How different was the husband she now found from him she had quitted! He was now a man, an earnest, thoughtful man, with a fiery determination, with decidedness of purpose, and yet thoughtful, following only what reason approved, even if the heart had been the mover. The passions of youth had died away. The excitable, thoughtless, pleasure-seeking officer of the king had become a grave, industrious, indefatigable, moral, austere servant of the people and of liberty. The songs of joy, of equivocal jesting, of political satire, had died away on those lips which only opened now in the clubs, in the National Assembly, to utter inspired words in regard to liberty, fraternity, and equality.
The most beautiful dancer of Versailles had become the president of the National Assembly, which made so many tears run, and awoke so much anger and hatred in the king’s palace of Versailles. He at least belonged to the constitutional fraction of the National Assembly; he was the friend and guest of Mirabeau and of Lafayette; he was the opponent of Robespierre, Marat, and Danton, and of all the fanatics of the Mountain party, who already announced their bloody views, and claimed a republic as the object of their conflicts.
Alexandre de Beauharnais was no republican, however enthusiastic he might have been in favor of America’s struggle for freedom, however deeply he had longed to go like Lafayette to America, for the sake of assisting the Americans to break the chains which yoked them to England, so as to build a republic for themselves. The enthusiasm of that day, the enthusiasm for France had driven him upon the path of the opposition; but while desiring freedom for the people, he still hoped that the people’s freedom was compatible with the power and dignity of the crown; that at the head of constitutional France the throne of a constitutional king would be maintained. To bring to pass this reunion, this balance of right between the monarchy and the people, such was the object of the wishes of Alexandre de Beauharnais; this was the ultimate aim of his struggles and longings.
Josephine looked upon these tumultuous conflicts of parties, upon this wild storm of politics, with wondering, sad looks. With all the tact of tender womanhood she held herself aloof from every personal interference in these political party strifes. At the bottom of her heart a true and zealous royalist, she guarded herself carefully from endeavoring to keep her husband back from his chosen path, and to bring into her house and family the party strifes of the political arena. She wanted and longed for peace, unity, and rest, and in his home at least her husband would have no debates to go through, no sentiments to fight against.
In silence and devotedness Josephine submitted to her husband’s will, and left him to perform his political part, while she assumed the part of wife, mother, of the representative of the household; and every evening opened her drawing-room to her friends, and to her husband’s associates in the same conflict.
What a mixed and extraordinary assemblage was seen in the drawing-room of the president of the National Assembly! There were the representatives of old France, the brilliant members of the old nobility: the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, the Count de Montmorency, the Marquis de Caulaincourt, the Prince de Salm-Cherbourg, the Princess von Hohenzollern, Madame de Montesson, the wife of the old Duke d’Orleans; and alongside of these names of the ancient regime, new names rose up. There were the deputies of the National Assembly—Barnave, Mounier, Thouvet, Lafayette, and the favorite of the people, the great Mirabeau. Old France and Young France met here in this drawing-room of Josephine on neutral grounds, and the beautiful viscountess, full of grace and prudence, offered to them both the honors of her house. She listened with modest bashfulness to the words of the great tribunes of the people, and oftentimes with a smile or a soft word she reconciled the royalists, those old friends who sought in this drawing-room for the Viscountess de Beauharnais, and found there only the wife of the president of the National Assembly.
The saloon of Josephine was soon spoken of, and seemed as a haven in which the refined, elegant manners, the grace, the wit, the esprit, had been saved from the stormy flood of political strife. Every one sought the privilege of being admitted into this drawing-room, whose charming mistress in her own gentleness and grace received the homage of all parties, pleased every one by her loveliness, her charms, the fine, exquisite tact with which she managed at all times the sentiments of the company, and with which she knew how to guide the conversation so that it would never dwindle into political debates or into impassioned speeches.
However violent was the tempest of faction outside, Josephine endeavored that in the interior of her home the serene peace of happiness should prevail. For she was now happy again, and all the liveliness, all the joys of youth, had again found entrance into her mind. The anguish endured, the tears shed, had also brought their blessing; they had strengthened and invigorated her heart; with their grave, solemn memories they preserved Josephine, that child of the South, of the sun, and of joy, from that light frivolity which otherwise is so often the common heritage of the Creoles.
The viscount had now the satisfaction which ten years ago, at the beginning of his married life, he had so intently longed for, the satisfaction of seeing his wife occupied with grave studies, with the culture of her own mind and talents. It was to him a ravishment to see Josephine in her drawing-room in earnest conversation with Buffon, and with all the aptitude of a naturalist speak of the organization and formation of the different families of plants; he exulted in the open praise paid to her when, with her fine, far-reaching voice, she sang the songs of her home, which she herself accompanied on the harp; he was proud when, in her saloon, with all the tact and assurance of a lady of the world, she took the lead in the conversation, and could speak with poets and authors, with artists and savants, and that, with understanding and feeling, upon their latest works and creations; he was made happy when, passing from serious gravity to the most innocent gayety, she jested, laughed, and danced, as if she were yet the sixteen-year-old child whom ten years ago he had made his wife, and from whom he had then so cruelly exacted that she should demean herself as a fine, experienced, and highly-refined lady.
Life had since undertaken to mould the young Creole into an elegant, highly-accomplished woman, but fortunately life had been impotent to change her heart, and that heart was ever beating in all the freshness of youth, in all the joyous warmth and faithfulness of the young girl of sixteen years who had come to France with so many ideal visions, so many illusions, so many dreams and hopes. It is true this ideal had vanished away, these illusions had burst into pieces like meteors in the skies; the dreams and hopes of the young maiden heart had fallen into dust, but the love, the confiding, faithful, hoping love, the love assured of the future, had remained alive; it had overcome the storms and conflicts; it had been Josephine’s consolation in the days of sorrow; it was now her delight in these days of happiness.