CHATEAUBRIAND, Fnaxgots AUGUSTE, Viscomte de, one of the most distinguished of French authors, was b. Sept. 4, 1769, at St. ,halo, in Bretagne, and received his early education in the college at Rennes. While traveling in _North America in 1790, he accidentally read in an English newspaper the account of the flight and arrest of Louis XVI. He immediately returned to France, intending to fight against the republic; but being seriously wounded at the siege of Thionville, in Sept., 1792, he escaped to Eng land, where he lived in such poverty that he was compelled to make translations for the book-sellers, and to give lessons in French. In 1797, he published his first political essay, Sur lee Revolutions Anciennes et Modernes, consideries dans leers Rapports avec la Revolution FranFalee (2 vols., London), a republican and sceptical work, the outcome of hardship, poverty, and sorrow. His skepticism soon vanished, but republican impulses continued to flash out at intervals during the whole of his strangely-checkered, inexpli cable, and inconsistent career. In 1800, C. returned to Paris, and wrote for the 111ercure de France. In this journal, he first printed his tale of Atala (1801), with a preface lauding the first consul, Bonaparte. Its success was remarkable, but nothing to the miraculous enthusiasm excited by his Genie du Christianisme (1802), a work exactly suited to the jaded skepticism of the age, and also in accordance with the policy of the first consul, who was then concluding the concordat with the pope, and wished to make the Roman Catholic priesthood subservient to his measures. Bonaparte, there fore. appointed C. secretary to the embassy in Rome, and, in 1803, sent him as ambas sador to the little republic of Valais. On the execution of the duke d'Enghien, Mar. 21, 1804, C. resigned in disgust. In 1806, he commenced his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, visited Greece, Palestine, Alexandria, and Carthage, and returned through Spain to France in May, 1807. From this period to the fall of Napoleon, he lived privately, pub lishing only two Works of any value—Les Martyrs and the Itineraire de Paris d Jeru salem. In 1814, his eloquent brochure, De Bonaparte et des Bourbons, excited such attention, that Louis XVIII. declared it was worth an army of 100,000 men in favor of
legitimacy.
After the battle of Waterloo, C. returned to Paris, where he was made peer and minister of state. Gradually his monarchical zeal subsided, and, in his address, De le Monarchic selon la Charte, delivered in the chamber of peers. he gave expression to such liberal tendencies as offended the king, who erased his name from the list of his coun selors. Soon, however, he appeared again as an ultraroyalist; and at the baptism of the infant duke de Bordeaux, C. presented to the duchess of Berry a flask filled with water from the Jordan. In 1822, he was appointed ambassador-extraordinary to the British court, but was rather rudely dismissed from office in 1824.
In 1826, C. prepared the first edition of his collected works, for the copyright of which the publisher gave the large sum of 600,000 francs, of which C. returned 100,000. During the days of July, 1830, he was staying with his friend Mme. Recamier at Dieppe; but as soon as he heard tidings of the revolution, he hastened to Paris. He refused to take the oath of fealty to Louis Philippe. This political crotchetiness, which always rendered it impossible to know beforehand what course of conduct C. would adopt, is perhaps best explained by the following passage from his De la Restauration et de kb Monarchic Elective (Paris, 1831): " I am a B% ourbonist in honor, a monarchist on grounds of rational conviction; but in natural character and disposition, I am still it republican." In 1832, he revised a new edition of his works, and, after visiting the court of the expelled Bourbons, devoted his attention to the preparation of his memoirs, intended to be published posthumously (hlemoires d'outre Tombe), though considerable extracts were printed during his lifetime. He also found leisure to write several other works. He died July 4, 1848.
C. wrote with warmth, energy, and a rich supply of imagery. Many of his descrip tive passages are excellent, but his ideas want depth and coherency,-3Iarin, Histoire de la Vie et des Ourrages de a de Chateaubriand (2 vols., Paris, 1832).