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The Court of the Empress Josephine

by Imbert de Saint-Amand · English · Gutenberg #9831 · 477,871 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Court of the Empress Josephine

Author: Imbert de Saint-Amand

Translator: Thomas Sergeant Perry


        
Release date: February 1, 2006 [eBook #9831]
                Most recently updated: December 26, 2020

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9831

Credits: Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, Shawn Wheeler, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COURT OF THE EMPRESS JOSEPHINE ***




Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon,
Shawn Wheeler, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed
Proofreading Team












THE COURT OF THE EMPRESS JOSEPHINE

BY

IMBERT DE SAINT-AMAND

TRANSLATED BY THOMAS SERGEANT PERRY

ILLUSTRATED

1900







CONTENTS.


CHAPTER

    I.  THE BEGINNING OF THE EMPIRE

   II.  THE JOURNEY TO THE BANKS OF THE RHINE

  III.  THE POPE'S ARRIVAL AT FONTAINEBLEAU

   IV.  THE PREPARATIONS FOR THE CORONATION

    V.  THE CORONATION

   VI.  THE DISTRIBUTION OF FLAGS

  VII.  THE FESTIVITIES

 VIII.  THE ETIQUETTE OF THE IMPERIAL PALACE

   IX.  THE HOUSEHOLD OF THE EMPRESS

    X.  NAPOLEON'S GALLANTRIES

   XI.  THE POPE AT THE TUILERIES

  XII.  THE JOURNEY IN ITALY

 XIII.  THE CORONATION AT MILAN

  XIV.  THE FESTIVITIES AT GENOA

   XV.  DURING THE CAMPAIGN OF AUSTERLITZ

  XVI.  THE MARRIAGE OF PRINCE EUGENE

 XVII.  PARIS IN THE BEGINNING OF 1806

XVIII.  THE MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCE OF BADEN

  XIX.  THE NEW QUEEN OF HOLLAND

   XX.  THE EMPRESS AT MAYENCE

  XXI.  THE RETURN OF THE EMPRESS TO PARIS

 XXII.  THE DEATH OF THE YOUNG NAPOLEON

XXIII.  THE END OF THE WAR

 XXIV.  THE EMPEROR'S RETURN

  XXV.  THE COURT AT FONTAINEBLEAU

 XXVI.  THE END OF THE YEAR 1807





I.

THE BEGINNING OF THE EMPIRE.


"Two-thirds of my life is passed, why should I so distress myself about
what remains? The most brilliant fortune does not deserve all the trouble
I take, the pettiness I detect in myself, or the humiliations and shame I
endure; thirty years will destroy those giants of power which can be seen
only by raising the head; we shall disappear, I who am so petty, and those
whom I regard so eagerly, from whom I expected all my greatness. The most
desirable of all blessings is repose, seclusion, a little spot we can call
our own." When La Bruyère expressed himself so bitterly, when he spoke of
the court "which satisfies no one," but "prevents one from being satisfied
anywhere else," of the court, "that country where the joys are visible but
false, and the sorrows hidden, but real," he had before him the brilliant
Palace of Versailles, the unrivalled glory of the Sun King, a monarchy
which thought itself immovable and eternal. What would he say in this
century when dynasties fail like autumn leaves, and it takes much less
than thirty years to destroy the giants of power; when the exile of to-day
repeats to the exile of the morrow the motto of the churchyard: _Hodie
mihi, eras tibi?_ What would this Christian philosopher say at a time when
royal and imperial palaces have been like caravansaries through which
sovereigns have passed like travellers, when their brief resting-places
have been consumed by the blaze of petroleum and are now but a heap of
ashes?

The study of any court is sure to teach wisdom and indifference to human
glories. In our France of the nineteenth century, fickle as it has been,
inconstant, fertile in revolutions, recantations, and changes of every
sort, this lesson is more impressive than it has been at any period of our
history. Never has Providence shown more clearly the nothingness of this
world's grandeur and magnificence. Never has the saying of Ecclesiastes
been more exactly verified: "Vanity of vanities; all is vanity!" We have
before us the task of describing one of the most sumptuous courts that has
ever existed, and of reviewing splendors all the more brilliant for their
brevity. To this court of Napoleon and Josephine, to this majestic court,
resplendent with glory, wealth, and fame, may well be applied Corneille's
lines:--

 "All your happiness
  Subject to instability
  In a moment falls to the ground,
  And as it has the brilliancy of glass
  It also has its fragility."

We shall evoke the memory of the dead to revive this vanished court, and
we shall consult, one after another, the persons who were eye-witnesses of
these short-lived wonders. A prefect of the palace, M. de Bausset, wrote:
"When I recall the memorable times of which I have just given a faint
idea, I feel, after so many years, as if I had been taking part in the
gorgeous scenes of the _Arabian Tales_ or of the _Thousand and One
Nights_. The magic picture of all those splendors and glories has
disappeared, and with it all the prestige of ambition and power." One of
the ladies of the palace of the Empress Josephine, Madame de Rémusat, has
expressed the same thought: "I seem to be recalling a dream, but a dream
resembling an Oriental tale, when I describe the lavish luxury of that
period, the disputes for precedence, the claims of rank, the demands of
every one." Yes, in all that there was something dreamlike, and the actors
in that fairy spectacle which is called the Empire, that great show piece,
with its scenery, now brilliant, now terrible, but ever changing, must
have been even more astonished than the spectators. Aix-la-Chapelle and
the court of Charlemagne, the castle of Fontainebleau and the Pope, Notre
Dame and the coronation, the Champ de Mars and the distribution of eagles,
the Cathedral of Milan and the Iron Crown, Genoa the superb and its naval
festival, Austerlitz and the three emperors,--what a setting! what
accessories! what personages! The peal of organs, the intoning of priests,
the applause of the multitude and of the soldiers, the groans of the
dying, the trumpet call, the roll of the drum, ball music, military bands,
the cannon's roar, were the joyful and mournful harmonies heard while the
play went on. What we shall study amid this tumult and agitation is one
woman. We have already studied her as the Viscountess of Beauharnais, as
Citizeness Bonaparte, and as the wife of the First Consul. We shall now
study her in her new part, that of Empress.

Let us go back to May 18, 1804, to the Palace of Saint Cloud. The Emperor
had just been proclaimed by the Senate before the _plébiscite_ which was
to ratify the new state of things. The curtain has risen, the play begins,
and no drama is fuller of contrasts, of incidents, of movement. The
leading actor, Napoleon, was already as familiar with his part as if he
had played it since his childhood. Josephine is also at home in hers. As a
woman of the world, she had learned, by practice in the drawing-room, to
win even greater victories. For a fashionable beauty there is no great
difference between an armchair and a throne. The minor actors are not so
accustomed to their new position. Nothing is more amusing than the
embarrassment of the courtiers when they have to answer the Emperor's
questions. They begin with a blunder; then, in correcting themselves, they
fall into still worse confusion; ten times a minute was repeated, Sire,
General, Your Majesty, Citizen, First Consul. Constant, the Emperor's
valet de chambre, has given us a description of this 18th of May, 1804, a
day devoted to receptions, presentations, interviews, and congratulations:
"Every one," he says, "was filled with joy in the Palace of Saint Cloud;
every one imagined that he had risen a step, like General Bonaparte, who,
from First Consul, had become a monarch. Men were embracing and
complimenting one another; confiding their share of hopes and plans for
the future; there was no official so humble that he was not fired with
ambition." In a word, the ante-chamber, barring the difference of persons,
presented an exact imitation of what was going on in the drawing-room. It
seemed like a first performance which had long been eagerly expected,
arousing the same eager excitement among the players and the public. The
day which had started bright grew dark; for a long time there were
threatenings of a thunder-storm; but none looked on this as an evil omen.
All were inclined to cheery views. The courtiers displayed their zeal with
all the ardor, the passion, the _furia francese_, which is a national
characteristic, and appears on the battle-field as well as in the ante-
chamber. The French fight and flatter with equal enthusiasm.

Amid all these manifestations of devotion and delight, the members of the
Imperial family alone, who should have been the most satisfied, and
certainly the most astonished by their greatness, wore an anxious, almost
a grieved look. They alone appeared discontented with their master. Their
pride knew no bounds; their irritability was extreme. Nothing seemed good
enough, for them. In the way of honors privileges, and when we recall
their father's modest at Ajaccio, it is hard to keep from smiling at the
vanity of these new Princes of the blood. Of Napoleon's four brothers, two
were absent and on bad terms with him: Lucien, on account of his marriage
with Madame Jouberton; Jerome, on account of his marriage with Miss
Paterson. His mother, Madame Letitia Bonaparte, an able woman, who
combined great courage with uncommon good sense, had not lost her head
over the wonderful good fortune of the modern Caesar. Having a
presentiment that all this could not last, she economized from motives of
prudence, not of avarice. While the courtiers were celebrating the
Emperor's new triumphs, she lingered in Rome with her son Lucien, whom she
had followed in his voluntary exile, having pronounced in his favor in his
quarrel with Napoleon. As for Joseph and Louis, who, with their wives, had
been raised to the dignity of Grand Elector and Constable, respectively,
one might think that they were overburdened with wealth and honors, and
would be perfectly satisfied. But not at all! They were indignant that
they were not personally mentioned, in the _plébiscite_, by which their
posterity was appointed to succeed to the French crown. This _plébiscite_
ran thus: "The French people desire the Inheritance of the Imperial
dignity in the direct, natural, or adoptive line of descent from Napoleon
Bonaparte, and in the direct, natural, legitimate line of descent from
Joseph Bonaparte and from Louis Bonaparte, as is determined by the organic
_senatus-consultum_ of the twenty-eighth Floréal, year XII." For the
Emperor's family, these stipulations were the cause of incessant squabbles
and recriminations. Lucien and Jerome regarded their exclusion as an act
of injustice. Joseph and Louis asked indignantly why their descendants
were mentioned when they themselves were excluded. They were very jealous
of Josephine, and of her son, Eugene de Beauharnais, and much annoyed by
the Emperor's reservation of the right of adoption, which threatened them
and held out hopes for Eugene. Louis Bonaparte, indignant with the
slanderous story, according to which his wife, Hortense, had been
Napoleon's mistress, treated her ill, and conceived a dislike for his own
son, who was reported to be that of the Emperor. As for Elisa Bacciochi,
Caroline Murat, and Pauline Borghese, they could not endure the
mortification of being placed below the Empress, their sister-in-law, and
the thought that they had not yet been given the title of Princesses of
the blood, which had been granted to the wife of Joseph and the wife of
Louis, filled them with actual despair.

Madame de Rémusat, who was present at the first Imperial dinner at St.
Cloud, May 18, 1804, describes this curious repast. General Duroc, Grand
Marshal of the Palace, told all the guests in succession of the titles of
Prince and Princess to be given to Joseph and Louis, and their wives, but
not to the Emperor's sisters, or to their husbands. This fatal news
prostrated Elisa, Caroline, and Pauline. When they sat down at table,
Napoleon was good-humored and merry, possibly at heart enjoying the slight
constraint that this novel formality enforced upon his guests. Madame
Murat, when she heard the Emperor saying frequently _Princess_ Louis,
could not hide her mortification or her tears. Every one was embarrassed,
while Napoleon smiled maliciously.

The next day the Emperor went to Paris to hold a grand reception at the
Tuileries, for he was not a man to postpone the enjoyment of the splendor
which his satisfied ambition could draw from his new title. In this
palace, where had ruled the Committee of Public Safety, where the
Convention had sat, whence Robespierre had departed in triumph to preside
over the festival in honor of the Supreme Being, nothing was heard but the
titles of Emperor, Empress, My Lord, Prince, Princess, Imperial Highness,
Most Serene Highness. It was asserted that Bonaparte had cut up the red
caps to make the ribbons of the Legions of Honor. The most fanatical
Revolutionists had become conservative as soon as they had anything to
preserve. The Empire was but a few hours old, and already the new-born
court was alive with the same rivalries, jealousies, and vanities that
fill the courts of the oldest monarchies. It was like Versailles, in the
reign of Louis XIV., in the Gallery of Mirrors, or in the drawing-room of
the Oeil de Boeuf. It would have taken a Dangeau to record, hour by hour,
the minute points of etiquette. The Emperor walked, spoke, thought, acted,
like a monarch of an old line. To nothing does a man so readily adapt
himself as to power. One who has been invested with the highest rank is
sure to imagine himself eternal; to think that he has always held it and
will always keep it. Indeed, how is it possible to escape intoxication by
the fumes of perpetual incense? How can a man tell the truth to himself
when there is no one about him courageous enough to tell it to him? When
the press is muzzled, and public power rests only on general approval,
when there is no slave even to remind the triumphant hero, as in the
ancient ovations, that he is only a man, how is it possible to avoid being
infatuated by one's greatness and not to imagine one's self the absolute
master of one's destiny? The new Caesar met with no resistance. He was to
publish scornfully in the _Moniteur_ the protest of Louis XVIII. against
his accession. He was to be adored both by fierce Revolutionists and by
great lords, by regicides and by Royalists and ecclesiastics. It seemed as
if with him everything began, or rather started anew. "The old world was
submerged," says Chateaubriand; "when the flood of anarchy withdrew,
Napoleon appeared at the beginning of a new world, like those giants
described by profane and sacred history at the beginning of society,
appearing on earth after the Deluge."

The former general of the Revolution enjoyed his situation as absolute
sovereign. He studied the laws of etiquette as closely as he studied the
condition of his troops. He saw that the men of the old régime were more
conversant in the art of flattery, more eager than the new men. As Madame
de Staël says: "Whenever a gentleman of the old court recalled the ancient
etiquette, suggested an additional bow, a certain way at knocking at the
door of an ante-chamber, a ceremonious method of presenting a despatch, of
folding a letter, of concluding it with this or that formula, he greeted
as if he had helped on the happiness of the human race." Napoleon
attached, or pretended to attach, great importance to the thousand
nothings which up the life of courts. He established in the palace the
same discipline as in the camps. Everything became a matter of rule.
Courtiers studied formalities as officers studied the art of war.
Regulations were as closely observed in the drawing-rooms as in the tents.
At the end of a few months Napoleon was to have the most brilliant, the
most rigid court of Europe. At times the whirl of vanities surrounded him
filled with impatience the great central sun, without whom his satellites
would have been nothing. At other times, however, his pride was gratified
by the thought that it was his will, his fancy, which evoked from nothing
all the grandees of the earth. He was not pained at seeing such eagerness
in behalf of trifles that he had invented. He liked to fill his courtiers
with raptures or with despair, by a smile or a frown. He thought his
sisters' ambition childish, but it amused him; and if they had to cry a
little at first, he finally granted them what they wanted.

May 19, after the family dinner, Madame Murat was more and more distressed
at not being a Princess, when she was a Bonaparte by birth, while Madame
Joseph and Madame Louis, one of whom was a Clary, the other a Beauharnais,
bore that title, and burst out into complaints and reproaches. "Why," she
asked of her all-powerful brother, "why condemn me and my sisters to
obscurity, to contempt, while covering strangers with honors and
dignities?" At first these words annoyed Napoleon. "In fact," he
exclaimed, "judging from your pretensions, one would suppose that we
inherited the crown from the late King our father." At the end of the
interview, Madame Murat, not satisfied with crying, fainted away. Napoleon
softened at once, and a few days later there appeared a notification in
the _Moniteur_ that henceforth the Emperor's sisters should be called
Princesses and Imperial Highnesses.

The Empress's Maid of Honor was Madame de La Rochefoucauld; her Lady of
the Bedchamber was Madame de Lavalette. Her Ladies of the Palace, whose
number was soon raised to twelve, and later still more augmented, were at
first only four: Madame de Talhouët, Madame de Luçay, Madame de Lauriston,
and Madame de Rémusat. These ladies, too, aroused the hottest jealousies,
and soon they gave rise to a sort of parody of the questions of vanity
that agitated the Emperor's family. The women who were admitted to the
Empress's intimacy could never console themselves for the privileges
accorded to the Ladies of the Palace.

In essentials all courts are alike. On a greater or smaller scale they are
rank with the same pettinesses, the same chattering gossip, the same
trivial squabbles as the porter's lodge, ante-chambers, and servants'
quarters. If we examine these things from the standpoint of a philosopher,
we shall find but little difference between a steward and a chamberlain,
between a chambermaid and a lady of the palace. We may go further and say
that as soon as they have places and money at their disposal, republicans
have courtesies, as much as monarchs, and everywhere and always there are
to be found people ready to bow low if there is anything on the ground
that they can pick up. Revolutions alter the forms of government, but not
the human heart; afterwards, as before, there exist the same pretensions,
the same prejudices, the same flatteries. The incense may be burned before
a tribune, a dictator, or a Caesar, there are always the same flattering
genuflections, the same cringing.

The new Empire began most brilliantly, but there was no lack of morose
criticism. The Faubourg Saint Germain was for the most part hostile and
scornful. It looked upon the high dignitaries of the Empire and on the
Emperor himself as upstarts, and all the men of the old régime who went
over to him they branded as renegades. The title of "Citizen" was
suppressed and that of "Monsieur" restored, after having been abandoned in
conversation and writing for twelve years. Miot de Mélito tells us in his
Memoirs that at first public opinion was opposed to this change; even
those who at the beginning had shown the greatest repugnance to being
addressed as Citizen, disliked conferring the title of Monsieur upon
Revolutionists and the rabble, and they pretended to address as Citizen
those whom they saw fit to include in this class. Many turned the new
state of affairs to ridicule. The Parisians, always of a malicious humor,
made perpetual puns and epigrams in abundance.

The Faubourg Saint Germain, in spite of a few adhesions from personal
motives, preserved an ironical attitude. General de Ségur, then a captain
under the orders of the Grand Marshal of the Palace, observed that in
1804, with the exception of several obscure nobles, either poor or ruined,
and others already attached to Napoleon's civil and military fortune, many
negotiations and various temptations were required to persuade well-known
persons to appear at the court as it was at first constituted. He goes on:
"As a spectator and confidant of the means employed, I witnessed in those
early days many refusals, and some I had to announce myself. I even heard
many bitter complaints on this subject. I remember that in reply I
mentioned to the Empress my own case, and told her what it had cost me to
enlist under the tricolor, and then to enter the First Consul's military
household. The Empress understood me so well that she made to me a similar
confidence, confessing her own struggles, her almost invincible
repugnance, at the end of 1795, in spite of her feeling for Bonaparte,
before she could make up her mind to marry the man whom at that time she
herself used to call General Vendémiaire."

Although Josephine had become Empress, she remained a Legitimist, and saw
clearly the weak points in the Empire. At the Tuileries, in the chamber of
Marie Antoinette, she felt out of place; she was surprised to have for
Lady of Honor a duchess of an old family, and her sole ambition was to be
pardoned by the Royalists for her elevation, to the highest rank.
Napoleon, too, was much concerned about the Bourbons, in whom he foresaw
his successors, "One of his keenest regrets," wrote Prince Metternich,
"was his inability to invoke legitimacy as the foundation of his power.
Few men have felt more deeply than he the precariousness and fragility of
power when it lacks this foundation, its susceptibility to attack."

After recalling the Emperor's attempt to induce Louis XVIII. to abandon
his claims to the throne, Prince Metternich goes on: "In speaking to me of
this matter, Napoleon said: 'His reply was noble, full of noble
traditions. In those Legitimists there is something outside of mere
intellectual force.'" The Emperor, who, at the beginning of his career,
displayed such intense Republican enthusiasm, was by nature essentially a
lover of authority and of the monarchy. He would have liked to be a
sovereign of the old stamp. His pleasure in surrounding himself with
members of the old aristocracy attests the aristocratic instincts of the
so-called crowned apostle of democracy. The few Republicans who remained
faithful to the principles were indignant with these tendencies; it was
with grief that they saw the reappearance of the throne; and thus, from
different motives the unreconciled Jacobins and the men of Coblentz who
had not joined the court, showed the same feeling of bitterness and of
hostility to the Empire.

The trial of General Moreau made clear the germs of opposition which
existed in a latent condition. It is difficult to form an idea of the
enormous throng that blocked all the approaches to the Palace of Justice
the day the trial opened, and continued to crowd them during the twelve
days that the trial lasted, which was as interesting to Royalists as to
Republicans. The most fashionable people of Paris made a point of being
present. Sentence was pronounced June 10. Georges Cadoudal and nineteen of
the accused, among whom were M. Armand de Polignac, and M. de Rivière,
were condemned to death.

To the Emperor's great surprise, Moreau was sentenced to only two years of
prison. This penalty was remitted, and he was allowed to betake himself to
the United States. To facilitate his establishing himself there, the
Emperor bought his house in the rue d'Anjou Saint Honoré, paying for it
eight hundred thousand francs, much more than it was worth, and then he
gave it to Bernadotte, who did not scruple to accept it. The sum was paid
to Moreau out of the secret fund of the police before he left for Cadiz.
Josephine's urgent solicitations saved the life of the Duke Armand de
Polignac, whose death-sentence was commuted to four years' imprisonment
before being transported. Madame Murat secured a modification of the
sentence of the Marquis de Rivière; and these two acts of leniency, to
which great publicity was given, were of great service in diminishing the
irritation of the Royalists. After Moreau's trial, the opposition, having
become discouraged, and conscious of its weakness, laid down its arms, at
least for a time. Napoleon was everywhere master.

