"As there is every reason to think, that you will not be permitted to come to see me before your departure, receive my embraces, the assurance of my esteem, and my friendship. Be happy.
[94:A] Sir Hudson Lowe is, doubtless, the person here alluded to by the emperor; but he would not have dared to act as he did if such tyrannical and unfeeling conduct had been against Lord Castlereagh's approbation.
We might add many other proofs of the inhumanity exercised towards Napoleon, were it necessary to our purpose. Let our readers look over the writings of O'Meara, Lascases[94:B], and numerous other persons now living, both French and English, who bear the most heart-rending testimony to all that was done to torture and to put an end to the life of this great man.
[94:B] Particularly his eloquent and manly "Appeal to the Parliament of Great Britain, on the case of the Emperor Napoleon."
The inhuman conduct pursued towards the captive emperor at length became the subject of parliamentary inquiry. A motion to this effect was introduced to the House of Peers by Lord Holland, in the month of March, 1817. Of the motives by which this noble lord was actuated, it is difficult to award sufficient praise. He declared, "My chief motive in bringing forward this motion is to rescue parliament and the country from the stain that will attach to them, if any harsh or ungenerous treatment has been used towards Napoleon." Such an anxiety for the character of his country was, doubtless, a patriotic and proper motive; but it never ought to claim precedence of the great, permanent, and universal feelings of pity for the unfortunate, which are among the noblest characteristics of our nature. His lordship, therefore, might have insisted more upon the merit of a motive to which, on all occasions, he has shewn himself to be eminently entitled. That the praiseworthy object of Lord Holland's motion was not attained must be matter of deep regret to every man who wishes to maintain the reputation of his country. But the ministers shuffled over the charge by reading partial extracts from those documents which his lordship wished to have produced, while they refused an examination of the entire papers. This, to say the least of it, had a very suspicious appearance. Such a mode of proceeding was contrary to the long-established usages of the House, to the laws of evidence, and to the common course of practice in all investigation; and, however it might answer Lord Castlereagh's purpose, was little calculated to dispel the doubts of impartial inquirers, or to make a satisfactory case to the world and to posterity. What judgment would a foreigner form of this matter, who might have heard the blessings of our happy administration of justice extolled to the skies? A captive, the most illustrious ever classed under that head, complained of the unnecessary rigour of his treatment. A British peer made a motion in parliament to inquire into the truth of these allegations, and for the production of papers connected with and tending to elucidate the subject. The secretary of state contended, that the assertions of the complainant were groundless, read partial extracts from the papers in question, but refused their entire production, and negatived the motion for them, without assigning any sufficient reason. If Lord Castlereagh thought the inference to be drawn from such a garbled statement would be favourable to his cause, he must have built his logic, not upon the REASON of the matter, but upon the VOTES OF HIS PENSIONED ADHERENTS,--a mode of conclusion not at all uncommon or unnatural to this minister. His lordship, indeed, considered his conduct to Napoleon as meritorious, on account of that great man having been the enemy of England! But does it follow that, because the uncertain events of war had placed the French emperor in a situation to claim the protection of our laws as a private individual, that his lordship was justified in betraying his misplaced confidence, or in treating him with the same spirit of hostility when he was a helpless captive, as when he was a powerful general arrayed in arms against the whole of Europe? A doctrine, more repugnant to humanity, more dangerous in its consequences to society, cannot be conceived. From what code of morality, or from what system of religion, did his lordship borrow such a principle? Much has been said of Lord Castlereagh's kindness of heart; but what a dark scroll of evidence does the treatment of Napoleon at St. Helena exhibit against such an assertion! To commiserate a fallen foe, to be moved by the sad spectacle of his fortunes, is the natural propensity and inseparable concomitant of every man possessing "PERSONAL COURAGE," or "KINDNESS OF HEART:"