At eleven o’clock, after the Emperor had retired to bed, he sent for me, and resumed his conversation on the ancient and modern drama; on which he made many curious remarks. In the first place, he expressed his surprise that the Romans should have had no tragedies; but then again he observed that tragedy, in dramatic representation, would have been ill calculated to rouse the feelings of the Romans, since they performed real tragedy in their circuses. “The combats of the gladiators,” said he, “the sight of men consigned to the fury of wild beasts, were far more terrible than all our dramatic horrors put together. These, in fact, were the only tragedies suited to the iron nerves of the Romans.”
However, it was observed that the Romans possessed some dramatic essays, produced by Seneca. By the by, it is a curious fact, that in Seneca’s Medea, the chorus distinctly predicts the discovery of America, which took place fourteen hundred years after that drama was written. In the passage here alluded to, it is said, “A new Tiphys, a son of the earth, will, in ages to come, discover remote regions towards the west, and Thule will no longer be the extremity of the universe.”[[5]]
THE EMPEROR CONSIDERABLY BETTER.—INFERNAL MACHINE
STORY.—MADAME R—-- DE ST. J—-- D’A—-- —THE TWO EMPRESSES.—JOSEPHINE’S EXTRAVAGANCE.—CHARACTERISTIC ANECDOTES OF THE EMPEROR.
9th.—To-day the Emperor felt himself infinitely better. He was surrounded by all his suite, and he began to talk of the prodigies of his early career, which, he said, must have produced a great impression in the world. “So great an impression,” said an individual present, “that some were induced to regard them as supernatural.” On this subject, the following anecdote was related: At the time of the explosion of the infernal machine, a person, who had just heard the news, called at a house in a certain quarter of the capital, and, hastily entering the drawing-room, in which a party was assembled, he informed the company that Napoleon was no more; and after giving an account of the event that had just taken place, he concluded by saying: “He is fairly blown up.” “He blown up!” exclaimed an old Austrian officer, who had eagerly listened to all that was said, and who had been a witness to many of the dangers which the young General of the army of Italy had so miraculously escaped; “he blown up! Ah! you know nothing about him. I venture to say that he is, at this very moment, as well as any of us. I know him and all his tricks of old!”
The name of Madame R—-- de St. J—-- d’A—-- having been mentioned, and some one having remarked to the Emperor how much attachment she had evinced for him during his stay at the Isle of Elba. “How! she?” exclaimed the Emperor, with mingled surprise and satisfaction.—“Yes, Sire.”—“Poor lady!” said he, in a tone of deep regret; “and yet how ill I treated her! Well! this at least repays me for the ingratitude of those renegades, on whom I lavished so many favours....” Then, after a few moments’[moments’] silence, he said, significantly, “It is very certain that one can never know people’s characters and sentiments until after great trials.“
At dinner, the Emperor was very good humoured and cheerful. He congratulated himself on having got through his late illness, without having recourse to medicine, without paying tribute to the Doctor. At this, he said, the latter had been very much vexed. He would have been content with ever so little, with the slightest acknowledgment; he only asked for compliance with the form, like a priest in confession. The Emperor laughed, and added, that, out of mere complaisance, he had made trial of a gargle, but that its strong acidity had disagreed with him. This led him to observe that mild medicines were best suited to his constitution. “Gentle remedies, whether physical or moral,” said he, “are the only ones that take effect on me.”
In the course of conversation, the Emperor spoke of the Empresses Josephine and Maria Louisa, of whom he related some very interesting details, and concluded with his usual observation, that the one was the model of the graces, with all their fascinations; and the other the emblem of innocence, with all its charms.
The Emperor mentioned that Malmaison had cost about three or four hundred thousand francs: that is to say, all that he was at that time possessed of. He then calculated the amount of the sums which the Empress Josephine must have received from him: and added that, with a little order and regularity, she might, probably, have left behind her fifty or sixty million francs. “Her extravagance,” said the Emperor, “vexed me beyond measure. Calculator as I am, I would, of course, rather have given away a million of francs than have seen a hundred thousand squandered away.” He informed us that, having one day unexpectedly broken in upon Josephine’s morning circle, he found a celebrated milliner, whom he had expressly forbidden to go near the Empress, as she was ruining her by extravagant demands. “My unlooked for entrance occasioned great dismay in the academic sitting. I gave some orders unperceived, and on the lady’s departure, she was seized and carried to Bicètre. A great outcry was raised among the higher circles in Paris; it was said that my conduct was disgraceful. It soon became the fashion to visit the milliner in her confinement, and there was daily a file of carriages at the gate of the prison. The police informed me of these facts. All the better, said I; but I hope she is not treated with severity; not confined in a dungeon?—‘No, Sire, she has a suite of apartments, and a drawing room.’ Oh, well! let her be. If this measure is pronounced to be tyrannical, so much the better; it will be a diapason stroke for a great many others. Very little will serve to shew that I can do more.” He also mentioned a celebrated man-milliner, who, he remarked, was the most insolent fellow he had ever met with in the whole course of his life. “I was one day,” said the Emperor, “speaking to him respecting a trousseau that he had furnished, when he had the presumption to call my conduct in question. He did what no man in France, except himself, would have ventured to do; he began, with great volubility, to prove to me that I did not grant a sufficient allowance to the Empress Josephine; and that it was impossible she could pay for her clothes out of such a sum. I soon put an end to his impertinent eloquence; I cut him short with a look, and left him transfixed.”
When the Emperor had retired to his chamber, he sent for me, and after he had gone to bed, he continued to converse very cheerfully, on various subjects. He said he found himself much better, and that he felt a pleasure in chatting. However, he was very much troubled with cough, and this had forced him to rise from table earlier than he otherwise would have done. “I unthinkingly took too much snuff,” said he, “my attention having been absorbed in the conversation of the moment. In such a case you should always take away my snuff-box: that is the way to serve those one loves.”