The rise and fall of the Emperor Maximilian/Introduction
THE RISE AND FALL
OF
THE EMPEROR MAXIMILIAN.
INTRODUCTION.
THE French expedition to Mexico belongs henceforth to history. The second emperor of that country was shot to death at Queretaro in 1867, as the first had been at Padilla in 1824. Yet both loved their adopted country, and Maximilian brought with him a high-minded conception of his mission.
Just at the time when a solemn debate is resounding within the walls of our Palais Législatif, we may perhaps be permitted to investigate the various causes which have combined in the ruin of this distant enterprise. The present time is all the more favourable to this investigation since the several acts of the Mexican drama—so fertile in catastrophes—date, so to speak, only from yesterday. Besides, it seems to us only just to apportion out and ascribe to each of the actors in this sanguinary tragedy the share of responsibility which duly falls upon him, both in the conception and management of the undertaking, and also in the failure of this unfortunate campaign. Let us then pursue this enquiry, and let us try to do it as impartially as possible. We must, first of all, admit that the French armed force, both sailors and soldiers, are beside the question in our present enquiry. It was this armed force alone which was found adequate to its mission. The slave of duty, it fulfilled its obligations to the end, and never for a moment swerved from its noble traditions. This fatal expedition will be estimated as but a fresh claim to glory. Rarely has French valour been compelled to testify to its personal prowess in so vast a field as this. If our country could only have been a witness of the thousand deeds of arms which were obscurely done during the last five years in every corner of Mexico, by a handful of men lost, as it were, in its vast expanse, the admiration which would have been inspired by the warlike virtues of her children might have stilled for a time the tumult of opposition and complaint. The brave men left scattered over the path from the Antilles to the Pacific proclaim loudly enough the noble devotion of the expeditionary corps.
It is then in the first 'idea' of the cabinet of the Tuileries—in the instructions which emanated therefrom—in the management of our policy and of our military operations, that we must seek for the information which is indispensable to throw a light upon the sad scene in which the national prestige has been diminished, and the throne set up by the hand of France has crumbled down in blood.