CHAPTER XX
(1806.)
N the suggestion of M. Portalis, the Minister of Public Worship, the Emperor issued a decree appointing his birthday to be kept on the Feast of the Assumption, the 15th of August, which was also the anniversary of the conclusion of the Concordat. The first Sunday of each December was also set apart as a holiday, in commemoration of Austerlitz.
On the 30th of March there was an important session of the Senate, which gave rise to much and various comment. The Emperor communicated to the Senators a long list of decrees, which were destined to affect Europe from one end to the other. It will not be amiss to give some details of these, as well as an extract from the speech of Cambacérès, the Arch-Chancellor, which affords an example of the obsequious skill with which the sudden resolves of a master who kept all things, even men’s minds, in unceasing ferment, could be clothed in specious phrases.
“Gentlemen,” said Cambacérès, “at the time when France, animated by the same spirit as ourselves, secured alike her happiness and her glory by an oath of obedience to our august sovereign, you foresaw in your wisdom the necessity of coördinating the system of hereditary government in all its parts, and likewise of strengthening it by institutions analogous to its nature.
“Your wishes have been partly fulfilled; they will be still further accomplished by the various enactments which his Majesty the Emperor and King orders me to lay before you. You will receive with gratitude these fresh proofs of his confidence in the Senate, and his love for the people, and you will hasten, in conformity with his Majesty’s intention, to inscribe them on your registers.
“The first of these decrees is a statute to regulate all things relating to the civil status of the Imperial family, and it also defines the duties of the princes and princesses toward the Emperor.
“The second decree unites the states of Venice to the kingdom of Italy.