“‘“Say no more!” I exclaimed, “I understand you: I expected this; but the blow is not the less mortal.”
“‘I could not say another word,’ continued Josephine. ‘I know not what happened after. I seemed to lose my reason; I became insensible, and when I recovered I found myself in my chamber. Your friend Corvisart and my poor daughter were with me. Bonaparte came to see me in the evening; and oh! Bourrienne, how can I describe to you what I felt at sight of him! even the interest he evinced for me seemed an additional cruelty. Alas! I had good reason to fear ever becoming an empress!’”
The 15th of December, 1809, was the fatal day appointed for the consummation of the divorce. The imperial council of state was convened, and the official announcements of the coming separation were made. Napoleon’s address on this occasion is well known. The prepared response which Josephine attempted to read in acceptation of this cruel decree, was too much for even her marvellous fortitude to endure; and Eugène was obliged to take the paper from his weeping mother, and finish for her the heart-breaking avowal which her quivering lips refused to utter.
Upon the following day the council was again assembled with the imperial family in the grand salon at the Tuileries, to witness the legal consummation of the divorce.
All were in court costume. Napoleon entered the apartment, clothed in the imposing robes of state. Pale as a corpse, he stood leaning against a pillar, with folded arms, motionless as a statue.
Again the poor victim of this cruel sacrifice must appear. The keen-edged knife of the political guillotine of blind ambition must this day perform its final act of political decapitation.
The door opens; a sad figure appears. Some reports clothe this sorrowful, weeping woman in white muslin; others in black satin. As the latter seems more fitting: to this funereal scene, we incline to that supposition, which would surely appear more appropriate than bridal white for this moment of public repudiation.
The graceful woman, bending like a weeping-willow before the storm of sorrow which is crushing her to the earth, walks slowly to the seat prepared for her, followed by her son and daughter. The pallor of death is upon her brow. A coffin would have seemed less cruel than the mocking chair of state waiting for her. Had she been Marie Antoinette upon the scaffold, she could scarcely have suffered more; for Marie Antoinette could at least love her dead husband without reproach; while the living husband of poor Josephine holds in his hand the cruel dagger which is piercing her bleeding heart, and his word tears from her brow her rightful royal diadem of wifehood.
The iniquitous decree is read. The quivering victim must pronounce her own sentence. Pressing her handkerchief to her streaming eyes for a moment, she slowly rises, and the oath of acceptance passes her pallid lips. The pen is handed to her, and she signs her own death-warrant; and then glides like a mournful spectre from the grand salon of state, the imperial grandeur of which, together with the presence of her triumphant foes, mock her unutterable woe.
It is the evening of the same day. The weeping woman has still another heart-rending duty to perform. She must take her final farewell of the man who has stabbed her to the heart; of the husband whom she still adores with every heart-beat of her loyal, loving soul; of the emperor who has crowned her, only to tear from her brow his royal gift and bestow it upon another. Was ever woman’s soul torn with such conflicting emotions? Pride and love have fought a terrible battle within her heart, since the cruel public sacrifice of the morning. But love has conquered; yes, so royally conquered, that there is no place left in her soul for aught but overpowering devotion to the adored husband of her heart.