Democratic Sentinel, Volume 6, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 November 1882 — Napoleen III. and Men of Talent. [ARTICLE]

Napoleen III. and Men of Talent.

Napoleon 111. and the Empress naturally attached importance to drawing eminent men of letters to court; but for the very reason that honors and more substantial things were showered upon those who came, every author and jourr-itt who declared himself a Bonapartist, got accused of selling his pen, and lost influence. From his rock at Guernsey Victor Hugo exercised a dreaded pontificate over the world of jetters, thundering anathemas against those who held any parley with “The Man of December.” He had sworn in magnificent verses written in his“Chatiments,” never to re-enter France so long as the empire lasted, and he kept his word; yet on one or two occasions the Emperor caused him to be treated with dignified courtesy. When “Les Miserables” was published, Theophile Gautier, who was literary critic of The Moniteur, wrote a brilliant panegyric on his book; but the editor was afraid to insert it until he had submitted a proof to the Emperor. Napoleon 111. at once ordered that the article should appear; and when next he saw Gautier at one of the Empress’ Monday night receptions, said a few kindly words to him in praise of Victor Hugo’s genius. He was always gracious in this way to those who approached him in a friendly spirit, and it may truly be said that no sovereign ever treated writers with such high consideration as he did. There is a story of the Princess Adelaide, Louis Philippe’s sister, having, in the fondness of her heart, sent fifty francs by a footman to a renowned critic, who, she had heard, was in straightened circumstances. Napoleon 111. never affected to regard writers after this lofty fashion, as Bohemians. He put Prosper Merimee, Ponsard and Sainte Beuve into the Senate, thereby giving them salaries of £1,200 a year. He made ■ the Corps Legislatif vote a pension of 20,000 francs a year to Lamartine, a Republican; Octave Feuillet he appointed librarian at Fontainebleau; and Jules Sandeau, librarian at Compeigne, snug and well-paid little sinecures. Edmond About was sent by bin* on special missions, and commissioned to write pamphlets; and numbers of other agreeable writers, taking the definition given in “Lothair” of agreeable people, were made happy with inspectorships of fine arts, custodianships of museums, and so forth. The Emperor was even sedulous to provide half-way houses for men of talent who were willing to forsake the opposition without going over at once to the Tuilleries. The Princess Mathilde used to " offer charming hospitality to these demi-rallios, and at one time Prince Napoleon made of the Palais Royal a place of resort for men like Ernest Renan, Emile de Girardin, Emile Ollivier, and others who were trying to form an Imperial Liberal party. All this was no use, however, and the Emperor got little more assistance from the authors whom he petted than from the loyal cures whom he promoted to be bishops. The cures, when they had obtained their mitres, ceased to gush about the Napoleons* and tried to curry favor with the Vatican; while the men of letters who went to court, avoided writing a line in favor of, the empire, but rather gave that institution sly digs with their pens to avoid the reproach of servility. Among the papers found at the Tuileries after Sedan, was the plot in the Emperor’s own hand of a novel which he had desired that some popular writer should work up for him. It was to describe the adventures of one Jean Bernard, who, coming up to Paris full of disloyal ideas put into his head by Republicans, was to be converted to Bonapartism by the splendors of the capital, and the sight of the many great and good things which the Empire had done for the workingman. The novel was never written, but the hero, Bernard, whether he came from the French provinces, from England, or from across the Atlantic, was a type of Bonapartist proselyte common enough.— London Times.