Part 11

Among others to whom he told this cock-and-bull story was a clergyman who came to the prison to visit Valentine Morris, the ex-governor of St. Vincent, who was then one of the inmates; and he succeeded in persuading the unsuspecting divine to visit the Duke of Rutland, and lay his case before him as that of a near relative. Of course the duke repudiated all connection with him, and all recollection of him; but a day or two later, when he remembered that he was the man who had married the natural daughter of Lord Robert Manners, he sent L200 and had him released.

Such a benefactor was not to be lost sight of. The duke was appointed Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in 1784, and had scarcely landed in Dublin when Hatfield followed him to that city. On his arrival he engaged a splendid suite of apartments in a first-rate hotel, fared sumptuously, and represented himself as nearly allied to the viceroy; but said that he could not appear at the castle until his horses, carriages, and servants arrived from England. The Yorkshire park, the Rutlandshire estate, and the thirty industrious labourers were all impressed into his service once more, and the landlord allowed him to have what he liked. When the suspicions of Boniface were aroused by the non-arrival of the equipages and attendants he presented his bill. Hatfield assured him that his money was perfectly safe, and that luckily his agent, who collected the rents of his estate in the north of England, was then in Ireland, and would give him all needful information. The landlord called upon this gentleman, whose name had been given to him, and presented his account, but of course without success; and Hatfield was thrown in the Marshalsea jail by the indignant landlord. By this time he was thoroughly familiar with the mysteries of prison life as it then existed, and had scarcely seated himself in his new lodging when he visited the jailer's wife and informed her of the relationship in which he stood to the lord-lieutenant. The woman believed him, gave him the best accommodation she could, and allowed him to sit at her table for three weeks. During this time he sent another petition to the new viceroy, who, fearing lest his own reputation should suffer, released him, and was only too glad to ship him off to Holyhead.

He next showed himself at Scarborough in 1792, and succeeded in introducing himself to some of the local gentry, to whom he hinted that at the next general election he would be made one of the representatives of the town through the influence of the Duke of Rutland. His inability to pay his hotel bill, however, led to his exposure, and he was obliged to flee to London, where he was again arrested for debt. This time the wheel of Fortune turned but slowly in his favour. He lingered in jail for eight years and a-half, when a Miss Nation, of Devonshire, to whom he had become known, paid his debts, took him from prison, and married him.

Abandoning his Rutlandshire pretensions, he now devoted himself to business, and persuaded a Devonshire firm, who knew nothing of his antecedents, to take him into partnership, and also ingratiated himself with a clergyman, who accepted his drafts for a large amount. Thus supplied with ready money he returned to London, where he lived in splendid style, and even went so far as to aspire to a seat in the House of Commons. For a time all appeared to go well; but suspicions gradually arose with regard to his character and his resources, and he was declared a bankrupt. Deserting his wife and her two children, he fled from his creditors. For some time nothing was heard of him, but in July 1802 he arrived in Keswick, in a carriage, but without any servant, and assumed the name of the Honourable Alexander Augustus Hope, brother of the Earl of Hopetoun, and member of Parliament for Linlithgow.

In his wanderings he became acquainted with an old couple called Robinson, who kept a little hostelry on the shore of the Lake of Buttermere, and who had one daughter who was locally known as "The Beauty of Buttermere." The handsome colonel at once began to lay siege to this girl's heart, and was the less loth to do so because it was rumoured that old Robinson had saved a considerable sum during a long lifetime. But with his usual prudence, he thought it well to have two strings to his bow, and finding that there was an Irish officer in Keswick who had a ward of good family and fortune, and of great personal attractions, he procured an introduction as the Honourable Colonel Hope of the 14th regiment of foot. He failed with the ward, but he was more successful with the Irishman's daughter. Her consent was given, the trousseau was ordered, and the wedding-day was fixed. But the lady would not agree to a secret ceremony, and insisted that he should announce his intended nuptials both to her own and his friends. This he agreed to do, and pretended to write letters apprising his brother, and even proposed a visit to Lord Hopetoun's seat. The bride's suspicions were, however, roused by the strange air of concealment and mystery which surrounded her intended husband; the desired answers to his letters came not, and she refused to resign either herself or her fortune into his keeping.

Thus baffled, he devoted all his attention to pretty Mary Robinson, and found her less reluctant to unite her lot with that of such a distinguished individual as Colonel Hope. The inquiries this time were all on the gallant officer's side, and it was only when he found that the reports as to old Robinson's wealth were well founded that he led her to the altar of Lorton church, on the 2d of October 1802.

