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No. 20. L'ambassadeur en Angleterre au Ministre des Affaires Etrangères. Londres, le 12/25 Juillet 1914.
Professor Marc-Auguste Pictet, of Geneva, visited the Edgeworths this summer, coming over from Mr. Tuite's, of Sonna, where he was staying with Mr. Chenevix. He afterwards published an interesting account of his visit to Edgeworthstown in the Bibliotheque Britannique, as well as in his Voyage de trois mots en Angleterre, which was published at Geneva in 1802. Of Maria Edgeworth he says: *
Look at the view down that impasse the sunlight and shadows on the houses, the doorways, the people. Oh, the air! Oh, the smells! Que c'est bon que je suis contente! Et dire que j'ai passé cinq mois, mais cinq grands mois, en Angleterre.
"Frappe a Londres" is printed on one part of it, and "La Descente dans Angleterre" upon another. Struck to commemorate a conquest, it remains now as a souvenir of a fiasco. But it was a close call.
And so when on the 22nd the fleets assembled at Portland and Milford Haven before rendezvous at the Lizard, the whole original proposal had fallen through: for here was neither tricolour nor saltire, only three German ships, only five Italian; the "probability", moreover, of the capture of a sea-fort by England was imminent: and on the evening of the mobilisation of the squadrons feverish activity was reported from Toulon; a British Legation attache,, seeing fit to stroll round the Caserne Pepiniere, beheld in the yard an extraordinary crowd of limbers: and, pitching into a cab, from the nearest postes et telegraphes wired to London the word: "Angleterre".
The inspector left the room as swiftly as his short legs could carry him, ignoring the ethics of common politeness. As he stumbled down the stairs he cursed the minister of police for requiring this spy work of him, and not informing him why it was done. Ah, these cursed Anglais from Angleterre! They were all alike, and this one was the worst he had ever encountered.
He also told him the anecdote of Lenny's own gallant countryman, Admiral Byng, whose execution gave rise to Voltaire's celebrated witticism, "En Angleterre on tue un admiral pour encourager les autres." Many other illustrations, still more pertinent to the case in point, his erudition supplied from the stores of history.
"You must leave all your wet things to be dried." "O! entre frères! In any boat-house in England we should find the same." "En Angleterre, vous employez des sliding-seats, n'est-ce pas?" "We are all employed in commerce during the day; but in the evening, voyez-vous, nous sommes sèrieux." These were the words.
No. 54. L'Ambassadeur en Angleterre au Ministre des Affaires Etrangères. Londres, le 10/29 Juillet 1914.
'Quoique la loi dont nous parlons, ne s'observe plus en Angleterre. 'An alien born may purchase lands or other estates, but not for his own use; for the King is thereupon entitled to them. 'Yet an alien may acquire a property in goods, money, and other personal estate, or may hire a house for his habitation.