After an imprisonment of about seven months, Napoleon was at last free to return to his wife and son at the little home in Chiselhurst, where the imperial family continued to live in the simplest manner; for although Camden House did not lack comfort and even elegance, it was so limited as to space that it was impossible to accommodate more than one or two guests at a time. Yet the joys of family life compensated in a measure for all the luxury and state of which they had been deprived by fortune, and in this smaller sphere Eugénie lost none of the dignity and charm of manner for which she had been so conspicuous. It was the more easy for her to adapt herself to these new conditions as gradually a circle of their old friends began to gather about the exiles, and expressions of loyalty and devotion arrived nearly every day from France, with many proofs of friendship from Queen Victoria and other royalties.
A great task still lay before her—to provide for the future of her son. She had always been a wise as well as devoted mother, and had not failed to impress on the young Prince that more would be required of him than of others, in order properly to fit himself for the high position he would one day be called upon to occupy. Now that the throne must be won back again, it was doubly important that he should receive a thorough military education. This son was now her only thought. She centred in him all her hopes and expectations, for the Emperor’s health—which had been poor for years—was now rapidly failing. She could never count on Napoleon the Third’s return to the throne; but as the mother of Napoleon the Fourth she saw herself in fancy once again in France, more highly honored, even prouder and happier if possible, than before.
The chronic ailment from which the Emperor had always suffered threatened, toward the close of 1872, to take a fatal turn and his physicians advised an operation. Personally, Napoleon was strongly opposed to it; but the Empress, not realizing the danger, and perhaps with the secret hope that it might enable her husband to become once more a power in French politics, urged him to yield to the physician’s advice. He submitted accordingly to the operation, but had not strength enough to recover from the shock; and on the ninth of January, 1873, the “dreamer” passed quietly away without a word or a sign.
Chapter XIV
Death of Prince Imperial
Eugénie’s grief at her husband’s death was deep and sincere. Over his bier she wept far bitterer tears than those she had shed during those dreadful days following her flight from the capital. Indeed she was so prostrated as to be unable to appear at the funeral. Human nature is elastic, however, and it was never the Empress’s way to fold her hands and brood over her troubles. She found one source of consolation, moreover, in the constant proofs of attachment that reached her, not only from the friends that had remained faithful to her through all the changes of fortune, but also from many others who had long seemed to have forgotten their vows of allegiance.
As death had removed all possibility of the restoration of Napoleon the Third to the throne, his old adherents rallied to the support of his son; and as there was still a large Bonapartist party in France, it seemed not improbable that with the exercise of courage and patience the Empire might one day be revived. In 1873, by uniting with the Legitimists and Orleanists, they succeeded in deposing Thiers, who had been President of the Republic since 1871, and electing Marshal MacMahon in his place, a change greatly to the advantage of the Bonapartists, who now entered the political arena once more as a regular party.
In the Autumn of 1872 the Prince Imperial entered the military academy at Woolwich, where he studied hard and made gratifying progress; and on the death of his father he was generally recognized as heir to the imperial throne, in spite of all the efforts made by his cousin Napoleon to prevent it. Eugénie now lived only in this son and his future; no stone was left unturned to smooth his pathway to the throne. As yet he had a hard struggle before him; but her faith in his ultimate victory was supreme; and supported by ex-Minister Rouher, the leader of the Bonapartists, then as ever one of Eugénie’s stanchest friends, she carefully but firmly gathered up the threads by which she hoped to guide the course of events.
On the seventh of February, 1875, the Prince passed the required examinations and left Woolwich with an officer’s commission. He had developed greatly in every respect, to his mother’s joy and the pride of his party, whose hopes were now fixed on him. His amiability and charm of manner won him friends wherever he went. Unlike his father, he objected strongly to any radical measures or political agitation of any sort, and hoped to recover what he considered his rightful crown by the natural allegiance of France. Besides her political ambitions for her son, Eugénie was anxious also to arrange a suitable marriage for him; but in this she was disappointed. The wooing of Napoleon the Fourth met with the same fate as that of his father. There were repeated rumors of a betrothal between him and Queen Victoria’s youngest daughter, Beatrice, who is said to have cherished a warmer feeling than friendship for the exiled Prince; but, deep as was the sympathy felt for him by the English royal house, and true a friend as Victoria had proved herself, to entrust her daughter’s fate to young Napoleon seemed to her a trifle too uncertain. When this plan failed, Eugénie fixed her hopes on the Princess Thyra of Denmark; and in 1878 the Prince made a visit to that country to try his fortune with the Danish court; but here, too, he was rejected as a suitor.
The Bonapartists now felt that to have any serious hope of gaining the French crown the Prince must first win his laurels as a soldier; they urged him, therefore, to join the English army, which was about to go to war with the Kaffirs of Zulu. Much as she desired to see her son seated on the throne, Eugénie shrank from this method of achieving it; but the Prince fell in at once with the suggestion, and unmoved by his mother’s attempts to dissuade him, sailed for Africa with the English troops, leaving a message of farewell to his followers.
On the ninth of April, 1879, he arrived at the headquarters of the commander-in-chief, Lord Chelmsford, and took part in several actions with great spirit and courage. In May, while he was on a reconnoitring expedition in the neighborhood of Itelezi with a fellow officer and several men, the party was suddenly surprised by a band of Zulus who sprang out from behind an ambuscade. Abandoned by his companions, who fled to save themselves, the Prince held out bravely as long as he could, but at length one of the savages dealt him a fatal blow, and he fell, his body pierced with seventeen spears. The Military Gazette, in which the young Prince received honorable mention, says: