Book: The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Book VII.

J >> Jean Jacques Rousseau >> The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Book VII.




On the first trial I made of his talents in my official functions,
I found him less troublesome than I expected he would have been,
considering he was a man without experience, in the service of an
ambassador who possessed no more than himself, and whose ignorance and
obstinacy constantly counteracted everything with which common-sense and
some information inspired me for his service and that of the king. The
next thing the ambassador did was to connect himself with the Marquis
Mari, ambassador from Spain, an ingenious and artful man, who, had he
wished so to do, might have led him by the nose, yet on account of the
union of the interests of the two crowns he generally gave him good
advice, which might have been of essential service, had not the other, by
joining his own opinion, counteracted it in the execution. The only
business they had to conduct in concert with each other was to engage the
Venetians to maintain their neutrality. These did not neglect to give
the strongest assurances of their fidelity to their engagement at the
same time that they publicly furnished ammunition to the Austrian troops,
and even recruits under pretense of desertion. M. de Montaigu, who I
believe wished to render himself agreeable to the republic, failed not on
his part, notwithstanding my representation to make me assure the
government in all my despatches, that the Venetians would never violate
an article of the neutrality. The obstinacy and stupidity of this poor
wretch made me write and act extravagantly: I was obliged to be the agent
of his folly, because he would have it so, but he sometimes rendered my
employment insupportable and the functions of it almost impracticable.
For example, he insisted on the greatest part of his despatches to the
king, and of those to the minister, being written in cipher, although
neither of them contained anything that required that precaution. I
represented to him that between the Friday, the day the despatches from
the court arrived, and Saturday, on which ours were sent off, there was
not sufficient time to write so much in cipher, and carry on the
considerable correspondence with which I was charged for the same
courier. He found an admirable expedient, which was to prepare on
Thursday the answer to the despatches we were expected to receive on the
next day. This appeared to him so happily imagined, that notwithstanding
all I could say on the impossibility of the thing, and the absurdity of
attempting its execution, I was obliged to comply during the whole time I
afterwards remained with him, after having made notes of the few loose
words he spoke to me in the course of the week, and of some trivial
circumstances which I collected by hurrying from place to place.
Provided with these materials I never once failed carrying to him on the
Thursday morning a rough draft of the despatches which were to be sent
off on Saturday, excepting the few additions and corrections I hastily
made in answer to the letters which arrived on the Friday, and to which
ours served for answer. He had another custom, diverting enough and
which made his correspondence ridiculous beyond imagination. He sent
back all information to its respective source, instead of making it
follow its course. To M. Amelot he transmitted the news of the court; to
M. Maurepas, that of Paris; to M. d' Havrincourt, the news from Sweden;
to M. de Chetardie, that from Petersbourg; and sometimes to each of those
the news they had respectively sent to him, and which I was employed to
dress up in terms different from those in which it was conveyed to us.
As he read nothing of what I laid before him, except the despatches for
the court, and signed those to other ambassadors without reading them,
this left me more at liberty to give what turn I thought proper to the
latter, and in these therefore I made the articles of information cross
each other. But it was impossible for-me to do the same by despatches of
importance; and I thought myself happy when M. de Montaigu did not take
it into his head to cram into them an impromptu of a few lines after his
manner. This obliged me to return, and hastily transcribe the whole
despatch decorated with his new nonsense, and honor it with the cipher,
without which he would have refused his signature. I was frequently
almost tempted, for the sake of his reputation, to cipher something
different from what he had written, but feeling that nothing could
authorize such a deception, I left him to answer for his own folly,
satisfying myself with having spoken to him with freedom, and discharged
at my own peril the duties of my station. This is what I always did with
an uprightness, a zeal and courage, which merited on his part a very
different recompense from that which in the end I received from him. It
was time I should once be what Heaven, which had endowed me with a happy
disposition, what the education that had been given me by the best of
women, and that I had given myself, had prepared me for, and I became so.
Left to my own reflections, without a friend or advice, without
experience, and in a foreign country, in the service of a foreign nation,
surrounded by a crowd of knaves, who, for their own interest, and to
avoid the scandal of good example, endeavored to prevail upon me to
imitate them; far from yielding to their solicitations, I served France
well, to which I owed nothing, and the ambassador still better, as it was
right and just I should do to the utmost of my power. Irreproachable in
a post, sufficiently exposed to censure, I merited and obtained the
esteem of the republic, that of all the ambassadors with whom we were in
correspondence, and the affection of the French who resided at Venice,
not even excepting the consul, whom with regret I supplanted in the
functions which I knew belonged to him, and which occasioned me more
embarrassment than they afforded me satisfaction.

