Of the present commander of our, flotilla at Boulogne, Lacrosse, I will also say some few words.  A lieutenant before the Revolution, he became, in 1789, one of the most ardent and violent Jacobins, and in 1792 was employed by the friend of the Blacks, and our Minister, Monge, as an emissary in the West Indies, to preach there to the negroes the rights of man and insurrection against the whites, their masters.  In 1800, Bonaparte advanced him to a captain-general at Guadeloupe, an island which his plots, eight years before, had involved in all the horrors of anarchy, and where, when he now attempted to restore order, his former instruments rose against him and forced him to escape to one of your islands—­I believe Dominico.  Of this island, in return for his hospitable reception, he took plans, according to which our General Lagrange endeavoured to conquer it last spring.  Lacrosse is a perfect revolutionary fanatic, unprincipled, cruel, unfeeling, and intolerant.  His presumption is great, but his talents are trifling.

LETTER XXXIV.

Paris, October, 1805.

My lord:—­The defeat of the Austrians has excited great satisfaction among our courtiers and public functionaries; but the mass of the inhabitants here are too miserable to feel for anything else but their own sufferings.  They know very well that every victory rivets their fetters, that no disasters can make them more heavy, and no triumph lighter.  Totally indifferent about external occurrences, as well as about internal oppressions, they strive to forget both the past and the present, and to be indifferent as to the future; they would be glad could they cease to feel that they exist.  The police officers were now, with their gendarmes, bayoneting them into illuminations for Bonaparte’s successes, as they dragooned them last year into rejoicings for his coronation.  I never observed before so much apathy; and in more than one place I heard the people say, “Oh! how much better we should be with fewer victories and more tranquillity, with less splendour and more security, with an honest peace instead of a brilliant war.”  But in a country groaning under a military government, the opinions of the people are counted for nothing.

At Madame Joseph Bonaparte’s circle, however, the countenances were not so gloomy.  There a real or affected joy seemed to enliven the usual dullness of these parties; some actors were repeating patriotic verses in honour of the victor; while others were singing airs or vaudevilles, to inspire our warriors with as much hatred towards your nation as gratitude towards our Emperor.  It is certainly neither philosophical nor philanthropical not to exclude the vilest of all passions, hatred, on such a happy occasion.  Martin, in the dress of a conscript, sang six long couplets against the tyrants of the seas; of which I was only able to retain the following one: