Indeed, the events which set France agog after the débuts of Georges and of Duchesnois as tragedy princesses, was the début of Napoleon as emperor.
This last début was certainly not free from intrigues: kings mocked; but the great actor who provided the world with the spectacle of his usurpation silenced them at Austerlitz, and from that time until the retreat from Russia it must be acknowledged that he carried his audience with him.
Meanwhile, the literature of the Empire held on in its own course.
In 1803, Hoffmann's Roman d'une heure was played. In 1804, Shakespeare amoureux by Alexandre Duval, Molière avec ses amis by Andrieux, and the Jeune Femme colère of Étienne were played. In 1805, the Tyran domestique and the Menuisier de Livonie of Alexandre Duval were played; Charon's Tartufe de mœurs, Bouilly's Madame de Sévigné and the Filles à marier of Picard; and in 1806 appeared Picard's Marionnettes, Alexandre Duval's Jeunesse de Henri V. Omasis or Joseph en Égypte by Baour-Lormian and the Templiers by Raynouard.
The two greatest successes of this last period were the Templiers and the Jeunesse de Henri V. The Jeunesse de Henri V. was borrowed from an extremely light comedy. This comedy, which was printed and published but not played, was called Charles II, dans un certain lieu. One phrase only of Mercier disturbed Alexandre Duval. Mercier had quarrelled with the Comédie-Française, and it had sworn, in its offended dignity, that never should a play by Mercier be acted in the theatre of the rue de Richelieu.
On the night of the representation of the Jeunesse de Henri V., Alexandre Duval strutted up and down the lounge. Mercier came up to him and, touching him on the shoulder, said, "And so, Duval, the Comédie-Français declared they would never play anything more of mine, the idiots!"
Alexandre Duval scratched his ear, went home, had the jaundice and wrote nothing for two years.
But the real success of the year, the literary success, was the Templiers. This tragedy was indeed the most remarkable dramatic work of the whole period of the Empire; it had, besides, an enormous success, produced piles of money, and, I believe, carried its author at one bound into the Academy.
The part of the queen was the second rôle Mademoiselle Georges had created since her first appearance at the Français four years before. At that time tragic creations were, as will have been observed, rare. Her first rôle had been as Calypso in the tragedy of Télémaque. Who ever, the reader will ask, could make a tragedy out of Télémaque?
A certain M. Lebrun. But, upon my word, I am like Napoleon and in danger of deluding myself. Was it Lebrun-Pindare? Was it Lebrun the ex-Consul? Was it Lebrun the future Academician, peer of France, director of the imperial printing-house? I really do not know. But I do know that the crime was perpetrated. Peace be to the culprit, and whether dead or alive, may he sleep a sleep as calm and as profound as his tragedy, wherein Mademoiselle Duchesnois played the rôle of Télémaque to Georges' Calypso, and which, in spite of the combined talent of these two great actresses, failed as completely as did the Cid d'Andalousie, twenty years later, in spite of the combined efforts of Talma and of Mademoiselle Mars.