M. de Montaigu, confiding without reserve to the Marquis Mari, who did
not thoroughly understand his duty, neglected it to such a degree that
without me the French who were at Venice would not have perceived that an
ambassador from their nation resided there. Always put off without being
heard when they stood in need of his protection, they became disgusted
and no longer appeared in his company or at his table, to which indeed he
never invited them. I frequently did from myself what it was his duty to
have done; I rendered to the French, who applied to me, all the services
in my power. In any other country I should have done more, but, on
account of my employment, not being able to see persons in place, I was
often obliged to apply to the consul, and the consul, who was settled in
the country with his family, had many persons to oblige, which prevented
him from acting as he otherwise would have done. However, perceiving him
unwilling and afraid to speak, I ventured hazardous measures, which
sometimes succeeded. I recollect one which still makes me laugh. No
person would suspect it was to me, the lovers of the theatre at Paris,
owe Coralline and her sister Camille, nothing however, can be more true.
Veronese, their father, had engaged himself with his children in the
Italian company, and after having received two thousand livres for the
expenses of his journey, instead of setting out for France, quietly
continued at Venice, and accepted an engagement in the theatre of Saint
Luke, to which Coralline, a child as she still was, drew great numbers of
people. The Duke de Greves, as first gentleman of the chamber, wrote to
the ambassador to claim the father and the daughter. M. de Montaigu when
he gave me the letter, confined his instructions to saying, 'voyez cela',
examine and pay attention to this. I went to M. Blond to beg he would
speak to the patrician, to whom the theatre belonged, and who, I believe,
was named Zustinian, that he might discharge Veronese, who had engaged in
the name of the king. Le Blond, to whom the commission was not very
agreeable, executed it badly.

Zustinian answered vaguely, and Veronese was not discharged. I was
piqued at this. It was during the carnival, and having taken the bahute
and a mask, I set out for the palace Zustinian. Those who saw my gondola
arrive with the livery of the ambassador, were lost in astonishment.
Venice had never seen such a thing. I entered, and caused myself to be
announced by the name of 'Una Siora Masehera'. As soon as I was
introduced I took off my mask and told my name. The senator turned pale
and appeared stupefied with surprise. "Sir;" said I to him in Venetian,
"it is with much regret I importune your excellency with this visit; but
you have in your theatre of Saint Luke, a man of the name of Veronese,
who is engaged in the service of the king, and whom you have been
requested, but in vain, to give up: I come to claim him in the name of
his majesty." My short harangue was effectual. I had no sooner left the
palace than Zustinian ran to communicate the adventure to the state
inquisitors, by whom he was severely reprehended. Veronese was
discharged the same day. I sent him word that if he did not set off
within a week I would have him arrested. He did not wait for my giving
him this intimation a second time.

On another occasion I relieved from difficulty solely by my own means,
and almost without the assistance of any other person, the captain of a
merchant-ship. This was one Captain Olivet, from Marseilles; the name of
the vessel I have forgotten. His men had quarreled with the Sclavonians
in the service of the republic, some violence had been committed, and the
vessel was under so severe an embargo that nobody except the master was
suffered to go on board or leave it without permission. He applied to
the ambassador, who would hear nothing he had to say. He afterwards went
to the consul, who told him it was not an affair of commerce, and that he
could not interfere in it. Not knowing what further steps to take he
applied to me. I told M. de Montaigu he ought to permit me to lay before
the senate a memoir on the subject. I do not recollect whether or not he
consented, or that I presented the memoir; but I perfectly remember that
if I did it was ineffectual, and the embargo still continuing, I took
another method, which succeeded. I inserted a relation of the affairs in
one of our letters to M. de Maurepas, though I had difficulty in
prevailing upon M. de Montaigne to suffer the article to pass.

