Memoirs of the Empress Josephine, Vol. 1 of 2

by Madame de Rémusat

I now return to the winter of 1804. This winter passed as the preceding one had done, in balls and fêtes at Court and in Paris, and in the organization of the new laws which were presented to the Corps Législatif. Mme. Bacciochi, who had a very decided liking for M. de Fontanes, spoke of him so often at that time to her brother, that her influence, added to Bonaparte’s own high opinion of the academician, determined him to make M. de Fontanes President of the Corps Législatif. This selection appeared strange to some people; but a man of letters would do as well as any other President for what Bonaparte intended to make of the Corps Législatif. M. de Fontanes had to deliver harangues to the Emperor under most difficult circumstances, but he always acquitted himself with grace and distinction. He had but little strength of character, but his ability told when he had to speak in public, and his good taste lent him dignity and impressiveness. Perhaps that was not an advantage for Bonaparte. Nothing is so dangerous for sovereigns as to have their abuses of power clothed in the glowing colors of eloquence, when they figure before nations; and this is especially dangerous in France, where forms are held in such high esteem. How often have the Parisians, although in the secret of the farce the Government was acting, lent themselves to the deception with a good grace, simply because the actors did justice to that delicacy of taste which demands that each shall do his best with the rôle assigned to him?

In the course of the month of January, the “Moniteur” published a selection of articles from the English journals, in which the differences between Bavaria and Austria, and the probabilities of a continental war, were discussed. Paragraphs of this kind were from time to time inserted in the newspapers, without any comment, as if to prepare us for what might happen. These intimations—like the clouds over mountain summits, which fall apart for a moment now and then, and afford a glimpse of what is passing behind—allowed us to have momentary peeps at the important discussions which were taking place in Europe, so that we should not be much surprised when they resulted in a rupture. After each glimpse the clouds would close again, and we would remain in darkness until the storm burst.

I am about to speak of an important epoch, concerning which my memory is full and faithful. It is that of the conspiracy of Georges Cadoudal, and the crime to which it led. With respect to General Moreau, I shall repeat what I have heard said, but shall be careful to affirm nothing. I think it well to preface this narrative by a brief explanation of the state of affairs at that time. Certain persons, somewhat closely connected with politics, were beginning to assert that France felt the necessity of hereditary right in the governing power. Political courtiers, and honest, sincere revolutionists, seeing that the tranquillity of the country depended on one life, were discussing the instability of the Consulate. By degrees the thoughts of all were once more turned to monarchy, and this would have had its advantages if they could have agreed to establish a monarchy tempered by the laws. Revolutions have this great disadvantage, that they divide public opinion into an infinite number of varieties, which are all modified by circumstances. This it is which gives opportunity to that despotism which comes after revolutions. To restrain the power of Bonaparte, it would have been necessary to venture on uttering the word “Liberty”; but as, only a few years before, that word had been used from one end of France to the other as a disguise for the worst kind of slavery, it inspired an unreasonable but fatal repugnance.

The Royalists, finding that day by day Bonaparte was departing more widely from the path they had expected he would take, were much disturbed. The Jacobins, whose opposition the First Consul feared much more, were secretly preparing for action, for they perceived that it was to their antagonists that the Government was giving guarantees. The Concordat, the advances made to the old nobility, the destruction of revolutionary equality, all these things constituted an encroachment upon them. How happy would France have been had Bonaparte contended only against the factions! But, to have done that, he must have been animated solely by the love of justice, and guided by the counsels of a generous mind.

When a sovereign, no matter what his title may be, sides with one or other of the violent parties which stir up civil strife, it is certain that he has hostile intentions against the rights of citizens, who have confided those rights to his keeping. Bonaparte, in order to fix his despotic yoke upon France, found himself obliged to come to terms with the Jacobins; and, unfortunately, there are persons whom no guarantee but that of crime will satisfy. Their ally must involve himself in some of their iniquities. This motive had a great deal to do with the death of the Duc d’Enghien; and I am convinced that all which happened at that time was the result of no violent feeling, of no blind revenge, but simply a Machiavellian policy, resolved to smooth its own path at any cost. Neither was it for the gratification of vanity that Bonaparte wanted to change his title of Consul for that of Emperor. We must not believe that he was always ruled by insatiable passions; he was capable of controlling them by calculation, and, if in the end he allowed himself to be led away, it was because he became intoxicated by success and flattery. The comedy of republican equality, which he was obliged to play so long as he remained Consul, annoyed him, and in reality only deceived those who were willing to be deceived. It resembled the political pretenses of ancient Rome, when the Emperors from time to time had themselves reelected by the Senate. I have heard persons who, having put on the love of liberty like a garment, and yet paid assiduous court to Bonaparte while he was First Consul, declare that they had quite withdrawn their esteem from him so soon as he conferred the title of Emperor upon himself. I never could understand their argument. How was it possible that the authority which he exercised almost from the moment of his entrance into the government did not enlighten them as to his actual position? Might it not rather be said that he gave a proof of sincerity in his assumption of a title whose real powers he exercised?