The Republic was forgotten. Its name still appeared on the coins: "French
Republic, Napoleon, Emperor"; but it survived as a mere ghost.
Nevertheless, the Emperor was anxious to celebrate in 1804 the Republican
festival of July 14; but the object of this festival was so modified that
it would have been hard to see in it the anniversary of the taking of the
Bastille and of the first federation. In the celebration, not a single
word was said about these two events. The official eulogy of the
Revolution was replaced by a formal distribution of crosses of the Legion
of Honor.

This was the first time that the Emperor and Empress appeared in public in
full pomp. It was also the first time that they availed themselves of the
privilege of driving through the broad road of the garden of the
Tuileries. Accompanied by a magnificent procession, they went in great
splendor to the Invalides, which the Revolution had turned into a Temple
of Mars, and the Empire had turned again to a Catholic Church. At the door
they were received by the Governor and M. de Ségur, Grand Master of
Ceremonies, and at the entrance to the church by the Cardinal du Belloy at
the head of numerous priests. Napoleon and Josephine listened attentively
to the mass; then, after a speech was uttered by the Grand Chancellor of
the Legion of Honor, M. de Lacépède, the Emperor recited the form of the
oath; at the end of which all the members of the Legion shouted "I swear."
This sight aroused the enthusiasm of the crowd, and the applause was loud.
In the middle of the ceremony, Napoleon called up to him Cardinal Caprara,
who had taken a very important part in the negotiations concerning the
Concordat, and was soon to help to persuade the Pope to come to Paris for
the coronation. The Emperor took from his own neck the ribbon of the
Legion of Honor, and gave it to the worthy and aged prelate. Then the
knights of the new order passed in line before the Imperial throne, while
a man of the people, wearing a blouse, took his station on the steps of
the throne. This excited some surprise, and he was asked what he wanted;
he took out his appointment to the Legion. The Emperor at once called him
up, and gave him the cross with the usual kiss.

The Empress's beauty made a great impression, as we learn from Madame de
Rémusat, who generally prejudiced against her, but on this occasion was
forced to recognize that Josephine, by her tasteful and careful dressing,
succeeded in appearing young and charming amid the many young and pretty
women by whom she was for the first time surrounded. "She stood there,"
Madame de Rémusat goes on, "in the full light of the setting sun, wearing
a dress of pink tulle, adorned with silver stars, cut very low after the
fashion of the time, and crowned by a great many diamond clusters; and
this fresh and brilliant dress, her graceful bearing, her delightful
smile, her gentle expression produced such an effect that I heard a number
of persons who had been present at the ceremony say that she effaced all
her suite." Three days later the Emperor started for the camp at Boulogne.

In spite of the enthusiasm of the people and the army, one thing became
clear to every thoughtful observer, and that was that the new régime,
lacking strength to resist misfortunes, must have perpetual success in
order to live. Napoleon was condemned, by the form of his government, not
merely to succeed, but to dazzle, to astonish, to subjugate. His Empire
required extraordinary magnificence, prodigious effects, Babylonian
festivities, gigantic adventures, colossal victories. His Imperial
escutcheon, to escape contempt, needed rich coats of gilding, and demanded
glory to make up for the lack of antiquity. In order to make himself
acceptable to the European, monarchs, his new brothers, and to remove the
memory of the venerable titles of the Bourbons, this former officer of the
armies of Louis XVI., the former second-lieutenant of artillery, who had
suddenly become a Caesar, a Charlemagne, could make this sudden and
strange transformation comprehensible only through unprecedented fame and
splendor. He desired to have a feudal, majestic court, surrounded by all
the pomp and ceremony of the Middle Ages. He saw how hard was the part he
had to play, and he knew very well how much a nation needs glory to make
it forget liberty. Hence a perpetual effort to make every day outshine the
one before, and first to equal, then to surpass, the splendors of the
oldest and most famous dynasties. This insatiable thirst for action and
for renown was to be the source of Napoleon's strength and also of his
weakness. But only a few clear-sighted men made these reflections when the
Empire began. The masses, with their easy optimism, looked upon the new
Emperor as an infallibly impeccable being, and thought that since he had
not yet been beaten, he was invincible. Josephine indulged in no such
illusions; she knew the defects in her husband's character, and dreaded
the future for him as well as for herself. Singularly enough for one so
surrounded by flatteries, in her whole life her head was never for a
moment turned by pride or infatuation.




II.

JOURNEY TO THE BANKS OF THE RHINE


Before having himself crowned by the Pope, after the example of
Charlemagne, Napoleon was anxious to go to meditate at the tomb of the
great Carlovingian Emperor, of whom he regarded himself as the worthy
successor. A journey on the banks of the Rhine, a triumphal tour in the
famous German cities which the France of the Revolution had been so proud
to conquer, seemed to the new sovereign a fitting prologue to the pomp of
the coronation. Napoleon was desirous of impressing the imaginations of
people in his new Empire and in the old Empire of Germany. He wished the
trumpets of fame to sound in his honor on both banks of the famous and
disputed river.

The Empress, who had gone to Aix-la-Chapelle to take the waters, arrived
there a few days before her husband. Napoleon wrote to her, August 6,
1804:--

"MY DEAR: I have been here at Calais since midnight; I am thinking of
leaving this evening for Dunkirk. I am satisfied with what I see, and I am
tolerably well. I hope that you will get as much good from the waters as I
get from going about and from seeing the camps and the sea. Eugene has
left for Blois. Hortense is well. Louis is at Plombières. I am very
anxious to see you. You are always essential to my happiness. A thousand
kind messages."

The Emperor wrote again from Ostend, August 14, 1804:--

"MY DEAR: I have not heard from you for several days, though I should have
been glad to hear that the waters have done you good and how you pass your
time. I have been here a week. Day after to-morrow I shall be at Boulogne
for a tolerably brilliant festival. Send me word by the messenger what you
mean to do, and when you shall have finished your baths. I am much
satisfied with the army and the fleet. Eugene is still at Blois. I hear no
more about Hortense than if she were at the Congo. I am writing to scold
her. Many kind wishes for all."

Napoleon reached Aix-la-Chapelle September 3. The Emperor Francis had, on
the 10th of August, assumed the Imperial title accorded to his house, of
Emperor-elect of Germany, Hereditary Emperor of Austria, King of Bohemia
and Hungary. He had then given orders to M. de Cobentzel to go to Aix-la-
Chapelle to present his credentials to Napoleon. Napoleon received the
Austrian diplomatist very kindly, and was soon surrounded by a multitude
of foreign ambassadors who came to pay their respects. He re-established
the annual honors long before paid to the memory of Charlemagne, went down
into the vault, and gave the priests of the Cathedral convincing proofs of
his munificence. The Empress was shown a piece of the true cross which the
Carlovingian Emperor had long worn on his breast as a talisman. She was
offered a holy relic, almost the whole arm of that hero, but she declined
it, saying that she did not wish to deprive Aix-la-Chapelle of so precious
a memorial, especially when she had the arm of a man as great as
Charlemagne to support her.

From Aix-la-Chapelle, Napoleon and Josephine went to Cologne, then to
Coblentz, then to Mayence, travelling separately. The Emperor left Cologne
September 16 at four in the afternoon, and reached Bonn a little before
nightfall, to start again the next morning. The town pleased her very
much, and she was sorry she could not remain there longer. She stayed at a
fine house with a garden opening on a terrace that looked out over the
Rhine. After supper she walked on the terrace. The delight of the people
assembled below, the peacefulness of the night, and the beauty of the
river in the moonlight, made the evening most enjoyable. At four the next
morning the Empress started off again in her travelling carriage, and at
ten she entered Coblentz. The Emperor did not get there until six in the
evening, having left Cologne the same day. At Bonn he got on horseback to
examine for himself everything that demanded close inspection. From
Coblentz, where a ball was given them, Napoleon and Josephine went to
Mayence, each by a different route. The Emperor followed the highway on
the edge of the Rhine; the Empress ascended the river in a yacht which the
Prince of Nassau Weilburg had placed at her disposal. It was a picturesque
voyage.

The morning mist soon cleared away. Josephine, who had breakfast served on
deck, admired the many charming scenes between Boppard and Bacharach, the
fertile fields, the towns perched on the steep banks; in the distance, the
mountains covered with forests; then the narrowing river, the bounded
view, the cliffs crowded together, where nothing can be seen but the
river, the sky, and the crags crowned by the mirrored towns of mediaeval
castles. The light boat, as it glided smoothly over the stream, with its
gilded Neptune at the bow, recalled Cleopatra's barge. At times the
silence was profound, then the church-bells would be heard, as well as the
cheers of the peasants on the river-banks. The pettiest villages had sent
guards of honor, had hoisted flags, and raised triumphal arches. Curiously
enough, the right bank, which did not belong to France, seemed to display
quite as much zeal and enthusiasm as the left bank, the French one; on
both sides were the same shouts of welcome, the same demonstrations, the
same salutes. When she reached Saint Goar, on the left bank, the Empress
saw the authorities of the town coming out to meet her, with military
music, in boats decorated with branches of trees; and on the other side of
the river, on the terrace of the castle of Hesse Rheinfels, the Hessian
garrison was presenting arms, and their salutes joined with those of the
inhabitants of Saint Goar, Further on, they shouted through a speaking-
trumpet to hear the famous echo of the Lorelei, with its wonderfully
distinct and frequent repetitions. Then they passed the fantastic castle
of the Palatinate, built in the middle of the stream, and in old times the
refuge of the Countesses Palatine, where their children were born and kept
in security during their babyhood. The Empress landed at Bingen, where she
spent the night, starting again the next morning. Towards three in the
afternoon she reached Mayence, where twelve young girls belonging to the
best families of the city were awaiting her. Almost simultaneously, the
cannon at the other gate announced the Emperor's arrival.

On his way, Napoleon had noticed on an island in the Rhine, at the very
extremity of the French Empire, the convent of Rolandswerth. He was told
that the nuns who lived there had refused to leave it during the last war,
that very often the cannon-balls of the contending armies had often fallen
on the island without damaging the convent where those holy women were
praying. The Emperor became interested in their fate, and made over to
them the forty or fifty acres of which the little island consisted.

On their arrival at Mayence, September 21, Napoleon Josephine were most
warmly greeted. In the evening all the streets and public buildings were
illuminated. The Prince Archchancellor of the Germanic Empire, who owed to
the French sovereign the preservation of his wealth and of his title,
desired to pay his respects. The Emperor was surrounded by a real court of
German Princes. The Princess of the House of Hesse, the Duke and Duchess
of Bavaria, the Elector of Baden, who was more than seventy-five years
old, and had come with his son and grandson, appeared as if vassals of the
new Charlemagne, the second Théâtre Français had been summoned from Paris,
and played before this public of Highnesses. Every one was struck by the
celerity with which this crowned soldier had acquired the appearance of a
sovereign belonging to an old line, while he still preserved the language
and appearance of a soldier. One day he asked the hereditary Prince of
Baden: "What did you do yesterday?" The young Prince replied with some
embarrassment that he had strolled about the streets. "You did very
wrong," said Napoleon. "What you ought to have done was to visit the
fortifications and inspect them carefully. How can you tell? Perhaps some
day you will have to besiege Mayence. Who would have told me when I was a
simple artillery officer walking about Toulon that I should be destined to
take that city?" It was at Mayence that the treasures unjustly extorted
from the German Princes were restored to them. It was at Mayence that
Gutenberg's name for the first time received formal homage.

General de Ségur, In his Memoirs, narrates an anecdote about Napoleon's
stay in this old German city. The Emperor had gone incognito and without
escort to an island in the Rhine, not far from the town. As he was walking
in this almost deserted island, he noticed a wretched hut in which a poor
woman was lamenting that her son had been drafted. "Console yourself,"
said Napoleon, without letting her know who he was, and giving her an
assumed name: "Come to Mayence to-morrow and ask for me; I have some
influence with the ministers and I will try to help you." The poor woman
appeared punctually. With delight and surprise she saw that the stranger
was the Emperor of the French. Napoleon delighted to tell her that her
house which had been destroyed by the war should be rebuilt, that he would
give her a little herd and several acres of land, and that her son should
be restored to her.

A letter in the _Moniteur_ thus described the departure of Napoleon and
Josephine: "Mayence, 11 Vendémiaire (October 3). The Empress left
yesterday for Paris, by way of Saverne and Nancy. The Emperor is just
leaving; he means to visit Frankenthal, Kaiserslanten, and Kreutznach;
then he will take the road to Trèves. The stay of Their Majesties has been
for us a source of lasting pleasure and advantage. The most important
interests of our department have been favorably regulated. We have nothing
now to wish for except an opportunity to show our gratitude, our devotion,
and our fidelity, and the sincerity of the good wishes our citizens
expressed by their unanimous cheers. The Electors, the Princes, and the
many distinguished strangers who have given our city the appearance of a
great capital, are now taking their departure."

This journey on the banks of the Rhine made a deep impression in France
and throughout Europe. It must be confessed that no one has ever equalled
the Emperor in the art of keeping himself picturesquely before the public.
Napoleon in the crypt at Aix-la-Chapelle, face to face with the shade of
Charlemagne is a subject to inspire a painter or a poet! At Brussels, in
the church of Saint Gudule, Napoleon evoked the memory of Charles V.; at
Aix-la-Chapelle in the Cathedral vault he questioned the shade of
Charlemagne. And as he meditated on the tomb of the Carlovingian hero, so
now do monarchs on their way through Paris meditate in their turn over his
tomb beneath the gilded dome of the Invalides. They go down into the
crypt, look at the porch upheld by twelve great statues of white marble,
each one commemorating a victory, at the mosaic pavement representing a
huge crown with fillets, the sarcophagus of red granite from Finland,
placed on a foundation of green granite from the Vosges. Then they enter
the subterranean chamber, the black marble sanctuary, which contains,
among numerous relics, the sword that Napoleon carried at Austerlitz, the
decorations he wore on his uniform, the gold crown voted him by the city
of Cherbourg, and finally sixty flags won in his victories. The church of
the Invalides Inspires the same thoughts as the Cathedral of
Aix-la-Chapelle. In the two temples kings and great men may make the same
reflection about glory, about death, about the handful of dust which is
all that is left of heroes.




III.

THE POPE'S ARRIVAL AT FONTAINEBLEAU.


The time for the coronation was drawing near. Napoleon, who had already
received the official recognition of foreign powers, was anxious to have
his Imperial title consecrated by a great religious ceremony, the fame of
which should resound throughout the whole Catholic world. The first date
proposed for the solemnity was the 26th Messidor, Year XII. (July 14,
1804), then that of the 18th Brumaire, Year XIII. (Nov. 9, 1804). But the
choice in each case was unfortunate. It was hard to combine the memory of
the taking of the Bastille with the coronation of a sovereign, and the
18th Brumaire would have recalled the regrets of Republicans and the
services of Lucien Bonaparte, who, after being the main aid of his
brother's fortune, was living at Rome, in disgrace and exile. On the other
hand, the Pope's hesitation, for it was with the greatest difficulty that
he could make up his mind to go to Paris, had further postponed the date,
which was at last fixed for the beginning of December.

Josephine awaited with impatience and fear an event on which, she felt,
her future fate depended. The Pope, that mysterious and holy person, had
started. Was he to prove her saviour? Was she to be a repudiated wife or a
crowned Empress? The clergy were untiring in their laudations of
Napoleon's glory. Bishops, in their charges, spoke of him as God's elect.
One prelate, speaking of the Empire, had said: "One God and one monarch!
As the God of the Christians is the only one deserving to be adored and
obeyed, you, Napoleon, are the only man worthy to rule the French!"
Another had said: "Napoleon, whom God called from the deserts of Egypt,
like another Moses, will bring peace between the wise Empire of France and
the divine Empire of Christ. The finger of God is here. Let us pray the
Most High to protect with his powerful hand the man he has chosen. May the
new Augustus live and rule forever! Submission is his due because he is
ordered by Providence!" Yet in spite of these extravagant outbursts which
came from every pulpit in the whole French Empire, this restorer of the
altars, this saviour of religion was married only by civil right! From the
ecclesiastic point of view, he was living in concubinage. He had had his
brother Louis's marriage with Hortense de Beauharnais, and his sister
Caroline's with Murat blessed by Cardinal Caprara, but in spite of
Josephine's entreaties, he had denied her this pious satisfaction. It was
on the Pope that the Empress put all her hope; she thought that he would
take pity on her, and by bringing her into conformity with the rules of
the church, would put an end to a condition of things humiliating to her
as a sovereign, and painful to her as a Catholic.

At the same time Josephine was anxiously wondering whether she was to be
crowned. Her brothers-in-law became more venomous in their intrigues
against her, and desired not only that she be excluded from any part in
the coronation, but also that she should be condemned to divorce on the
pretext of barrenness. Joseph Bonaparte was never tired of saying that
Napoleon ought to marry some foreign Princess, or at least some daughter
of an old French family, and he skilfully laid stress on his own
unselfishness in urging a plan which would necessarily remove himself and
his descendants from the line of inheritance. The Emperor's sisters showed
the same hostility towards Josephine, whom they hated, although she well
deserved their love. Since Napoleon maintained an absolute silence about
his intentions concerning the coronation, the Bonapartes already imagined
that she was going to be divorced, and hence exhibited an untimely delight
which displeased the Emperor and brought him closer to his wife. At last,
tired with family bickerings, he suddenly put an end to them and filled
Josephine with joy by telling her that she was to be crowned at Notre
Dame.

The reader should turn to the curious account in Miot de Mélito's Memoirs
of the council held at Saint Cloud, November 17, 1804, to arrange the
formalities of the coronation. Of Napoleon's four brothers, two were in
disgrace, Lucien and Jerome, and they were not to be present at the
ceremony. As for Joseph and Louis, it was decided that they should appear,
not as Princes of the blood, but only as high dignitaries of the Empire.
Joseph, it will be remembered, was Grand Elector, and Louis was Constable.

This decision once taken, Joseph said in the council of November 17:
"Since it has been recognized that, with the exception of the Head of the
State, no one else, whatever his rank, can be regarded as partaking the
honors of sovereignty, and that we especially are not treated as Princes,
but only as high dignitaries, it would not be right that our wives, who
henceforth are only wives of high dignitaries, should as Princesses carry
the train of the Empress's robe, which consequently must be carried by
Ladies of Honor or of the Palace." This remark displeased the Emperor, and
many members of the council cited many examples to refute it, notably that
of Maria de' Medici. Joseph, who had foreseen their arguments, displayed
unexpected erudition: "Maria de' Medici," he said, "was accompanied only
by Queen Margaret, the first wife of Henri IV., and by Madame (Catherine
of Bourbon), the King's sister. The train was carried by a very distant
relative. Queen Margaret had, indeed, offered a fine example of generosity
by being present at the coronation of the woman who took her place and
who, more fortunate than herself, had borne heirs to Henri IV. But she was
not asked to carry the train of Maria de' Medici, and yet Maria de' Medici
had a right to every honor, because she was a mother." This very
transparent allusion to Josephine's barrenness so exasperated Napoleon
that he arose suddenly from his chair and addressed his brother with the
intensest bitterness and violence. After the meeting Joseph proposed to
his brother retiring to Germany. Napoleon relented and, November 27, he
said to his brother: "I have given a great deal of thought to the
difference that has arisen between you and me, and I will confess that
during the six days that this quarrel has lasted, I have not had a
moment's peace. I have even lost my sleep over it, and you are the only
person who has this power over me; I know nothing that disturbs me to this
degree. This influence comes from my old affection for you and from my
recollection of what you did for me in my boyhood, and I am much more
dependent than you think on feelings of that sort.... Take your position
in an hereditary monarchy and be the first of my subjects. That is a fine
enough position, to be the second man in France, perhaps in Europe....
Comply with my wishes; follow my ideas; do not flatter the patriots when I
drive them away; do not oppose the nobles when I summon them; form your
household according to the principles that have guided me. In a word, be a
Prince, and do not disturb yourself about the importance of the title."

Joseph at last yielded, and promised that his wife should conform without
a murmur to the ceremonies established for the coronation. Only this
concession was made to their susceptibilities: that in the rules the
phrase, _bear the cloak_ was substituted for _carry the train_, "for," as
Miot de Mélito says, "Vanity will clutch at a straw."

As for Madame Bonaparte, Napoleon's mother, she persisted in remaining at
Rome with Lucien. In spite of frequent messages from Paris, she was not to
get there until some days after the coronation, a fact which did not
prevent her appearing in the great picture commemorating the event,
painted by David, who was successively Jacobin and Imperialist, and
beginning with the apotheosis of Marat, celebrated that of Napoleon.

