In the midst of all these things the Emperor worked incessantly, and issued decrees almost daily. Some of these were of great utility. For example, he improved the public offices in the departments, increased the salaries of the curés, and reëstablished the Sisters of Charity. He caused a senatus consultum to declare the judges irremovable at the end of five years. He also took care to encourage talent, especially when his own glory was the aim of its efforts. The “Triomphe de Trajan” was given at the Paris Opéra. The poem was by Esménard, and both he and the composer received presents. The work admitted of significant applications. Trajan was represented burning papers that contained the secret of a conspiracy with his own hand. This recalled what Bonaparte had done at Berlin. The triumph of Trajan was represented with magnificent pomp. The decorations were superb; the conqueror appeared in a chariot drawn by four white horses. All Paris flocked to the spectacle; the applause was unstinted, and charmed the Emperor. Soon afterward “La Vestale,” the libretto by Mme. Jouy, the music by Spontini, was performed. This work, which is good as a poem, and remarkable as a musical composition, also included a “triumph,” which was much applauded, and the authors received a liberal recompense.
About this time the Emperor appointed M. de Caulaincourt ambassador to St. Petersburg. He had great trouble in inducing him to accept this mission; M. de Caulaincourt was very reluctant to part from a person whom he loved, and he refused. Bonaparte at length, by dint of flattering and affectionate persuasions, brought him to consent, promising that his brilliant exile should not be prolonged beyond two years. An immense sum was granted to the ambassador for the expenses of his establishment, and his salary was fixed at from seven to eight hundred thousand francs. The Emperor charged him to eclipse all the other ambassadors in splendor. On his arrival at St. Petersburg, M. de Caulaincourt found himself at first in an embarrassing position. The crime of the death of the Duc d’Enghien had left a stain upon him. The Empress-Mother would not see him; a great number of ladies refused to receive him. The Czar received him graciously, and soon conceived a liking for him, which grew into friendship; and then the great world, following his example, treated the ambassador with less severity. When the Emperor learned that a mere memory of this kind had affected the position of his ambassador, he was astonished. “What!” said he, “do they remember that old story?” He made use of the same expression every time he found that the circumstance was not forgotten, which indeed was frequently; and he would add: “What childishness! Nevertheless, what is done, is done.”
Prince Eugène was Arch-Chancellor of State. M. de Talleyrand had to replace the Prince in the discharge of the functions attached to that post; so that the former united a number of dignities in his own person. The Emperor also began to settle great revenues on his marshals and generals, and to found those fortunes which seemed immense, and which were destined to disappear with himself. A man would find himself endowed with a considerable revenue, perhaps declared proprietor of a vast number of leagues of territory in Poland, Hanover, or Westphalia. But there were great difficulties about realizing the revenues. The conquered countries gave them up reluctantly, and the agents sent to collect them found themselves in an embarrassing position. Transactions and concessions became inevitable; a portion of the promised sums only could be had. Nevertheless, the desire of pleasing the Emperor, the taste for luxury, an imprudent confidence in the future, induced these men to place their expenditure on the footing of the presumed income which they expected to receive. Debts accumulated, embarrassments cropped up, in the midst of this seeming opulence; the public, beholding extreme luxury, took immense fortunes for granted; and yet nothing real, nothing secure, was at the bottom of all this.
We have seen most of the Marshals coming to the Emperor, when pressed by their creditors, to solicit aid, which he granted according to his fancy, or the interests to be served by binding certain persons to himself. These demands became excessive, and perhaps the necessity for satisfying them counted for much among the motives of the subsequent wars. Marshal Ney bought a house; its purchase and the sums expended upon it cost him more than a million, and he has since complained bitterly of the difficulties into which this purchase threw him. Marshal Davoust was in the same case. The Emperor prescribed to each of his marshals the purchase of a house, which involved a great establishment and large expenditure in furniture. Rich stuffs and precious objects of all kinds adorned these dwellings; splendid services of plate glittered on the Marshals’ tables. Their wives wore valuable jewels; their equipages and dress cost great sums. This display pleased Bonaparte, satisfied the shopkeepers, dazzled everybody, and, by removing individuals from their proper sphere, augmented their dependence on the Emperor—in fact, perfectly carried out his intentions.
During this time the old nobility of France lived simply, collecting its ruins together, finding itself under no particular obligations, boasting of its poverty rather than complaining, but in reality recovering its estates by degrees, and reamassing those fortunes which at the present day it enjoys. The confiscations of the National Convention were not always a misfortune for the French nobility, especially in cases where the lands were not sold. Before the Revolution that class was heavily in debt, for extravagance was one of the luxuries of our former grands seigneurs. The emigration and the laws of 1793, by depriving them of their estates, set them free from their creditors, and from a certain portion of the charges that weighed upon great houses; and, when they recovered their property, they profited by that liberation, which, in truth, they had bought at a high price. I remember that M. Gaudin, Minister of Finance, related once before me how the Emperor had asked him which was the most heavily taxed class in France, and he had answered that it was still that of the old nobility. Bonaparte seemed uneasy at this, and remarked, “But we must take order with that.”
Under the Empire a certain number of tolerably large fortunes were made; several persons, military men especially, who had nothing formerly, found themselves in possession of ten, fifteen, or twenty thousand livres per annum, because, in proportion as they were remote from the observation of the Emperor, they could live according to their own fancy, and expend their income with order and economy. Of those immense fortunes with which the grandees of Bonaparte’s Court were so gratuitously accredited, but little remains; and on this point, as on many others, the party who, on the return of the King, thought that the state might be enriched by seizing upon the treasures supposed to be amassed under the Empire, advised an arbitrary and vexatious measure which led to no result.
At this period my family had a share in the gifts of the Emperor. My brother-in-law, General Nansouty, was given the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor. He had been First Chamberlain to the Empress, and was made First Equerry, replacing M. de Caulaincourt in his absence. He received a grant of thirty thousand francs in Hanover, and one hundred thousand francs for the purchase of a house, which might, if he chose, be of greater value, but which became inalienable by the fact of this grant. The amount went toward its price.