Polignac's Mission. 369
the aid of the French nation. To this the Emperor made no reply. In taking leave of him I asked permission to introduce an aid-de- camp of the Governor of Louisiana, the bearer of a letter to him. The Emperor hesitated a moment, asking (I well remember his words) : ' ' Que me dit il dous cette lettre f ' ' (What does he tell me in that letter ?) I replied that I had not read the letter, but that it surely recalled the fact that Louisiana had originally been a French settlement, adding that the ties of blood had ever since kept alive a natural sympathy with France among the descendants of the first settlers. The Emperor granted my request, but more I think from courtesy to me than from any other motive, for it struck me at the time how guarded he had become the moment we approached the boundary of official grounds. However, the next day I intro- duced Colonel Miltenberger. He handed Governor Allen's letter to the Emperor, who. without opening it, laid it on a table near him. He received us standing and our conversation lasted only a few minutes.
This was my last interview with the Emperor. The news of Gen- eral Lee's surrender reached us almost immediately afterward, and the briefness of the interval would itself suffice to disprove the alle- gations contained in the first editorial of the Washington Post on "A Lost Chapter of History" (March 14, 1901), from which I quote the following extract:
"At all events, Polignac, accompanied by Moncure, went to Paris via Galveston, we think and though their mission was barren of re- sult so far as concerned the Confederacy, it leaked out when Moncure returned, that Louis Napoleon had frequently consulted with Lord Palmerston and that so far from refusing to consider the proposition at all whatever it may have been the latter had given it a great deal of his time, and had finally dismissed it with reluctance. We have since been told that the Queen herself intervened, but we rather think that the appearance of the Russian fleets at New York and San Francisco with orders, as afterward transpired, to place themselves at the disposal of the United States government cut at least some figure in Lord Palmerston's philosophy."
So much for history ! The wonderful array of political intrigues, negotiations, conflicting efforts, and warlike demonstrations, sup- posed to have taken place in the space of a few weeks, perhaps only of a few days, does infinite credit to the dramatic imagination of the author, as well as to the spirit of enterprise which distin- guished his dramatis personae. Indeed, the tenor of the whole article, with the Queen and the Russian fleets thrown in, appeals so strongly to one's sense of humor that it seems a pity to mar by any commentaries the comical foundation of the scene.
Nor are the afterthoughts intended to supply motives for these imaginary facts less ingeniously contrived. I quote again from the aforementioned letter to the editor of the Washington Post f March 16, 1901):
- * * Jhere was a strong feeling at the time west of the
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