Pope Pius VII., then sixty-two years old, had left Rome November 2, after
praying for a long time at the altar of Saint Peter's, The populace had
followed his carriage for a long distance, weeping with terror at his
undertaking a journey to revolutionary France. At Florence he had been
received by the Queen of Etruria, then a widow and her son's Regent. At
Lyons he became less anxious; a number of the inhabitants crowded about
him, and fell on their knees, asking for the blessing of the Vicar of
Christ. Meanwhile, Napoleon was putting the last touches to the repairs be
had commenced at the Palace of Fontainebleau, to put it in a suitable
condition to receive the Sovereign Pontiff. In less than twenty days the
furnishing of the palace had been completed, and the castle had, as if by
magic, resumed its old-time splendor.

Every one wondered how the first meeting between the Pope and the Emperor
would take place. Many points of etiquette arose which Napoleon managed to
elude. Pius VII. was to arrive through the forest of Fontainebleau, and
the Emperor was to go to meet him through the forest of Nemours. To
prevent all formality, Napoleon made an excuse of a hunting party. All the
huntsmen, with their carriages, met in the forest. Napoleon was on
horseback, in hunting dress. When he knew that the Pope and his suite were
due at the cross of Saint Hérene--at noon, Sunday, November 25, 1804--he
turned his horse in that direction, and as soon as he reached the half-
moon at the top of the hill, he saw the Pope's carriage arriving.

According to the account given in the Memoirs of the Duke of Rovigo, the
carriage of Pius VII. stopped, and the pontiff in his white robes got out
by the left-hand door. The road was muddy, and he was averse to stepping
into it with his white silk slippers; but there was nothing to be done.
Napoleon got off his horse to receive him, and sprang cordially into his
arms. These two famous men, who, although they were entire strangers, had
already thought so often of each other, and were to exercise such great
influence over each other's destiny, now met with deep emotion. As they
were embracing, one of the Emperor's carriages, which had been ordered to
drive up, pushed on a few steps as if by an oversight of the coachman; the
footmen held both doors open; the Emperor took that on the right; a court
official pointed to that on the left for the Pope, so that the two
sovereigns entered the same carriage simultaneously by the two doors. The
Emperor sat down naturally on the right-hand side, and this first step
established the etiquette for the whole time of the Pope's stay, without
discussion.

At the entrance of the Palace of Fontainebleau, the Empress, the high
dignitaries of the Empire, the generals, were formed in a circle to
receive and salute Pius VII. He was welcomed with the utmost reverence.
His fine, noble face, his air of angelic kindness, his soft, yet sonorous
voice, produced a deep impression. Josephine was especially moved by the
presence of the Vicar of Christ. After resting a few moments in his
private apartment, to which he had been conducted by M. de Talleyrand,
High Chamberlain, by General Duroc, Grand Marshal of the Palace, and by M.
de Ségur, Grand Master of Ceremonies, the Pope paid a visit to Napoleon,
who, after an interview of about half an hour, conducted him back to the
hall that was at that time called that of the High Officers. The two
sovereigns dined together, and the Pope went early to bed, to rest himself
after the fatigues of his long journey. The next evening some singers had
been summoned to the Empress's apartment, but Pius VII. withdrew just as
the concert was about to begin.

In the course of the day Josephine had had a private interview with the
Pope, and had confided to him the secret which so distressed her. She who
was reigning over the greatest of Catholic nations, the consort of the
successor of the very Christian Kings, the wife of a ruler about to be
crowned by the Pope, was married only by civil rite! She entreated Pius
VII. to use all his influence with Napoleon to put an end to a situation
which was a continual torture and reproach to her as a wife and as a
Christian. The Pope appeared touched by the confidence of his dear
daughter, as he always called the Empress, and promised to demand, and, if
necessary, to insist, upon the celebration of the Emperor's religious
marriage, as a condition of the coronation, and this promise filled
Josephine with joy.

The presence of the Pope and the Emperor, the throng of prelates,
generals, courtiers, and beautiful women, the combination of religious and
Imperial pomp gave to the Castle of the Valois, a few days before
dilapidated and abandoned, new splendor and magnificence. Never in the
most brilliant days of the reign of Francis I., or Henri II., or of Louis
XIV., had this sumptuous residence appeared in greater state. This
wonderful palace is renowned for its superb and picturesque architecture,
its majestic façades, its five courts: that of the White Horse, of the
Fountain, of the Dungeon, of the Princes, of Henri IV. The Festival Hall
is very beautiful, with its rich and abundant ornamentation, its walnut
floor, divided into octagonal panels richly outlined with inlaid gold and
silver, its monumental mantelpiece, with its figures, emblems, and
fantastic frescoes, the brilliant masterpieces of Primaticcio, and of
Nicolo d'Abati.

Alas! this splendid Fontainebleau, the gorgeous palace where Pope and
Emperor were then living in triumph, was later to be to both an accursed
spot. The Pope was to return to it a prisoner, maltreated though old,
though a priest, though the Vicar of Christ, and there the Emperor was to
drink the cup of humiliation, of despair, to the dregs. It was there that,
conquered, broken, betrayed by fortune, he was to sign his abdication. It
was there that he was to utter those heart-rending words: "It is right; I
receive what I have deserved. I wanted no statues, for I knew that there
was no safety in receiving them at any other hands than those of
posterity. A man to keep them while he lives, needs constant good fortune.
I think of France, which it is terrible to leave in this state, without
frontiers when it had such wide ones!--that is the bitterest of the
humiliations that overwhelm me. To leave France so small when I wished to
make it so great!" It was there that, overcome by immeasurable grief, the
conqueror of so many battles wished to seek in suicide a refuge from the
tortures of thought, and that he was to fail to find death, he who on the
battle-field had squandered so many lives. O mortals, ignorant of your own
fates, how happy you are not to have foreknowledge of them!




IV.

THE PREPARATIONS FOR THE CORONATION.


The Empress left Fontainebleau, Thursday, November 29, 1804, in company
with Madame de La Rochefoucauld, Maid of Honor, and Madame d'Arberg, Lady
of the Palace, and reached Paris the same day, a few hours before the
Emperor and the Pope, who left Fontainebleau in the same carriage and
entered the Tuileries at eight in the evening. A platoon of Mamelukes
escorted the Imperial carriage, and it was a singular sight to see the
Mussulman escorting the Vicar of Christ. The Pope was installed at the
Tuileries in the Pavilion of Flora. There were attached to his person M.
de Viry, the Emperor's Chamberlain; M. de Luçay, Prefect of the Palace,
and Colonel Durosnel, Equerry.

All Paris was excited by the approach of the great event. The hotels were
crowded; the population of the capital was nearly doubled, so vast was the
throng of provincials and foreigners. Tradesmen were working night and day
to prepare the dresses and uniforms. In every workshop there was
unparalleled activity. Leroy, who previously had been only a milliner, had
decided for this occasion to undertake dressmaking, and had made Madame
Raimbault, a celebrated dressmaker of the time, his partner. From their
shop came the magnificent robes to be worn by the Empress on Coronation
Day. Her jewels, consisting of a crown, a diadem, and a girdle, were the
work of the jeweller Margueritte. The crown was formed of eight branches
meeting under a gold globe surmounted by a cross. The branches were set
with diamonds, four in the shape of a palm leaf, four in the shape of a
myrtle leaf. Around the curve was a ribbon, inlaid with eight enormous
emeralds. The frontlet was bright with amethysts. The diadem was formed of
four rows of pearls interlaced with diamond leaves, with many large
brilliants, one alone weighing one hundred and forty-nine grains. The
girdle was a gold band, enriched with thirty-nine pink gems. The Emperor's
sceptre had been made by Odiot; it was of solid silver, enlaced by a gold
serpent, and surmounted by a globe on which was a miniature figure of
Charlemagne seated. The hand of justice, the crown, and the sword came
from the workshops of Biennais. The dress of the courtiers was to be very
magnificent; it consisted of a French coat of different colors according
to the duties of the wearer under the Grand Marshal, the High Chamberlain,
and the Grand Equerry, with silver embroidery for all; a cloak worn over
one shoulder, of velvet, lined with satin: a scarf, a lace band, and the
hat caught up in front, and adorned with a feather. The women were to
appear in ball dress, with a train, with a collar of blond-lace, called a
_chérusque_, which was fastened on both shoulders and rose high behind the
head, recalling the fashions of the time of Catherine de' Medici.

There were rehearsals of the coronation as if it were a spectacular play.
Every one, from the principal actors to the most insignificant assistants,
studied his part most conscientiously; the Masters of Ceremonies were to
act as prompters to those who might forget. The Imperial carriages and
those of the Princes and Princesses one morning were all driven empty to
the neighborhood of Notre Dame, that coachman, postilions, and grooms
might know the route they were to take, and when they were to draw up. The
carriages were superb, the horses magnificent, the liveries sumptuous.
Never in the most extravagant days of the monarchy had such luxury been
seen.

M. de Bausset says that a week before the coronation the Emperor commanded
of the artist Isabey seven drawings representing the seven principal
ceremonies to take place at Notre Dame, which, however, could not be
rehearsed in the Cathedral on account of the number of workmen busy day
and night in decorating it. To ask at once for seven drawings each
containing more than a hundred persons in action, was asking for the
impossible. Isabey skilfully eluded the difficulty. He bought at the toy
shops all the little dolls he could find, dressed them up as Pope,
Emperor, Empress, Princes, high dignitaries, Chamberlains, Equerries,
Ladies of Honor, Ladies of the Palace, These dolls thus arrayed he
arranged on a plan in relief of the Interior of Notre Dame, and carrying
it to the Emperor, said: "Sire, I bring Your Majesty something better than
the drawings." Napoleon thought the idea ingenious, and used the dolls and
the plan to make every official understand his place and his duty.

The _Moniteur_ of the 9th Brumaire, Year XIII, (November 30, 1804),
published in advance all the details of the ceremony, which the Emperor
had fixed with as much care as if it had been the plan of a battle. A
difficulty arose on this occasion. The Pope had wished Napoleon to receive
the holy communion in public on the day of the coronation, and Napoleon
had given the matter thought. The Grand Master of Ceremonies, M. de Ségur,
brought up against the proposition the necessity of a preliminary
confession and the possibility that absolution might be denied him.
"That's not the difficulty," said the Emperor, "the Holy Father knows how
to distinguish between the sins of Caesar and those of the man," Then he
added: "I know that I ought to give an example of respect for religion and
its ministers; so you see that I treat the priests well, go regularly to
mass, and listen to it with all due seriousness and solemnity. But every
one knows me, and how would it be for me, and for others, if I should go
too far? Would not that be setting an example of hypocrisy, and committing
a sacrilege?" The Pope did not insist upon it. This dread of committing
sacrilege Napoleon referred to again at Saint Helena, in 1816: "Everything
was done," he said then, "to persuade me to go in great pomp to communion
at Notre Dame, after the fashion of our kings; I absolutely refused; I did
not believe enough, I said, to get any good from it, and yet I believed
too much to consent to be guilty of sacrilege."

Another difficulty which gave the Pope much anxiety, and was not settled
in the formalities of the coronation, was whether the Emperor should
receive the crown from the hands of the Sovereign Pontiff. Pius VII. had
brought up the question before leaving Rome, and Cardinal Consalvi had
written on this matter, to which the Vatican attached great importance, as
follows: "All the French Emperors, all those of Germany, who have been
crowned by the Popes, have accepted the crown from them. The Holy Father,
before undertaking this journey, requires to receive from Paris the
assurance that there will be no innovation made in the present case, in
the way of a diminution of the honor and dignity of the Sovereign
Pontiff." At Rome only vague and dilatory answers had been received. In
Paris the Emperor, leaving the matter to be decided on the spur of the
moment, had only said: "I will arrange that myself."

The preparations at Notre Dame had come to an end. They had been very
considerable. Several houses that hid the north façade had been destroyed.
Before the great entrance, still scarred by the ravages of the
Revolutionists, there had been set up a decoration of painted wood,
representing a vast Gothic porch with three arches upholding the statues
of the thirty-six good cities, the mayors of which were to be present at
the coronation. To the right and the left stood images of Clovis and
Charlemagne, sceptre in hand. Above, between two golden eagles, appeared
the Imperial coat-of-arms. This was intended for the sole entrance of the
Pope and the Emperor. It was connected with the Archbishop's palace by
large, covered, wooden galleries, adorned within by gobelin tapestry. This
palace, to which Pius VII. and Napoleon were to go before they entered the
Cathedral, no longer exists; it was destroyed, February 14, 1831, in an
insurrection. It used to stand just by the side of the church. It was
built in 1161 by Maurice de Sully, rebuilt in 1697 by the Cardinal of
Noailles, embellished in 1750 by the Archbishop de Beaumont, and was the
meeting-place of the Constituent Assembly from October 19 to November 9,
1789. There the Pope and the Emperor were to alight on their way from the
Tuileries and put on their grand coronation robes before entering the
Cathedral.

The whole church of Notre Dame had been hung with crimson stuffs adorned
with gold fringe, with the arms of the Empire embroidered on the corners.
On each side of the nave and around the choir had been built three rows of
galleries, decorated alike with silk and velvet stuffs fringed with gold,
and flags had been arranged like a trophy about each pillar. Above the
trophies were winged and gilded victories, holding candelabra with a vast
number of candles. There were, besides, twenty-four chandeliers hanging
from the roof. The galleries kept out the light, especially at the season
when the days were short; consequently it had been decided that the
Cathedral should be artificially lit during the ceremony, thus augmenting
the pomp and beauty of the spectacle. The choir, shut off by a railing,
was reserved for the clergy. To the right of the high altar, on a platform
with eleven steps, had been raised the pontifical throne, above which was
a golden dome adorned with the arms of the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman
Church. In front and on each side of the pontifical throne were benches
with backs for the cardinals and prelates. For the Emperor and the Empress
had been prepared what was called the great and the little throne. The
little throne was formed of two armchairs, one for Napoleon, the other for
Josephine. These two chairs stood on a platform with four steps, opposite
the high altar. The Emperor and Empress were to occupy them during the
first part of the ceremony. The grand throne was at the other end of the
church, with its back against the great door, which was thus closed. This
great throne stood on a large semicircular platform, and was reached by
twenty-four steps. It stood under a canopy in the shape of a triumphal
arch, upheld by eight columns, and it overlooked the whole church. The
Emperor and the Empress were not to ascend this throne till after the
coronation.

For the coronation Napoleon had given to the Cathedral a number of holy
vessels in silver-gilt, enriched with diamonds, and very valuable lace
albs, a processional cross, chandeliers, and incense-burners. At the same
time he restored to the Cathedral a great number of relics with which the
piety of Saint Louis had endowed the Sainte Chapelle. In 1791 they had
been deposited in the treasury of Saint Denis, by order of Louis XVI.,
thence in 1793 they had been transferred to the cabinet of curiosities in
the National Library, and had been exposed under the Directory, in the
Hall of Antiquities. The Emperor restored them to the worship of the
faithful.

The preparations were completed, and the ceremony promised to be
magnificent. Madame Junot, afterwards the Duchess of Abrantès, breakfasted
with the Empress at the Tuileries, December 1, 1804, the day before the
coronation. Josephine was much excited and radiantly happy. At breakfast
she told how amiably the Emperor had talked with her that morning and how
he had tried on her head the crown which she was to put on the next day at
Notre Dame. As she said that she shed tears of gratitude. She spoke then
of her pain when Napoleon had refused her request for Lucien's return. "I
wanted to plead this great day," she said, "but Bonaparte spoke so harshly
that I had to keep silent. I wanted to show Lucien that I could return
good for evil; if you have a chance, let him know it."

In the evening the Senate came to the Tuileries to announce to the Emperor
the result of the _plébiscite_ which approved of the Empire and the matter
of inheritance; 3,521,660 citizens having voted for, and 2,579 against.
Napoleon replied to the President of the Senate with the infatuation that
springs from success and the consciousness of strength: "I ascend the
throne to which I have been called by the unanimous voices of the Senate,
the people, and the army, with my heart full of feeling of the great
destinies of this people whom, from the midst of camps, I first saluted
with the name of great. Since my youth all my thoughts have been devoted
to it, and I must say here, my pleasures and my pains now are nothing but
the pleasures and the pains of my people. My descendants will long fill
this throne. They will never forget that contempt of laws and the
overthrow of the social order are only the results of the weakness and
indecision of rulers."

The hour of disaster was approaching, but it had not yet struck; the
morrow was to be radiant. Salvos of artillery were fixed every hour from
six in the evening till midnight; at each salvo, the towers, spires, and
public buildings were illuminated for a few minutes by Bengal lights.
Imperial insignia, among others the sword of Charlemagne, were already in
the Church of Notre Dame. General de Ségur, then a captain under the
command of the Grand Marshal of the Palace, was charged to watch that
precious relic during the night. He records one thing about it which
clearly shows the bellicose spirit of the men of the time. One of the
officers guarding the Imperial sword conceived the mad idea of using it
against one of his comrades, who defended himself with his own sabre, and
consoled himself for his defeat and for a slight wound with the thought
that he was beaten by so glorious a weapon.

That same night, the one before the coronation, Josephine's wishes were
granted. Her union with Napoleon was blessed by the church. An altar was
mysteriously raised in the Tuileries, and there, in the presence of M. de
Talleyrand and the Marshal Berthier, who were the only witnesses, Cardinal
Fesch celebrated, in the profoundest secrecy, the religious marriage of
the Emperor and Empress. The scruples of Pius VII. were thus allayed.
Josephine could be crowned the next day.




V.

THE CORONATION.


It was December 2, 1804. Since early morning all Paris had been alive. It
was very cold; the sky was covered, but no one thought of the unpleasant
weather. All the streets through which the procession was to pass had been
carefully swept and sprinkled with sand. The inhabitants had decorated the
fronts of their houses according to their tastes and means, with
draperies, tapestry, artificial flowers, and branches of evergreens. Two
lines of infantry were drawn up for a space of about half a league. Long
before the hour of the departure of the Pope and the Emperor from the
Tuileries, a vast throng had gathered in the streets, was crowding every
window, and assembling on every roof. Marshal Murat, Governor of Paris,
offered at an early hour a sumptuous breakfast to the Princes of Germany
who had come to Paris for the coronation--the Elector Archchancellor of
the German Empire, the Princes of Nassau, of Hesse, and of Baden. After
the breakfast they drove to Notre Dame in four superb carriages, drawn by
six horses each, with an escort under the command of one of his aides-de-
camp, and he himself mounted his horse to take his place at the head of
the twenty squadrons of cavalry which were to go in front of the Emperor's
carriage.

At the Tuileries Napoleon put on what was called the undress attire; this
he was to wear on his way from the palace to the Archbishop's. He was not
to put on full dress, that is to say, the Imperial robes and cloak, until
he was to enter the church. The undress is thus described by Constant, the
Emperor's valet: silk stockings embroidered with gold; low boots of white
velvet, embroidered with gold on the seams; with diamond buttons and
buckles on his garters; a coat of crimson velvet faced with white velvet:
a short cloak of crimson lined with white satin, covering the left
shoulder and fastened on the right-hand side by a double clasp of
diamonds; a black velvet cap, surmounted by two aigrets, a diamond loop,
and for button, the most celebrated of the crown jewels, the Regent.

The Empress's costume was no less magnificent. She wore a dress, with a
train, of silver brocade covered with gold bees; her shoulders were bare,
but on her arms were tight sleeves embroidered with gold, the upper part
adorned, with diamonds, and fastened to them was a lace ruff worked with
gold which rose behind half up her head. The tight-fitting dress had no
waist, after the fashion of the time, but she wore a gold ribbon as a
girdle, set with thirty-nine pink gems. Her bracelets, ear-rings, and
necklace were formed of precious stones and antique cameos. Her diadem
consisted of four rows of pearls interlaced with clusters of diamonds. The
Empress, whose hair was curled, after the fashion of the reign of Louis
XIV., although forty-one years old, looked, according to Madame de
Rémusat, no more than twenty-five. The Emperor was much struck by
Josephine's beauty in this sumptuous attire; all this luxury impressed
him. He recalled the days of his childhood, and turning to his favorite
brother, he said: "Joseph, if father could see us!"

Nine o'clock sounded, the hour set for the departure of the Pope, who was
to reach Notre Dame before the Emperor. The Sovereign Pontiff, clad in
white, went down the staircase of the Pavilion of Flora and entered his
carriage, which was drawn by eight horses; above it was a large tiara. At
Rome it was the custom that when the Pope went forth to officiate at one
of the great churches,--for instance, to Saint John Lateran,--for one of
his chamberlains to start a moment before him, mounted on a mule, and
carrying a great processional cross. Pius VII. asked that the same thing
might be done at Paris; consequently the pontifical procession was headed
by a chamberlain whose mule did not fail to amuse the vast crowd that
lined the quays; yet when the Pope passed, all knelt down and received his
blessing with due respect. With cavalry in front and behind, the Pope's
carriage and the eight carriages in which were the cardinals, Italian
prelates and officers who had come from Rome with him, drove slowly along
the quays to the Archbishop's Palace. There were awaiting him all the
French cardinals, archbishops, and bishops, and he was received by the
Cardinal du Belloy, the Archbishop of Paris, as he entered to put on his
pontifical robes. The pontifical procession entered Notre Dame in the
following order; a priest, carrying the apostolic cross; seven acolytes,
carrying the seven golden candlesticks; more than a hundred bishops,
archbishops or cardinals, in cope and mitre, marching two by two; and last
of all the Holy Father, his tiara on his head, under a canopy between two
cardinals who held up the ends of his golden cope. The clergy intoned the
hymn _Tu es Petrus_, which was very impressive, and the Sovereign Pontiff,
after kneeling for a few moments before the high altar, took his seat in
the middle of the choir on the pontifical throne, above which was a dome
adorned with the coat-of-arms of the church.