I knew that our despatches, although their contents were insignificant,
were opened at Venice. Of this I had a proof by finding the articles
they contained, verbatim in the gazette, a treachery of which I had in
vain attempted to prevail upon the ambassador to complain. My object in
speaking of the affair in the letter was to turn the curiosity of the
ministers of the republic to advantage, to inspire them with some
apprehensions, and to induce the state to release the vessel: for had it
been necessary to this effect to wait for an answer from the court, the
captain would have been ruined before it could have arrived. I did still
more, I went alongside the vessel to make inquiries of the ship's
company. I took with me the Abbe Patizel, chancellor of the consulship,
who would rather have been excused, so much were these poor creatures
afraid of displeasing the Senate. As I could not go on board, on account
of the order from the states, I remained in my gondola, and there took
the depositions successively, interrogating each of the mariners, and
directing my questions in such a manner as to produce answers which might
be to their advantage. I wished to prevail upon Patizel to put the
questions and take depositions himself, which in fact was more his
business than mine; but to this he would not consent; he never once
opened his mouth and refused to sign the depositions after me. This
step, somewhat bold, was however, successful, and the vessel was released
long before an answer came from the minister. The captain wished to make
me a present; but without being angry with him on that account, I tapped
him on the shoulder, saying, "Captain Olivet, can you imagine that he who
does not receive from the French his perquisite for passports, which he
found his established right, is a man likely to sell them the king's
protection?" He, however, insisted on giving me a dinner on board his
vessel, which I accepted, and took with me the secretary to the Spanish
embassy, M. Carrio, a man of wit and amiable manners, to partake of it:
he has since been secretary to the Spanish embassy at Paris and charge
des affaires. I had formed an intimate connection with him after the
example of our ambassadors.

Happy should I have been, if, when in the most disinterested manner I did
all the service I could, I had known how to introduce sufficient order
into all these little details, that I might not have served others at my
own expense. But in employments similar to that I held, in which the
most trifling faults are of consequence, my whole attention was engaged
in avoiding all such mistakes as might be detrimental to my service. I
conducted, till the last moment, everything relative to my immediate
duty, with the greatest order and exactness. Excepting a few errors
which a forced precipitation made me commit in ciphering, and of which
the clerks of M. Amelot once complained, neither the ambassador nor any
other person had ever the least reason to reproach me with negligence in
any one of my functions. This is remarkable in a man so negligent as I
am. But my memory sometimes failed me, and I was not sufficiently
careful in the private affairs with which I was charged; however, a love
of justice always made me take the loss on myself, and this voluntarily,
before anybody thought of complaining. I will mention but one
circumstance of this nature; it relates to my departure from Venice, and
I afterwards felt the effects of it in Paris.

