Germaine de Staël

THEY SAY.  WHAT SAY THEY ?

NECKER found only £10,000 in the King’s coffers.  During the morning of his first day of office the funds rose by 30 per cent., a clear indication of the way the wind was blowing.

The banker, master of the situation, cast an anxious eye on the future.  The States-General, or parliament of the nation, which the King was about to summon, had not met since 1614, that is to say, during 175 years.  It was a body composed of three orders, the Clergy, the Nobility and the Tiers État or Commons.  These three deliberated separately from each other and presented separate reports to the King.  Voting was by order, not by head, so that if the Clergy and Nobles happened to be of the same mind on any subject, the Commons could offer no effective resistance to them.  Clergy and Nobles, as Necker knew very well, were of the same mind on the subject of taxation ;  they did not intend to pay.  Where did the business man come in ?  The banker, in spite of Compte Rendu and his Mémoire Justicatif, had no illusions about the Royal finances.  The existing revenue of government was permanently in­adequate, and the basis of taxation must therefore be broadened forthwith.  He foresaw that if the States-General refused to broaden it, the middle class, suddenly enlightened, would rally, as of old, to the support of the King.  It was essential, therefore, that the voice of the business world should be heard effectively in the coming deliberations.

But the Swiss had small thought of poking his own stick into the hornet’s nest.  He lent no public countenance to the demand which many of his supporters, Germaine among them, were making on his behalf, namely, that voting at the meeting of the States-General should be by head rather than by order.  He suggested merely, that as the population of France had greatly increased since the year 1614, the membership of the Commons ought as a matter of course to be doubled.  He offered the further suggestion that the King might find it expedient to place this proposal before the Assembly of Notables.  The plan was excellently conceived and succeeded even beyond the hopes of its author.  Scenting danger to their pockets, the Notables refused to hear of any increase in the number of the Commons.  Instantly they became the object of popular sus­picion and execration, so much so, indeed, that a lively terror seized upon the Parlement of Paris, to which Necker now turned.  This body, so lately bold in opposition to the King, bolted for safety behind his throne, declaring that the number of members of any of the three orders was a matter solely to be determined by His Majesty’s wisdom.  Without moving a finger Necker had achieved the double purpose of showing Versailles his strength in Paris and showing Paris his strength in Versailles.  Louis, at a sitting of the Privy Council at which the Queen was present for the first time, ordered the doubling of the Commons’ membership ;  the credit went to Necker.  The banker could now afford to wait upon events.  It was certain that the new Order of Commons, composed as it would be largely of business men, lawyers, philosophers and journalists, would argue that, since its membership had been doubled, its voting power must be doubled also.  In other words, the Commons could be relied on to fight desperately for voting by heads instead of voting by orders.  Necker had no doubt that, in the existing temper of Paris, they would succeed.  He meant, as soon as that had been accomplished, to recommend the formation of two Chambers, as in England, with the power of imposing taxation vested in the House of Commons.  The rest, he thought, ought to be plain sailing.

The elections of the members of the States-General, which took place early in 1789, justified his expectations.  So far as the Commons were concerned there was only one issue, namely, the method of voting.  From every corner of France the same challenge rang out :  votes must be counted by head and not by order.  Mirabeau, at Marseilles, went further.  He demanded the fusion of the three orders into one parliament.  That proposal drove the blood out of Necker’s cheeks ;  where would financial stability be found in a single chamber ?  Honore Gabriel Riquetti, Comte de Mirabeau, younger son of a crazy sire, himself great of courage, evil of visage, pock-marked, with grave brow, predatory nose, sneering lips and eyes dulled by an incredible satiety of pleasure, was received with bouquets of flowers by the hungry people of Marseilles when he drove in among them.  He bent his shaggy head and wept.  But his heart leaped at thought of the battle which lay before him.

Germaine saw him a few months later, at Versailles, at the opening of the States-General, when the three orders went in procession to the church of Notre Dame in that town.  The sight made her gasp.

“It was hard,” she wrote, “not to keep gazing at him once you had begun to gaze.  His tremendous head of hair marked him out from all the others so that you felt that, like Samson, his strength resided in it.  Its very grossness lent something to the expression of his face and his whole being conveyed the idea of power, irregular perhaps, but such as ought to be possessed by a tribune of the people.  His name and his alone was famous then among the 600 members of the Commons.”¹

Mirabeau, in his black coat, strode on into the church, behind the splendours, spread prodigally under the Maytime sun, of clergy and nobility.  Germaine’s breath came freely again.

