Before proceeding to the account of the wedding, celebrated by proxy in Vienna, at the Church of the Augustins, March 11, 1810, it may be well to enumerate the members, at that time, of the Imperial family.
The Emperor, Francis II., head of the house of Hapsburg-Lorraine, who was born February 12, 1768, had just entered his forty-third year; consequently, he was only eighteen months older than his son-in-law, the Emperor Napoleon, who was born August 15, 1769. The Austrian monarch had taken for his third wife his cousin Marie Louise Beatrice of Este, daughter of the Archduke Ferdinand, Duke of Modena. This Princess, who had no children, was born December 14, 1787, four years, almost to a day, before her step-daughter, the Archduchess Marie Louise, Napoleon's wife, who was born December 11, 1791. The new Empress of the French, at the time of the celebration of her wedding in Vienna, was consequently eighteen years and three months old, and twenty-two years younger than her husband.
Francis II. had eight children, three boys and five girls, all by his second wife, Marie Theresa, of the Two Sicilies, and born in the following order: In 1791, Marie Louise; in 1793, Ferdinand, the Prince Imperial; in 1797, Leopoldine, who became the wife of Dom Pedro, Emperor of Brazil; in 1798, Marie Clementine, who married the Prince of Salerno, and was the mother-in-law of the Duke of Aumale, the son of Louis Philippe; in 1801, Caroline, who married Prince Frederick of Saxony; in 1802, Francis Charles Joseph; in 1804, Marie Anne, who became Abbess of the Chapter of Noble Ladies in Prague; in 1805, John.
He had one sister and eight brothers, to wit: Marie Theresa Josepha, born 1767, who married Antoine Clement, brother of Frederic Augustus, King of Saxony; Ferdinand, born 1769, who, after having been Grand Duke of Tuscany, became Grand Duke of Würzburg, and a great friend of Napoleon; Charles Louis, born 1771, the famous Archduke Charles, Napoleon's rival on the battle-field; Joseph Antoine, born 1776, Palatine of Hungary; Antoine Victor, born 1779, who became Bishop of Bamberg; John, born 1782, who presided over the parliament at Frankfort in 1848; Reinhardt, born 1783, who was Viceroy of the Kingdom of Lombardy and Venetia when it became an Austrian province; Louis, born 1784; Rudolph, born 1788, who became a Cardinal. Consequently, at the time of Marie Louise's marriage, there were eleven Archdukes, three sons and eight brothers of the Emperor. The wedding ceremony was preceded, March 10, 1810, by a rite called the renunciation. At one in the afternoon, Marshal Berthier, Prince of Neufchâtel, Ambassador Extraordinary of France, drove to the Palace with his suite, in a state carriage drawn by six horses, and was conducted to the hall of the Privy Council, to witness this ceremony. As soon as Francis II. and Marie Louise had taken their seats beneath the canopy, the Emperor, as head of the family, spoke as follows: "Inasmuch as the customs of the Imperial family require that the Imperial Princesses and Archduchesses shall before marriage recognize the Pragmatic Sanction of Austria, and the order of succession, by a solemn act of renunciation, Her Imperial Highness the Archduchess Marie Louise, who is betrothed to His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of the French, King of Italy, is about to take the usual oath, and proceed to the formal rite of renunciation." The Archduchess then went up to a table on which stood a crucifix between two lighted candles, and the holy Gospels. Count Hohenwart, Prince Archbishop of Vienna, opened the book of the Gospel according to St. John, and the Archduchess, having placed upon it two fingers of the right hand, read aloud the act of renunciation of the right of succession to the crown, and took the oath. That evening, Gluck's Iphigenia among the Taurians was given at the Royal opera-house. The stairway to the boxes was brilliantly lighted, and lined with orange-trees. The next day, Sunday, the wedding was celebrated with great pomp at the Church of the Augustins. The procession filed through the apartments of the Palace, which had been covered with rugs and filled with chandeliers and candelabra. Grenadiers were drawn up in a double line from the Palace to the church. This was the order of the procession: Two stewards of the court, the pages, the stewards of the chamber, the carvers, the chamberlains, the privy councillors, the ministers, the principal officers of the court, the French Ambassador Extraordinary, the Archdukes Rudolph, Louis, Reinhardt, John, Antoine, Joseph, preceded by the Archduke Charles, accompanied by the Grand Master of the Court; the Emperor and King, followed by the Captain of the Noble Hungarian Guard, the Captain of the Yeomen, and the Grand Chamberlain; the Empress Queen holding the bride by the hand. The train of the Empress's dress was carried by the grand mistresses of the court as far as the second ante-chamber, by pages to the church, and then again by the grand mistresses. On each side of the Emperor, the Empress, and the Archdukes, marched twelve archers and as many body-guards; at some distance the same number of yeomen bearing halberds. Kettledrums and trumpets announced the arrival of the Emperor and the Empress at the church, where the Prince Archbishop of Vienna, accompanied by the clergy, met them at the door and presented them with holy water; that done, he proceeded with his bishops to the foot of the altar, on the gospel-side. The Imperial family took their place in the choir. The Archduke Charles, as Napoleon's representative, and the Archduchess Marie Louise, kneeled at the prayer-desks before the altar. When the Archbishop had blessed the wedding-ring, which was presented to him in a cup, the Archduke Charles and the bride advanced to the altar, where the ceremony took place in German, according to the Viennese rite. After the exchange of rings, the bride took the one destined for Napoleon, which she was to give herself to her husband. Then while those present remained on their knees the Te Deum was sung. Six pages carried flaming torches; salvos of artillery were fired; the bells of the city announced to the populace the completion of the rite. After the Te Deum the Archbishop pronounced the benediction. Then the procession returned to the Palace in the order of its going forth.
