Memoirs of the Empress Josephine, Vol. 2 of 2

by Madame de Rémusat

During the month of August several of the German princes arrived in Paris—some in order to visit the Emperor, others to solicit some favor, or some liberty in behalf of their petty states.

The Prince Primate of the Confederation of the Rhine came at about this time, to celebrate the marriage of Princess Catherine of Würtemberg, who herself arrived on the 21st of August. She was, I think, about twenty years of age, and was a nice-looking girl; her figure was already rather stout, and seemed to indicate that she would take after her father, whose size was so enormous that he could only sit on chairs specially constructed for him, and had to dine at a table which had been hollowed out in a semicircle to make room for his unwieldy figure.

This King of Würtemberg was a very able man, but had the reputation of being the most worthless prince in Europe. He was hated by his subjects, who, it is said, more than once tried to rid themselves of him. He is now dead.

The marriage of Princess Catherine and the King of Westphalia took place at the Tuileries with great splendor. The civil ceremony was performed in the Gallery of Diana, as in the case of the Princess of Baden’s wedding; and on Sunday, the 23d, at eight in the morning, the religious marriage was solemnized at the Tuileries, in presence of the whole Court.

The Prince and Princess of Baden had also come to Paris. She was prettier than ever. The Emperor did not appear to notice her particularly. I will speak of her again presently.

The King and Queen of Holland arrived at the end of August. They seemed to be on good terms, but still depressed on account of their loss. The Queen was thin, and suffering all the malaise of an early stage of pregnancy. She had been a very short time in Paris when seeds of the old distrust and disquiet were once more sown in the mind of her husband. Evil tongues insinuated falsehoods respecting the life that the unhappy woman had led at the Pyrenean watering-place. Her grief, the tears that were still flowing, her downcast air, her too evident ill health, failed to disarm her enemies. She talked of the excursions she had made among the mountains, and of the soothing effects of the mountain scenery. She told how she had met M. Decazes, and pitied the profound grief into which his wife’s death had plunged him. All this she related in the most frank and simple manner, but calumny laid hold of it, and the suspicions of Louis were reawakened. He wished, naturally but selfishly, to take his wife and son back to Holland. Mme. Louis was as submissive as he could require her to be; but the Empress, alarmed by the declining state of her daughter, insisted on a consultation of physicians being held. The doctors were unanimous in pronouncing the climate of Holland unfit for a woman in the Queen’s situation, whose chest was already delicate; and the Emperor settled the question by announcing that he intended to keep his step-daughter and her child with himself for the present. The King submitted sullenly, and bitterly resented to his wife a decision which she had not solicited, but which, I believe, was in accordance with her wishes. Discord once more reigned in that wretched household; and Queen Hortense, profoundly offended this time by the jealous suspicions of her husband, lost for ever the interest which she had recently felt in him, and conceived a positive aversion toward him. “From that time forth,” she has often said to me, “I was fully aware that my unhappiness must always be irremediable. I regarded my hopes as entirely and irrevocably ruined. All grandeur inspired me with horror. As for the throne, and what so many people called my ‘luck,’ I cursed them many a time. I was a stranger to every enjoyment of life. All my dreams had vanished; I was wellnigh dead to all that was passing around me.”

About this time the Academy lost two of its most distinguished members: Le Brun the poet, who has left some beautiful odes and the reputation of great poetical talent, and M. Dureau de la Malle, the esteemed translator of Tacitus and the intimate friend of Delille.

M. Delille lived peaceably in the enjoyment of a moderate fortune, surrounded by friends, popular in society, left to his repose and his freedom by the Emperor, who had given up the idea of conquering him. He published certain works from time to time, and reaped the reward of his natural amiability in the favor with which they were received. His life was indeed a peaceful one, untroubled by any bitter thoughts or hostile opinions. M. Delille was a professor at the College of France, and received the salary of a chair of literature, but Le Gouvé did its work for him. This was the only boon which he consented to accept from Bonaparte. He prided himself on preserving a faithful remembrance of Queen Marie Antoinette, whom he called his benefactress. It was known that he was composing a poem in honor of her, the King, and the émigrés, but no one resented this to him. A Government which was always anxious to efface such memoirs respected them in Delille, and would not have ventured to incur the odium of persecuting the amiable, grateful, and generally beloved old man.

The two vacant seats in the Academy were much discussed in the salons of Paris. M. de Chateaubriand was mentioned for one of them. The Emperor was angry with him, and the young writer—who was pursuing a course which gained him celebrity, procured him the support of a party, and nevertheless did not expose him to any real danger—kept up an opposition which gained strength from the fact that it excited the Emperor’s anger. The French Academy, imbued at that time with the revolutionary and would-be philosophical incredulity that had come into fashion in the last century, opposed the choice of a man who had hoisted religious colors as the banner of his genius. It was said by those who most frequented M. de Chateaubriand’s society, that the habits of his life were by no means in harmony with the precepts that adorned his compositions. Excessive pride was imputed to him. Women, captivated by his talents, his peculiar manner, his handsome face, and his reputation, vied with each other in admiring and petting him, and he showed himself by no means insensible to their advances. His extreme vanity, the exalted opinion of himself which he entertained, made us all believe that, if the Emperor had only coaxed him a little, he would have succeeded in gaining him over to his side, although, of course, he would have to pay the high price at which M. de Chateaubriand himself would have rated his partisanship.

The silent labors of the Corps Législatif were continued. It ratified all the laws that emanated from the Council of State, and the administrative organization of the power of the Emperor was completed without opposition. It was now certain that he could rule France, by the strength of his own genius and by the proved ability of the members of this Council of State, with an appearance of legality which reduced the country to silence and pleased his orderly mind; and, regarding the remains of the Tribunate as merely a center of opposition, which, however feeble, might be troublesome to him, he resolved to make an end of it. The Tribunate had been considerably lessened in number under the Consulate. By a senatus consultum the tribunes were transferred to the Corps Législatif, and the session was immediately closed. The speeches delivered at the last sitting of the Tribunate are remarkable. It is surprising that men should mutually consent to act such a farce, and yet we had become so much accustomed to that sort of thing, that nobody noticed it particularly at the time.