TALLEYRAND-PÉRIGORD (Charles-Maurice de). Letter... Lot 19

TALLEYRAND-PÉRIGORD (Charles-Maurice de). Letter signed "Ch. Mau. Talleyrand" as Minister of Foreign Relations to the French chargé d'affaires in the Valais, Joseph Eschassériaux. Paris, 30 frimaire year XIII [21 December 1804]. 5 pp. 1/4 in-folio. "THE CORONATION OF HIS IMPERIAL MAJESTY HAS FINISHED THE REVOLUTION. They replaced France under the government which was appropriate to its extent, to its habits, and to which one had given up, after a test of fourteen centuries, only to throw oneself in vague theories without connection with the past and giving for the future no guarantee... ALL OF FRANCE WAS REPRESENTED AT THE CORONATION... THE PRESENCE OF HIS HOLINESS ENLARGED STILL THE SPECTACLE... It would be difficult to paint the emotion of the spectators when His Holiness, preceded by all the cardinals, all the bishops of France, of all the Clergy of the capital, made his entry in the church of Notre-Dame, to call on the new emperor the blessings of the Sky, and when finally the emperor and the empress, arrived in the church with the imperial ornaments, but having placed them on the altar and having received the Holy Unction, were again decorated with them, the EMOTION REDOUBLATED WHEN HIS MAJESTY THE EMPEROR TAKEN WITH VIVACITY HIS CROWN ON THE ALTAR, PUT IT ON HIS HEAD AND THEN CROWNED HIS MAJESTY THE IMPERATRESS... [Talleyrand then describes and comments on the ceremonies and festivities that followed, before concluding:] I thought, Sir, that it might be useful to place this picture before your eyes, so that the memorable time of Their Majesties' Coronation and all the circumstances which accompany it might be considered in the country where you reside, from the same point of view as they are in France. THE AUTHORITY OF HIS IMPERIAL MAJESTY IS TODAY CONSECRATED BY ALL THAT IS MOST RESPECTABLE AND MOST AUGUST. IT IS STRENGTHENED BY THE FEELINGS OF AFFECTION WHICH ALL THE FRENCH PEOPLE HAVE DEVOTED TO HIM, AND BY THE NEW DEVELOPMENT WHICH HIS MAJESTY HAS GIVEN TO THE POWER AND THE PROSPERITY OF THE EMPIRE... " GENDER OF GASPARD MONGE, JOSEPH ESCHASSERIAUX was first a lawyer at the Parliament of Bordeaux and president of the Election of Marennes. During the Revolution and the Consulate he had a political career: member of the Directory of Charente-Inférieure, deputy to the Legislative Assembly, to the Convention (twice member of the Committee of Public Salvation), to the Legislative Body, member of the Council of Five Hundred, member of the Tribunate during the Consulate. Under the Empire, he held diplomatic posts in the Valais (1804-1806) and at the Court of Lucques and Piombino (1806-1809). Napoleon I made him Baron of the Empire in 1810. - Piasa sale, March 6, 2007, n°684.