At midnight I took my leave, without much hope of seeing her again. But that particular day will for ever be stamped on my memory. It is a pleasure to pay one’s homage of respect to fallen grandeur, when, as in Hortense’s case, natural and amiable genius is added to the fascination of a kindly nature.
Meanwhile the sleighing-fête was over, and a blast of trumpets gave the signal for the return to Vienna. Wrapt in their cloaks, the illustrious guests proceeded towards the court of the palace. Ranged in two lines, their sleighs were waiting for them. Everybody resumed the position of the morning. A martial strain gave the signal for the start, and the vehicles disappeared at a gallop, leaving on the horizon a trail of light across the snow and the hoar frost of the trees.
While the palace of Schönbrunn was the scene of these intoxicating pleasures, how were those occupied to whom it represented only a prison? Avoiding all contact with the joyous guests of the Congress, Marie-Louise and her son preferred to get away from a pleasure party which could only awaken sad recollections. Early in the morning, they departed in sleighs to the smiling valley of St. Helena, near Schönbrunn, where they passed the day—the empress offering dinner to her small Court—and returned to Schönbrunn in the evening. A strange coincidence of names between the valley of St. Helena where Marie-Louise went to hide her grief, and that famous island, also called St. Helena, where her husband, a few months later, buried both his glory and his disasters.
The next morning the Emperor of Austria made a present to Alexander of the gilded sleigh in which the latter had ridden. To show his appreciation of the gift, the czar had it carefully packed and sent to St. Petersburg. The expenses of that sleighing-party and the fête following it were estimated at three hundred thousand florins. Many years have passed since that joyous period of the Congress of Vienna. Many of those whom I saw so gaily carried away by the tinkling-belled coursers have been pitilessly carried away since then by relentless death. How many perished before their time! Emperor Alexander, whose courtesy and youthful spirit were the life of all those parties; the Emperor of Austria; the Kings of Prussia and Bavaria; Prince Eugène, so kind and cordial—all are lying in their graves. The Empress of Austria, so graceful, and such a beneficent friend to art; the charming Elizabeth of Russia; her sister-in-law, the Grande Duchesse d’Oldenbourg; the Comtesse Julie Zichy; Madame de Fuchs—all were taken away as prematurely as unexpectedly. How many other women in the zenith of their beauty, whose grace enhanced those gatherings, followed them when their life was scarcely more than half run! And among the political or military notabilities, de Wrède, Schwartzenberg, Talleyrand, Castlereagh, Dalberg, Capo d’Istria, besides the friends so dear to my affection, such as Koslowski, Ypsilanti, de Witt! In truth, the almost imperceptible track of the sleigh gliding on the polished snow was the image of our rapid passage, or rather of our short-lived apparition, on this earth.
CHAPTER XVI
Reception at Madame de Fuchs’s—Prince Philippe d’Hesse-Hombourg—The Journalists and Newsmongers of Vienna—The French Village in Germany—Prince Eugène—Recollection of the Consulate—Tribulations of M. Denville—Mme. Récamier—The Return of the Émigré—Childhood’s Friend, or the Magic of a Name—Ball at Lord Stewart’s—Alexander proclaimed King of Poland—The Prince Czartoryski—Confidence of the Poles—Count Arthur Potocki—The Revolutions of Poland—Slavery—Vandar—Ivan, or the Polish Serf.
At one of the soirées at the Comtesse de Fuchs’s, the whole of the coterie had gathered round her—for she also had her coterie. In default of diplomatic treaties, her grace and friendship constituted its bond. The conversation had turned on some news which, it was said, had leaked out from the high deliberations of the Congress.
They were asking Prince Philippe d’Hesse-Hombourg if the fate of his family’s Landgravate had been fixed, either by the decisions on the Graben or by those of the more serious Congress.