The Emperor and the Empress, who were to leave the Tuileries at ten, did
not start till half past ten. They got into the magnificent coronation
carriage which excited the hearty admiration of the crowd, always fond of
show. It was drawn by eight superb horses, splendidly harnessed; upon it
was a golden crown upheld by four eagles with outstretched wings. The four
sides of the coach were of glass, set in slender carved uprights, so that
there was an unobstructed view of Napoleon and Josephine on the back seat,
with Joseph and Louis Bonaparte opposite them. Salvos of artillery
announced the Emperor's departure from the Tuileries. Twenty squadrons of
cavalry, with Marshal Murat at their head, led the procession. Eighteen
carriages, with six horses each, followed, conveying the high dignitaries
and the courtiers. Bands played triumphal marches, and all along the way a
vast crowd saluted this sovereign. The procession starting from the
Tuileries by the Carrousel went along the rue Saint Honoré as far as the
rue de Lombards, crossed the Pont au Change, and then along the quay to
the rue du Parvis Notre Dame and the Archbishop's Palace. Just as the
Emperor and the Empress were entering the palace courtyard, the mist,
which had been thick all the morning, cleared away, and the sun came out
glistening on the gilded decorations of the Imperial coach. The
_Moniteur_, with its official enthusiasm, spoke of "the orb of day
escaping, against every expectation, from the rigid rule of a stormy
season to light up the festal day."

At the Archbishop's Palace, Napoleon changed his dress, putting on his
coronation robes. This differed entirely from the costume he had worn from
the Tuileries to the palace, and consisted of a tight-fitting gown of
white satin, embroidered with gold on every seam, and of an Imperial
mantle of crimson velvet, all over which were golden bees; it was bordered
by worked branches of olive-tree, laurels, and oak, in circles enclosing
the letter N, with a crown above each one; the lining, the border, and the
cape were of ermine. This cloak, fastened on the right shoulder, while
leaving the arm free, reacted to just above the knee, and weighed no less
than eighty pounds, and though it was held by four persons, Prince Joseph,
Prince Louis, the Archchancellor Cambacérès, the Archtreasurer Lebrun, was
for the Emperor, who was a short man, a sumptuous, but heavy load. He
carried it, however, with fitting majesty. On his head he had put a crown
of golden laurel, the laurel of Caesar; around his neck he wore the
diamond necklace of the Legion of Honor; on his left side he carried a
sword with a large handle--the scabbard was of blue enamel adorned with
gold eagles and bees. At the same time Josephine completed her dressing,
putting on a long red velvet cloak, sprinkled with gold bees, and lined
with ermine; its skirts were upheld by Princesses Joseph, Louis, Elisa,
Pauline, and Charlotte.

The Imperial procession proceeded from the Archbishop's Palace to Notre
Dame through the wooden gallery, and entered the church, not through the
middle entrance, which was blocked by the great throne, but through one of
the side-doors. They advanced in the following order, with an interval of
ten paces between each group: the ushers, four abreast, the heralds at
arms, two abreast; the Chief Herald at Arms; the pages, four abreast; the
aides of the masters of ceremonies; the masters of ceremonies; the Grand
Master of Ceremonies, M. de Ségur; Marshal Sérurier, carrying on a cushion
the Empress's ring; Marshal Moncey, carrying the basket which was to
receive her cloak; Marshal Murat, carrying her crown on a cushion; the
Empress, with her First Equerry on her right, and her First Chamberlain on
her left; she wore the Imperial cloak, which was supported by the five
Princesses, the cloak of each one of these being supported by an officer
of her household; Madame de La Rochefoucauld, Maid of Honor, and Madame de
Lavalette, the Empress's Lady of the Bedchamber; Marshal Kellermann,
carrying the crown of Charlemagne, a diadem with six branches adorned with
valuable cameos; Marshal Perignon, carrying Charlemagne's sceptre, at the
end of which was a ball representing the world, with a small figure of the
great Carlovingian Emperor; Marshal Lefebvre, carrying Charlemagne's
sword; Marshal Bernadotte, carrying Napoleon's necklace; Colonel General
Eugene de Beauharnais, the Emperor's ring; Marshal Berthier, the Imperial
globe; M. de Talleyrand, the basket destined to receive the Emperor's
cloak. Then came the Emperor, the crown of golden laurel on his head,
holding in one hand his silver sceptre, topped by an eagle, and encircled
by a golden serpent, and in the other his hand of justice. His cloak was
supported by his two brothers, Joseph, Grand Elector, and Louis,
Constable, as well as by the Archchancellor Cambacérès and the
Archtreasurer Lebrun. Then followed the Grand Equerry, the Colonel General
of the Guard, and the Grand Marshal of the Palace, the three abreast, the
ministers, four abreast, and the high officers of the army.

As Napoleon entered the church, the twenty thousand spectators shouted,
"Long live the Emperor!" A cardinal gave holy water to Josephine; the
Cardinal, the Archbishop of Paris, presented it to Napoleon; and the two
prelates, after complimenting the Emperor and the Empress, conducted them
in a procession, under a canopy held by canons, to the smaller throne in
the middle of the choir. There they were to sit during the first part of
the ceremony, near the high altar, on a platform with four steps. As the
Emperor and the Empress entered the choir, the Pope came down from the
pontifical chair, and intoned the _Veni Creator_. The Emperor handed to
the Archchancellor his hand of justice; to the Archtreasurer, his sceptre;
to Prince Joseph, his crown; to Prince Louis, his sword; to the Grand
Chamberlain, his Imperial cloak; to Colonel General Eugene de Beauharnais,
his ring. The six objects formed what were called "the Emperor's
ornaments." They were placed on the altar by the representative
dignitaries, and were to be handed again to the Emperor by the Pope in the
course of the ceremony. The same was true of the "Empress's ornaments,"
her ring, cloak, and crown, which, were placed on the altar; the ring, by
Marshal Sérurier; the cloak, by Marshal Moncey; the crown, by Marshal
Murat. Charlemagne's insignia, his crown, sceptre, and sword, remained
during the whole ceremony in the hands of Marshals Kellermann, Perignon,
and Lefebvre, who stood at the right of the small throne in the choir.

As soon as the ornaments of the Emperor and Empress had been placed on the
altar, the Pope asked the Emperor in Latin if he promised to use every
effort to have law, justice, and peace rule in the church and among his
people; Napoleon touched the gospels with both hands, as it was held out
to him by the Grand Almoner, and answered _Profiteor_. Then the Pope, the
bishops, archbishops, and cardinals knelt before the altar and began the
litany. When they reached the three verses used only at coronations, the
Emperor and Empress also knelt.

After the litany, the Grand Almoner, another cardinal, and two bishops
advanced towards the small throne, and bowed low before Napoleon and
Josephine, and conducted them to the foot of the altar to receive sacred
unction. The Emperor and Empress knelt on blue velvet cushions placed on
the first step of the altar. The Pope anointed Napoleon on the head and
his two hands, uttering the prayer of consecration: "Mighty and Eternal
God, who didst appoint Hazael to be king over Syria, and Jehu to be king
over Israel, making known thy wishes through the prophet Elijah; and who
didst pour holy oil of kings upon the head of Saul and of David, through
the prophet Samuel, send down through my hands, the treasures of thy grace
and of thy blessings upon thy servant Napoleon, whom, in spite of our
unworthiness, we consecrate to-day as Emperor, in thy name."

Then the Pope anointed the Empress in the same way, reciting this prayer:
"May the Father of eternal glory be thy aid; and may the Omnipotent bless
thee; may he hear thy prayers, and give thee a long life, ever confirming
this blessing and maintaining it forever with all thy people; may he
confound thy enemies; may the sanctification of Christ and the anointing
of this oil ever aid thee, so that he who on earth has given thee his
blessing may give thee in heaven the happiness of the angels, and that
thou mayst be blessed and guarded for eternal life by Jesus Christ, our
Saviour, who lives and reigns forever and ever."

The Emperor and Empress were then conducted to the small throne, that is
to say, to their two chairs; before each one was a praying-stand. Then
high mass began; it was said by the Pope; the music had been composed by
Paesiello, the Abbé Rose, and Lesueur. There were three hundred
performers, singers, and musicians; among the soloists were the great
singer Laïs, and two famous violinists, Kreutzer and Baillot. At the
_Gradual_ the mass was interrupted for the blessing of the ornaments which
the Emperor and Empress then put on.

Napoleon, followed by the Archchancellor, the Archtreasurer, the Grand
Chamberlain, the Grand Equerry, and two chamberlains, and Josephine,
accompanied by her Lady of Honor, her Lady of the Bedchamber, her First
Chamberlain, and her First Equerry, advanced towards the altar, and
ascended the steps at the same time; the Sovereign Pontiff, with his back
to the altar, was sitting on a sort of folding-chair. He blessed the
Imperial ornaments, reciting a special prayer for each one. His Holiness
then handed them to the Emperor in the following order: first the ring,
which Napoleon placed on his finger; then the sword, which he put in its
scabbard; the cloak, which his chamberlains fastened on his shoulders,
then the hand of justice and the sceptre which he handed to the
Archchancellor and the Archtreasurer.

The only ornament left to be given to the Emperor was the crown. It will
be remembered that there had been a long negotiation at Rome to ascertain
whether the Emperor would be crowned by the Pope or would crown himself.
The question was left uncertain, and Napoleon had said that he would
settle it himself at Notre Dame when the time came. Still Pius VII. was
convinced that he was going to place the crown on the sovereign's head. He
had just handed him the ring, the sword, the cloak, the hand of justice,
and the sceptre, and was preparing to do the same thing with the crown.
But the Emperor, who had ascended the last step of the altar, and was
following every motion of the Pope, grasped from his hands the sign of
sovereign power and proudly placed it on his own head. Pius VII.,
outwitted and surprised, made no attempt at resistance.

After thus crowning himself, Napoleon proceeded to crown the Empress. This
was the most solemn moment in Josephine's life; the moment which dispelled
all her incessant dread of divorce, the brilliant verification of her
fondest hopes, the completion of her triumph. Napoleon advanced with
emotion to this companion of his happiest days, to the woman who had
brought him happiness; she was kneeling before him, shedding tears of joy
and gratitude, with her hands clasped and trembling. He recalled all that
he owed her: his happiness, for, thanks to her, he had been blessed with a
requited love; his glory, for it was she who, in 1796, had secured for him
the command of the Army of Italy, the origin of all his triumphs. He must
have been glad at this moment that he had not followed his brother's
malicious suggestions and had not separated from his dear Josephine! The
affection of the young General Bonaparte revived in the heart of the
sovereign. He thought Josephine more gracious, more touching, more lovable
than ever, and it was with an outburst of happiness that he placed the
Imperial diadem on her charming and cherished head.

The Emperor and Empress, once crowned, proceeded to the great throne, at
the entrance of the church, by the great door, being solemnly led there by
the Pope and the Cardinals. The Imperial procession then formed again in
the order in which it had come to Notre Dame, the Empress going before the
Emperor. At this moment the Princesses seemed to hesitate about carrying
the skirt of the Empress's cloak; Napoleon noticed this, and said a few
severe, firm words to his sisters, and all was smoothed. The procession
reached the foot of the great throne; the Emperor ascended the twenty-four
steps and sat down in full majesty, wearing his crown and Imperial cloak,
holding the hand of justice and the sceptre. At his right, on a seat like
his, but one step lower, the Empress placed herself. Another step lower,
sat the Princesses on simple seats. At the Emperor's left, two steps below
him, were the Princes and high dignitaries. On each side of the platform
the marshals, high officers, and ladies of the court took their places.
The sight was most impressive. The Pope in his turn ascended the twenty-
four steps, and thus commanding the whole Cathedral, extended his hands
over the Emperor and the Empress, and uttered these Latin words, the
formula used for taking the throne: "_In hoc solio confirmare vos Deus, et
in regno aeterno secum regnare faciat Christus!_"--"May God establish you
on your throne, and may Christ cause you to reign with him in his eternal
kingdom!" Then he kissed the Emperor on the cheek, and turning towards the
assembled multitude, said: "_Vivat Imperator in aeternum!_"--"May the
Emperor live forever!" This was what had been said ten centuries before at
Saint Peter's in Rome when the ruler of the same people, Charlemagne, had
been proclaimed Emperor of the West.

Applause broke forth and three hundred musicians intoned the _Vivat
Imperator_, a hymn composed by the Abbé Rose. The pontifical procession
and the Imperial procession returned to the choir; the Emperor and Empress
resumed their places on the chairs, and the Pope began, the _Te Deum_.
After this, which was sung by four choirs and two orchestras, the mass,
which had been interrupted by the ceremony with the ornaments and the
taking possession of the throne, went on. At the offertory, Napoleon and
Josephine, followed by the two Princes and the five Princesses, went to
lay their offerings before the Pope; these consisted of a silver-gilt
vase, a lump of gold, a lump of silver, and a candle about which were
inlaid thirteen pieces of money. At the elevation Prince Joseph removed
the Emperor's crown, and Madame de La Rochefoucauld, Maid of Honor, that
of the Empress. Napoleon and Josephine knelt before the Host, and when
they rose, put their crowns on again.

When mass was over, the Emperor took the political oath prescribed by the
constitution, which had aroused much opposition in Rome. The presidents of
the great bodies of the state brought him the formula, and with one hand
held over the gospels, the Emperor swore to maintain, the principles of
the Revolution, to preserve the integrity of the territory, and to rule
with an eye to the interest, happiness, and glory of the French people.
The First Herald-at-Arms then called forth in a loud voice: "The most
glorious and most august Emperor Napoleon, Emperor of the French, is
crowned and enthroned: Long live the Emperor!" That was the end of the
ceremony. Salvos of artillery mingled with the applause.

The solemnity had been most successful, and Napoleon could say with truth
to his brother Joseph: "For me it is a battle won; by my art and the
measures I took, I have succeeded beyond my expectations." Had he not
prophesied accurately when he said to his secretary at the signing of the
Concordat: "Bourrienne, you will see what use I shall make of the
priests!" The golden chasubles had made a brilliant spectacle by the side
of the uniforms; the crosses and the tiara by the side of the swords and
the sceptre. Napoleon, always a master of theatrical effect, had known how
to lend antiquity to his newborn glory by borrowing from the past all its
majesty and pomp, and by skilfully decking himself with what was most
brilliant in the chronicles of remote centuries. From Charlemagne he took
his insignia; from Caesar his golden laurel. The head of a nation that had
grown great by the cross and the sword, he desired to make his coronation
the festival of the church and of the army.

The Imperial and the pontifical processions returned to the Archbishop's
Palace, and half an hour later proceeded to the Tuileries, through the New
Market, the Place du Châtelet, the rue Saint Denis, the boulevards, the
rue and the Place de la Concorde, the Pont Tournant, and the grand roadway
of the castle. Night had fallen; the houses were illuminated. Five hundred
torches cast their light on the two processions, and by their imposing and
strange brilliancy, the crowd gazed with interest on the new Charlemagne
and the Vicar of Christ.

Napoleon and Josephine re-entered the Tuileries at half past six; the Pope
at about seven. The Emperor, who was somewhat tired by all this ceremony,
gladly resumed his modest uniform of Colonel of the Chasseurs of the
Guard. He dined alone with Josephine, asking her to keep on her head the
becoming diadem which she wore so gracefully. That evening he chatted
pleasantly with the ladies-in-waiting, and praised the rich dresses they
had worn in such splendor at Notre Dame; he said to them, laughing: "It's
I who deserve the credit for your charming appearance." Then they looked
out of the windows on the illuminated garden, the large flower-garden
surrounded with porches covered with lights, the long alley adorned with
shining colonnades, on the terraces of orange-trees all aglow, with a
number of glasses of various colors on every tree, and finally on the
Place de la Concorde, one blazing star. It was like a sea of flame.

It was the painter who had been a member of the Convention, the
_montagnard_, the regicide who had insulted Louis XVI., who had painted
the apotheosis of Marat, and with a malicious hand had drawn the features
of Marie Antoinette on her way to the scaffold; it was this artist, this
fierce demagogue, the ardent Revolutionist, who was commissioned with
painting the official representation of the coronation. He carried his
gallantry so far as to choose for his subject, not the moment when
Napoleon crowned himself, but that of the coronation of the Empress; and
when a critic accused him of making Josephine too young, he said: "Go and
say that to her!" When the picture was finished, the Emperor and the court
went to see it in the artist's studio. Napoleon walked up and down for
half an hour, bareheaded, before the canvas, which is about twenty feet
high, about thirty long, and contains one hundred portraits. (It is now at
Versailles in the Hall of the Guards, at the top of the marble staircase.)
The Emperor examined it with the closest attention, while David and all
who were present maintained a respectful silence. This long waiting made
the artist very anxious. At last Napoleon turned towards him and said:
"It's good, David, very good. You have divined all my thought; you have
made me a French knight. I thank you for transmitting to ages to come the
proof of affection I wanted to give to her who shares with me the pains of
government." Then taking two steps towards the artist, he raised his hat
and said, in a loud voice: "David, I salute you."

Sometimes at Notre Dame in Holy Week, at evening service, when the
Cathedral is lit up as at the coronation, I recall the various ceremonies
of this church: the royal baptisms and marriages there celebrated; the
banners hung from its roof; the _Te Deums_ and _De Profundis_ so often
sung there; Bossuet uttering the funeral oration of the Prince of Condé;
the shameless goddess of Reason profaning the sanctuary. I close my eyes
in meditation, and seem to be present at the coronation, to see Pius VII.
on his pontifical throne, and, before the altar, Napoleon crowning
Josephine with his own hands, I hear the echo of distant litanies, of the
trumpets, of the organ, and of the applause. Then I think of the
nothingness of all human glory and grandeur. Of all the illustrious
persons who have knelt in this old basilica, what is left? Scarcely a few
handfuls of dust. I open my eyes. The days are silent; the crowd has
quietly withdrawn. The lights are out, and at the end of the church, in
the shadow, like a timid star in a cloudy day, burns a solitary lamp.




VI.

THE DISTRIBUTION OF FLAGS.


The coronation was the signal for a succession of festivities. Napoleon
was anxious that all classes of society should take part in the
rejoicings; that commerce should be benefited; that luxury should do
wonders; and that Paris should take the position of the first city in the
world, the capital of capitals. The day after the coronation was to be the
popular holiday, and the day when the flags were distributed was to be the
festival of the army. Monday, December 3, booths were open on every side
for the entertainment of the crowd. Adulation assumed every guise, even
the humblest; and every form of language, even that of the markets, was
employed to flatter the new sovereign. There was sung, "The joyous round
on the lottery of thirteen thousand fowls, with an accompaniment of
fountains of wine." It was a description of the food distributed to the
poor people of Paris. This song was sung in every street and place, as the
_Ça ira_ was sung in '93.

The compliment of the marketmen and of their ladies ran thus: "I have
reasoned it out with my wife that a house a thousand times as large as
Notre Dame would not be able to hold all those who have reason to bless
you." In the way of incense, nothing was too gross for the sovereign. One
district said of Napoleon:--

 "He received for us when God formed him,
  The arm of Romulus, the mind of Numa."

The Empress too was praised:--

 "Spouse of the hero whom the universe regards,
  The Graces accompany you to the temple,
  Every one sees in your face the bounty
  Of which you distribute the gifts."

In allusion to her love of flowers this quatrain was composed:--

 "Josephiniana! this is the new flower
  Whose beauty catches my eye.
  To join the laurels of Caesar
  Nothing less is needed than an immortal flower."

The Emperor was sung, too, in mythological language, for his flatterers
tried to exhaust all sorts of adulation. On Coronation Day the Prefect of
Police had distributed a poem entitled _The Crown of Napoleon brought from
Olympus command of Jupiter_:--

 "Mounting one of the coursers of the proud Bellona,
  Mercury brings a crown from Olympus;
  The king of the gods sends it to the hero of the French
  As the reward of his success.
  Ye whom he guided a hundred times in the fields of glory,
  Phalanx of warriors, children of victory,
  Braving the impotent fury of the English,
  Sing Napoleon, sing your Emperor."

December 3 the public rejoicings organized by the government extended from
the Place de la Concorde to the Arsenal. Heralds-at-arms walked through
the city, distributing medals struck to commemorate the coronation. These
medals bore on one side the head of the Emperor, his brow wearing the
crown of the Caesars; on the other, the image of a magistrate, and of an
ancient warrior, supporting on a buckler a crowned hero, wearing an
Imperial mantle. Beneath was the inscription: "The Senate and the People."

As soon as the heralds-at-arms had passed by, the merry-making began,
continuing till late in the night. There was a distribution of food, as
well as sports of all kinds, reminding one of the times of the Roman
Emperors: _panem et circenses_. On the Place de la Concorde had been built
four large wooden halls for public balls. The cold was severe; there was a
hard frost, but this did not check the universal enjoyment. On the
boulevards there were at every step puppet shows, wandering singers, rope
dancers, greased poles, bands of music. From the Place de la Concorde to
the end of the boulevard Saint Antoine sparkled a double row of colored
lights arrayed like garlands. The Garde Meuble and the Palace of the
Legislative Body were ablaze with lights. The arches of Saint Denis and of
Saint Martin were all covered with lights; the crowd was enraptured with
the fireworks, which had never been so fine.

The people of Paris had been invited to illuminate the fronts of their
houses, and moved either by enthusiasm or self-interest, they had spent
large sums for this purpose. Among the notable illuminations was that of
the engineer Chevalier, on the Pont Neuf. There was a transparency in
which, amid encircling laurels and myrtles, was to be seen an optician
turning his glass up to the sky towards a bright star, around which was
this inscription: "_In hoc signo salus_!"--"In this sign is safety!"

December 3 was the first day of the coronation festivities. The third day
was devoted to what the _Moniteur_ called, "arms, valor, fidelity." This
was the day when Napoleon formally presented to the army and to the
National Guard of the Empire the eagles, "which they were always to find
on the field of honor." This ceremony took place on the Champ de Mars. To
quote once more from the _Moniteur_: "This vast field, crowded with
deputations representing France and the army, bore the aspect of a brave
family assembled under the eyes of its chief." The main front of the
Military School had been decorated with a huge gallery, with several tents
as high as the apartments on the first floor. The middle one, resting on
four columns which supported winged victories, covered the thrones of the
Emperor and the Empress. The Princes, the high dignitaries, the ministers,
the marshals of the Empire, the high officers of the crown, the civil
officers, the ladies of the court, were to take their places at the right
of the throne. The gallery, in the middle of which was the Imperial tent,
was in front of the Military School, and was divided into sixteen parts,
eight on each side, representing the sixteen cohorts of the Legion of
Honor. A broad staircase led from this gallery to the Champ de Mars; the
first step was for the presidents of cantons, the prefects, sub-prefects,
and the members of the municipal councils. On the other steps, there
stationed themselves colonels of regiments and presidents of the electoral
colleges of the departments, holding flags surmounted with eagles. On each
side of the staircase were colossal figures of France, one at war, the
other at peace. Twenty-five thousand soldiers, in faultless trim, had been
under arms since six in the morning.

Unfortunately, the weather was terrible; a thaw had begun and it was
raining in torrents. The Champ de Mars was a sea of mud. The courtiers
who, on the 2d of December, had so belauded the sun, representing it as a
sharer in the festival, a docile slave of the Emperor, were obliged to
acknowledge that it was raining. Madame de Rémusat made a very true remark
about this; she said with truth that one of the commonest, though one of
the absurdest, flatteries of every time, was that of pretending that a
sovereign's need of fine weather was sure to bring it. "At the Tuileries,"
she said, "I noticed the opinion that the Emperor needed only to appoint a
review or a hunt for a certain day, and that day would be pleasant.
Whenever that happened, a great deal was said about it, while silence was
kept about rainy or foggy weather. This is exactly what used to happen
under Louis XIV. For the honor of sovereigns I should prefer that they
accepted this childish flattery with indifference or disgust, and that no
one would think of offering it. It was impossible to deny that it rained
during the distribution of the eagles at the Champ de Mars; but how many
people I met the next day, who assured me that the rain had not wet them!"

In spite of the bad weather, an enormous crowd lined the road through
which the Imperial procession was to pass. The terraces of the Tuileries,
the Place de la Concorde, the _quais_ were thronged. Numberless spectators
covered the slopes of the Champ de Mars. The ever obsequious _Moniteur_,
in its official account of the ceremony, said; "If the spectators were
uncomfortable, there was not one who was not consoled by the feeling that
held him there, and by the expression of his wishes which the applause
made very clear."

At noon the Emperor and the Empress, followed by their suite, left the
Tuileries in the order observed at the coronation, passed down the broad
road, over the Pont Tournant, through the Place de la Concorde, to the
Champ de Mars. Before their carriage rode the Chasseurs of the Guard and a
squadron of Mamelukes; behind it came the mounted grenadiers and the
chosen Legion. On reaching the Military School, Napoleon and Josephine
received the compliments of the Diplomatic Body; then they put on their
coronation robes, and took their place in the gallery in front of the
building. As soon as the Emperor had seated himself on the throne, cannon
were fired, drums beat, bands played. The deputations from the army, who
were assembled in the Champ de Mars, formed in close columns and came
forward. Then Napoleon arose and said in a loud voice: "Soldiers! These
are your flags; these eagles will always be your rallying point; they will
be wherever your Emperor may think necessary for the defence of his throne
and of his people. You will swear to offer your life in their defence, and
by your courage to keep them always on the path to victory. You swear it?"
Officers and men replied: "We swear it!"

Alas! these flags were to be always on the path of honor, but not always
on the path of victory, for victory is a female goddess and a fickle one.
Against how many enemies these flags were to be defended, beneath
scorching suns, under avalanches of ice and snow! What heroism, what
miracles of bravery, were to be witnessed by these standards on many a
battle-field! What fatigue, what suffering, what sacrifices, dangers,
wounds, how many glorious deaths, what seas of blood, to come at last to
the most lamentable disasters I Had the future been seen, those drums
would have been draped in black. But the army imagined itself invincible.
The thought of defeat would have called forth a smile of pity. Proud of
itself, of its commander, it shouted with joy and pride as it passed
before the throne.

A single incident disturbed this martial ceremony. Suddenly an unknown
young man approached the Imperial gallery, and shouted: "Down with the
Emperor! Liberty or death!" This ardent Republican was at once arrested.
His voice had been lost in the music and clatter of arms.

The rain continued, and soon soaked through the canvas and stuffs
sheltering the throne, The Empress was obliged to leave, with her
daughter, who had recently given birth to a child. The other Princesses
followed this example, with the exception of Madame Murat, who, although
lightly clad, remained exposed to the showers. She said that she was
learning how to endure the inevitable discomforts of the highest rank.

At five o'clock Napoleon and Josephine were once more at the Tuileries
where a state dinner was given in the Gallery of Diana. In the middle of
this gallery the table of the Emperor and the Empress was placed beneath a
magnificent canopy, on a platform. The Empress sat there with the Emperor
on the right and the Pope on her left. The high officers of the crown, as
well as a colonel-general of the Guard and a prefect of the palace,
remained standing near the Imperial table.

Pages waited on the tables. The Archchancellor of the German Empire took
his place at that of the Emperor. In the same gallery were set other
tables for the French Princes and for the hereditary Prince of Baden, for
the ministers, for the ladies and officers of the Imperial household.
After the dinner was a concert, at which the Pope consented to be present.
When that was over Pius VII. withdrew, and the evening ended with a ballet
danced by the dancers of the opera in the great hall called since the
Empire the Hall of the Marshals.




VII.

THE FESTIVITIES.


The winter of 1804-5 was very brilliant. Napoleon was anxious to give the
beginning of his reign an air of splendor. He allowed his officials
generous salaries, but he insisted on their spending all they received in
sumptuous living, in entertaining freely, and receiving distinguished
foreigners. Luxury became compulsory, and trade flourished beyond all
expectations. Paris had never, even in the grandest days of the old
monarchy, known greater social animation. This martial generation,
accustomed to desire a short but merry life, aware that the festivities of
day would be interrupted by the battles of the next, were as eager in the
ball-room as on the battlefield. They hastened to enjoy their present
prosperity as if they foresaw the disasters to come. French gallantry,
which had been forgotten during the Revolution, resumed its sway. The
women were like the fair mistresses of castles in the Middle Ages who gave
their hearts to the bravest knights. Love and glory both became the
fashion. The former Lady of the Bedchamber to Marie Antoinette, Madame
Campan, who taught most of the young women of the court in her school at
Saint Germain, had formed a group of beauties, trained in aristocratic
manners, at the head of whom was her ablest, most intelligent pupil,
Hortense de Beauharnais, who had been married to Prince Louis Bonaparte.
The Grand Chamberlain, M. de Talleyrand, a poor bishop but an excellent
specimen of a grand lord, and the Grand Master of Ceremonies, M. de Ségur,
whose success as ambassador of Louis XVI. at the court of Catherine was
very great, set the tone in the households of the Emperor and the Empress.

Napoleon set an example of luxury and elegance. Grand dinners, concerts,
official entertainments succeeded one another with startling rapidity.
Josephine, who was wildly fond of dress, was glad of an excuse to indulge
her extravagant tastes. The Emperor's three sisters lived like real
princesses, rivalling one another in magnificence. Princes Joseph and
Louis displayed the pomp of future kings.

Almost all the women of the court were young and pretty. It would have
been hard to confer on any one, to the exclusion of the rest, the palm of
beauty. There were three who were especially distinguished: Madame Maret
(later the Duchess of Bassano); Madame Savary (later the Duchess of
Rovigo); and Madame de Canisy (later the Duchess of Vicenza). The last
named had married M. de Canisy, the Emperor's equerry. Later, she got a
divorce and married M. de Caulaincourt, Duke of Vicenza and Grand Equerry.

At Saint Helena Napoleon thus recounted the origin of this famous beauty:
"Madame de Loméne, the Cardinal's niece, before being put to death in the
Revolution, entrusted to Father Patrault her two young daughters. When the
terror was over, Madame de Brienne, their aunt, who had weathered the
storm and still possessed a large fortune, demanded them of Father
Patrault, who refused to give them up for a long time, on the ground that
their mother had urged him to bring them up as peasants." And Napoleon
went on: "I was then General of the Army of the Interior; and was able to
secure the return of the two children, though with some difficulty, for
Patrault resisted in every way in his power. They were the women whom you
afterwards knew as Madame de Marnésia, and as the beautiful Madame de
Canisy."

The Duchess of Abrantès, in recalling the brilliant winter of 1804-5,
says, in her Memoirs: "One especially impressive beauty, particularly in
the ball-room, was Madame de Canisy, I have often compared her to a muse.
It would be impossible for a single face to present a fuller combination
of charms than hers: she possessed regular features, a delightful
expression, an attractive smile; her hair was silky and glossy. Seldom
have I seen anything more charming than Madames de Canisy, Maret, and
Savary in entering a ball-room together,"

There was no lack of entertainments at which these beauties shone. The one
given at the Hotel de Ville, December 16, 1804, to the Emperor and the
Empress, was so costly that it kept the city of Paris for many years in
debt. Napoleon, Josephine, Princes Joseph and Louis drove to it in the
coronation coach. Batteries of artillery, stationed on the Pont Neuf,
announced the moment of their arrival, while tables covered with poultry,
and fountains of wine, attracted an enormous crowd to the place; almost
every one had a share in this distribution of food, thanks to the
precautions taken by the authorities of delivering it only to those who
presented a ticket. The front of the Hotel de Ville was illuminated with
colored lanterns. When the Empress entered the apartments reserved for
her, she found there a complete and magnificent gold toilet-service: it
was a present from the City Council. The President of the Council thus
addressed her: "Madame: How could the Parisians, who are so capable of
distinguishing what is good, delicate, and noble, let slip this
opportunity of paying their homage to the profound tenderness, the
touching grace, the true dignity that characterize Your Majesty? The happy
influence of these rare qualities already makes itself felt in all classes
of society, and while your august spouse elevates France in glory, you
inspire it to resume the first rank among the races most renowned for
urbanity." The hall in which the Imperial banquet was to be given was
called the Hall of Victories. On the door was the inscription _Fasti
Napoleoni_, and at intervals, separated by military trophies and
standards, were Latin inscriptions in honor of Napoleon. Before dinner he
was presented with a table-service of silver-gilt by the city of Paris.
Then he took his seat, with the Empress, on a platform beneath a canopy,
and the meal began. During dinner, a band, hidden behind green foliage,
played a symphony of Haydn's, and then was sung a cantata full of flattery
for the Emperor and the Empress.

After the dinner there were magnificent fireworks. As the first rockets
rose, a second cantata was sung. One of the pieces of fireworks
represented a man-of-war with eighty guns: its decks, masts, sails, and
rigging were represented by glowing lights. Another, which the Emperor
himself set off, represented Mount Saint Bernard sending forth a volcanic
eruption from snow-covered rocks. In the centre appeared the image of
Napoleon at the head of his army, riding up the steep slope of the
mountain.

This entertainment, which closed with a ball at which seven hundred
persons were present, was a real apotheosis. Madame de Rémusat, speaking
of the extravagant adulation devised for this occasion, says: "A great
deal has been said about the fulsome flatteries of Louis XIV. during his
reign; I am sure that altogether they would not amount to a tenth part of
those that Bonaparte received. I remember that at another festivity given
by the city to the Emperor a few years later, since all inscription had
been exhausted, there were placed above the throne on which he was to sit,
these words from Scripture, in gold letters: _Ego sum qui sum_,--and no
one was shocked."

The Senate and the Legislative Body also gave grand entertainments in
honor of the coronation. That of the Legislative Body was particularly
brilliant. This assembly, which rivalled the Senate in obsequiousness, had
decided that a marble statue should be raised to the Emperor in the room
where it sat, in honor of the drawing up of the civil code. The day when
this statue was to be inaugurated was chosen for the festivity. The
Empress, followed by a magnificent suite, reached the Palace of the
Legislative Body at about seven in the evening. As she entered, musicians
intoned Glück's famous chorus, which used to be sung on formal occasions
in the reign of Louis XVI., in honor of Marie Antoinette:--

  "What charms! What majesty!"

Unanimous applause emphasized the allusions. Then on the President's
invitation, Marshals Murat and Masséna raised the veils that covered the
statue, and all eyes beheld the figure of Napoleon, wearing on his brow a
laurel wreath, in which were mingled oak and olive leaves. Later, at the
time of his abdication at Fontainebleau, Napoleon expressed a regret that
he had permitted his statue to be made during his lifetime.

Then M. de Vaublanc ascended the tribune, and made a speech full of
extravagant praise; it ended thus: "You live, all of you, threatened by
the perils of the times; you live, and you owe your life to him whose
statue you behold. You return unfortunate exiles; you breathe once more
the delicious air of your own country; you embrace your fathers, your
children, your wives, your friends; all this you owe to him whose statue
you behold. There is no longer any question of his glory; I say nothing
about it; I invoke humanity on one side, gratitude on the other; I ask you
to whom you are indebted for this great, extraordinary, unexpected good
fortune. You all answer with me, It is to the great man whose statue you
behold." Throughout the whole speech, a perfect masterpiece of official
composition, adulation came in like a chorus. The President in his turn
uttered a similar eulogy: "Very few at the time," says Constant, who
describes this occasion, "found this praise extravagant; possibly their
opinions have changed since then."

After the speeches, dinner was served to three hundred guests, followed by
a magnificent ball. Though, in the middle of the winter, there was a great
show of shrubs and flowers. The Halls of Lucretia and of the Reunion, in
which there was dancing, were like one large bed of roses, laurels,
lilacs, jonquils, lilies, and jasmine.

Perhaps the finest of all the entertainments was that given to the Emperor
and Empress by the marshals of the Empire in the Opera House. It cost
each, marshal ten thousand francs. The Opera House at that time was in the
rue de Richelieu, where it had been since 1794. (It was the one torn down
during the Restoration, on account of the murder of the Duke of Berry, who
was killed on the threshold.) By means of a floor placed level with the
stage over the orchestra and the pit, there was made a magnificent ball-
room. Twenty-four chandeliers hung from the ceiling, and candelabra were
set on each side of every box. The decorations consisted of silver gauze,
and wreaths of flowers. The uniforms of the men and the dresses of the
women were almost equally magnificent. The eyes of the spectators were
dazzled by dresses trimmed with precious stones. Never had there been seen
such profusion of light, flowers, perfumes, and diamonds. In this magical
setting, fashionable beauties, with their dresses worked with silver and
gold foil, their turbans of Eastern stuffs, their jewels and ancient
cameos, appeared like sultanas. It was a most sumptuous and fairy-like
show.

The marshals arrived at eight in the evening, the Empress at ten, the
Emperor at eleven; as he entered the ball-room, the applause was so
violent that it was feared that the candles would be put out. A military
march was played, and then there was a concert, closing with the Abbé
Rose's _Vivat Imperator_, which had made such an impression on the
Coronation Day. After the concert, Prince Louis Bonaparte, Marshal Murat,
Eugene de Beauharnais, and Marshal Berthier opened the ball with the
Princesses. The Emperor walked twice around the hall, as if he were
reviewing troops. Then he sat down by the side of the Empress on a raised
platform, and withdrew before the end of the ball.

Besides all these entertainments there were the grand levees and concerts
at the Tuileries. The Hall of the Marshals was an impressive sight on
those evenings, filled, as it was, with young and pretty women, in
gorgeous dresses, and with men resplendent with stars, epaulettes,
feathered hats, and sword-belts set with diamonds. After the concert the
company would go to the Gallery of Diana, where the supper-tables were
set: that of the Empress, those of the Princesses, of the Lady of Honor,
of the Lady of the Bedchamber, of the Ladles of the Palace. "All these
tables," says the Duchess of Abrantès, "were occupied by women with roses
on their heads, and smiles on their lips, and often with tears in their
eyes; for vanity, everywhere triumphant, holds its court especially at
court. There, favor is everything, disgrace is everything. A chance word
or glance of the Emperor or Empress is a blow and a serious one. What,
then, must be the result of an invitation sent or withheld?"

During the concert the Empress made up the supper-table; that is to say,
chose the women who were to sit at her table, commissioning her
chamberlain to notify those she had selected. The Princesses did the same,
and the officers of their households likewise informed the women whom they
had chosen. There were but twelve places at the Empress's table; eight or
ten at those of the Princesses. When the chamberlains came to bring these
most welcome invitations, there fluttered through the eight hundred or
thousand women present at the concerts and grand levees an anxious emotion
which amused observers. The aspect of the Gallery of Diana was most
impressive. On the Empress's table shone a golden service amid glass and
Sèvres ware. During the supper the men strolled up and down the gallery,
but as soon as the Emperor appeared, awe and fear appeared on every face.
It seemed as if the times of Louis XIV. had returned, of which La Bruyère
said: "Nothing so disfigures certain courtiers as the presence of their
Prince; I can sometimes scarcely recognize them, so altered are their
features, so degraded their faces. The proud and haughty ones are the most
disturbed, for they change the most; and the upright and modest man comes
out best; he has nothing to change." The Duchess of Abrantès, recalling
the intimidation caused by Napoleon's approach, wrote: "Even those who
nowadays talk about the Corsican with a great show of scorn, those very
ones (I have seen them, and I am not the only one,) were the most timid
before the very shadow of his hat." The women trembled even more. They
dreaded the questions the Emperor might put to them, and, according to
Madame de Rémusat, there was not one who would not gladly have been
anywhere else. During the First Empire, everything, even the festivities,
wore a military air. The sovereign always had the air of a commanding
general. Discipline prevailed, at a ball as well as in a camp, and the
young men took part in those pleasures only to return with renewed zeal
and courage to the battle-field.




VIII.

THE ETIQUETTE OF THE IMPERIAL PALACE.


By the beginning of 1805 the court was definitely formed. After laborious
studies on the part of a special commission, and long discussions in which
Napoleon took as interested a part as he did in the preparation of the
civil code, all the wheels of etiquette had been arranged, and the
machinery worked with perfect regularity. The Emperor attached great
importance to the subject, from both a political and a social point of
view. In his eyes, etiquette had the great advantage of drawing between
him and those who had recently been his superiors, a distinct line of
separation. He looked upon it as a useful tool of government, as an
accompaniment of glory absolutely essential for a sovereign, especially
for one of recent origin. He was very proud of his court, of the wealth it
displayed, and of the vast results he obtained at a comparatively small
expense, and at Saint Helena he liked to recall its agreeable memory.

"The Emperor's court," we read in the _Memorial_, "was in every respect
much more magnificent than anything that had been seen up to that time,
and cost infinitely less. The suppression of abuses, order and regularity
in the accounts, made the great difference. His hunting, with the
exception of a few useless or absurd particulars, such as the use of
falcons, was as splendid and as crowded as that of Louis XIV., and it cost
only four hundred thousand francs a year, while the King's cost seven
millions. It was the same way with the table; Duroc's order and severity
wrought wonders. Under the kings, the palaces were not permanently
furnished; the same furniture was transported from one palace to another;
there were no accommodations for the people of the court; every one had to
provide for himself. Under him, however, there was no one in attendance,
who, in the room allotted him, was not as comfortable as at home, or even
more comfortable, so far as what was essential and proper was concerned."

The court moved as smoothly as a well-drilled regiment. Napoleon would
have shown no mercy to the slightest disregard of the rules he had himself
drawn up after long meditation. The courtiers were expected to be as
familiar with the code of etiquette as were the officers with the manual
of arms. The Emperor noticed the minutest details, busied himself with
everything, saw everything. There had been much more latitude at court
under the old monarchy, and those of the old régime who entered the
Emperor's court were soon wearied by the inflexible severity of its
discipline. The court, moreover, was very splendid. The Faubourg Saint
Germain brought to it its politeness and conversational charm. For his
part, Napoleon speedily assumed the manners of a European sovereign, while
preserving his martial character. He was at the same time Emperor and
commander-in-chief. Yet the military element did not control his court;
the civil element was more powerful there than in other European courts,
the Russian, for example. Napoleon would never have suffered in his
presence the faintest sign of the familiarity of the camp; every one who
crossed the threshold of the Tuileries was compelled to preserve the
manners, the bearing, the language of a courtier.

The levees and couchees of the sovereign were restored as in the time of
the Bourbons; though under the monarchy they were real things, and a mere
imitation under the Empire. These moments were not devoted to the petty
details of toilette, but rather to receiving, morning and evening, those
members of the civil and military household who had to receive his direct
orders or enjoyed the right of "paying their court at these privileged
hours." At Saint Helena, Napoleon boasted that at the Tuileries he had
suppressed in the matter of etiquette "all that was real and commonplace,
and had substituted what was merely nominal and decorative." "A king," he
said, "is not a natural product; he is a result of civilization. He does
not exist nakedly, but only when dressed."

Let us try to retrace the lines of etiquette as they existed in 1805, at
the same time indicating the principal members of the Emperor's household
and the nature of their duties. There were many separate duties, each
under the control of a high officer of the Crown, with their provinces
carefully defined and sedulously distinguished from one another. There
were six high officers of the Crown; the Grand Almoner (Cardinal Fesch);
the Grand Marshal of the Palace (General Duroc); the Grand Equerry
(General de Caulaincourt); the Grand Chamberlain (M. de Talleyrand); the
Grand Master of Ceremonies (M. de Ségur).

The colonels-general were: Marshal Davout, commanding the foot grenadiers;
Marshal Soult, commanding the chasseurs-à-pieds; Marshal Bessières,
commanding the cavalry; Marshal Mortier, commanding the artillery and
sailors. These colonels-general of the Imperial Guard formed part of the
Emperor's household, and enjoyed the prerogatives as the high officers of
the Crown.

The Grand Almoner was the bishop of the court, wherever that might be. He
gave the Emperor and his court a dispensation from fasting. He accompanied
him to church ceremonies and gave him his prayer-book. At grand dinners he
said grace. He set free the prisoners whom the Emperor pardoned on certain
holy days.

The Grand Marshal of the palace had charge of the military command in the
Imperial residences; of their maintenance, decoration, and furnishing; of
the assignment of rooms, the supply of food, the heating, lights, silver,
and livery. He commanded the detachments of the Imperial Guard on duty in
the Imperial palaces. He gave orders to beat the reveillé and the tattoo,
to open and shut the palace gates. When the Emperor was with the army, or
travelling, he had to find him quarters. In 1805 the Grand Marshal's
budget amounted to 2,338,167 francs. In 1806 it reached the sum of
2,770,841 francs. There were four tables in the palace,--that of the
officers and ladies-in-waiting, that of the officers of the guard and the
pages, that of the ladies who read to the Empress and introduced visitors.

The Grand Marshal had under his orders the prefects of the palace: M. de
Luçay, M. de Bausset, and M. de Saint Didier. They had charge of the
provisions, lighting, heating, the silver, and the liveries. They
inspected the kitchens, pantries, cellars, and linen-closet to see that
everything was in order. There was always one prefect of the palace on
duty for a week at a time. He also carried word to the Emperor and the
Empress when a meal was ready, conducted them to the table, and back to
their rooms afterwards.

The Grand Marshal had also under his orders the governor of the palaces
and the marshals; these last were charged with choosing apartments for the
Emperor and the Empress, and quarters for their suite in the Imperial
residences and on journeys. They had for assistants the quartermasters of
the palace.

The Master of the Hounds had charge of all the coursing and hunting in the
woods and forests belonging to the Crown.

The Grand Equerry looked after the stables, the pages, the couriers, and
the Emperor's arms; he also had the supervision of the horses at Saint
Cloud. He walked just before the Emperor when he came forth from his rooms
to ride, gave him his whip, held his reins and the left stirrup. He was
responsible for the good condition of the carriages, the intelligence and
skill of the huntsmen, coachman, and the postilions, the safety and the
training of the horses. In a procession, or on a journey, he was in the
carriage just before the Emperor's. He accompanied the Emperor to the
army, if the sovereign's horse was killed or disabled, it was his duty to
pick the Emperor up and to offer him his own horse.

The Grand Equerry had four equerries under his orders: Colonels Durosnel,
Defrance, Lefebvre, Vatier, and two equerries in ordinary, M. de Canisy
and M. de Villoutrey. An equerry on duty always accompanied the Emperor,
whether he was driving or riding. If the Emperor drove, the equerry on
duty rode by the right-hand door of the carriage, unless the colonel-
general on duty happened to be on horseback, in which case the equerry
rode on the other side. The equerry on duty walked before the Emperor when
he left or returned to his apartment; he never left the waiting-room
during the day, and slept in the palace.

The pages, whose governor was General Gardane, were also under the orders
of the Grand Equerry. They were appointed when between fourteen and
sixteen, and held the position until they were eighteen. At grand dinners
and in the apartments of honor, they waited on the Emperor and Empress,
and on the Princes and Princesses. When the Emperor rode out, one followed
on horseback; if he drove, the page got up behind the carriage. When the
sovereign went forth in his state-coach, as many pages as possible
clambered up behind it and upon the box by the side of the coachman. At
receptions, and on days when mass was said, there were eight pages on
duty. They stood in a row when the Emperor returned to his apartment, and
walked before him when he left it. If the Emperor had not returned to the
palace by nightfall, the pages would wait at the entrance-door to walk
before him, carrying lights. The pages, too, served as messengers, and
when they carried letters of the Emperor, the doors were thrown wide open
before them.

The impression produced by the pages, when they were first on duty at the
Tuileries in 1804, is thus described by a contemporary: "They have been
much noticed, especially in the evening, by the ladies. The fact is, they
are all good-looking boys, particularly the oldest; they have good figures
and wear a new and becoming uniform, and since they are in the service of
a severe master, and of a most kind and indulgent mistress, they have to
be very attentive and considerate. Their full dress differs from livery
only by the lace of their coat which imitates embroidery, by the knot on
their left shoulder, and by the lace frill above their waistcoat, Besides,
in full dress they wear, like footmen, a green coat with all the seams
laced with gold, gold shoe-buckles, a hat with a white feather, but they
have no sword. Perhaps this is well, for they would be playing with it.
They have all been chosen among the sons of generals of divisions and of
high dignitaries of the Empire."

At Saint Helena Napoleon said, speaking of the pages and the Imperial
stables: "The Emperor's stables cost him three million francs; the horses
cost three thousand francs apiece per year. A page, from six to eight
thousand francs; this last was perhaps the heaviest expense of the palace;
but there was every reason to be satisfied with the education they
received, and with the care taken with them. All the first families of the
Empire sought to get the places for their sons; and they were right."

The Grand Chamberlain had charge of all the honors of the palace, the
regular audiences, the oaths taken in the Emperor's study, the admissions,
the levees and couchees, the festivities, receptions, theatrical
performances, the music, the boxes of the Emperor and Empress at the
different theatres, the Emperor's wardrobe, his library; he also looked
after the ushers and valets de chambre.

The Grand Chamberlain had under his orders (this refers to 1805), a First
Chamberlain, M. de Rémusat, and thirteen chamberlains: MM. d'Arberg, A. de
Talleyrand, de Laturbie, de Brigode, de Viry, de Thiard, Garnier de
Lariboisière, d'Hédouville, de Croy, de Mercy-Argenteau, de Zuidwyck, de
Tournon, de Bondy. In the Imperial Almanack of 1805, these men are not
named with their titles, even the _de_ is in all cases omitted or joined
with the name, thus: M. Rémusat, M. Darberg, A. Talleyrand, Laturbie,
Tournon, Dethiard, Deviry, Hédouville, etc., etc.

The chamberlain on duty was called the chamberlain of the day. At the
palace there were always two chamberlains of the day, one for the grand
apartment, the other for the Emperor's apartment of honor. They were
relieved every week. The principal duties of the chamberlains were to have
charge of introductions to the Emperor, to give orders to the ushers and
valets de chambre, to see that the orders about the receptions were
carried out, and to attend upon the sovereign's levees and couchees.

Either a chamberlain or one of the Emperor's aides-de-camp served as
Master of the Wardrobe. He had charge of the clothes, the linen, the lace,
the boots and shoes, and of the ribbons of the Legion of Honor. If he
assisted at the Emperor's toilet, he had to hand him his coat, fasten his
ribbon or collar, give him his sword, hat, and gloves, in the Grand
Chamberlain's absence.

The Grand Master of Ceremonies determined questions of rank and
precedence, drew up and enforced the rules for public, formal ceremonies,
for the reception of sovereigns and hereditary princes, and, foreign
ambassadors and ministers.

The colonels-general of the Imperial Guard and the Emperor's aides also
made part of the household.

At ceremonies when the Emperor was in his state-coach, there were two
colonels-general of the Guard at the left door. When he rode, all four
followed close behind. The Grand Equerry, or his substitute, had a place
among them.

The colonel-general on duty received directly the Emperor's orders
relative to the different requirements of the Imperial Guard, and
transmitted them directly to the other colonels-general. He was quartered
in the palace, in preference to any other officer of the Crown, and as
near as possible to the Emperor's apartment, whether at the residence or
when travelling. In the field he slept in the Emperor's tent.

Napoleon had twelve aides-de-camp. The one on duty was called the aide-de-
camp of the day, He always had a horse saddled or a carriage harnessed
ready in the stable, to carry any messages the Emperor might give. As soon
as the Emperor had gone to bed, the aide-de-camp on duty was especially
entrusted with guarding him, and he slept in an adjoining room. In the
field the Emperor's aides served as chamberlains.

There were two distinct elements in the Emperor's household: the military,
and the aristocratic. Some men owed their position entirely to their
merit; others entirely to their birth; these were both patriots of 1792
and émigrés, but it must be confessed the Imperial Almanack shows that the
aristocratic element was the more prominent. Napoleon, though certain
writers persist in representing him as the crowned champion of democracy
and the emperor of the lower classes, had a more aristocratic court than
Louis XVIII. He was more impressed by great manners than were the old
kings. Even after he had been betrayed, abandoned, denied, insulted by the
aristocracy, he had a weakness for it. In 1816 he said: "The democracy may
become furious; it has a heart; it can be moved. The aristocracy always
remains cold and never pardons." Yet even after this, he blamed himself
for not having done enough for the French nobility. "I see clearly," he
went on, "that I did either too much or too little for the Faubourg Saint
Germain. I did enough to make the opposition dissatisfied, and not enough
to win it to my side. I ought to have secured the émigrés when they
returned. The aristocracy would have soon adored me; and I needed it; it
is the true, the only support of a monarchy, its moderator, its lever, its
resisting point; without it, the state is like a ship without a rudder, a
balloon in mid-air. Now, the strength, the charm of the aristocracy lies
in its antiquity, the only thing I could not create." It must be confessed
that from an old Republican general, for the man who had sent Augereau to
execute the coup d'état of the 18th Fructidor, and who the 13th
Vendémiaire, from the steps of the Church of Saint Roch had crushed the
Paris conservatives, this was a very aristocratic way of talking,
reminding one of the old régime. In 1816 Napoleon said again: "Old and
corrupt nations cannot be governed like the virtuous peoples of antiquity.
For one man nowadays who would sacrifice everything for the public
welfare, there are thousands who take no thought of anything except their
own interests, pleasures, and vanity. Now to pretend to regenerate a
people off-hand would be madness. The workman's genius is shown by his
knowing how to make use of the materials under his hand, and that is the
secret of the restoration of all the forms of the monarchy, of the return
of titles, crosses, and ribbons."

The old Republicans of 1796, who used to denounce kings, "drunk with blood
and pride," would not have readily recognized their old general under the
golden canopies of the Tuileries, where he dined in state. His table stood
on a platform, beneath a canopy, and there were two chairs, one for
himself, the other for the Empress. As he entered the banquet-hall, he was
preceded by a swarm of pages, masters-of-ceremonies, and prefects of the
palace; he was followed by the colonel-general on duty, the Grand
Chamberlain, the Grand Equerry, and the Grand Almoner. The Grand Almoner
advanced to the table and blessed the dinner. A general of division, the
Grand Equerry Caulaincourt, offered a chair to Bonaparte. Another general
of division, Duroc, the Grand Marshal of the Palace, handed him his napkin
and poured out his wine. Not merely high dignitaries, but the Princes of
the Empire themselves, deemed it an honor to wait upon him as servants. If
a Prince of the Imperial family happened to be in the Emperor's room, any
article of dress that he asked for was given by the chamberlain-in-waiting
to the Prince, and by the Prince to the Emperor. The time of the Sun King
seemed to have returned.

The Imperial apartment at the Tuileries consisted of two distinct parts,
the grand state apartments and the Emperor's private apartment. The state
apartment contained the following rooms: 1, a concert hall (the Hall of
the Marshals); 2, a first drawing-room (under Napoleon III. called the
Drawing-room of the First Consul); 3, a second drawing-room (that of
Apollo); 4, a throne room; 5, a drawing-room of the Emperor (afterwards
called that of Louis XIV.); 6, a gallery (of Diana). The private apartment
was itself composed of the apartment of honor, containing a hall of the
guards and a first and second drawing-room, and an interior apartment
containing a bedroom, a study, an office, and topographic bureau. The
ushers had charge of the apartment of honor; the valets de chambre of the
other. A rigid etiquette determined the right of entrance into the
different rooms composing the state apartment, according to a carefully
studied system. The pages were authorized to enter the Hall of the
Marshals; members of the household of the Emperor and Empress could enter
the first and second drawing-rooms; the Princes and Princesses of the
Imperial family, the high officers of the Crown, the presidents of the
great bodies of the state, had admission to the throne room. Men and women
had to bow to the throne whenever they passed it. The Emperor and the
Empress alone had the right of entering the Emperor's drawing-room. No one
else could go in except by the Emperor's summons.

An absurd importance was attached to these trivialities, to these empty
nothings, to the right of entering this room or that, of walking before
this or that person, of handing the Emperor this or that article of dress.
"An honest, reasonable man," said Madame de Rémusat, "is often overcome
with shame at the pleasures and pains of a courtier's life, and yet it is
hard to escape from them. A ribbon, a slight difference of dress, the
right of way through a door, the entrance into such and such a drawing-
room, are the occasion, contemptible in appearance, of a host of ever new
emotions. Vain is the struggle to acquire indifference to them.... In
vain, do the mind and the reason revolt against such an employment of
human faculties; however dissatisfied one is with one's self, it is
necessary to humiliate one's self before every one and to desert the
court, or else to consent to take seriously all the nonsense that fills
the air and breathes there."

Vanity of human events! What has become of these drawing-rooms of the
Tuileries, which it was such an honor to enter, which were trod with such
respectful awe? Look at the lamentable ruins of this ill-fated palace.
There may still be seen, blackened with petroleum and stained by the rain,
some of those drawing-rooms, once so brilliant, once thronged with an
eager and showy crowd. What an instructive spectacle! When is one more
urgently reminded of the emptiness of human glory and greatness? This
nothingness fills the soul with melancholy when one thinks that soon these
crumbling fragments will be razed and that soon one can say with the poet:
The ruins themselves have perished, _Etiam periere ruinae_! [Footnote: The
ruins have since been removed.--TR.]




IX.

HOUSEHOLD OP THE EMPRESS.


We have just studied the civil and the military household of the Emperor
in 1805; let us now study the Empress's household at the same period.

The Empress's First Almoner was a bishop, a great lord, Ferdinand de
Rohan. Her Maid of Honor was a relative of her first husband, the Duchess
de La Rochefoucauld, called in the Imperial Almanack of 1805 simply Madame
Chastulé de La Rochefoucauld. She was short and deformed, but
distinguished, for her intelligence, tact, and wit, void of ambition, with
no taste for intrigue, who only reluctantly accepted the position of Maid
of Honor, and often wanted to hand in her resignation. The Lady of the
Bedchamber was Madame de Lavalette, a Beauharnais, an able and
affectionate woman, who immortalized herself, in the early days of the
Restoration, by saving her husband's life by her heroism.

To the four Ladies of the Palace at the beginning of the Empire, Madame de
Luçay, Madame de Rémusat, Madame de Talhouët, Madame de Lauriston, were
added thirteen other ladies: Madame Duchâtel, Madame de Séran, Madame de
Colbert, Madame Savary, Madame Octave de Ségur, Madame de Turenne, Madame
de Montalivet, Madame de Bouillé, Madame de Vaux, Madame de Marescot.

The Maid of Honor was for the Empress what the Grand Chamberlain was for
the Emperor. The Lady of the Bedchamber's duties corresponded to those of
the Keeper of the Wardrobe. The Ladies of the Palace were, so to speak,
female chamberlains.

"We were all," said the Duchess of Abrantès, "at that time radiant with a
sort of glory which women seek as eagerly as men do theirs, that of
elegance and beauty. Among the young women composing the court of the
Empress and that of the Princesses it would have been hard to find a
single ill-favored woman, and there were very many whose beauty made, with
no exaggeration, the greatest ornament of the festivities held every day
in that fairy-like time."

All the Ladies of the Palace were young, and almost all were remarkable
for their beauty. Among the most conspicuous was Madame Ney, a niece of
Madame Campan; Madame Lannes, whose face recalled the most charming
pictures of Raphael, and above all, the wife of an already aged Councillor
of State, Madame Duchâtel (whose son was Minister of the Interior in the
reign of Louis Philippe, and whose grandson was Ambassador of the Republic
at Vienna). The Duchess of Abrantès thus describes this famous beauty:
"There is one woman in the Imperial court who made her appearance in
society shortly before the coronation, whose portrait is drawn in all the
contemporary memoirs, especially in those written by a woman, and that is
Madame Duchâtel. Madame Duchâtel would not serve as a model for a
sculptor, because her features lack the regularity which his art requires.
The indefinable charm of her face, a charm which words are unable to
convey, lay in dark blue eyes, with long, silken, lashes, in a delicate,
gracious, refined smile, which, disclosed teeth of ivory whiteness, and,
moreover, beautiful light hair, small hands and feet, a general elegance
which matched a really remarkable mind. All these things formed a
combination which first attracted and then attached every one to her."

Josephine's First Chamberlain, in 1805, was the General of Division
Nansouty; the chamberlain who introduced the ambassadors was M. de
Beaumont; there were four ordinary chamberlains, MM. d'Aubusson-
Lafeuillade, de Galard-Béarn. de Coutomer; de Gavre; a First Equerry,
Senator de Harville; two equerries, Colonel Fowler and General Bonardy de
Saint Sulpice; a private secretary, M. Deschamps. The Council of the
Empress's household was composed of the Maid of Honor, the Lady of the
Bedchamber, the First Chamberlain, and the First Equerry. The private
secretary was also the secretary of the Council. The Chief Steward of the
household was also a member.

The Lady of the Bedchamber had under her orders a first woman of the
bedchamber, Madame Aubert, who had whole charge of the wardrobe. Madame
Saint-Hilaire held this place under Josephine, as Madame Campan had done
under Marie Antoinette. Madame Saint-Hilaire's duties consisted in
supervising the chamberwork, in receiving the Empress's orders about the
hours of her rising, and of her morning and evening toilet. The first
woman of the Bedchamber had what were called the honors of the service
when the Maid of Honor and the Lady of the Bedchamber were absent. The
Empress had also ushers and women who discharged the same duties, six
ordinary chambermaids, a reader, the beautiful Madame Gazani; four
ordinary valets de chambre, and two footmen, trusted men always in the
ante-chamber. The ushers, who remained without the drawing-room where the
Empress was, never opened both the doors to their full width except for
the Princes and Princesses of the Imperial family; and they could not
leave their posts except to ask the Maid of Honor the names of those who
were waiting to be presented. There were two pages in the Empress's
service; the older carried the train of her dress when she left her
apartments, and got in or out of a carriage; the other walked before her.

The Empress's apartment consisted of an apartment of honor and an inner
apartment. The first consisted of an ante-chamber, the first drawing-room,
the second drawing-room, the dining-room, the music-room, the other, of
the bedroom, the library, dressing-room, boudoir, bath-room. The entrance
to the Empress's apartment was controlled by etiquette like that to the
Emperor's.

Josephine played her part as sovereign as easily as if she had been born
on the steps of the throne. "One of her charms," says the Duchess of
Abrantès, "was not merely her graceful figure, but the way she held her
head, and the gracious dignity with which she walked and turned. I have
had the honor of being presented to many real princesses, as they are
called, in the Faubourg Saint Germain, and I can truly say that I have
never seen one more imposing than Josephine. She combined elegance and
majesty. Never did any queen so grace a throne without having been trained
to it."

