whatever pretexts may have been resorted to by Buonaparte – whatever Jacobin yells he may have joined in, to assist his own advance towards power – every subsequent act of his life assures us, that the military prepossessions in which he was educated, became those by which he was influenced as a statesman; and we are well persuaded of his conviction, that it was impossible for any country, above all, for France, to be governed otherwise than by one sole authority – undivided and unlimited. It may, we confess, be no satisfaction to the French, nor any great consolation to the rest of Europe, to know through what means it was, or by what vicious training, that Buonaparte was fitted, nay, predestined almost, to be a scourge and destroyer of the rights of nations, instead of employing a power irresistible, and which, in such a cause, none would have felt disposed to resist, for the promotion of knowledge, peace, and liberty throughout the world.

‘In hinting at what we conceive to be the fact, however, we are bound by regard for truth; our business is not to apologize for Buonaparte; but, so far as may be done within the brief limits of a newspaper, to analyze, and faithfully describe, him. The factions, also, which he was compelled to crush, and whose overthrow obtained for him the gratitude of his country, still threatened a resurrection when the compressing force should be withdrawn. Hence were pretexts furnished on behalf of despotism of which men, more enlightened, and better constituted, than Buonaparte, might not soon have discovered the fallacy. Raised to empire at home, his ambition sought for itself fresh aliment; and foreign conquest was at once tempting and easy.

‘Here the natural reflection will obtrude itself – what might not this extraordinary being have effected for the happiness of mankind, and for his own everlasting fame and grandeur, had he used but a moiety of the force, or perseverance, in generous efforts to relieve the oppressed which he wasted in rendering himself the monopolist and patron of oppression! But he had left himself no resource. He had extinguished liberty in France, and had no hold upon his subjects, but their love of military glory. Conquest, therefore, succeeded to conquest, until nothing capable of subjugation was left to be subdued. Insolence, and rapacity, in the victor, produced, among the enslaved nations, impatience of their misery, and a thirst for vengeance. Injustice undermined itself, and Buonaparte, with his unseasoned empire, fell together, the pageant of a day.

‘His military administration was marked by strict and impartial justice. He had the art, in an eminent degree, of inciting the emulation, and gaining the affections of his troops. He was steady and faithful in his friendships, and not vindictive, on occasions where it was his power to be so with impunity.

Of the deceased Emperor’s intellectual, and characteristic, ascendency over men, all the French, and some of the other nations besides the French, who had an opportunity of approaching him, can bear witness. He seems to have possessed the talent, not merely of command, but, when he pleased, of conciliation and persuasion. With regard to his religious sentiments, they were, perhaps, of the same standard as those of other Frenchmen starting into manhood at a time when Infidel writings had so domineered over the popular mind, that revealed religion was become a public laughing stock, and in a country where the pure Christian faith was perplexed with subtilties, overloaded with mummeries, and scandalized and discountenanced by a general looseness of morals. Upon the whole, Buonaparte will go down to posterity as a man, who, having more good at his disposal than any other potentate of any former age, had actually applied his immense means to the production of a greater share of mischief and misery to his fellow creatures – one who, on the basis of French liberty, might have founded that of every other State in Europe – but who carried on a series of aggressions against foreign States to divert the minds of his own subjects from the sense of their domestic slavery; thus imposing on foreign nations a necessity for arming to shake off his yoke, and affording to foreign despots a pretext for following his example.

‘The sensation produced by the death of Buonaparte will be a good deal confined, in this country, to its effects as a partial relief to our finances, the expense of his custody at St. Helena being little short of 400,000l. per annum. In France, the sentiment will be more deep and complex, and, perhaps, not altogether easy to define. The practical consequence of such an event may be remotely guessed at by those who have had occasion to watch, in other Governments, the difference between a living and an extinct Pretender. A pretext for suspicion and severity in the administration of affairs may be taken away by a Pretender’s death; but then, a motive to moderation – a terror, now and then salutary, of popular feelings being excited in the Pretender’s favour by misgovernment – is, at the same time, removed from the minds of reigning Princes. Buonaparte’s son still lives, it is true; but how far he may ever become an object of interest with any great party of the French nation, is a point on which we will not speculate.’

