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Updated: June 5, 2025
It was not a little extraordinary to see the direction of the Government consigned to a man who neither had nor could have any knowledge of France. From the commencement M. de Blacas affected ministerial omnipotence.
In the month of January I determined to mention the business to M. de Blacas, who then engrossed all credit and all power, and through whose medium alone anything could reach the sovereign. I need scarcely add that my intention was merely to mention to him the facts without naming the individuals from whom I obtained them.
That favourite, who succeeded Comte d'Avaray, enjoyed the full confidence of the King, and concentrated the sovereign power in his own cabinet. The only means of transmitting any communication to Louis XVIII. was to get it addressed to M. de Blacas by one of his most intimate friends.
Amongst the baggage was also a cabinet in which were a number of medallions, given him by the Pope and other potentates, some letters of Louis XVIII. which he had left behind him on his writing-table in the suddenness of his flight from the Tuileries on the 20th of March, and a number of other letters found in the portfolio of Dia Blacas intended to calumniate Napoleon.
But the party thus rejected were not disposed to yield; they surrounded the King they were unable to control, and found their strongest roots in his own family and bosom friends. The Count d'Artois was their ostensible chief, and M. de Blacas their discreet but steady ally. Through them they hoped to gain a victory as necessary as it was difficult.
I warn you that all this hypochondria, paleness, and languor are caprices which are very disagreeable to others. There is a Provence proverb which says: Vaillance de Blacas, prudence de Pontevez, caprice de Corandeuil. If there was not such a saying, it should be created for you, for you have something incomprehensible enough in your character to make a saint swear.
But what was most gratifying to the public in the composition of this new ministry was that M. de Blacas, who had made himself so odious to everybody, was superseded by M. de Richelieu, whose name revived the memory of a great Minister, and who, by his excellent conduct throughout the whole course of his career, deserves to be distinguished as a model of honour and wisdom.
He knows that though only forty-eight hours have elapsed since you entered upon your functions, you have already rendered greater services than you are perhaps aware of." I then asked M. de Blacas whether he had not received any intimation of Bonaparte's intended departure from the island of Elba by letters or by secret agents.
While Bonaparte was thus delayed I would have sent to the coast of Provence a sufficient body of men devoted to the Royal cause, sending off in another direction the regiments whose chiefs were gained over by Napoleon, as the correspondence should reveal their names. "You are perhaps right, sir," said M. de Blacas, "but what could I do? I am new here.
In the character of M. de Blacas there were no such apparent inconsistencies. Not that he was either an ardent, or a decided and stirring partisan of the contra-revolutionary reaction; he was moderate through coldness of temperament, and a fear of compromising the King, to whom he was sincerely devoted, rather than from clear penetration.
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