Josephine had all the qualities that are attractive in a sovereign:
affability, gentleness, kindliness, generosity. She had a way of
convincing every one of her personal interest. She had an excellent
memory, and surprised those with whom she talked by the exactness with
which she recalled the past, even to details they had themselves nearly
forgotten. The sound of her gentle, penetrating, and sympathetic voice
added to the courtesy and charm of her words. Every one listened to her
with pleasure; she spoke with grace and listened courteously. She wanted
no one to go away from her annoyed. She always appeared to be doing a
kindness, and thus inspired affection and gratitude. Her courtiers and her
suite were her friends. Madame de Rémusat, who was never too favorable,
was forced to recognize the charm which Josephine exercised over the court
by her tact, intelligence, and dignity. "The Empress," she says, "is
enchanted to be surrounded by a large suite, and it gratifies her vanity.
Her success in attaching Madame de La Rochefoucauld to her person, her
pleasure in counting MM. d'Aubusson, de Lafeuillade among her
chamberlains, Madame d'Arbry, Madame de Ségur, and the wives of the
marshals among the ladies of the palace, turned her head a little, but
even this feminine joy did not lessen her usual graciousness; she always
succeeded in maintaining her rank, even when most deferential to those men
and women who lent it a new lustre by their brilliant names." She was very
kind, extremely soft-hearted, and always overwhelming her companions with
attentions and regards. Mademoiselle Avrillon, her reader, says: "I do not
believe that there ever lived a woman with a better character, or with a
less changeable disposition." She never dared to utter a word of blame or
reproach. "If one of her ladies," said Constant, the Emperor's valet de
chambre, "ever gave her cause for dissatisfaction, the only punishment she
inflicted was to maintain absolute silence for one, two, three days, a
week, more or less, according to the seriousness of the case. Well! this
punishment, apparently so slight, was for most of them very severe. The
Empress knew so well how to make herself beloved!"

Her only fault was extravagance. She had an unbounded love of luxury and
dress. The jewel-case which had belonged to Marie Antoinette was too small
for Josephine. One day when she wanted to show some ladies all her jewels,
a great table had to be arranged to hold the cases, and, since that was
not enough, much more of the furniture was covered by them. Josephine had
the fault that accompanies this quality, for generous persons are commonly
lavish. Her extravagant expenditures came from her kindliness. She had not
the heart to dismiss a tradesman without buying something of him, and it
never entered her head to try to beat him down. Often she bought for vast
sums things she did not want, simply to oblige the dealers. There was no
limit to her liberality. She would have liked to own all the treasures of
the earth in order to give them all away. She sought for opportunities for
alms-giving. Many of the émigrés lived entirely on her bounty. She was
always in active correspondence with the sisters of charity. She was the
Providence of the poor, and did good with delicacy, tact, and discretion.
Giving is not all; the art lies in knowing how to give. She seemed to be
the debtor of those to whom she made gifts. Naturally, with this
disposition, she got into debt. But Napoleon was there to help her; and
since he was economical by nature, he grew angry and scolded his
extravagant wife, and ended by paying.

In fact, Napoleon could refuse Josephine nothing, and she was really the
only woman who had any influence over him. If he opposed her, she had an
infallible resource in her tears. She knew thoroughly her husband's
character. She knew how to speak to that mind and heart. She busied
herself with seeking what could please, with divining his wishes, with
anticipating his slightest desires. If he was the least ailing or annoyed
she was literally at his feet, and then he could not live without her. He
felt that when misfortune came Josephine alone would be able to console
him. She had brought him happiness with her gentleness, her tenderness,
her devotion; she had well deserved to receive the crown from his hands.




X.

NAPOLEON'S GALLANTRIES.


Josephine appeared to have every wish, satisfied; her good fortune
exceeded her wildest dreams; never had a more wonderful romance actually
happened, and yet the Empress of the French, the Queen of Italy, was not
happy. A cruel passion which brings no pleasures, but only cruel
sufferings, disturbed her happiness and tormented her heart. This passion,
jealousy, which had tortured Napoleon in the early days of his wedded
life, now Josephine in her turn had to endure with all its keen anguish.
She felt that for her, a woman of forty-one, to hold fast the affections
of a man of thirty-five, covered with glory and full of charm, was a
difficult task; but this reflection, far from consoling her, only
disturbed her the more, and she made desperate efforts to triumph in an
almost hopeless contest. As was said by Mademoiselle Avrillon, her reader,
she seemed not to understand that if the highest rank is a safeguard for a
woman, because few men are bold enough to pursue her, the same is not true
of a sovereign whose glory dazzles the inexperience of the young, and
whose slightest attention arouses coquetry and flatters vanity.

Josephine had not a moment's peace. In the hope of pleasing her, many
women of the court, who were, so to speak, on the watch for the Emperor's
attentions, hastened to torture her with their interested revelations. For
several years now her beauty had been fading. Napoleon, on the other hand,
had never been better looking. His health, which formerly had been
delicate, had much improved. He had grown stouter, and this was very
becoming. His head was like that of a Caesar. Full of self-confidence,
fortunate, flattered on every side, at the height of power, he imagined
that in love, as in war, he had but to appear to say, _veni, vidi, vici_,
"I came, I saw, I conquered." Many of the beauties of the time did their
best to confirm him in this good opinion of himself, and as Madame de
Rémusat says of him, he in his court was not unlike the Grand Turk in his
harem.

"The Emperor," we read in Constant's Memoirs, "used to say that a good man
was to be known by the way he treated his wife, his children, and his
servants. He added that immorality was the most dangerous vice a sovereign
could have, because it established a precedent for his subjects. What he
meant by immorality, was giving scandalous publicity to relations which
should have been kept secret; these relations he was by no means disposed
to refuse when they presented themselves before him." The faithful valet
de chambre goes on in an attempt to defend his master: "Others perhaps
would have succumbed oftener. Heaven forbid that I should undertake to
apologize for him; I will even acknowledge that he did not always practise
what he preached, but it was none the less a good deal for a sovereign to
hide his distractions from the public, to prevent scandal, and, what is
worse imitation; and from his wife, to save her pain."

Napoleon was by no means so indifferent to women as he professed to be. He
was averse to being ruled by them, but he was far from being insensible to
their charms. Opposition exasperated him; all his caprices found many
obsequious allies ready to further his suit, and more than one woman made
a deep, if brief, impression upon him. His disdain of woman has, we are
sure, been much exaggerated. At Saint Helena he declaimed against women,
but his remarks were mere paradoxes, not meant to be taken seriously.

Count Las Cases, in the _Memorial_, reports these remarks of the Emperor
to the ladies who shared, his captivity. "We Occidentals," he said, with a
smile full of malice, "have spoiled women by treating them too well. We
have made the mistake of raising them almost to an equality with
ourselves. The Orientals showed more intelligence and justice: they
declared they were men's property; and, in fact, nature has made them our
slaves, and it is only by our whimsicalness that they presume to be our
sovereigns; they abuse their advantages to mislead and control us. For one
who inspires us to our good there are a hundred who make us do stupid
things." Then he went on to praise polygamy in a very unchivalrous and
unsentimental way, saying ironically: "What cause of complaint do you
have, after all? Have we not acknowledged that you have a soul? You know
that there are philosophers who have weighed it. Do you claim equality?
But that is absurd; women are our property, we are not theirs; for she
gives us children, men give them none. So she is his property, as a fruit-
tree is a gardener's property. Nothing but a lack of judgment, of common
sense, and a defective education, can make a woman think that she is her
husband's equal. And there is nothing degrading in the difference; each
sex has its qualities and its duties: your qualities are beauty, grace,
charm; your duties are dependence and submission."

Napoleon was often malicious with women; often he teased them; but at
heart he honored faithful wives and good mothers. His ideas were far more
moral than those of the men of the Directory, and his court was far purer
than that of the kings of France. We will add that Josephine was the only
woman he ever loved for a long time and seriously. The others appealed to
his senses, not to his heart.

Fortunately for herself, Josephine had a shallow character; her
impressions were keen, but evanescent. The pleasures of sovereignty
outweighed the griefs. She felt that the crown was heavy at times, but it
adorned her and kept her young; and in spite of the jealousy it gave rise
to, the court satisfied her vanity and brought her sufficient consolation.
To the satisfaction of her pride she found another purer and more lasting
emotion, which she valued more, in the opportunity of doing good. She had,
besides, passed through so many vicissitudes in her life that nothing
could surprise her, and her soul, accustomed to suffering, was prepared
for the most violent emotions, the most terrible anguish. She wept
readily, but her tears were soon dried; the rainbow followed close upon
the storm, and Josephine would smile through her tears.




XI.

THE POPE AT THE TUILERIES.


While Napoleon, proud in the possession of his new empire, was exhibiting
at the Tuileries his vast power and grandeur, the same palace was
inhabited by a holy old man, whose humility presented a marked contrast
with the conqueror's haughty spirit. Pius VII., who was quartered in the
Pavilion of Flora, led the life of an anchorite, with all the modesty and
piety of an old monk, fasting every day as in his convent, and edifying
even the impious by the nimbus that shone around his pale and mystic face.
It was impossible to approach this worthy Vicar of Christ without a filial
feeling of tenderness. The crimes of the French Revolution--the massacre
or the execution of the priests, the profanation of the altars, the
persecutions and blasphemies--had imprinted the stamp of melancholy on his
face. It was easy to see that he lamented the barbarities of the times,
and that his life had been full of anguish. He embodied all the sufferings
of the Church. With his ascetic air, his deep-set eye, his complexion as
pallid as ivory, his white robes tinged with red, the Sovereign Pontiff
had in his whole person something strange and imposing. He occupied the
apartment on the first floor of the Pavilion of Flora, where Madame
Elisabeth had lived from October, 1789, to August 10, 1792. The Abbé
Proyart, the author of the letter to the prisoner of the Temple, came to
offer the Pope a copy of this same life of Madame Louise of France, which
he had long since offered to the sister of Louis XVI.

"I am living here," said Pius VII., "in the apartments of another saint."
What singular vicissitudes! The same place occupied in turn by Madame
Elisabeth, the members of the Committee of Public Safety, and by the Vicar
of Christ!

The Pope had been very anxious before he started for Paris. His fears were
so great that just as he was leaving Rome, with a presentiment of the
captivity that awaited him, he had left his abdication in the hands of
Cardinal Consalvi, in case he should suffer any violence during his
journey. It was only with trembling and prayer that he had set foot on the
volcanic soil of France, which, from a distance, seemed alive with impiety
and terror. The unfailing respect with which he had been treated had
comforted him somewhat. Whenever he visited a church, the Parisians
followed him with mingled curiosity, sympathy, and veneration: they knelt
to him as he passed them, and received with all decorum his apostolic
benediction. Every day a large crowd gathered under his windows. He had
found his rooms arranged and furnished like those he occupied at the
Vatican, and he had been very grateful for this, which he called a really
filial attention.

General de Ségur, at that time captain and aide of the Grand Marshal of
the Palace, was entrusted with guarding the Pope's person. He says in his
Memoirs: "The same attention and respect was shown to the Pope as to the
Emperor himself. His rooms had been so arranged and furnished as to recall
Rome so far as possible, and to suit his tastes. As for Napoleon, we all
noticed his ever gentle and grateful gaiety, and his filial and
affectionate deference to his guest. When the Holy Father gave his
blessing from his window, and more especially at his audiences in the
gallery of the Louvre, which were always crowded, precautions were taken
against any outbreak of the indiscretion or levity to which the French are
prone. We saw the atheist Lalande himself fall at the Pontiff's feet and
kiss his slipper. In the public buildings which the Pope honored with his
presence he was received as a sovereign. No one dared to betray more
curiosity than piety; and it often happened to me to see this real saint,
the successor of the Apostles, whose venerable face bore the stamp of the
serenest gentleness, so frugal, simple, and austere for himself alone, and
so kindly indulgent to others, deeply moved by the intense and holy
impression he made."

Every day the long gallery of the Louvre was filled with two rows of men
and women who had come to ask his blessing. Preceded by the governor of
the Louvre, and followed by the Italian cardinals and nobles of his
household, Pius VII. advanced slowly between the two lines of the
faithful, often stopping to place his hand on some child's head, to say
some kind words to its mother, and to offer his ring to be kissed. One
day, when he was surrounded by a crowd of prostrate and respectful people,
he saw a man whose worn face bore traces of irreligious passion, who was
moving away as if to escape the apostolic benediction. The Holy Father
approached him, and said gently, "Do not run away; an old man's blessing
has never done any one any harm." This remark spread through Paris and
made a most favorable impression. Pius VII. was not only respected, but,
if we may use the worldly phrase, he became the fashion. Dealers in
rosaries and chaplets made much money all that winter. In January alone a
shopkeeper in the rue Saint Denis who sold those articles is said to have
cleared forty thousand francs. All who approached the Pope had chaplets
blessed for themselves, their relatives, and friends in Paris and the
provinces. "The prolonged stay of the Holy Father," says Bourrienne, "was
not without influence in the return to religious ideas, so great was the
respect inspired by the Pope's gentle appearance and kindly manners. When,
the time came for him to be persecuted, it would have been desirable that
Pius VII. had never come to Paris, for it was impossible to look upon him
otherwise than as a man whose holy gentleness was a matter of notoriety."

At Saint Helena, Napoleon spoke thus of this venerable Pope: "He was
really a lamb, a thoroughly good and upright man, whom I greatly esteem
and love, and who, I am sure, does not wholly hate me."

It has been asserted that the Pope made such an impression in Paris that
the Emperor felt for the august old man a sort of secret jealousy. But
even granting, what is by no means certain, that he suffered from this, he
had at least skill to conceal it. Always the Pope was overwhelmed with
flattering attentions. The President of the Legislative Body, M. de
Fontanes, said to him November 30, 1804: "Everything else has changed;
religion alone knows no change. It sees the families of kings, and those
of subjects, perish; but resting on the ruins of thrones, it ever admires
the successive manifestations of the eternal designs and obeys them with
confidence. Never has the universe beheld a more imposing sight, never
have its people received more important lessons. This is no longer the
time of rivalry between the priesthood and the Empire. They have joined
hands to repel the fatal doctrines which threatened Europe with total
overthrow. May they yield forever to the double influence of politics and
religion combined! Doubtless this wish will not be disappointed; never in
France has there been so great a genius to control its policy, and never
has the pontifical throne presented to the Christian world a more worthy
and more touching model." The _Moniteur_, in its report of the coronation,
spoke with the same official enthusiasm "of the most venerable apostolic
virtues and of the most astounding political genius crowned by the highest
destinies." David, the artist, once a member of the Convention and a
regicide, then an Imperialist, painted the portrait of Pius VII., and the
_Moniteur_ in the number of March 30, 1805, thus praised the picture and
the sitter. "A large crowd gathered in the gallery of the Senate, to see
the portrait of His Holiness by M. David, member of the Institute and
first painter to the Emperor. This portrait is in every way worthy of the
master's reputation. If the first essential in a portrait is an exact
likeness, this one possesses it to a very high degree. The head, which is
admirably painted, expresses the indulgent and wise character, the
gentleness and reasonableness, that are so conspicuous in the model; the
eyes an expression, affectionate and paternal; the expression of the mouth
is most striking; one feels that it can utter only words of peace,
consolation, and truth."

Josephine had for Pius VII. a feeling of veneration full of gratitude. She
was most grateful to him for having persuaded Napoleon, to have the
religious marriage for which she had long yearned. She, who had preserved
her faith, in the midst of an irreligious society, was happy to inhabit
the same palace, to live under the same roof, with the Vicar of Christ,
and firmly hoped thereby to secure good fortune for herself and her
husband. For his part, Pius VII. appreciated Josephine's good qualities,
especially her charity: he treated her as an indulgent father treats his
child.

The second son of Louis Bonaparte and Hortense de Beauharnais was baptized
by the Pope himself at Saint Cloud, March 27, 1805. The ceremony was most
impressive. Eight Imperial carriages conveyed thither Pius VII. and his
suite. The gallery of the palace had been turned into a chapel. In one of
the Empress's drawing-rooms had been placed, on a platform, beneath a
canopy, a bed without posts. On the foot of the bed had been spread a
large cloak lined with ermine, to cover the child. In the same room were
two tables on which were placed what were called the child's _honors_;
that is to say, the candle, the chrisom-cap, and the salt-cellar, and the
_honors_ of the godfather and godmother,--the basin, the ewer, and the
napkin. The towel was placed on a square of golden brocade, and all the
other things, except the candle, on a gold tray. Preceded by the Grand
Master of Ceremonies, and followed by a colonel-general of the Guard, by
the Grand Almoner, the Grand Chamberlain, and the Master of the Hounds,
the Emperor, who was godfather, and the godmother, Madame Bonaparte, his
mother, went to the room where the ceremony was to be performed. The child
was uncovered by Madame de Villeneuve, Maid of Honor to Princess Louis
Bonaparte, and by Madame de Boubers, who was serving as governess. The
first one lifted up the baby and handed him to the godfather, who gave him
to Madame de Boubers to carry to the font. The Grand Master of Ceremonies
handed the salt-cellar to Madame de Bouillé, the chrisom-cap to Madame de
Montalivet, the candle to Madame Lannes, the towel to Madame de Sérant,
the ewer to Madame Savary, the basin to Madame de Talhouët. Then, they
went to the gallery, which had been turned into a chapel. Mesdames
Bernadotte, Bessières, Davout, and Mortier held the corners of the
Empress's cloak. The godmother was at the Emperor's left. After the
baptism the child was carried back to his room with the same procession.

That evening _Athalie_ was given, with choruses, at the court theatre. The
company on their way thither passed through the orange house, which was
aglow with colored lanterns.

All day the park of Saint Cloud had been open to the public; the fountains
had been playing; shows of all sorts amused the crowd; the road to Paris
was crowded with carriages and foot-passengers. In the evening there were
fireworks: the palace and gardens were illuminated; there were bands
playing, and rustic balls.

The Pope, who had reached Paris November 28, 1804, left April 4, 1805,
just when the Emperor was starting for Italy, there to be crowned at
Milan. Pius VII. had received some magnificent presents from the Emperor:
a gold altar with chandeliers, and the sacred vessels of rich workmanship,
a superb tiara, some gobelin tapestries, carpets from the Savonnerie, and
a statue of Napoleon in Sèvres ware. The Empress had given him a valuable
vase decorated by the best artists. The _Moniteur_ thus announced the
Pope's departure: "To-day, April 4, at half-past twelve, His Holiness left
Paris with the prelates and others of his suite. A crowd of both sexes and
all ages assembled on the way he was to pass through, and received the
Sovereign Pontiff's blessing; once more he was the object of expressions
of the deepest veneration, and plainly manifested the emotions which these
expressions called forth."

Yet Pius VII. was not wholly satisfied with his journey. He had received
much homage, but he had not secured any real political concessions of any
importance. He had been unable to settle the important matter of the
organic statutes, and nothing had been done about the restoration of the
legation on which he was so warmly set. Besides, he was much annoyed that
he had not himself crowned Napoleon, as the Popes, his predecessors, had
crowned emperors and kings. He, who later was to be a prisoner at
Fontainebleau, went away distressed about the present, anxious for the
future, and wondering whether his host might not say, with Voltaire, "It
is all very well to kiss the Popes' feet, but it is better to have their
hands tied first."




XII.

THE JOURNEY IN ITALY.


The Pope had left Paris to return to Rome April 4, 1805. At almost the
same time the Emperor and Empress had started from Fontainebleau to go to
Milan, where Napoleon was to be crowned King of Italy. The code of
etiquette that prevailed at the Tuileries was observed on journeys. The
house in which the Emperor lodged at any stopping-place was the place
where all who accompanied him were to meet. A great placard on which were
written all the names, and where they were to be quartered, was pasted on
the front door. In the villages where Napoleon spent but one night he
received the local authorities, either before or after dinner. In the
towns where he spent more than one day, after he had eaten his breakfast
and held his receptions, he rode out to visit the fortifications and
monuments. The evenings were generally taken up by the entertainments
offered him.

The Emperor and Empress reached Troyes April 2. A letter dated the 3d was
printed in the _Moniteur_. It said: "Everywhere the presence of the
Emperor has evoked the liveliest applause; the people seem astonished to
see him wearing such a modest uniform, and conspicuous, in the midst of
his court, by the plainness of his dress. The people of this department
exhibit this joy all the more because it is here that was brought up the
man who was destined to raise France to the highest glory and prosperity.
It is at Brienne that the Emperor received his earliest instruction. His
Majesty, being anxious to revisit the places that recall these agreeable
memories, started at two o'clock to-day for Brienne."

On the steps of the castle in this town Napoleon found Madame de Brienne
and Madame de Loménie, who had been the guardians of his childhood. He
treated them with the greatest respect, and took pleasure in recalling
happy and touching memories of the past. He recalled many anecdotes, and
told them in his usual vivid, picturesque way. He accepted their
invitation to dinner, played cards with them, and having found out their
usual time of going to bed, asked to be shown at that hour to the room
which had been prepared for him at his request. At dawn the next morning
he went alone, without escort, to see some of his old walks in the
neighborhood. He remembered a hut where he and his companions used to
lunch, and recognizing the wood in which it was, he rode through the shady
path that led to it.

