Romilly. Are you aware to which of our sovrans we must attribute the deadly curse of African slavery, inasmuch as our country is concerned in it? Wilberforce. Certainly to none of our justly revered kings can so horrible a crime be imputed, although the royal power, according to the limitations of our constitution, may have been insufficient to repress it effectively. Romilly. Queen Elizabeth equipped two vessels for her own sole profit, in which two vessels, escorted by the fleet under the command of Hawkins, were the first unhappy Blacks inveigled from their shores by Englishmen, and doomed to end their lives in servitude. Elizabeth was ava ricious and cruel; but a small segment of her heart had a brief sunshine on it, darting obliquely. We are under a king notoriously more avaricious; one who passes without a shudder the gibbets his sign-manual has garnished; one who sees on the field of the most disastrous battles, battles in which he ordered his people to fight his people, nothing else to be regretted than the loss of horses and saddles, of haversacs and jackets. If this insensate and insatiable man even hears that Queen Elizabeth was a slave-dealer, he will assert the inalienable rights of the Crown, and swamp your motion. QUEEN POMARE, PRITCHARD, CAPTAINS POLVEREL AND DES MITRAILLES, LIEUTENANT POIGNAUNEZ, MARINERS. Polverel. Mr. Pritchard, I have desired your presence, as a gentleman of great influence and authority. Pritchard. Sir, I know not exactly in what manner I can be of service to crews of vessels which invade this island. Polverel. The island is in a state of insurrection. We come opportunely to aid the legitimate Power in quelling it. Among the natives there are many discontented, as you know. Pritchard. The very men who apparently ought to be the most contented: for they not only enjoy the fruits of French principles, but also of French manufactures, and they possess many luxuries which the others never heard of. Polverel. Is it possible? Pritchard. They have displayed, most ostentatiously and boastingly, knives, cutlasses, tobacco, brandy, rum, plates, dishes, mirrors, and other articles of furniture and luxury, which a generous magnanimous ally, ever devoted to their welfare, ever watchful over their prosperity, has munificently bestowed. you know my humour, my temperament, my taste, by intuition. I enjoy a joke, no man better. Pritchard. Especially such jokes, M. le Capitaine, as you utter vivaciously from the mouth of your cannon, and which play with lambent light about your cutlasses and bayonets. Polverel. We have done with war, totally and for ever done with it. France, having conquered the confederated world, desires only peace. She has subdued and civilised Africa. The desert teems with her harvests. Temples and theatres rise above and beyond the remotest tent of Moor and Arab. The conquerors of Spain implore the pardon of France. The camel bends his arched neck and falls on his flat knees, supplicating the children of mothers from our beautiful country, to mount the protuberance which provident Nature framed expressly for the purpose, and to alight from it in the astonished streets of Timbuctoo. We swear he shall alight in safety. Yes, we swear it, Mr. Pritchard! Pritchard. You have sworn many things, M. le Capitaine, some of which were very soon countersworn, and others are unaccomplished: but in this, impracticable as it appears to me, I heartily wish you success. Polverel. Mr. Pritchard! every word you utter raises my wonder higher. We are both of us philanthropists: let us then, dispassionately and amicably, talk together on the present condition of these misguided people, so mysteriously de-versibly. luded. Polverel. Consider it as done, completely, irre Pritchard. Population is increasing rapidly Pritchard. Our conversation, I suspect, would both in France and England: industry should alter but little what is predetermined. Polverel. Mon Dieu! What can that be? Pritchard. Evidently the subjugation of the large the field of commerce, in which the most natives. Polverel. Mr. Pritchard! your language is quite unintelligible to me. France never subjugates. She receives with open arms all nations who run into her bosom for protection: she endows them with all the blessings of peace, of civilisation, of industry, of the sciences, of the fine arts. Pritchard. Certainly no arts are finer than the arts they receive from that bosom of hers, at once so expansive and so stringent. Polverel. Ah, Mr. Pritchard! Mr. Pritchard! increase proportionally. By conciliating and humanising the various tribes in Africa, you en industrious and the most honest will ultimately be the most successful. It might be offensive to you if, in addition to this, I mention to you the blessings of religion. Polverel. Not at all, not at all. I have given proofs already that I can endure very dark reflections, and can make very large allowances. Our soldiers will relieve the poor devils of Mahometans from the grievous sin of polygamy. If anyone of them is rich enough to keep a couple of wives or concubines, he is also rich enough to keep a confessor, who will relax a little the bonds of Satan for him, and carry a link or two of the chain