“ I was seated,” she wrote, “at a window near Madame de Montmorin, wife of the Foreign Minister, and I felt, I confess it, the most lively hope when for the first time I saw representatives of the Nation in France.  Madame de Montmorin . . . declared in a sharp tone . . . ‘ You’re making a great mistake in congratulating yourself ;  terrible misfortunes for France and all of us are coming out of this.’ ”²

That was the King’s view also on this 5th of May.  He looked weary, Germaine thought, when she saw him next day at the formal opening of the Assembly.

“ When the King took his place on the throne . . . I felt for the first time a sense of fear. . . The Queen was very much moved, she came a little late and looked pale.  The King spoke with his usual simplicity, but the expression of the deputies were more energetic than that of the monarch. . . .”³

Necker then addressed the Assembly at such unseasonable length that even his friends were bored to death.  He talked money, nothing else, letting it be understood that his husbandry would soon make the King solvent again.  Nobody believed him.  Was this the saviour at whose feet Paris lay prostrate ?  Next day the battle between Lords and Commons was joined.  It lasted six weeks, at the end of which time the nobility, in living fear, fled helter-skelter to the King for protection.  Gone now their arrogance and their bold talk about the English system :  let his Majesty levy what taxes he might think necessary, they were ready to pay.  As they spoke, they glanced anxiously towards the meeting-place of the faithful Commons.  A whiff of democracy had given Louis all that he had asked and more.  He could have money now, and a free hand, for the foundation of Necker’s power was sapped.  Instinct counselled a speedy dissolution of the States-General which had so admirably served its purpose.  The banker was in despair ;  but he had one card left—namely, the hatred that had been worked up in Paris against the Royal house.  Rumours about the King’s intentions began to spread in the Capital ;  that he meant to betray his people, to fasten the yoke more firmly than ever on their necks, to destroy liberty and re-establish tyranny.  He would certainly, it was proclaimed, succeed in these designs unless the Com­mons bestirred themselves.  Germaine was her father’s chief agent.  She served him well.  Her salon became a sounding-board ;  words were transmuted to actions overnight, and once again the name of Necker was on every lip.

The effect at Versailles was tremendous.  Until this time, the King had managed to avoid taking sides and the Commons had not sought to draw him into their struggle.  Had he dis­solved them, they would have obeyed.  But the fury of Paris imported a new element into their discussions.  On June 17 the Abbe Sieyès, whom Mirabeau had already nicknamed “Mahomet,” proposed that, as they represented ninety-six per cent. of the nation, they should call themselves The National Assembly and get to work without troubling further about the other two orders.  Necker had the King in his toils once more.  He followed up his advantage.  Two days later the majority of the Order of the Clergy, headed by five bishops, went over to the Commons.  They were followed by what Germaine called the more enlightened part of the nobility.  Louis, faithful to his principles, resisted this challenge to his authority by shutting the Commons’ house.  The deputies met in the tennis-court and took an oath not to separate till they had given France a Constitution, a further direct defiance of the Royal power.  Necker, in ecstasies, advised the King to submit and threatened to resign if his advice was rejected, moves which were duly advertised from the housetops of Paris.  Louis had now to decide whether to go on governing or to vacate his throne in favour of the banker and the banker’s friends.  To Jacques’ lively astonishment he chose to go on governing, declaring that, for the public safety, authority must be upheld.  He added that he proposed, by a bold declaration of policy, to graft reform upon the stem of absolutism.

The three orders were called to a Royal sitting on June 23, 1789.  Louis told them that he would not allow his authority to be set aside.  He declared the proceedings of the last few days illegal, ordered the Estates to meet separately and then turned to his reforms.  These consisted in the withdrawal of privilege in the matter of taxation and the throwing open to talent of all the public services, military as well as civil.  The King retired, followed by the Clergy and the Nobles.  But the Commons lingered in the hall.  One of the masters of ceremonies, de Brézé, came to order them to leave.  There was a moment of hesitation.  Then Mirabeau sprang forward, his eyes bloodshot, his lips foaming :

“ Go and tell your Master,” he shouted, “ that we are here by the will of the people, and that we shall not go out from here except at the point of the bayonet.”

This was a gesture towards Paris.  In fact, it was not Mirabeau but Necker who dominated the situation.  That evening worthy Jacques, the news of whose resignation had made other events seem paltry, was carried shoulder-high through the streets of Versailles.  Germaine tells :

“ The report that M. Necker had resigned spread.  In an instant all the streets of Versailles were full of people shouting his name.”

In Paris demonstrations of a fiercer kind were in progress.  Louis saw the hopelessness of resistance other than by armed force.  He shrank as yet from that, though Talleyrand, Bishop of Autun, had advised him to call up the troops.  Necker was recalled to the palace and invited to take office again.