At the epoch of which I am treating, it became necessary that the First Consul should strengthen his position by some new measure. The English, who had been threatened, were secretly exciting disturbances to act as diversions from the projects formed against themselves; their relations with the Chouans were resumed; and the Royalists regarded the Consular Government as a mere transition state from the Directory to the Monarchy. One man only stood in the way; it became easy to conclude that he must be got rid of.

I remember to have heard Bonaparte say in the summer of that year (1804) that for once events had hurried him, and that he had not intended to establish royalty until two years later. He had placed the police in the hands of the Minister of Justice. This was a sound and moral proceeding, but it was contradicted by his intention that the magistracy should use that police as it had been used when it was a revolutionary institution. I have already said that Bonaparte’s first ideas were generally good and great. To conceive and carry them out was to exercise his power, but to submit to them afterward savored of abdication. He was unable to endure the dominion even of any of his own institutions. Restrained by the slow and regular forms of justice, and also by the feebleness and mediocrity of his Chief Judge, he surrounded himself with innumberable police agents, and by degrees regained confidence in Fouché, who was an adept in the art of making himself necessary. Fouché, a man of keen and far-seeing intellect, a Jacobin grown rich, and consequently disgusted with some of the principles of that party—with which, however, he still remained connected, so that he might have support should trouble arise—had no objection to invest Bonaparte with royalty. His natural flexibility made him always ready to accept any form of government in which he saw a post for himself. His habits were more revolutionary than his principles, and the only state of things, I believe, which he could not have endured, would have been one which should make an absolute nonenity of him. To make use of him one must thoroughly understand his disposition, and be very cautious in dealing with him, remembering that he needed troublous times for the full display of his capacity; for, as he had no passions and no aversions, he rose at such times superior to the generality of those about him, who were all more or less actuated by either fear or resentment.

Fouché has denied that he advised the murder of the Duc d’Enghien. Unless there is complete certainty of the fact, I see no reason for bringing the accusation of a crime against a man who positively denies it. Besides, Fouché, who was very far-sighted, must have foreseen that such a deed would give only a temporary guarantee to the party which Bonaparte wanted to win. He knew the First Consul too well to fear that he would think of replacing the King on a throne which he might occupy himself, and there is little doubt that, with the information he possessed, he would have pronounced the murder of the Duc d’Enghien to be a mistake.

M. de Talleyrand’s plans were also served by his advice that Bonaparte should invest himself with royalty. That proceeding would suit M. de Talleyrand to a nicety. His enemies, and even Bonaparte himself, have accused him of having advised the murder of the unhappy prince. But Bonaparte and his enemies are not credible on this point; the well-known character of M. de Talleyrand is against the truth of the statement. He has said to me more than once that Bonaparte informed him and the two Consuls of the arrest of the Duc d’Enghien and of his own unalterable determination at the same time. He added that they all three saw that words were useless, and therefore kept silence. That was indeed a deplorable weakness, but one very common to M. de Talleyrand, who would not think of remonstrating for the sake of conscience only, when he knew that a line of action had been decided upon. Opposition and bold resistance may take effect upon any nature, however resolute. A sovereign of a cruel and sanguinary disposition will sometimes sacrifice his inclination to the force of reason arrayed against it. Bonaparte was not cruel either by inclination or on system; he merely wanted to carry his point by the quickest and surest method. He has himself said that at that time he was obliged to get rid of both Jacobins and Royalists. The imprudence of the latter furnished him with this fatal opportunity. He seized it; and what I shall hereafter have to relate will show that it was with the coolest of calculation, or rather of sophistry, that he shed illustrious and innocent blood.

A few days after the first return of the King, the Duc de Rovigo [General Savary] presented himself at my house one morning. He then tried to clear himself from the accusations that were brought against him. He spoke to me of the death of the Duc d’Enghien. “The Emperor and I,” he said, “were deceived on that occasion. One of the inferior agents in Georges Cadoudal’s conspiracy had been suborned by my police. He came to us, and stated that one night, when all the conspirators were assembled, the secret arrival of an important chief who could not yet be named had been announced to them. A few nights later, a person appeared among them, to whom the others paid great respect. The spy described the unknown so as to give us the impression that he was a prince of the house of Bourbon. About the same time the Duc d’Enghien had established himself at Ettenheim, with the intention, no doubt, of awaiting the result of the conspiracy. The police agents wrote that he sometimes disappeared for several days together. We concluded that at these times he came to Paris, and his arrest was resolved upon. Afterward, when the spy was confronted with the persons who had been arrested, he recognized Pichegru as the important personage of whom he had spoken; and when I told this to Bonaparte he exclaimed, with a stamp of his foot, ‘Ah, the wretch! what has he made me do?’ ”