on his own shoulders. Seriously, for at bottom I am a true believer and a good catholic, we must establish the mass both there and here. France has recovered her fine old attitude, and can endure no longer the curse of irreligion. Asia now lies at her feet, but intermediately the Pacific Ocean. It shall roll its vast waves before her with due submission, and everyone of them shall reflect her tricolor. Pritchard. Sir, you promised that we should converse together amicably, and that neither of us, in the course of our discussion, should give or take offence. Polverel. A Frenchman's word was never violated: a grain of dust never could lie upon his honour. Pritchard (aside). Certainly not without the cramp, if dust could catch it. Polverel. I perceive your mute acknowledgment. Speak then freely. Pritchard. How happens it, M. le Capitaine, that having subdued such restless and powerful tribes, and thereby possessing such extensive territories, so fertile, so secure, so near home, you covet what can bring you no glory and no advantage? Polverel. The honour of France demands it. Pritchard. You promised you would retire from Barbary when you had avenged the insults you complained of; and Europe believed you. Polverel. The more fool Europe. Pritchard. And the more what France? Polverel. No remarks on France, sir! She is never to be questioned. Reasons of state, let me tell you, are above all other reasons, as the sword is the apex of the law. We often see after a few steps what we never saw until those steps were taken. Thus my country sees the necessity of retaining her conquests in Barbary. England is reconciled to what she could not prevent nor resist. and although we are perhaps more free in general from suspicion than might be expected in a nation so calm and contemplative, yet, if armed men landed in England, and demanded terms and conditions, and on protecting those who refused their protection, we should suspect a hostile disposition. Polverel. On this remark of yours, M. Pritchard, I declare to you, as a man who have studied my profession in all its parts, and who am far from ignorant of England and of her present means of defence, we could at any time land twenty thou sand men upon her shores, and as many on the coast of Ireland. Beside Pritchard. Nelson saw this before steamers were invented and the most intelligent and farsighted of our engineers, General Birch, has recently warned the nation of its danger, Wooden heads still reverberate the sound of our wooden walls we want these: but we also want such as render France secure on every coast. which, we require a strong central fortress, not indeed so extensive as those of Paris, but capable of protecting a large body of troops in readiness for any quarter of the island. Birmingham, which may be considered as our grand arsenal and foundry, is unfit: but Warwick, united to it by canals and railway, is so situated that all access to the town may be inundated by three or four brooks, and the river and an artificial piece of water, broad and deep, render it a place admirably suited for an entrenched camp. Polverel. You talk, M. Pritchard, of places which may hereafter be defended, but which at present are without defence. Our generosity alone has spared you. Pritchard. Doubtless, the King of the French, so prompt to gratify the humour of his Parisians for hostilities with us, which this wanton aggression fully proves, would have invaded Ireland, were it not for the certainty of insurrection in various parts of his own kingdom. All the libe rals and robbers and rabble are republicans: half Pritchard. She destroyed those batteries which the poorer tradesmen and ignorant peasants are you occupied. Polverel. Exactly so. She is always so complaisant as to pave the way for us, either with her iron or her gold. She has in some measure done it here; but neglecting to support legitimate power, the task devolves on us of protecting the queen from the violence and artifice of her enemies. We offer the Entente Cordiale to Queen Pomare as we offered it to Queen Victoria. The one is unsuspicious; the other would be if evil counsellors were removed from about her. I have difficulties to surmount, if indeed, where Frenchdifficulties can be. men are, Pritchard. Certainly there are fewer impediments and restrictions in their way than in the way of any other men upon earth. Polverel. Bravo! M. Pritchard! I love an enlightened and unprejudiced man, rarely found (if ever) among your countrymen. Pritchard. We have indeed our prejudices: royalists, in favour of the ejected dynasty. Polverel. Insurrection indeed! Do you Englishmen talk of insurrection? you whose whole army is wanted, and would be insufficient, to keep it down in Ireland. Pritchard. It must be acknowledged that all the atrocities of France are fewer and lighter and more intermittent than ours in Ireland. In that country, not one in eight is of the religion whose priesthood all are equally bound to maintain. And to maintain in what manner! Far more sumptuously than the favourites of the Pope are maintained in Italy. I could mention ten bishoprics in the Papal and Neapolitan states, of which the united emoluments fall short of a single protestant one in Ireland. The least reformed church is our reformed church. But I see not how one injustice can authorise another in another country. We refuse to the Irish what we granted to the Scotch. And we are in danger of losing Ireland in our first war, whatever may be our enemy. The people are justly exasperated against us and they will throw up many advantages rather than continue in the endurance of an indignity. Polverel. I am charmed at hearing a man speak so reasonably, especially an Englishman: for I respect and esteem you in such a degree that I would rather have the pleasure of fighting you than any other people upon earth. Pritchard. I am apprehensive the pleasure you anticipate is not remote. For certainly, ill able as we are at present to cope with any enemy, the people of England will never bear your interference with a nation they always have protected, and have taught the advantages of peace, commerce, morality, and religion. Polverel. Religion ! Never shall the poor Tahitians lose that blessing by any interference or any negligence of ours. I have brought over with me a few gentlemen of the Company of Jesus. Pritchard. In these latter ages the company kept by the blessed Jesus, much against his will, as when he was among the scourgers and between the thieves, is a very different sort of company from what he was accustomed to meet by the Sea of Galilee and at the Mount of Olives. Polverel. Between ourselves, they are sad dogs. If ever we land, which is possible, I fear my sailors and they will speedily come to blows about certain articles of the first necessity: and the Jesuits are the least likely to be the sufferers. Pritchard. It is not because I am a missionary, and profess a doctrine widely different from theirs, that I adjure you to abstain from giving any countenance to the turbulent and the traitorous. It is already well known at whose instigation they became so and not only the English, but also the Americans, will promulgate the disgraceful fact. If war (which God forbid !) is to rage again between the two nations which alone could impose eternal peace on the world, let it never spring from wanton insolence, but rather from some great motive, which must display to future generations how much less potent, in the wisest of rulers, is reason than resentment and ambition. We have been fighting seven hundred years, nearly eight hundred, and have lately breathed longer between the rounds than we ever breathed before: we have time and room to consider how little has either party gained, and how much both have suffered. Polverel. M. Pritchard! I really beg your par don I yawned quite involuntarily, I do assure Polverel. I carry no dictionary in my pocket. We can discourse more intelligibly on the condition of Ireland. Parbleu! I believe there neither is nor ever was anything similar in any other country under the sun. We must invade Ireland; I see we must. My ship is in readiness to sail into the bay of Dublin: my brave crew has already planted the tricolor on the castle-walls. I see the Atlantic, the Pacific, California, China, India. We have been too merciful, M. Pritchard! we have been too merciful to you; but we must correct that error. Pritchard. It is a foible, sir, in you, of which few beside yourselves have complained. If others had shown as little of it, I should not at this moment have had the honour of conversing with you on the protectorate of Tahiti. Polverel. We fear and respect no power that omits its opportunity of crushing an enemy. You have omitted this, and more. America and France, justly proud of free institutions, have each its National Guards. Where are yours? You ought to have in England at least two hundred thousand of them, beside forty thousand artillerymen and engineers; and in Ireland half the number. If there is in England any class of men which apprehends the danger of such an institution, you must instantly annihilate that class, or submit to annihilation. Have you any reply for this? Pritchard. I wish I had. More temperate men than yourself entertain the same opinion. You happen to be governed at the present time by the wisest king that ever reigned over you, or perhaps over any people; his wisdom would render him pacific, if his power and popularity consented. But our negligence is a temptation to him. There are many who would not tear a straw-bonnet off the head of a girl wide awake, yet would draw a diamond-ring from the finger if they caught her unprotected and fast asleep. We must fortify all our ports and roadsteads in both islands. To conciliate popularity, every minister is ready to abolish a tax. We should never have abolished one on the contrary we should have quoted the authority of Nelson on the dangers we have escaped, and on the necessity of guarding against them for the future. My own opinion is, that a less sum than twenty millions of pounds sterling would be inadequate. But in twenty weeks of the last war we expended as much we may now disburse more leisurely. Polverel. We shall at all times be a match for you. Pritchard. As a minister of religion, and an advocate for whatever tends to promote the interests of humanity, of which things peace is the first, I can not but regret this commencement of hostilities, so unworthy in its object, even if the object be ultimately attained. Polverel. Sir, after such strong language, so derogatory to the dignity of France, I must inform you that I merely sent for you in order to let you know that I am not ignorant of your designs. Pritchard. You have greatly the advantage over | ceremonial he reserves for the defenceless, in order to establish the glory of his navy. You begin it with a priest, and (no doubt) you will end it with a woman. me, M. le Capitaine, I remain in profound ignorance of yours, if you intend no aggression. Polverel. I come by order of his Majesty the king of the French to protect the queen and people of Tahiti, from rebels, incendiaries, and fanatics. Pritchard. Namely, those who have risen in all quarters of the island to escape from the protection Jou offer. Polverel. At your instigation. Pritchard. It required no instigation from me, or from any other man, native or stranger. For many years, indeed ever since we discovered the country they inhabit, they have lived peaceably and happily, subject to no foreign laws or controul Under the guidance of disinterested men, men contented with laborious poverty, they have abandoned their ancient superstitions, immoral and sanguinary, and have listened to the promises of the Gospel. Polverel. It is now their duty to listen to ours, more positive and immediate. We have nothing to do with Gospel or with missionaries: we come to liberate a people crushed by your avarice. Pritchard. Of what have we ever deprived them? what taxes, what concessions, what obedience, have we ever exacted? They never fought acainst us, never fled from us, never complained of us. Polverel. How dared they? Pritchard. Yet they dare attack men so much traver. Polverel, M. Pritchard! I perceive you are a person of impartiality and discernment. You bestow on us unreservedly the character we claim and merit. The rabble is not to be consulted in affairs of state: and the rabble alone is in insurrection against us. Pritchard. I did imagine, sir, that the word mable had no longer a place in the French language. Polverel. It never had for the French. But these wretches must be taught obedience to the Pritchard. What laws? [Des Mitrailles enters.] Polverel. Permit me to present to you M. le Capitaine Des Mitrailles, and to take my leave. Des Mitrailles. If that abominable hag Pomare were present at this instant, I would strike her to the earth, were it only to irritate the English. Pritchard. You would succeed in both exploits. Our queen must be enamoured of your king's gallantry, when she hears that his officers have executed his commission so delicately. Des Mitrailles. The queen Pomare has concealed herself. Pritchard. How! From the Protectorate she solicited so earnestly? Des Mitrailles. Find her: bring her in: or expect the confiscation of your property, and a prison. Pritchard. Find her! bring her in! I am no bloodhound. Des Mitrailles. Unless she comes forward and acknowledges our Protectorate, I dethrone her in the name of Louis Philippe, king of the French. Pritchard. Europe may not see with tranquillity the execution of such violence. Des Mitrailles. We have a long account to settle with Europe, and our quarrel must commence with her Paymaster-general. Pritchard. I hope he does not reside in Tahiti. Des Mitrailles. You understand me better. Pritchard. Until now there has been little discord in the island, no insurrection and murder. He who first brings war into any country will be remembered and execrated by all others to the end of time. Can Englishmen believe that a king who hath seen so much suffering, and hath endured so much himself, will ever enjoy a phantom of power rising up over blood and carnage? This happy people want protection against no enemy. Our mariners discovered their island, and have continued to live among them not as masters, or what you call protectors, but simply as instructors. We do not even exercise the right which is usually conceded to discoverers: we are unwilling to receive, and more unwilling to exact, submission. Improbable then is it that we should let another, under any pretext, usurp it. Des Mitrailles. We are aware of that sentiDes Mitrailles. On my entrance you were ask-ment; otherwise my frigate would not have sailed at present to the South Sea. I shall act according to my orders. ing what laws the people of Tahiti are to obey: the answer is easy and simple: ours, and no other. Pritchard. Consider, sir, the responsibility. Pritchard. The answer is easier than the What is now occurring in this obscure little island, execution. [Des Mitrailles, clenching his fist.] Pritchard. I am a man of peace, M. le Capitaine, and a servant of God. But if any impertinent arrogant outrageous aggressor should strike me, I might peradventure wipe the dust off the wall with his whiskers: so take care. King LouisPhilippe, I imagine, issued no orders to bestow on so humble an individual as myself an earnest of his Protectorate by a blow in the face, which is a may agitate the minds of the most powerful in the present age, and of the most intellectual in the future. What were once the events of the