Julie Bernard, the subject of the present memoir, was born at Lyons, on the 4th of December, 1777. Her father, a notary of that city, was remarkable for his handsome face and fine figure, and Madame Bernard was a noted beauty. She had a passion for show, and during the long illness which ended in her death in 1807, found her chief amusement in dress and ornaments. When Julie was seven years old, her father was appointed to a lucrative post in Paris, and left his little daughter at Villefranche, under the care of an aunt. Here the first of her numberless admirers, a boy of her own age, made a deep impression on her susceptible mind, and here, too, she received her earliest education in the convent of La Déserte. The memory of that hallowed spot, its clouds of incense, its processions in the garden, its hymns and flowers, abode with her, [{80}] she said, through life like a sweet dream, and to the lessons there taught she ascribed her retention of the faith amid the host of sceptical opinions she encountered in after years. It was not without regret and tears that she bade farewell to the abbess and sisters, and turned her face toward Paris and the attractions of her parents' home. Nothing but accomplishments were thought of to complete her education. The brilliant capital was to supersede the "Déserte" in her affections, and her mother took great pains to make Juliette as frivolous as herself. Her chief attention was given to music, she was taught to play the harp and piano by the first artists, and took lessons in singing from Boïeldieu. This was a real gain, though in a different way from that which was intended. We shall see further on how the skill thus acquired was afterward employed in the service of religion, and how the habit of playing pathetic airs and pieces soothed many a sad moment when she was old and blind.
Her first contact with royalty was by accident. Her mother had taken her to see a grand banquet at Versailles, to which, as in the days of Louis XIV., the public were admitted as spectators. Juliette was very beautiful, and the queen, struck by her appearance, sent one of her ladies to ask that she might retire with the royal family. Madame Royale was just of the same age as Juliette, and the two children were measured together. Madame Royale also was a beauty, and not over-pleased, it seems, by this close comparison with a girl taken out of a crowd. How little could either foresee the strange fortunes that awaited the other!
Madame Bernard, with her love of display, took a pride also in gathering clever men around her. Laharpe, Lemontey, Barrère, and other members of the legislative assembly, frequented her drawing-room, and M. Jacques Récamier, an eminent banker of Paris, and son of a merchant at Lyons, was a constant guest. His character was easy and jovial; he wrote capital letters, spouted Latin, made plenty of money, spent it fast, and was often the dupe of his generosity and good humor. He had always been kind to Juliette, and had given her heaps of playthings. When, therefore, in 1793, he asked her hand in marriage, she consented without any repugnance, though Madame Bernard explained to her the inconveniences which might arise from their disparity of age, habits, and tastes—M. Récamier being forty-two and Juliette only fifteen. The wedding took place; but their union is a mystery which has never been solved with certainty. To her nominal husband she was never anything but a daughter. Her niece, Madame Lenormant, says she can only attest the fact, which was well known to all intimate friends, but that she is not bound (chargée) to explain it. Madame M——, another biographer, believes, as did many beside, that she was in reality M. Récamier's daughter; that, living, as every one did during the reign of terror, in fear of the guillotine, he wished to be able to leave her his fortune in case of his death, and, in the meantime, to place her in a splendid position; that Madame Récamier, made aware of her real parentage, would of course be the last to reveal and publish her mother's shame; and that this story, carefully borne in mind, explains all the anomalies of her life.
