One morning, a few days after the last-described event, I called upon Prince Eugène de Beauharnais. Our acquaintance dated from my youth, and whenever circumstances brought us together either in Paris, Milan, or Vienna, I, like all his other friends, had ever found him kind, helpful and sympathetic. The bonds of sympathy so quickly contracted in youth had never been severed by the difference in rank. It had not been his fault that his rule in Italy had been fruitless to me as far as a brilliant administrative career went. And these proofs of his affection had made me deeply grateful to him.
On the occasion of my visit he was slightly ill, and it did not take me long to discover that the cause of his indisposition was mental rather than physical. It was not surprising, considering the misfortunes that had accumulated around him. There were the disasters of France, the fall of Napoleon, the loss of a brilliant position, and, to fill his cup of grief, the death of his mother, whom he worshipped.
His position at Vienna was constrained and more or less false. His reception there had been the subject of diplomatic discussions; but for the persistence of his father-in-law, the King of Bavaria, and the affection of Emperor Alexander, he would probably have been excluded. In spite of this, the fact of his being the adopted son of Napoleon could not be forgotten. It was, moreover, well known that his noble character would never belie itself, and that he would bring all his influence to bear in favour of the man who had been his benefactor. Between the Powers celebrating France’s reverses with fêtes and the representatives of the government of the Bourbons, he seemed isolated amidst that crowd and in that whirlpool of pleasure.
He welcomed me in his cordial and amicable way. Glad to find somebody with whom he could talk about his recollections, he referred to his past, which was so brilliant and glorious. His attitude and the expression of his face were stamped with a melancholy that could not fail to win one’s heart. We went over the various phases of his military career, when all at once he became most animated. Yielding to a strong emotion, he carried me with him to Egypt, and began to describe the loss of his first friend, killed by his side by a cannon ball at the battle of the Pyramids. At the last words of that mournful story I noticed his eyes filling with tears, which he vainly endeavoured to repress. In order to divert his thoughts to brighter subjects, I spoke to him of our first meeting at a luncheon given by Mme. Récamier during the short-lived Peace of Amiens, a luncheon graced by the presence of all the celebrities of France and England. As a matter of course, our conversation drifted to all the gay doings of Vienna during the last few weeks, and also of those to come. I soon noticed, though, that all those functions, so intoxicating to the majority of both actors and spectators, constantly reminded him of the sad cause nearest to his heart. I was not sorry, then, when we were interrupted by the servant announcing the Emperor of Russia, who, according to his custom, came to take him, without any ceremony, for a walk in the Prater. I took my leave of him, after he had made me promise to come and see him often. I need not say that I gladly acceded to his request, and that the duty really became a pleasure.
On leaving him, I went to pay my daily visit to the Prince de Ligne. I delighted in giving him an account of my previous day’s doings. Although at that happy period my occupations mainly consisted of a life spent away from my own quarters and in consorting with my young friends in the pursuit of pleasure, it was like a lullaby to me to go to him to gather from his lips some of his witty and subtle sallies, and to study in a familiar way a small section of that living panorama.
The little house was as full as it could hold, and the amiable host was, as usual, dispensing large doses of wit and wisdom to his visitors. His never-failing spirits and the brightness of his recollections reminded his listeners that though the body might be tottering, he prevented it from collapsing. No one conveyed a more accurate idea of the sparkle and the almost indefinable grace of the French intellectual qualities of former days. Hearing the Prince de Ligne talk, I always fancied I was going back a century in the history of French society.
The prince’s visitors were repeating to him some of the rumours with which the amateur politicians of the Graben kept public curiosity alive. After having distributed crowns and allotted states, the quidnuncs and newsmongers had taken it into their heads to try their hand at match-making. According to them, the King of Prussia was reported one day to be betrothed to the Grand-Duchess of Oldenburg, the next to one of the Austrian arch-duchesses.
‘Those gentlemen strangely put our credulity to the test,’ remarked the Comte de Witt. ‘Nothing less will satisfy them than the divorce of Marie-Louise, so that she may be joined in matrimony to his Majesty of Prussia.’
‘Mirabeau was in the habit of saying that there is no piece of idiocy, however crude, that may not find acceptance on the part of a clever man, provided one gets his valet to repeat it to him every day for a month,’ laughed the prince. ‘I am afraid, though, that the Viennese journalists credit us with a somewhat too robust faith. I am not at all certain how “Robinson” on his island of Elba would appreciate the joke?’
The conversation drifted to the theatrical performances the Empress of Austria was offering at the Imperial Palace.