day are become the events of all days. Historians and orators of the first order have founded their fame on what at the beginning raised only a little dust round the market-place. Des Mitrailles. You have the presumption and impertinence, sir, to reason and argue and dogmatise with me, and even to call me to account. I am responsible only to the king my master, and to the minister who gave me his instructions. Pritchard. If that minister is a demagogue whose daily bread is baked on the ashes of ruined habitations; if that minister is a firebrand of which every spark is supplied by the conflagration of the household gods. Pomare. O inhumanity! Although I am a woman, a Christian, and a queen, and although you are Frenchmen, I never could have expected this. Des Mitrailles. Bravo! bravo! but rather lower, Poignaunez! hit rather lower. How the tiger defends her breast! Well; the eyes will do. Des Mitrailles. Do not talk to me of households Again! Bravo! you have pretty nearly knocked and gods. out one. Pritchard. Depend upon it there are men in England who can catch the ball with whatever force you bat it; and you will not win the game. You threatened to strike a woman to the ground, a defenceless woman, whom you avowedly came to protect. Des Mitrailles. We did come to protect her, and she insults our generosity by her flight. A Frenchman never threatens what he finds himself unable to execute. Were the wretch here, you should see the proof. Lieutenant Poignaunez. My captain! we have brought in the fugitive, the incendiary, the traitress. Des Mitrailles. Chain her, and carry her aboard. Pritchard. I protest against either outrage. Lieutenant Poignaunez. You protest! who are you? Pritchard. British Consul. Lieutenant Poignaunez. What are British consuls in the presence of French officers? My captain! with submission! knock out at least a tooth as a trophy. I have set my heart on a couple of her front teeth; they are worth a louis in the Palais Royal. M. du Petit Thouars, our admiral, has extorted his six thousand dollars; are a couple of teeth above a lieutenant's share of the booty? Des Mitrailles. Knock out one yourself; it is not among the duties of a French capitaine de vaisseau. You may strike her safely; she is so heavy with child she can not run after you. Pomare. Spare my life! do not murder me! O brave captain! can such be your orders? Des Mitrailles. May it please your Majesty! I bear no such injunctions from the King my master, or from Monsieur his minister of state for the marine and colonies. Pritchard. Have you received or given orders that I should be seized and detained? Des Mitrailles. Sir, I call upon you to attest in writing the perfect good-faith and composure with which we have acted. Pritchard. Every man in England receives a slap in the face when a woman receives one in any quarter of the globe. Des Mitrailles. Queen Pomare did not receive a slap on the face. Lieutenant Poignaunez. By no means. Des Mitrailles. She had only a tooth knocked out. Lieutenant Poignaunez. My captain! pardon! you concede too much. The tooth is in its place, and in accordance with all the rest: it has merely undergone the declension of a few degrees toward the horizon. Des Mitrailles. Madame! I am exceedingly concerued, and intimately penetrated, that, by some strange unaccountable interpretation, so untoward an accident has befallen your Majesty. Lieutenant Poignaunez (to the crew). Cry, you fools, cry. Sailor. I thought, M. le Lieutenant, we were to carry her off in chains. Here they are. Lieutenant Poignaunez. Presently, presently. But now deploy your throats, and cry, rascals, cry Lieutenant Poignaunez. Madame, the queen! I carry the orders of Monsieur le Capitaine, serving in the Pacific, by appointment of his Majesty' Vive la Reine.' Louis-Philippe, king of the French, to knock out a tooth. Crew. Vive la Reine! À bas les fuyards! À bas les Anglais! A bas les tyrans. Vive le [Strikes her in the face; sailors hold Pritchard. Roi! LA FONTAINE AND DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULT. La Fontaine. I am truly sensible of the honour I receive, M. de la Rochefoucault, in a visit from a personage so distinguished by his birth and by his genius. Pardon my ambition, if I confess to you that I have long and ardently wished for the good fortune, which I never could promise myself, of knowing you personally. Rochefoucault. My dear M. de la Fontaine ! La Fontaine. Not de la,' not 'de la.' I am La Fontaine purely and simply. Rochefoucault. The whole; not derivative. You appear, in the midst of your purity, to have been educated at court, in the lap of the ladies. What was the last day (pardon !) I had the misfortune to miss you there? La Fontaine. I never go to court. They say one can not go without silk stockings; and I have only thread: plenty of them indeed, thank God! Yet, would you believe it? Nanon, in putting a solette to the bottom of one, last week, sewed it so carelessly, she made a kind of cord across : and] verily believe it will lame me for life; for I walked the whole morning upon it. Rochefoucault. She ought to be whipt. La Fontaine. I thought so too, and grew the warmer at being unable to find a wisp of osie |