The last individual memorial I can find of Napoleon, in a popular form, was published by Hone in May 1821. It is a black-edged sheet, having, as heading, profile portraits of Napoleon, Maria Louisa, and the King of Rome, and down the sides four full-length portraits of Napoleon. It is called: —

MemorialofNAPOLÉONBorn 15 Aug. 1769. Died 5 May 1821

He put his foot on the neck of Kings, who would have put their yokes upon the necks of the People: he scattered before him with fiery execution, millions of hired slaves, who came at the bidding of their Masters to deny the right of others to be free. The monument of greatness and of Glory he erected, was raised on ground forfeited again and again to humanity – it reared its majestic front on the ruins of the shattered hopes and broken faith of the common enemies of mankind. If he could not secure the freedom, peace, and happiness of his country, he made her a terror to those who by sowing civil dissension, and exciting foreign wars, would not let her enjoy those blessings. They who had trampled upon Liberty could not at least triumph in her shame and her despair, but themselves became objects of pity and derision. Their determination to persist in extremity of wrong, only brought on themselves repeated defeat, disaster, and dismay: the accumulated aggressions their infuriated pride and disappointed malice meditated against others, returned in just and aggravated punishment upon themselves: they heaped coals of fire upon their own heads: they drank deep and long, in gall and bitterness, of the poisoned chalice they had prepared for others: the destruction with which they had threatened a people daring to call itself free, hung suspended over their heads, like a precipice, ready to fall upon and crush them. ‘Awhile they stood abashed,’ abstracted from their evil purposes, and felt how awful Freedom is, its power how dreadful. Shrunk from the boasted pomp of royal state into their littleness as men, defeated of their revenge, baulked of their prey, their schemes stripped of their bloated pride, and with nothing left but the deformity of their malice, not daring to utter a syllable or move a finger, the lords of the earth, who had looked upon men as of an inferior species, born for their use, and devoted to be their slaves, turned an imploring eye to the People, and with coward hearts and hollow tongues invoked the Name of Liberty, thus to get the people once more within their unhallowed grip, and to stifle the name of Liberty for ever.

He withstood the inroads of Legitimacy, this new Jaggernaut, this foul Blatant Beast, as it strode forward to its prey over the bodies and minds of a whole People, and put a ring in its nostrils, breathing flame and blood, and led it in triumph, and played with its crowns and sceptres, and wore them in its stead, and tamed its crested pride, and made it a laughing stock and a mockery to the nations. He, one man, did this, and as long as he did this (how or for what end, is nothing to the magnitude of this mighty question) he saved the human race from the last ignominy, and that foul stain that had been so long intended, and was at last, in an evil hour, and by evil hands, inflicted on it.

If Napoleon was a conqueror, he conquered the Grand Conspiracy of Kings against the abstract right of the Human Race to be free. If he was ambitious, his greatness was not founded on the unconditional, avowed surrender of the rights of human nature. But, with him, the state of Man rose exalted too. If he was arbitrary and a tyrant, first, France as a country was in a state of military blockade, on garrison duty, and not to be defended by mere paper bullets of the brain; secondly, but chief, he was not, nor could he become, a tyrant by ‘right divine.’ Tyranny in him was not ‘sacred’: it was not eternal: it was not instinctively bound in league of amity with other tyrannies: it was not sanctioned by all ‘the laws of religion and Morality.’

Hazlitt.Disgusting crew! who would not gladly flyTo open, downright, boldfac’d tyranny,To honest guilt that dares do all but lie,From the false juggling craft of men like these,Their canting crimes, and varnish’d villanies;These Holy Leaguers, who then loudest boastOf faith and honour when they’ve stain’d them most;From whose affection men should shrink as loathAs from their hate, for they’ll be fleec’d by both;Who, even while plund’ring, forge Religion’s nameTo frank their spoil, and, without fear or shame,Call down the Holy Trinity to blessPartition leagues, and deeds of devilishness!Moore.

Even his old enemy, George Cruikshank, whose peculiarly impetuous temper had found a free vent in caricaturing Napoleon, left off doing so when he was in safe keeping, and only designed (in a publication called the ‘Omnibus’) a ‘Monument to Napoleon’ when he died. In a note to this design he says, ‘As for me, who have skeletonised him prematurely, paring down the prodigy even to his hat and boots, I have but “carried out” a principle adopted almost in my boyhood, for I can scarcely remember the time when I did not take some patriotic pleasure in persecuting the great enemy of England. Had he been less than that, I should have felt compunction for my cruelties; having tracked him through snow and through fire, by flood and by field, insulting, degrading, and deriding him everywhere, and putting him to several humiliating deaths. All that time, however, he went on “overing” the Pyramids and the Alps, as boys “over” posts, and playing at leapfrog with the sovereigns of Europe, so as to kick a crown off at every spring he made – together with many crowns, and sovereigns, into my coffers. Deep, most deep, in a personal view of matters, are my obligations to the agitator – but what a debt the country owes to him!’

1

Gauls.

2

False of Heart, light of Ear, bloody of Hand,Fox in Stealth, Wolf in Greediness, Dog in Madness,Lion in Prey; – bless thy five Wits. King Lear, act iii. scene 4.

3

Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 345.

4

Coombe evidently did not think chronological accuracy of any importance, for Napoleon’s coronation was on December 2, even if reckoning old style.

5

The Naval Chronicle, 1805.

6

As a matter of fact, the crown is a broad circle of gold, set with large rubies, emeralds, and sapphires, on a ground of blue and gold enamel. The reason of its being called the ‘Iron Crown’ is that, running round the centre of the interior of the circle is a thin and narrow band of iron, which is supposed to be manufactured from one of the nails used in the Crucifixion of our Saviour, and given by St. Helena to her son Constantine as a talisman to protect him in battle.

7

Free translation for ‘God has given it me – let him beware who would touch it,’ the usual form of words when this crown was used.

8

Vol. xlix. p. 763.

9

September 11, 1805.

10

The news of the victory at Trafalgar was only published on November 6.

11

Everyday Book, vol. i. p. 575.

12

He was a constant attendant in the crowd on Lord Mayor’s show.

13

On March 31 Joseph Bonaparte was made King of Naples, and Murat Grand Duke of Berg and Cleves. A few months subsequently, Louis Bonaparte was made King of Holland, and the following year Jerome King of Westphalia.

14

A ‘hand,’ as a measure in horse-flesh, is four inches.

15

The nine of diamonds.

16

Suspected.

17

Of Austria.

18

‘The Broken Bridge, or Boney outwitted by General Danube,’ June 1809.

19

The divorce took place on December 16.

20

His second valet.

21

Memoirs of Madame Junot.

22

Third part of King Henry VI., act v. scene 6.

23

See next page.

24

Napoleon in Exile, by B. O’Meara.

25

My Reminiscences, by Lord Ronald Gower, vol. i. p. 209, ed. 1883.

26

The italics are mine. – J. A.

27

The Hetman, Platoff, is said to have promised his daughter in marriage, and a fortune for her dowry, to whoever would bring him Napoleon’s head.

28

Napoleon was at Dresden when he heard the news of the defeat at Vittoria.

29

Würtemburg.

30

The real quotation is: ‘Justice demands of her the sacrifice of her bloodguilty tyrant.’

31

Gas was just then coming into notoriety as an illuminating power. Westminster Bridge was lit by gas December 31, 1813, but its use did not become general in London until 1816.

32

Deceiving.

33

‘Funking’ is smoking, or causing a great smell.

34

Buonapartiana, ou Choix d’Anecdotes curieuses. Paris, 1814.

35

One of the pyramids.

36

Histoire de l’Empereur, racontée dans une Grange par un vieux Soldat.

37

Borodino.

38

In the French original it is ‘Tirez donc, François, vous nous faites attendre!’

39

They alluded to the Duke of Bassano, Caulaincourt, Bertrand, and some others.

40

He accompanied the Emperor to Elba. Constant, as we have seen, left him.

41

Anagram upon Bonaparte’s name, on his attempting to steal the Crown, &c. ‘Bona rapta pone, Leno! Lay down the goods you have stolen, Rascal!’

42

The first twenty-seven verses of the fourteenth chapter of Isaiah.

43

As a matter of fact, both his mother, Madame Letitia, and his sister, Pauline went to Elba, soon after his arrival.

44

A Voice from St. Helena. O’Meara.

45

Plentifully.

46

Slept.

47

Rolls of the drum.

48

Horse, or, as we should say, ‘gee-gee.’

49

Stronger.

50

We must recollect that George the Magnificent was then Regent, and his taste in architecture was decidedly Eastern.

51

Or Hartwell, in Buckinghamshire, where he resided whilst in England.

52

There is a very amusing skit about these ‘R – l Whiskers,’ which were assumed to be as false as the historical wigs, published early in 1816. It is too long to reproduce, although it is really laughable; but, at all events, space can be found for the first few lines.

L’AdieuFrom a puissant Prince to his Cast-off Whiskers, on his leaving London to make an ExcursionAdieu, my dear Whiskers! dear Whiskers, adieu!I ne’er shall love Whiskers as I have lov’d you,So becoming your form, and so brilliant your hue,I ne’er admir’d Whiskers as I’ve admired you.Your curve was so lovely, so like a horse-shoe,Not a Whisker at Court was so lovely as you.The Baron Geramb’s were immense, it is true,But they didn’t sweep round half so tasty as you.

53

Times, June 1, 1815.

54

George Alexander Stevens gave the famous ‘Lecture on Heads’, circa 1763 or 1764, by which it is said that here and in America he cleared nearly 10,000l.

55

June 30, 1815.

56

July 25, 1815.

57

General Gourgaud.

58

A visit to Bonaparte in Plymouth Sound, by a Lady. Plymouth, 1815.

59

Mackerel.

60

Interesting Particulars of Napoleon’s Deportation for Life to St. Helena, &c. London, 1816. Printed for W. Hone.

61

By George Colman the younger.

62

i. e. the midshipmen who took female parts.

63

The Bourbon colour.