Queen Hortense: A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era

by L. Mühlbach

From that day forward a new world began to take shape, and the forms of etiquette which, during the ascendency of the democratic republic, had slunk away out of sight into the darkest recesses of the Luxembourg and the Tuileries, began to reappear, slowly and circumspectly, 'tis true, in broad daylight. People were no longer required, in accordance with the spirit of equality, to ignore all distinctions of condition and culture, by the use of the words "citizen" and "citizeness;" or, in the name of brotherhood, to endure the close familiarities of every brawling street ruffian; or, in the name of liberty, to let all his own personal liberty and inclination be trampled under foot.

Etiquette, as I have said, crept forth from the dark corners again; and the three consuls, who had taken possession of the Luxembourg, whispered the word "monsieur" in each other's ears, and greeted Josephine and her daughter, who were installed in the apartments prepared for them in the palace on the next day, with the title of "madame." Yet, only a year earlier, the two words "monsieur" and "madame" had occasioned revolt in Paris, and brought about bloodshed. A year earlier General Augereau had promulged the stern order of the day in his division, that, "whoever should use the word 'monsieur' or 'madame,' orally or in writing, on pretext whatever, should be deprived of his rank, and declared incapable of ever again serving in the army of the republic[7]."

[7] Bourrienne, vol. i., p. 229.

Now, these two proscribed words made their triumphant entry, along with the three consuls, into the palace of the Luxembourg, which had been delivered from its democratic tyrants.

Josephine was now, at least, "Madame" Bonaparte, and Hortense was "Mademoiselle" Beauharnais. The wife of Consul Bonaparte now required a larger retinue of servants, and a more showy establishment. Indeed, temerity could not yet go so far as to speak of the court of Madame Bonaparte and the court ladies of Mademoiselle Hortense; they had still to be content with the limited space of the diminutive Luxembourg, but they were soon to be compensated for all this, and, if they still had to call each other monsieur and madame, they could, a few years later, say "your highness," "your majesty," and "monseigneur," in the Tuileries.

The Luxembourg Palace was soon found to be too small for the joint residence of the three consuls, and too confined for the ambition of Bonaparte, who could not brook the near approach of the other two men who shared the supreme control of France with him. Too it was also for the longings that now spoke with ever louder and stronger accents in his breast, and pushed him farther and farther onward in this path of splendor and renown which, at first, had seemed to him but as the magic mirage of his dreams, but which now appeared as the glittering truth and reality of his waking hours. The Luxembourg was then too small for the three consuls, but they had to go very circumspectly and carefully to work to prepare the way to the old royal palace of the Bourbons. It would not do to oust the representatives of the people, who held their sessions there, too suddenly; the distrustful republicans must not be made to apprehend that there was any scheme on foot to revolutionize France back into monarchy, and to again stifle the many-headed monster of the republic under a crown and a sceptre. It was necessary, before entering the Tuileries, to give the French people proof that men might still be very good republicans, even although they might wish to be housed in the bedchamber of a king.

Hence, before the three consuls transferred their quarters to the Tuileries, the royal palace had to be transformed to a residence worthy of the representatives of the republic. So, the first move made was to set up a handsome bust of the elder Brutus--a war-trophy of Bonaparte's, which he had brought with him from Italy--in one of the galleries of the Tuileries; and then David had to carve out some other statues of the republican heroes of Greece and Rome and place them in the saloons. A number of democratic republicans, who were defeated and exiled on the 13th Vendémiaire, were permitted to return to France, and news of the death of WASHINGTON, the noblest and wisest of all republicans, arriving just at that time, Bonaparte ordered that the whole army should wear the badge of mourning for ten days. Black bands were worn on the arm, and sable streamers waved from the standards, in honor of the deceased republican hero.

However, when these ten days were past, and France and her army had sufficiently expressed their regret, the three consuls entered the Tuileries through the grand portal, on the two sides of which towered aloft two liberty-poles that still bore the old inscription of the republic of 1792. On the tree to the right was the legend "August 10, 1792," and on the one to the left, "Royalty in France is overthrown and will never rise again." It was between these two significant symbols that Bonaparte first strode into the Tuileries. It was a very long and imposing procession of carriages which moved that day toward the palace, through the streets of the capital. They only lacked the outward pomp and magnificence which rendered the latter fêtes of the empire so remarkable. With the exception of the splendid vehicle in which the three consuls rode, and which was drawn by the six grays presented by the Emperor of Austria, there were but few good equipages to be seen. France of the new day had not had the opportunity to build any state-coaches, and those of old France had been too shamefully misused to admit of their ever serving again; for it would be out of the question to employ, in this solemn procession of the three consuls, the state-carriages of the old aristocracy, that had served as the vehicles in which the democratic republic had transported dead dogs to their place of deposit. Such had been the fact in the September days of the year 1793.

The unclaimed dogs of the fugitive or slaughtered aristocracy at that time wandered without masters, by thousands, through the streets and slaked their thirst with the blood which flowed down from the guillotine and dyed the ground with the purple of the new system of popular liberty.

The smell of the fresh blood and the ghastly sustenance which the guillotine yielded them had restored the animals to their original savage propensities, and hence those who had been so fortunate as to escape the murderous axe of the sans-culottes had now to apprehend the danger of falling a victim to the sharp teeth of these wild blood-hounds; and as the ferocious brutes knew no difference between aristocrats and republicans, but fell upon both with equal fury, it became necessary, at last, to annihilate these new foes of the republic. So, the Champs Elysées were surrounded with troops, and the dogs were driven into the Rue Royale and the Place Royale, where they were mowed down by musketry. On that one day the dead carcasses of more than three thousand dogs lay about in the streets of Paris, and there they continued to fester for three days longer, because a dispute had arisen among the city officials as to whose duty it was to remove them. At length the Convention undertook that task, and intrusted the work to representative Gasparin, who was shrewd enough to convert the removal of the dead animals into a republican ceremony. These were the dogs of the ci-devants and aristocrats that were to be buried, and it was quite proper, therefore, that they should receive aristocratic honors.