AND REPUBLIC  PF HAYTI.                 [ill
marine and the colonies, had selected as emissaries to
Hayti, a terrorist, an agent of Robespierre's, notoriously
infamous, and, to complete his character; sentenced to
the gallies for the crime of bigamy; a renegado Spaniard,
formerly a smuggler; and an old man equally unknown
in Hayti and in France. Such were the persons chosen
to execute his disgraceful projects^
The Viscount du Bouchage, entertaining the same
prejudices, and schooled in the same principles as M.
Malouet, likewise made an unfortunate choice when he
sent us commissioners who were all ex-colonists : the
French cabinet, always influenced and misled by the
ex-colonists, imagined that these perverse and deceitful
men still retained some influence in the country. The
Viscount du Bouchage fancied then that he had made a
master-stroke when he selected six ex-colonists to notify
to us the orders of Louis XVIII.
My readers will doubtless not be displeased to
learn the names and characters of these ci-devant mas-
ters, who were thus sent to insult, deceive and entrap
their ci-devant slaves.
The Viscount de Fontanges, chief of the mission,
is an old man, an ex-colonist of Gonaives, ex-colonel of
the regiment of the Cape, ex-commandant of the cordon
of Marmelade, who had twenty-eight years before
carried on hostilities against Generals Jean François
and Biassou, the champions of freedom.          i
The Viscount de Fontanges, during the revolution-
ary war of St. Domingo, possessed great influence over
the men of colour, whome he carressed and flattered,
in order to induce them to make war upon the blacks
under Generals Jean François, and Biassou ; it was
expressly on this account that he was chosen as envoy
to General Pétion, being, from long experience quite
expert at such intrigues.