On the day before the wedding the soi-disant Colonel Hope wrote to a gentleman of his acquaintance, informing him that he was under the necessity of being absent for ten days on a journey into Scotland, and enclosing a draft for thirty pounds, drawn on a Mr. Crumpt of Liverpool, which he desired him to cash and pay some small debts in Keswick with it, and send him over the balance, as he was afraid he might be short of money on the road. This was done; and the gentleman sent him at the same time an additional ten pounds, lest unexpected demands should be made upon his purse in his absence.

The Keswick folks were naturally astonished when they learned two days later that the colonel, who had been paying his addresses to the daughter of the Irish officer, had married "The Beauty of Buttermere," and the confiding friend who had sent him the money at once despatched the draft to Liverpool. Mr. Crumpt immediately accepted it, believing that it came from the real Colonel Hope, whom he knew very well. Meantime, instead of paying his proposed journey to Scotland Hatfield stopped at Longtown, where he received two letters, by which he seemed much disturbed, and returned after three days' absence to Buttermere. Some friends of the real colonel, chancing to hear of his marriage, paused on their way through Cumberland, at Keswick, and wrote to their supposed acquaintance, asking him to come and visit them. Hatfield went in a carriage and four, and had an interview with the gentlemen, but flatly denied that he had ever assumed Colonel Hope's name. He said his name was Hope, but that he was not the member for Linlithgow. It was notorious, however, that he had been in the habit of franking his letters with Colonel Hope's name, and he was handed over to a constable. He contrived to escape, and fled first to Chester and subsequently to Swansea, where he was recaptured.

He was brought to trial at the Cumberland assizes on the 15th of August 1803, charged with personation and forgery, and was found guilty and sentenced to death. He was executed at Carlisle on the 3d of September 1803.

HERVAGAULT--SOI-DISANT LOUIS XVII. OF FRANCE.

There is no darker page in the history of France than that whereon is inscribed the record of the Revolution; and in its darkness there is nothing blacker than the narration of the horrible treatment of the young dauphin by the revolutionists. The misfortunes of his father King Louis XVI., and of Marie-Antoinette, are sufficiently well known throughout Europe to render the repetition of them tedious; but the evil fate of the son has been less voluminously recorded by historians, and it is, therefore, necessary to repeat the story at some length to render the following narratives of claims to royalty thoroughly intelligible.

Louis-Charles was the second son of Louis XVI. and his consort Marie-Antoinette, and was born at the Chateau of Versailles, on the 27th of March, at five minutes before seven in the evening. An hour and a half later he was baptised with much ceremony by the Cardinal de Rohan and the Vicar of Versailles, and received the title of Duke of Normandy. Then the king, followed by all the court, went to the chapel of the chateau, where Te Deum was sung in honour of the event, and subsequently the infant prince was consecrated a knight of the order of the Holy Ghost. Fireworks were displayed on the Place d'Armes at Versailles; and when the news reached Paris it is said "joy spread itself from one end of the great city to the other; the cannon of the Bastille responded to the cannon of the Invalides; and everywhere spontaneous illuminations, the ringing of bells, and the acclamations of the people, manifested the love of France for a king who, in the flower of his youth, found his happiness in the happiness of the people." Such was the introduction into the world of the young prince.

Fate seemed to have the brightest gifts in store for him. On the 4th of June 1789, the dauphin, his elder brother, died at Meudon, and the young Louis-Charles succeeded to his honours. At this time he was rather more than four years old, and is described as having a graceful and well-knit frame, his forehead broad and open, his eyebrows arched; his large blue eyes fringed with long chestnut lashes of angelic beauty; his complexion dazzlingly fair and blooming; his hair, of a dark chestnut, curled naturally, and fell in thick ringlets on his shoulders; and he had the vermilion mouth of his mother, and like her a small dimple on the chin. In disposition he was exceedingly amiable, and was a great favourite both with his father and mother, who affectionately styled him their "little Norman."

His happiness was destined to be very short-lived, for the murmurs of the Revolution could already be heard. On the 20th of July, 1791, King Louis XVI., his family and court, fled from the disloyal French capital in the night, their intention being to travel in disguise to Montmedy, and there to join the Marquis de Bouille, who was at the head of a large army. When they awoke the little dauphin, and began to dress him as a girl, his sister asked him what he thought of the proceeding. His answer was, "I think we are going to play a comedy;" but never had comedy more tragic ending. The royal party were discovered at Varennes, and brought back to the Tuileries amid the hootings and jeers of the mob. "The journey," says Lamartine, "was a Calvary of sixty leagues, every step of which was a torture." On the way the little girl whispered to her brother, "Charles, this is not a comedy." "I have found that out long since," said the boy. But he was brave, tender to his mother, and gravely courteous to the commissioner of the Assembly who had been deputed to bring them back. "Sir," he said, from his mother's knee, "you ask if I am not very sorry to return to Paris. I am glad to be anywhere, so that it is with mamma and papa, and my aunt and sister, and Madame de Tourzel, my governess."

