I can bear witness that this unhappy lady ascended the throne in the spirit of a victim resigning herself to sacrifice.
CHAPTER XXI
(1806.)
N the June of this year I went to take the waters at Cauterets, and remained away three months. I was in very delicate health, and needed a respite from Court life and from the daily anxieties which were wearing alike to mind and body. My family—that is to say, my husband, my mother, and my children—were settled at Auteuil, whence M. de Rémusat could easily get to Saint Cloud, and there they passed a happy and peaceful summer. Our Court was then in solitude; the sovereigns of Holland had taken their departure, and the members of Bonaparte’s family had separate establishments. The Emperor was engrossed by the gathering clouds in Europe, and was constantly at work; his wife employed her leisure in beautifying her estate of Malmaison.
The “Moniteur” contained glowing accounts of the triumphal entries of the princes created by Bonaparte into their respective states. Enthusiasm was said to be at the highest at Naples, at Berg, at Baden, and in Holland, and the populace was delighted everywhere. The speeches of the new kings or princes, in which they treated their subjects to a pompous panegyric of the great man whose envoys they were, were published for our edification. It is certain that, at first, Louis Bonaparte found favor with the Dutch. His wife shared his popularity in it, and displayed such affability that very soon, as I heard from some French people who accompanied them, her strange husband became jealous of the affection she inspired.
Like his brother, Louis was intolerant of the least independence in others. After exacting that the Queen should hold a brilliant Court, he suddenly changed his mind, and reduced her by degrees to a very solitary life, thus isolating her from the people over whom she too had been appointed to reign. If I may believe the accounts I have received from persons who could have had no motive for inventing them, he resumed his distrustful jealousy and his system of spying, and the Queen was constantly subjected to insult. The poor young creature, in a state of chronic ill health and profound melancholy, perceived that it was not her husband’s pleasure that she should share the affection he hoped to inspire in his Dutch subjects. Sorrow had made her indifferent to such things; she withdrew into the solitude of her palace, where she lived almost as a prisoner, devoting herself to the arts she loved, and indulging her excessive affection for her eldest boy. The child, who was forward for his age, greatly loved his mother, to the extreme jealousy of Louis. The latter would sometimes try to obtain his preference by indulgence carried to excess; sometimes he would alarm him by outbreaks of passion, and the boy clung the more to her, who always loved and never frightened him. Men were found—and such as are always to be found in courts—who, for hire, undertook to watch the Queen and report her every action. The letters she wrote were opened, lest they might contain any allusion to events in her husband’s dominions. She has assured me that more than once she found her desk open and her papers upset, and that, if she had chosen, she might have detected the King’s spies in the act of carrying out his instructions. It was soon perceived at the Dutch Court that to appear to be influenced in any way by the Queen was to lose one’s own chances of favor, and on this she was immediately forsaken. Any unfortunate person addressing himself to her, in order to solicit a favor, would be immediately suspected; any minister conversing with her on the most trifling matter would fall under the King’s displeasure. The damp climate of Holland aggravated her ailments; she fell into a state of atrophy perceptible to every one, but which the King did not choose at first to notice. She has told me that her life at this time was so hard and seemed so hopeless, that frequently, when residing at one of her country-houses not far from the sea, and gazing at the ocean stretched out before her, and English vessels blockading the harbors, she ardently wished that some chance would bring one of them to the coast, and that some partial invasion might be attempted, in which she would have been made a prisoner. At last her physicians ordered her to Aix-la-Chapelle, and the King himself, who was out of health, resolved on taking the waters there with her.
From this time Holland began to suffer from the prohibitive system which the Emperor imposed on everything appertaining to the Empire. It must be conceded to Louis Bonaparte that he promptly defended the interests of the people confided to him, and opposed the tyrannical measures forced on him by the Imperial policy as strongly as was in his power. He bore with firmness the Emperor’s reproaches on the subject, and resisted him in such a manner as to gain the affection of the Dutch. In this they did him justice.
Switzerland also was compelled to decline all trade with England, and English goods were seized everywhere. These measures served to strengthen the party in London who were anxious to force France into fresh European wars at any price. Mr. Fox, who was then Prime Minister, seemed, however, to lean toward peace, and to be willing to receive overtures of negotiation. During the summer he was attacked by the illness which subsequently proved fatal to him, and his influence declined. The Russians were still contending with our troops for the possession of certain parts of Dalmatia. The Grand Army showed no sign of returning to France; the promised fêtes were constantly deferred.