Memoirs of the Empress Josephine, Vol. 1 of 2

by Madame de Rémusat

On this occasion I happened to see the First Consul give way to one of those rare bursts of emotion of which I have before spoken. It was at Saint Cloud, rather late one evening. Mme. Bonaparte was anxiously waiting the result of this final conference between the two brothers; M. de Rémusat and I were the only persons with her. She did not care for Lucien, but she deprecated any family scandal. It was near midnight when Bonaparte came into the room; he was deeply dejected, and, throwing himself into an arm-chair, he exclaimed, in a troubled voice, “It is all over! I have broken with Lucien, and ordered him from my presence.” Mme. Bonaparte began to expostulate. “You are a good woman,” he said, “to plead for him.” Then he rose from his chair, took his wife in his arms, and laid her head softly on his shoulder, and with his hand still resting on the beautiful head which formed a contrast to the sad, set countenance so near it, he told us that Lucien had resisted all his entreaties, and that he had resorted equally in vain to both threats and persuasion. “It is hard, though,” he added, “to find in one’s own family such stubborn opposition to interests of such magnitude. Must I, then, isolate myself from every one? Must I rely on myself alone? Well! I will suffice to myself, and you, Josephine—you will be my comfort always.”

I retain a pleasurable recollection of this little scene. Tears were in Bonaparte’s eyes as he spoke. I felt inclined to thank him when he betrayed feelings like those of other men. Shortly after this, his brother Louis crossed his wishes in another way, and this incident had probably a great influence on the fate of Mme. Bonaparte.

The Consul, being quite resolved to raise himself to the throne of France and to found a dynasty, had occasionally glanced at the question of a divorce already; but, either because of his attachment to his wife being still too strong, or because his existing relations with Europe did not permit him to hope for an alliance which would strengthen his political position, he seemed just then disinclined to break with Josephine, and disposed to adopt the young Louis Napoleon, who was his own nephew and also Josephine’s grandson.

He no sooner allowed this project to be discerned than his family rebelled. Joseph Bonaparte ventured to represent to him that he had done nothing to forfeit the right to the crown which, as eldest brother, he would acquire, and he defended that right as if it had really existed of old.

Bonaparte, who was always irritated by opposition, grew very angry, and only the more determined. He confided his intentions to his wife, who was overjoyed, and spoke to me as though the realization of this project would bring her own anxieties to an end. Mme. Louis assented, but without displaying any gratification. She was not at all ambitious, and, in fact, could not help fearing that such an elevation would bring down misfortune on the head of her son.

One day, when Bonaparte was surrounded by his family, he placed the little Napoleon between his knees, and said, while playing with him, “Do you know, my little fellow, that you run the risk of being a king some day?” “And Achille?” immediately asked Murat, who was present. “Oh, Achille,” answered Bonaparte, “will be a great soldier.” This reply incensed Mme. Murat; but Bonaparte, pretending not to notice her, and stung by his brother’s opposition, which he believed with reason to have been prompted by Mme. Murat, went on to say to his little step-grandson, “And mind, my poor child, I advise you, if you value your life, not to accept invitations to dine with your cousins.”

We may imagine to what feelings such bitter words would give rise. From that moment Louis Bonaparte was beset by his family, who adroitly reminded him of the rumors respecting his wife, and that he ought not to sacrifice the interests of his own kinsfolk to those of a child who was at least half a Beauharnais; and, as Louis Bonaparte was not quite so destitute of ambition as people have since made him out, he, like Joseph, went to the First Consul to ask why the sacrifice of his own rights should be demanded of him. “Why,” said he, “should I yield my share of inheritance to my son? How have I deserved to be cut off? What will my position be when this child, having become yours, finds himself very much higher placed than I, and quite independent of me, standing next to yourself, and regarding me with suspicion, if not with contempt? No; I will never consent to this; and, rather than renounce the proper course of succession to the royalty which is to be yours, rather than consent to humble myself before my own son, I will leave France, taking Napoleon with me, and we shall see whether you will dare openly to take a child from his father!”

The First Consul, powerful as he was, found it impossible to overcome his brother’s opposition. His wrath availed nothing, and he was obliged to yield, for fear of a vexatious and even ridiculous scandal; for such it certainly would have been, to see this whole family quarreling beforehand over the crown which France had not yet actually conferred.

The strife was hushed up, and Napoleon was obliged to draw up the scheme of succession, and the possible case of adoption which he reserved to himself the power of making, in the terms to be found in the decree relating to the elevation of the First Consul to the Empire.

These quarrels embittered the enmity already existing between the Bonapartes and the Beauharnais. The former regarded the plan of adoption as the result of Mme. Bonaparte’s scheming. Louis gave stricter orders to his wife than before that she should hold no familiar intercourse with her mother. “If you consult her interests at the cost of mine,” he told her harshly, “I swear to you that I will make you repent. I will separate you from your son; I will shut you up in some out-of-the-way place, and no power on earth shall deliver you. You shall pay for your concessions to your own family by the wretchedness of the rest of your life. And take care, above all, that none of my threats reach the ears of my brother. Even his power should not save you from my anger.”