Memoirs of the Empress Josephine, Vol. 2 of 2

by Madame de Rémusat

Toward the end of the winter an order from the Emperor reached Paris, to the effect that the newspapers were to remind persons distinguished either in art or science that the decree, dated from Aix-la-Chapelle, 24th Fructidor, year 12, concerning the decennial prizes, was to come into effect at the expiration of one year and eight months from the then date. This decree promised considerable rewards to every author of an important work, of any kind whatsoever. The prizes were to be assigned at intervals of ten years, dating from the 18th Brumaire, and the jury which was to allot them was to consist of members of the Institute. This project has real greatness in it; we shall see, hereafter, how it fell to pieces in consequence of a fit of ill humor on the part of the Emperor.

In March the Vice-Queen of Italy gave birth to a daughter, and the Empress was much pleased at being grandmother to a little princess related to all the greatest powers in Europe.

During the suspension of war on both sides, from the inclemency of the season, the Emperor took every means to insure that in the spring his army should be more formidable than ever. The kingdoms of Italy and Naples had to furnish further contingents. Men born under the smiling skies of those beautiful lands were suddenly transported to the wild banks of the Vistula; and they might wonder at the change, until others were seen marching from Cadiz, to perish beneath the walls of Moscow, thus affording a proof of the courage and strength of which men are capable, and also of what can be done by the strength of the human will. The army was reorganized; our newspapers were filled with columns of promotions, and it is curious, among these military decrees, to come upon one dated, like the rest, from Osterode, appointing bishops to vacant sees both in France and in Italy.

But, notwithstanding our victories, or perhaps because of them, our army had suffered considerable loss. The extreme humidity of the climate caused sickness among the troops. Russia was evidently about to make an immense effort. The Emperor felt that this campaign must be decisive; and, not feeling satisfied that the numerous troops furnished to him were sufficient to insure victory, he put his own power and our submission to the test. After having, at the end of December, 1806, levied the conscription for 1807, he demanded from the Senate in April the levy for 1808. The Prince of Neufchâtel’s report, which was published in the “Moniteur,” announced that during the year the army had been augmented by one hundred and sixty thousand men, levied by the conscriptions of 1806 and 1807; sixteen thousand men were non-combatants either from sickness or superannuation, and, without troubling himself with calculations, which it was too certain no one would venture to make, because it was our system to conceal our losses, he put down the “casualties” of the campaign at fourteen thousand men. As our army had been increased by only a hundred and thirty thousand efficient soldiers, prudence required that the eighty thousand men of the conscription of 1808 should be raised, and drilled, each in his own department. “Were this delayed,” said the report, “the men would have to march at once to the seat of war; but, by making the levy six months in advance, they will acquire strength and knowledge, and will be better able to defend themselves.”

State Councilor Regnault de St. Jean d’Angely, who was the bearer of the Imperial message to the Senate, paused when he came to this portion of the report, and called the attention of the Senators to the paternal goodness of the Emperor, who would not allow the new conscripts to brave the dangers of war without some previous preparation. The Emperor’s letter announced that the whole of Europe was again in arms—that two hundred thousand recruits had been raised in England; and declared his own desire for peace, on condition that the English were not prompted by passion to seek their own prosperity in our abasement.

The Senate passed the required decree, and voted an address of congratulation and thanks to the Emperor. He must have smiled on receiving it.

The minds of men who wield absolute power need to be very generous, in order to resist the temptation to despise the human species—a temptation which is only too well justified by the submission that is accorded to them. When Bonaparte beheld a whole nation giving him its life-blood and its treasure in order to satisfy his insatiable ambition, when educated men of that nation consented to veil his acts of invasion on the human will in plausible phrases, how could he fail to regard the whole world as a vast field, open to the first person who would undertake to occupy and till it? Heroic greatness of soul alone could have discerned that the adulatory words and the blind obedience of the citizens who were isolated by the tyranny of his institutions, and then decimated at his command, were dictated by constraint only.

And yet, although Bonaparte had none of those generous feelings, reasonable observation might have shown him that the alert obedience with which the French marched to the battle-field was but a misdirection of that national spirit which a great Revolution had aroused in a great people. The cry of liberty had awakened generous enthusiasm, but the confusion that ensued had rendered men afraid to complete their work. The Emperor skillfully seized on this moment of hesitation, and turned it to his own advantage. For the last thirty years the French character has been so developed that the bulk of our citizens of every class have been possessed by the desire to live, or, if to live were impossible, by the desire to die, for some particular object. Bonaparte did not, however, invariably mistake the bent of the genius of the people whom he had undertaken to rule, but he felt within himself the strength to control it, and he directed it, or rather misdirected it, to his own advantage.

It was becoming hard to serve him; feelings which seemed instinctively to warn us of what was to come were not to be repressed. Many were the sad reflections of my husband and myself—I remember them well—in the midst of the splendor and luxury of a position for which we were no doubt envied. As I have said, our means were small when we joined the First Consul’s Court. His gifts, which were sold rather than freely bestowed, had surrounded us with luxury on which he insisted. I was still young, and I found myself enabled to gratify the tastes of youth and to enjoy the pleasures of a brilliant position. I had a beautiful house; I had fine diamonds; every day I might vary my elegant dress; a chosen circle of friends dined at my table; every theatre was open to me; there was no fête given in Paris to which I was not invited; and yet even then an inexplicable cloud hung over me. Often on our return from a splendid entertainment at the Tuileries, and while still wearing our garb of state—or shall I say, of servitude?—my husband and I would seriously discuss all that was passing around us. A secret anxiety as to the future, an ever-growing distrust of our master, oppressed us both. Without distinctly knowing what we dreaded, we were aware that there was something to dread. “I am unfitted,” my husband used to say, “for the narrow and idle life of a Court.” “I can not admire,” I would say to him, “that which costs so much blood and misery.” We were weary of military glory, and shocked at the fierce severity it often inspires in those who have gained it; and perhaps the repugnance we felt for it was a presentiment of the price which Bonaparte was to make France pay for the greatness that he forced upon her.

To these painful feelings was added the fear of being unable to feel any affection for him whom we must still continue to serve. This was one of my secret troubles. I clung with the enthusiasm of youth and imagination to the admiration for the Emperor that I desired to retain; I sincerely tried to deceive myself with regard to him; I eagerly recalled cases when he had acted up to my hopes. The struggle was painful and vain, but I suffered more after I had relinquished it. In 1814 numbers of people wondered at my ardent desire for the fall of the founder of our fortune, and for the return of those who would ruin it; they accused us of ingratitude in so promptly forsaking the cause of the Emperor, and honored us with their surprise because of the patience with which we endured our heavy loss. They were unable to read our hearts; they were ignorant of the impressions that had been made on us long before. The return of the King ruined us, but it set our hearts and minds at liberty. It promised a future in which our child might freely yield to the noble inspirations of his youth. “My son,” said his father, “will perhaps be poor, but he will not be shackled and hampered as we have been.” It is not sufficiently known in the world—that is, in the regulated and factitious society of a great city—that there is happiness in a position which allows of the complete development of one’s feelings and of freedom in all one’s thoughts.