Our cook, whose name was Rousselot, had brought from France an old note
for two hundred livres, which a hairdresser, a friend of his, had
received from a noble Venetian of the name of Zanetto Nani, who had had
wigs of him to that amount. Rousselot brought me the note, begging I
would endeavor to obtain payment of some part of it, by way of
accommodation. I knew, and he knew it also, that the constant custom of
noble Venetians was, when once returned to their country, never to pay
the debts they had contracted abroad. When means are taken to force them
to payment, the wretched creditor finds so many delays, and incurs such
enormous expenses, that he becomes disgusted and concludes by giving up
his debtor accepting the most trifling composition. I begged M. le Blond
to speak to Zanetto. The Venetian acknowledged the note, but did not
agree to payment. After a long dispute he at length promised three
sequins; but when Le Blond carried him the note even these were not
ready, and it was necessary to wait. In this interval happened my
quarrel with the ambassador and I quitted his service. I had left the
papers of the embassy in the greatest order, but the note of Rousselot
was not to be found. M. le Blond assured me he had given it me back. I
knew him to be too honest a man to have the least doubt of the matter;
but it was impossible for me to recollect what I had done with it. As
Zanetto had acknowledged the debt, I desired M. le Blond to endeavor to
obtain from him the three sequins on giving him a receipt for the amount,
or to prevail upon him to renew the note by way of duplicate. Zanetto,
knowing the note to be lost, would not agree to either. I offered
Rousselot the three sequins from my own purse, as a discharge of the
debt. He refused them, and said I might settle the matter with the
creditor at Paris, of whom he gave me the address. The hair-dresser,
having been informed of what had passed, would either have his note or
the whole sum for which it was given. What, in my indignation, would I
have given to have found this vexatious paper! I paid the two hundred
livres, and that in my greatest distress. In this manner the loss of the
note produced to the creditor the payment of the whole sum, whereas had
it, unfortunately for him, been found, he would have had some difficulty
in recovering even the ten crowns, which his excellency, Zanetto Nani,
had promised to pay.

The talents I thought I felt in myself for my employment made me
discharge the functions of it with satisfaction, and except the society
of my friend de Carrio, that of the virtuous Altuna, of whom I shall soon
have an occasion to speak, the innocent recreations of the place Saint
Mark, of the theatre, and of a few visits which we, for the most part,
made together, my only pleasure was in the duties of my station.
Although these were not considerable, especially with the aid of the Abbe
de Binis, yet as the correspondence was very extensive and there was a
war, I was a good deal employed. I applied to business the greatest part
of every morning, and on the days previous to the departure of the
courier, in the evenings, and sometimes till midnight. The rest of my
time I gave to the study of the political professions I had entered upon,
and in which I hoped, from my successful beginning, to be advantageously
employed. In fact I was in favor with every one; the ambassador himself
spoke highly of my services, and never complained of anything I did for
him; his dissatisfaction proceeded from my having insisted on quitting
him, inconsequence of the useless complaints I had frequently made on
several occasions. The ambassadors and ministers of the king with whom
we were in correspondence complimented him on the merit of his secretary,
in a manner by which he ought to have been flattered, but which in his
poor head produced quite a contrary effect. He received one in
particular relative to an affair of importance, for which he never
pardoned me.

He was so incapable of bearing the least constraint, that on the
Saturday, the day of the despatches for most of the courts he could not
contain himself, and wait till the business was done before he went out,
and incessantly pressing me to hasten the despatches to the king and
ministers, he signed them with precipitation, and immediately went I know
not where, leaving most of the other letters without signing; this
obliged me, when these contained nothing but news, to convert them into
journals; but when affairs which related to the king were in question it
was necessary somebody should sign, and I did it. This once happened
relative to some important advice we had just received from M. Vincent,
charge des affaires from the king, at Vienna. The Prince Lobkowitz was
then marching to Naples, and Count Gages had just made the most memorable
retreat, the finest military manoeuvre of the whole century, of which
Europe has not sufficiently spoken. The despatch informed us that a man,
whose person M. Vincent described, had set out from Vienna, and was to
pass by Venice, in his way into Abruzzo, where he was secretly to stir up
the people at the approach of the Austrians.

In the absence of M. le Comte de Montaigu, who did not give himself the
least concern about anything, I forwarded this advice to the Marquis de
l'Hopital, so apropos, that it is perhaps to the poor Jean Jacques, so
abused and laughed at, that the house of Bourbon owes the preservation of
the kingdom of Naples.

