Mills, was detained in exile; he was a man of
the most perfect goodness and obliging manners, and according to the
English expression, altogether inoffensive. He was made dreadfully
miserable, without the least pretence or utility. But the Austrian
ministry is apparently persuaded that it will derive an air of
strength from turning persecutor; its counsellors are not mistaken;
and as was said by a man of wit, their manner of governing in
matters of police, resembles the sentinels placed upon the half
destroyed citadel of Brunn,--they keep a strict guard round the
ruins. Scarcely had I arrived at Brunn when all sorts of
difficulties were started about my passports, and those of my
companions. I asked permission to send my son to Vienna, to give the
necessary explanations upon these points. I was told that neither
myself nor my son would be allowed to go one league backwards. I
know not if the emperor, or M. de Metternich were informed of all
these absurd acts, but I encountered at Brunn, in the agents of
government, a dread of compromising themselves which appeared to me
quite worthy of the present French regime; and it must even be
admitted that when the French are afraid, they are more excusable,
for under the emperor Napoleon they run the risk of exile,
imprisonment, or death.
The governor of Moravia, a man in other respects very estimable,
informed me that I was ordered to go through Gallicia as quickly as
possible, and that I was forbid stopping more than twenty-four hours
at Lanzut, where I had the intention of going.
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