There soon came the wild scene in the Tuileries, and the sad appearance of the dethroned king in the Assembly, with its still more lamentable ending. Louis XVI. was carried to the prison of the Temple. This building had originally been a fortress of the Knights Templars. In 1792, the year in which it received the captive monarch, it consisted of a large square tower, flanked at its angles by four round towers, and having on the north side another separate tower of less dimensions than the first, surmounted by turrets, and generally called the little tower. It was in this little tower that the royal family of France were located by the commune of Paris. Here the king spent his time in the education of his son, while the best historian of the boy says he devoted himself to comforting his parents: "Here he was happy to live, and he was only turned to grief by the tears which sometimes stole down his mother's cheeks. He never spoke of his games and walks of former days; he never uttered the name of Versailles or the Tuileries; he seemed to regret nothing."

On the morning of the 21st January, 1793, Louis XVI. was carried to the scaffold, and suffered death. On the previous day, at a final interview which was allowed, he had taken the dauphin, "his dear little Norman," on his knee, and had said to him, "My son, you have heard what I have just said"--he had been causing them all to promise never to think of avenging his death--"but, as oaths are something more sacred still than words, swear, with your hands held up to Heaven, that you will obey your father's dying injunction;" and, adds his sister, who tells the story, "My brother, bursting into tears, obeyed; and this most affecting goodness doubled our own grief." And thus father and son parted, but not for long.

On the 1st of July the Committee of Public Safety passed a decree, "That the son of Capet be separated from his mother, and committed to the charge of a tutor, to be chosen by the Council General of the Commune." The Convention sanctioned it, and it was carried into effect two days later. About ten o'clock at night, when the young dauphin was sleeping soundly in his bed, and the ex-queen and her sister were busy mending clothes, while the princess read to them, six municipal guards marched into the room and tore the child from his agonized mother. They conveyed him to that part of the Tower which had formerly been occupied by his father, where the "tutor" of the commune was in waiting to receive him. This was no other than a fellow called Simon, a shoemaker, who had never lost an opportunity of publicly insulting the king, and who, through the influence of Marat and Robespierre, had been appointed the instructor of his son at a salary of 500 francs a month, on condition that he was never to leave his prisoner or quit the Tower, on any pretence whatever.

On the first night, Simon found his new pupil disposed to be unmanageable. The dauphin sat silently on the floor in a corner, and not all his new master's threats could induce him to answer the questions which were put to him. Madame Simon, although a terrible virago, was likewise unsuccessful; and for two days the prince mourned for his mother, and refused to taste food, only demanding to see the law which separated him from her and kept them in prison. At the end of the second day he found that he could not persist in exercising his own will, and went to bed. In the morning his new master cried in his elation, "Ha, ha! little Capet, I shall have to teach you to sing the 'Carmagole,' and to cry 'Vive la Republique!' Ah! you are dumb, are you?" and so from hour to hour he sneered at the miserable child.

On one occasion, in the early days of his rule, Simon made his pupil the present of a Jew's harp, at the same time saying, "Your she-wolf of a mother plays on the piano, and you must learn to accompany her on the Jew's harp!" The dauphin steadily refused to touch the instrument; whereupon the new tutor, in a passion, flew upon him and beat him severely. Still he was not cowed, although the blows were the first which he had ever received, but bravely answered, "You may punish me if I don't obey you; but you ought not to beat me--you are stronger than I." "I am here to command you, animal! my duty is just what I please to do; and 'vive la Liberte, l'Egalite.'" By-and-by personal suffering and violence had become only too common occurrences of his daily life.

About a week after the dauphin was transferred from the little tower, a rumour spread through Paris that the son of Louis XVI. had been carried off from the Temple Tower, and crowds of the sovereign people flocked to the spot to satisfy themselves of its truth. The guard, who had not seen the boy since he had been taken from his mother's care, replied that he was no longer in the Tower; "and from that time the popular falsehood gained ground and strength continually." In order to quiet the public apprehension, a deputation from the Committee of Public Safety visited Simon, and ordered him to bring down "the tyrant's son," so that the incoming guard might see him for themselves. They then proceeded to cross-question Simon as to the manner in which he discharged his duties. When that worthy had satisfied them as to his past treatment, he demanded decisive instructions for his future guidance.

"Citizens, what do you decide about the wolf-cub? He has been taught to be insolent, but I shall know how to tame him. So much the worse if he sinks under it! I don't answer for that. After all, what do you want done with him? Do you want him transported?"

"No."

"Killed?"

"No."

"Poisoned?"

"No."

"But what then?"

"We want to get rid of him!"