The Marquis de l'Hopital, when he thanked his colleague, as it was proper
he should do, spoke to him of his secretary, and mentioned the service he
had just rendered to the common cause. The Comte de Montaigu, who in
that affair had to reproach himself with negligence, thought he perceived
in the compliment paid him by M. de l'Hopital, something like a reproach,
and spoke of it to me with signs of ill-humor. I found it necessary to
act in the same manner with the Count de Castellane, ambassador at
Constantinople, as I had done with the Marquis de l'Hopital, although in
things of less importance. As there was no other conveyance to
Constantinople than by couriers, sent from time to time by the senate to
its Bailli, advice of their departure was given to the ambassador of
France, that he might write by them to his colleague, if he thought
proper so to do. This advice was commonly sent a day or two beforehand;
but M. de Montaigu was held in so little respect, that merely for the
sake of form he was sent to, a couple of hours before the couriers set
off. This frequently obliged me to write the despatch in his absence.
M. de Castellane, in his answer made honorable mention of me; M. de
Jonville, at Genoa, did the same, and these instances of their regard and
esteem became new grievances.

I acknowledge I did not neglect any opportunity of making myself known;
but I never sought one improperly, and in serving well I thought I had a
right to aspire to the natural return for essential services; the esteem
of those capable of judging of, and rewarding them. I will not say
whether or not my exactness in discharging the duties of my employment
was a just subject of complaint from the ambassador; but I cannot refrain
from declaring that it was the sole grievance he ever mentioned previous
to our separation.

His house, which he had never put on a good footing, was constantly
filled with rabble; the French were ill-treated in it, and the ascendancy
was given to the Italians; of these even, the more honest part, they who
had long been in the service of the embassy, were indecently discharged,
his first gentleman in particular, whom he had taken from the Comte de
Froulay, and who, if I remember right, was called Comte de Peati, or
something very like that name. The second gentleman, chosen by M. de
Montaigu, was an outlaw highwayman from Mantua, called Dominic Vitali, to
whom the ambassador intrusted the care of his house, and who had by means
of flattery and sordid economy, obtained his confidence, and became his
favorite to the great prejudice of the few honest people he still had
about him, and of the secretary who was at their head. The countenance
of an upright man always gives inquietude to knaves. Nothing more was
necessary to make Vitali conceive a hatred against me: but for this
sentiment there was still another cause which rendered it more cruel. Of
this I must give an account, that I may be condemned if I am found in the
wrong.

The ambassador had, according to custom, a box at each of the theaters.
Every day at dinner he named the theater to which it was his intention to
go: I chose after him, and the gentlemen disposed of the other boxes.
When I went out I took the key of the box I had chosen. One day, Vitali
not being in the way, I ordered the footman who attended on me, to bring
me the key to a house which I named to him. Vitali, instead of sending
the key, said he had disposed of it. I was the more enraged at this as
the footman delivered his message in public. In the evening Vitali
wished to make me some apology, to which however I would not listen.
"To--morrow, sir," said I to him, "you will come at such an hour and
apologize to me in the house where I received the affront, and in the
presence of the persons who were witnesses to it; or after to--morrow,
whatever may be the consequences, either you or I will leave the house."
This firmness intimidated him. He came to the house at the hour
appointed, and made me a public apology, with a meanness worthy of
himself. But he afterwards took his measures at leisure, and at the same
time that he cringed to me in public, he secretly acted in so vile a
manner, that although unable to prevail on the ambassador to give me my
dismission, he laid me under the necessity of resolving to leave him.

A wretch like him, certainly, could not know me, but he knew enough of my
character to make it serviceable to his purposes. He knew I was mild to
an excess, and patient in bearing involuntary wrongs; but haughty and
impatient when insulted with premeditated offences; loving decency and
dignity in things in which these were requisite, and not more exact in
requiring the respect due to myself, than attentive in rendering that
which I owed to others. In this he undertook to disgust me, and in this
he succeeded. He turned the house upside down, and destroyed the order
and subordination I had endeavored to establish in it. A house without a
woman stands in need of rather a severe discipline to preserve that
modesty which is inseparable from dignity. He soon converted ours into a
place of filthy debauch and scandalous licentiousness, the haunt of
knaves and debauchees. He procured for second gentleman to his
excellency, in the place of him whom he got discharged, another pimp like
himself, who kept a house of ill--fame, at the Cross of Malta; and the
indecency of these two rascals was equalled by nothing but their
insolence. Except the bed-chamber of the ambassador, which, however, was
not in very good order, there was not a corner in the whole house
supportable to an modest man.

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