To this strange alliance, however, is due the formation of the most remarkable literary salon of the present age. It represented more perfectly than any other those of the Hôtel Rambouillet and of Madame de Sablé in the seventeenth century; of Madame Geoffrin, Madame d'Houdetot, and Madame Suard, in the eighteenth; [Footnote 5] and it surpassed in solid attractions those of Madame de Staël at Coppet, and of Madame d'Albany of [{81}] Florence, of which it was the contemporary. She was herself its life, and diffused over it a charm no biographer can seize. So young and fair, so fascinating yet so innocent, she riveted every gaze, and attracted all hearts without yielding to any. Like the coloring of a landscape which changes every hour, she defied description, and found no adequate reflex save in the fond esteem and faithful memory of those who knew her. Yet her nearest and dearest friends felt that she was above them; and it might be said of her, as Saint-Simon said of the Duchess de Bourgogne, that she walked like a goddess on clouds. Her beauty made her popular, and she was talked of everywhere; for the Parisians at this time, like refined pagans, affected the worship of beauty under every form. She seemed, therefore, by general consent, to have a natural mission to restore society, which a series of revolutions had completely disorganized, and her power of drawing people together and harmonizing what party politics had unstrung, became more apparent every day. By birth she belonged to the people, by tastes and manners to the aristocracy, and had thus a double hold over those who, with republican principles, were fast returning to early associations of rank and order.
[Footnote 5: "Causeries du Lundi," par Sainte-Beuve. Tome i, pp. 114, 115.]
It was a happy day when the churches were re-opened in Paris, and the soft swelling notes of the O Salutaris Hostia filled the crowded fanes once more. It was as the paean of the faithful over the scattered army of unbelief. Madame Récamier was in request. She held the plate for some charitable object at Saint-Roch, and collected the extraordinary sum of 20,000f. The two gentlemen who attended her could scarcely cleave a way for her through the crowd. People mounted on chairs, on pillars, and the altars of the side chapels, to see her. In these days, dancing was her delight. She was the first to enter the ball-room, and the last to quit it. But this did not last long. She soon gave up the shawl-dance, for which she was famous, though nothing could be more correct and picturesque than the movements she executed while, with a long scarf in her hands, she made it by turns a sash, a veil, and a drapery—drooping, fluctuating, gliding, attitudinizing, with matchless taste. Her reign was absolute. In the promenades of Longchamps, no carriage was watched like hers; and every voice pronounced her the fairest.
Twice only in her life did she meet Bonaparte, and to most persons in her position and at that period those moments would have proved fatal. His eye was as keen for female charms as for weak points in the enemy's line. He saw her first in 1797, during a triumphal fête given at the Luxembourg palace in his honor. He had just returned from his marvellous campaign in Italy and genius was reaping the laurels too seldom bestowed on solid worth. Madame Récamier was not insensible to his military prowess. She stood up to observe his features more plainly, and a long murmur of admiration filled the hall. The young conqueror turned his head impatiently. Who dared to divide public attention with the hero of Castiglione and Rivoli? He darted a harsh glance at his rival, and she sank into her seat. But the beautiful vision rested in his memory. He saw her once again, about two years later, and spoke with her. It was at a banquet given by his brother Lucien, then minister of the interior. Madame Récamier as usual was all in white, with a necklace and bracelets of pearls. The First Consul paid her marked attention, and his words, though insignificant in themselves, meant more than met the ear. His manners, however, were simple and pleasing, and he held a little girl of four years old, his niece, by the hand. He chid Madame Récamier for not sitting next him at dinner, fixed his gaze on her during the music, sent Fouché to express to her his admiring regard, and told her himself that he [{82}] should like to visit her at Clichy. But Juliette, though respectful, was discreet. Time flowed on; Napoleon became emperor, and from the giddy height of the imperial throne bethought him of the incomparable lady in white. He had a double conquest to make. Her château was the resort of emigrant nobles who had returned to France, and whose sympathies were all with the past. To break up her circle, to gain her over to his interests, to enhance by her presence the splendor of his dissolute court, were objects well worthy of his plotting, ambitious, and unscrupulous nature. Fouché was again employed as tempter. He remonstrated with her on the species of opposition to the emperor's policy which was fostered in her salons, but found her little disposed to make concessions, or avow any liking for the despot. His genius and exploits, she admitted, had dazzled her at first, but her sentiments had entirely changed since her friends had been persecuted, the Duc d'Enghein put to death, and Madame de Staël driven into exile. In spite of these frank avowals, which were equally respectful and fearless, Fouché persisted in his design, and in the park around Madame Récamier's elegant retreat, urged her, in the emperor's name, to accept the post of dame du palais to the empress. His majesty had never yet found a woman worthy of him, and it was impossible to say how deep might be his affection for one like her; how wholesome an influence she might exert over him; what services she might render to the oppressed of all classes; and how much she might "enlighten the emperor's religion!" Madame Murat, to her shame, seconded these proposals, and expressed her earnest desire that Madame Récamier should be attached to her household, which was now put on the same footing as that of the empress. To these reiterated advances, Madame Récamier returned the most decided refusal, alleging, by way of courtesy, her love of independence as the cause. At last, foiled and irritated, Fouché—the Mephistopheles of the piece—quitted Clichy, never to return.
