But unpleasant incidents during her stay in the Russian capital seem to have been few. She visited several institutions, was received everywhere with politeness and cordiality, and revelled again, as she had done in Vienna, in listening to the free expression of sentiments that agreed with her own. Events, however, were progressing rapidly, and, in spite of the engagement never to sign a peace entered into by the Czar with Bernadotte at Abo, the battle of Borodino and the taking of Moscow filled most people with dismay. Madame de Staël, always easily alarmed, thought that the moment had arrived when she could no longer remain in Russia with safety, and she set her face towards Sweden, en route for England; thus quitting St. Petersburg a few days too soon to receive in all its force the electric shock of learning that Moscow was fired. At Abo, where she was to embark for Stockholm, she met Bernadotte, now Prince Royal of Sweden, whom she had formerly known in Paris as an habitué of her own and Madame Récamier’s salon. Of course he admired the lovely Juliette, and hastened to inquire after her with an interest which Madame de Staël straightway conveyed in a letter to her friend—a letter worded, however, with a caution that reveals the inconceivable difficulty even of private correspondence in those stormy days.
At Stockholm she was welcomed, according to her son, with “perfect kindness”; and as she was notoriously enthusiastic about Bernadotte, whom she unhesitatingly pronounced to be “the hero of the age,” it is probable that he honored her with a great deal of his confidence. Galiffe (author of D’un siècle à l’autre), who had access to her correspondence from Sweden with J. A. Galiffe in St. Petersburg, was of opinion that her influence had a large share in determining Bernadotte to declare himself against Bonaparte.
She dedicated her Réflexions sur le Suicide to the Prince in a very complimentary preface, in which she compared herself and her children as seeking his protection in the same way as Arabian Shepherds take shelter from a storm “under a laurel”; and went on to assure him that his public life had been signalized by all the virtues which claim the admiration of thinkers, and she encouraged him to persevere and remind the world of that which it had entirely forgotten, namely, that the highest reason teaches virtue. In contrast to all this praise, it is piquant to learn that Bernadotte—like so many other practically-minded people—had his little grumble at his illustrious guest, and talked of the “inconceivable preoccupation with self,” which by this time had led Madame de Staël to see in every political move of Napoleon the beginning of some new measure against herself.
Her oft-professed anxiety about her sons’ future was allayed by the Prince Royal’s offer to interest himself in Auguste’s diplomatic career, while Albert was to enter the Swedish army.
One might wonder why this obvious solution of her difficulties had not presented itself sooner to Madame de Staël, were it not evident that she had consciously or unconsciously made the most of every circumstance which could heighten the apparent hardship of her lot.
CHAPTER XIII.
ENGLAND AGAIN.
After quitting Sweden Madame de Staël went to England. Some eighteen years or so had passed since she had wept in the lanes at Mickleham at the thought of separating from the charming colony at Juniper Hall. Her heart was still almost as young as in those days; the vivid flame of enthusiasm for all that was good still burnt as brightly in her soul. If her spiritual horizon had widened, and a fervent if rather vague religious sentiment had succeeded to her unquestioning faith in men—that was almost all the change in her. For her nature was a singularly homogeneous one, and growth, while widening and deepening it, did not render it more complex.