The French Ambassador wrote to the Duke of Cadore: "The marriage of His Majesty the Emperor with the Archduchess Marie Louise was celebrated with a magnificence that it would be hard to surpass, by the side of which even the brilliant festivities that have preceded it are not to be mentioned. The vast multitude of spectators, who had gathered from all quarters of the realm and from foreign parts, so packed the church, and the halls and passage-ways of the Palace, that the Emperor and Empress of Austria were often crowded. The really prodigious display of pearls and diamonds; the richness of the dresses and the uniforms; the numberless lights that illuminated the whole Palace; the joy of the participants, gave to the ceremony a splendor worthy of this grand and majestic solemnity. The richest noblemen of the country made a most brilliant display, and seemed to rival even with the Emperor. The ladies who accompanied the two Empresses, who were for the most part Princesses and women of the highest rank, seemed borne down by the weight of the diamonds and pearls they wore. But all eyes were fixed on the principal person of the solemnity, on this adored Princess who soon will make the happiness of our Sovereign."
When the procession had re-entered the Palace, the Imperial family and the court assembled in the room called the Room of the Mirror. The Emperor of Austria and the two Empresses received the congratulations of all the nobility. By the side of Marie Louise stood the grand mistress of the household and twelve ladies-in-waiting. "Her modesty," Count Otto continues in the same report, "the nobility of her bearing, the ease with which she replied to the speeches addressed to her, enchanted every one…. I was the first to be introduced to her. She answered my congratulations by saying that she would spare no pains to please His Majesty the Emperor Napoleon and to contribute to the happiness of the French nation which had now become her own. Her Majesty then received all the noblemen of the court, and spoke to them with an affability that delighted them. When the reception was over, I was presented to the Emperor, who spoke to me most amiably and most cordially. He told me that, in spite of his delicate health, he was unwilling to lose any opportunity of testifying his high esteem of my master, the Emperor. 'He will always find in me,' he went on, 'the loyalty and zeal which you must have noticed in this last negotiation. I give to your Emperor my beloved daughter. She deserves to be happy. You see joy on every face. We have neglected nothing to show our satisfaction with this alliance. Our nations require rest; they applaud what we have done. I am sure that the best intelligence will reign between us, and that our union will become only closer.' All these gratifying things that the Emperor said to me were made even more marked by the voice and the smile which accompanied them. This monarch, in fact, has a charm of manner which accounts for his great popularity. During and after the ceremony, the Empress held her stepdaughter by her right hand, leading her in this way in the church and through the halls and rooms. The large crowd of spectators, which almost blocked the inside of the Palace and all the approaches, seemed to belong to the Imperial family, so great was its emotion on seeing the new Empress pass by. All the Frenchmen who were near me confessed that they had never seen a grander or more touching sight. The court has had a large number of medals struck off in memory of this event. Many hundred of these have been sent to the Prince of Neufchâtel, who, to the last, has been treated with the most marked consideration."
After the wedding and the reception a grand state dinner was given at the Palace. A splendid table was set upon a platform covered with costly carpets, over which there was a canopy in the shape of a horseshoe. The Grand Master of the Court announced to their Majesties that the dinner was served. Carvers and pages brought in the meats. After the lavabo the Archbishop asked the blessing, and the Imperial family took their places in the following order; in the middle, the Empress of the French; on her right, the Emperor of Austria; on her left, the Empress; on the two sides the Archdukes Charles, Joseph, Antoine, John, Reinhardt, Louis, Rudolph, the Prince of Neufchâtel, the Ambassador Extraordinary. The Grand Master of the Court sat on the right, behind the Emperor's chair; near him were the Captain of the Yeomen, and on the left the Captain of the Noble Hungarian Guard. The ministers of state and the representatives of foreign courts sat on the right, and the two grand mistresses of the court on the left below the platform. The rest were opposite the table, next to the body-guard. The Emperor's children had a place assigned to them in the gallery from which they could look down on the feast. A concert, vocal and instrumental, accompanied the dinner. At the end the officiating bishop said grace in a low voice.
There was much comment on the presence of the Prince of Neufchâtel at the Imperial table, where he sat from the beginning to the end of the dinner. This was a modification of the ceremonial of the Viennese court, which admitted Ambassadors to the monarch's table only on very rare occasions, as at the marriage of an Archduchess; but even in this case, required that they should leave the table when the dessert was served, to move about among the noblemen admitted to the banquet-hall. It was recalled that at the marriage of the French Dauphin to the Archduchess Marie Antoinette, the Marquis of Durfort, the Ambassador of Louis XV., was not invited to the dinner in order to avoid the question of precedence between him and Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen, who was present at the banquet. This same Duke, as well as the brothers of the young Empress of the French, did not attend the state dinner of March 11, 1810; and the reason given was the desire to show a particular honor to Napoleon's Ambassador Extraordinary.
The same day, the Archduke Charles who had just represented the French
Emperor at the wedding, wrote to him this letter:—
"March 11, 1810. SIRE: The functions which Your Imperial Majesty has been kind enough to impose on me have been infinitely agreeable. Flattered at being chosen to represent a sovereign who, by his exploits, will live eternally in the annals of history, and convinced of the mutual happiness which must ensue from the union of Your Imperial Majesty with a Princess endowed with so many qualities as my dear niece, I have felt happy at being called on to cement this bond. I beg Your Imperial Majesty to receive the most earnest assurances of this feeling, as well as of the profound consideration with which I shall never cease to be, sire, Your Majesty's very humble and very obedient servant and cousin, CHARLES."