The consular episode in Madame Récamier's life has made us anticipate some important events. We must return to the first years of her marriage. It was in 1798 that some negotiations between her husband and M. Necker, the ex-minister of Louis XVI., brought her in contact with that statesman's celebrated daughter, Madame de Staël. At their first interview a sympathy sprung up between the two ladies, which ended in a lasting friendship. Madame Récamier lived in her friends, and her circle was a host ever increasing, for she always talked much and fondly of the friends of former years. She could say, like the Cid, "five hundred of my friends." Yet she had her degrees of attachment. They were, to use the beautiful simile of Hafiz, like the pearls of a necklace, and she the silken cord on which they lay. The chief of this favored circle were four—Madame de Staël among womankind, and for the rest Chateaubriand, Ballanche, and Montmorency.
M. Necker's hôtel in the Rue du Mont-Blanc having been purchased by M. Récamier, no cost was spared in its decoration. It was a model of elegance, and every object of furniture down to the minutest ornament was designed and executed expressly for it. Here the opulent husband was installed, while the fair hostess held her court at the château of Clichy. M. Récamier dined with her daily, and in the evening returned to Paris. No political distinction prevailed in her assemblies, but the restored emigrants were peculiarly welcome. Like Madame de Staël, Chateaubriand, and almost all reflective persons in our age, she thought monarchy had better be limited by a parliament than, as Talleyrand said, by assassination. Yet revolutionary generals and military dukes gathered round her, side by side with the Duc de Guignes, Adrien and [{83}] Mathieu de Montmorency, and other representatives of the fallen aristocracy. In her presence they forgot their difference at least for awhile, and lost insensibly the asperity of party prejudice.
Duc Mathieu de Montmorency was Madame Récamier's senior by seventeen years. He had served in America in the regiment of Anvergne, of which his father was colonel, and on his return to France abandoned himself to all the pleasures and fashions of the world. His residence in the land of Penn and Washington had imbued him with republican notions, which he shared with a clique of young noblemen like himself. Such persons, as is well known, were among the earliest victims of the revolution they hurried on. Duc Mathieu emigrated in 1792, and soon afterward learned in Switzerland that his brother, the Abbé de Laval, whom he tenderly loved, had been beheaded. Remorse filled his breast, and drove him almost to madness. He charged himself with his brother's death. It was he who had proposed in the states general the abolition of the privileges of nobility, approved the sequestration of church property, and strengthened the hands of Mirabeau and the power of that assembly which paved the way for regicide and the reign of terror. Madame de Staël was his intimate friend. She had shared his political enthusiasm, and did all in her power to soothe him. But religion alone could pour balm into his smarting wounds. His conversion was complete and lasting. The impetuous, seductive, and frivolous young man became known to all as a fervent and strict Christian. Sainte-Beuve speaks of him as a "saint." Extreme delicacy of language indicated the inward discipline he underwent; while the warmth of his feelings and the solidity of his judgment inspired at the same time confidence and regard. His friendship for Madame de Staël continued, though their religious convictions differed, and he was alive to the imperfections of her character. He hoped one day to see her triumph over herself, and his solicitude for Madame Récamier was equal, though in another way. Over her he watched continually like a loving parent. He trembled lest she should at last fall a victim to the gay world which so much admired her, and which she sought to please. To shine without sinning is difficult indeed. Montmorency's letters prove the depth and purity of his affection. His intimacy with his amiable amie lasted unbroken during seven-and-twenty years, and ended only with his death.