“ In returning home from the King’s presence,” says Germaine, “ M. Necker was carried in triumph by the populace.  The lively ecstasy I experienced then still glows in my memory, reawakening the emotions which, in these beautiful moments of youth and hope, the spectacle pro­duced.  All those voices which called my father’s name seemed to me to be the voices of friends who shared my tender reverence for him. ... People about the court tried to suggest that M. Necker had staged this scene himself. . . .

“ The majority of the Clergy, the minority of the Nobility, all the Commons crowded to visit M. Necker on his return from the King.  His house could scarcely contain them. . . I heard my father urging the Commons not to hush their demands too far.  ‘ You’re the strongest party just now,’ he said, ‘ It’s up to you to show wisdom.’  He described for their benefit the state of France and showed them the good they could accom­plish.  Several of them wept and promised to be guided by his counsels.  But they insisted on hearing the King’s intentions.”⁴

These were announced a day or two later.  Louis commanded the three orders to sit together.  It was Necker’s victory.  But if the banker had Paris and the Assembly, the King had his army.  Very reluctantly Louis decided that he must play this, his last card.  The stake, as he believed, was the safety of France, which arising tide of violence already threatened, especially in Paris.  France, he thought, would welcome his policy of reform all the more if there was no price to pay for it in weakening of the national unity or in diminished respect for law and order.  Regiments, notably regiments containing foreign soldiers, were ordered to Versailles and Paris in readiness for the day when the King should see fit to dismiss Necker and dissolve the Assembly.  The banker mobilised his forces, which at this moment included Mirabeau.  In an appeal delivered with the magic of an oratory which wept, laughed, sneered, coaxed, threatened, abused and flattered by turns, and which, at mo­ments, filled men’s hearts with the purest flame of patriotism, Mirabeau cried to the King :

“ Sire, we conjure you in the name of the Fatherland, in the name of your goodness and your glory, send back your soldiers to the outposts from which your advisers have brought them.  Send back the guns that were forged to protect your frontiers.  Above all, send back the foreign mercenaries—those allies of our nation whom we pay not to threaten but only to defend us.  Your Majesty doesn’t need them.  What, a sovereign adored by 25,000,000 Frenchmen needs to waste his money gathering a few thousand foreigners round his throne !  Sire, you are among your children ;  let their love protect you.”

This was the cue.  Necker went daily to the palace, with his smug mouth tight shut and his ears open.

“ Every evening my father told us in strict confidence,” says Germaine, “that he expected to be arrested next morning, but that, in his opinion, the danger to which the King was exposing himself was so great that he had made it a rule of conduct not to let it appear that he suspected any­thing.

“ On the 11th of July, at three o’clock in the afternoon, M. Necker received a letter from the King in which he was ordered to leave Paris and France.  He was further ordered to keep his going a profound secret.  The baron de Breteuil had, the King stated, offered the advice that M. Necker should be placed under arrest because his dismissal was likely to cause a riot.  ‘I replied,’ wrote the King, ‘ that he (Necker) will give me strict obedience in the manner of his going.’  M. Necker was touched by this proof of faith in his honour even though it accompanied an order of exile.”⁵

He and Suzanne left for Brussels, with Germaine in pursuit.  The news soon spread.  Up went the barricades in Paris.  Out poured the mobs from their kennels.  The city went mad, partly from fear of the troops, partly from dismay at the loss of its saviour.  On July 14 the King’s great stronghold in the city’s heart, the Bastille, was attacked, entered by a trick, and des­troyed.  Bloody heads appeared on the ends of poles.  As the formidable towers came crashing down, Paris vowed that Necker should return.  Because the supply of green ribbon had given out, the trees in the Tuileries gardens were stripped of their leaves to make Necker cockades.⁶

Jacques and Suzanne had left Brussels and were homeward bound for Coppet, by way of Bâle.  They put up at an inn in this town and were settling for the night when a messenger was announced.  The good couple could scarcely believe their ears.  He came from Gabrielle de Polignac, who, fleeing with her husband and child from stricken Versailles, was staying at another hostelry in the town.⁷

¹ Considerations, Part I, p. 186.

² Considerations, Part I, p. 187.  Madame de Montmorrin died on the guillotine.  One of her sons was guillotined, another drowned.  Her husband was a victim of the September massacres.  Her eldest daughter died in prison, her younger died of grief.

³ Considerations, Part I, p. 189.

⁴ Considerations, Part I, pp. 227-229.

⁵ Considerations, Part I, p.  235.

⁶ This fact is attested by eyewitnesses.  See The Grim Bastille, by Friedrich Kircheisen (Hutchinson).

⁷  Considerations, Part I, p. 243.