It belonged to a woman who in old times used to serve nuts, cheese, and
brown bread to the schoolboy of Brienne, the future Emperor. He was
delighted to see her once more, and asked her for the same repast which
had formerly been his delight. At first the poor woman did not recognize
the stranger; but gradually he refreshed her memory by recalling many
incidents of the past. Then she understood that she was in the presence of
the all-powerful Emperor, and flung herself at his feet. Napoleon lifted
her, and left her a purse of gold, promising as he left to provide for her
old age.

The Emperor and Empress arrived at Lyons April 10. A quarter of a league
from the city, on the Boucle road, stood a triumphal arch, on the top of
which, as in the reign of Augustus, was perched an eagle supporting the
conqueror's bust. On the two side doors were two bas-reliefs, one
representing the union of the Empire and Liberty; the other, Wisdom, in
the figure of Minerva distributing crosses of honor to soldiers, artists,
and scholars. On these two bas-reliefs were statues of the Rhone and the
Seine. At the top of the arch was a flattering inscription in verse.

April 12, the Empress held a reception. The _Bulletin of Lyons_ thus
described it: "The assembly was most brilliant. As our sovereign has
exhibited in his audiences profundity, affability, exact and varied
learning, and true greatness, so his august wife has shone with grace,
courtesy, and gentleness. Thus we witness a revival of that old French
urbanity and politeness of manners which have always distinguished our
court, and have made it an example and an object of admiration for all
foreign courts."

The city offered Napoleon and Josephine an entertainment at the Grand
Theatre. The back-scene represented the Emperor, seated, clad in a long
triumphal robe. Two allegoric figures, representing, one, France, the
other, Italy, with their feet resting on clouds, held in their hands a
roll bearing this inscription: _Sublimi feriam sidera vertice_, "I shall
strike the stars with my lofty head"; with the other, they each offered a
crown to Napoleon. Thus did flattery renew the apotheoses of the Caesars
of ancient Rome.

There was sung a cantata entitled _Ossian's Dream_. The young men of the
National Guard of Lyons and the leading ladies of the city waltzed before
the throne. Two young girls held each a basket into which the dancers
threw flowers as they passed by; out of these flowers the girls wove two
crowns which, after the dance, they presented to the Emperor and Empress.

April 29, Napoleon and Josephine were present at a grand performance at
the Grand Theatre in Turin. They stayed at the castle of Stupinizi, just
outside of the city, where they bade farewell to Pius VII., who had
celebrated the Easter festival at Lyons, and was on his way to Rome.

The Emperor and the Empress reached Alessandria May 2, at ten in the
morning, amid the roar of cannon and the ringing of church-bells. Napoleon
spent the day in revisiting the battle-field of Marengo, where he gave the
Empress a mimic representation of the battle he had won five years before.
From a throne he watched the manoeuvres executed under the command of
Murat, Lannes, and Bessières. He had had the coat and hat he wore on the
day of the battle brought from Paris. The coat was somewhat moth-eaten,
and the odd hat would have seemed very much out of date if it had not
recalled such precious memories. But Napoleon liked to recall that
eventful day when he had managed to grasp victory when apparently beaten.
After the manoeuvres he solemnly laid the corner-stone of a monument to
the memory of Desaix and the other brave men who fell at Marengo.

At Alessandria, the next day, he had an interview with his brother Jerome,
which in fact was a reconciliation. In 1808, after the breaking of the
Peace of Amiens, Jerome Bonaparte, who then, a young man of twenty, was in
the naval service, happened to be forced by an English cruiser to land in
the United States. There he had fallen in love with the young and charming
daughter of a rich merchant of Baltimore, Miss Elisabeth Paterson, and he
married her. Napoleon was unwilling to recognize this marriage. No sooner
had he ascended the throne than he at once exhibited all the feeling and
prejudices of a monarch who belonged to a dynasty of the most venerable
antiquity. He really believed that his brothers could marry only
princesses, and that any other marriage was an unpardonable mésalliance.

If, possibly, Napoleon was able to condemn Lucien's wife for her past
conduct, no such criticism could apply to the wife of Jerome, who was a
young woman of conspicuous morality, intelligence, and amiability. But she
was the daughter of a ship-owner, a merchant, and thus was not a proper
match, he thought, for the brother of the powerful monarch who was already
dreaming of restoring the vassal kingdoms and the whole vast imperial
edifice of Charlemagne. He, the Emperor of the French, the King of Italy,
did not like to remember that he had wedded a simple subject, and that he
had been very proud of his marriage. He could not pardon his brother
Jerome for making a love-match. He would not even listen to his defence of
his young wife, soon to be a mother, and who deserved only respect and
pity, and who, humiliated, abandoned, and brokenhearted, was about to be
treated as a concubine, and driven away forever. Ambition had destroyed
Napoleon's natural kindliness. Yet, if he had seen Jerome's wife, a
devoted and interesting woman, warmly attached to her husband, and alive
to her duties, probably he would have taken pity on her. Possibly he was
himself aware of this, for he forbade the unhappy young woman to enter any
part of the Empire, and compelled this innocent victim of political
considerations to take refuge in England, as if she were a criminal.

February 22, 1805, Napoleon had compelled his mother, Madame Letitia, to
place in the hands of a notary, Raguideau, a protest against Jerome's
marriage, on the pretext that he, having been born November 15, 1784, was
not yet twenty at the date of his marriage, and according to the law of
September 20, 1792, a marriage contracted by any one under twenty without
the consent of his father and mother was null and void. The _Moniteur_ of
the 13th Ventôse, Year XIII. (March 4, 1805), had contained the following
lines: "11th Ventôse. By an act dated to-day, all the civil officers of
the Empire are forbidden to receive on their registers a copy of the
certificate of an alleged marriage contracted by M. Jerome Bonaparte in a
foreign country, when under age, and without his mother's consent, and
without previous publication in the place where he is domiciled." A few
days later this appeared in the _Moniteur_: "M. Jerome Bonaparte has
arrived at Lisbon in an American ship; in the passenger list were the
names of Mr. and Miss Paterson, M. Jerome at once took port for Madrid,
Mr. and Miss Paterson have re-embarked. They are supposed to be returning
to America."

Jerome, in obedience to the Emperor's orders, started from Portugal for
Italy, posting day and night at full speed, through Badajoz, Madrid,
Perpignan, and Grenoble, He says in his Memoirs: "Amid the mountains of
Estremadura, his modest carriage encountered the almost royal train of the
French Ambassador to Portugal. It was Junot whom he had left a simple
aide-de-camp of the First Consul, and saw again one of the first
personages of the Empire. Madame Junot, an old friend from childhood of
Jerome, was with her husband. This interview was a most interesting one,
partly from the deserted spot where they met, and partly from the great
events that had occurred since their separation."

Junot and his wife found Jerome much improved. He had become more serious;
a certain gravity had taken the place of his youthful bubbling high
spirits. He spoke with emotion, respect, and affection of his young wife
whose pathetic situation was made even more disturbing by the state of her
health. He proposed to throw himself at his brother's feet, and by prayers
and supplications to wring from him the consent he desired. "No one can
doubt," he says in his Memoirs, "that his heart was torn by the keenest
agitations, to say nothing of the anxiety about his wife; the
mortification at two years of inactivity, during which his comrades,
friends, and relatives had worked, fought, and become great; the regret
for the lofty position he had lost; the hope of regaining it; his fear of
his brother's wrath which he had ventured to arouse, and which made kings
tremble on their thrones."

Napoleon was to be inflexible; he refused to admit that his brothers could
be anything but members of the dynasty, future sovereigns. It was then
that according to Miot de Mélito, he said: "What I have accomplished so
far is nothing. There will be no peace in Europe until it is under a
single head, an Emperor, who shall have his officers for kings and divide
the kingdoms among his lieutenants; who shall make one King of Italy,
another King of Bavaria, one Landemann of Switzerland, another Stadtholder
of Holland, and all with high positions in the Imperial household, with
titles as Grand Cupbearer, Grand Master of the Pantry, Grand Equerry,
Grand Master of the Hounds, etc. It will be said that this plan is only an
imitation of that on which the German Empire is established, and that
these ideas are not new; but nothing is absolutely new; political
institutions only revolve in a circle, and what has happened necessarily
recurs." A man with such aspirations and so near to realizing them, could
not endure the idea of being the brother-in-law of a simple ship-owner.

Jerome arrived at Turin, April 24, 1805. Napoleon was then at Alessandria.
Eleven days passed before the brothers met. The Emperor had announced his
decision. He was absolutely determined not to meet Jerome until he had
made perfect submission. The unhappy youth still ventured to hope against
hope, but soon he had to recognize his mistake. Then his heart and soul
were torn by a hot conflict: on one side were his love for his wife,
family feeling, the thought of the child that was soon to be born, his
respect for marriage and for his vows; on the other, ambition, love of
power, the visions of the kingdoms that he might rule; on one side, the
smiles and tears of the woman he loved; on the other, the influence and
glory of the genius who filled the earth with his fame, and always
exercised a powerful fascination. Jerome, who was less sentimental and
less proud than Lucien, at last yielded to his terrible brother, and
condemned himself out of ambition never to see again the woman whom he
loved and cherished. May 6th he went to Alessandria, having first sent a
letter of submission to the Emperor. Napoleon before receiving him,
replied to it in these terms:--

"Alessandria, May 6, 1805. MY BROTHER: Your letter of this morning informs
me of your arrival at Alessandria. There is no fault which cannot be
effaced in my eyes by repentance. Your marriage with Miss Paterson is null
in the eyes of both religion and law. Write to Miss Paterson to return to
America. I will grant her a pension of sixty thousand francs for life, on
condition that she shall never bear my name, a right which does not belong
to her in the non-existence of the marriage. You must tell her that you
could not and cannot change the nature of things. When your marriage is
thus annulled by your own will, I will restore to you my friendship, and
resume the feelings I have had for you since your infancy, hoping that you
will show yourself worthy of them by the efforts you will make to win my
gratitude and to acquire distinction in the army."

A few days later Napoleon wrote to the Minister of the Navy: "M. Décrès,
M. Jerome has arrived. He has confessed his errors and disavows this
person as his wife. He promises to do wonders. Meanwhile I have sent him
to Genoa for some time."

After his reconciliation with Jerome, Napoleon went to Pavia, where the
magistrates presented to him the homage of his new capital, and he entered
that city, with the Empress, May 8, amid the roar of cannon and the
ringing of bells.




XIII.

THE CORONATION AT MILAN.


By descent, by his physical, moral, and intellectual nature, by his
imagination and genius, Napoleon was much more an Italian than a
Frenchman. His father and mother were Italians, his ancestors were
Italian, and Italian was his mother-tongue. His family and Christian names
were Italian. His mother spoke French with the strongest Italian accent.
He had loved Corsica before he loved France. As a child, he had felt the
greatest enthusiasm for Paoli, the Corsican patriot, and had then looked
upon the French as foreigners and oppressors. His face not only resembled
that of an Italian, but that of an ancient Roman. By a singular
coincidence, he had the head of a Caesar. Italy was not only the home of
his family, it was there that he laid the foundations of his glory. That
unrivalled country, as one of our poets calls it, had brought him good
fortune. There he wrote the famous bulletins of his first victories; there
he began to impress the popular imagination; and it was through Italy that
he subjugated France. There he felt at home. The people of that peninsula
greeted him as a fellow-countryman. He liked to speak their language to
them, charmed by its harmony and sincerity. His Southern genius rejoiced
in its bright skies which lent everything such lustre, and well suited the
conqueror's thoughts. He perhaps preferred Milan to Paris as a place to
live in.

His formal entrance into the capital of his kingdom of Italy had been
skilfully arranged. Cardinal Caprara, the Archbishop of that city, had
great influence there, and he was never tired of speaking to his flock
about the services Napoleon had rendered to the Catholic religion. The
Grand Master of Ceremonies, M. de Ségur, who reached Milan a few days
before the Emperor, charmed the best society of Lombardy by his pleasant
wit and delightful manners, and induced the most illustrious families to
solicit the honor of figuring among the ladies and officers in waiting at
the palace of the King and Queen of Italy, as Napoleon and Josephine were
called at Milan.

The first visit which the King and Queen made in this capital was to the
famous Cathedral. There they fell on their knees, and the Milanese were
much touched by the spectacle. The _Italian Journal_, in its official
account of Napoleon's entrance into Milan, uttered these dithyrambics: "It
is impossible to imagine a more brilliant day than that which yesterday
adorned our capital, when Bonaparte, the hero of the age, our adored
monarch, entered within our walls. This day will be forever memorable in
the chronicles of our history. Milan saw entering its gates, bearing the
proud name of King, the same hero who had already been proclaimed
conqueror, liberator, peace-maker, and legislator, and who to-day, under
his august Empire, assures that greatness to which his victories and his
genius permit us to aspire. The Emperor entered by the gate named after
his most glorious triumph, the Marengo Gate."

On reaching Milan, Napoleon exchanged the decorations of the Legion of
Honor for the oldest orders of chivalry in Europe. He received from the
Minister of Prussia the Black and the Red Eagle; from the Spanish
Ambassador, the Golden Fleece; from the Ministers of Bavaria and Portugal,
the Orders of Saint Hubert and Christ respectively; and he gave them the
broad ribbon of the Legion of Honor. When he had received besides foreign
decorations for the principal men of the Empire, he granted an equal
number of his own. May 12, wearing the broad ribbon of the Black Eagle, he
went with the Empress to the theatre of La Scala and saw the opera of
_Castor and Pollux_. The theatre, which was brilliantly lit, was crowded
with the fair ladies of Milan, resplendent in full dress and jewels. The
elegance and splendor of these deservedly famous beauties, the brilliant
diversity of the uniforms, the sumptuousness of the Imperial box, and on
the stage the magnificence of the dresses and the scenery, the skill of
the singers, all combined to make the performance most memorable. That
day, after mass, Napoleon had ridden out, and had inspected the troops who
paraded on the Place of the Cathedral.

The Empress's grace and affability aroused general admiration. At the
reception of the upper clergy of Italy, May 25, she was thus complimented
by the Archbishop of Bergamo: "Madame, If charity were to descend from
heaven to relieve the woes of humanity, it would seek no other asylum than
the heart of a Queen, adored by her subjects. The feelings of love,
gratitude, and respect which animate all your subjects are the same that
lead to your feet all the bishops of the kingdom of Italy. Happy to find
in your august spouse sublimity, glory, and genius, and in you all the
charm of kindness, nothing is left for them but to pray for the happiness
of your reign, and to offer thanks to heaven for having united in the
souls of their sovereigns everything which can make supreme power loved
and respected." This speech will suffice to show to what pitch the
official flatteries were tuned.

The coronation took place May 26, in the Milan. Cathedral, which is the
largest church in Italy, with the single exception of Saint Peter's in
Rome. The weather was magnificent. From early morning a numberless throng
crowded the Place of the Cathedral, the court-yards of the palace, and the
adjacent streets. Just as in Paris at the coronation, a wooden gallery had
been built, connecting the Archbishop's Palace with Notre Dame, so here at
Milan, a similar gallery led from the palace to the Cathedral. The
interior of the church was decorated with crimson silk stuffs. As at Notre
Dame, a large throne had been built at the entrance to the nave,
approached by twenty-five steps. Four gilded statues, representing
victories, upheld like caryatides the canopy above the throne. The four
figures held in one hand palms; in the other, the green velvet mantle
falling from the royal crown above the canopy. The Cathedral was
brilliantly lit by forty chandeliers hanging from the roof, and as many
candelabra fastened on the columns.

Josephine, who had been crowned as Empress in Paris, was not to be crowned
at Milan, although she bore the title of Queen of Italy. She watched the
ceremony from a gallery. At half-past eleven she went to the Cathedral,
preceded by her sister-in-law, the Princess Bacciocchi, and was conducted
beneath a canopy to her gallery, amid loud applause. At noon the Emperor
and King left his palace, and reached the Cathedral through the wooden
gallery. On his arrival there incense was burned, and he was welcomed by
an address from Cardinal Caprara, Archbishop of Milan, at the head of all
his clergy. Preceded by the ushers, the heralds-at-arms, the pages, the
Grand Master and the masters of ceremonies, by the seven ladies carrying
offerings, and by the honors of Charlemagne, of the Empire, and of Italy,
he appeared in most impressive pomp. On his head he wore the crown; he
carried in his hands the sceptre, and the hand of justice of the kingdom;
on his back he wore the royal cloak, the skirts of which were carried by
the two First Equerries of France and Italy. As he entered the Cathedral a
march of triumph was played. He took his seat on the small throne in the
choir, having on his right the honors of Italy, on his left, those of
France. The Archbishop of Bologna, who held a place at the coronation of
the King very like that of the Pope at the crowning of the Emperor,
carried to the altar the iron crown of the old Lombard kings, and began
the mass. After the gradual, he blessed the royal ornaments in the
following order: the sword, the cloak, the ring, the crown. Napoleon
received from the Archbishop's hands the sword, the cloak, and the ring,
but he took himself the iron crown from the altar, and proudly placing it
on his head, exclaimed, in a voice that thrilled all present: "_Dio me la
diede, guai a chi la tocca!_"--"God has given it to me; woe to him who
touches it!" Then, having replaced the iron crown on the altar, he took
the crown of Italy and placed it on his head, amid unanimous applause.
Preceded by the same officials who had conducted him to the chair, he
walked down the nave and took his place on the great throne at the other
end by the entrance. The first herald-at-arms shouted, "Napoleon, Emperor
of the French and King of Italy, is crowned and enthroned. Long live the
Emperor and King."

The same day, at half-past four in the afternoon, the King and the Queen
drove in a state carriage, with a brilliant escort, to the church of Saint
Ambrose, one of the most revered sanctuaries of Italy, and there they
heard a _Te Deum_ of thanksgiving.

Mademoiselle Avrillon, Josephine's reader, tells us that Napoleon, when he
had returned to the palace, was full of the wildest gaiety. He rubbed his
hands, and in his good humor said to the reader: "Well! Did you see the
ceremony? Did you hear what I said when I placed the crown on my head?"
Then he repeated, almost in the same tone that he had used in the
Cathedral: "God has given it to me! Woe to him that touches it!" "I told
him," says Mademoiselle Avrillon, "that nothing that had happened had
escaped me. He was very kind to me, and I often noticed that when there
was nothing to annoy the Emperor, he talked cheerfully and freely with us,
as if we were his equals; but whenever he spoke to us he used to ask
questions, and in order to avoid displeasing him, it was necessary to
answer him without showing too much embarrassment. Sometimes he gave us a
pat on the cheek, or pinched our ears; these were favors not accorded
every one, and we could judge of his good humor by the way they hurt
us.... Often he treated the Empress in the same way, with little pats
preferably on the shoulders; it was no use her saying: 'Come, stop,
Bonaparte!' he went on as long as he pleased."

The Emperor greatly enjoyed his stay in Milan, and breathed with rapture
the incense burned in abundance before him. The _Italian Journal_ in its
account of the coronation reached lyric heights:

"The most brilliant day has lit up Milan; it has had no equal in the past,
and it offers the happiest auguries for the future.... Old men themselves,
accustomed as they are to praise the past, have exhibited the liveliest
enthusiasm. It was in vain that night struggled to draw its veil over our
city, it had to yield before the general and magnificent illumination
which brought out in lines of fire the shape and admirable form of the
Duomo. Most of the palaces and private houses were covered with devices
and inscriptions. The first one of the days consecrated to the liveliest
national rejoicing was ended by a vast exhibition of fireworks, which were
set off on the spot where so many have perished at the stake."

The next day games were celebrated, in the manner of the ancients, in a
circus rivalling the Roman amphitheatres in size. This was the occasion of
a dithyrambic outburst inserted in the _Moniteur_: "The Italians have just
offered Napoleon the same spectacle that their ancestors offered Marcus
Aurelius and Trajan; but the presence of Napoleon has called forth more
joy and admiration, because it has aroused greater admiration and higher
hopes. They were but the preservers of Italian greatness; he is its
creator and its father. In the pomp of the games, amid the tumultuous
applause, the immense mass of people were to be seen turning their eyes
towards him alone, as if they were saying to him: 'These festivities are
but feeble expressions of the gratitude that all Italy vows to you for all
the good you have done her; and since you deign to accept it, since you
like to sit among us as our Prince and our father, these festivities
become an augury to us of still greater benefit. The day will perhaps come
when Italy, restored to this new life, may be able to adorn its circus
with the monuments of its own bravery which will also be the monuments of
your glory; and Italy, being never doomed to perish, whatever great deeds
may be wrought by Italians in the course of centuries will be due to the
hero who has recalled them to life.'" After the races there was a balloon
ascension. The courageous wife of the aeronaut Garnerin accompanied him
and threw down flowers to Napoleon and Josephine. "Thus," the _Moniteur_
goes on, "in a single day, at one show, the Italians have combined the
proudest pomp of the ancients and the boldest invention of modern science,
together with the presence of a hero who excels both ancients and
moderns."

The 29th of May was devoted to popular festivities. All the afternoon the
public gardens were crowded with musicians, singers, mountebanks, and
pedlars. In the evening the via della Riconoscenza, as far as the East
Gate, was lit by lampstands, and at the end of a long row there was an
eagle of fire holding on his breast an iron crown.

Nothing was neglected to touch the national pride of Italy. An article in
the _Mo

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