As soon as an agreeable visitor presents himself, it is the etiquette of the house to consider him as an inmate; but to allow him at the same time a perfect liberty to dispose of his hours and his person as suits his convenience or caprice. In this extensive and superb mansion a suite of apartments is assigned him, with a valet-de—chambre, a lackey, a coachman, a groom, and a jockey, all under his own exclusive command. He has allotted him a chariot, a gig, and riding horses, if he prefers such an exercise. A catalogue is given him of the library of the chateau; and every morning he is informed what persons compose the company at breakfast, dinner, and supper, and of the hours of these different repasts. A bill of fare is at the same time presented to him, and he is asked to point out those dishes to which he gives the preference, and to declare whether he chooses to join the company or to be served in his own rooms.
During the summer season, players from the different theatres of Paris are paid to perform three times in the week; and each guest, according to the period of his arrival, is asked, in his turn, to command either a comedy or a tragedy, a farce or a ballet. Twice in the week concerts are executed by the first performers of the opera-bouffe; and twice in the week invitations to tea-parties are sent to some of the neighbours, or accepted from them.
Besides four billiard-tables, there are other gambling-tables for Rouge et Noir, Trente et Quarante, Faro, La Roulette, Birribi, and other games of hazard. The bankers are young men from Corsica, to whom Joseph, who advances the money, allows all the gain, while he alone suffers the loss. Those who are inclined may play from morning till night, and from night till morning, without interruption, as no one interferes. Should Joseph hear that any person has been too severely treated by Fortune, or suspects that he has not much cash remaining, some rouleaux of napoleons d'or are placed on the table of his dressing-room, which he may use or leave untouched, as he judges proper.
The hours of Joseph Bonaparte are neither so late as yours in England, nor so early as they were formerly in France. Breakfast is ready served at ten o'clock, dinner at four, and supper at nine. Before midnight he retires to bed with his family, but visitors do as they like and follow their own usual hours, and their servants are obliged to wait for them.
When any business calls Joseph away, either to preside in the Senate here, or to travel in the provinces, he notifies the visitors, telling them at the same time not to displace themselves on account of his absence, but wait till his return, as they would not observe any difference in the economy of his house, of which Madame Joseph always does the honours, or, in her absence, some lady appointed by her.
Last year, when Joseph first assumed a military rank, he passed nearly four months with the army of England on the coast or in Brabant. On his return, all his visitors were gone, except a young poet of the name of Montaigne, who does not want genius, but who is rather too fond of the bottle. Joseph is considered the best gourmet or connoisseur in liquors and wines of this capital, and Montaigne found his Champagne and burgundy so excellent that he never once went to bed that he was not heartily intoxicated. But the best of the story is that he employed his mornings in composing a poem holding out to abhorrence the disgusting vice of drunkenness, and presented it to Joseph, requesting permission to dedicate it to him when published. To those who have read it, or only seen extracts from it, the compilation appears far from being contemptible, but Joseph still keeps the copy, though he has made the author a present of one hundred napoleons d'or, and procured him a place of an amanuensis in the chancellory of the Senate, having resolved never to accept any dedication, but wishing also not to hurt the feelings of the author by a refusal.
In a chateau where so many visitors of licentious and depraved morals meet, of both sexes, and where such an unlimited liberty reigns, intrigues must occur, and have of course not seldom furnished materials for the scandalous chronicle. Even Madame Joseph herself has either been gallant or calumniated. Report says that to the nocturnal assiduities of Eugene de Beauharnais and of Colonel la Fond-Blaniac she is exclusively indebted to the honour of maternity, and that these two rivals even fought a duel concerning the right of paternity. Eugene de Beauharnais never was a great favourite with Joseph Bonaparte, whose reserved manners and prudence form too great a contrast to his noisy and blundering way to accord with each other. Before he set out for Italy, it was well known in our fashionable circles that he had been interdicted the house of his uncle, and that no reconciliation took place, notwithstanding the endeavours of Madame Napoleon. To humble him still more, Joseph even nominated la Fond-Blaniac an equerry to his wife, who, therefore, easily consoled herself for the departure of her dear nephew.
The husband of Madame Miot (one of Madame Joseph's ladies-in-waiting) was not so patient, nor such a philosopher as Joseph Bonaparte. Some charitable person having reported in the company of a 'bonne amie' of Miot, that his wife did not pass her nights in solitude, but that she sought consolation among the many gallants and disengaged visitors at Morfontaine, he determined to surprise her. It was past eleven o'clock at night when his arrival was announced to Joseph, who had just retired to his closet. Madame Miot had been in bed ever since nine, ill of a migraine, and her husband was too affectionate not to be the first to inform her of his presence, without permitting anybody previously to disturb her. With great reluctance, Madame Miot's maid delivered the key of her rooms, while she accompanied him with a light. In the antechamber he found a hat and a greatcoat, and in the closet adjoining the bedroom, a coat, a waistcoat, and a pair of breeches, with drawers, stockings, and slippers. Though the maid kept coughing all the time, Madame Miot and her gallant did not awake from their slumber, till the enraged husband began to use the bludgeon of the lover, which had also been left in the closet. A battle then ensued, in which the lover retaliated so vigorously, that the husband called out "Murder! murder!" with all his might. The chateau was instantly in an uproar, and the apartments crowded with half-dressed and half-naked lovers. Joseph Bonaparte alone was able to separate the combatants; and inquiring the cause of the riot, assured them that he would suffer no scandal and no intrigues in his house, without seriously resenting it. An explanation being made, Madame Miot was looked for but in vain; and the maid declared that, being warned by a letter from Paris of her husband's jealousy and determination to surprise her, her mistress had reposed herself in her room; while, to punish the ungenerous suspicions of her husband, she had persuaded Captain d' Horteuil to occupy her place in her own bed. The maid had no sooner finished her deposition, than her mistress made her appearance and upbraided her husband severely, in which she was cordially joined by the spectators. She inquired if, on seeing the dress of a gentleman, he had also discovered the attire of a female; and she appealed to Captain d' Horteuil whether he had not the two preceding nights also slept in her bed. To this he, of course, assented; adding that, had M. Miot attacked him the first night, he would not then perhaps have been so roughly handled as now; for then he was prepared for a visit, which this night was rather unexpected. This connubial farce ended by Miot begging pardon of his wife and her gallant; the former of whom, after much entreaty by Joseph, at last consented to share with him her bed. But being disfigured with two black eyes and suffering from several bruises, and also ashamed of his unfashionable behaviour, he continued invisible for ten days afterwards, and returned to this city as he had left it, by stealth.
This Niot was a spy under Robespierre, and is a Counsellor of State under Bonaparte. Without bread, as well as without a home, he was, from the beginning of the Revolution, one of the most ardent patriots, and the first republican Minister in Tuscany. After the Sovereign of that country had, in 1793, joined the League, Miot returned to France, and was, for his want of address to negotiate as a Minister, shut up to perform the part of a spy in the Luxembourg, then transformed into a prison for suspected persons. Thanks to his patriotism, upwards of two hundred individuals of both sexes were denounced, transferred to the Conciergerie prison, and afterwards guillotined. After that, until 1799, he continued so despised that no faction would accept him for an accomplice; but in the November of that year, after Bonaparte had declared himself a First Consul, Miot was appointed a tribune, an office from which he was advanced, in 1802, to be a Counsellor of State. As Miot squanders away his salary with harlots and in gambling-houses, and is pursued by creditors he neither will nor can pay, it was merely from charity that his wife was received among the other ladies of Madame Joseph Bonaparte's household.