France in the Nineteenth Century

by Elizabeth Wormeley Latimer

In the midst of the crowd that composed this court the emperor and the empress shine out as the best. Both wanted to do their duty, as they understood it, to France. Whether it was the emperor's fault or his misfortune, is still undecided; but, with one or two exceptions, he was able to attach to himself only keen-witted adventurers and mediocre men. Among the women, not one who was really superior rose above the crowd. The empress led a giddy circle of married women, as in her youth, according to Washington Irving, she had led a giddy circle of young girls.

The two most able men among the emperor's advisers were his own kinsmen,—Count Walewski, who died in 1868, and the Duc de Morny, a man calm, polished, socially amiable, and so clever that Guizot once said to him: "My dear Morny, you are the only man who could overturn the Empire; but you will never be foolish enough to do it." By his death, in 1865, Louis Napoleon was bereft of his ablest adviser.

Persigny, or Fialin, had been the close personal friend of the emperor in his exile, and took a prominent part in the abortive expedition to Boulogne. In his youth he had led a disreputable life, and was not a man of great intellect, but he was presumed to be devoted to his old comrade. His friendship, however, had not always a happy effect upon the fortunes of his master. In 1872 he made a miserable end of his adventurous life, after having turned against the emperor in his adversity.

Fleury was another personal friend of Louis Napoleon, and was probably his best. The prince president had distinguished him when he was only a subaltern in the army. He had enlisted in the ranks, and had done good service in Algeria. In the emperor's last days of failing health he loved to keep Fleury beside him; but the empress was jealous of her husband's friend, and used her influence to have him honorably exiled to St. Petersburg as French ambassador. This post he occupied when the Franco-Prussian war broke out, so that he could be of little help to his master.

Saint-Arnaud had been made a marshal and minister of war, in spite of having been twice turned out of the French army.

M. Rouher had charge of the emperor's financial concerns, and Fould was a man who understood bureau-work, and how to manipulate government machinery.

Whoever might be the emperor's ministers, this little clique of his personal adherents—De Morny, Persigny, Saint-Arnaud, Fleury, Rouher, and Fould—were always around their master, giving him their advice and sharing (so far as he allowed anyone to share) his intimate councils.

The members of the Bonaparte family were an immense expense to the emperor, and gave him no little trouble. They were not the least thirsty among those who thronged around the fountain of wealth and honor; and their importunate demands upon the emperor's bounty led to a perpetual and reckless waste of money. The empress frequently remonstrated with her husband in regard to his lavish largesses and too generous expenditure. Contrary to what has been generally supposed, she was herself orderly and methodical in her expenditures and accounts, always carefully examining her bills, and though by the emperor's express desire she always expended the large amount annually allowed her, she never exceeded that sum.

Unhappily, the revived imperialism of Louis Napoleon was not, like Legitimacy, a cause, but to most persons who supported it, it was a speculation. Adherents had therefore to be attracted to it by hopes of gain, and all services had to be handsomely rewarded.

The emperor's policy in the early years of his reign may be said to have been twofold. He wanted to make France increase in material prosperity, and he wished to have money freely spent within her borders. He set on foot all kinds of improvements in Paris, and all kinds of useful enterprises in the provinces. Work was plenty; money flowed freely; the empire was everywhere popular. But the government of France was the government of one man; and if anything happened to that one man, where would be the government? There seemed no need to ask that question while France was prosperous and Paris gay. France under the Second Empire was quieter than she had been for any eighteen years since the Great Revolution; and for that she was grateful to Napoleon III.